20.
INCENTIVE
WALKING BACK TO my girls, I can’t stop thinking about the charades game, how inspiring it was. But more than just inspiring me, it inspires me to inspire. Even though incentive, as a concept, doesn’t really do much for me personally, it usually works on other people, so I assume it’ll probably work on the girls. I’m starting to get used to what it feels like to be a leader, and I’m also getting used to giving speeches and just basically trying to share my voice with other females and other potential future writers. I gather the girls near the animal area by the bunny pen and give them a long speech, which they have no choice but to listen to.
“When I was a kid, even younger than you guys, my mom had a jar that she filled with quarters. It was a big jar, with like a thousand quarters—which used to seem like a thousand dollars, but is really only like two hundred and fifty bucks, which is still a lot. I was seven, and my parents decided that was a good age for me to start receiving an allowance. They said they’d give me a quarter for each chore I did. That was the plan, that there was no set weekly amount; I could earn however much I wanted if I just did the work. So I asked my mom what jobs there were, but each week she’d only be able to think of, like, three or four jobs because I was so short and sort of clumsy and also because my older sister’d already done most of the important chores. So every Friday I only earned like four quarters, which I thought was unfair, since I was willing to do more work. My dad told me to start inventing new chores, like ironing his ties or separating the mail—Job Creation, he called it—but that felt like a hassle, because there was a chance my mom wouldn’t even consider those real chores, and then I wouldn’t get more quarters.
“I tried to make my mom an offer that I’d do any work she wanted, all week long, for a flat fee of two dollars, or eight quarters. To me that seemed more than fair; she could take advantage of the situation if she wanted and have me washing her hair or something and for only two dollars! I don’t know if any of you get an allowance, but I just don’t think that’s a lot to ask, even with the economy or whatever. But my mom said no. She told me she wasn’t bargaining and that I had to earn those quarters, quarter by quarter. She called it ‘incentive.’ Have you heard of incentive? It means, like, motivation or encouragement or inspiration.
“So—I was thinking about the journals, which I know some of you want to use as diaries or for doodling or writing notes to each other, and I had this cool idea: we’re going to take everyone’s favorite things that they write this summer—if it’s a story or a poem or a letter or even just like a rant or an essay about something you love or hate—and we’ll make a collection. I’ll make a zine—have you heard of a zine? It’s like a magazine but smaller and photocopied and indie, like independent. I’ll bind the collection like a little book, and then you’ll have a memory of this summer you can keep forever. It’ll be all our cool thoughts and feelings, and it’ll be just for us, though you can show it to your parents if you want. Then they’ll see how you’re these smart writers and how you didn’t just have fun this summer, you also used your brain.
“This is your incentive to care about what you write and care about each other’s writing too. It’s incentive to love your journal and to love writing and to love our group!”
When I finish, no one says anything. A few girls look down at their journals, in a daze. But I can see wheels turning in Billie’s head, just like I saw those Harry Potter ideas light up Trevor’s face.
I tell them tonight’s assignment is to think of something you’re really good at and then describe precisely how to do it in as few sentences as possible. I tell them this kind of writing is called Second Person, which makes me feel how Mr. Roush must feel when he’s teaching a classroom of semi-attentive young minds about Second Person: excited.
After camp, out by the bus, Alyssa comes over and tells me there’s nothing that she’s so good at, that she knows so well, that she could describe how to do it in just a few steps.
“No way, you’re good at a bunch of things,” I say.
“Not really,” Alyssa says.
“What about that cool friendship bracelet?” I ask, pointing to her wrist.
“I didn’t make that.”
“Okay,” I say, looking all over Alyssa. I look at her shoes and her shirt and then up around her face, but all I notice is her sleek black eyeliner, perfectly straight, with the tiniest flick at the edge of each eye. It’s like a cat-eye tutorial in a magazine, pristine as some Kate Moss photo. “What about your eyeliner?” I suggest. “You rule at putting on eyeliner. Way better than me.”
“It’s just practicing in the mirror. I just do it every day.”
“Well, there you go,” I say, patting her shoulder. “Now you’ve got something: Putting on Eyeliner.”
And that’s another problem solved.
Later, when Courtney and I are setting the table for dinner, I tell her about the assignment and Alyssa’s cat-eye talent. Courtney’s so impressed she puts down the silverware to give me a hug.
“You’re not just stimulating them,” Courtney says, “you’re also helping with their self-confidence. It’s awesome!”
“It feels good,” I say. “Self-confidence is major.”
“What are you going to write about for the assignment?”
“I don’t know yet, maybe the best way to play charades.”
“But you hate charades,” Courtney says.
“I used to hate charades,” I correct her. I set all the plates and the cups down and it reminds me: “I told the girls about Mom’s quarters and our allowance.”
“You told them what you did?”
“The story’s about incentive, Court.”
“The story is about indigestion,” Courtney says, raising her eyebrows at me.
But I don’t tell my sister that the girls heard an abridged version, like how sometimes editors shorten Charles Dickens because he’s so rambling and annoying and repetitive. With Great Expectations it’s about the highlights, not about the long dinners with Uncle Pumblechook. So that’s what I gave my girls—the highlights—not the long parts about how I started swallowing the quarters, one by one, week after week, until my mother not only gave me the raise I demanded but also started paying me in crisp one-dollar bills.
We were talking about incentive anyway, and besides, I have Great Expectations for these girls, so if a story can be a bridge—from one person to another—then this story can be abridged, no problem.
21.
GCHATTING WITH LINDSAY
Lindsay: r u there
me: i’m here, hey
Lindsay: can’t talk 2 long, have rehearsal in an hour, but wanna at least say hi
me: rehearsal for what
Lindsay: pirates of penzance, i’m n it
me: you’re an actress
Lindsay: yah
me: yr a theater major
Lindsay: yah, whut r u
me: wlp
Lindsay: ?????
me: writing, literature, and publishing
Lindsay: oh weird
me: i guess emerson does have a rlly good theater dept
Lindsay: yah but i wanna go 2 london
me: when
Lindsay: i wanna transfer after 2 yrs
me: to london??
Lindsay: u evr heard of the west end
me: i think my parents used to watch that show
Lindsay: no, it’s n london, where they do all the plays
me: london
Lindsay: u evr been
me: not really
Lindsay: it’s tha best
me: but aren’t you excited for boston and for emerson
Lindsay: yah of course but i’m also thinkin bout after that
me: so yr a pirate
Lindsay: no i’m the daughter
me: sounds like a good part
Lindsay: tha leed!
me: i wish i could see it
Lindsay: ever been 2 SD?
me: se
a world, yeah
Lindsay: wanna come back?
me: hmm got this job now
Lindsay: sat n sun?
me: maybe
Lindsay: i can get u free tix 2 my play
me: i’ll see
Lindsay: can’t b leeve we r gonna b roomies
evr shared a room?
me: i have a sister
Lindsay: me 2, she’s 11
me: i’m a counselor and my girls are all 9
Lindsay: the worst
me: u think?
Lindsay: they r so mean 2 each other, meaner than hi skool 4 sure
me: hmm
Lindsay: whut r yr girls like
me: i don’t really know
Lindsay: haha
me: got any tips
Lindsay: NO haha
me: i’m teaching them to write
Lindsay: dont they alrdy know how 2 write
me: no, like, to write a story or a poem
Lindsay: oh kool
evr write plays?
me: not really
Lindsay: u shd, i can be in it
me: maybe
Lindsay: 4 emerson, u know
AH! gotta run
me: have fun at yr thing
Lindsay: rad 2 talk! last summer, make it count!!
me: i’m counting
22.
IDEA FOR A PLAY
IT’S A BUMPY rest of the week, mainly because there’s so many horseback-riding sessions. On Wednesday it was just me and Alyssa sitting out with Alexis, but by Thursday and especially Friday, all the girls are sitting out—it’s not just Alexis who doesn’t want to do anything. But my incentive is working, the girls are writing, even if it’s partially for the wrong reasons. I’m writing too, though (My name is EVA, and I’m traveling toward SAN DIEGO), and when I feel ready to read my stuff to the girls, they’ll probably feel like they’re ready too. That’s called Leading by Example, and it’s what Foster does; I know because I watch him, whenever he’s around.
I thought I’d find more literary inspirations at camp and in my experiences here, but so far I haven’t really experienced that much. Overall it’s been pretty normal, just going from activity to activity, half doing whatever we’re supposed to be doing and half working on our journals. Sometimes an hour or so passes with all of us just quietly buried in our books, huddled under a big oak tree or sitting along the edge of the lake, before I realize it’s time to gather everyone up and march on to the next station.
I’m proud, though, because we’re becoming kind of a unified little front. Foster says our group’s totally distinguished itself by never screaming or arguing or getting sent to Steven’s office to settle some fight over swim towels or lunch sacks or who called who a stupid bitch. I’m not sure if I should be worried, if that sort of conflict is somehow more healthy than what I’ve created, which is this odd, isolated, mellow utopia. Mr. Roush once said that in literature there’s no such thing as a utopia, because writing about utopia inherently means writing about dystopia, because even a perfect world—especially a perfect world—is suspect.
I had thought that making it to the first weekend of my first-ever job would feel incredibly satisfying, like I’d been through so much and really come out on top. But when Friday night comes, I don’t know, it’s not like that. I don’t feel like a survivor, and I definitely don’t have a million great stories or funny anecdotes. I text Michelle and Steph to see if they want to go to the movies and then wait for them to text back.
It seems like there’s a lot of static in the air, because I keep getting shocked when I touch the banister or doorknobs or the DirecTV remote. For a minute there’s even a brownout, then a full-on blackout, which makes Courtney scream because she’s in the shower. There’s a scramble for the candles, but once they’re lit I find my phone and still no one’s texted. Mom starts saying how the good thing about landlines was that you never lost your phone, while Dad makes jokes about something ancient called a beeper. I’d always rather have a cell phone, because it means that no matter how long power is out Elliot can still call, and Michelle or Steph can still text. Even though none of them do.
Sitting in the dark, watching my sister flipping the switch of her blow dryer on and off, I get an idea for a new play. There’re two couples, two families, who live next door to each other. This is the 1980s or nineties, it’s a period piece, so that means they have landlines and regular plugged-in phones. After a blackout, their phone lines get crossed. The first couple starts receiving calls meant for the second couple and vice versa. One night the first couple gets a call from a worried friend of their neighbors’ teenage daughter. She’s missing. She’s run away. The two of them were on a summer trip together in Amsterdam or London, and last night she vanished. Just gone. But the first couple doesn’t tell their neighbors; they don’t say a word about it. To them it’s a mystery, like a problem, one they want to solve, so they hide the truth, pose as their neighbors, try to piece together clues, only to get the call at the end of the second act that their daughter is never coming back. Not their daughter, their neighbors’ daughter. And now they can’t keep the secret anymore, because they’ve got to go over there and do the right thing. The play could be called Neighbors, or Lines, or Crossed Lines maybe.
Knock, knock.
Hello.
You remember that blackout last month?
Yes.
Our lines got crossed.
Yes.
We’ve got something to tell you.
Then the play ends, before anyone has to say the word “dead.”
Maybe I’ll give this one to Foster. Or maybe we can share it.
23.
REP
MICHELLE AGREES TO hang at the mall until four, but Steph is busy until seven. I don’t want to wait there for three hours, and besides, the point is to all hang out together, but when I explain this, they say it’s okay because they saw each other last night, so it’s fine if there’s no overlap today. Then Michelle tells me about this Santa Barbara Jewelry Fair she’s working next week—although she doesn’t exactly invite me—while Steph describes how Miranda caught a shoplifter at the Gap, but I can’t pay attention to either of them, because I want to know where and why they were hanging out without me last night. I interrupt our three-way call and, in a weird desperation, start reading back all the texts I sent last night, demanding to know why they didn’t respond. They both claim they didn’t even receive them. But even if that is true, even if the lines were somehow crossed and my texts got sent to two different friends, that still doesn’t explain why I wasn’t invited, why they didn’t reach out to me.
“We were just at Kerry’s house, watching Kate Mara movies and Rooney Mara movies,” Michelle says. “Kerry calls it a Marathon, and since you hate Kerry and don’t really have any feelings about the Mara sisters, no one thought to call.”
“I don’t remember hating Kerry,” I tell Steph.
Then, without saying the name Bart, but implying as much, Steph reminds me I hate everyone.
She’s wrong, though—I don’t hate everyone. It’s just that in high school you say mean things about your classmates because you’re dying of boredom and dying to graduate and because you’re just joking anyway.
“It’s not a big deal. You wouldn’t have had that much fun anyway,” Michelle says, and that hurts too, because why do my best friends assume I wouldn’t have fun watching movies with them?
This must be my rep: someone who’s Not a Good Sport, someone who’s this Very Specific Person, and not in a good way. I guess a Classic Eva move doesn’t mean a funny, cool, chill move, but a close-minded, judge-y move, which maybe was true before, but I honestly feel like I’ve begun to change all that.
“Am I that much of a bummer?” I ask.
“Bummer’s not the word I’d use,” Steph says, and Michelle just says, “Eh.”
“It’s just that you’re so rigid,” Steph says.
“Yeah, you have a lot of rules,” Michelle
adds.
“Okay, but I’d still like to be extended the opportunity, even if sometimes I say no. Is that bratty?”
“I wouldn’t call it bratty,” Steph says, and then Michelle says, “I would.”
“Are you mad at me or something?”
“Let’s not get into that again,” Steph says.
“It’s not about being mad,” Michelle tells me.
We run out of things to say for a minute, so I check my email and there’s a message in my in-box from Shelby, asking if I want to hang out today. I relay this to Michelle and Steph, plainly fishing, hoping they’ll say something mean or dismissive about Shelby, but realize that’s more something I would do, which is what Courtney calls Classic Projection. Neither of them has a reaction to my news about Shelby, so eventually we trade stilted good-byes and I text Shelby that we should meet for lunch later.
Downstairs my mom’s got the fridge open, calling out items to my dad, who’s writing a shopping list. They can tell right away that something’s wrong.
“You know, water seeks its own level,” my mother says.
“What does that even mean?” I ask.
“It means people match up with other people who are on their level.”
“Okay, but what do you mean by ‘level’?”
“It’s advice, Eva,” my father says. “Take it or don’t take it.”
“But how can I take it if I don’t understand it?”
“You love Michelle and Steph, but you’re also on your way to college, where you’ll meet a ton of new people, many of whom will have the same agenda as you,” my mother says.
“Other writers, you mean.”
“Writers, thinkers,” my father says. “Other smart young men and women.”
“I’m not going to Harvard,” I say.
“Yes, but you’ll be near Harvard,” my mother says, hopefully.
“Sure, geographically, but not like, mentally.”
“You could make Harvard friends,” my father says. “It’s not impossible.”
“This is not advice,” I say.
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