Unteachable

by Leah Raeder

  Hiyam glanced at me coyly. “You have a crush on him.”

  “So do you.”

  “He’s super hot.”

  I had no idea how I was supposed to react. Should I agree? Was it suspicious if I didn’t? “Yeah, he is.”

  “I’d fuck the shit out of him.”

  Oh my god. How do I get out of here? “Not interested,” I said. “I’ve got a boyfriend.”

  Hiyam’s eyebrows rose. Then she smiled. “In college?”

  “Older.”

  Her intrigue became genuine appreciation.

  “What did you want to talk about?” I said.

  She rolled her wrist, scrawling a spiral of smoke in the air. “I heard you can hook people up.”

  I was too drunk and unsettled to realize what she meant.

  “I’m looking for some coke,” she said bluntly.

  Oh.

  I opened my mouth, and then it hit me. The reason Hiyam invited us—me—to this stupid party. Because of my druggie mother. Because I could be a supplier. Not because we had one fucking iota in common, not even how we felt about our hot teacher.

  My fingernails scraped against granite.

  “I don’t deal,” I said.

  Hiyam was accustomed to a certain degree of obedience. She didn’t wheedle me. She looked at me icily, took a drag, and said, “Let me know if you change your mind. I can connect you with a lot of interested parties.”

  She walked away, trailing smoke.

  My nails perched on the stone like bird claws. I thought I’d been reinventing myself, choosing who I wanted to be, but I was so naive. I’d always be my mother’s daughter.

  I went back in, looking for Wesley. The dancing crowd no longer seemed charming. They were just a bunch of stupid drunk kids who didn’t know shit about the real world. Who wanted to buy coke with their rich parents’ money while my mom gave blowjobs in her van to supplement our income.

  I finally found Wesley outside, smoking one of his clove cigarettes on a bench beside a pool. A bare bulb shivered beneath the water, marbling his face with cyan light.

  “These people suck,” I said.

  He glanced at me, then off into the shadows. I sat.

  “What’s your problem?”

  “What’s yours?”

  “Hiyam thinks I’m a drug dealer. That’s the only reason she invited us.”

  He turned halfway back to me. “Seriously? What a bitch.”

  “I don’t know what I expected. We don’t fit in with anyone, anyway.”

  I leaned back on my palms, looking at the Milky Way spilling in modest grandeur across the sky. A fountain of stars frothing over, surrounded by a mist of stardust. It looked like raw magic, like the glimmer I’d spy in a shadowy corner where the sun skimmed off invisible particles, reminding me there was a whole hidden world tucked inside this ordinary one. And it was up there every night, offering its mute beauty while we sat here with our heads down, tragically terrestrial. Not until I’d met Evan had I begun to open my eyes and really see this universe I was part of.

  “You ever think the reason we’re into filmmaking is because we’re scared to be in front of the camera?” I said.

  “No shit, Captain Obvious.”

  I smiled. The notes of an acoustic guitar floated into the night, the beginning of “Wake Me Up When September Ends.” We both laughed.

  “How wonderfully cliché,” I said.

  “And the camera flies in for their close-up,” he said.

  I was still smiling at him, but his had fallen. I was so fucking naive. “Close-up for what?”

  Wesley kissed me.

  Your body sometimes automatically reacts to things, especially when that thing has been building up for a long time, especially when you’re drunk and feeling like the only person who understands you at that moment is the person who was right beside you the whole time. So I kissed him back. I was stunned, and responding on reflex, and very, very slightly curious. Our kiss was gentle, sweet, almost pure. A boy and a girl kissing. I tasted bitter smoke on his lips and the clean metallic vodka we’d drunk.

  Then my eyes opened, and reality came rushing back. I pushed him away.

  Girl: shocked, bewildered. Boy: hopeful, anxious.

  “What are you doing?” I whispered.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, breathing fast. “I’ve wanted—I thought—”

  Neither of us were really looking at each other.

  “Oh, god. Wesley—I’m with someone.”

  “Who? That guy you’re sneaking around with?”

  Now our eyes met.

  “You wouldn’t understand,” I said.

  He laughed, not nicely. “I wouldn’t, huh? You act like you’re so mature, but you’re doing something you have to hide from everyone. Maybe I’m not as mature as you, but I know that’s fucked up.”

  I felt cold inside. “Don’t judge me. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  I stood and took a few aimless steps away, needing space. He followed.

  “You know I’m your friend, right? Why don’t you trust me?”

  I whirled around. “Because of this. Because I had no fucking idea you were going to kiss me.”

  “You kissed me back.”

  “Oh my god. This is way too high school for me.”

  “God, you’re stuck up.”

  “Fuck you,” I said.

  “No, fuck you, Maise. Why are you hiding all this shit from me and then acting like you’re my friend?”

  “I am your friend, you idiot.”

  At some point we’d progressed to yelling. My voice rang across the night. Shadows stirred, faces turning.

  Wesley was close, looming over me. He lowered his voice. “Then who the hell is he?”

  I shook my head.

  “Why are you so ashamed of him? Who is he?”

  “None of your fucking business,” I spat.

  Wesley laughed again. “You know, I should’ve listened the first time we met. You really meant it. You don’t want friends.”

  He stalked off into the dark.

  #

  There’s only one thing to do when your sole friend abandons you at a party full of people you hate.

  Get shitfaced.

  I found the Grey Goose guy and gave him another twenty for the rest of a bottle, grabbed a cup of punch for a chaser, sat in the manicured grass beside a pool, and started drinking with steely determination.

  Fucking Wesley. Ruining a good thing.

  Idiot boys, never content with friendship.

  Fucking cokehead Hiyam.

  It occurred to me after five or seven shots that I no longer had a ride home. I couldn’t call Siobhan, even though she’d probably sympathize. I took out my phone and instead of calling a cab, I looked at photos. Evan had taken one of me running into the rain. Dark doorframe, bright silver rectangle of water coming down like tinsel, a girl I barely recognized throwing her arms wide to the sky.

  He answered on the second ring. “Hi,” I said.

  “Hi.”

  I lay back in the grass, my limbs all loose string. “I’m really drunk. I’m sorry for calling.”

  “Don’t be sorry. Where are you?”

  “Beverly Hills.”

  I pictured him frowning. “What?”

  “My ride left. I’m stranded in paradise.” I was very drunk. I knew this in a detached, clinical way, as if observing my body from behind glass. “Everyone hates me, Evan. Hiyam just wants drugs, Wesley wants to fuck me. My mom wants—she wants me to not exist. I can’t give them anything they want.”

  His voice came through the phone like a warm breath on the side of my face. “Listen to me. It’s okay. I’ll come get you. Tell me where you are.”

  By the time he got there I’d had three more shots and was temporarily happy again. I stood up and then immediately sat down, not prepared for gravity.

  “When did everything get so heavy?” I said, but with fewer consonants than it needed to be intelligible.
>
  Evan looked at the empty bottle with alarm. “Did you drink all of that yourself?”

  “No. I think.”

  He started to lift me beneath the arms and a shadow wandered toward us from the bright blur of the house.

  “Is she okay?” a small voice said.

  It was Britt, from my history class. I hadn’t even talked to her the whole night. I really was a stuck-up bitch.

  “I think so,” Evan said. “I’ll take her home.”

  Once I was standing, I felt a million times worse. I leaned into him, arms around his waist for balance. The ground kept wanting to flip up and tumble me into the sky.

  “Mr. Wilke,” Britt said.

  She handed him my phone.

  He thanked her and said good night.

  “Shit,” I said as he walked me toward the gate. “She knows. They’re all gonna know.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay. They’ll take your job, they’ll take my—” I couldn’t think of what they’d take from me. Unknown privileges, vanishing in an instant.

  “It’s okay, Maise. If they know, they know. We’ll deal with it. I’m going to make sure you get home safe.”

  “This is how it ends,” I said mournfully. “I blew it. I’m a fucking idiot.”

  “You’re not a fucking idiot,” he said, squeezing my shoulders. “But you should probably stop talking about it.”

  I made it to his car in a sort of dream sequence, moments not fully connected to each other. Images jumbled in a flotsam in my head: my fevered forehead on the blessedly cool window; trying to tell him my address unsuccessfully until he found it in my phone. That detached part of me watched with loathing. Child, it said. If you were trying to prove how unready you are for this, congrats. You nailed it.

  Somehow I communicated the existence of the spare key taped beneath the mailbox. Then I was on my couch in a living room that smelled like cigarettes and unsavory men. The hallway light slanted across Evan’s face, an amber stripe showing stubble and soft lips. He smoothed my hair.

  “You are really drunk,” he said, almost wonderingly.

  “Wesley kissed me.”

  His hand slowed. “Seriously?”

  “He’s in love with me. I didn’t know. It’s horrible.”

  Evan smiled. “I can see why.”

  I had enough wits to know he was making fun. “You—” I cut off, sitting up. A comet that had been accelerating inside my belly decided it was ready to crash into Earth. I clapped a hand to my mouth.

  We made it to the bathroom just in time for the show.

  Things I never expected to do my senior year: kiss my best friend, fuck my teacher, let said teacher hold my hair while I puked my guts out.

  Thankfully, I was so drunk by then I barely knew what was happening. Cold linoleum, colder ceramic. Mouthwash, swirl and spit. Evan made me sip water that I promptly threw back up and he made me keep sipping until it stayed down. I felt a thousand years old, a set of bones wired together with rags and ancient sinew. He carried me back to the couch.

  “Where’s your mom?”

  “Who fucking cares.”

  “I don’t want to freak her out.”

  My eyes kept trying to drift shut. He was a fuzzy shadow against the warm hall light. “Are you staying?”

  “Until I’m sure you don’t have alcohol poisoning.”

  My eyes closed. “This isn’t how…” I trailed off.

  He stroked my hair again. “Sleep.”

  For a while, I did. Woke with my chest burning, the house dark. Evan sat on the end of the couch with my legs in his lap. I thought he was asleep but when I shifted, he looked at me. I was still pretty drunk.

  “I kissed Wesley back,” I whispered. “I don’t know why. I’m sorry.”

  I caught the edge of a smile in the dark. “It’s okay.”

  “It felt wrong. I’m not in love with him.”

  I couldn’t make out Evan’s face, but I heard his breath. His hand curled around mine, lifted it, brought it to his mouth.

  “I’m—”

  “Shhh,” he said. “You’re drunk.”

  “Not that drunk,” I said, but my eyes had already closed, my brain slowly erasing itself into unconsciousness.

  Later that night I woke again, and the hallway light was back on. A shadow stood in it.

  “Who are you?” it said in my mother’s voice.

  “I’m her friend. My name is Evan.”

  “She okay?”

  “Yeah. She is.”

  The shadow watched us for a moment longer. Then the light turned out.

  #

  I woke alone on the couch under a slab of late September sun. My head was a fireball, my body mummified. It took a while before I could think about anything except how much I wanted to die.

  Then: panic.

  What the hell had I said last night? I knew what I’d been trying to say while Evan hovered over me like a guardian angel, but had I actually said it?

  I sat up, and the world took a good five seconds to recalibrate to our new viewing angle. I groaned.

  On the coffee table before me, a folded piece of paper with my name on it. Inside, his handwriting, flowing and elegant, the letters not quite closed.

  I haven’t been fair to you, and I didn’t realize how much stress I’ve been putting you under. Maybe I didn’t want to realize it. You deserve better than this. You deserve better than being Harriet the fucking Spy. Sorry if this sounds dramatic—this isn’t a breakup letter.

  Jesus, I thought, my heart pounding, maybe you should’ve started with that.

  This is me saying I’m going to do better. I want you to be happy, Maise. You mean more to me than you know. Seeing you miserable and drunk breaks my heart. I want to make you as happy as you were that first night when we got off that crazy death ride together. I want you to be that free again.

  The paper trembled in my hands.

  I have an old friend who owns some property in St. Louis. He might be willing to sublet us a loft for the weekends. If you’re feeling better Sunday, I’d love to take you to the city.

  My heart was going like mad again, but this time with joy.

  You’ve done something to me, too. I can’t get enough of you. You’re in my blood like holy wine. And before you think that’s cheesy, that’s Joni Mitchell. Google her, young Padawan.

  I laughed and cringed at the same time.

  Okay, I should probably go. I don’t want to stop, though. I can’t stop with you. Come with me to St. Louis. Let’s find happiness.

  I read it three times before I folded it up and stuck it in my bra. Not quite inside my heart, but that was okay. The words were already engraved there.

  —5—

  My bare feet propped on the dashboard, sun blazing in my heart-shaped glasses (I bought a pair before we left), singing along at the top of my lungs to Modest Mouse’s “Float On” as we drove up I-55: this was going to be an awesome day.

  Things I learned about my teacher: He had pretty good taste in music, despite being born in 1980. He could cook and had been dying to cook for me. He was terrified of geese. (“Bad experience in a petting zoo.” “How old were you?” “Twenty-six.” I laughed.) He’d never been married, but was briefly engaged. (“College mistake. She cheated on me with her psych professor.” Awkward smile. Subject change.) He cried every time he watched Casablanca. (“We’ll watch it sometime.” He’d said that already. I think it made him nervous.)

  Hot asphalt cut through woods so green they looked unreal. At the end of summer everything swelled with life, almost grotesque, bloated and overripe. The sky was so full and pregnant you could punch a hole in it and douse the world with blue paint. I’d been to St. Louis as a kid for a Cards game, but had only a vague memory of a giant pretzel I held with both hands and Mom letting me sip her beer, my nose wrinkling. I watched for the Arch like a hawk, occasionally sitting up at a silvery glint in the distance.

  “Is that it?” I said.


  Evan just smiled.

  We followed I-55 up the Mississippi, through lazy suburbs rolling into city blocks. Finally the Arch appeared, like magic: a huge silver ribbon arcing over the skyline, stropped with white licks of sunlight. It looked like a handle on the world, as if God could reach down and pick us up and fling us into deep space.

  Then we were in the city proper. St. Louis was a knot of rivers tied into a loose horseshoe heart. Sun baked the streets, everything glazed with light and soaking with color. Skyscrapers scaled in mirrored glass tinted sky blue. Old red brick factories. A boulevard with an artery of thick lush green running down the middle. People everywhere, wearing shades and drowsy smiles. I couldn’t peel my face off the window.

  “Hungry?” Evan said.

  We found a restaurant with a patio. He took my hand when we got out of the car and I froze, instinct kicking in.

  “No one knows us here,” he said.

  I relaxed, but a tiny live wire still vibrated somewhere in me.

  We ordered scallops and a bottle of white wine and I had the most adult meal of my life. I savored the sweet buttery meat, the dry clarity of the wine. Evan fed me scallops by hand, his fingertips brushing my lips, my teeth lightly scraping his skin, goosebumps racing up the backs of my arms and legs, and then he leaned over and kissed me in front of everyone. My heart didn’t know where to settle in my chest. It still felt like we held a secret, but at the same time I was beginning to accept this openness. I ran a hand over his thigh under the wrought-iron table and his muscle tensed. His eyes, usually so changeable, burned gas flame blue.

  After lunch we walked around downtown, Evan’s arm casually circling my waist. Another first in my adult life: window-shopping with my boyfriend.

  Was he my boyfriend? Secret lover? Person abusing his position of authority or trust?

  “You’d look amazing in that,” he said, eyeing a diaphanous sundress, sheer and breezy.

  A few stores down, I said, “You’d look amazing in that,” nodding at a store clerk stripping a mannequin.

  Evan gave me that sly smile that I felt as a warmth deep in my belly.

  I glanced at our reflection in the plate glass as we walked on. If only you could see this, Wesley, I thought. I’m not ashamed at all.