That Time I Joined the Circus (18 page)

Frostproof, Florida — Saturday, January 1

I knew I couldn’t hide out with Louie, Lina, and Liska forever, not now that my mom was back in the picture. I had a prepaid semester of Sheldon to claim, now that I had a legal guardian in tow. And after that, college.

Knowing I had to leave didn’t make it any easier. Lina had tears in her eyes, though she didn’t let go of Jamie’s hand as she hugged me good-bye outside Eli’s car.

“I will miss you, my second sister,” she told me. “You will always have a home here if you want one.”

Then she made fun of
me
for crying; but her words had touched a nerve. A home: That’s what she and Louie and Liska had given me, when I didn’t have one and needed
one so desperately. I sniffed hard, trying to get control of my tears.

“This isn’t good-bye,” I told her. “Louie promised I could have my job back this summer,” I reminded her.
College
wasn’t prepaid, and Callie didn’t have a steady job yet, so I knew I would need a summer job, and being able to come back at the end of the semester seemed like the perfect solution.

Jamie presented me with the Miami tree as we were leaving. I accepted it happily, especially since it was still decorated with most of my jewelry. “Be good in the big bad city,” he told me.

Liska hugged me and told me to be careful, too, and that she looked forward to seeing me in the summer. When she pulled away from me, her eyes were wet, but Lina didn’t tease her, wisely. Lina and I exchanged a look over Liska’s head, and Lina said, “I told you so,” about her sister who I had once thought was so cold.

In the car, I sat in the backseat with Callie. It was a little awkward at first, but then we all started eating snacks and drinking sodas, and I felt myself loosen up, remembering how it used to feel to be with her. She seemed so familiar — and she looked so much like me, it was hard to feel awkward for long around her. Callie hadn’t brought up Gavin again, which under the circumstances suited me just fine. Eli was quiet, for Eli, in the front, but was acting silly along with us by the time we pulled into the huge airport parking lot.

“Why are we flying again when we have a car?” I asked as Eli parked.

“Because my aunt lives in Orlando, and I’m selling her the car,” he told me. “My uncle’s gonna drive her here to pick it up. And because class starts the day after tomorrow.” He caught my eyes in the rearview mirror. “You do remember school?”

“Vaguely,” I said with asperity. “I can’t see what the rush is; I’ve already missed, um, the entire year.”

“Exactly,” he told me. “If you have any hope of graduating, you have to be there for all of second semester. As it is you’ll be doubling up with the courses you missed first term.”

“Ugh.” I sat back against the seat. “What about you?” I challenged. “You missed some, too.”

“I was there for most of it,” he told me. “I think I can go back and take the finals and be okay.”

“You suck,” I told him as Callie and I climbed out of the backseat.

“I know,” he smiled, grabbing my worldly goods and hoisting them on his back as he shut the trunk.

Eli bought me a mocha from Starbucks and sat down beside me in the chairs at the gate. “Where’s Callie?” he asked.

“Calling somebody,” I said. “She’s trying to figure out where we’re going to live. She hasn’t said anything, but I don’t think that she’s exactly New York real estate flush.”

“I know, that’s why I gave up the car,” Eli said. I looked at him in surprise. “I mean, who can afford a car in New
York?” he asked, and I realized I had misunderstood. For a minute there, I’d been worried that he meant he planned to give us the money toward our housing dilemma. “I’d say you could stay with us,” he went on, “but I’m not too sure I’m even going to be allowed back home. And under the circumstances —”

“I get it,” I stopped him, pulling the lid off my mocha and taking my first sip.

“Why do you always pull the lid off?” Eli asked.

“I like the foam,” I told him. “So, Callie and I are going to live in maybe, like, Brooklyn,” I warned him. “I’d say that’s best-case scenario.”

“And Jersey City is worst-case?”

“Hope not.” I laughed. “We are such snobs.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But it’s our birthright. But don’t worry — I’ll take the train, or the PATH train, whatever. We’ll still see each other.” He looked at me. “That is, if you want to see me.”

I met his eyes. “I want to,” I told him. It was getting easier to see him and not think of all the bad stuff. And right then, I thought of something — of someone — I had managed almost, to my shame, to forget.

“Oh my God — Bailey!” I sat up, splashing a little mocha on myself.

“I told you not to take the lid off,” Eli said, his face unreadable.

I ignored that comment. “Eli, we can’t hang out together at school. It’s too mean. We’ve already been awful enough —”

“Lex, it’s okay,” he said. “Bailey transferred to Sidwell.”

I slumped in my seat, more relieved than I had a right to be. “I shouldn’t feel happy about that. I’m a horrible person.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I’m pretty sure I am. But I’m also pretty sure I can’t ever make this up to her. And that maybe if I apologized it would just bring it all back for her. I think the nicest thing I can do for her now is never see her again. Is that being selfish?”

“Wouldn’t you feel better if you could apologize to her?”

I thought about that. “Maybe. But I still don’t think it’s right — not now.”

“Then you’re being the opposite of selfish. It’s going to be hard enough for you to go back there, I know. You sort of need one thing, at least, to be easier. And I know for a fact that she’s happier never seeing
my
face again, so it all works out.”

“Yeah, it all works out,” I said, my voice a little flat, as I watched Callie walking toward us. If only it didn’t all work out so that
everybody’s
heart got broken.

“Happy New Year!” The perky flight attendant smiled at me as I shuffled off the plane. One of the flight crew — maybe the captain, maybe not, but he looked a little like a Ken doll come to life — added his own “Happy New Year” in a husky voice. I didn’t take it personally. He had flirted with every other passenger — he was clearly one of those people who flirted as often as they breathed.

For some reason, this whole New Year’s thing was really bothering me. I guess because I had just landed in my home state, so instead of new, today I was going back to old. And I had messed things up so badly in the old place, and, apparently, so had my dad, that I wasn’t really sure how much I wanted to go there. My room, my home, weren’t there anymore, and I was facing an uncertain future with a rather flaky mom.

Happy New Year.

When we left the airport, Callie gave the cab driver an address near our old neighborhood. “I found us a sublet,” she said, smiling tentatively at me.

It was a sunny two-bedroom walk-up, fully furnished but uncluttered. After we got our bags inside, Callie and I walked to the diner she always used to take me to.

“You nervous about school Monday?” she asked me as we ate.

Somewhere in the diner, “Scar Tissue” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers was playing. Seemed appropriate for the moment. I felt like I had so many barely healed emotional bruises, the thought of going back to school was almost not something I could reconcile myself to doing. “Yeah,” I heard myself say.

“High school sucks,” Callie said, grabbing a fry from my plate and smiling. She was always doing that, alternating typical mom-type stuff, like,
Are you nervous about school Monday?
with comments like
High school sucks
, which
made her seem more like my friend. Of course, Dad had been like that, too. They really were — had been — a lot alike. I wondered what went wrong. I both desperately wanted to know and not to know.

“At least Eli will be there,” she told me. “He’ll help you get reacclimated.”

“I guess,” I said. I didn’t add that seeing Eli was still almost more stressful than school. I had not told her about the night Dad died — she seemed to have guessed the most important part, but I knew I was going to my grave without ever telling the story of the morning after to anyone. It was bad enough Eli existed in the world to know it, too.

“We have to get up early tomorrow,” she observed, frowning a little. “We were lazy last week at Europa.”

“Yep,” I said, listlessly making a French-fry pyramid.

“I’ve never seen you not eat fries,” Callie told me.

I didn’t point out how many fry-eating opportunities of mine she had, in fact, missed. Things were still too tenuous. “I’m okay.”

“I’m sorry everything’s so hard right now.”

“It’s not your fault.” She shot me a look. “Okay, it’s nowhere near
all
your fault,” I amended, making myself smile at her.

“Thanks for that,” she said. “Oh, hey, wait — I got you something. It’s not an amazing phone, but I took in the old one and got you the same number.”

I couldn’t help but smile as I accepted the small silver
phone. Maybe this one would actually last the year. “Thanks, Callie. That’s really nice of you.”

“It’s nothing. I just want to thank you for — you know — letting me keep you, or at least trying it out until college. I mean it, Lexi. You’ll never know how grateful I am.”

I nodded, tears unaccountably pricking my eyes. “’S okay,” I mumbled.

I poked at the half burger lying on my plate, thinking about Eli. He’d wanted to join us for dinner, but I had talked him out of it. I knew he would be busy making amends with his own parents for running away, spending his college money on a car, and missing school since early December.

So it was just Callie and me. It was both comforting and surreal to be back in my old neighborhood. Absolutely everything had changed for me, but looking around, everything here looked exactly the same.

13 Broome Street — Wednesday, January 5

“I heard she went crazy and stole a car. They had to legit lock her up. In
Florida
. Can you even imagine?”

This comment was the best one. I wish I hadn’t been in a bathroom stall, unable to find out who said it, so I could have asked them to write it in my yearbook.

The rumors were flying about me and Eli. I was definitely no longer invisible, and it made me weirdly happy. It was sort of a thrill to hear people actually talking about me. (It wouldn’t last, of course; I was pretty sure I’d be back to being part of the walls by graduation.) The fact that Bailey had left soon after I did only added fuel to the fire.

I was thinking a lot about Bailey lately, now that I was
back in these hallways and classrooms, where she and I had once been friends. Bailey may not have always been a perfect friend, might have taken advantage of me sometimes — but I had let her. If I hadn’t learned anything else in the last four months, it was that I didn’t want to be Doormat Girl ever again. I just hoped she was happy at her new school. Just hoped she’d be happy again, period.

First thing Monday, I had an appointment with the headmaster. As I walked toward the office, my stomach felt like I had a dead ferret in there. I’d heard from Eli that there was a new headmaster, though, which made me happy. Dr. Cranston had never exactly been crazy about me. Her compassion for me at the worst moment of my life would have fit in one of those little triangular paper cups she kept in her office by the water cooler.

This new headmaster had to see me differently, though; I had to make sure that he did. I’d made a New Year’s resolution, one I was determined to keep: I was going to take school seriously. I was going to go in there and murder this last semester, and apply and get into a great college. Somehow.

The headmaster’s name was Dr. Browning. I sat carefully in one of the chairs that faced his big desk.

“Miss Ryan,” he intoned, disapproval evident in his voice. “You’ve had quite a year,” he observed, laying what I assumed was my student file down on his desk.

Browning had embraced the stereotype and was wearing actual tweed, complete with those weird little elbow patches
on his jacket. Those have always bothered me — what were they for? Just in case a sudden game of rugby erupted and he didn’t have time to shuck his jacket? I pulled my attention back to the meeting at hand and reminded myself of my resolution.

“I really have,” I told him.

“I’m very sorry about your father,” he said next, surprising me. “And I must apologize, it seems, for my predecessor’s handling of your … situation. She ought to have assisted you in locating your mother. I hold Eleanor Cranston largely responsible for your having to hare off to parts unknown to track down your parent.” He actually sounded sort of angry. I enjoyed his use of
hare
as a verb and felt myself relax a little.

“But,” he went on, “as Dr. Cranston is now the problem of the Immaculate Heart School in Boston, we shall move on. Thankfully, it seems, in looking at your records, that you will be able to complete your senior year this semester, with sufficient credits for graduation. I imagine that is your wish?”

I nodded. “Yes, sir. I absolutely want to graduate. I’ll take whatever classes I need to.”

“You missed an English credit and world history last term,” he told me, “and this semester you need to take physics to complete the science requirement. Many of the other seniors will have a far less taxing schedule,” he warned. “But you can do it if you set your mind to it.”

“I can — I will.”

“Very well,” he said. “I will see to it your schedule is changed. Miss Ryan.” He leaned forward then, almost smiled. He seemed like a serious guy, even though he was probably not that much older than my mom. But his eyes were a nice, kind brown. Of course, he would have been an improvement on Cranston had he been an actual snake.

“Miss Ryan, I think it is very admirable how you have managed your circumstances these last few months. You found yourself in very dire straits, and you seem to have kept your wits about you, all on your own, and come out just fine. Though I hadn’t met you until today, only read your file, I am proud of you. You may find, having come through the crucible of such an experience, that you will now have a clearer sense of who you are and what you want. I hope that you will use this knowledge wisely.”

He stood then and I belatedly followed suit; he shook my hand and sent me on my way.

I was back, easy as that. Thanks to Nick Tarus, who found my mother; Eli Katz, who gave up his college money to buy a car and come get me; and Callie, for coming back to New York with me and being my parent again. And I owed massive thanks to Lina and her father and her sister for taking me in, feeding me, and giving me a job. Dr. Browning had been wrong about that one thing: I hadn’t done it all on my own, in the end.

I threw myself into schoolwork; I had enough catch-up work to keep me busy every night. I got into a routine in the new
little apartment. It didn’t really feel like ours — Callie had sublet the place from a friend, and her decor was still in place. I didn’t even hang up my gargoyle lights in the tiny second bedroom. Callie had tried to give me the biggest one, one of the many manifestations of her guilt, but I didn’t want to let her guilt turn me into an evil princess, so I turned her down. Compared to the room I’d had in Lina’s trailer, my new digs were gigantic. There was a bed with a pretty light yellow quilt, and matching curtains. At first I put the ring Nick had given me on the top of the dresser, but then I decided to put it in a drawer.

Lina and I Skyped sometimes, but it was hard, because when she wasn’t working, I was in school. She kept me updated on all the Europa gossip. The first time we spoke, the show was outside Baltimore, and I wished I had a car so I could just go see everyone in person. Not that missing any more school was actually an option.

Eli would walk me home every afternoon, but then he had to go straight home. He was a step beyond grounded for running off to Florida — something closer to house arrest: school, work at his uncle’s deli (to pay back the college fund), homework, and bed. But he never complained, not to me, anyway.

As for Callie, she was a little bit like a caged bird. Before she got a job, she was always dutifully on her perch when I came home from school. But it only took her two weeks to find a pretty decent job as a receptionist in a dentist’s office nearby. I could see the marks of strain, though.
She
was the
real gypsy — though not a fortune teller, clearly, given her life choices. But I was grateful to her for going through the motions of boring-ness for me, for staying put when she wanted to roam.

As part of my get-into-college resolution, I rejoined the yearbook staff. I had joined for much the same reason at the beginning of the year, and had started going to meetings, but of course I’d missed most of the work putting the book together.

One afternoon, when I was typing in names for the colophon, I was surprised to see my name listed in with the rest of the staff. I told the assistant editor, Samantha, “You didn’t need to put me in there.”

She looked up from the computer screen across from me. “What are you doing right now?” she asked me.

“I’m typing in names,” I said, puzzled.

Samantha sighed. “I mean, are you working on the yearbook?” she asked.

“Um, is that a trick question?”

“You wouldn’t think so.” She snorted. “You’re working on the yearbook. Therefore, you are on the yearbook staff, genius.” She smiled, taking all the sting out of the insult.

I looked at her and realized in that second that I had never really noticed Samantha Myers before — if I had, I would have seen someone who could have, maybe, been my friend at Sheldon. If I hadn’t been walking around with my mind made up about everyone in this place.

“You know, I’ve been meaning to tell you, I was actually a little mad at you while you were gone,” Samantha said.

“Why?”

“We voted for senior superlatives right before you left, do you remember?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“You got one — did you know?”

“Most likely to be invisible?” I asked. I wasn’t the most anything else in this class. Or hadn’t been, until I’d gained a smidge of notoriety from my disappearing act.

Samantha laughed. “No, you got most likely to never leave New York.” She raised her eyebrows at me. “I got a really good candid of you and Eli out on the steps, looking very permanently rooted here, I might add. I designed the spread, and then boom — you took off and proved us all wrong! I had to redo the whole spread and use Tish Morgan and James Andrews instead.”

“Me and Eli?” I asked.

“Yeah, he was voted the guy most likely never to leave,” she said, laughing, “and then
he
left, too!”

“That’s funny,” I told her. “Me and Eli getting voted for that.”

“It’s not all that surprising,” Samantha said. “We all knew you were both going to college here, probably getting married to each other, and having hipster babies.”

“Getting married? Me and Eli?” I was horrified to realize my voice had just come out really high-pitched.

“Well, lots of people thought that,” Samantha said, sounding a tad defensive. “You guys were always together. I know, you’re thinking of Bailey Conners. But she was just a temporary distraction, obviously.”

My brain started working on all the input Samantha had just given it, and I quickly steered the conversation away from me and toward her new boyfriend, Brandon. We kept talking about Brandon until I’d finished the page and could tactfully extricate myself.

Most likely to never leave New York? As I walked home, I realized something: I was a little happy that I had been voted for a superlative. But what I was actually happier about, in a weird way, was the fact that I had proven them wrong.

“We have to talk,” Callie announced when I got home.

I was surprised at her serious tone. She had treated me with kid gloves since our arrival here, clearly not wanting to upset me or the tenuous truce we had formed. Callie knew I needed her, to finish school, to have a way to live. But I knew she wanted me to stick around for more than just those reasons.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ve got some homework, though. Can we talk later?”

“No. I want to … Can we please just talk now?” She began pacing in front of me as I sat on the small love seat that took up a good portion of the living room. I felt my
stomach drop a little. I had grown very unfond of news. “I know you aren’t going to want to talk to me about this. But I’ve decided I don’t care. I mean, I’ve decided that no matter the consequences — if you’re mad, or even if you decide to leave, that I can’t just be quiet anymore.”

Whoa. This sounded like a super fun conversation. “What is it?” I asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

“I can see something here.” She continued pacing. “And it’s not because I have some special mom powers or some amazing insight into you. I know we’re just getting to know each other again.” She took a deep breath. “Lexi, I’ve lived with you for a couple weeks now, I’ve paid attention. There’s something you need to do before you can ever even think of forgiving me, or your father, or even deciding what you’re going to do next year.”

“What’s that?” I asked, afraid suddenly of her insight. I remembered, long ago, not being able to get anything by her.

She took another huge breath, stopping to kneel in front of where I sat. “You need to forgive yourself.”

“For what?” I asked, my voice unnaturally loud.

“I think I know, but I’m not sure.” She looked at me expectantly.

I sat squirming under her gaze. “I thought I had,” I whispered.

“Have you? Then why do you look like you’re going to throw up right now?”

“Bad sushi?” I asked, but then gave up the halfhearted
attempt at funny misdirection. “Mom,” I started, and barely noted that I’d just used the word for the first time in almost ten years. “I want to. I want to move past it.”

“Have you told anybody about it? What you did?”

I shook my head miserably. “It’s not even a big deal,” I said, feeling pathetic and stupid. “Everyone at school does worse, all the time, before breakfast, even. I’m so pathetic.”

“Oh, honey, you’re not pathetic!” She leaned forward and put her arms around me. “If you don’t want to talk about it, you don’t have to. But if you want to tell somebody about it … if you want to tell me, I promise I will just listen and then throw it away. Whatever it is, it will pale in comparison to my awfulness. If it makes you feel any better.”

I hugged her back. “It might,” I admitted and tried to smile.

So I told my mother everything about the night I had betrayed my friend Bailey by fooling around with her boyfriend, betrayed Gavin by not being there on the last night of his life, betrayed myself by doing what I’d done.

She listened and didn’t say anything, just made little sounds of comfort or understanding. She interjected nothing at all about Gavin, though she might have wanted to. I thought it would feel awful to look at Callie and know that she knew about the worst thing I’d ever done, but she didn’t show any signs of judging me. And I felt lighter, somehow, now that I’d said it all out loud.

As I was heading back to my room, I turned back toward my mom. I was starting to think of her that way again, already. “Mom?”

“What, Lex?”

“You don’t have to stay here. It’s not that I don’t want you to!” I added when I saw her face. “It’s just, that’s one thing I’ve learned this year. I think you need to figure out where you belong. Just leave me an address and a phone number — how about that?”

“Deal.” Callie smiled, then walked over to me and gave me another hug. “It will all work out,” she said in my ear, before releasing me and heading back down the hallway to her room. “Night, Lex,” she called over her shoulder. “Love you.”

“Love you, too,” I called back without thinking.