So Christina stopped driving herself wacko and started actually not thinking about Burn at all, even though he was in so many of her classes. After all, she had tons of friends in every class, so she never actually had a free minute to talk to him or even be in a position where he could talk to her, which was fine as far as she was concerned. Except that the Mexican cultural chapter was, in fact, on the quiz, and when they got them back a week later, she saw that she got a 94 and felt just fine, but then he tapped her on the shoulder, and when she turned, she noticed his grade, which was 100, even though every word had to be in Spanish and Señorita Sanchez was unforgiving when it came to using the correct tense and spelling and even accents. Burn said he noticed that she didn’t get the Mexican cultural questions right, and did she somehow forget that he told her it was going to be on the quiz?
And that was the way it pretty much was, with them not saying anything to each other for weeks on end, and then one question, one answer, then back to not saying anything at all. Which took them through October and no more issues with destiny, at least until Halloween, when Kelly had one of what would become her famous parties, the ones where her parents went to sleep early, leaving kids to come and go totally unsupervised, which also allowed kids from other grades to show up with bottles of bottled water that wasn’t bottled water at all.
I remembered this particular party, at least the first half of it. The second half was mostly a haze of beer pong and vodka shots. I didn’t even remember that Christina was there. Or Burn, who hardly ever went to parties.
But there she was, according to her, in her Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz costume, or so she remembered, and Burn, who was working on getting drunk, was there with Paige, who was already drunker than drunk. And Burn bumped into her, Christina, seemingly by accident, but nothing with Burn was ever an accident, and he said, “Sorry,” and she said, “It’s OK,” and he said, “Not about bumping into you, I couldn’t help bumping into you. Sorry that I was such an asshole the first week of school,” and she said, “It’s OK,” and then they were done, so she figured that they wouldn’t talk again until maybe Christmas based on their pattern.
Except that when she got into class on Monday, there was a note waiting for her, which she opened and read even though Ms. Reynolds was watching. What the note said was “Can we start over?” and she wrote back “Why?” and he sent her back a note that said:
“Because you matter. And I can make you a better singer.”
She read his note in the bathroom, in the privacy of a stall, at lunch between classes, and she prepared a note to give him back during American history, which simply said, “How?” His note back to her, which intrigued her, said:
“Because your voice is so absolutely incredible that songs should be made just for it, songs that are sung so loudly and clearly that it would break mirrors with its absolute brilliance. And because I hear things differently than everyone else you have ever sung for.”
So even though she had been to the best vocal coaches in Manhattan, and even though she only took advice from professionals, practicing her breathing exercises every day and working tirelessly on songs from Broadway to Madonna to Kelly Clarkson and Alicia Keys and other singers like Karen Carpenter and Dusty Springfield and Aretha Franklin and Joni Mitchell and Patti LuPone and Patti LaBelle because she wanted her voice to be that good, and even though so many people had told her that it was, or could be, as in that good, she still didn’t believe it, not deep down where it mattered, and until she believed it she knew that she could never be that good. And what she also knew was that even though she didn’t believe she could be that good, Burn believed that she could be that good.
So she said, “OK, teach me what you know.”
So they started to spend time together, after school, on weekends, going to movies, going into the city to see musicals, going to concerts, and she always felt a little uncomfortable with him, partially because she knew that he still believed in the whole destiny thing, but mostly because, when it came down to it, he looked at her differently than any kid, or for that matter, any adult, had ever looked at her before. With eyes that seemed to love and question at the same time, at least that was how she interpreted the look he was always giving her. Like, when she was sitting in a show and watching the performers, and knowing at the same time that he was watching her, never the stage, that he didn’t care at all about the performers. All that mattered to him was her and how she experienced things.
There was also something very old about him, which she sensed. Almost nothing teenage at all. He was, for one thing, so serious about everything that she frequently needed a break from him. But, despite his shortcomings, he was, in fact, teaching her something about singing that no one had ever taught her before. He was not teaching her how to sing. He didn’t know anything at all about technique, about breathing, about anticipating a note or a phrase.
What he knew was how to get “inside” a song and how to turn it into something that mattered in your own life. Like take just one song and really put yourself into it. Not just the words but, more importantly, the melody. Every note, he told her, actually matters. Every note was a second that would be lost unless you totally experienced it with every part of your being.
And she sang for him, giving him everything she learned from the best songs that she did, and he just listened, sitting back, as if taking notes in his head. And then he made her sing again, this time twice as slow, next time the same thing except with raging anger, next time with frustration, and then finally he made her sing the same song with no words at all, just concentrate on the notes, he told her. What he said was that you had to be naked, stripped of everything but your essence if you were going to get it right. It was just you and the sound.
And even if she didn’t completely understand him, she sensed that everything he told her, he told her because he believed that he could make her better. And he seemed not to doubt himself at all, so self-assured about what he heard, that when they managed to sneak into the empty auditorium of the high school one afternoon, she stood at the edge of the stage and he went to the back row, and she finally and completely stripped herself of everything but the sound, listening to herself for the first time as if she was in the back row with him and her voice came from another place, from another person she didn’t know or even recognize for a second.
And it was absolutely incredible, which brought tears to her eyes because she realized that for the very first time, she heard herself the way he heard her, and because when she was in the zone she could move him to tears. His eyes were always welling up with tears, and he would let them flow freely, without embarrassment, which of course was at first completely uncomfortable for her, but then finally, finally, after working with him for so many months, she completely understood.
What’s more, her vocal coach noticed, not only noticed, but complimented her practically to the point of exaltation, and asked what had changed, because there was suddenly something more mature about her, as he put it, something that he considered to be unteachable. A sense of timelessness that few singers, even the greatest ones, ever get to.
And so he asked, what made her change? And she wouldn’t tell, not because she was afraid to give David credit, but because a selfish part of her wanted to keep the credit for herself.
And not only her vocal coach, but Mr. Morris, who conducted the chorus and was in charge of the musical productions at school, and then even other kids who heard her sing, and even her parents.
They all knew. Something was different.
She was actually, finally, really that good.
And months went by, into the spring of sophomore year, and they, she and Burn, continued to spend time together. At first he hardly talked about himself, but then he talked incessantly, about his aunt and living at her house; about school and being a genius, or at least being radically different from everyone else; about being bipolar, which he didn’t believe he was for a minute, but was labeled anyways; abou
t medications and how none of them worked; about marijuana and cocaine and ecstasy and all of the other things he tried; about his research on the internet about virtually everything; about the kids in our grade and the juniors and seniors; about Roxanne, who was always getting into trouble with her mom for her adventurousness, and sometimes stayed out for weeks without coming home, which worried him especially after the suicide attempt; about the people he met through Roxanne; about his mom and her problems and her New Age philosophies and all the self-help books she was always reading; and then, finally, about living in the shadow of the memory of the World Trade Center, remembering how his father took him there as a kid, remembering how incredibly big the towers were and how the wind between the buildings practically lifted him skyward the first time he visited his dad at work, remembering how proud he was of his father as he sat in his father’s chair and looked across the huge office out at the world outside and the convergence of rivers.
He remembered pressing his nose against the window in his father’s office on the eighty-somethingth floor, feeling the extreme cold when he made contact with the glass, staring down at the miniature people and the insignificant reality that everyone below was living, and he remembered thinking how his father must have been some kind of god with the power over life and death if he spent so much of his time at work so close to the heavens. And then, 9/11 and nothing, not a chance to say good-bye. And his last memory of his father, the one that lingered in his mind, that kept him going, was an end-of-summer barbecue on that Sunday before the Tuesday that was 9/11. Remembering how he spilled the pitcher of ice tea and his mother was all over him for that, but not his father, working the grill and turning the hot dogs with a practiced perfection like he did for so many summer Sundays before then and everyone expected he would do for all those summer Sundays to come. Don’t worry about the tea, we can always make another pitcher; we can’t always make another boy, honey. Or something like that.
And then into the blackness and the smoke. Where was my dad in all that rubble? Somehow he must have made it out.
He must have.
He must have.
He must have.
But there was no word, no sign, no signal from other worlds that might be but probably were not, that life on this planet was anything more than simple, inconsequential short-term existence, no spirit in the sky that you became a part of or could communicate back from, because if there was, his father would have found a way.
Again, maybe it was the magic of Jacob’s Gold making me more observant, or maybe Christina was feeling the effects of it too, though she had only taken a few hits, but in describing for me what Burn had described to her a few years before our time together on her uncle’s couch, in the middle of the woods, in the middle of the night, in the middle of another summer, Christina Haines totally and completely morphed into David Burnett, as in totally surrendering to his mannerisms, his speech patterns, the way he talked, and even the tone of his voice. It was spooky, in a way, and it made me realize what an incredible actress she actually was or was going to be.
She continued with her Burn impression, explaining that there were times of overwhelming grief, followed by times of overwhelming sadness, but mostly there was overwhelming anger at that fact that he and Roxanne and his mom were the real living victims of terrorism. And he learned soon enough, at least in his fragile but genius mind, that the real culprits were not the Osama bin Ladens of the world, but the U.S. military-industrial complex, whatever that was. Whatever it was, according to Burn, it was responsible for the destruction of the Twin Towers and for U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq. Guys like Cheney and Rumsfeld and other members of the Bush administration were responsible, and Burn said he was going to prove it one day.
The point, she explained to me, was that Burn was consumed with every theory on 9/11 and had an extensive database of everything ever written on the subject, which I already knew from Roxanne.
Which led me to get Christina back into focusing on her relationship with Burn, and so I asked were they hooking up at that time. She said that for months Burn never even tried, not while he was working with her on her music, but by spring, when all he could talk about was his 9/11 theories, he started in with her, and she kind of felt obligated to comply, as in making out and not much more, which he didn’t seem to mind at all. But then one day they were at a party, and I was there and apparently I was doing my thing, which of course was to get totally shitfaced, and Burn noticed the way she was noticing me, which got him all kinds of jealous, and apparently that was when he told her that we, he and I, were “connected” in some cosmic way, and it didn’t surprise him that she had feelings for me, because the three of us were connected in a way that he didn’t exactly understand yet.
Except that, after seeing how his girlfriend, the person he considered to be his girlfriend, was interested in someone else, he tried to close the deal with her, as in bringing it to the next level the next time they were alone, and she had to tell him, “David, I don’t like you like that,” and he said, “You mean the way you like Crash,” and she said, “Steven has nothing to do with it,” and he said, “Then how do you like me?” and she said, “As a friend.” And he shook his head, kept shaking his head like he was listening to some kind of music that only he could hear, and he did this for a while, finally repeating “as a friend . . .”
And that was it.
He stopped calling, stopped returning her calls, stopped responding to instant messages, stopped coming over or making plans.
He just moved on to something else, whatever that was, and sure she was sad, but in a way it made sense, because he would never be more than a friend to her, and that would never be good enough for him, because, as he said, she was his destiny, but he wasn’t hers.
And so ended sophomore year for her, and she didn’t want to talk about the problems that she had with him junior year. She confessed that she hated it when other people used the word “abduction” after the Massachusetts incident, because even though she wasn’t a willing participant, she never actually felt that her life was in danger. He never actually threatened her; he just refused to take her home.
Still, she said, it could have been different if I hadn’t showed up to save her.
She leaned over and kissed me, in a completely nonsexual way, but in a way that reminded me of our connection and my willingness to risk my life for her, which, despite everything else I may have thought until that moment, was evidence that maybe I had feelings for this girl, no matter what I pretended or even told myself at any given moment.
So maybe I did deserve to be there with her.
And literally minutes after finishing the story, she was sound asleep. But not me, as I was still wired from the food, the weed, and the sex and having already had a major nap. So I started flipping the channels and retorching my bowl. Another chunk of Jacob’s Gold, burning it nice and easy, taking slow, unhurried hits, flipping through infomercials and an old Chappelle’s Show on Comedy Central. Next some real old black-and-white movie, and then Pete’s favorite horror movie of all time, Cabin Fever, and the scene where the girl shaves her legs and chunks of flesh come off. And being as we were in a cabin in the middle of the woods and I was flying high, I thought it best to switch to something more upbeat, and sure enough, I found Happy Feet, which I watched but was still feeling too cold to handle, still kind of shivering from the hot tub, cold nap, and then . . .
Pop.
Then . . .
Total darkness.
The lights went out, the cable went out, the electricity stopped buzzing, and we were plunged into total and complete blackness.
And silence.
Now, I was suddenly seeing absolutely nothing, and hearing only the sound of Christina’s rhythmic breathing, which normally would have sounded relaxing. Except that on top of that sound, I could hear, and feel, my own heart pumping, as on those rare occasions when you oversmoked, too many bong hits on kush, and you start wondering if
somehow you finally went over the line, and your mind starts zipping past funny and relaxed and totally chill and somehow gets to Paranoia City. I have had this like two or three times in the past and have witnessed my friends go through it, so I know that when you start actually feeling your heart, it is not a good thing at all.
And, as bad as that typically is, I just learned that it is like a million, no a billion times worse when you are doing this in total and complete darkness.
“Stay calm, Crash.”
I may have said this out loud. A part of me desperately needed to hear my own voice to make sure I was still OK.
I know that sounds fucked up, but you had to be there.
Then I waited, because I knew from experience that the heartbeat/breathing/panic thing would lift, as it always does. Only the more I waited, the more freaked out I was getting.
It occurred to me, just for a fleeting instant . . . what if I was actually dead? What if this is what it felt like to be dead?
So I got up and started pacing the room. Then I blindly crawled up the steps and found my way into the bedroom, to the sliding glass doors that led to the deck that led to the hot tub, and I stepped outside.
I looked out into the vast darkness and could see no other lights anywhere. Except for the incredible night sky. And I could feel that I was just a speck, on a speck of the planet, in a speck of the solar system, in a speck of a galaxy, which made me think that I was thinking just like Burn would have thought if he had stepped out of the darkness onto the deck that night instead of me, and maybe if things hadn’t happened the way they did, it would have been him, not me, standing there on this particular night, having christened Christina as in being the first one for her.
It would have seemed the logical progression of things for him to be her first, and I had to wonder, did I somehow, several months ago, by saving the school and keeping him from killing himself and others, alter the course of the future?
Crash and Burn Page 28