by Dyan Sheldon
Sicilee’s teeth clench in irritation. She might have known that it was too good to be true. Maya Baraberra is another thing that never happens in Sicilee’s dreams. The girl must have him bugged.
Maya dumps her book bag between Cody and Sicilee and, with the agility and nonchalance of someone not wearing a tailored skirt, climbs over the back of the couch to join them.
“I’m so glad I ran into you two,” says Maya, looking at Cody. “I saw this awesome show on the Discovery Channel last night? And it brought up so much stuff that I really need to talk to someone about.” Now she looks at Sicilee with a smile like a dose of strychnine. “Someone who’s really clued up, you know?”
That, of course, is the last time either Maya or Cody actually looks at Sicilee.
Cody saw the programme, too. He’s been dying to discuss it. It really blew him away. Words and phrases Sicilee has either never heard or doesn’t remember hearing – clear-cut … oil shale … resource substitution … biodiversity … the three faces of power … primativists – fall from his and Maya’s lips like autumn leaves fall from the trees. Sicilee has no choice but to sit there and listen, looking fascinated and pretending to know what they’re talking about.
How does Maya know all this stuff? How does she remember it? And then a new question occurs to Sicilee: Why bother? Proving that Joy Marie Lutz is right and every cloud does have a silver lining – even the one that brought Maya into the lounge today – it is in the second that she asks herself that question that Sicilee has her great idea. It is an idea both simple and touched with genius. An idea that will grab Cody Lightfoot’s attention and shake it the way Lucy the cat pounces on and shakes her catnip mouse when she’s feeling really playful. This idea will knock that so-cool-I-rule smile from Maya Baraberra’s face for the next fifty years.
Sicilee is so happy she fairly shimmers. She’s been going about this all wrong. It’s like buying a new outfit. In order to buy a new outfit, you don’t need to know how to design and sew a dress, cobble a pair of shoes, make socks, knit a sweater or fashion glass and gold into an attractive necklace with matching bracelet. All you need is a credit card and a ride to the mall. Saving the planet is exactly the same.
Put another way, you don’t have to know the words to be able to hum the tune.
Chapter Twenty-six
One great idea deserves another
Maya leans back in her chair, her legs casually stretched out in front of her (so that every time Sicilee glances at the floor, she will see Maya’s environmentally friendly feet and be annoyed), and lets Cody’s sweet, warm voice pour over her like sunshine over a verdant field. Her soul softens; her heart melts; her thoughts dissolve into stardust. Cody, standing in the centre of the circle as usual, is talking about stalls and sponsorship and fundraising, but that, though interesting in its way (and certainly relevant to the meeting), is not what Maya hears. Maya hears: Baby, you know that I dig you. Maya hears: You’re incredible, I’ve never known anyone like you. Maya hears: I’m begging you, just give me one more kiss. Sighing softly, she feels rather than sees the drill-like eyes of Sicilee Kewe fall on her, and looks over to find Sicilee smiling superciliously across Cody’s empty seat. Enjoy yourself, you poor, dumb cow, because you won’t be smiling for much longer, thinks Maya, and returns her own eyes to the middle of the room without giving Sicilee the satisfaction of making any response.
Maya is feeling pretty pleased with herself. It has taken much longer than she expected, but, finally, she is making some real progress with Cody. And, once more illustrating the relationship between silver linings and clouds, she owes it all to the cafeteria’s pea soup. Maya’s study of vegan websites – and her new understanding of things like whey, sugar-refining, the true meaning of “natural sources”, and the many uses of fat taken from the stomachs of pigs – has given her a new confidence and authority. Which, in turn, has made her conversations with Cody longer and more personal. They discuss what cookies they can eat and the barbaric slaughter of cattle. He swapped her half his non-dairy cheese sandwich for half her non-meat salami. He told her where to buy a non-toxic water bottle. She made him laugh with a joke about plastic bags. He recommended a shampoo. She gave him a recipe for vegan cupcakes. And yesterday, in a moment that will forever be held in her memory like a fly in amber, she balanced a notebook on her arm while Cody, leaning against her, his breath as soft as the stroke of a feather against her face, jotted down the names of some documentaries that he thinks she might be interested in. “I haven’t had a chance to watch them all myself yet,” said Cody, “but Clem says they’re really good.”
The business of the afternoon drifts around her. Usually Maya is tense and watchful through these meetings – waiting to see what Sicilee will say, trying to guess what Sicilee’s next move will be, ready to pounce on any show of weakness and undermine any show of strength – but today Maya has more important things on her mind. She is about to make her move. As soon as she can get him alone, Maya is going to ask Cody if he wants to come over to her house one evening to watch one of the documentaries he recommended. How can he refuse?
Maya is now imagining herself and Cody in the Baraberras’ living room, side-by-side on the sofa with a bowl of chips balanced on the narrow gap between their legs. The lights are out, the door is shut and her family has gone to visit some suitably distant place like Norway and won’t be back for hours. Totally engrossed in the movie, they are silent as they watch, but as soon as the credits begin to roll, Cody takes the chip bowl and puts it on the coffee table in a meaningful way. He turns to Maya, his arm slipping over the back of the couch, leaning towards her. “Maya,” he whispers, his mouth almost touching her ear. “Maya… Maya, I—”
“I have an idea!”
Maya returns to Room III with a start.
Sicilee is on her feet, swinging her hair and rattling her bracelets as if she’s about to announce that she’s discovered the Meaning of Life. “I know we’ve been getting some really excellent feedback about Earth Day and everything,” Sicilee is saying, “but I was thinking that maybe we’ve been concentrating too much on that. You know, not doing anything about educating people like we said we would? I think we need to make them aware so they’ll care even before they get to the fair.”
“Oh, great. Now she’s a poet,” mutters Maya, making a spare-me face.
But Sicilee, of course, is no longer looking at Maya. If her smile were sunshine, Cody would be burnt to a crisp.
Cody, however, doesn’t step into the shade. Maya watches in horror as he opens his arms to Sicilee the way he opens them to Maya in her fantasies, as though inviting the girl who isn’t aware and doesn’t care to step into them.
“Don’t keep us in suspense—” pleads Cody. And he hesitates. Maya sits up straight, her bones locked. Why does he pause? Was he going to call her “baby”? Was he going to call her “Siss” the way her friends do? Sicilee is practically glowing; she has ideas about what he was going to call her, too. (In fact, Cody hesitates because the only thing he can remember about Sicilee’s name is that it has something to do with pizza – but neither Maya nor Sicilee will ever know that, of course.) “Shine the light of knowledge on us. Tell us what your idea is.”
Maya’s smile is as gone as the woods that once covered Manhattan. Has she made a mistake? Was she so certain of victory that she dropped her guard? So sure of success that she moved her eyes from her opponent to the prize? She’s definitely misjudged to what levels someone like Sicilee – someone not handicapped by scruples – is willing to sink.
“Well…” Sicilee shrugs as though she actually knows what “modestly” means. “It kind of hit me that a lot of people, you know, they want to do stuff to help the planet, but they really don’t know what to do.” She removes two sheets of paper the same shade of purple as her blouse from the purple folder in her hand. “So what I figured was that we could do a series of posters on, you know, basic things we all can do to make things better.”
Of c
ourse, it’s an embarrassingly simple idea – how could it not be when it comes from someone who thinks that an example of an existential question is: What should I wear with these shoes? But even Maya can see that it’s not a bad idea.
Cody thinks it’s a great idea. “Man,” he says, “that’s so close to being a stroke of genius you couldn’t tell them apart.”
Maya sits a little straighter, raising her hand. “Excuse me,” she says, smiling almost apologetically, “but I have a question.”
Sicilee turns to her with the look a queen might give a cat. “Yes?”
“Well, I was just wondering if maybe it isn’t a little anti-environmental to use brand-new paper that matches your clothes when you could write your notes about how to save the planet on the back of an old envelope or something like that?”
Sicilee’s smile doesn’t dim. There is no way the Barbarian is going to ruin this moment of triumph for her. She may be snide, sneaky, unprincipled and treacherous, but this time she has met her match. “Well, obviously I would have, Maya. Sweet Mary, of course I would. But, unfortunately, we’d just taken everything to the recycling centre and there wasn’t any scrap paper at all in the house.” And then she sails on as though the only sound for the last few minutes has come from her. “So I already jotted down some suggestions… Just really easy things anybody can do. You know, like recycling and composting organic waste and cutting back on disposable items and using those energy-efficient light bulbs? I figured that if we put up a list of maybe twelve different things every week or so, by Earth Day everybody will be, like, really with the programme.”
Maya can’t believe her ears. Couldn’t Sicilee think of anything more obvious? That’s like telling people to open the door before they walk through it. She looks at Cody, expecting him, if not to laugh out loud, at least to stop smiling as if Sicilee just invented a car that runs on air.
But Cody says, “Hey, I like it! I really like it!” He thinks it’s a great idea. He is jubilant. Exultant. If he stands any closer to Sicilee, he’ll be past her. “Let’s see what else you have there.” He reaches out his hand to her.
This time, Maya doesn’t bother raising hers. “Recycling and energy-efficient light bulbs?” she asks. “Are you serious?” She says this in a kindly, helpful way. “I mean, I really don’t think that there’s anyone who isn’t living in an igloo who doesn’t already know about those things.”
Cody disagrees. “No, she’s flat-out right.” Cody says you should always start with the really obvious stuff and work your way up. “A-B-C,” says Cody. “That’s how you teach.” He touches Sicilee’s fingers. He smiles at Sicilee in a way that he has never smiled at Maya. There are places in the world where the way Sicilee smiles back at him would get them both arrested. Maya shuts her mouth so tightly she can feel her teeth.
Things, however, are about to get even worse.
It may be a bitter moment for Maya, but for Sicilee it couldn’t be sweeter if it were covered in honey. Cody is standing so near her you could barely slip a mobile phone between them, and Maya is glaring at her as if she would turn Sicilee into a lizard if she hadn’t left her cauldron and broomstick at home. “You know what?” says Sicilee. “I just had another idea.” Luminous with victory, she grabs Cody’s arm and purrs, “Wouldn’t it be really cool if Maya did some of her cartoons to go with my lists?” She moves her head just enough so that she can look right into Maya’s eyes. “You know, because she’s so artistic.”
The only reason Maya doesn’t gasp out loud is because her mouth is clamped so tightly closed. The girl’s completely delusional. Can she possibly think that Maya would work for her? Or is she just trying to jerk Maya’s chain?
“That could be really awesome,” says Cody, though not to Maya. “That could really float the boat.”
Maya unclamps her mouth and gives Sicilee a look that could sink every ship in the navy. “Oh, what a shame,” she says, managing to keep any trace of regret from her voice. “I’m afraid I can’t help you, Siss.” There is no trace of regret in her smile, either. “Because I already have a project. And it’s pretty all-encompassing, if you know what I mean. It doesn’t leave me any time to doodle pictures of light bulbs.” She rises from her seat, addressing the group at large. “Actually, I’ve been mulling it over for a couple of weeks now. You know, doing some preliminary sketches … getting my thoughts in order … sorting out my ideas?”
“Oh, really?” Sicilee brushes a long, golden hair from her sleeve. “And just what is this all-encompassing project, pray tell?”
Maya can only wish she knew. She forces herself to smile, her eyes darting around the room as though the idea that will save her is tucked into a corner or languishing on the window ledge. In fact, the idea that saves her is sitting on the lap of a girl named Daphne. It is a bottle of lemon-flavoured water. Only a few days ago, Maya had a conversation with Cody about plastic. Cody said that the problem with plastic wasn’t just that, instead of wonders of civilization like the pyramids, we’re leaving our descendants mountains of plastic that won’t rot away for a thousand years, but that we completely ignore the hidden costs of mass production. Maya’s smile takes on a luminosity of its own. “I call it Do You Know?” she says, staring back into Sicilee’s eyes – glacier-blue today to match her heart. “It’ll be a series of illustrated information posters that say things like—” She pauses, as if searching for an example. “Like … do you know how many litres of water it takes to make one litre of Coca-Cola? And then I give the answer. You know, two-and-a-half. That kind of thing.”
Cody nods his head approvingly – as well he might, since this information came from him to begin with.
“I don’t know what’s rising or what’s transiting, but the stars are righteously with us today,” he says. “Two great ideas in one afternoon! How outlandishly cool is that? I tell you all, I’m as happy as a bear in salmon season.” He looks over at Clemens. “What did I tell you, bro?” demands Cody. “We are going to be so gold we’ll have to rename ourselves El Dorado.”
Clemens says something and Cody walks towards him, while around them everyone else starts to talk.
Maya and Sicilee, standing facing each other now, are smiling at each other in a way that suggests pistols at dawn.
“So where are all these preliminary sketches, Baraberra?” Sicilee waves her purple folder in Maya’s face. “We’ve all seen my ideas. Where are yours?”
“I didn’t bring them today, did I?” Maya rests a hand on the back of an empty chair, leaning forward. “I didn’t feel ready to show them yet.”
“Oh, I’m sure.” Sicilee leans towards her. “Like you even thought of this all-encompassing project of yours more than five minutes ago.”
“I don’t want to burst your little-princess bubble, Sicilee, but in case nobody told you, drawings aren’t like writing down ‘turn out the lights’ and ‘recycle your fashion magazines’ while you’re straightening your hair. They actually take some time and effort.”
“Let me tell you something, poor little worker bee.” Sicilee tilts towards her. She even smells purple. “You have so bitten off more than you can chew this time. And I, for one, hope that you choke on it.”
“Well, don’t bet on it,” counters Maya. “Because if you think you’re going to change the world with your feeble lists, you’re in for a big surprise.” She moves so close their noses almost touch. “In case this is something else no one bothered to tell you, a picture is worth a thousand words.”
It is Sicilee who pulls back first. “Did you know that you’re, like, a million times more irritating than a mosquito?”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” Maya laughs.
“A mosquito can be crushed,” says Sicilee.
“You’d better make sure it doesn’t give you malaria first,” says Maya.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Waneeda finally volunteers for something
Waneeda, Joy Marie and Clemens shut the door to Room III behind them and
head down the stairs. Waneeda and Joy Marie are talking about the meeting. Which is to say that Waneeda is complaining that the meetings have turned into The Maya and Sicilee Show (or Two Princesses in Pursuit of a Prince, as Waneeda also calls it when she and Joy Marie are alone). They have more opinions than the Supreme Court and a psychotic need to share them with everyone else. Any time one of them volunteers to do something for Earth Day, the other will volunteer to do two things. Their exclamations of approval, agreement and admiration follow everything Cody says like a particularly cheerful Greek Chorus. The only consolation Waneeda has is that they obviously irritate each other even more than they irritate her. “I just don’t understand how Cody doesn’t notice,” Waneeda grumbles as they reach the main doors.
From behind them, someone shouts out, “Hey, wait up!”
The three of them stop and turn around to see Cody, who has just stepped out of the office, trotting towards them.
“I’m really glad I caught up with you guys,” he says as he follows them outside, “because we’re going to need your help here, with the Things You Can Do and Did You Know? campaigns.” Several steps behind Waneeda and Joy Marie, he nonetheless manages to give the impression that he has his arms around their shoulders. So there’s no doubt which guys he means. “You know, laying out the posters and typing them up and copying them and everything? Dr Firestone is really enthused about these ideas. He thinks we should get started pronto.”
Here is another thing of which Cody is apparently unaware. Although Joy Marie was well disposed towards him to begin with because he was saving the club and Waneeda was well disposed towards him because of his breathtaking good looks, neither of them is feeling that well disposed towards him now. While the other girls volunteer for all the look-at-me Earth Day projects to win Cody’s approval, it is Waneeda and Joy Marie whom Cody volunteers for all the boring scut work – typing and photocopying, emailing and gathering information, putting up notices and flyers – that keeps everything going. Though not in what you could call a cheerful way.