by Dyan Sheldon
“Except that it wasn’t a phoney line.” She’s wearing her favourite dangling gold star earrings. They sway when she moves, flashing in the street lamps. “It was true. It was me. It was totally me.”
On the day before Sorrel sent him the break-up text they’d gone back to her house after school. Since they’d started dating the only times he’d been in her house (briefly) were when he was picking her up to go somewhere. Which hadn’t bothered him as much as it might have. They all avoided going to Sorrel’s house whenever possible because her mother was almost always there – and there was almost always a scene. How long it took for Sorrel and her mother to start fighting depended on everybody’s mood or whether Meryl had had an early cocktail or not, but it rarely took long enough to finish a soda. He went with her on that afternoon because Sorrel wanted his opinion on the project she was doing for art. And, like a gift from the gods, that day they had the place to themselves. He wouldn’t have to leave because he was embarrassed or because Sorrel was too angry to want him around. They went up to her room – the first and last time he would ever be in it. She got out her project and they talked about it for a while, and then they started making out. Which also wasn’t something that happened a lot. Thinking about it later, he reckoned that he got a little carried away, but at the time he thought she pushed him off her because she heard her mother come home. She was up first, pulling her clothes together. Saying they’d better go down. He was surprised to discover that her mother hadn’t come home, but before he could suggest going back to her room and finishing what they’d started she said he’d better leave. She kissed him goodbye, but not the way she’d been kissing him ten minutes before. Or maybe it was not the way that he’d been kissing her. And at 1.45 a.m. she sent him a text: I think we should stop dating. I’m really sorry. It’s nothing to do with you. It’s me. We’re better off friends . Merry Christmas.
Now he says, “Well that’s not what it felt like to me.” Especially when he practically begged her to give him another chance and she refused. “It felt like it was my fault.”
“Because you weren’t paying attention. You were only thinking about how you felt; you never thought about me,” says Sorrel. “I always really liked you, Orlando. You know that. I liked you a lot. I still do. I just never liked you that way. You’re a great guy. But not for me. I was into somebody else.”
Knowing that he’s a great guy for someone else doesn’t keep the bitterness out of his voice. “Then why did you go out with me if you never liked me that way? Why lead me on?”
“I didn’t mean to. But I had to go out with somebody. You can’t be the girl all the guys want to date and not go out with somebody. Everybody expected it. Especially my mom. She never got off my case. And my mom wanted me to date you.” Despite the fights, Sorrel did what her mother told her to do – just as Orlando does what Officer Gwinnet wants. “Meryl was always on at me about you. Orlando this… Orlando that… Maybe she really does like you.” Her laugh sputters. “She probably likes you more than she ever liked me. You know, because you’re good-looking and a sports star. She figured we were a perfect match. Beauty and the Jock.” They’ve both stopped walking and are stood facing each other. “And if it worked out, and you became a big basketball legend and I was this mega model, then it was win–win all the way, wasn’t it?”
That depended on how you looked at it. One person’s win–win could be another’s lose–lose.
“But what about me? What about my feelings? Did you ever consider how I felt?”
“Of course I did. That’s why I ended it. I could see you were starting to get serious. I was trying to save you from being hurt.”
And look how well that turned out.
“If you’re trying to make me feel better it isn’t working.”
But maybe it is. Because suddenly he sees very clearly that the enthusiasm was all on his side. In that short time when they dated Sorrel had treated him exactly as she’d always treated him – like a buddy, like a good and close friend. The only difference was that sometimes she’d link her arm with his when they were walking together, or even hold his hand. And she’d let him kiss her – only now he isn’t sure if she really kissed him back. Because he finally gets it, sees the pattern. All the guys Sorrel went out with – never for more than a few weeks, if that long – all big men at school; guys her mother would approve of, probably guys her mother picked the same way she picked him. Somewhere way at the back of his mind, images are stirring. Sorrel really happy. Sorrel really excited. Sorrel really involved. Sorrel smiling like she knew the best secret there ever was.
“So who was it you really wanted to go out with?” asks Orlando. “Who was it you liked that way?”
She tilts her head to one side. “Can’t you guess?”
On either side of them the coloured lights glow and the bare, iced branches of the trees shine. In front of him, Sorrel gazes back at him calmly, the gold stars glinting against the darkness. Of course. The earrings. A gift from Celeste. And he sees the two of them at the birthday party, heads together; hears Sorrel say she’s eighteen and can do what she wants. How could he have missed it? Celeste and Sorrel; Sorrel and Celeste. Inseparable; close as the bricks in a wall. A match guaranteed to displease both their mothers.
“Celeste,” says Orlando. It was always Celeste. It really wasn’t about him.
“I knew you’d be able to guess,” says Sorrel.
A door shuts on Orlando’s right, and he turns to see two French bull terriers and a man in a green parka on the porch decorated with glowing snowmen. The dogs hurl themselves down the steps, pulling the man behind them. As they pass, the man gives Orlando the wary sort of smile you’d give someone who’s been standing for some time on an empty street talking earnestly to himself as they pass.
Celeste is nervous and excited. After months of preparation, the night of the Christmas concert has arrived. Everyone involved in the concert has worked and practised hard for it, but none harder than Celeste. She wants to make her father proud, but she also wants to make her mother proud. To show Lilah that music isn’t just a hobby for her; that it’s what she’s good at; that it’s what she wants to do. This concert means so much to Celeste that she’s been able to think of nothing else all day. Her mother and sister talk to her, but she has no idea what they’re saying. She goes into a room, and then has no idea why she’s there. She is so distracted that she could have had a complete makeover in the time it’s taken her to get ready.
Now, however, Celeste, Sorrel and Celeste’s guitar are in the living room. The guitar is wearing an angel sticker on its case. Celeste is wearing a long, flowing, red tunic over a long, flowing, red skirt and earrings like the ones she gave Sorrel last year, but in silver not gold. Sorrel is wearing a reindeer onesie – something she always wanted that her mother wouldn’t let her have. This time Celeste knows exactly why she is here. She and her guitar are waiting for Ruben to pick them up. After categorically saying that he was no longer interested in working on school productions, Ruben suddenly changed his mind and agreed to design the sets for the concert. The musicians have to get to the school early to get ready, and because he wants to check everything one last time Ruben offered to give her a lift. Sorrel stands at the window, acting as lookout. They both turn as Celeste’s mother comes in, glancing at her watch.
Time is a peculiar thing. More a fluid than a solid, minutes can seem like hours, and hours can seem like the blink of an eye. Which is a roundabout way of saying that though Tylor Redwing may think that he and Lilah have been apart long enough for the debris of their break-up to have passed under the bridge and crossed several seas by now, that is not how Lilah sees it. She has accepted the fact that he is making his Christmas visit early so that he can attend Celeste’s concert – and that she will have to be in the same room with him in front of her friends and clients – but acceptance isn’t the same as being happy about it. Her only official statement has been, “It’s a free country. I can’t stop him fr
om coming.” But she would if she could, and both she and Celeste know that. Which is why she hasn’t been told that Jake is coming, too.
“What time did Ruben—” Lilah is saying, but breaks off when she sees Celeste. She tilts her head at an angle of disapproval. “You don’t think that outfit is a little informal for a concert?” Her smile is helpful. “I thought orchestras always wore black and white.”
“She’s thinking of penguins,” says Sorrel. “The Philharmonic Penguin Orchestra.”
Celeste smiles back. “No, I don’t think it’s too informal. I think it’s perfect.” Sorrel helped her pick it out. Casual, but not too casual; colourful enough for a blues band, but not too colourful for a serious solo. “I told you, it’s all about the music. And Ms Santos doesn’t believe in following outmoded conventions.”
“Um.” Thinking of her ex-husband brings to mind several outmoded conventions that Lilah believes in following.
“Christmas is a celebration,” says Celeste. “Ms Santos said we should look like we’re at a party, not a funeral.”
“Well, I hope you do have something to celebrate. I hope your father’s not too late. You know how unreliable he is.”
“He’s not going to be late. He had a flat tyre, that’s all. I told you, he fixed it right away.”
Lilah frowns. “I don’t remember him being that handy before. He could barely change a light bulb when he lived with us. Do you remember the time he flooded the bathroom trying to stop the tap from dripping? And the ti—”
“Ruben’s here,” announces Sorrel. “And not a second too soon.”
Celeste picks up her coat from the arm of the sofa. “I’ll see you later, Mom. I have to go.” She gives Lilah a quick kiss as Ruben sounds his horn. “Don’t forget, it starts at seven sharp.”
Sorrel’s antlers wave as she turns away from the window. “You may be sorry you reminded her,” says Sorrel.
The auditorium is almost full and the lights slightly dimmed as the orchestra takes its seats onstage for the first half of the programme. Celeste scans the crowd for familiar faces. Her mother and Astra sit in the middle with Lilah’s friends from work. Orlando and Suzanne Gwinnet sit with Ruben on the opposite side of the aisle. Lilah keeps glancing over her shoulder, which means that the reason Celeste doesn’t spot her father is because he isn’t there. She’ll never hear the end of it if her mother is right and Tylor doesn’t make the concert after all. But then, as Ms Santos takes the stage, the doors open at the back and Tylor and Jake appear, framed for a second in the doorway, looking out of place in their jeans, leather jackets and Christmas ties among the suit jackets and slacks of the other men in the audience. It isn’t just Celeste’s mother who looks over as they stride down the aisle to the miraculously (or, possibly, unfortunately) empty seats at the front. But it is Lilah who gets Celeste’s attention; her expression the mix of horror and surprise you would experience if, in the middle of a torturous nightmare, you suddenly realized that you aren’t asleep. Celeste really should have told her Jake was coming. Ms Santos raises her baton. Sparing Celeste from seeing the look her mother shoots her way.
It may or may not be true, as the playwright William Congreve said, that music has charms to soothe the savage breast, but it definitely has enough charm to make Celeste forget about anything else. And from the reception both parts of the programme receive, it seems that music’s charms work on the audience as well. At the very end, when all the musicians come out onstage, they are given a standing ovation. The first people on their feet are Tylor and Jake; the first and the loudest.
Celeste has done such a good job of forgetting anything but the concert that it isn’t until she and her guitar emerge to find her family in the foyer that the happiness of tonight’s success walks straight into a wall. Here, clearly, is something she should have thought of before. The two sides stand facing each other like duellists. Her father seems to be doing most of the talking, Jake smiling and nodding beside him. Lilah also is smiling, but like a woman carved out of stone; Astra is by the doors, talking to some kids she knows from school.
“There she is!” Tylor wraps her – and the guitar – in a hug. “You were great, honey. Absolutely fantastic.”
Jake holds up his video camera. “And we have the whole thing recorded here for posterity.” And then he takes his turn at hugging.
Lilah smiles at Celeste. “I’m sure you must be ex—.”
Tylor cuts her off. “I was just saying to your mom that we should all go out and celebrate.” He moves his hand between him and Jake. “Our treat. Just name the place.”
“And I was just saying to your father that we’ve already eaten—”
Celeste was too wound up to eat supper. “I haven’t—”
“But you’re tired,” says Lilah. “You’ve been working so much for tonight. All those rehearsals. All that practice. I’m sure you’d like to get an early night.”
“We don’t have to stay out late,” says Tylor. “We can just go get a pizza. Give us all a chance to catch up.”
Lilah looks as though she’d rather catch the plague. “I’m afraid you’ll have to count me and Astra out. We really aren’t hungry.” She turns her Mount Rushmore smile on her daughter. “But if Celeste wants to go that’s up to her, of course.”
Three pairs of eyes focus on Celeste. She would love to go out with her father and Jake. She would also love not to have her mother looking at her like that, as if Celeste is twisting a knife in her back. Celeste can feel guilt sucking all the joy of the last two hours from her heart.
“Of course,” Lilah says to Tylor, still smiling at Celeste, “you are going to see them both tomorrow. You could celebrate then.” If anyone’s twisting a knife in anyone’s back it isn’t Celeste.
Celeste looks from the men to her mother. She can’t leave Lilah to drive home alone. And she will see her father and Jake tomorrow. And she is pretty tired; it’s been a long day.
She opens her mouth to say that she thinks she’d better go home, but the voice she hears is Sorrel’s.
“Are you kidding me?” Still in her onesie, Sorrel is standing just behind Lilah. “Your dad and Jake came all this way to see you play, and you’re going to go home because your mom wants to punish you and them? You should go celebrate. Believe me, you’ll have plenty of time to feel guilty tomorrow.” Sorrel’s antlers bob. “Didn’t I tell you you’d regret reminding your mom to be on time?”
Celeste leans over and gives her mother a kiss. “I’ll see you later,” she says. “You don’t have to wait up, I have my keys.”
Sylvia frowns at the screen. Since a few not-too-bright lights have been allowed back on in the house she’s started leaving her room more. She won’t go into the kitchen yet, but she comes downstairs and eats supper with Ruben in the dining room. Some nights she’ll even give him a game of Scrabble or cards, and twice has watched a film with him on his laptop. At Christmas she let him drive her around the neighbourhood to look at all the decorations, talking about all the times the three of them had gone from street to street, always picking up a take-out on the way home. “Remember how much your father loved it?” she asked. Sorrel, in the back seat, said, “I told you so.”
Besides this new willingness to see where she’s going and to go there, Sylvia has started answering her own emails. The email she’s frowning at right now is from the manager of the bookshop in the local mall, telling her how excited they are about her forthcoming author event and including photos of the poster and window display they’ve made. “I don’t remember saying I’d do it,” says Sylvia. “Why would I say that? I haven’t done anything like that in months. And it’s miles away.” She looks up at Ruben, who is peering over her shoulder. “Do you remember me saying yes? Do you even remember them asking?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I was out of that loop. But we can check your old messages, see if they did ask, and if you did reply.” He leans across her to move the cursor. And there it is, three emails. The first the shop’s requ
est, the third the shop’s acknowledgment of her reply, and the second Sylvia’s reply: Thank you so much for your kind invitation. I’d be delighted to do a book signing at your store… Signed by Gaia Pendragon. “There you go,” says Ruben. “It looks like you did agree.”
“I still don’t remember.” She shakes her head. “This is why you have to be careful with electrical things. You can’t trust them. Your computer must’ve answered the invitation itself.”
This is true and not true at the same time. It’s true in the sense that Ruben’s laptop sent the acceptance without any help from Sylvia. But it isn’t true that it decided to cut out the middleperson and answer the bookshop itself. It was Ruben who typed out the message and hit Send. A deed that he blames on Sorrel. His mother hadn’t been online for a couple of days and he was looking through her mail, just checking. There was more than one request for an author visit. Usually, he automatically deletes them, but Sorrel was right beside him, hassling him as usual. Yapping on and on about how Sylvia was doing a disservice to herself and her fans. How much the Pendragon books mean to her readers. How much better it would make Sylvia feel to realize that. How it would boost her confidence to accept one or two of the invitations she’s always receiving. How it would ground her to take on some responsibility. How she might have fun getting out of the house and talking to people again. It would do her several worlds of good. Wasn’t it time she faced her fears instead of hiding from them? Wasn’t it time she got her life back? And then Sorrel gave him one of her sour, meaningful looks, so he’d know she was talking about more than one life. Which was an example of Sorrel ignoring his efforts to get his own life back, bit by bit. Didn’t he leave his mother alone to go keep an eye on Astra and Winnie? Didn’t he do the sets for the concert? Didn’t he make another painting as his Christmas present for Orlando, Celeste and his mom this year? Hasn’t he been making an effort to hang out with Orlando and Celeste? “There’s still more to do,” said Sorrel. “Maybe a journey starts with the first steps, but it doesn’t end with them.” He begged her to stop nagging him. “I’ll stop if you just say yes to your mom doing one signing,” said Sorrel. “The nearest one. That one in the mall. I mean, my God, it’s almost the new year. Time for a change.” He accepted the invitation as Gaia Pendragon to keep Sorrel quiet, thinking that his mother could always change her mind. Though how he thought she would do that when he never told her about it is another of life’s unanswered questions. And then he forgot all about it himself.