by Emma Straub
Katherine had stood there for almost an hour before she gave up and skulked back to the bench that Cecelia was sitting on. She should have told her parents then. He must have come, Cecelia thought, and seen more than one girl. There were cops around, too, just hanging out next to their squad car. If Jesse was really a teenager, he would have sloped up to them like Katherine’s older brother would have, with a dumb look on his face and eyes full of fear. That was when Cecelia should have told. The next time anyone told her anything, she was going to shout it from the rooftops. She was going to be clear and direct. It was the only way.
* * *
—
August and Cecelia walked together to the bus stop after school. They’d stayed late to help Ms. Skolnick put away things after they dried, and to help prep the next round of things that needed to be painted, which meant cutting out tiny doors and windows for the float, and August was going to come over for dinner. The sun was hanging above the trees, turning the sky purple and pink, and they both cupped their hands around their eyes to stop the glare.
“Can I ask you something?” she said to August, who was rearranging things in his backpack.
“Mm-hmm,” August said, without looking up.
“Are you gay?” Cecelia felt her heart beating fast. She was nervous. What a crazy thing to ask someone, just flat out, outside, in the middle of all this light and air.
August looked up. It didn’t seem to be the question he was expecting. “Did someone tell you that?”
“A girl asked me, in Parade Crew. The seventh grader with all the freckles. I said I didn’t know.” Cecelia closed her eyes, her resolve gone at the first clip. “I’m sorry, that was a crazy way to ask that. You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”
August zipped his bag back up and slung it over his shoulder. A lock of hair got caught under the strap, and he tugged it out gently. “People have been asking me that for a long time. For a while, I thought I was. But I’m not.”
At the other end of the driveway, a kid drove their car too fast and screeched to a stop at the light. It was a miracle anyone survived childhood, really.
“I have a friend at camp who’s trans, do you know what that is?” August was speaking quietly. He stood up straight and took a step closer, so that she could hear him.
Cecelia nodded. She’d known a few kids, back in Brooklyn, people who had asked the teachers to say She instead of He, but none of them had ever really been her friends, just figures of interest at school. She stared ahead, to the wall of trees, to the purple sky, to the neat lines of birds sitting on the telephone wires. This was important—Don’t fuck this up, she told herself. Whatever you did before, don’t do that now. Don’t lose your only friend. React perfectly. Whatever that is, just do that, and nothing else.
“Trans is when you’re born into a body that doesn’t match what’s in your brain. My friend was born looking like a boy, so everyone treated her like a boy, but inside, she always knew she was a girl. Like, always. From preschool. She always knew she was a girl.” August shifted from side to side. He was nervous, too, Cecelia could tell. Some kids pushed through the main school doors, some fifty feet away, and were laughing loudly. Their voices echoed into the trees.
“Okay,” Cecelia said. “She.”
“She,” August said. “Yeah. But it’s hard to tell everyone, so she hasn’t yet. Just at camp, and when she’s alone with her parents, for now.”
Cecelia shifted her body so that they were standing next to each other instead of opposite each other and pressed the side of her body into the side of his body, and together they stared out, as if to designate that they were united in this space, that they were a human oasis from the Sidney Fogelmans of the world. The tip of Cecelia’s elbow touched August’s, two points in the dark. “This sounds like a close friend.”
“Really close,” August’s voice was small, just above a whisper.
“Like how close?” Cecelia asked, whispering. “Like your best friend? Emily?”
“Like, closer than Emily. Like, inside my body close,” August said, now almost inaudible.
“Does she have a name? Like, a different name?”
People said that the past and the future didn’t exist, but they did. Just not at the same time. The past was right there, if you wanted to look at it. The only trick was knowing that your past was never the same twice, and the past was never the same for two people. Everyone looked at things through their own eyes, and also through every single thing that had happened before that moment. Even the present was iffy.
“Robin,” August said. “It’s my middle name. It goes both ways. It’s used for both boys and girls, I mean.”
“Nice to meet you, Robin,” Cecelia said. “I won’t tell anyone, I swear. Not anyone in the world, as long as I live, not until you tell me it’s okay.” It was important that August knew that—that Robin knew it. She was done telling secrets. Not for her friends, not for her grandmother, not for anybody. Cecelia leaned sideways, until their heads were touching. She wasn’t the only one who wanted to fast-forward, she understood. Maybe everyone wanted to zoom through space in one direction or the other, and the trick was finding people who wanted to go the same way you did, to help pass the time. The bus came around the corner, circling back to pick up the kids coming from after-school activities, and the driver offered a friendly honk, acknowledging that she’d seen them waiting. Cecelia felt like a much larger alarm should sound every time someone in school said or thought or did something enormous and life-changing, something that their adult selves would remember for the rest of their lives, every time a bowling ball began its heavy roll. But of course then that alarm would sound constantly, all day long, and no one would be able to learn anything at all.
Chapter 29
Barbara Baker, Rest in Peace
Barbara had been a Quaker, and so the memorial service was at the Clapham Valley Congregation of Friends, with the reception to follow in the basement. Astrid dragged Porter and Cecelia, promising to take them to a movie afterward, all three of them stuffed with homemade caramels and snickerdoodles and salads with mysteriously pink dressing, the only foods that Astrid had ever been served in a church basement of any denomination. Birdie was going to meet them at the church. It made Astrid nervous in a way she didn’t like to think about. She and Birdie had been to a thousand places together—at the shop, at the movies, at every restaurant in town, at the dry cleaner, at the bookstore, at the garden center, at Heron Meadows. There were lots of gay and lesbian couples in Clapham and the surrounding towns, many of them gray-haired just like Birdie and her, eating breakfast at Spiro’s, arguing over which new hose to buy at Frank’s hardware store, browsing at Susan’s Bookshop, all the things that made up the days and lives of anyone. But somehow this felt different—it was An Occasion, the kind of event where people held hands with their spouses and thought about their own funeral arrangements. Astrid was nervous.
“What are Quakers?” Cecelia asked under her breath, as they pulled open the light wooden door. “I mean, like, where do they fall on the heaven/hell scale?”
Porter shrugged. “I think they’re kind of like the do-unto-others religion,” she said. “No heaven or hell.”
“Heaven!” Astrid said. “Why not believe in heaven? It’s absurd, but so is everything else in life. It’s dessert, right, heaven? What you get at the end, for being a good person?”
“Do you believe in heaven, Mom?” Porter stopped in her tracks. “Seriously? Like, angels?” On the other side of the door, a large crowd filled nearly all the pews. The room was simple, with diamond-shaped windows of red, yellow, and green. It felt how Porter imagined preschool would look in Sweden. Pale, and light with the sun.
“Of course not, not in a literal sense,” Astrid said. “But I’m not a humanist. My grandparents left their country in order to have more freedom.” She rolled her eyes. “Of course,
Barbara believed in people doing good for goodness’ sake. Good god, it’s the lyrics to ‘Santa Claus Is Coming to Town’!”
Bob Baker was standing a few feet inside the entrance, greeting mourners as they entered. Standing beside him was a woman who looked just like Barbara, only with a feathered blond bob, her bangs winging out to the sides like a host on the Home Shopping Network, a woman who had found Her Look in 1984 and was sticking with it, come hell or high water. Astrid shook her head. “It’s the sister.”
“Barbara’s sister?” Porter asked. “Does she live here?”
“Vermont,” Astrid muttered through clenched teeth. “Dog breeder.”
“Isn’t that kind of like being a pimp?” Cecelia asked. “Like, haven’t we all agreed, as a culture, that the concept of ‘purebred’ sounds like eugenics, and that we should just adopt? What kind of creep chooses genetic material?”
“Um, hello? First of all, could you be a little less smart, please?” Porter asked, and then pointed to her belly: “And second of all, some of us need a little help, you know.”
“Why didn’t you adopt, Porter? That’s actually an excellent question, Cecelia.” Astrid paused. “Did you ever consider it? No judgment. I’m just curious.”
Porter rolled her eyes. “We are at a funeral. Can we talk about my decision to carry my biological child later?” She shoved Cecelia in the back.
“I was talking about dogs,” Cecelia said.
“Are you a dog lover too?” a voice asked. The three Stricks turned around to find Barbara’s sister mooning at them. There were embroidered dogs all over her sweater. Barbara never would have worn anything so garish.
“I have goats,” Porter said. “But, yes, big dog lovers, all of us. So sorry for your loss.”
Astrid stuck out her hand. “Very sorry for your loss. These events aren’t easy, I know. I lost my husband. People expect you to be the host, when all you want to do is stay in bed. Bob told me you’ve been a great help.”
Barbara’s sister nodded. “He’s a wonderful man. They were a great couple. One for the ages.” She looked skyward. “I think we’re going to start soon, if you’d like to find seats.”
“Thank you, we will,” Astrid said, and guided Cecelia by the shoulders to the last row, nearest the exit. “I bet you a million dollars that Barbara hated her sister. Two million. One for the ages, my ass. Do you think her sister knew that Barbara was living at Heron Meadows? I doubt it. You think all those cats of Barbara’s are purebred? No way.” Astrid looked toward the door and saw Birdie.
She was as dressed up as she got. Birdie was wearing a navy blue button-down shirt and some pin-striped pants, with a skinny silver bolo tie. The tie made the silver streak in her hair—a blaze, Astrid had learned it was called, like Susan Sontag, or Cruella de Vil—sparkle. At least that’s what it looked like to Astrid. She stood up and waved, smiling perhaps a little too broadly for the occasion.
It came and went, her courage. She had felt it this morning, a little cloud floating above Birdie’s side of the bed. Birdie, who had always been herself. Astrid had never lied, but she had also never been loud. She tried to imagine what Russell would have said, if she’d told him that she had sometimes imagined being with a woman. Not more often than she imagined being with a man, just sometimes. Every so often, once every five years or so, there would be someone who caught her eye, and Astrid would imagine a first kiss with that person, and having sex, and being married, and after a few months, the feeling would pass. Porter’s fifth-grade teacher had lingered; he had been tall and brawny, and once Astrid had had an extended fantasy about him taking her camping in the Catskills, and what he would do to her body in the tent at night. Another was a woman with beautiful dark eyebrows who had worked at Susan’s Bookshop and then left to go to library school. Russell had been sensitive, self-conscious, and he would have been hurt if he’d known. But if he had lived, she would have stayed married, and she wouldn’t have ever told him anything. That was the truth of a successful marriage that Astrid understood: All you had to do was not get divorced or die! Everything else was fair game. Taken was taken. All love settled. Not settling for something less than you deserved, just settled down, the way breath settles in a sleeping body, not doing more than necessary. Was that what Nicky and Juliette were trying to avoid, the boredom of an average marriage? Was that why Elliot and Wendy seemed so miserable? Astrid understood. It sounded old-fashioned, and depressing, but that’s how things used to be, she wanted to tell her children. All three of them needed to hear it! This is how it was! Do you think your grandparents and your great-grandparents and your great-great-grandparents were always in love? You heard about those couples, the ones who danced beside their dining room tables every night, who held hands every day until they were ninety years old and then died two days apart because they couldn’t bear the loss, but those were the exceptions, weren’t they? Astrid thought so, but she couldn’t be sure. She and Russell had been a good couple but not an extraordinary one. He listened to terrible music. They argued and pointed fingers; they had both spent nights sleeping on the couch, too angry to stay in bed beside the other one. If he were still alive, they would no doubt be fighting still. And would she and Birdie have started going out to lunch? Would they have gone to the movies and shared popcorn, their hands digging into the buttery bag at the same time, knuckles knocking against each other? And would Astrid have felt a tiny zip up her spine? She didn’t know, she didn’t know.
“Gammy, I think you’re a Barbara stan,” Cecelia whispered.
“What is that, a country? Afghanistan?” Astrid craned her neck, watching Birdie make her way through the crowd to their row. Memorial services were exactly like weddings—you never talked to the people whose names were on the invitation, and you spent the whole time catching up with acquaintances while holding disposable plates and paper napkins.
“No, it means stalker/fan. You’re her stan.”
“I see,” Astrid said. “Now, be quiet, both of you.” She stood up and scooched Cecelia and Porter over so that Birdie could sit on her other side.
“Hi,” Birdie said, when she’d finally reached them. “Got the cheap seats, I see.”
Astrid laughed and then kissed Birdie lightly on the lips. Birdie looked pleasantly surprised, which made Astrid feel simultaneously horrible that it had taken her so long and joyous that she’d finally done it. They squeezed into the pew and faced forward, attentive. Astrid wondered if anyone had seen, if she’d hear about it later, gentle questions on the sidewalk in front of the grocery store.
A woman with a black robe and a rainbow-colored woven scarf walked up to the podium and nodded at everyone, making eye contact until the crowd hushed.
“We are here to celebrate the life of our friend, neighbor, sister, and wife, Barbara Baker,” the woman began, and much to her own surprise, that was all Astrid needed to burst into tears. Birdie reached for her hand and intertwined their fingers. They’d never done that before, not in public, not like this, in the middle of the day, surrounded by the entire town. That made Astrid cry harder. Now that she’d told her children, she could tell anyone. And it was Barbara Baker, unlucky Barbara Baker, who had made it all possible, somehow. A woman in the row ahead of them—Susan Kenney-Jones, who owned the bookstore and whose children were roughly the same age as Astrid’s, but living elsewhere—passed back a travel-size package of Kleenex. Susan’s bookstore was two doors down from Shear Beauty—they saw Susan every day. Astrid had known Susan even longer than she’d known Barbara. Susan’s husband had died, too, maybe four years ago. Brain cancer. More tears. Astrid had never cried so much, not in public or in private. Porter looked over, alarmed.
“Are you all right?” Birdie whispered into Astrid’s ear. “We can go, if you want; the girls will be fine.”
Astrid shook her head and commanded herself to get it together.
The pastor went on. “For those of you wh
o have not attended a Quaker service before, we will all sit in silence for the next hour, creating a community through our bodies and our breath. If you feel moved to speak, please stand up and do so. That is all. Thank you.” She bowed her head, and everyone else did too.
Astrid came from a family—two families, really—for whom being lost in your own thoughts during a religious service was something you weren’t supposed to admit. She liked the pretense of paying attention to someone with a strong voice, an expert in the field of faith, telling a roomful of people what they should believe and why. This felt sort of like not getting one’s money’s worth, as a religious experience. Was it a religion? She should know this. Astrid wiped her eyes and then turned to look at Porter. She’d shut her eyes tightly and had a faint smile on her face. Her hands roamed her belly. She was midconversation, clearly, the constant nonverbal dialogue that first-time mothers had with their unborn children. Astrid remembered being pregnant with Elliot, how terrified and excited she’d been, how she had whispered to him in the middle of the night, before he had a face, before he had a name. Was Elliot listening then?
A woman sitting on the other side of the room stood up. She brushed her hair out of her eyes and said something about Barbara’s potato salad, and then sat back down. Porter’s eyes flickered open and then closed again. Every few minutes, someone else would stand up, say a few words, and sit back down. Astrid felt herself getting agitated, and shifting in her seat. After a long pause, she straightened her legs.
“Hello,” she said. She held on to Birdie’s hand. Both Porter and Cecelia looked up at her, surprised. “My name is Astrid Strick, and I’ve known Barbara for forty years. I’ve never done this before, so apologies if I’m not doing it right, but what I want to say is this: Barbara told the truth.” All around the room, people nodded in agreement. “And that’s not an easy thing to do. That’s all I want to say.” Astrid gave an awkward wave with her free hand and sat back down.