My First Love

by Callie West

  Anyone who looked closely at me would have been able to tell that my whole life was splitting apart at the seams, but Chris, the guy who said he loved me, was oblivious.

  “No how, no way, no time,” I told him angrily. “No more Astronomy Club.”

  At home, in the mailbox, the third terrible shock was waiting for me. It was an envelope addressed, in my father’s handwriting, to Miss Amy Wyse. I was afraid to even mention it to Mom, who had a half-hour break between her two jobs and was changing her work clothes. She had sent him a note after I showed her the financial aid form.

  I hesitated for a moment before opening it, torn between wanting to know what my father’s response to my mother’s note was and not wanting any more bad news that day. Finally, nervously, I tore it open and read the first few lines quickly. When I didn’t see the phrase “Not on your life!” in the first paragraph, I continued reading, feeling braver and stronger as I got through each line.

  Dear Amy, the letter began, in that same crampy script he used to sign my birthday card each year. Your mom tells me you’re planning for college, and of course I want to offer as much help as I can. But things haven’t been easy for me these last few years. Did you know that I’ve changed jobs five times, trying to find something I like?

  When I read the last line, I thought of how Mom had to work two jobs just to make ends meet. I’m sure my father never asked if she liked what she did for a living. “Poor guy,” I couldn’t help mumbling sarcastically.

  “Are you talking to me?” Mom called from her room, giving her hair a last-minute brushing.

  “No,” I said. “Just talking to myself.”

  All this by way of saying, I continued to read, that the contribution I can make toward your tuition isn’t much to speak of. But to help with your applications to the state schools (this, he’d underlined), I’d like to give you an early graduation present: any electric typewriter of your choice (within reason, of course).

  The last line was so awful that it was almost funny. I mean, what century was this man living in, anyway? I had been using a laptop ever since I learned to type. I crumpled his letter, walked into the kitchen, and threw it into the trash.

  “I see you found your father’s letter,” Mom said.

  “You read it?” I asked.

  “I didn’t have to,” she said, coming over to put her arm around me. “I know your father well enough to know he’ll never change. I thought it’d be better if we just got that hope out of the way.”

  Mom was being so sympathetic that I wanted to burst into tears. “Cheer up, Amy,” she said when she saw my eyes welling up. “We’ll work things out. The best years of your life are still ahead of you.”

  I knew that her idea of “working things out” was my applying to a state school. We couldn’t afford tuition, let alone room and board, at a private school. I was afraid that if I said that’s what I wanted, Mom would go out and get a third job.

  I wiped the tears from my eyes with the back of my hand and walked with my mom to the driveway. After I watched her drive off down the street, I went back into the empty apartment and strode purposefully to my room.

  After the awful day I’d had, what I needed was to write an A+ project for Ms. Hutchinson and, for once, get a good night’s sleep.

  That night, I spent almost four hours composing a can-you-top-this paper on intimacy. I printed it out on bond paper and placed it in a crisp red folder I found in my desk. After I’d finished, I was feeling relieved and also pretty pleased with myself.

  When I heard the tap on my window, my heart didn’t leap. It sank. Mom would be home from El Rancho any minute. Technically, I was still grounded, and by that time—ten-fifteen—I was supposed to be fast asleep.

  I opened the window and glared at Chris. “What are you doing here?” I asked him. “I told you, no more.”

  “Please, Amy. It’s still early, and I won’t keep you up late,” he promised. Something reckless in his eyes alarmed me. What if he did something stupid, I worried, like hang around until Mom pulled into the driveway and we were both caught? That’s when I decided that getting him safely out of there would be easier if I just played along.

  I glanced at my glow-in-the-dark alarm clock and saw that there wasn’t time to change back into my clothes. “Stay right there. I’ll come outside.”

  There was really no graceful way to climb out my window wearing an ankle-length nightgown. “Let me help you,” Chris said as I balanced, half in and half out of the window. I rested my arms on his strong swimmer’s shoulders, and he lifted me in his arms and carried me to the lawn.

  I shivered as he set me down in the shadow of the oleanders, where we could stay out of sight. “Cold?” Chris asked. I nodded, and he pulled me close.

  Around us, it had started to thunder. In the distance, I saw a flash of lightning.

  “I can’t stay,” I told him. “It’s going to pour. Besides, my mom will be home any minute.”

  “Stay just a little while,” Chris begged.

  “I can’t risk it,” I told him. “By the time my mom gets home from work, I’ve got to be back inside, asleep in my bed.”

  Just then, the skies broke open, and the rain came down in torrents. “Chris, I can’t—” I started to protest, but he had already taken my hand and was pulling me to the shelter of a palm tree. Its fronds made a puny umbrella.

  “Amy,” he said, pulling me closer, “I had to tell you. When you were mad at me today, I realized …” He paused for a moment, as if unsure of his words. “It’s just that I love you. I don’t want you to be angry. I don’t want to be apart.”

  It was exciting to hear those words, but it was a little scary too. I wasn’t sure I was ready.

  “Well, we have to have some time apart,” I tried to joke. “You know—to see our families, change our clothes.” But Chris wasn’t laughing, and he held me so tightly I could hear his heart beating in his chest.

  “Chris, I really have to go,” I told him, pulling away.

  “Amy, you know I’d do anything for you,” Chris whispered.

  I stared at him for a moment as he held my arm, and I realized that though he meant what he said, it wasn’t true. If it were he wouldn’t be holding me so tight when I was desperate to get back to the safety of my bedroom.

  “Chris, listen,” I said, getting anxious. “If my mom comes home and I’m out here soaking wet in my nightgown, we’re both going to be in big trouble. Don’t you even care?”

  “Of course I care,” Chris said.

  “Then let me go,” I protested. “If you really care, you’ll do what’s best for me. All these late nights don’t even seem to affect you. You work half as hard as I do and end up with much better grades. You swim as well as ever, and I end up getting benched. You may not need the space, but I do!”

  Just then, a pair of headlights flashed across the front lawn as a car turned into our drive. “Quick! Duck!” I said, pushing Chris into the oleanders. I recognized the whiny sound of the car’s engine. I didn’t even have to look to know that it was Mom.

  “You’ve got to get out of here!” I whispered, and without waiting for an answer, I took off for my open window. I prayed that Mom would fumble with her door keys, giving me a few extra seconds to get inside.

  “I’ll wait for you,” Chris promised, running beside me.

  “Don’t you dare!” I snapped at him. “If my mother catches you here, I’ll be grounded for the rest of my life.”

  “It’s not a crime for us to want to be together,” Chris said defiantly as he helped me back through the window.

  I couldn’t believe he was talking in such a loud voice when my mom was just fifty feet away, probably turning her key in the lock. “Go home!” I whispered desperately. “Go home and leave me alone! I mean it!”

  Chris started to protest, but I slid the window shut. Then I crawled into bed and pulled up the covers just as Mom cracked open my door to check in on me. My heart was pounding, and I was relieved whe
n she closed the door.

  As I lay there in bed, tears ran down my face. I didn’t want to give up Chris, I really didn’t.

  But I couldn’t take sneaking around behind my mother’s back anymore, I couldn’t take feeling tired all the time, I couldn’t take feeling so distant from Blythe and Rick, and I couldn’t take failure in school and on the swim team.

  If this is what being in love meant, then maybe my mom was right: I wasn’t meant to be in love.

  chapter fifteen

  For the next week at school, I stayed as far from Chris as possible. It was hard, and I missed him constantly, but I had finally admitted to myself that being in love and achieving my goals just didn’t mix. The only way I was going to get back on track was by giving him up.

  Blythe was great—she had totally forgiven me for yelling at her about the dance. Every day she waited with me and kept me occupied until Chris had left the classroom after physics, and at swimming I made sure to stay in the locker room until Coach August blew his whistle for practice.

  I really concentrated on my swimming. Often, I stayed after practice to get some extra swimming in. To be completely honest, part of my swimming late had to do with avoiding Chris. But mostly I wanted to prove to Coach August, and to myself, that I was prepared for the regionals.

  One night I had a really bizarre dream. Chris and I were at the regionals, but I was swimming his breaststroke events instead of my freestyle, and he wasn’t swimming at all. He had come to compete as a diver. He turned tight somersaults high in the air and then sliced the water cleanly just a few feet from where I was swimming laps in the pool.

  The water, however, was not clear and sparkling blue, but a sinister, murky, river brown. When he landed, it creepily closed up around his body, like a sea anemone. Dirty bubbles rose to the surface while the audience applauded.

  In the middle of the race, I stopped swimming and dog-paddled to the place where he’d entered the water, afraid that he might drown. But then I heard his voice calling from the pool deck, and I knew that he’d found his way out. I woke up frog-kicking the covers, panicked because I had given up the competition and gotten myself lost.

  I told Mom about it that morning at breakfast. She seemed to think it was a pretty easy dream to interpret. “Amy, you’re drowning in all the pressure you’ve put yourself under,” she said.

  I stared at her in disbelief, anger rising in my throat. “Who are you to talk about pressure?” I demanded angrily. “You’re the one who’s always pressuring me to get good grades and win a swimming scholarship so I can go to college.” I was really steamed. “You don’t want me to have any kind of life. You won’t even let me date!”

  I was amazed by the rage in my own voice, but I couldn’t stop myself. The floodgates had opened, and there was nothing I could do to close them. “I can’t do everything you want me to!” I yelled at her in a choked voice. “I can’t get perfect grades! I’m never going to be an Olympic swimmer!”

  Suddenly my anger broke and sadness rushed in to replace it. Before I knew it, tears were streaming down my cheeks, and my chest was heaving with quiet sobs. “I can’t live your life for you, Mom,” I whispered. “I can’t make your dreams come true.”

  Mom’s face was anguished, and when she stood up from her chair I was scared she was going to walk out of the kitchen. But she didn’t. She came over and put her arms around me and rocked me gently back and forth.

  I don’t even know how long we stood there in our bathrobes, holding each other. I just knew it felt good to be in her arms and feel like her little girl again.

  “I’m sorry, Amy,” she said at last when she pulled away. I could tell from the streaks on her face that she’d been crying too. “I only wanted to protect you. I wanted to save you from making the mistakes I’ve made. But I know I can’t. I have to let you grow up.”

  A fresh wave of tears filled my eyes as she pushed my hair back from my forehead.

  “Sometimes it’s hard to know the right way to love someone,” she said in a soft voice. “It’s hard to know when and how to let go.”

  I realized when she said that, she could have been talking about Chris.

  Three days before the junior-senior dance, Rick called and asked me to go with him. As a friend.

  “That is, if you’re not already going with Shepherd,” he said, as if the rumor of our breakup hadn’t circulated throughout the entire school.

  “I’d love to go to the dance with you,” I said truthfully. “There’s just one problem—I already have a date.”

  “You do?” Rick asked. “But I thought you and Shepherd broke up.”

  “We did,” I said, and then I couldn’t help laughing. “Blythe doesn’t have a date, and she and I agreed to go together.”

  “How about if Blythe comes with us?” Rick suggested.

  “That’s a great idea,” I told him. “The threesome is back in action. You call her.”

  He and I talked for a few minutes more, then hung up. I sat by the phone, smiling. Rick wasn’t right for me, and I knew it. But he was right for Blythe, only he didn’t know it yet. I knew he wasn’t seeing beyond her crazy clothes and her outspoken ideas and all their years of platonic friendship, so before I hung up, I spent a few minutes talking up Blythe’s romantic side to Rick.

  Then I called up Blythe to discuss what we were going to wear to the dance. I knew I couldn’t possibly ask Mom for money to buy a dress. As usual, Blythe came to my rescue.

  “You can wear something of mine,” she said. “I’ll be right over to pick you up.”

  A half hour later Blythe was searching her large closet for something I could borrow. She sorted through a row of worn-once fancy dresses and then pulled out her brand-new black velvet. “This would look great on you,” she said.

  “Blythe, you haven’t even worn that yet,” I protested.

  “I know.” Blythe sighed and smoothed the fabric around the neckline lovingly. “Once I got it home, I decided it just didn’t fit.”

  “Right,” I told her, squinting skeptically. “Like you really gained twenty pounds since you bought it.” I knew she was pretending it didn’t fit because she was trying to make me feel better about having broken up with Chris. I hadn’t told her about my conversation with Rick—I was nervous that she’d get mad if she found out I’d been playing matchmaker.

  “Why don’t you try this on again,” I said to Blythe, “just to make sure.”

  While she was dressing, the phone in the hallway rang. “I’ll get it,” I said, running. “I’ll bet it’s for you.”

  “Who could be calling?” Blythe said sarcastically. “You’re already here.”

  “Hello?” I said, and my suspicious were confirmed. “Hi. Yeah, hang on just a sec.”

  I went to Blythe’s bedroom door. “It’s Rick,” I whispered. “And I don’t think he wants to talk about PSATs.”

  “You didn’t!” Blythe screamed at me, covering her face so that I couldn’t tell if she was angry or pleased. “You didn’t actually ask Rick if I could tag along on your date to the dance!”

  “Of course not,” I said. “I told him I had a date with you and that he could tag along with us.”

  “I am so embarrassed,” Blythe said.

  “Blythe, what’s the deal?” I demanded. “The three of us have gone to parties and dances together before.”

  “But that was before …”

  Blythe’s sentence trailed off, but I finished it for her in my head. Before he kissed me? Before you realized you were falling in love with him?

  “Fine,” Blythe said at last. “We’ll go. The Awesome Threesome reunited.”

  I smiled. “Great.”

  “But”—she pointed a warning finger at me—“don’t you dare go acting like it’s anything else.”

  I nodded innocently. “Whatever you say.”

  So Blythe and I shared a date, and she shared her beautiful peacock-blue silk dress with me. And that’s how it happened that on Friday we made ou
r entrance, three abreast, at the junior-senior dance.

  Sure, some people were whispering about our strange date. But they’d seen it before, and the way I figured it, I had the best of both worlds: my best friend and my other best friend. I tried not to think of what I was missing without Chris.

  I have a picture of us from that night, taken by one of those cheesy freelance photographers with the ruffled shirt and sly smile. The three of us are laughing hysterically, posing against this odd Hawaiian backdrop of plastic potted plants. Rick appears more relaxed and happy than I’ve ever seen him. Blythe is in the middle, getting Rick’s attention by making a face. I’m off to one side, looking out toward the dance floor, as if I’m searching for something I’ve lost.

  “Come on!” Blythe said after the picture was taken and our threesome recorded for posterity. “Let’s get out there and show the school that this trio knows how to dance!”

  The first song didn’t go so well, though. I love to dance, but it was so crowded on the dance floor that my arms were practically pinned to my sides and I could barely move my hips. Besides, I felt self-conscious, especially since Rick was moving so carefully, swaying a half inch in either direction and stiffly snapping his fingers. It was about as much fun as one of those dances in junior high where the girls dance together, while the boys huddle against the cafeteria wall.

  Blythe circled around us making fun of our serious expressions, doing her best to get us both to loosen up. Then, in a fit of desperation, she tried another tactic. Blythe, who can be very persuasive, convinced a whole group of kids to get in a long line and do the Bunny Hop.

  I was shocked that Rick joined in immediately, grabbing Blythe by the waist and following her down some imaginary trail. “What a nutcase!” he said appreciatively as I hooked on the line. Blythe’s idea had been risky—I mean, the Bunny Hop’s not exactly the picture of cool. But as always, she knew just the right thing to make people laugh and have a good time. Even Rick was moving easier, and I could tell by his face that he was greatly relieved. The line got longer and longer, and soon half the students had joined in, weaving all around the gym.