Where I Want to Be

by Adele Griffin

  “If you can’t pretend to be in other times and places, you’ll be stuck in the real world forever,” Jane would warn. “And the real world isn’t half as good.”

  But Lily seemed to get along just fine in the real world.

  Her grandparents were different. They liked olden days. Granpa knew the whole history of Peace Dale. Before he’d retired, he’d worked at the Rhode Island Historical Center. It was Granpa who showed Jane the home of Mary Butterworth, the sneaky counterfeiter who bought a mansion in Providence with money she’d made herself, using a quill pen and copperplates. Granpa who showed Jane the Old Stone Mill that had been built a thousand years ago by Norse Vikings.

  Augusta was not much for field trips or stories. But her presence was like a lullaby.

  “Don’t go yet,” Jane said now, reaching out her hand.

  Augusta did not leave. She stayed at the edge of the bed and skimmed her fingertips up and down the length of Jane’s arm. The sheets were as crisp as a tablecloth against Jane’s skin, and the sink of the mattress molded to the shape of her body. She closed her eyes and pulled the edge of the linsey-woolsey blanket so that it brushed her chin. A linsey-woolsey blanket was folded at the edge of every bed at Orchard Way. They were famous blankets, knit by Peace Dale’s own textile mills and dyed with walnut shells to mossy greens and browns. During the Civil War, thousands of these blankets had been distributed to Union soldiers.

  “Pretend I’m a soldier,” Jane used to suggest to Lily, “and I’m about to die from frostbite on the battlefield, and you’re a poor factory girl named Hepsbeth, and you find me and cover me with a blanket just in time.”

  Lily had liked that game better. Lily liked to rescue people.

  “How long can I stay?” Jane asked Augusta sleepily.

  “Until you want to go.” Her grandmother’s voice sounded far away.

  Yes, that was a nice answer. Sleep was falling softly over her. “Orchard Way is my only place,” she mumbled. She burrowed deeper, darker, safer.

  Her grandmother didn’t answer, but her fingers continued to trace the length of Jane’s arm. Up and down, up and down. She would not stop until Jane was asleep.

  4 — COBWEBS

  Lily

  Caleb drops by late. After his own day at the Pool & Paddle Youth Club, he had to work a shift at the Co-op for a friend. But he bangs through the door with his dimpled smile locked in place. His guitar is in one hand, and a bag of something that smells yummy is in the other.

  “You could have called,” I say, wrapping my arms around his neck. My lips touch his throat, his chin, and the tip of his nose. “I’da picked you up. I hate thinking of you walking all this way.”

  “The fastest journey is achieved on foot,” Caleb answers grandly. Thoreau, most likely. Caleb is something of a Thoreau fiend. He lets me reclaim him a few seconds longer. Then he shakes the bag. “You eaten?”

  “No.” The cereal was hours ago. I’m hungry again.

  We set up for a nighttime feast at the picnic table out back. I even light the tea candles and get out the coasters, self-consciously adult without Mom and Dad around. We talk about next month and the start of my senior year at North Peace Dale High. I’ve gotten expert at dodging around the subject of what Caleb is planning to do this fall. My standing policy on that is to wait for him to bring it up.

  Instead, I ask him what happened today at the Pool & Paddle, where Caleb teaches swimming. It’s the right job for him, mixing his love of kids with his near-perfect patience.

  “Nothing much. Actually, one of my tadpoles drew me a picture.”

  “Oh, cute! Do you have it? Let me see!”

  Sheepish, Caleb pulls it from his wallet, unfolding it with care, and passes it over. But he knows I’ll like it.

  The picture is of two stick figures. Same height, squiggly spider hands joined and wearing shoes that look like flowerpots. Behind them is a blue blob, which I guess is the pool.

  For Coach Caleb love Sophie marches in painstaking print across the bottom.

  “Those kids love you. You have such a good heart,” I tell him.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he answers. He’s shy about compliments.

  “Seriously.” I tweak the pink tip of his ear.

  “Hey, you’re the one who bakes chocolate chip cookies for crazy old ladies.”

  “Mrs. Orndorff’s not crazy, she’s a sweetie pie. Especially if you make her cookies.”

  “Which reminds me.” Caleb reaches up and swipes a couple of plates off the top shelf just as the toaster oven timer pings. “I’m starved.”

  After more than a year of semi-conversion to Caleb’s vegan diet, soy cheese still tastes like soggy paper to me, but it doesn’t stop me from polishing off two veggie burritos. Then I dig out the last lemon Italian ice in the freezer for dessert. We move off the picnic bench to sit on the stoop, sharing a spoon, scraping and passing the carton back and forth as we check out the stars.

  “Lesson?” Caleb suggests.

  “Okay, but, warning—I don’t think I’ve improved since last time.”

  “How about just as an excuse to sit close to you and breathe down your neck?”

  “Oh, well, sure. In that case.”

  He stuffs stray burrito wrappings and napkins back into the paper sack, and then places the guitar across my lap and swings a leg around so that he’s sitting behind me. I’m not exactly passionate about these guitar lessons. I’ve got hypersensitive, redhead’s skin, and the strings always feel like they’re about to draw blood from my fingertips. But nothing feels sexier than Caleb sitting so close, the insides of his thighs hard against the outsides of my thighs, his fingers pressing over mine, his breath in my ear as he explains frets and chord progression. Always breath-minty breath, too, because Caleb is totally paranoid about halitosis.

  We strum through some chords. Caleb’s talented. He learned guitar from his uncle Rory, a burned-out music genius who lives in Venice Beach. Unfortunately, I’m no Uncle Rory. After I mangle an old Eric Clapton song, the pads of my fingers begin to welt.

  “End of lesson,” I tell him.

  “A’right, ma’am, then I’ll have to demand some payment.”

  The only thing sexier than Caleb sitting behind me is when he leans forward to kiss me. Warm, mint mouth, palms cupping the edge of my face. So slow, as if he is living only inside right now, without a hungry eye on what might come next. For a second, though, I think I sense something different, a funny-shaped moment where Cay seems to almost-but-maybe-not shift away from me.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Just…these damn mosquitoes,” Caleb says.

  “What are you talking about? There’s no mosquitoes. It hasn’t rained for weeks.”

  In response, he makes a halfhearted slap at the side of his neck.

  I pull away. “Caleb, if you don’t want to fool around, you don’t need to invent some pathetic lie about it.”

  “I’m not…” He slaps his forearm, too deep in.

  Now I’m annoyed, so I stand up in a huff and head inside. I scoop up the remote and turn on the television. Caleb, following me, flops onto the couch and yawns.

  “Okay. The thing is…Mike Heller’s having a party at his place.” Caleb forces the casual tone in his voice. “Tonight.”

  “Eh,” I answer. I press the channel changer.

  Caleb clears his throat. “I’ve been thinking. We’ve been us two pretty much every night. I dunno, Lily. It might be good to get out. See kids.”

  “We see kids every day at work.”

  “You know what I mean, smart-ass. Our-age kids. Even if we don’t want to…”

  I turn from the screen. Caleb scratches at the late-night fuzz that shades his jawline. I won’t say what I’m feeling. This summer, I’m too old for fun and parties.

  “Next party,” I say. “Next time. Promise. Just, not tonight.”

  “Right.” He seems disappointed. I act like I don’t notice.

  “Besides, this is fun, isn
’t it?” I wish I could sound a little more joyful about it. “Playing house? No ’rents?”

  “Mmm.”

  The truth is, it’s not that different from when Mom and Dad are home, cloistered in their bedroom to watch their own TV and give us some privacy.

  I shinny down on the couch next to him and stretch out on my side. Our bodies curve together. Familiar, but not so relaxed that there isn’t a charge there. Or at least, I feel the charge, even though it’s been one year, nine months, three weeks, and five days since Caleb and I started seeing each other. It doesn’t seem like real time, though. It feels like one single, perfect day blended with forever. But our two-year anniversary is real enough. October 10.

  We doze through a horror movie. My head is propped on a cushion that rests on Caleb’s shoulder. My fingers drag lightly up and down his forearm, the way my grandmother used to do when I was a kid to get me to sleep. Caleb’s arm is as thin as mine, chlorine bleached and nearly hairless.

  “Something happened to me today,” he says. “At the pool.”

  There’s a quiet flutter in my blood. “What?”

  “I wasn’t going to tell you, but…”

  “Tell me.”

  Now Caleb speaks in a rush, like he’s been holding it in all evening. “It was during kick practice. I had the five through eights. My kids are all lined up with their paddleboards in the shallow end, and I’m standing in front of them, I’m yelling Kick! Kick!, the water’s churning, and I’ve got this whole line of noisy little squirts kicking like crazy.” He pauses to smile. He loves his job. “All I was thinking about was making sure nobody kicked too close or hard—no fighting, no biting. And then.”

  “And then?”

  He clears his throat. “You know that kinda prickly thing that happens on your skin if someone’s staring at you from behind? It was like that. But stronger. Only when I turned to look? Nobody. All day I’m trying to think how to describe it, but the best I came up with is it felt like a piece of cobweb or something had landed right…here.” He reaches around to the small of his back. “Except as soon as it happened, I thought—no, I knew.” Caleb corrects himself.

  “Knew…?” My fingertips still hurt. I press them against my neck.

  “Look, I’m not saying Jane was watching me for real.” Caleb darts me an uneasy look. “It’s more like she was there because she’s in my head. She’s…I dunno. Around.” He swipes a hand back through his hair. “Ah, just tell me to shut up. Hearing myself talk about it, it sounds totally insane.”

  “No, it doesn’t.” I shake my head. “So, what did you do? At the pool, I mean.”

  “Got out. Cooled off. Let Maureen take over for a few minutes.”

  Caleb is being serious, but I’m not really sure what it is that he’s told me, so I’m not really sure how to respond. “I was in Jane’s bedroom earlier tonight,” I confide, “and I had the same feeling. I think. Caleb…” I slide up on an elbow to look at him. “Do you ever feel guilty?”

  This is exactly the kind of question Caleb hates. Something close to panic holds his eyes; one a bleached blue, the other a dark, marbled navy. Odd, definitely, but I think they’re amazing. Even if the whites are bloodshot from pool chlorine and his chronic lack of sleep.

  “The thing you can’t forget in all this…” He stops. I wait him out. “What you can’t forget, is that you weren’t responsible for how Jane was.”

  “You say that, but I know I could have helped her better. Somehow.”

  Caleb shakes his head. “We’ve had this talk a zillion times, Lily. There was no way for you to have known. You keep beating yourself up for not noticing, for not seeing the changes. But nobody else saw them, either. Why do you put all the blame on yourself?” His confidence envelops me, almost.

  “Because I’m her sister,” I answer, “and I should have been able to do more. For all I know, I was part of the problem. Maybe we both were.” With this last sentence, my voice is so low, I can hardly hear myself.

  But Caleb hears me fine. He looks angry. “How were we the problem? Just by existing? By being us?”

  “By being happy.” I know I’m on shaky logic ground here. “Maybe it made us selfish. It must have hurt her.”

  Caleb’s bony shoulder flinches in defense. “Being happy isn’t our fault.”

  “Okay.” I make my voice dull, agreeing and not agreeing. Our zillion-and-oneth talk is not going anywhere. I drop it. Lean back against him and try to anesthetize myself with TV. I imagine kids arriving at Mike Heller’s house. Mike’s a senior, and I picture his party crowded with other seniors—Jane’s classmates, although I’m better friends with most of them, mostly on account of dating Caleb.

  Heller’s would be a total scene. First kids would make this whole big joyfest of seeing me, oh, hey, wow, glad you made it, great to see ya, and then there’d be the usual gossiping behind their hands, scrutinizing me, passing judgments about how I’m doing really. And I just do not want to deal with it.

  “Stay here with me tonight, Cay?” It’s a plea, but I try to make it sound like a suggestion. I move to tuck my arm underneath Caleb’s waist. So thin, not a scrap more flesh on him than necessary. Wrapping myself closer, I whisper, “You make me feel so safe.”

  One of Caleb’s scarecrow legs hooks and twines through mine. This means he’ll stay and keep me safe the way I need him to. But I also can feel myself holding on too hard, relying on him too much. Be with me, stay with me, don’t leave me. As if I’ve lost my hold on the world around me, and he’s the only grip I’ve got.

  5 — SQUEAK

  Jane

  Jane woke up yelling. In her mouth, in her open eyes, the darkness poured into her.

  She sat up in bed and remembered. She was safe. She was at her grandparents’ house. And she had not been yelling. Not out loud, anyway.

  Thunder rumbled. That must have been the sound that woke her. Rain was driving hard on the rooftop and against the window. She slipped from the bed and out of the bedroom. Every floorboard, every piece of furniture at Orchard Way was so familiar to her that her imagination could shape whatever her sight couldn’t reach. But she kept a hand on the banister as she tiptoed down the stairs, touching each step as lightly as a dancer.

  Years ago, she and Lily used to play a game called Squeak. The winner was the one who could make it all the way up and back down the stairs the quietest. Only Jane got too good at it. She’d learned the mystery of each step, just as she’d learned every other secret thing about her grandparents’ house.

  When Lily stopped coming regularly to Orchard Way, Jane continued to play the game alone. Winning over and over against an invisible Lily.

  At the front door, Jane turned the knob and stepped out onto the porch. The rain echoed on the roof, as loud as charging hooves. Could Lily hear it, too? Lily always used to wake up in storms. They’d terrified her, sent her flying into Jane’s room, where she’d fling herself into Jane’s bed and shiver under the covers. But storms at Orchard Way were beautiful and startling. Jane refused to let Lily hide through them. Instead, she’d coax her outside to play Runaway Horse.

  “Pretend you’re Finnegan, a wild stallion,” Jane would say, “and pretend I’m Señor Jorge, the horse catcher who is coming to tame you for the circus!”

  Once she had turned into a horse, Lily would forget about being afraid. Together, she and Jane would race through the slopping wet grass, raindrops smacking their arms and legs, Jane tugging the reins of Lily’s hair and yelling, “There is no escape for you, Finn!” as Lily screeched in terror and delight.

  Settled on the ladder-back rocker, Jane let it tilt her back and forth, back and forth. Finnegan and Señor Jorge! They had seemed so real back then. When Jane thought back on some of those old pretending games, they seemed so strange. As if somebody else had thought them up. As if they weren’t from her mind at all.

  She had missed being here. Missed it dull like a sickness and missed it sharp as a thousand scratches on her heart. Orchard Way h
ad been the perfect place for snowstorms and thunderstorms and swimming and fort building, for birthdays and weekends and games and more games. It was a house of pretending impossible things. It was her whole, entire childhood blended into one single, perfect day that she thought would never end.

  Back and forth. The rocker creaked if Jane pressed too hard against its spine. She tilted and held it with the tips of her toes as she watched another break of lightning, followed by a boom of thunder so loud that now she knew. Lily was awake.

  6 — SPECIAL NEEDS CHILD

  Lily

  The thunder wakes me up. It takes me a minute to remember where I am, on the couch, with my arms and legs pretzel-twisted around Caleb.

  Through the living room window, I can see the summer storm raging. It’s a biggie, electric with lightning. I untangle myself from Caleb’s limbs and ease myself to my feet to double-check that all the windows are closed. Not scared not scared, I chant as I pad through the house. Lalala. Storms are definitely in my top five list of things that petrify me.

  Kitchen, living room. The patio door is closed, but—oops—I’d left it unlocked. Parents’ room, my room. At the end of the hall, the door to Jane’s room, I hesitate.

  Then I take a breath and turn the knob.

  Her window is wide open. Rain blows in slantways, rattling the blinds up and down like a xylophone. My throat catches in senseless panic as I rush toward it. I can feel the carpet soaked and spongy under my feet. I lean up, struggling, but the window is stuck fast. Water sops my T-shirt and beats against my face. “C’mon, c’mon.”

  The window gives so suddenly that it almost takes off my fingers as it slams shut. Quickly, I turn the latch and step back, wiping the spray from my face.

  The rocking chair is wet. It creaks back and forth as if by an invisible hand. I pluck a cotton T-shirt from the stack on Jane’s bed and use it to dry the wood. The skin of my fingers stings where it tore. My heart is still thumping. I sit on the chair to calm myself. The rocking motion soothes me. I tilt myself into the rhythm as I listen to the rain.