“You can’t get fired. You just got this job.”
My vision starts to adjust to the light. A boy stands in front of me, though his features are still blurred slightly. I know it’s all in my head. I try to act normal, like I’m not completely freaking out, but normal has never been easy for me.
“Nothing in life is permanent,” he says.
“But in a sea of artificial flavors and hormone-injected meat, you make working here better, so get rid of the damn board, or I’ll kick your ass.” Leia shoves him in the shoulder.
“OK, don’t hurt me, Princess,” Luca says. “I won’t skateboard in the store anymore.”
He kicks his skateboard into the air and catches it effortlessly. And I know I’m looking at him with this pinched expression on my face, like the sun is blaring down on us inside Rosario’s Market, but I can’t help it. In fact, I can barely breathe as he walks away, a swagger to his hips like he’s still coasting by on a skateboard.
Leia sounds exasperated when she says, “Luca’s an idiot, but a fun idiot.”
My heart might explode from pounding so hard.
“Luca?” I say.
“He works in the deli.”
“Does he go to school with us, too?”
Is it possible I missed him, along with Leia?
“No. He goes to Catholic school—Gonzaga Prep.” Then Leia corrects herself. “Though I’m not sure how often he actually goes to school.”
My eyes won’t seem to move from the spot where he was. I’ve seen people with similar auras—matching shades of orange or pink or green.
But no one has ever been Lizzie’s color. No one.
She is the only one who blazes cadmium yellow. The color of the sun.
Or so I thought.
“Luca,” I say again.
“Sometimes all it takes is one person to make swimming in a sea of shit better, you know.” Leia gestures all around us. “Welcome to my sea of shit, but if I want to go to college out of state, I need this job.” She takes me by the arm again. “Come on. I’ll show you where the essential oils are.”
As we make our way to a new aisle, I can’t help but look over my shoulder at the streak of sunshine left on the floor where Luca stood.
In the end I don’t have the courage to deviate from the list. My cart is still filled with garbage that might give Chief and me cancer. But change is not that easy.
Still, I grab a bottle of patchouli oil. No one likes to be sad and filled to the brim with shit.
7
MONET’S GARDEN
Lizzie started sending me postcards in third grade, when she found me crying because I wasn’t invited to Regan Trentini’s birthday party and the rest of my class was. Regan had forgotten me, like so many others. Lizzie asked me to paint flowers on her walls that day.
“As many as you want. How about tulips, Songbird? Can you paint me those?”
“But they bloom in the spring, and this is a summer forest.”
“Who cares about science? In our world tulips bloom in the summer.”
And people aren’t left behind to wilt. That’s what Lizzie was trying to say.
A week later her first postcard dropped through the mail slot in our front door—addressed to Wren Plumley. On the front was a picture of the Empire State Building.
Dear Wren,
People look like ants from up here, and you know what they say about ants—they can carry two hundred times their weight. Maybe we’re really ants in the universe, which means we can carry a lot of baggage and still survive. I know life feels like a lot sometimes, but you can handle it.
I love you,
Mom
Wren Plumley
20080 21st Ave.
Spokane, WA 99203
“See, Songbird,” Lizzie said. “She’s thinking about you. You’re not forgotten. A person doesn’t need to be present to be remembered.” But I could tell from the look on her face and the wink she gave me that Lizzie had actually sent the postcard.
And it was perfect.
After that a new one came every few months. Some would apologize for missing school performances, some would ask whether I was getting good grades and cleaning my room, some even hinted at a future when we would all be together as a family again.
For a while it worked.
For a while it felt real.
But reality has a way of dimming imagination as we age.
It’s been over four years since Lizzie sent me a postcard.
After unloading the groceries, with Chief asleep upstairs, I sift through a stack of week-old mail—junk magazines and Valpak and Publishers Clearing House mailers. I get why people keep this junk.
Hope.
Hope that one day you won’t be poor because the Publishers Clearing House Prize Patrol will come to your door with balloons and cameras and give you a gigantic check for $1 million, all because you didn’t throw out the one thing that most people do.
I know that feeling, but I still toss the Publishers Clearing House mailer into the recycling bin.
And then a card freezes me in place.
A postcard.
Blue Water Lilies, 1916–1919
Dear Songbird,
Have you ever noticed that water lilies grow in polluted lakes? More proof that beauty can be found even among life’s garbage. Maybe that’s why Monet painted this—as a reminder.
Sometimes beauty breaks through even the murkiest, smelliest, most contaminated lakes, and the next thing you know, a frog will take a rest on a lily pad in the sunshine.
I love you,
Lizzie
Wren Plumley
20080 21st Ave.
Spokane, WA 99203
Light comes through the window of the kitchen, as if to illuminate the words. It’s a sign.
She’s back.
I run around the house, postcard in hand, checking each room for Lizzie. Behind the sofa, in her closet, under the kitchen table, until I’m in the backyard searching the bushes and trees and air for any sign of her. But the clouds have covered the sun now, and I’m still holding a postcard from a person who no longer lives here.
The postcard has no return address. It’s postmarked from London, a place Lizzie couldn’t possibly be, considering she has no passport. I do a quick search on my phone and figure out the postcard was made on a mobile app called PostIt, a company out of England. It’s impossible to track where it was created.
I climb to the roof of the garage and sit with my knees in tight, arms wrapped around my body as if to hold myself together, when really, I’m just holding myself in.
“Where are you, Lizzie?” I ask the lilies in Monet’s garden, imagining the sound of a frog echoing from somewhere on the water.
8
THE TRUTH ABOUT WET UNDERWEAR
I’m on the roof when Wilder’s light comes on again. It’s dark outside, and Chief is at work. Olga is watching TV on the couch in the living room, where she’ll eventually fall asleep. She’s barely said a word to me.
Chief wasn’t happy to see me up here again. It’s too far off the ground, and he’s seen what people are capable of even when they have two solid feet on the earth.
Some days I really wish he wasn’t a police officer.
When Wilder comes to the window, I give a slight wave from my perch. A moment later a text comes through to my phone.
Wilder: Wyd up there?
Me: Waiting for the sun to rise
Wilder: It might be a bit
I look down at Lizzie’s postcard.
Me: I’m a little worried about that
Wilder: Is that y ur sad?
Yes, I think to myself. But it’s more than that. It’s . . . me.
Wilder: Do u want some company while u wait?
Me: That would be nice
Wilder: That’s me
Wilder: Mr. Nice Guy
I giggle.
Me: Do u want to come sit on the roof with me, Mr. Nice Guy?
Wilder: Unfortunately I can’t
> Me: Why not?
Wilder: I get sick when I go outside
Me: Are u a vampire or something?
Me: I hear we have a few of those in WA
Wilder: ☺ I’m not cool enough to be a vampire
Me: Same
Wilder: We’re the perfect pair then
At that I can’t help but grin down at my phone.
Me: If ur not a vampire what is wrong with u?
Wilder: IDK no one can figure it out
Me: So u just stay inside all day?
Me: Doing what?
Wilder: Waiting just like u
Me: For what?
Wilder: My life to show up
He tells me that he’s lived almost his entire life indoors. How no doctor has ever been able to diagnose what’s wrong with him, but every time he went outside when he was little, he’d get a fever and a cough and a runny nose and be in bed for days. And it was awful, so he just stopped going outside.
Wilder: It wasn’t worth the risk
He moved from Seattle to live with his grandparents in Spokane, where the air is drier. They’re hoping it might help.
Wilder: So far I’m too afraid to even open my window
Wilder: What if I get sick again? Then no place is safe
Wilder: It just feels easier to stay inside
The silhouette standing in the window almost looks too skinny to be an actual person, almost like he’s disappearing into the light.
Wilder: Want me to entertain you?
Me: How?
Wilder: I’m a well of useless information
Me: Like what?
Wilder: Did u know chickens are attracted to beautiful people?
Me: Swear?
Wilder: I read about it in a research paper
Me: What else?
Wilder: Coke was originally green
Me: Gross
Wilder: Exactly
Wilder: No one wants to drink something green
Wilder: Even if it is delicious
Before I can respond, Olga sticks her head out of the back door. Her poorly maintained blond hair sharply contrasts her black eyebrows, and she’s wearing too much makeup for a person whose job it is to sleep. She’s clearly annoyed when she finds me on the roof.
“I’m going to bed,” she says in a thick Russian accent. When I don’t budge, she groans. “Don’t make my job any harder than it already is. Come down from that roof, Wren. Your dad don’t like you up there.”
The silhouette in the attic window is gone, as if Wilder is hiding, but the light remains on.
“I’ll come inside in a minute.”
Olga closes the door with too much vigor.
My phone rings with a text.
Wilder: Ur name is Wren?
He’s back, standing in the window. Even though I can’t see his eyes clearly, it feels like we’re looking at each other, like we’re connected somehow.
Me: Yes
Wilder: Do u ever think about flying away?
I’m too scared, I think to myself, unable to muster the courage to type it. When I don’t type anything back, Wilder texts again.
Wilder: Someone did research to find out if wet underwear is uncomfortable
Me: That seems pretty obvious
Wilder: Apparently even the obvious needs to be researched
Me: The findings?
Wilder: Wet underwear is uncomfortable
Me: Mind blown
“Wren!” Olga’s voice bellows from inside the house. “Get your butt down from that roof! I need sleep!”
Me: Gimme a sec
I climb down from the roof and bypass Olga on the couch, then go straight to my room and turn on the light. At the window across from mine, Wilder stands, phone in hand, waiting for me. I can see him clearly now, his hair and eyes, his too-thin body. The space around him, that lack of an aura. I know it’s wrong to feel comfort in that, but we’re the same. No one has ever been like me. For the first time, I don’t feel so lonely.
He smiles, and I swear that the stars just starting to appear in the sky get brighter.
Me: Ever noticed that birds only need a bit of light to sing in the morning?
Me: Just a sliver and the chorus starts
Wilder: If that’s the case I hope the sun comes out tmrw
I press my nose to the glass, my breath fogging the window.
Wilder does the same.
“Good night,” I say, my words trapped inside my room.
Good night, he mouths back.
The light in his room goes out a moment later.
9
CADMIUM YELLOW
Safer on Wheels Driving School is located in an old strip mall, probably filled with asbestos, south of town. The ceiling tile has water damage, and the fluorescent lights cast a gloomy, unhealthy glow on everyone who walks in. Outside the sun shines. I lean my head back against the chair and stare up at the lights until my vision starts to pepper with black spots. The seat next to me remains empty, along with the rest of the row, and I’d like it to stay that way.
It’s a Washington State requirement that all teenagers looking to acquire a license must attend thirty hours of classroom instruction in person. The irony of having to attend driving school is that I had to take the bus to get here, since Chief is working the graveyard shift all week and sleeping by day. But if this is what he needs in order to believe I’m “getting back out there,” so be it. He hasn’t mentioned Utah again, so I won’t complain.
Every morning we play Wheel of Fortune, eyes forced on puzzles we can solve instead of the mysteries that plague our house. It’s better that way. If we pretend hard enough that life is fine, eventually it will feel like that—I learned that from Lizzie.
“Take your seats,” the overweight, angry-looking teacher states in a monotone voice. Wrinkles around his eyes carve deep ravines in his cheeks, and I can tell that this man is not happy to be here either.
There’s a bit of a scramble as people move around, during which someone sneaks in the back of the room and takes a seat in my row at the last second. I glance quickly in his direction and am instantly blinded by cadmium yellow. It blazes so brightly, I have to close my eyes.
Again?
“Shit,” I whisper to myself.
When I peek to check if I’m actually seeing the color correctly, Luca, the boy from the grocery store, is at the end of the row, staring at me.
My heart rate surges again, and my head swims. I will not pass out, I repeat to myself. I will not pass out.
Nothing about Luca’s appearance screams yellow. In fact, he’s dressed head to toe in black—a tight black shirt, black jeans with rips in the knees. The nose ring dangling from the center of his nose . . . is black. Even his hair is black. But his eyes are another story. They’re cinnamon brown. None of this outdoes the cadmium yellow.
He’s blinding.
He’s overwhelming.
He’s staring at me.
I move over a few seats, but it doesn’t help. In a room filled with dreariness, he is light. Unavoidable and bright and burning, even in this overly air-conditioned room.
I need a distraction, so I start to write Lizzie a letter in my notebook.
Dear Lizzie,
Monet wasn’t appreciated by the French until the Americans found interest in his work. Is this how it goes in life? The people closest to you are the least appreciative until some outsider tries to take you away?
My pen taps on the paper. The letter isn’t working. I have nowhere to send it anyway. And cadmium yellow seeps into my peripheral view, staining the edges of the paper in light that can’t be erased.
I take another quick glance at Luca. He’s still looking at me.
Oh no.
With a quick glance at the window, I check for an escape route. I need to hang a piece of my body outside, like Lizzie did in the cruiser. It took me a while to understand why she rolled down the window, her body never fully contained by the car, even when it was freezing outside.
She felt trapped. Frostbite means little when you can touch freedom.
But it’s sealed shut. The windows at Driver’s Ed are strictly to let light in. Nothing can get out. I scribble more to Lizzie.
Remember how you said that if I ever feel overwhelmed, all I have to do is open a window and fly? What do I do if the window is sealed shut?
Frustrated, I rip the letter from my notebook and ball it up. It’s useless. I can’t even send Lizzie a text. Her phone is shut off or dead or floating in the Spokane River. She never responds, no matter how many texts I send.
And then Luca plops himself in the desk next to me, shoving his skateboard under the seat. Another blinding streak of cadmium yellow hits me.
He needs to turn down his light, but I know from Lizzie that it’s impossible.
“I know you,” he says.
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do. I saved your life yesterday.”
“No, you didn’t. You’re the one who knocked me over.”
“But I grabbed you before you fell,” Luca says. “So I think that negates the crime.”
“That’s not how it works.”
“Says who?”
“The police.”
He stares at me for seconds that pile onto seconds and create a mountain of pressure on my chest. I scoot over, needing space.
He scoots closer. “Is something wrong?”
“No.” I can’t look at him.
“Do I smell or something?”
“What?” I chance a glance at him and catch a scent of the outside. He even smells like sunshine.
“I blame Leia. She’s making me wear natural deodorant. According to her, there are all these toxins in real deodorant that cause cancer, but I’m thinking maybe the natural stuff isn’t working, because you clearly don’t want me close to you.” Luca smells his armpit and shrugs. “Smells OK to me, but people never think they stink. It’s always someone else. Which is poetically sad, because we all think like that, and we all kind of stink.”
He has a point, but I refrain from responding.
“Leia’s a totally weird hipster. Probably belongs in Seattle, but you can’t change where you’re born, right? But seriously, what’s worse: Cancer, or a life with chronic BO? Be honest.”
Postcards for a Songbird Page 4