Spin the Sky

by MacKenzie, Jill;

  I tuck the knot under the flat piece of ribbon against my ankle and then grab the other shoe to begin the whole process over again. But instead, I rest the shoe in my lap and peer out the window. The sun is starting to fade behind Mount Hood, causing Vine Street and probably the whole darn town to be smothered in the golden glow of twilight. It’s my favorite time of day. And being here, confined in these walls of this studio, is my favorite place on earth.

  I’ve done this a million times before, this shoe-tying business. Could do it even before I was six. But as George drones on about “seizing the day” and “grabbing life by the reins,” all I can think of are his other words. Taunting me.

  Nobody could hate you if you made Summerland famous, could they?

  “Hey George,” Abby calls from across the room. And just like that I’m back here again. “We know you took the sign off the door,” she says. “We saw you stuff it down your pants. You can’t stop everyone from trying out.”

  “Yeah.” Quinn eyeballs George’s crotch. “And we’ve got no problem going in there and getting it back if it comes down to that.”

  When Abby and Quinn take three seductive little steps toward George and grab Mark’s arm to do the same, Mark shrugs them off. “No way,” he says. “You two are on your own with that one.” But then his eyes lock on me. His eyebrows push together and he studies my freckle-dusted cheeks. My bulbous nose. My forehead, dotted with tiny pimples like some kind of unknown, yet undesirable constellation.

  I give him a little smile to remind him of all those other times we had together. Long before The Thing That Happened happened. Like the time when we were nine and his mouse costume got lost so we raced all through the dressing rooms looking for it until we found it—both of us grabbing the giant mouse ears from a trunk of old costumes at the exact same time, which sent us tumbling backward into a giggling heap. Like the time we were freshmen and neither of us could find our classes so both of us ditched and hung out together—huddled behind a bush because we were so afraid of getting caught—instead of going to class at all. I hope my smile will remind him of it all. Remind him that, I swear to God, I’m nothing like her.

  He takes a step toward me, his eyes wide and clear like magic windows leading into a warm, warm world. A world where I’m wrong. A world where he won’t look at me in this new way he looks at me these days, all silent and scrutinizing. A world where none of them do.

  George plunks himself next to me. He wraps his arm around my waist. I lean my head on his shoulder and close my eyes. When I open them, Mark’s still staring at me.

  “What?” I cross my arms.

  “Nothing,” Mark says. He spins around and does a series of jeté entrelacé over and over on the far side of the room, even though they were perfect the first time around.

  I want to get up and give him a piece of my mind. Tell him to stop staring because I hate it and always have. But George pats my leg. “Leave it alone,” he says, so I do. Instead, I breathe in and out, inhaling George’s scent, the mixture of boy and salt I know so well. At least I’ll always have him. At least I know he’ll never leave me the way the rest of them have, one by one by one.

  “So what do you say about the competition?” His voice is soft, threading its way in and then out of me.

  “I say it’s a total long shot. You know how many people go to those things, don’t you? Everyone will be there. Everyone thinks they’re good enough to be on that show.” I watch Mark and Quinn and Abby practice a series of ronds de jambe en l’air at the far side of the studio, their legs extending at perfect ninety-degree angles. All of them look good. All of them look strong. “Katina’s entire studio will want to try out.”

  “They say they’ll go, but they won’t. No one ever leaves this town. No one ever does anything around here except shun you if you’re different and snub you if you’re not. Unless we do this, we’re going to end up just like them.”

  I stare straight into his eyes, and in them I see the reflection of my own soul. It’s all there between him and me and has been since we were four. That was the day our moms met on our beach, Wick Beach, the last day of Season.

  We were there, me and Mom and Rose, just doing our thing when up rocked Mrs. Moutsous carrying one very squirmy George wearing a tangerine tutu and a pair of red fire-truck gum boots with little blue wheels painted at the toes and heels. It was thundering and lightning something awful out that day. Flashes thrust into the sand all around us, warning us with every crackle and every ominous boom. I remember thinking that it wasn’t safe for any of us to be so close to the ocean in that kind of weather.

  All George says he remembers is that he had peed his pants hours before but didn’t want his mom to know for fear that she’d make them go home.

  That’s how George goes through life. Even though we’re as different as Deelish’s flavors—him being Magic Marshmallow and me vanilla—George sees and feels everything I’ve felt, and vice versa. And today is no exception. As usual, he sucks away all that nasty cynicism I’m prone to, leaving me with no choice in the matter but to go with his flow.

  He grabs my hands. Eyes on me. Baby blues shimmering. For me. “I’m going to be there. I just want you to be there with me.”

  I don’t know why he does this. Maybe it’s because he can’t stand to spend his days with someone who doesn’t overtly believe that people can change—that the world can change—the way he does. Or maybe he only looks at me this way because he feels guilty that he’ll never love me the way I love him. Not because I’m not pretty enough or smart enough or even good enough at dancing to be his girl. But because he couldn’t love me that way even if he tried.

  I’d always had my suspicions. When I was eight and ten and twelve, I knew something wasn’t quite right in the story of me and George that was supposed to end with happily ever after. But I never knew for sure that George didn’t play for my team until the day I saw him on the beach with Sammy Baker on the first day of Season, the summer before we started high school.

  Still, loving on me or not, George has stuck by my side when not many others have. Even through the hard stuff when my mom first started using and the harder stuff that came later, with The Thing That Happened. I’m the yin to his yang, or at least that’s what he’s always said.

  I throw my hands up in the air. “Fine. I’ll go with you.” I flip my head over and gather my mass of hair into a firm bun on top of my head. I secure it with four bobby pins, twisting and sticking, twisting and sticking. “But you know getting Rose to agree won’t be easy.”

  George smiles and bends down to tie my left shoe for me, which sends a twinge through my ankle again. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head about your alpha sister. I’ll take care of her. You know I always do.”

  I let my eyes meet his and stay inside his for what seems like forever. Because what if he’s right? What have I got to lose by trying out for the show?

  What if I actually won?

  TWO

  Rose digs her nails into my right leg and gives it a little shake.

  I don’t move an inch. I don’t grunt or roll over onto my back either. Nothing to acknowledge the fact that she’s huddled next to my bed at 5:16 a.m. On a Sunday. The one day a week during summer when I don’t have to get up early for pointe class.

  I’m not ready to let the light in or give in to the early-bird-gets-the-worm mentality of the first day of Season. And I’m sure as hell not ready to be reminded of The Thing That Happened, a year ago today, bursting through my brain the second I open my eyes. No. Not yet. Lie still. The trick is to lie still and maybe it will all go away.

  “Magnolia, come on.” Rose shoves my legs over and squeezes her round butt next to me on the bed. The mattress that I’ve had since I was three wilts under her weight like a flattened flower, but I still don’t budge. Instead, I lie there smelling Rose—the 24/7 scent of Virginia Slims and spearmint gum that reminds me so much of her, it’s sickening. And intoxicating. I inhale it. It jolts me awake
awake awake.

  But there’s something else in that smell. I scrunch up my nose, trying to place it. Resignation. That’s the smell that is my sister and that was her, too.

  Is. Is my mother.

  Rose leans forward and shakes my arm. I can’t help but stretch my toes and then calves, working my way up my body, my thighs, my glutes, my abdominals, isolating each muscle group the way Katina taught me to. The movement of my limbs breaks my pretend-sleep spell and Rose and her smell are on me, sticking to me with the force of Gorilla Glue. I deliver her one gratuitous moan, roll over, and pull my sheet up so that it covers my ears.

  She grabs a fistful of sheet by my feet and pulls. “Mags, please? I have to be at work in two hours. We’ve only got one good hour before I have to go and that’s if we get out there pronto.”

  I open one eye to sneak a peek at her. “Did you just say ‘pronto’? I’m not getting up this early for anyone that uses the word ‘pronto.’”

  Rose lets go of her end of the sheet and swipes the pillow out from under my hair. My face makes a whap! noise as it bounces off this old mattress, sending Rose into a fit of giggles. I burrow under my covers. I can’t help but smile at the sound of Rose’s girly laugh because she almost never laughs anymore. She may have to be at work in a couple of hours, but she’s never been able to resist a good pillow fight. I roll over and in one swift motion swipe the pillow away from her grip and then swing it around toward her face. “Ha! Take that!”

  Rose jumps back and grabs the pillow out of my hands. “You’re pretty slow in the morning, you know that?”

  I swipe the pillow. “Faster than you.”

  She pulls it back. “That’s what you think.”

  “It’s what I know.” I grab it once and for all and then smack her over her head three times, like I’m hammering a nail. Her hair gets super frizzy and stands up all over her head like she’s being electrocuted, which sends me into a fit of giggles, too.

  “Stop it!” she shrieks, but it’s a happy shriek and I know she’s loving it. “I can’t go to work like this!” She bolts to the door and grabs my dance bag.

  Ha. Sucker. Rose may love herself a good pillow fight but I love my bed more. While she’s at the door, I crawl back in and pull the covers over my head. Let it be known, I am not a morning person. So while she may be swifter than me before 9 a.m., I have my principles, one of them being don’t get out of bed before nine unless you have to.

  But then she’s back and dangling my bag above my head. “I know your shoes are in here. I wonder what it would feel like to have these come down on your head. What are these things made of anyway? Wood?”

  I open both eyes. Prop myself up on one elbow. “Canvas, actually. And paper. And really strong glue.”

  “So they’d definitely hurt if I dropped them on your face.”

  Now she’s getting serious. That’s the other thing about Rose. She can be fun and silly and totally carefree when she wants to be, but it never lasts. At least, it never lasts anymore. “Touch my shoes and you’re dead,” I tell her. “Put the bag down, and back away from my shoes.”

  Rose huffs in this real exaggerated way, which is how I know the fun’s over for real. She’s getting close to going out there without me. I know it because she’s pulling down her sleeves and tying up her hair and putting her game face on. Fact is, she was probably ready long before she came to get me, wearing about a billion layers of baggy clothes and carrying her thermos of deep black coffee.

  “We gotta get out there before Perkins nabs all the biggies. Remember last year? We lost about six big ones because of your lazy ass.”

  Last year.

  She said it, not me.

  Last year. The words hang above us now, thick and heavy, like the fog that rolls in on Wick Beach every morning by seven, gone by noon.

  July tenth, last year.

  The words are out now so there’s no use staying nestled between the warmth of my mattress and sheet. And even though she knows full well that my lazy ass has nothing to do with why Mrs. Perkins got first dibs on all the big clams last year, I sit up straight, obliging the eager beaver that is my older sister.

  “Fine. I’m up. Happy?” I snap, but I can’t really be mad at her. After all, without her, where would I have spent the last year of my life? Two words jump out at me like grating little no-see-ums on my thin skin: foster care.

  “Not quite. I’ll be happy when you put some clothes on.”

  “What do you call these?” I hold my plaid pajama pants and tank top away from my body and give them a once-over.

  “You can’t go out like that. It’s still subzero out there, and you’ve got no meat on those skinny bones of yours.” She chucks me my old hoodie, heavily worn and loved, from Summerland’s local surf shop. I pull it over my head and weave my hair into a side braid and hide the whole mess of it under my favorite faded, barely orange wool beanie.

  Rose grabs the knee-high gum boots from my closet and jams one on my right foot.

  I laugh as she holds me down, cramming it on my toes like it’s two sizes two small, when we both know that Mom’s feet were always bigger than mine. “Hey, watch how you treat my feet. I need those.” I lift my sheet and rummage around until I find one of my socks. It takes me a second to find its match, but when I do, I put it up to my nose to give it a quick smell check. Semiclean. Good enough. “Can’t I at least use the bathroom before you drag me out there before the sun’s even up?”

  “No. Time’s a tickin’. Anyway, I’m dying to test out the new gun Mrs. Moutsous got us.”

  “Got me, you mean. I didn’t see your name on that card.” I remove the lone boot that Rose shoved on my foot, slip the first torn sock over my toes, and replace the boot. “My birthday gift. Remember?”

  “Whatever. Aren’t you dying to try it out? It’s going to work so much better than that stupid shovel.” She does a little happy dance around my room, shaking her tush and rubbing her belly. “I can almost taste those fritters now.”

  I turn my head away. Five minutes ago, she was funny. Now, not so much. “The shovel’s never let us down in the past.”

  “Hey, you should consider yourself lucky that Mrs. Moutsous got you this at all. That woman’s so your Santa Claus.” Rose holds the clam gun to her chest and rubs it a couple times like one would a poodle, not a three-inch metal tube. I pull my bedroom curtains away from the window and scan our wide sprawling beach. My eyes zero in on the specks of brightness poking out behind the sheet of gray sky. That’s how the sun rises here in Summerland. No grand streaks of pink or magenta. No friendly fluffy puffs of cloud either. Just microscopic bits of light over the sea to let us know that yet another day on the Oregon Coast is about to begin.

  It’s so beautiful. My heart swells with all the love I’ve got left in the world. I turn back to Rose. She’s staring at me like all her last bits of love rest on me, which makes me feel guilty, and awful, and so very guilty. Because it’s been twelve hours since I told George I’d go with him to try out for Live to Dance, and I still haven’t mentioned it to Rose.

  She’ll think he talked me into it. She’ll know I’ve got some other reason, some ulterior motive for finally agreeing to it. Which is the best reason of all to not tell her. Nope, decision made. No point in giving myself one more reason to completely loathe a day that’s barely begun.

  “The sun is almost up,” Rose says. “Can’t we just get out there?”

  I exhale, the morning magic slipping in time with my breath. “Okay. Let’s go.”

  She bounds out of my room, vindicated. I wait until I hear her meaty feet plodding down the hall before I grab the pillowcase piece out from under my bed. I fold it into a neat square, place it under my bra strap for safety, and meet her in front of our hall closet. She tosses me the newer of the down jackets, grabbing the one with two torn armpits for herself. Side by side like sausage links, we tumble down the three steps of our driftwood front stoop till our toes meet the packed sand of the beach for t
he first day of clam digging season.

  For as long as I can remember, the first day of Season has always been on July tenth. But this July tenth is different. This July tenth marks the one year anniversary of the day that The Thing That Happened happened. The day my mother crossed the line from being your run-of-the-mill junkie-loser mom to murderer.

  Rose was right.

  We were too slow getting out and now there are about a gazillion people combing our beach for the telltale little feet that pop out of the sand and then disappear without warning.

  “I told you it was going to be packed early,” Rose mutters. “Come on.” She grabs my arm and pulls me away from the circles of people milling around the sand outside our house, toward the shoreline where the tide has left the beach still wet and glistening.

  That’s the thing about Summerland newbies—people who don’t know much about digging for razor clams—they usually stick to the dry, powdered sand and then wonder why they only pull one or two clams all day. But we know that razors like the sand where the tide’s just left. The hard, packed stuff that shimmers under the morning sky, even on the grayest of days.

  We reach the water’s edge and drop our gear ten feet from Abby, Quinn, and Mark to the right of us, a bunch of local kids who graduated with Rose to the left. Both groups flick their heads in our direction and whisper way too loudly to be considered whispering. As usual, Rose and I pretend they don’t exist. Pretend that not seeing them will somehow make them go away.

  Rose stomps around the sand in a circle, creating strong vibrations all around her. She’s always been good at this part, so I hang back and let her work her magic. Within seconds a foot pops out of the ground next to her and then is gone, digging itself deeper for safety. Hiding itself away from a world that wants to eat it alive.