A Girl Named Digit

by Annabel Monaghan

  That first day of school lasted forever. I had lunch in my math teacher’s room, assuring her that I was fine and blowing through some tests that I’d missed. I was grateful that they were making me finish all the work I’d missed. And then I’d have AP exams and finals to kill the next few weeks. My mind seemed to offer a break for my heart. Letting my mind do that computing thing kept me afloat. It was so natural and so involuntary, it seemed to happen without me. Anything that required any effort at all, however, eventually required me to use my will. And my will to do things was gone.

  In the weeks that followed, things were really different between me and the Fab Four. First of all, I found that there was nothing I could do to get them to dump me. I told them I wasn’t really interested in drinking as a sport. I told them I wanted to stay home Friday night to watch Cosmos on PBS. I told them my SAT scores. I told them about MIT. I was completely in their face with Digit, and they were unfettered. I wondered if they’d been true friends all along. Or if my cachet as Party Girl was nothing compared to my status as Kidnapping Victim. I’d gotten them on TV, for God’s sake.

  The second change was me. I saw them now from the perspective of someone who had watched Olive save the lives of hundreds of people through her knowledge of science. What else was possible? Kat’s sarcastic comments suddenly had humor to them. Veronica was still no genius, but she seemed softer and sweet. I found out that Tish took classes at the Santa Monica Arts Center and was really into sculpting. Where had I been?

  My days were busy with normal stuff like school and homework. But when that wasn’t enough to fill the time, I found myself diving into the less healthy side of Digit. I made a habit of taking everything out of the linen closet—and I mean everything: flat sheets, fitted sheets, hand towels, bath towels—and ironing them into perfect nine-inch squares. The shelves in the closet were thirty-two inches wide, so I was able to place three stacks on each shelf, perfectly equidistant, with one and one-quarter inches separating them from each other and the walls. Temporary relief.

  My nights were brutal. I alternated between staring at the ceiling and staring out my window, torturing myself by replaying every moment: the days in the warehouse, laughing at Luke and Scarlet, the flight to New York, the cramped secret townhouse entrance, the first kiss, the one and only phone conversation, the end. I wanted to tell myself that it didn’t make sense, that it’d been a mistake, and that he’d be back. But I was fully committed to being honest, even with myself. I had known he had a tendency to shut down and go robot. Even his dad had seen this coming and had tried to warn me. If all of his girlfriends had told him he was emotionally unavailable, why was I going to be any different? Could someone get me Oprah’s number?

  On the one-month anniversary of my broken heart, I had a little knock on my door at around two a.m. Danny walked in, rubbing his eyes, and sat down on the side of my bed. “Man, Digit, you were hit pretty hard. Think you’ll ever sleep again? I can hear you in here every night, in bed, out of bed, in the bathroom, back in bed. It’s exhausting.”

  I smiled at his concern. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen this movie before. Is it going to be a week and I’ll wake up okay, or will it be a lifetime of regret and a house full of cats? I have no idea.”

  “I liked him. I don’t now, of course, don’t get me wrong. But I thought he was cool and sort of genuine, in an old dude sort of way.”

  “I guess he was, until he wasn’t.”

  “I don’t get that, Dig. But what I know is that you are a cool girl. I’ve thought you were cool ever since you put my Hot Wheels Volcano together on Christmas Day when no one else wanted to. I mean, you saved all those people at Disney World, all those kids. I don’t think you really see how important you are, and I don’t just mean since that guy dumped you. I mean ever.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. He was painting a picture of me that was so far from the victim I felt like.

  “Don’t get me wrong—I wouldn’t want to be like you. It makes me tired just thinking about it. But it’s like you observe the world from a slightly different angle than everyone else. And it makes you really powerful. I guess I just wish you could find a way to let that make you happy.”

  “Jeez, Danny. That’s deep. Where are you getting all this?”

  “It’s the ka-ra-te. Powerful stuff, Digit. Powerful stuff.”

  I laughed and gave him a hug. I’d envied that kid for so long—it was like he was born at Disneyland with a FASTPASS in his hand. It made me feel good that he admired me and all the crazy things that made me different. We could probably learn a lot from each other. He left and shut the door. I saw the bumper sticker that read GOD BLESS THE WHOLE WORLD. NO EXCEPTIONS. Nice.

  After a few weeks, I asked my dad if I could come to UCLA after school. He had never let me before, saying I needed to do normal kid things while I could. Now he realized that normal was not an option, that I wasn’t going to come home and announce that I’d joined the cheerleading squad. He seemed happy that there was something I wanted to do, anything, so he agreed. He put me in a “Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos” seminar and let me work on the assignments and take the tests. It helped.

  As I lay in my bed on night forty-three of my imprisonment in hell, I realized that the fact that it was over wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was that I had been so wrong. I had become my truest most authentic self; I had listened to my instincts and followed them completely. I had opened up and jumped in . . . and I had been completely wrong. That was the piece that was going to take the longest to heal. I’m sure that replaying that week in my mind, dissecting it like it was a Faulkner novel, wasn’t helping. Intellectually, I could go back and see where I might have been smarter to keep my guard up, where he was showing me that he wasn’t going to stick around. But whenever I fell asleep, I was always remembering that feeling I had when I was within reaching distance of him, and I was baffled to think he hadn’t felt it too.

  Love Your Mother

  A week before graduation, my grandparents (both sets) arrived from Seattle and Denver. Luckily, the news of my kidnapping had never made it out of state, so there was no dramatic reunion. My house was such a frenzy of activity that no one had any patience for my sulking. That was probably just what I needed. Six weeks had passed. I’d heard nothing from John and didn’t even know where he was. It was over.

  My parents planned a huge graduation party. I’m sure it was a lot more extravagant than it would have been if they hadn’t been so worried about me. I woke up on the morning of my graduation to a house full of hot pink peonies. My mom had gone to the flower mart at five a.m. to get them and had arranged them in vases around the house and on small tables in the yard. I smiled when I saw them and then saw her watching me with tears in her eyes. She looked so tired.

  “Mom, this is so beautiful. Are you okay? I’m not leaving until August . . .”

  “I’m fine. It’s just that I hadn’t seen you smile in so long. I’ve just been so worried about you.” She grabbed me and hugged me like I’d been away at war. And I guess I had.

  “I’m going to be okay, and I’m sorry that you and Dad have had to go through all of this.” I wiped a tear from her face. “But I hope you didn’t want grandchildren because I guarantee I will never be involved with another man—I think they’re all terrorists.” She gave me a little smile. “I’m going to be okay.”

  We laughed and hugged a little and then walked around looking at all the party preparations. The doorbell rang, and I went to get it. “Jeez, Mom. More flowers?” I said as I came back into the kitchen. I was holding a small bouquet of baby roses in a square glass vase. They were all shades of white and the palest pink.

  “I didn’t order those,” she said. And then our eyes met, and she grabbed the vase as I started to lose my grip. I couldn’t move.

  “Please open the card, Mom. I can’t do it.” My heart was pounding so fast that I had to steady myself against the kitchen counter.

  “‘Congratul
ations to a most outstanding girl. Henry Bennett.’ Oh. That was thoughtful,” she said.

  Disappointment threatened to pull me under again. I knew he meant well, but it was sort of like pulling off a scab that had just started to heal. “It’s just so sad, Mom. We really knew each other; it’s not like it was just some mad crush. Everything about us together was so right, like we’d been waiting for each other or something. And to have him just leave without a thought makes me think I was crazy.”

  “You were not crazy, darling. I saw it too. I never saw you as at ease with another person. And the way he looked at you . . . Well, this isn’t helping. But I cannot get onboard with Henry and call him an idiot and a coward, because I think he is neither. I think he cares about you a great deal, but I think he cares about his career more.”

  “Great.” That wasn’t exactly what I wanted to hear.

  “I know a lot about people, Farrah. And I know that men that age can feel inadequate and fearful about their future. It’s as if they have to get themselves to a certain place before they feel worthy of that big relationship. They don’t understand that on their own they have enough to offer.”

  I nodded in agreement. “I know that’s true. But his dad did it—he risked his career to be with Mrs. Bennett, and it all worked out. And I mean, it’s not like I wanted the guy to buy me a house and get me pregnant. I just wanted to watch a movie and eat pizza with him and see where it went.”

  “I get the feeling he’s not a let’s-see-where-it-goes kind of person. Which is too bad, because life’s best experiences usually happen when you’re making other plans.” She walked over and put her arm around me. “You’ll get through this. You’re brilliant and seventeen, two of the best things you can be. Now let’s get you into that putrid gown and get going.”

  The Truly Educated Never Graduate

  My graduation started at 11:30 on what had to be the hottest day of the year. There were 790 kids sitting up on a stage melting in black polyester caps and gowns. Our principal spoke; we sang; our valedictorian spoke; we sang; some woman who had started with nothing and hit it big spoke; we sang. There were sixteen awards, and I won four. Thank God, because the only relief I got from the heat was the breeze up my gown when I walked across the stage to receive an award and shake hands with the principal. I was a little dizzy looking out into the crowd. My parents and all four grandparents were in the twenty-fourth row toward the aisle. I imagined my parents older and squinted to morph their parents’ faces over theirs. This wasn’t hard to do with the sweat dripping down into my eyes. I imagined that the guy standing behind the last row of chairs, who must have been sweltering in that suit, was John. That he’d helicoptered in from points unknown to be here today, to tell me he was an idiot and a coward. And that I’d been right about us.

  Then I imagined he was looking right at me, raising his left hand in a little wave. Kids were passing wet washcloths around to cool us down. One came my way, and I wiped my face temporarily cool. I looked out again. I raised my hand slowly to give a low wave back, just to see if I was crazy. He waved again, and I saw a small sad smile. I was going to need some Gatorade and some professional help.

  Mercifully, we processed off the makeshift graduation stage into the air-conditioned gym for cold drinks. I dumped my gown in the collection bin and went to find my family. My grandparents had had all they could take of the heat and went to meet us at the house. My parents congratulated me about a thousand times as I scanned the crowd for this ghost I’d imagined.

  “Honey, are you okay?” My dad had his arm around me as he led me to the car.

  “I’m fine, great. Just hot and maybe going a little crazy. Let’s get going so we can beat our party guests home.”

  Danny said, “By the time we get home, Nana will have the house cooled down to about fifty-nine degrees. You’ll be begging to be back in your toasty polyester gown.” I paused for a minute in the parking lot, waiting to see a figure in a dark suit approach. The crowds broke up—moms, dads, little kids, old people fanning themselves. No prince. No white horse.

  In the car, my mom read the inscriptions on all of my awards. My dad wondered aloud at how long it would take to get to the dorms at MIT from our front door, including getting in the car, driving to the airport, waiting in the security line, et cetera. Mom, Danny, and I waited patiently as he worked it out (eight hours, twenty-three minutes, just so you know), and assured himself that it wasn’t really that far.

  Actions Speak Louder than Bumper Stickers

  We laughed as we walked in through the kitchen door and got hit by the ice-cold air. “Nana? Granny? Aren’t you freezing?” I stopped as I got to the living room, frozen myself. He was seated on the smaller sofa, between my two grandmothers, smiling shyly. “Hi.”

  “Sweetheart, your friend came to the party a little early, so we are all just getting acquainted. We didn’t know you had a friend who used to work for the FBI—how fabulous!” Did you guess that was my mom’s mom?

  “Used to?” I asked. My parents were standing behind me, I’m sure as shocked as I was. John freed himself from the grandmothers and walked toward me.

  My dad stepped in front of me protectively.

  “Sir, may I just speak to her for a minute? I’ve come a long way,” John said.

  “You’d better have.” My dad moved out of the way, and there was John standing three inches from me. I scanned myself for feelings: angry, hurt, excited. They were all there. My heart was beating so fast that I had an instinct to run away, but instead I stood there staring.

  “Digit, can we go outside for a second?” He had the nerve to take my hand, and I let him. We walked out the front door and took a seat on the steps. I could tell he was really nervous, so I thought I’d break the ice.

  “Your dad thinks you’re an idiot.”

  “I’ve heard. He wrote me a letter outlining all of my shortcomings. It seems that this last move was the icing on the cake. He really thinks I blew it.”

  “I could have told you that.”

  “I’m really sorry.” He waited for me to say something. Probably the something that part of me wanted to say: It’s okay. Let’s go back to the way things were. But it wasn’t okay, so I said nothing. He went on, “I felt like I didn’t have a choice.”

  “If that had been me, I would have felt like I didn’t have any choice but to stay. I couldn’t have left you like that.”

  “Then maybe you’re a little quicker than I am.” He was quiet for a while, studying my hand. “The minute I got on the plane, I knew I’d made a mistake. But I just kept thinking it would get better, that the ache I felt would go away. I told you I’ve never felt anything like this before; I didn’t know how long it would last.”

  “It’s not the stomach flu.”

  He laughed. “I know. I guess I was just testing it to see if it was real. I mean, I was with you for a week and a half, under the strangest of circumstances. Standing in front of my big career break, I wasn’t sure.”

  Great. “So why are you here?”

  “It didn’t take me this long to figure out how I feel. I knew in the first twenty-four hours, but it took me this long to get out of the decision I’d made. The whole time we were apart, I had this anxious feeling like I’d left my car running. Like there was something I needed to get back to urgently.” He took both of my hands now, so serious that I was going to overlook the stupid leaving-the-car-running analogy. “I knew that I loved you when we were in the warehouse, studying our transcripts. I knew it was something real, but I was sure it was wrong, given the circumstances. And when we were on the plane to New York and I was watching you sleep for three hours straight, I promised myself I wouldn’t act on my feelings, not because I knew it would get me into trouble, but because I wanted to protect you more than anything in the world. And when I finally got to hold you all night in that middle school, I knew I was cheating, but I’d never gone to sleep so happy.”

  I still said nothing. I was hoping for more. I got:<
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  “I went to the other side of the world to understand what this is. I love you. And it’s not going to change. Ever.”

  My heart was racing. I wanted so much to jump into his lap, but I was still so raw. I continued my interrogation.

  “So you quit?”

  “I quit. I called Don Woods and told him the truth: I’ve fallen in love, and if I don’t find out where this is going, I know I will regret it for the rest of my life. Well, I used my own words.”

  “You’ve fallen in love.” I found it soothing to repeat the words. “What did he say?”

  “I was surprised that he was so cool about it. He told me that at twenty-one, I owed myself a little time. He offered to bring me home and give me the summer off, then in September I’m joining the Terror Task Force in New York.”

  I didn’t say anything. I just let him hold my hand and let it all sink in. He was back, he was in love, and he was staying all summer.

  He went on. “I called my dad on the flight here. He wanted to know if I’d bothered to find out if you were still interested in me before I quit my job. Then he wanted to know if I’d bothered to send flowers. He concluded by telling me that you’re too good for me, anyway.”

  “I really like that man.” There are so few times in your life when you feel like you are holding all the cards. I have to admit that I was enjoying it immensely.

  “It’s a good job. Not as prestigious as Special Sector, but a lot better than managing the public. I’ll have weekends off, if you want me to come to Boston, but no pressure. I don’t want to start making a whole new set of five-year plans. I just want to spend time with you before you move in August. I mean, if it’s okay, if you still feel the same way. I’m so sorry I ever left you.”

  That was really all I’d needed to hear. I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him like it was going to save my life. We had no place to go. I didn’t care if the guests started arriving or if my grandparents were spying out the window—which was likely.