The Girls of No Return (16 page)

Yes, I wanted more. I wanted to raise my eyebrows at her whenever Boone got into one of her moods and said something sharp. I wanted to pick the locks on the Mess Hall windows at night and push her through, arms first; I'd wait out there in the cold, hugging myself and keeping watch, whispering the same song lyrics over and over to myself until her head appeared in the window and she dropped an armload of Triscuits and cheese, yesterday's cake, a can of whipped cream at my feet. I wanted to sit next to her around the campfire and hold her pale hand during the last soulful songs. But even more than that: I wanted her to give me something I could use in our friendship, like an orienteering tool — a compass or a thermometer, at least — something to give me direction, to gauge the meaning of her laughter and her silence. I wanted to hear her say
best friend
, to watch her mouth form each perfect word.

But these things didn't happen. The closest I got — the closest I would ever get, it seemed — to really knowing what Gia thought of me were the little comments she dropped like jewels for me to pick up and slide in my pockets surreptitiously. Calling me her old so-and-so, a name so strange it was almost sweet. Telling me I was a badass. And one evening, late, walking with me to my cabin and saying in a half whisper, “I've been around the world two or three times, Lida, but I don't think I've met anyone like you.”

It was enough. For the moment, at least.

 

 

I'm writing this for her, of course.

Really.

No, really.

Now see, just as soon as I wrote that, I read it over again, and here's what I said to myself, loud enough to slap myself in the face with it but not loud enough to wake my dad and Terri: “What utter crap.”

Am I writing this just for her? Impossible. If I'm being honest (and admit it, it's time to be honest), I'm writing it more for me than for her, since she'll never read this anyway. I'm writing it for the things I should have said but did not, and the things I should have done but could not.

I can hear you now. “But, Lida, it's been over a year. Can't you, um, just move on?”

Answer: I can. I have. Kind of. To those who watch me (Dad, Terri, Dr. Hemler), I'm doing well. Better than that, even: I'm doing extremely well. Impressively well. And most of it's real. I knew what I needed to do to survive when I left Alice Marshall; I knew that if I didn't reach into the world, I wouldn't make it a week back in Bruno. So I reached. And there were hands to grab on to, and voices urging me forward — and I did move, step by step, into a life that has sheltered me so far from my memories.

I was able to hold them at bay for a long time. But ever since Margaret started calling, things have changed. Now, sitting up in bed in the middle of the night, my sheets tangled around my waist, I am caught by my memories, which rush at me with accusing fingers and leave me shaken and helpless. I've begun to worry that the past year and a half has all been a ruse, a castle on a fault line, the earth's plates shifting at any moment, even now.

So, yes. I write it for her. But oh, oh, oh, I write it for me.

 

 

BOONE AND I DIDN'T TALK ABOUT THE HIKE TO THE LOOKOUT;
she didn't mention it, and I was afraid to. I couldn't figure out why she'd taken me up there, and the Elsa who chatted comfortably with Ben was nowhere to be found at school. Once we got off the mountain, she was the same unpredictable Boone. Same anger bubbling under the surface like hot tar. Same ability to shut a person down with a single look. The only difference I could see was in the way that Boone treated me when we were alone together. If I found her in the cabin before the other girls came in, or if we were alone on the beach at the tail end of Waterfront, Boone would make the occasional joke, looking at me like she knew I'd get it. Sometimes, she would even laugh. It was subtle, but it was there: an acceptance, even — maybe — a grudging regard.

Boone couldn't have known about the time I spent with Gia; if she had, she would never have invited me on the hike. She would definitely not be making jokes with me. So I certainly wasn't about to bring it up. I learned that lesson soon enough.

We were sitting around the table at lunch. Karen and Gwen were talking about something having to do with shampoo, maybe hair spray, and Jules was smiling around hopefully. I was trying not to look over at Gia's table. Boone was shoveling down a bowl of disgusting chili, but she looked up sharply when she heard Jules say, “I would give anything to have hair like Gia's. It's just so silky. What kind of conditioner do you think she uses?”

“Next subject,” Boone said, narrowing her eyes at Jules. “You're ruining my appetite.”

Jules looked swiftly down at her plate. “Sorry,” she said.

“Why do you hate her so much?” The words were out of my mouth before I had a chance to take them back.

Boone leaned over and spat on the floor before answering, which should have been a sign.

“What's there to like?” she'd said. “I know her kind. She's worse than the I-bankers.”

“I don't think —” I started, and she raised her hand swiftly in front of my face, either an innocent Stop sign, or the beginning of a slap. She narrowed her eyes.

“You got a horse in this race, Townie?” she asked.

I shook my head.

“Then shut the hell up.”

 

Circle Share continued to meet once a week, and it wasn't until mid-August that I had to decide between Gia and Boone. It was a hot day, the kind of glaring hot that sinks all the way through your skin, and everyone was moving more slowly. It felt like it was going to rain, but so far, the only moisture I felt was that of my own sweat. I was washing my face in the Bathhouse, pretending that I was submerged in the chilling depths of Bob. Since I refused to go swimming, even though I love it, this was as close as I got to feeling the relief of cool water. I could have stayed there forever, which is why I lost track of time. I was a few minutes late getting to the Rec Lodge.

The transition from the brightness of the afternoon sun to the dim, shaded interior of the building was disconcerting, and I blinked rapidly, trying to focus. Almost everyone was there already. The worst part was, they were apparently waiting for me. I started toward the group, scanning for an empty seat, and then I stopped. There were only two open spots. One was next to Boone. One was next to Gia. I swallowed.

“Welcome, Lida,” said Amanda. “Take a seat wherever you like.”

I took an uneasy step forward. If I sat next to Gia, Boone would declare war on me too. This was no child's game. My hair would be the least of it. But if I chose Boone, would Gia speak to me again? My breath caught in my throat. She could pick any girl at the school to spend her time with — any of them. Why would she waste her energy on someone who was too weak-minded to pick a goddamn place to sit?

Amanda tilted her head. “Is something the matter?” She gestured around the circle. “Don't worry — we haven't started yet. We were just about to begin.”

I took another step forward, my feet moving in slow motion. But maybe Gia would think that I hadn't seen the place next to her. Or, if I did, that I wouldn't think it was for me. And was it? Really, who did I think I was? Why did I think she would even want to sit next to me? Of course she would assume that I would sit with my cabinmates. It's what anyone else would do.

I walked quickly to where Boone was sitting and plopped myself down, bending over to retie the laces of my shoes. When I sat up again, Amanda had begun the incantation.

“We are kind to others; we are kind to ourselves,” we said in unison. “We honor the Circle of Truth.”

I studied my lap, raising my eyes briefly to look at Gia. She sat tall and regal in her chair, staring straight ahead. On the seat next to her was a small notebook that she sometimes carried around. I exhaled the breath that I hadn't known I was holding. Had the notebook been there all along? If so, that seat had never been mine.

Amanda began the session by talking about the idea of centeredness, of having a place within yourself to come back to, again and again, even during the difficult times. As she finished speaking, the other girls started adding their own voices, everything blending together in a monotonous, calming drone.

Slowly, I let my mind wander away from the room and its inhabitants. I pictured the cafeteria of Bruno High School, the parallel rows of long, white tables that always seemed to be claimed by bands of girls who waved their friends down from across the room. The tables all had their own groups of people — speaking their own languages, it seemed, like small, proud European countries. I had always eaten in the hall. Now I added another white table to the room, with a girl sitting on each end of it, both of them waving to me.

I kept that image in the back of my head as I listened to a Fifteen talk about how, after she'd broken into her parents' wine bar and stolen their money, she felt calm, at peace. Boone agreed with her and then sat back, clearly done talking for the day. Another Fifteen named Crystal chimed in with her own Thing: running away to Santa Cruz with a group of high school dropouts. She began to relate it to what Amanda had said, but I wasn't paying attention. It was all lies, anyway, everyone rewriting their stories as they spoke so that all of the insight that they had since adopted was available to them back then, even as they broke windows and panhandled on the boardwalk. I didn't need to listen to this crap.

“. . . To think about not just
what
you've done, but
why
you've done it.”

I snapped back to attention when I felt Amanda's eyes on me. I may not have said a word in Circle Share, but I spent enough time halfheartedly listening to notice the way Amanda talked about our Things. And it was clear that, right now, she was talking about what I called our Sea Level Things.

The Sea Level Thing. The place from which your Thing (or Things) sprang up like a jagged mountain. Because, see, even though most girls were sent to Alice Marshall for one specific thing that they did, a final straw like robbing a wine bar, our Things were more complicated than that. They were as layered as the contour lines on a map. You got to the summit of one Thing, only to realize that there was a steeper, craggier Thing looming above it — something else you'd done that no one knew about, for instance. And another one above that. And one above that. And lying there at the base of them all, the line that encircled all of the other Things somewhere around sea level, was usually a word.
Loneliness. Fear. Rejection. Failure.
It was embarrassing to realize that everything that felt so utterly complicated could be summed up in a word. It made me feel simple, like I'd been staring at a math problem for years that a first-grader could just walk up and solve.

“Lida,” Amanda said now, “how do you feel about what Crystal said? Does any of it sound familiar to you?”

“What?” I asked.

“Maybe you would like to share some of your own experiences,” she said. “We haven't heard much from you.”

I looked quickly at my knees. “Oh,” I said, “that's okay.” I waited for the moment to pass, as it always had whenever Amanda singled me out.

But Amanda didn't say anything else, and when I finally looked up again, she was still staring at me. Everyone was. Even Boone looked mildly interested. She had her head cocked to one side, and she was smiling at me as though encouraging a toddler to walk across some railroad tracks. Gia knit her eyebrows together and gave me a sympathetic frown. Everyone was waiting, and this time, they weren't giving me an out.

Think. Think. Think. Think.
The word kept repeating in my head, silencing all the other sounds around me. It was as though I was watching the word march from one side of my brain to the other and then back again.
Think.

I stood up so quickly that I almost knocked my chair over. I steadied it and pushed it back from the circle. “I . . . I'm sorry,” I said. “I don't feel very well.”