by Sarah Dessen
“Already gone?” the blonde said in that same flat voice.
“Drove off just as I got out there,” Morgan grumbled. As she passed, the blonde gave her the apron, flipping another page of the magazine.
“Too bad,” she said.
“This is the last summer I work here,” Morgan declared, pulling her apron strings into a perfect bow. “I mean it.”
“I know.” The blonde turned another page.
“I’m serious.” Morgan went over to the soda machine and filled a cup with ice, shaking some into her mouth and crunching it with a determined look. Then she saw me. “You been helped?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“She’s Mira’s niece,” said the blonde.
Morgan looked at me with new interest, eyebrows raised. “Really?”
“You remember. Norman told us about her.” The blonde put down her magazine and turned her full attention back to me. “Kiki Sparks’ kid. Can you imagine.”
“I can’t,” Morgan said, but she smiled. “What’s your name?”
“Colie,” I said warily. I’d had enough experience with girls in groups to be on my guard.
“What’s the deal with that thing in your lip?” the blonde said bluntly. “It’s creepy.”
“Isabel,” Morgan said, elbowing her. “How old are you, Colie?”
“Fifteen,” I said.
Morgan came closer to me, tucking her hair behind her ear. On her right hand, she wore a ring with a tiny diamond, just big enough to flash in the light. “How long you down for?”
“Just the summer,” I said.
“Order up!” Norman yelled from the kitchen.
“That’s great,” Morgan said. “You’ll be right next door. Maybe we can go to the movies sometime or something.”
“Sure,” I said, but I kept my voice low. “That would be—”
“Here you go,” Isabel, the blonde, said, dropping my food right in front of me. “Ketchup’s inside the box. That’ll be fifteen-eighteen with tax.”
“Right,” I said, handing her the twenty. She turned on her heel and went to the register.
“Well, tell Mira I said hi,” Morgan said, “and that I’ll be by for Triple Threat tomorrow, since I’m off.”
“Triple Threat,” I repeated. That had to have something to do with wrestling. “Okay. I will.”
“Here’s your change,” Isabel said, slapping it on top of one of the boxes.
“Thanks,” I said.
She stepped back, next to Morgan, and squinted at me. “Can I tell you something?” she said.
“No,” Morgan told her, her voice low.
I didn’t say anything. So she did.
“That thing in your lip is, like, repulsive.” She scrunched up her nose as she said it.
“Isabel,” Morgan said sternly in a Mom voice. “Stop it.”
“And next time you decide to dye your hair,” Isabel went on, ignoring her, “you should try to get all of it one color. I’m sure your mom can afford to send you to a professional.”
“Isabel,” Morgan said, grabbing her by the arm. Then she looked at me. “Colie,” she said, like she knew me. “Just don’t listen . . .”
But I didn’t hear her, couldn’t, was already gone, turning and walking out the door with the food in my hands to the parking lot before I even knew what was happening. Over the years I had perfected removing myself from situations. It was kind of like automatic pilot; I just shut down and retreated, my brain clicking off before anything that hurt could sink in.
But every once in a while, something would get through. Now I stood under that one streetlight and the fries and onion rings stank in my hands. I wasn’t hungry anymore. I wasn’t even me anymore. I was bigger, a year younger, and back in my neighborhood the night Chase Mercer and I took that walk down to the eighteenth hole.
I didn’t cry as I walked back to Mira’s house. You get to a point where you just can’t. It never stops hurting. But I was glad when I didn’t cry anymore.
I didn’t even know this girl, this Isabel with her blonde hair and pouty lips. It was like I wore a permanent “Kick Me” sign, not only at home and school but out in the rest of the world, too. It isn’t fair, I thought, but those words were as meaningless as all the rest.
Mira was sitting in front of the TV when I came in. She’d put on a pair of blue old-lady slippers and replaced the kimono with a faded plaid bathrobe.
“Colie?” she called out. “Is that you?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Did you find it okay?”
I looked at myself in the full-length mirror by the door: my black hair, my piercing, my torn-up jeans and black shirt, long-sleeved even in this summer heat. Isabel had hated me on sight, and not because I was fat. Just because she could.
“Colie?” Mira called out again.
“Yeah,” I said. “Your salad’s right here.” I took it into the back room. She opened the box immediately and popped a piece of lettuce into her mouth.
“Oh, I just love their Caesar dressing!” she said happily. “Norman sneaks some home to me every once in a while. It’s wonderful. What did you get?”
“Just a burger and fries. Here’s your change.” I put it on the coffee table, where she had two plates and two iced teas and a stack of napkins waiting.
“Oh, thank you. Now sit down and let’s eat. I’m ravenous.” Cat Norman hauled himself out from under the couch and nudged the bottom of the box with his nose.
“I’m not that hungry,” I said.
“Bad cat,” she said, pushing him back with one foot. To me she added, “But you must be starving! You’ve had such a long day, all this excitement.”
“I’m really tired,” I said. “I think I’ll just turn in.”
“Oh.” She stopped eating, glancing up at me. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” This came instantly, like a reflex.
“You sure?”
I thought of Isabel, the way her eyes narrowed as she zeroed in on me. Of my mother in her purple windsuit, new shoes squeaking, waving good-bye. Of an entire summer stretching ahead. “Yes,” I said. “I’m sure.”
“Well, okay,” she said slowly as if we were striking a bargain. “You probably are worn out.”
“Yeah,” I said, starting out of the room, my cold smelly burger still in my hand. “I am.”
“Okay, well, then good night!” she called after me as I started out of the room. “And if you change your mind . . .”
“Okay,” I said, “thanks.” But she was already settling back in her chair, Cat Norman leaping with a bit of effort to the arm beside her. She turned up the volume on yet another wrestling match, and I could hear the crowd roar, cheering and screaming, as I climbed the stairs to my room.
“Colie!”
It wasn’t morning. The room was dark, with the moon big and yellow and hanging just where I’d left it in the corner of the window.
“Colie!”
I sat up in bed, forgetting for a second where I was. Then it came back: the train, Norman, wrestling, Isabel’s beauty tips. My face was dry and tight, my eyelashes sticky from the crying I didn’t do anymore.
“Colie?” It was Mira, her voice right outside my door. “You have company, honey.”
“Company?”
“Yes. Downstairs.” She tapped the door with her fingers before walking away. I wondered if I was dreaming.
I pulled my jeans back on and opened the door, looking down the stairs at the lighted room below. This had to be a joke. I didn’t even get company at home, much less at a place I’d been less than a day.
I started down the stairs, squinting as the light got brighter and brighter. Everything felt strange, as if I’d been sleeping forever. I was close to the bottom when I saw a set of feet, in sandals, by the door. Two more steps and there were legs, knees, and a small waist with a windbreaker knotted around it. Another two steps, and the beginnings of blonde hair, a pair of pouty lips, and then those same eyes, narrowed at me
. I stopped where I was.
“Hey,” Isabel said. She had her arms crossed over her chest. “Got a second?”
I hesitated, thinking of Caroline Dawes and all the girls like her I’d left behind.
“I just want to talk to you, okay?” she snapped, as if I’d already said no. Then she took a deep breath and glanced outside. This seemed to settle her down. “Okay?”
I don’t know why, but I said, “Okay.”
She turned and went out on the front porch, leaving the screen door in half-swing for me to catch. Then she leaned against one of the posts, bit her lip, and looked out into the yard. Up close, I hated to admit, she was even prettier: a classic heart-shaped face, big blue eyes, and pale skin without a zit in sight. Somehow that made it easier to dislike her.
Neither one of us said anything.
“Look,” she said suddenly. “I’m sorry, okay?” She said this defensively, as if I’d demanded it of her.
I just looked at her.
“What?” she said. “What else do you want?”
“Isabel.” Morgan stepped out of the shadows by the bottom of the steps. Her face was stern. “You know that is not how we discussed it.”
“It is too,” Isabel snapped.
“Do it like I told you,” Morgan said evenly. “Like you mean it.”
“I can’t—” Isabel said.
“Do it. Now.” Morgan came up to the second step and nodded toward me. “Go ahead.”
Isabel turned back to face me, smoothing her hair. “Okay,” she began, “I am sorry I said what I said. I tend to be very critical of what I don’t . . .” Here she paused, looking at Morgan.
“Understand,” Morgan prompted.
“Understand,” Isabel repeated. “What I said was rude and hurtful and uncalled-for. I’d understand if you never respected me again.” She looked at Morgan, eyebrows raised.
“But?” Morgan said, prodding her.
“But,” Isabel grumbled, “I hope that you can forgive me.”
Morgan smiled, nodding at her. “Thank you.” Then she looked at me.
“It’s okay,” I said, taking the hint. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Thanks,” Isabel said. She was already inching off the porch, toward the steps.
“See?” Morgan said to her, squeezing her arm. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?”
“I’m going home,” Isabel told her, her duty done. She was lighter on her feet now, practically bounding down the steps and across the yard to the little white house I’d seen earlier.
Morgan sighed. Close up she looked older and pointier: bony elbows, prominent collarbone, a nose that jutted out sharp and sudden.
“She’s not so bad,” she said to me, as if I’d said otherwise. “She can just be a real bitch sometimes. Mark says she’s friendship impaired.”
“Mark?” I said.
“My fiancé.” She smiled and extended her right hand, that tiny diamond twinkling.
There was a sudden burst of music from the little house. Lights were coming on in the windows, and I caught a glimpse of Isabel passing by.
“Then why do you put up with her?” I asked.
She looked over at the house; the music was cheerful, bouncy and wild, and now Isabel was dancing, a beer in one hand. She shimmied past the windows, shaking her hair, hips swaying. Morgan smiled.
“Because, for the most part, she’s all I’ve got,” she said. And then she went down the steps, across the yard, and up the path to that little house. When she got to the doorstep she turned and waved.
“See you around,” she said.
“Okay,” I said.
I watched as she opened the door, the music spilling out; it was disco, some woman wailing. And as Morgan stepped in, Isabel whirled by, grinning, and grabbed her arm, pulling her into that warm light before the door swung shut behind them.
chapter three
The next morning, when I went in to the bathroom to brush my teeth, I noticed the index card over the sink.
RIGHT FAUCET DRIPS EASILY, it said. TIGHTEN WITH WRENCH AFTER USING. And then there was an arrow, pointing down to where a small wrench was tied with bright red yarn to one of the pipes.
This is crazy, I thought.
But that wasn’t all. In the shower, HOT WATER IS VERY HOT! USE WITH CARE was posted over the soap dish. And on the toilet: HANDLE LOOSE. DON’T YANK. (As if I had some desire to do that.) The overhead fan was clearly BROKEN, the tiles by the door were LOOSE so I had to WALK CAREFULLY. And I was informed, cryptically, that the light over medicine cabinet WORKS, BUT ONLY SOMETIMES.
They were all over the house. I came across them like dropped bread crumbs, leading me from one thing to another. Windows were PAINTED SHUT, banisters LOOSE, chairs had ONE LEG TOO SHORT. It was like a strange game, and it made me feel unsteady and weird, wishing that even one thing was new enough to work perfectly. I wondered how anyone could live like this, but it was obvious that Mira wasn’t just anyone.
Before I got to Colby, all I knew was that she was two years older than my mother, unmarried, and had inherited all of my grandparents’ money. I also knew that, like us, she was overweight. Mira had lived in Chicago during the first few years we’d crisscrossed the country in our Volaré, and the one thing I clearly remembered about visiting her were the doughnuts she’d made out of Pillsbury biscuit dough, fried and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. She always seemed to be cooking or eating.
When my mother got thin, it was like she’d found religion. She wanted to share it with everyone: me first, followed by the legions of women who flocked to her aerobics classes, and then the rest of the free world. She was like an evangelist of weight loss. But it was clear Mira hadn’t converted: the closet in my room contained every bit of Kiki merchandise ever manufactured, all of it stacked and neat in its original packaging. (I’d added mine to the pile.) And that morning Mira made doughnuts. I sat and watched her eat five of them, pop pop pop pop pop, one right after another, licking her fingers and laughing that giggly laugh all the way.
Mira had been my grandparents’ favorite: art school educated, full of promise, the good daughter. My mother, on the other hand, with her wild clothes and lifestyle, had fallen entirely out of favor when she’d gotten pregnant at twenty, dropped out of college, and had me. We spent so much time moving around that her family hardly ever knew where we lived, much less who we were. Our few visits to Mira’s had ended with big blowouts, usually sparked by some childhood memory she and my mother recalled differently. The last time I’d seen her was at my grandmother’s funeral, in Cincinnati, when I was about ten. We’d stuck around just long enough to find out Mira was inheriting everything; not too long after, she’d moved to Colby.
After I ate two doughnuts, I realized those forty-five-and-a-half pounds could creep back easily over a whole summer of what my mother termed “Stuffin’ for Nothin’.” I ran on the beach for an hour, Walkman on, music pounding in my ears.
When I got back I found Mira in her studio, a big messy room off the kitchen. She wore yellow overalls and her slippers, and her hair was piled up on top of her head, with about seven pens, capped and uncapped, sticking out in various places.
“Do you want to see my new death card?” she asked me cheerfully. “I’ve been working on it all week.”
“Death card?”
“Well, technically it’s called a condolence card,” she said, shifting in her office chair, which was jacked up as high as it could go. “But it is what it is, you know?”
I took the two pieces of thick sketch paper she handed me. On the first was a pastel drawing of some flowers, over which was written:
I am so sorry . . .
And on the second, which was to be the inside of the card:
All losses are so hard to bear, but the loss of former love can be the hardest. Regardless of the reasons, there was love. And my heart and thoughts are with you at this difficult time.
“Too much?” she said as I looked down at the bottom of the page
, where Mira’s Miracles was written in small print, with tiny red hearts topping both i ’s.
“Um, no,” I said. “I just never saw a card that specific before.”
“It’s the new wave,” she said simply, pulling a pen out of her hair. “Specialized condolence cards for new occasions. Dead ex-husbands, dead bosses, dead mailmen . . .”
I looked at her.
“I’m serious!” she said, spinning around in her chair and reaching for a box behind her. “Here it is!” She produced a card and cleared her throat. “The outside says, I considered him a friend. . . . And when you open it up, it reads, Sometimes a service can become more than just routine, when it is delivered with heart and humor and personal care. I considered him to be my friend and I will miss so much our daily contact.” She looked at me, grinning. “See what I mean?”
“You give that to your mailman?” I said.
“To your mailman’s widow,” she corrected me, chucking the card back into the box. “I have them for everything, every profession. You have to. People’s lives are very specialized now. Their cards need to be, too.”
“I don’t know if I’d buy a card for my mailman’s widow.”
“You might not,” she said seriously. “But you are probably not a card person. Some people just need to give cards. And they’re the ones that keep me in business.”
I looked at the shelves against the back wall, all of them stacked with boxes and boxes of cards. “Did you do all of these?”
“Yep. I’ve done about two or three a week since art school.” She gestured towards them. “I mean, I have cards here from ten, fifteen years back.”
“Do you only do death cards?” I asked her.
“Well, I started out with the standard line,” she said, straightening a can of pens on her desk. “Birthdays, valentines, et cetera. But then I hit big in the eighties with NonniCards.”
“Wait,” I said suddenly. “I know that name.”
She smiled, reaching under her desk and coming up with another card. “Yep, she was the motherlode. Nonni made me my name in this business.”