The Year of Living Awkwardly

by Emma Chastain

  I nodded.

  “I don’t want to give you more information than you need, but essentially we hit a wall, and Veronica wasn’t willing to continue talking about it. I decided to move ahead, so I filed for divorce. Because she’s in Mexico, I had to go through the central authority there to transmit the letters rogatory—the details don’t matter. The point is, the court clerk there attempted to serve her with papers, but she’s no longer at her old address.”

  “So where is she?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  I stopped walking. It was too difficult to take in what he was saying and coordinate my legs at the same time.

  “I don’t get it,” I said.

  “I think she moved to avoid getting served. If you officially acknowledge receipt of the papers, it sets the divorce in motion, and I believe she’s stalling.”

  “Why?”

  He sighed. “She sees the writing on the wall. She knows she’s not going to get custody of you, and she knows she won’t get other concessions she’s asked for, so she wants to run away from the whole thing. And I’m speculating here, but I think she may regret the path she’s chosen.”

  “Like, she regrets leaving you?”

  “It’s possible. She sounds unhappy. I don’t know if her life there is what she imagined it would be.”

  “Is she still with Javi?”

  “I’m not sure. I don’t ask.”

  “Do you think she’s even in Mexico? She could be in Bali. She could be HERE!”

  “It’s true that she’s not necessarily in Mexico anymore.”

  I looked out at the ocean. The sun was making diamond crescents on the water.

  “I realize this is upsetting,” Dad said. “I wish I had more information for you.”

  “It’s OK,” I said. I was having a hard time listening to him, because I was trying to understand what he’d told me, and the shock of the information was freezing my mind.

  We walked back in silence. I knew I should have questions for him, but they weren’t coming to me. All I could think about was Mom in Tokyo, or Minnesota, or Bucharest. All of the possibilities canceled each other out, and it felt like she’d disappeared entirely.

  Walking up the stairs to our cottage shook my thoughts loose, and when we got to the top, I said, “Does this mean you can’t get a divorce?”

  Dad shook his head. “I can proceed without her cooperation. It’ll take longer, that’s all.”

  “How long?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Wednesday, July 12

  I slept terribly, and when I woke up, I threw on yesterday’s clothes and ran downstairs. Dad and Miss Murphy were eating breakfast. I could tell by the way they looked up that they’d been talking about me. I poured myself some coffee and stood by the sink drinking it until Dad headed up to take a shower. Then I sat down next to Miss Murphy and said, “You know about my mother, right? That she disappeared, or whatever?”

  She nodded.

  “Are you going to break up with Dad?” I asked, and to my surprise, my eyes filled with tears.

  She looked shocked. “No. Why do you ask that?”

  “The divorce is going to take forever. Maybe you’ll get sick of waiting.”

  She squeezed my hand once, hard. “I won’t.”

  “What if you want to have kids? Don’t you have to do that soon?” As I asked this, I looked at the tablecloth instead of at her.

  She sighed and said, “Yeah, probably.”

  I couldn’t help darting my eyes to her face. I’d thought she might say, “Everything in due course,” or “I’m not even sure I want children,” or “You’re the only kid I need.” I don’t want to admit this, but I was upset and shocked to hear she does want babies, and with my father, and soon. What about me? was my first thought. I’ll be replaced! They’ll love this baby more than they love me! But my second thought was about Bear, and how cute and smart he is, and how much I love talking to him. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.

  “How would you feel about having a half sibling?” she said.

  A suspicion jolted through me. “Are you pregnant???”

  “No!” she said. “Really, no.”

  I thought about the idea of a new baby. A little person waking me up screaming at night. Dad cooing over someone else’s face. Miss Murphy breastfeeding!! (Am I a prude if the thought of seeing her boobs makes me want to die?)

  “It would be weird,” I said. “Having a half sibling.”

  “Yeah. It would definitely be weird.” She sounded deflated.

  “Would you try to get pregnant even if my parents are still married?”

  She was looking at my face but without seeing it. Then her eyes snapped back into focus and she said, “I would really rather not do that.” So she’s thought about doing that!

  The beach was no fun today. I didn’t get through a single page of my book. Instead of lying on my towel, I sat bolt upright with all my muscles tensed, thinking hard about everything that’s happened and everything that might happen.

  Thursday, July 13

  The only way I could get to sleep last night was by fantasizing about Grady coming into the concession stand and saying, “Chloe, I have to tell you something: I’m in love with you,” and then hugging me as tightly as he could. I fell asleep imagining the feeling of his arms around me.

  Friday, July 14

  Man, screw my parents and Miss Murphy for ruining the best week of the year. This is the one time when I can focus on my surroundings and not my thoughts. I hear the waves, I feel the sun warming up my hair, I taste the salt on my lips, and that’s it. I don’t zone out, oblivious to the world around me, thinking only about whatever’s worrying me, like a brain in a jar. Except this year I am zoning out. I walk along the beach and I might as well not be there. I’m not taking any of it in. I’m obsessing about Dad’s imaginary new baby and Mom’s current whereabouts.

  Saturday, July 15

  Dad said Mom’s fine, but how does he know that? OK, she said she’d be out of touch, but she could have said that and then been abducted, or had a heart attack, or drowned.

  Sunday, July 16

  Mom,

  Dad told me you probably moved. Where are you now? Are you OK? Please write.

  —Chloe

  Monday, July 17

  Back to work today, and it wasn’t even that painful. I could hardly see Grady or hear Nadia. My head was so full of my mother, I had no room to think about them.

  Tuesday, July 18

  I rode my bike to Pop’s to meet Tristan and Hannah. God, it was a relief to see their faces. Tris was stressed out because he detagged himself in a bunch of pictures Elliott posted and now Elliott’s accusing him of being ashamed of their relationship. “But that’s not it!” Tris said. “It’s that I have a double chin in every picture he takes of me!” Hannah was stressed out because Reese and Zach are all over every social media platform, announcing their love to the world. There are selfies of them sharing the same ice cream cone, forming a heart shape with their hands, lying on the grass with their heads touching, and sitting on playground swings and leaning past the chains to kiss each other, to give just a few examples. They have the same profile picture on Instagram: the words “Zach <3 Reese” carved into the sand. “Everyone must be pitying me,” Hannah said. “It’s so embarrassing.”

  “It’s not!” Tris said. “And if everyone’s pitying you, that’s nice. You’re the good guy!”

  “I’m the pathetic guy,” she said.

  “Everyone’s too busy throwing up at how cheesy these pictures are to think about you,” I said.

  “But they get so many likes!”

  “Likes mean nothing,” Tris said. “People are so desperate to stay on Reese’s good side, they’d like anything she posted.”

  Eventually I told them about Mom, and they felt terrible for complaining about their internet problems when my mother’s run away again. But they shouldn’t have felt bad. First of all, internet problems are real.
Second of all, it felt so good to stop thinking about myself for an hour and focus on social media disasters.

  Wednesday, July 19

  Chloe,

  I’m in good health and am living in Mexico City. Attempts to find me will prove fruitless, I assure you. I’m sorry you and your father have driven me to these lengths, but driven me you have.

  —Veronica

  Oh, thank God, thank God, thank you, God, if you exist. It feels so luxurious to be angry that she signed off “Veronica” instead of “Mom”! Now I can keep despising her without worrying that she’s dead.

  I instantly forwarded the email to Dad and then called him at work to see what he thought. He was furious with her but pretended not to be. I asked him if he was going to try to find her, and he said that would be expensive and probably impossible. I said, “Do you think we’ll ever see her again?” and he said, “I’m sure we will.” But why is he so sure?

  Thursday, July 20

  I wasn’t on the schedule today, so Noelle came over and we had lunch on the deck. After we finished, she put her feet on the railing and lit a cigarette. “So what’s going on with Grady?” she said.

  “I think—” I started, and then remembered: she’s friends with Reese again. It’s not that I think she’d ever spy for her, but what would stop her from gossiping about whatever I said? Talking about people behind their backs is what every normal human does.

  “I think it’s not meant to be,” I said.

  “Really?”

  “He’s not into me. It’s fine. I’m over it.”

  She studied my face and said, “You’re not holding out on me because he’s Reese’s ex, are you?”

  “Noelle! No.”

  She ashed into her empty Diet Coke can. “OK. Just asking.”

  I felt slightly nervous for the rest of the afternoon. I don’t think she did, but she never feels nervous. She’s Noelle.

  Friday, July 21

  Now that I know Mom’s OK, there’s nothing mentally blocking my view of Grady. There he is, across the pool from me, looking tan against his white chair. Sometimes he leans forward and puts his elbows on his knees. Sometimes he leans back and lets his head rest against his interlaced fingers. When the sun shines in his eyes, he squints, which would make him look like a cowboy if he weren’t also wearing a black baseball cap. When he’s bored, he adjusts his rubber bands, takes off his hat and rubs his hair violently until it’s sticking straight up, or juts out his jaw and massages it with his fingertips. Usually he keeps his shirt on, but sometimes he’ll take it off, and then I can hardly look at him, he’s so beautiful to me. Although he’s grown a few inches at least, he’s still skinny, wiry, which I thought I didn’t like, but it turns out skinny and wiry makes my legs turn cold with lust. When the kids act up, he blows his whistle and bellows at them in a confident, deep voice. During adult swim, he stands in the lifeguard shack checking his phone. Sometimes youngish mothers come over to flirt with him, and he smiles and laughs, but not in a gross way. You can tell all the little girls are in love with him, which is only natural.

  He’s distant but polite to all of us—me, Reese, Nadia, and the college kids on staff: Jeff, Quentin, Angela, Phoebe. He’s never late. Even though he’s allowed to close the pool when it’s raining, he almost never does, I think because the kids beg him not to and he doesn’t want to let them down. Sometimes when the pool has just opened and no one’s arrived yet, he’ll get out his notebook and sketch.

  I’m stalking boys from other schools online, and I’ve tried to force myself to develop crushes on Jeff or Quentin, even though Jeff sniffs violently every 10 minutes and Quentin covers his entire face in white zinc. Nothing works. I love Grady, only Grady.

  Saturday, July 22

  Dad grilled chicken to go with a salad Miss Murphy made.

  “I put in cranberries, avocado, feta, and bacon,” she said as she brought it out. “I just went for it.”

  “When it comes to salad, M&M doesn’t hold back,” Dad said.

  I was setting out napkins and silverware. It felt like I was seeing my father and Miss Murphy through the wrong end of a telescope. I can’t relax and joke around with them, knowing the divorce might take a long time and Miss Murphy may or may not get pregnant and may or may not be my stepmother. I can’t stand not knowing what’s going to happen, which is kind of a problem, since the whole crux of life is that you don’t know how everything will turn out.

  Sunday, July 23

  Dad sat me down after breakfast and said, “Chloe, it’s very important that you try to get over this fear of driving. I don’t want you to be limited later in life because you don’t have your license. What if you don’t wind up living in an urban area? You could find yourself trapped by a decision you made when you were a teenager.”

  “I’m not deciding anything!” I said. “It’s not like I want to be afraid. I just am.”

  “Let’s go out to the car right now,” he said. “I’ll back it up for you. We’ll drive down the street—that’s it. You can go as slowly as you want to.”

  I tried as hard as I could. I lectured myself as I walked outside and as I watched Dad position the car for me. I breathed deeply and thought about calming things (Snickers, swimming, chatting with Tris). It didn’t work. As soon as I got in the car, my heart started pounding and my vision got foggy. Dad looked at my hands, which were shaking on the wheel, and said, “It’s not safe for you to drive in this state. Let’s try again another day.” He was trying to be understanding, but I could hear frustration in his voice. I don’t blame him. I wish I could fix whatever’s wrong with me.

  Monday, July 24

  I didn’t have work today, so I went over to Tris’s house to hang out with him and Elliott. It was meltingly hot, so Tris dragged his old Blues Clues kiddie pool out of the basement, and we inflated it with a bicycle pump, filled it with water from the hose, and then sat on beach chairs with our feet in it.

  Elliott and I talked about books for a while and decided to have a two-person book club. He suggested The Handmaid’s Tale, and I gave his idea two thumbs up (a real-life like!). Then I very casually asked him how Grady’s doing.

  “He doesn’t seem that great, honestly.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, he’s gotten super quiet and moody.”

  “Do you think he’s still upset about Reese?”

  “Probably. I’ve asked a few times, but he says he doesn’t want to talk about it, so I don’t push him.”

  It doesn’t matter whether or not he’s over Reese. The point is, he’s not into me.

  Tuesday, July 25

  I kind of hate being alone between the end of my shift and Dad’s arrival home. It was fun the first dozen times, but now I’m used to it, and after about 20 minutes I start hearing a high-pitched buzz in my ears. It’s probably juvenile tinnitus. Maybe it would be OK if Miss Murphy and her baby moved in.

  Wednesday, July 26

  Rode my bike to visit Hannah at Strawberry Hills Ice Cream Parlor, where she’s working this summer. I thought she’d be able to sneak me some free scoops, but she charged me full price for my mint chip cone, and she wouldn’t come around the case to sit down with me for a minute, even though I was the only customer in the shop. That’s Hannah for you. I missed that rule-abiding schoolmarm of a high school kid so much.

  Thursday, July 27

  It was overcast today, and you could hear occasional thunder, although it never wound up raining. The parents and nannies must have been worried about a storm, because no one showed up. Reese was working alone, and eventually she got sick of her phone and came over to talk to me and Nadia. She went on and on about Zach, which was bizarre, since she stole him from one of my best friends. Either she doesn’t know Hannah and I made up, or she doesn’t remember, or she doesn’t care, or two of the three.

  “He’s incredibly good-looking—Nadia, you’ve seen him, right? Yeah, so you know. His body is unreal. He’s spending the rest of the summer doing this supe
r-exclusive music program in California. He’s all stressed out, like, ‘You won’t forget about me, will you?’ and ‘You’d never cheat on me, right, baby?’ I think he’s worried about leaving me alone with Grady.”

  “But you dumped Grady for him,” I said.

  “So?”

  “So isn’t Grady mad at you?”

  Reese laughed and stroked her own hair like it was a little pet. “You know what guys are like.”

  What does that mean?! I don’t know what guys are like! Is she saying she could get him back with one expert BJ? Is she saying she wants to get him back?

  I knew it was a bad idea, but I called Noelle on my bike ride home and said, “Is Reese still into Grady?”

  “I thought you were over him,” Noelle said.

  “I am. I’m curious, that’s all.”

  “Why are you out of breath?” she said.

  “I’m on my bike. I have earbuds in.”

  “Hmm, this sounds like a pretty urgent question!”

  “Noelle, just tell me.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I don’t think I should. I don’t want to get in the middle of this. I’m friends with both of you and I want to keep it that way.”

  “So she does still like him.”

  “Chloe, come on.”

  She wouldn’t tell me, but it was the same thing as telling me.

  At least she said she’s friends with us both. I don’t think it’ll last, but I’m going to enjoy it while it does.

  Friday, July 28

  Oh my GOD. Nadia was distracted all day today, and finally, at a slow moment, she said, “Do you think I’d ever have a shot with Grady?”

  “With Grady? Grady the lifeguard?”