Inevitable and Only

by Lisa Rosinsky

  “Anything you want to play.”

  So I curled up under the covers while my little brother played the tender, poignant Prelude from the second Bach cello suite over and over until I fell asleep. I didn’t even hear Mom and Elizabeth come home.

  Sunday morning, Mom and Dad were already gone by the time I woke up—Mom had to prepare for parent-teacher conferences, and Dad must’ve gone in early to the bookshop. There was a note on the table with three lines in Mom’s neat handwriting—

  C: hope you’re feeling better! please remember to take E to church.

  J: don’t forget to practice your Popper.

  C: make sure J practices his Popper.

  I wasn’t hungry, so I stuck a granola bar in my pocket while Elizabeth got ready for church. Josh was already practicing his scales and arpeggios, so I left a note outside his door that said At church—Mom says to practice Popper—sorry. Thanks for the music last night. Love you.

  Elizabeth protested that she knew the way and didn’t need me to walk with her. I sure would’ve liked to stay home—in fact, I didn’t feel like talking to Elizabeth ever again—but I knew how angry Mom would be if she found out that I’d let Elizabeth walk by herself. Not that she cares if her precious ten-year-old son is home alone, because she knows he’ll lock himself up all day with his cello and not come out until someone reminds him it’s time to eat. Little Miss Perfect, though, needs all the protection she can get on these big bad streets.

  “Look,” I told Elizabeth, as we left the house, “I think I’ll just wait for you at the Daily Grind today and meet you after Mass. I have tons of lines to memorize.”

  “Okay.”

  There was silence for a few blocks. Then, “Cadie, what happened last night? Something happened at the dance. Right?”

  “It’s not a big deal.”

  “Oh.”

  More silence.

  “Is it—was it—did I do something? Or say something?”

  “No.”

  “Oh.”

  I sighed. “Fine. It’s really not a big deal, okay? But my friend Farhan kind of likes you. So do me a favor, and if he asks you out, feel free to say yes. If you want to, I mean. He’s a great guy. I’m sure you’d like him, too.”

  Elizabeth stopped walking. “Wait. Your boyfriend Farhan, you mean?”

  “He’s not my boyfriend!” I said over my shoulder, without slowing down, and it came out louder than I’d intended. Elizabeth had to run a few steps to catch up with me. “We’re just friends. We went to the dance as friends. And he told me that he has a crush on you. He asked if you were dating Sam. You’re not, right?”

  She shook her head. “No, no, I’m not.”

  “Why not?” I couldn’t help it, I was curious. “I mean, half the girls in our school are in love with Sam Shotwell.”

  “Oh, he’s just not my type.”

  “Okay. Well, if nerdy guys with great taste in music are your type”—I felt a burning sensation behind my eyes and blinked angrily—“then you and Farhan would get along really well.”

  “Cadie, I don’t—are you sure? I could’ve sworn you said you liked him. I mean, as more than friends.”

  “Nope. I thought so, maybe, for like two minutes. But he’s not my type,” I said, echoing her without meaning to. The words felt strange in my mouth. I wondered if they’d felt equally strange in hers.

  We were across the street from Saints Philip and James now.

  “All right, I’ll meet you back here when Mass is over.” I was more than ready to end this conversation.

  “Bye,” she said, and hesitated, as if wondering whether she should say something else.

  I walked away before she could decide, and I didn’t look back.

  Instead of going to the Daily Grind, though, I wandered over to the Baltimore Museum of Art. It’s right next to the Hopkins campus, and admission is free. Micayla had introduced me to the museum. She brought her homework there sometimes and worked sprawled out on a bench in front of her favorite paintings. “Osmosis and all that. Can’t hurt to try,” she said.

  After talking about Farhan, I felt too restless to sit and memorize lines. I decided to go to the Matisse and Van Gogh room instead. All those wild colors seemed like the right medicine for my mood.

  “Hey, Cadie.”

  I looked up. Heron Lang was standing behind the front desk in the lobby.

  “Heron! I didn’t know you worked here.”

  “Just a weekend gig. Gets me free admission.”

  “But admission is already free …”

  “I know. Joke. Ha?”

  I shook my head. “Ha. Sorry, I had kind of a rough night. And a rough morning.”

  Heron nodded sympathetically. “Dance drama?”

  “Yeah, why? Please don’t tell me you’ve already heard about it.” At a school as small as Fern Grove, rumors spread like maple syrup across a hot pancake … My stomach started grumbling, and I realized I still hadn’t eaten my granola bar.

  “Heard nothing,” she said. “I could see it in your face.”

  I studied Heron. She had dark circles under her eyes. “Did you have dance drama, too?”

  “Bingo.” She hunched her shoulders. “I think me and Aimee are over for good this time.”

  “Oh, Heron, I’m sorry. I didn’t even know you were dating her.”

  “Ehh. We were on-again, off-again all last year. I thought going to the Fall Ball together might help us feel like more of a couple, but she said it just showed her that she’ll never feel that way about me.”

  “Well, turns out my date didn’t feel the same way about me, either.” Somehow it was easier to talk to Heron, whom I barely knew, about what had happened with Farhan. The whole story came spilling out. “You know what? I realized I don’t even know him. Like, we’ve gone to school together since forever, but I’ve barely ever even said a word to him. Until this whole dance thing. So why the hell am I so upset?”

  Heron came around the desk to give me a hug. “I’m sorry, Cadie. It still sucks. You deserve better than that. And what’s Elizabeth’s deal, anyway? I thought I saw her there with Sam Shotwell.”

  “Yeah, but apparently she’s not interested in him.”

  “Whoa. Not sure if Sam’s ego can take that; he’s used to getting any chick he wants. Well, good for her. Showing him that he can’t automatically snap up the new hot pick of the week.”

  “Heron!”

  “I mean, no offense, I know she’s your sister and all, but—wow. She’s kind of smokin’.”

  I laughed. “Don’t even. Know where she is right now? At church. That’s why I’m here. I’m waiting for Mass to be over so I can escort her home. My mother thinks she’ll get kidnapped or something if we let her wander around Baltimore on her own.”

  Heron raised her eyebrows. “I thought your family was Jewish?”

  “We are. She’s my half sister, through my dad. Her mom was a super-religious Catholic.”

  “I could set a world record,” Heron said, “in the category of Falling for the Most Unavailable Girls. Any roomful of people, I can instantly pick out the girl who is least likely to ever want to date me. And of course that’s the one I won’t be able to stop thinking about.”

  I sighed. “I know that feeling.”

  “Guess we’re both screwed.” But Heron grinned. “Thanks for listening to me complain. It helps a little.”

  “No, thank you. I’m the one who started it.”

  “Hey—I get off at three, and Micayla’s meeting me to drown our sorrows in milk shakes at the Charmery. Her date with Troy didn’t go so great either. Want to come?”

  “Sure. Mind if I invite Raven, too? She wanted to go last night, but I wasn’t feeling up to it.”

  “Of course.”

  “Great. See you later, then.”

  I started up the stairs, then turned around and found a table in the museum café instead. I ordered a grilled cheese sandwich with extra cheese and cracked open my Much Ado script to page
one. I was starving, and I really did have a lot of lines to learn.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  At Monday night’s rehearsal, we were supposed to be off book.

  Ha.

  Actually, I didn’t do too badly. We ran a few of the Beatrice-Benedick scenes, and Zephyr had his lines down perfectly. But I was only one or two cues short.

  “Seven weeks!” Robin moaned. “Seven weeks until tech week, people. I know that sounds like a long time, but remember that time is an illusion. And that’s not the Bard, it’s Einstein, so don’t argue. Please, please, please. Do whatever it takes this week to get these lines down. Consider this me begging and groveling.”

  The play was the first weekend in December—the weekend before Josh’s competition. Last night at dinner, Mom had told me she’d probably have to come to the Sunday matinee of Much Ado, since Josh had an important rehearsal with his pianist on Friday evening and couldn’t stay out too late on Saturday. Dad said he wouldn’t miss opening night for the world.

  “Josh, are you sure you don’t want to change your rehearsal so you and Mom can come to Cadie’s opening night?” he asked. “I’m sure you can move it to a different day.”

  “He cannot move it,” Mom snapped. “The pianist had very limited availability; we’re lucky to have squeezed in any rehearsals with her at all.”

  Then Dad said, “Let Josh speak for himself, Melissa,” and Mom was about to respond, but Elizabeth interrupted to say, “May I be excused?” That seemed to remind Mom and Dad that there were other people in the room, and they stopped arguing, although the air was still so charged it felt like static was crackling between them. Josh toyed with his food. I put my arm around him.

  “Hey,” I said, “how about some after-dinner music?”

  But he shook his head no.

  “Okay. A game of Spit?”

  His eyes lit up. “We haven’t played that in forever!”

  So I went up to Josh’s room with him, since Elizabeth had gone into our room and closed the door, and we played a break-neck game of cards, and then another, and another. Just like we used to in the olden days. B.E.—Before Elizabeth.

  I was done trying to be friends with her, and I was done trying to forgive Dad for bringing her into our lives, too. It was time for him to figure out how to make things right again—right with Mom, with me, with all of us. Maybe I wasn’t exactly on Mom’s side either, but I was sick of picking sides. I was on my own side.

  Zephyr and I sat silently in the back of the theater and watched Rina rehearse one of her Dogberry scenes. We had a Beatrice/Benedick scene scheduled for this time slot, but Rina’s rehearsal was running behind. She was still overacting all her lines, killing the comedy of them, and Robin kept making her start over.

  “So, um.” I tried to think of something to say to Zephyr. “Did you have fun at the Fall Ball this weekend? I don’t think I saw you there.”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, didn’t go. Long story.”

  “Oh.” Why was it so hard to make conversation with Zephyr? When we were on stage, our lines flew back and forth like the ball in a tennis match. Off stage, we were more like a game of golf—I’d hit the ball, watch it roll far away from where it was supposed to go, and then wait while he teed up. Was that what golf was like? I’d never actually played.

  “What’re you thinking about?” Zephyr asked.

  “Golf,” I said, before I could stop myself. Brilliant.

  Zephyr raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

  “Just kidding. Um, I was thinking about the Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? production at Center Stage. It opens this weekend; we just got a postcard in the mail. Actually, we have an extra ticket. Want to go see it?”

  Wait a minute. What had my brain just told my mouth to say?

  Zephyr raised his other eyebrow, so his amber-gold eyes widened. “Okay. Sure. I’d like that.”

  “Great! I’ll, um, I’ll get the ticket and bring it tomorrow and—”

  “People!” Robin roared, facing the back of the theater and shading his eyes with one hand. “I can’t see who that is back there, so count yourselves lucky. I shall flay anyone who disrupts this rehearsal one more time with that infernal chatter!”

  Zephyr and I ducked our heads and tried not to look at each other. I knew I’d break into an uncontrollable giggle fit if we made eye contact, and he must’ve felt the same way, because when I sneaked a glance at him out of the corner of my eye, his jaw was twitching. So was the dimple in his cheek.

  Zephyr had a dimple? I’d never noticed before. I wondered if he had one on the other side to match. I’d have to remember to check next time we were facing each other. Sometime when I wasn’t trying to remember lines of Shakespeare, of course.

  That night, I found everyone still eating dinner when Micayla dropped me off.

  “Mushroom-kale casserole,” Dad said, handing me a plate. “Took longer than I thought, so you get it fresh from the oven tonight.”

  “Lucky me,” I muttered.

  Mom looked at me sharply, but didn’t say anything.

  “So!” Dad said. “How was rehearsal?”

  “Fine. Hey, by the way, you weren’t planning on going to Center Stage this weekend to see Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, right?”

  Dad blinked.

  I barreled on. “I figured, since we only have two tickets, it wouldn’t really be fair if I stole you for the whole evening. And I didn’t think you’d want to leave everyone else out.”

  By everyone else, of course, I meant Elizabeth. Mom had never expressed any interest in joining our father-daughter theater outings, and Josh wasn’t allowed to stay out late unless it was for a concert—Mom worried that a late night would interfere with his practicing schedule.

  “So,” I continued, “I invited someone from the play to go with me. As long as it’s okay if he uses your ticket?”

  Dad cleared his throat.

  Say no. Say I’m wrong. Say you’d love nothing more than to spend an evening at Center Stage with your daughter just like old times. Your first daughter—well, technically your second daughter, but your real daughter.

  But all he said was, “Okay, then, if that’s what you want to do.”

  “He?” Mom said.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “You said ‘he.’ You asked if it was okay if ‘he’ used Dad’s ticket. Who’s ‘he’?”

  “Oh, just a guy from the play. He’s Benedick.”

  Mom looked shocked. “Then why are you asking him out?”

  “What? I’m not asking him out!”

  “It sounds like you are, and you just said he’d been a dick. By the way, I don’t appreciate that kind of language at the dinner table.”

  Dad and I burst out laughing at the same time. I hated how this felt like we were somehow on the same team again, as if I hadn’t just wounded him. I didn’t want to be on Dad’s team anymore.

  “Benedick,” I said to Mom. “It’s the name of the main character in Much Ado About Nothing.”

  “Beatrice’s, aka Cadie’s, love interest,” Dad added, winking. He was pretending that I hadn’t just hurt him by asking for his ticket. Or maybe he wasn’t hurt. Did he care? I wanted him to care.

  “Only in the play,” I said, pushing my chair back. “Which reminds me, I have to go work on my lines. Can I bring my plate upstairs?”

  “Cadie, we need to talk more about this!” Mom called after me. “What night are you going? How will you get there? Will anyone else be with—”

  I slammed my door to cut off the rest.

  No one came up to try to talk to me until Elizabeth came in a while later to do her homework.

  I ignored her, too.

  The next morning, I dodged the hordes of students moving far too slowly, trying to make my way to Raven’s locker. I had to catch her before first period and tell her what had happened.

  Then I turned the corner and saw Farhan. Leaning against Elizabeth’s locker, an idiotic smile splitting his stupid face. He notic
ed me before I could look away and pretend I hadn’t seen them. Elizabeth turned and smiled at me, too, a hesitant smile. Farhan wiggled his eyebrows and gave me a quick thumbs-up while Elizabeth was still turned, looking at me. Both of them looking at me. I waved, then ducked my head and kept going.

  Forget about Farhan, he’s an infant, I told myself. Zephyr’s a senior. You asked out a senior. Did you ask him out? I think you asked him out. He said yes. I think you’re going on a date with a senior.

  I had to find Raven, or I was going to progress to full-scale endless looping arguments with myself in my head. I scanned the wall of lockers and spotted her curly red head. Pushed my way through the crowd.

  “Raven! You’ll never guess what happened.”

  She looked up at me, her arms full of books and her eyes brimming with concern. “I know. I saw.”

  “Wait—what?”

  “Farhan. Fart-on. And—”

  “Oh, don’t worry about it. And you don’t have to call him that. I’m fine, really.”

  “No, you’re not,” she said sensibly, slamming her locker door. “You’re very good at pretending you’re fine. We both know it’s one of your best skills. But that’s not the same as being fine. And you don’t have to pretend with me.”

  “Okay, maybe I’m not fine with it, but I’m distracted right now. Listen.” I told her about the Much Ado rehearsal last night, about asking Zephyr to the play.

  “But—I don’t get it, how did you have an extra ticket? I thought you had season tickets with your dad, so wasn’t that your dad’s ticket?”

  “Well, yes, but I don’t know, my mouth just moved faster than my brain and made up things, and then I couldn’t exactly go back and tell him I didn’t have an extra ticket after all. What was I supposed to say?”

  “You could say you thought your dad couldn’t go, but it turns out now he can.”

  “Dad doesn’t want to go anyway. I asked him if Zephyr could use his ticket and he agreed right away.”

  “Huh. That’s weird. I thought he really loved going to see plays with you.”

  I felt myself getting annoyed at Raven for taking Dad’s side. “He did, before he had another, better daughter to spend time with.”