by Sarah Dessen
“Emaline,” he said quietly.
I shook my head. “Go. Please.”
I was crying now, why, I had no idea. The tears just came, carrying with them all the strain of these last few crazy days, this year, this summer. As my father looked at me, I knew, this time with certainty, that it was too late for us. But with Benji, he had so much time to do better. And it started right here, right now.
I didn’t say any of this, of course. But as he finally turned and began to walk across the lot, it occurred to me that all I’d wanted from him was the unconditional love you get from family, that strong, innate connection so unlike anything else. For whatever reason—time, circumstance, distance—he wasn’t able to give it to me himself. But he did give me Benji, and I would be forever grateful. With love like that, you can’t get picky about how it finds you or the details. All that matters is that it’s there. Better late than never.
21
I HAD TO admit, it was different.
“I’ll swipe the card!” Benji yelled, running out ahead of me as we entered the station. He did, and I pushed through the turnstile, feeling a blast of hot, smelly city air as I did so. A moment later he joined me, and I peered down the dark tunnel, trying to get my bearings.
“Which one are we getting on, again?” I still hated not knowing where I was, or was going. Part of growing up in a berg, I supposed.
“The R. It’s this way. Come on, I think that’s one right there.”
He grabbed my hand and we ran together along the platform, getting to the train just as the doors were closing. Inside, we found a single free seat, which he gallantly gave to me. He hung onto a pole instead.
“You’re sure you have the invitation?” he asked me, for about the millionth time.
“I have the invitation,” I told him. “But even if we didn’t, I bet we could get in. We do know the artist’s assistant.”
“True,” he said, taking a spin around the pole. It was mid-November, only three months or so since I’d last seen him, but I’d swear he’d shot up a good foot. Add in his new haircut—a sort of a faux-hawk—and I’d almost not even recognized him when he and my father picked me up at the airport a few days earlier. Almost.
We’d planned this trip all the way back in August, when he and my father had left Colby. In the end, they’d stayed three more days, which allowed us to do all the big Colby things one last time: shrimp burgers, arcade, check-ins. On the last night, I’d kept my promise, emptying out our Summer Ending Tax jar, which held just enough for two tickets to the Surfside Ferris wheel. In the end, though, we didn’t have to pay. High School Special.
As for my father, things had remained distant, especially as there was more distance between us. While I called and texted with Benji regularly—he loved that phone of his—I did not hear a thing from my father for two full months. Then, in the beginning of November, I opened up my e-mail to find a message. It had no subject, and no greeting, and just said this:
What are you reading for school that you love?
What do you hate?
For a full week, I left it in my inbox, where again and again I’d open it, scan these words, and then close it. I owed him nothing and hoped he knew to expect as much. But the one thing that had always worked for us was e-mail. So eventually, I wrote him a response, telling him that I liked Chaucer but found Milton impossible to understand. Within three hours, he’d written back. Since then, we’d kept up a steady discourse, solely about literature. It wasn’t parenting, but I had that in spades with my mom’s regular calls and texts. And he did know an awful lot about Paradise Lost.
“This is our stop,” Benji called out now, as the train began to slow down. We followed a clump of other passengers out, then up the stairs, to my great relief. As a beach girl, being underground still felt weird to me. If I couldn’t have water in sight, the sky was the next best thing.
“Okay,” I said, pulling out the directions my father had printed out for us. “From the station, we go two blocks east, then three west. The gallery should be on the corner.”
“This way,” he said, turning right. “Follow me.”
I did, the control freak in me requiring that I pull out my phone, where I’d programmed the address as well, to make sure we were going the right way. With all the noise and bustle of the city, I felt constantly uncertain. A year ago, it would have been my worst nightmare. But by now, after being the same old way for so long, I’d learned a little newness could be good for me.
My first semester at East U was a classic example. Even though it was only two hours from Colby, it was a different world. The campus was large, based on the edge of a city easily twice the size of Cape Frost, and I shared a dorm suite with three other girls. They were all nice and we got along fine, but I still found the training my mom and sisters had given me in my old room came in awfully handy when it came to our shared space. Despite my assumptions that it would be otherwise, no one else from my high school had ended up in my dorm or in any of my classes, which was both exciting and frightening all at once. No one had known me since kindergarten, so I could be anything or anyone. But no one had known me since kindergarten, so no one knew me, period.
Okay, maybe not no one. There was Luke, whose dorm was right down the block. He’d been a great comfort during those first, fierce days of homesickness, just as he had the night Benji ran off.
After my father and Benji went back to North Reddemane, Luke had driven me to the Pavilion, where I was able to catch the tail end of the party. He stayed, helping us clean up, and even went along when Ivy, a bit loopy on white wine and in a celebratory mood, insisted we all go dancing at Tallyho. There, she and Amber hit the floor together, with Morris and Daisy in tow, while I sat off to the side, nursing my blistered feet and a soda water.
“Thank you,” I said to Luke, who was beside me, a watered-down beer in his hand.
“For what?” he asked.
“Helping with Benji, doing all this,” I said, waving my hand.
He looked at me over the rim of his cup. “Don’t thank me for Tallyho. Remember what happened earlier this summer.”
“Oh, right.” I put my hand over my mouth. “Sorry.”
He made a face, sipping on his beer again. Out on the floor, Ivy was dancing with some sweaty guy in a tight red T-shirt, her head thrown back. Whoa.
“I was surprised to see you tonight, at the rental office,” I said to Luke after a moment. “I thought you had plans.”
“I did,” he said.
“Oh. What happened?’
He looked at me. “Emaline. I was driving by and saw you in a total panic. Like I wasn’t going to immediately stop and help you. Come on.”
“Sorry,” I said. He sat back. “No really, I am. I didn’t mean to ruin your night.”
“You didn’t,” he assured me. “But I probably ruined someone else’s.”
I didn’t know what to say to this. I sat there for a moment, watching everyone on the floor, then leaned over and kissed his cheek. Just as I was thinking how his skin tasted salty, familiar, he pulled away.
“Don’t do that,” he said. Not in a mean way, but firm. “Really. It’s just going to complicate things.”
“Okay,” I said immediately. “I get it.”
“Do you?” He turned to face me. “Because when it comes to you, Emaline, there can’t be any halfway with me. And as far as I know you still have a boyfriend.”
“We just broke up.”
“We just broke up,” he added. He looked down at his cup, then at me. “My point is, I don’t want any more weirdness between us. Which means, honestly, not having anything between us. At least not now. All right?”
It was all right, strangely enough. In fact, it was just what I needed. Luke had been my love, but he’d also been my friend. That, despite everything, had not changed, even when I thought otherwise. We’d seen each other quite a bit over the remaining days of summer, and I was happy to just hang out, not worrying about what came next
for us at East U. I truly believed that if we were meant to be, we would be. And there was no better way than jumping into a pool of thousands of strangers to find that out.
“This is it,” I said to Benji now, as I spotted the gallery, a gray banner reading CLYDE CONAWAY: COLLECTED WORKS fluttering out front. Inside, it was bright and warm looking, people milling around. Seeing the paintings, the only thing familiar in this big foreign place, was like a comfort to me.
“Emaline!” Ivy called out as soon as we came in. She was in her classic black, skirt and top, her hair pulled back tight at her neck. Despite the city armor, I would always think of her that night at Tallyho, grinding with the guy in the T-shirt. Some things never leave you. “You made it!”
“Barely,” I told her, as she hugged me, then Benji. “This place is so confusing.”
“What? New York is the easiest city to navigate in the world. It’s a grid, for God’s sake.”
“I just don’t like not knowing where I am,” I told her.
“Oh, God, no. Who does?” She took a sip of her drink, glancing around. “Let’s look for Clyde. I know he is dying to see you guys.”
We found him holding court in the back of the gallery, in front of one of the beach grass details. He had on a nice shirt and tie … and a Finz ball cap, well worn. When he saw me, he grinned. “There she is,” he said. “My Colby girl.”
“Like a fish out of water here,” I said, hugging him.
“That makes two of us,” he told me. “Have you seen my assistant yet?”
I bit my lip. “No. Not yet.”
“Why do you look so nervous?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging and glancing around. “It’s still so, kind of weird. You know how I feel about him.”
“I do,” he assured me, waving at someone over my shoulder. “And it’s fine.”
The room was getting warmer as more people came in. Outside, the night was falling, cabs and cars passing with their lights on. It was pretty, I had to admit.
“New York during the holidays,” Ivy said from beside me, looking out the window as well. “Nothing better.”
“Except the beach in the fall,” I replied. “Or anytime.”
She made a face at me. “Just you wait. I’ll make you a city lover yet.”
“Don’t be so sure.”
“Oh, I am. When you get here in May, it’ll be a whole new, wonderful world. Museums, theater, great food!” She sighed and took a sip of her wine. “Of course, you’ll be working for me way too hard to actually enjoy any of that. But still, nice to know it’s there.”
“I’m not afraid to work,” I told her.
“I know it. That’s why you already have the job.”
I smiled. All that hustling back in August had paid off, and not just with the hefty check Ivy had written me the day she left. She’d also extended the offer of employment the following summer, working for her here. It, too, was a new and scary prospect, which was just why I’d taken it. I would miss Colby, but it wasn’t going anywhere. All the more reason why I should.
Benji, who’d gone off to find a drink, returned with two bottled waters. “They aren’t half-frozen. But good anyway.”
“Perfect,” I told him, uncapping mine. “To Clyde.”
“To Clyde,” he repeated, and we drank.
I still had one more person I needed to see, as my nervous stomach kept reminding me. I wasn’t even sure why I felt like I had so much at stake, other than the fact that it was old habit. Even in a whole new world, some things never change.
“There he is!” Benji said, tugging at my sleeve.
I turned, looking where he was pointing. Sure enough, there across the gallery, in dark jeans and an untucked plaid shirt, was Morris. He was talking to two women in cocktail dresses, gesturing at the gray painting behind him, and for a moment I just watched him, marveling. When he finally looked over, seeing us, and grinned at me, I laughed out loud.
Because of Benji’s disappearing act, I’d missed Clyde announcing the plans for this tour at the art show. Which was no big deal, as I’d already known about that. It was the other, less public choice he made that I knew, in the end, had probably qualified as Theo’s Biggest Surprise Ever. Despite his glad-handing and mad ambition, or probably because of it, he was not the one chosen to come along for the ride. Instead, that was Morris, and it had been him even before he identified Theo’s exotic plant as common beach grass. It had been what Clyde had wanted to talk to me about, before I found out Benji was missing, and in a way I was glad he’d never had the chance.
After all, my confidence in Morris’s abilities was shaky to say the least. Which was why I’d stayed out of it as he began really working for Clyde, focusing instead on my own life, which is what I should have been doing all along. To my surprise, but not Clyde’s, Morris turned out to be a quick study once inspired, the perfect mix of capable and familiar. Did he know everything about Clyde’s oeuvre and the art world? No. But he didn’t have to, either. All that was needed was for him to keep a schedule and do what he was asked, tasks I’d been struggling to get him to master for years. Somehow, though, Clyde was a good influence, not to mention role model, and Morris was doing well. At least if this event was any indication.
“Look at you,” I said, as he came towards us. He high-fived Benji and gave me a hug. “You’re wearing long pants!”
“It’s winter,” he told me. “Here, that means it’s actually cold.”
“Still, I’m impressed,” I told him. “You look good.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded. “And happy.”
“Well, this one was a biggie,” he said, glancing around. “You should meet the gallery owner. What a jerk. He’s totally crackers.”
I smiled. “You hear from Daisy lately?”
“Got a letter yesterday,” he said, pulling a yellow envelope out of his shirt pocket. “Gonna answer it tonight.”
“I still can’t picture you writing letters,” I admitted.
“I wouldn’t for anyone else,” he replied. “But I love that girl.”
“Enough to get off the couch,” I said, looking around.
“Yeah.” He slid the letter back into his pocket. “Way off.”
The day after the Beach Bash—where Daisy and I had extended our Best-Dressed Couple streak, thanks to the candy dresses—Morris had indeed gone to break up with Daisy. He explained all his reasons, as well as why he felt it was what he had to do for her. And she informed him, flat out, that he was wrong. Typical Daisy: she wouldn’t even do a breakup like everyone else. She did agree, however, that long-distance would be hard, and proposed that they try a different approach to staying together. Instead of talking and texting more, they’d go for the opposite tack, pledging for the entire fall to communicate only via time-honored, almost-obsolete handwritten correspondence. I knew from e-mailing with Clyde that Morris spent nights he wasn’t working hunched over a legal pad, painstakingly detailing everything he was doing while away from her. It was an odd way to stay close, but then nothing about Daisy and Morris had ever made sense. It wasn’t like I should have expected this to be the exception.
I felt my phone beep in my pocket and pulled it out, knowing already what I’d see. Sure enough, it was a text from my mom, the kind I’d gotten regularly since landing in New York.
Just tell me you are still alive please.
And well, I wrote back. At Clyde’s show. Will call later.
This, I knew, would hold her over. For about fifteen minutes. She was better when I was at school, but not by much. It was still early days, though, and I knew she’d adjust eventually and realize the distance between us didn’t really have to change anything. She still loved me to the moon. This was just the more.
“Let’s get a picture,” Clyde called out, gesturing for me, Morris, and Benji to come over to where he and Ivy were standing. Behind them was a broad canvas, one I hadn’t seen before, made up of deep blues and greens, dotted with tiny sp
ecks of something I couldn’t make out. I walked closer to the canvas, leaning in.
“Okay, everyone,” the photographer, a tall girl with braids, called out. “Look here!”
Morris looped his arm over my shoulder, while Benji moved in beside me. Out on the street, traffic rushed past, night falling as everyone headed back to the place they called home. People were walking past the gallery, some looking in, some with their heads ducked down against the cold. Not for the first time since I’d been here, I thought of a boy in a sport jacket, raising a glass, who, despite everything else, had taught me something I needed to know about the difference between the superlatives and everything else. Any other girl might not have been so lucky.
The thing is, you can’t always have the best of everything. Because for a life to be real, you need it all: good and bad, beach and concrete, the familiar and the unknown, big talkers and small towns. Otherwise, how could I have all these things and still be so close to my own Best Ever After? As close as this painting behind me, which as the flash popped, I reached a hand back towards, suddenly knowing what it was I’d seen on it earlier. It was just the lightest dusting, and another person might have mistaken it for something else. But I knew where I came from. No matter where I was, or what got me there, I would always feel at home when I touched sand.
Did you always want to be a writer?
As far back as I remember, I’ve been writing. I’ve always had this wild imagination, and I love to embellish stories to make them more interesting. When I left school I wrote like crazy. At times it seemed stupid – I was broke and there was no guarantee that anything would come of it. Luckily, it did. But even if I hadn’t sold a book I’d still be writing. It becomes part of you, just something you do.
Who were your favourite authors as a child and who are you into now?
I really liked Judy Blume and Lois Lowry. Currently I’m really into Anne Tyler, who wrote The Accidental Tourist. John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany is probably my favourite book right now.