Summer in the Invisible City

by Juliana Romano

  “Do you even remember that we hooked up?” I ask. “We had sex.”

  Noah’s hands flinch nervously in mine. The amusement fades from his eyes.

  “I know,” he says.

  “It was my first time,” I tell him. “Did you know that?”

  Noah drops my hands and takes a step back.

  “For real?” he asks. “Fuck. I’m sorry. I had no idea. I’m so sorry. I wouldn’t have. I didn’t know.”

  I wait for him to go on but he doesn’t.

  “So why now?” I ask. “Why did you ignore me after that and now you’re back? Out of nowhere?”

  “It’s not like that,” he says.

  “What’s it like?” I ask.

  “I don’t know,” he says, swallowing. “We’re two people who have a connection. We went our separate ways, but it’s still there. Don’t you feel it, too?”

  I look at Noah. He’s as good-looking as ever. He hasn’t changed. Maybe I’m the one who’s changed.

  “No.” I shake my head. “I guess I don’t. I’m going home.”

  “Wait,” he says, stepping toward me again.

  “No, seriously,” I say, flinching away from him before he can touch me. “I’m not interested.”

  He nods like he understands, and then he turns away from me and heads back toward the building. I stand there, watching him go, and as he disappears into the lobby, I think, Be good, Noah. Okay?

  And then I turn away from him, and as I walk down the street, I can’t help but smile.

  Chapter 40

  “I have to talk to you,” Izzy says in class on Monday.

  We are sitting in the two desks in the very back of the room. Izzy’s expression is dead-serious.

  “Is everything okay?” I ask.

  “Eyes up here,” Benji says, looking right at me.

  It’s Day One of the final critiques. Today, half the class presents. Tomorrow, the second half presents, including me. I’m one hundred percent not ready. Izzy is in the first half, but she doesn’t seem to care at all.

  “I know this is weird but I have to tell you before you find out some other way,” she says. “Noah and Phaedra hooked up yesterday.”

  Even though I’m certain I don’t like Noah anymore, my first thought is ouch. That was so fast. Too fast. It makes me feel dirty. The empowerment I felt when I walked away from him the other night is gone.

  “Oh no. You look sad. Are you okay?” Izzy asks.

  “I’m not upset,” I say. “It’s just really fast. How did that even happen?”

  “I’ve upset you, I’m sorry,” Izzy says, putting a hand on my thigh. “Phaedra doesn’t want to do anything that’s weird for you.”

  I look up at Izzy, and I can see a smile sizzle behind her mascaraed eyes.

  “You didn’t upset me; I don’t care,” I repeat. I don’t want to give Izzy the satisfaction of knowing that there’s even a little part of me that’s still jealous. “Noah is absolutely nothing to me. I don’t like him at all.”

  “Good,” Izzy says. “Because Phaedra asked him about you and if it was gonna be weird or whatever, and he said no. He said you guys hooked up once when you were drunk but that it was never anything. And he told Phaedra he’s liked her forever. Like since middle school. They stayed up all night talking. I feel like they’re gonna be really serious.”

  “Okay, let’s get back to work,” Benji says, returning to the front of the room.

  Noah told Phaedra there was never anything between us? It’s like I’m being erased from history, or becoming invisible.

  I glance at Izzy. She’s grinning and hiding her cell phone under her desk and texting.

  —

  After class, I try to slip out of the room alone, but Izzy catches up with me.

  “I am so glad this class is over,” Izzy moans. “Benji has had it out for me since the beginning. He’s the effing worst.”

  “I like him,” I say lamely.

  “Yeah, of course you like him,” she scoffs. “He kisses your ass because of who your dad is.”

  Her words stun me. “Excuse me?” I ask.

  “Whoa! Chill.” Izzy laughs. “It’s not a big deal. It’s just the truth. Everyone was talking in the darkroom the other day when you were having your meeting with Benji.”

  I stop walking. “Everyone in the class thinks that?”

  “It’s not something everyone thinks,” she replies, a little meanly. “It’s a fact. Your dad is a huge artist, of course Benji is going to want to suck up to his daughter. Remember when you handed in a postcard for an assignment? He let you redo it. I mean, he would never in a million years let anyone else get away with that.”

  I want to speak, to tell Izzy she’s wrong, but I can’t find my voice. I want to tell her she’s just jealous because she’s bad at photo. I want to tell her that Benji doesn’t like her because she’s lazy and not talented and dumb.

  But I know if I speak I’ll start crying and that would be the most humiliating thing of all. So I turn and walk away. I can hear her calling out to me to stop, but I don’t turn around. I keep walking, not slowing down or looking over my shoulder, until I’m back on my own block. Then, I slump down at the bus stop on my corner and rest my backpack on my lap.

  Izzy’s words chase me all the way home. Everyone thinks that Benji only likes you because of who your dad is. It can’t be true, I tell myself. But didn’t Benji go to Allan’s opening? Didn’t he tell me that Allan gave a lecture when he was at Yale and it was packed? Wasn’t he shockingly easy on me about the postcard assignment? He could have failed me if he wanted. He could have done anything.

  There’s an ad for City College mounted on the inside wall of the bus stop. It’s been here for years. People have scribbled their names on it in Sharpie and scratched their tags into the plastic shell that’s covering the picture. But the model in the ad still looks happy. She’s sitting at a big desk table with a laptop screen in front of her. “Discover. Create. Become,” read the words over her smiling face.

  Follow your dreams. Everyone always says that. Everyone on the planet wants to find their passion and be good at it.

  I wonder what’s happened to the girl in the poster. I wonder if she was a model or a real student. I can tell the advertisers think that she’s ‘regular pretty’ not ‘supermodel pretty,’ but she’s still prettier and cleaner and happier than anyone in the real world really is. I wonder if she discovered, created, became or if she ended up selling cars in a lonely town, raising kids and hating her husband, or becoming a famous model and getting rich and living alone and wondering why her life didn’t become what she hoped.

  Eventually the world will flatten out my dreams just like it does everyone’s.

  Forget Benji. Forget photography. Forget Allan. What I need is to start from scratch. I need a good, clean do-over. It’s time to accept the fact that this summer was a disaster and let go. And I know exactly how I’m going to do it.

  Chapter 41

  Skipping class is easy. The hard part is deciding what to do with my day. First, I get an iced coffee and wander through SoHo. I have almost fifty dollars of allowance I’ve saved and I feel like spending it on something dumb. So I walk to all the trendy, polyester disposable clothing stores on Broadway. People scurry past me, striding down the street with briefcases, wearing suits, trying to fight the sweat that’s breaking out all over their skin, smearing their makeup and making their aftershave evaporate off of them in pungent waves.

  This part of the city is the worst. Crowded and packed with tourists year-round. Everywhere are screaming children and the flags of all the mega clothing stores wave from the sides of buildings like the sails of sad, commercial ships. I feel a shredding sense of nothingness, being stuck down here on a hot day, like if the city swallowed me up it might never spit me out.

  I wonder what’s happe
ning in Benji’s class right now. What will Benji do when he realizes I’m ditching? Will he fail me? If Izzy’s right, he would never do that because I’m Allan Bell’s daughter. If he lets me get away with it, I’ll know for sure that she was right.

  It’s not even eleven a.m. by the time I’m done window shopping and the day starts to drag. I try not to notice all the faces of the people walking past me on the street that I want to photograph. Photography is a thing of my past. It was just a phase I went through in high school. At least Allan would be glad to know I’m taking his advice.

  As I walk, the morning drizzle turns into a heavy rain, and by noon, it has become a wild summer storm. Water seems to come at me from all directions. The sky is dark as night. You’d never know that behind the wall of clouds, the sun is still afternoon-high in the sky.

  I duck into a deli and buy an umbrella. But back on the street, a gust of wind grabs the umbrella and suctions it so hard that the whole shell flips inside out. I tug at the stem and try to pull it back, but I feel one of its spidery legs snap from the pressure.

  I toss the broken umbrella in a trash can on the corner and give up. I’m already drenched, anyway.

  —

  At home, I check my e-mail. Allan still hasn’t e-mailed or called since our fight. It’s funny in a depressing way that I’m not even surprised. He doesn’t care about me at all. The realization is so huge, it makes me feel more numb than sad. Like thinking about climate change or overpopulation or the possibility of getting hit by a car. Some things about life are so hopeless, so impossible to control, they can only inspire apathy.

  My phone rings, shaking me out of my daze. It’s my mom. She’s supposed to be teaching a class, but I don’t answer. Then, a minute later, she sends me a text message asking where I am and if I’m okay. Then, before I can even write back, she calls again.

  “Hello?” I say.

  “Oh, thank God,” she gasps.

  “What’s the matter?” I ask.

  “Why aren’t you in class? Your teacher called. He said you didn’t come in today and it’s the last day and—where are you?” she asks.

  “Home,” I say. “I just couldn’t go to photo today. I’m fine. It’s a long story.”

  “I’m leaving work early. I’m on my way home. You better be there,” she says, and then hangs up.

  —

  My mom is soaked when she walks into the apartment twenty minutes later. Puddles pool at her feet. She doesn’t bother taking off her shoes or her coat, she just collapses onto the couch next to me, getting everything all wet around us.

  “What happened?” she demands. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” I grumble. “I told you. It’s a long story.”

  “You love that class.” She frowns. “I don’t understand.”

  “I did love it,” I say. “I thought I wanted to do an independent study in photo next year and go to art school and then Allan literally laughed at me when I told him.”

  My mom cocks her head, confused. “So?”

  “So that’s what happened,” I say, because it’s obvious. “Allan ruined it. He’s an artist and even he thinks being an artist is pointless.”

  She looks baffled. “Why do you care what he says? He doesn’t know you at all. He’s not interested in other people. It’s not about you. It’s about him.”

  “He’s my father,” I say. “And he’s an artist. What do you mean why do I care what he thinks? He’s the only person who gets it.”

  Her eyes are glued to mine and I can see her thinking. Then she sighs and sinks back down into the couch and closes her eyes, defeated. She reaches up and pushes her hair back off her face and it stays because it’s still wet from the rain.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “Allan,” she says simply. “He’s such a disappointing person. All I ever wanted was for you to not have to depend on him for anything. He lets people down.”

  For a moment I think she’s going to cry, and my heart expands, threating to splinter inside my chest. I’ve never seen my mom cry. I’m not sure if I could handle it if she did.

  But she doesn’t cry. She just folds her hands carefully in her lap and nods her head, like she’s thinking something through. Suddenly, I want to hug her for that. It’s impossible to rock her. Someday, I want to be like that, too.

  “Do you wish Allan was different?” I ask. “Do you wish he had been the kind of guy who wanted to marry you and be a father to me and everything?”

  “Sadie.” My mom drops her head forward in exasperation for a minute before looking at me. “What do you want me to say?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, shifting around. “Anything. I want to know that you guys loved each other but circumstances pulled you apart. Or that you tried to make it work. I want to feel like I was born out of love. That I’m meant to be here.”

  Her expression shifts and I have the feeling, even before she speaks, that she’s about to say something that she’s never told me before.

  “I was never in love with Allan,” she says. “I was in love with someone else for ten years. Maybe more. And he was married. He moved away with his family a few months before I met Allan. I was just trying to move on.”

  “What?” I exclaim, shrinking away from her. Quiet settles as I try to picture what she just told me. An affair? For ten years? It’s a billion times worse than anything that happened with me and Noah. It’s worse than anything I could imagine.

  “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you,” she says. “But you keep asking me about Allan and you’re never satisfied with what I tell you. Allan only means one thing to me: he gave me you.”

  “Who was he?” I ask, my voice a whisper. “Who was this other guy?”

  “He was a dancer. He was older. A principal when I was a student. He slept with everyone,” she says, laughing to herself a little. “All my friends. And me.”

  “How come you never told me about him?” I ask.

  “Because it’s a terrible story to share,” she says. “I acted horribly and I suffered so much. It’s a really sad story. But it has a good ending.”

  “What’s the ending?” I ask.

  “You,” she says, pulling me toward her. She’s soaking wet, but I let her hug me. “You are the love of my life. Beyond anything I ever felt for anyone.”

  “But,” I object, “I thought the love of your life was supposed to be a romantic thing.”

  “It can be whatever you want,” she says, talking into my hair. “For me, it wasn’t a man. Allan . . . I never loved him in that way. I mean, I love him because he’s your father. And I respect him, in a way. But he never broke my heart. And I never wanted him to break yours.”

  She lets go of me and I sink into the couch.

  “So, what? Allan’s just a sperm donor?” I ask, brushing aside tears. I don’t know when I started crying. I don’t know why.

  “You don’t have to have a relationship with him if you don’t want one,” she says. “It’s up to you.”

  “But I do. Or I think I do. He’s just so frustrating. He gave me that camera. And I just felt like he knew I was gonna be an artist. I thought he wanted me to. And then . . . and then I was so wrong. He doesn’t care at all. And it makes me feel so stupid for even trying.”

  My mom grabs my shoulders and stares right into my eyes.

  “Listen to me. Allan can’t make you stop being interested in art because he is not the person who made you love it in the first place,” she says.

  “He is though,” I say.

  “No, he’s not,” she declares, unblinking. “He might have given you that camera, but big deal! Do you know how many ballet shoes I bought you over the years? It didn’t turn you into a dancer.”

  I laugh. “I wasn’t very good at ballet, was I?”

  “You didn’t love it,” she says. “You com
plained constantly. I couldn’t make you a dancer. Allan can’t make you an artist. It doesn’t work that way. You aren’t simply a combination of me and Allan. You are entirely one hundred percent your own person.”

  “But Allan is an artist. He’s so powerful in that world. I can’t do it without his support and he said—”

  My mom cuts me off. “Don’t dignify whatever stupid things he said by repeating them.”

  I stop talking.

  “You loved this photography class,” she says firmly. “You can’t give up on it now. You can’t give up on yourself.”

  I sink down into the couch and close my eyes. I know my mom is right. But what good is it now? After, ditching class, I ruined everything. “Benji’s going to fail me. I’m such an idiot.”

  “He wants to meet with you,” she said. “I called him after I talked to you and told him you were all right. He was worried, too. And then I said I’d bring you in tomorrow so you can talk.”

  Chapter 42

  Benji and I are alone in his office and it’s awkward. My mom had a private meeting with Benji before mine. Now she’s waiting for me outside.

  “Are you going to fail me?” I ask.

  Benji smiles, then frowns, then smiles. But the smile he lands on is not a happy smile. “I don’t want to.”

  “Why not?” I ask.

  “I’ve never failed anyone,” he says. “And you don’t deserve to fail, I don’t think.”

  “Plus, I’m Allan Bell’s daughter,” I say. “So . . . there’s that.”

  Benji shifts uncomfortably. “What does that mean to you?”

  “What does it mean to you?” I counter.

  Benji blinks. “It means you have a lot to overcome if you want to be an artist.”

  That makes me quiet. I’ve always seen it the other way, like having Allan for a father should make it easier for me to be one, too.

  “That’s not what I thought you were going to say,” I admit.

  “What did you think?” he asks.

  “People in the class have been saying you only like me because my father is who he is,” I say. “That I’m not talented.”