Where the Stars Still Shine

by Trish Doller

  Obsolete desktop computer models sit beside newer laptops, but as I scan the shelves I don’t see mine. A man comes into the aisle. He’s older, his hair graying at the temples, and he’s liberally doused in the same cologne Frank put on in the morning. By the time he came to my room at night, it was faded and sour, but I remember the way the new scent would linger in the bathroom after he went to work. The memory brings an itch to my feet and I think about leaving. But this man is wearing a polo shirt with the name of the shop stitched on the chest.

  “Need help?”

  “I, um—I’m looking for a specific laptop.” There’s a tremble in my voice as my heart struggles to calm itself down. “One that would have been brought in about a week ago by a woman with short super-blond hair and”—I gesture at my mouth—“really red lipstick. It’s, um, white—”

  “I remember.” He nods. “Sold it. That model always goes quick.”

  I’m not surprised the laptop is already gone, but I can’t stop the sinking feeling I get. Greg doesn’t spend much time in the Airstream, but every time he comes out for a little visit, I worry this will be the time he notices the computer is missing. I can’t hide it forever. “Could I, um—can I give you a number to call if you get another one?”

  The man gives me the “wait a minute” sign with his index finger. “Hang on.”

  He goes into the back, leaving me alone with the lingering and unsettling scent of his cologne. Five minutes later, he returns with a white laptop that from the outside looks the same as mine.

  “This one’s newer.” He opens the lid. The keyboard is identical, but the track pad doesn’t have a button along the bottom the way mine did. Still, it’s close enough that Greg might not notice. He’d have to sit down to use it to see the difference. “Just came in last night.”

  “How much?”

  “Two-fifty.”

  I press the power button to boot up the computer. The pawnbroker just stands there, and though I don’t look at him, I can feel him watching me. I don’t like it, but I think he’s keeping an eye on his merchandise, rather than on my merchandise. The laptop comes to life with a familiar chime. I open all the programs and type out a few nonsense sentences to test the keys: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Help, I’m a genie trapped inside this computer! Set me free and I’ll grant you three wishes!

  That last one makes him chuckle a little.

  I turn off the computer. “Would you take one hundred?”

  “Two-fifty. Firm.”

  Two hundred and fifty dollars means I won’t have much to spend on Christmas presents, but Mom didn’t leave me much choice. I hand over the cash and he gives me the laptop, the power cord, and a dirty pink neoprene carrying case that I throw in the trash on my way out of the store. Then I feel bad for tossing away a carrying case just because it was dirty. Who have I become that castoffs aren’t good enough for me? I go back to fish it out of the trash, but the pawnbroker is watching, which makes me feel suspicious and stupid, and the broken door chime keeps going off every time I open the door. Finally, with my face as pink with embarrassment as that dirty old laptop case, I just leave.

  It’s still early and I have no other plans, so I stash my new computer in the wire basket attached to my bike and ride to the bookstore. The breeze cools both my cheeks and the irritation I’m feeling toward my mom.

  The chalkboard sign outside the bookstore is empty, and I’m greeted by angry, bone-rattling bass as I open the door. The throw pillows on the couch spell SUCK IT, and Ariel is standing on a stepladder, shelving books in a new section called asses for the masses. Most of the books in the section are legal thrillers and mysteries by stratospherically famous authors, so the implication is not lost on me. I’m not sure it’s a statement she should be making when she’s trying to sell these books to customers. Then again, I’m the only one in the store.

  “Hey!” She has to shout over the music as she hops off the stepladder. She leans over the checkout counter to lower the volume. “Need any help?”

  I shake my head. “I’m just kind of looking.”

  “Did you bring your application?”

  “What?”

  “I saw you take one the last time you were here,” she says. “Are you going to apply for the job?”

  “I don’t know.” A sigh escapes me. “I mean, I have a job right now with a family business—”

  “God, I know how that works.” Ariel hoists herself onto the counter, the zipper tabs on her green plaid bondage pants rattling against the wood. Her black T-shirt looks like it got caught in a shredder, but she pulls off the look. “My mom owns this place and I worked here through high school. Then I went away to college and I thought I’d escaped Tarpon Springs forever, and yet”—she lifts her arms like a TV game-show model—“here I am.”

  She wants to escape. Alex wants to escape. I wonder if I’d lived in this town my whole life if I’d feel that way, too, instead of being the girl who wants to stop moving and just stay in one place for a while.

  Ariel spins the artsy postcard display, making it wobble and squeak. “I need to get the hell out of here.”

  “Would your mom be upset if you left?” I don’t think Theo would mind if I quit, but family is important to Greg. He might be disappointed. Yiayoúla, too. And I think Kat wouldn’t understand at all. But, really, the only thing the gift shop has going for it is its proximity to Alex.

  “Well, I think she’s like any mom. She’d probably keep me forever, if she could.” Ariel laughs. “But I think she’ll be relieved to have her shop back to normal.”

  “Why does she let you do all this?”

  She shrugs. “It’s kind of our thing. I work for cheap and she leaves me alone to do what I want. But when I’m bored, this is the result.”

  “Well …” I look around at the handmade signs. They’re a nice touch and I think Ariel has the right idea—just not the best execution. “I think it’s funny, but I can see how customers might be insulted by the suggestion that their favorite books suck.”

  “Oh, I’m fully aware,” she says. “What my mom needs is someone who is invested, who will keep her from turning it into a haven for little old ladies who read bodice-ripper romances, but isn’t, you know, me. Someone like … you.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “You just strike me as a book girl.”

  “A book girl?”

  “The last time you were here, you looked for the books you wanted instead of whining about not being able to find them, the way most customers do.” She lowers herself off the counter. “I’m Ariel, by the way.”

  “From The Tempest?”

  “Thank you. God, just—you have no idea how many people assume I’m named after The Little Mermaid. What the hell was my mom thinking?”

  “It could be worse,” I say. “She could have called you Dogberry or Elbow.”

  “You know your Shakespeare.” She smiles. “I like that.”

  “I’m Callista.” I try out my full name, but then change my mind. “Callie.”

  “Nice to meet you,” she says. “Anyway, think about the job, okay? I’ve got a good vibe about you, Callie, and I believe in vibes.”

  I allow myself to imagine working here. Rearranging the pillows into kinder words, making the sections more user-friendly, and playing music that isn’t quite so—loud. I can picture girls like Kat lounging on the couch, drinking coffee and talking. Or girls like me, tucked in the corner with a book. “I will.”

  “Take your time.” Ariel walks back over to her step-ladder and the pile of books perched on top, waiting to be shelved. “I’ve scared off everyone else who has applied because they’re just not right for the job. When you’re ready, it’ll be here.”

  After setting my new computer to my preferences, I spend the next couple of hours choosing a small stack of books. A couple I’ve read, but have always wanted to own. A couple more are books I’ve never read. And one is
a book on architecture for Greg for Christmas. Ariel raises a judgmental eyebrow at Hiaasen.

  “My, um, this guy I’m—” I trip over my tongue describing Alex as my boyfriend. I mean, he is. I think. But it feels strange talking to someone else about him. “He reads these and—you shouldn’t judge.”

  She laughs as she enters the price of the paperback novel into the cash register. “I didn’t say anything.”

  “He likes other stuff, too.” I don’t know why I feel the need to defend him—or myself—to her, but I do. “He mostly reads Thoreau.”

  “Sweet baby Jesus, you’re not talking about the Walden tattoo guy, are you?” Ariel slides her hand down her forearm from elbow to wrist—the exact location of Alex’s tattoo. “He buys books here all the time and, yeah, that guy can read anything he wants. Are you and him …?” The words taper off into empty space as my cheeks catch fire.

  “Well, it’s still kind of new and he’s gone most of the time, but, um—I guess we are.”

  She grins. “Not gonna lie. I’ve been secretly hoping he’ll use a credit card so I can find out his name, but he always pays in cash.”

  “His name is Alexandros. Alex.”

  “Of course it is.” She begins bagging up my purchases. “I mean, what other kind of name would a Greek god have? And you, Callista … the two of you should just get married and have beautiful demigod babies and—”

  “Demigods have one human parent.”

  Ariel reaches across the checkout counter and pushes her fingers against my forehead. “Shut up, egghead. You’re spoiling my story.”

  I can’t help but laugh. “What are you? Twelve?”

  “We don’t get many guys in this store, let alone hot ones,” she says. “So this is a big deal for me. Anyway, he looks like the kind of guy who could be a total dick, but he’s always really polite. And quiet. And please tell me he’s a good kisser.”

  I nod. “So good.”

  “I hate you.” She hands over the bag of books and my receipt. “Get out of here and don’t come back until you’re ready to take the job. Got it?”

  “See you later, Dogberry.”

  There’s a short stick of white chalk lying on the top of the sign outside the store, so I use it to write on the empty sandwich board a Zen quote I remember from a book: Leap and the net will appear.

  I mean it for Ariel, but I hope—I so hope—that it’s true.

  The moon—which was full and bright on the night of my sponge lessons in the gas-station parking lot—is absent, and the dark seems so much darker than usual as I ride to the house on Chesapeake. The breeze seeps through my sweatshirt, making me shiver. It bothers me that I’m sneaking out in the middle of the night again—that all I ever seem to do is sneak—but if Mom is at the house I can talk to her. Make sure she won’t be there when Greg and I arrive.

  I leave my bike by the street and go the rest of the way on foot, crossing the scrubby grass and sand lot to the house. The differences are marked from the last time I was here. The windows have been installed, and as I climb the steps to the new front door, I wonder if Mom could even get inside. Of course, this is my mother. She’s developed a knack for getting inside locked places.

  The front door is secure, but one of the sliding glass doors facing the bayou is not.

  “Mom?” My voice bounces through the empty house and I slide off my flip-flops to silence the echo of my steps. I switch on the flashlight I found in Phoebe’s kitchen junk drawer and slide the beam around the room. The skeleton frame of walls has been covered with dry-wall and the concrete floor covered with a rich brown wood. An L-shaped counter marks the boundary of the new kitchen and I can picture Phoebe preparing dinner there, looking up from time to time to admire the water or check on the boys.

  The stairs to the second floor are finished with a handrail in the same wood, but with modern-looking stainless-steel balustrades. Like downstairs, the walls are hung, and the dormer overlooking the front of the lot is finished and wide enough for Greg’s drawing table. I enter my room—my room—and the big hole in the outside wall is gone. In its place is a window seat with a set of French doors leading out onto the balcony. And around the window seat is the built-in bookcase he promised. Lying on one of the shelves is a hardcover copy of Mandy. I pin the flashlight beneath my chin, pick up the book, and open the cover. Inside is a note from Greg:

  Callie,

  I can’t give you a shell cottage of your own, but I hope this will do.

  Love,

  Dad

  My eyes fill with tears as I tuck the note back into the book and place it on the shelf, hopefully in the same spot he left it. Clearly I was not meant to see this until tomorrow. Sadness and joy tangle in my heart as I make my way back downstairs. I want this house. This room. This family. But the price is my mom, and I’m not sure I’m prepared to pay it.

  When I reach the bottom of the steps, the orange glow of a lit cigarette cuts through the dark house, and I catch my mother in the beam of the flashlight. “Mom, you can’t smoke in here.”

  “Look at you,” she says, as I swipe cooled ashes into my hand from where she’s tapped them onto the kitchen counter, and carry them out to the back deck. “Just a regular little daddy’s girl now, aren’t you?” The amusement in her voice follows me and I hate it.

  “No one is supposed to know you’ve been here.” My hands are dusty with ash when I come back inside. I wipe the residue on my jeans. “Why do you have to trash it?”

  “You know, I find it interesting that you care so much about a place that’s not your home.” She sends a deliberate breath of smoke into the air and I can hardly stand the smell of it anymore. “Or, maybe you’d rather stay here with him. Is that what you’re saying?”

  “No, of course not.” I answer too quickly and I worry that it’s a lie. That she’s seen the book upstairs. “Greg has been kind, Mom, and it’s just—he’s excited about showing me the house. So stay away tomorrow until we’re gone, okay? Please?”

  She doesn’t even acknowledge the request. She leaves me standing in the dark uncomfortable silence until the only thing that feels right is to leave. And I’m no more certain about what will happen tomorrow than I was when I arrived.

  Chapter 17

  “You doing okay, Cal?”

  Greg catches me picking at the pepperoni on my slice of pizza, my stomach so knotted by worry that we’ll arrive at the house and find Mom there that I can barely eat. I want to enjoy this father-daughter moment, but instead I tell him a half-truth to cover the reality. “Just really excited.”

  I am looking forward to seeing the renovations with him, and I can’t wait for him to give me the book he thinks will be a surprise. But … there’s always a chance of “but” when my mother is involved.

  Greg’s enthusiasm is almost too big for his body to contain. At this moment, I can see heredity in play. He’s just like Tucker. “We can go now,” he says. “If you want.”

  We bike from the pizza place to the house on Chesapeake and enter through the front door. In daylight it’s even prettier than in the dark, and the weathered gray shingles, even though they’re new, keep the house looking like the one that’s been standing in the same spot for decades. As we kick off our shoes in the front hall, there’s no evidence my mom’s even been here.

  “So the choice is yours,” Greg says, as we make our way toward the great room and the stairs to the second floor. “We can do the whole house tour first and save your room for last. Or start with your room.”

  I’m on the lookout for stubbed-out cigarettes or crumpled fast-food bags—classic signs of Mom—but relax when there’s not even a sign of leftover ash on the kitchen counter. “My bedroom, definitely.”

  Following him up the stairs, I feel my own excitement build inside me like the fizz in a soda can, even though I’ve already seen his surprise.

  “Ready?” He opens the door—

  —and I see it.

  The hardcover shell of the book is lying
open in the middle of the floor with all the pages torn out and scattered around the room. Along the spine of the book, nothing but ragged little page stumps remain, and the thought of Mom, here in this room, deliberately destroying a book that was meant for me, hurts as badly as anything I can remember.

  “What the hell—?” Greg goes into the room and squats down to pick up the pages as I stand rooted in the doorway, my hand clamped over my mouth, fighting to hold in the secrets clawing their way up my throat.

  He looks over his shoulder at me, his dark eyes so sad. He knows. Of course he knows. Who else would do such a thing? “What, um—” He clears his throat. “Do you know anything about this, Callie?”

  Anger throbs under my skin like a pulse. I could tell him the truth. We could find her. Turn her over to the police. But it’s just a book. She could have broken all the windows or damaged something that might have hurt Tucker or Joe instead of just me. I shake my head and swallow all the words but one. “No.”

  A tear tracks down my face. I pretend it’s not there as he asks again. “Are you sure?”

  I nod. “I’m sure.”

  “This was supposed to be for you.” He tucks all the torn pages back into the cover and stands. “So you would know—the only thing I’ve ever wanted is for you to feel at home.”

  “I do.” He doesn’t know I’ve seen his note.

  His face shows everything as he looks at me for a long time. The uneasy shift of his jaw, the lingering sadness in his eyes, the confusion of his eyebrows as they pull together … there’s so much more he wants to say as we stand here in deadlock. The tear seeps into the corner of my mouth and I swear I can taste the sorrow.

  “Do you?” Greg places the ruined book on the window seat and crosses the room.