September Girls (33 page)

Well, I could have just asked you, and you would have given me something else. I’m sure you would have given me anything. But I didn’t want to ask, so I just have your dirty sock with a hole in the heel. I’m sorry I took it like that, but I’m happy I have it. If you asked for it back I would not return it, because I cannot afford generosity the way you can. It’s beyond my means, and the sock belongs to me.

I do have other things of course, besides the crap in my jewelry box. I mean, in a sense. I have some clothes and a blue lighter and a pack of Gauloises, and several earrings (with pairs!), and things like that. But the clothes and earrings will be loaned out before I know it, the lighter will be stolen (because, see, I’m not the only one who steals around here), and the cigarettes will probably all be bummed by tomorrow, which is fine because I’m not going to smoke anyway. Cigarettes, like beauty, don’t really count as a possession.

The things in my jewelry box are the things that I know are mine for a while. They are the sum of it. I know the other girls have their own jewelry boxes, too. We don’t talk about it.

I never even look in the box much. I just like to know it’s there. But a few months ago, the week before Kristle’s final birthday, I had to open it up. She was out on a smoke break, and I had a little bit of privacy for a few minutes. So I dug into the back of the freezer and looked inside, hoping to find something that had slipped my mind. It wouldn’t be the first time something escaped me; we are practical but scatterbrained.

I don’t know what I was looking for. It could have been anything. A photograph, maybe, of the thing I once was? A nameplate necklace bearing the name that belonged to me, before I took this name that isn’t really mine? I don’t know.

All I found was a blue shell, one earring, strange coins, a plastic charm bracelet, and a smelly sock. And I knew then that if I had somehow been forced to choose—if I’d really had to make a decision—I would have sacrificed all the other items in order to keep the sock.

Because in rifling through my jewelry box I was looking for the thing I love most. Although it was not in there, the closest thing I have ever had to myself is you, which makes your old sock a clue or maybe even something like a treasure map.

What you have to understand is that I’d never even considered most of this until I saw you for the first time—or rather, until you saw me. It’s not that I was content before, exactly—we are not content—but rather that I was unquestioning in my ignorance. It did not occur to me that I could be anything beyond “we.” It just did not occur to me that I could be something other than “one.”

Then at some point you looked at me, and somewhere in the space of your gaze (your gaze that is bold and unguarded and searching, both sharp and vulnerable), I saw a shape unfurl itself. It was a ghost-impression of something unraveling and reforming into a girl who resembled me and only me. In a voice I didn’t even know I had, I thought,
I could be her
. For the first time, I thought,
I
.

It took me a while to figure out that this was the reason I was following you. I thought you could lead me to myself.

There were other reasons, anyway. Because you are handsome. Because you are kind, in a brittle and irritable sort of way. And of course, much as I would like to, I cannot discount the unfortunate specifics of our curse. It would be a lie to say that didn’t play a part.

But then, on the Fourth of July, we were sitting on the shore after the party, and we were peaceful and happy.

I could have done it then. I could have broken the curse right there. It was the moment all of us pursued. Me, Kristle, the Donnas and Brendas and Kellys and L’Oréals who have gone before me, and the ones who will follow me, summer after summer, spit naked from the waves.

I didn’t do it. Instead, I asked you, “Why me? What’s the difference between us?” I knew I sounded stupid and weak and I didn’t like it, but I asked because I actually wanted to know the answer. I’m actually smart enough to know when to keep my mouth shut, but I’m also smart enough to ignore my own judgment a lot of the time.

And you said, “DeeDee, you make things too fuckin’ complicated.”

And I said, “Well make it simple for me please; I’m not from around here.”

And you said, “I can’t just lay it out there. It doesn’t work like that.”

And I said, “Yeah, see?”

You said nothing. I didn’t say anything either. But I think we both understood.

I wanted to ask you the same question but different: Why do you love me? Who am I to be loved? But I didn’t ask, because then I understood that I should have the patience to let you reveal your reasons.

We are not patient. But maybe I am?

So I waited, and it happened. Slowly. The way you put your hand on my shoulder. The way you smiled at me when I was talking, the way I’d tell a joke and not even realize it was a joke until you were laughing. The way you kissed me, the way I saw you ambling toward me down the beach, still in the distance. In your small movements and gestures, something happened: the girl you thought I was began to acquire form—the way we construct our physical bodies from waves and foam when we arrive here—and she was beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with what I’d thought of as beauty. She was beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with our knife: she was odd and clever and angry and talkative and bold and full of opinions, kind but maybe a little irritable. She was a bit like you.

And I saw that she was me, sort of. I was her. I am those things that she is. It’s unclear to me whether I am those things because you could see something that no one else could—something I couldn’t see before I met you—or if I am those things because you made it true by seeing it.

It doesn’t matter anyway. Either way, it would not be enough. I am no longer just “one,” and I am more than the many to which I no longer belong. I am more than some accumulation of difference. I know this now.

I mean, I may not know who I am. But I know a few things. And although I love you (in a way), I know that I am more than who you think I am. This is not your fault. I loved you. I love you.

All of this is to tell you that I am keeping the sock. It’s mine now, and I will keep it close to me until I no longer need it, along with the other items in my jewelry box. I will take it with me to a home I’ll find for myself in a place I can’t yet imagine. I’m not going to hide it this time. I will keep it not just to remember you—although it’s important to me to remember you—but to remember the girl that I am now.

Because soon I will be different; soon I will be in my car, alone for the first time and driving away from here, heading toward a destination that I’m certain will be familiar upon my arrival.

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Table of Contents

Disclaimer

Half Title

Also by Bennett Madison

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

ONE

HOME

TWO

FIRST

THREE

YOU

FOUR

NAME

FIVE

MAGIC

SIX

THE KNIFE

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

OCEAN

TEN

ELEVEN

MOTHER

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

LOVE

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

FREEDOM

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

LOSING

NINETEEN

BECOMING

TWENTY

LEGEND

TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-TWO

STORM

TWENTY-THREE

GIRLS

TWENTY-FOUR

SEPTEMBER GIRLS

TWENTY-FIVE

WANT

TWENTY-SIX

RAPTURE

TWENTY-SEVEN

TWENTY-EIGHT

TWENTY-NINE

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE SOCK

About the Publisher