by A. S. King
“My best friend is dating someone from here. We’re only visiting tonight.”
“Who?”
“Donna?”
“Oh! So you’re in high school, right? Her girl’s from high school, isn’t she?”
“Yeah. We’re seniors.”
“You the one who was lying on the picnic table for the last hour?”
I nod and try not to blush.
“What were you doing out there?”
“Just looking at the sky. And at the airplanes. It’s what I do, I guess.”
“Huh,” she says. “Wanna show me how you do it?”
I look around, and I see the others looking at us. Still, no one is really smiling or being all that welcoming. I don’t get that. These are supposed to be my people. I didn’t think they’d be douches at all. Note to self: Not all gay people will be cool. Not all straight people will be not cool. When did you get so us-and-them, Astrid?
As we walk out to the table, I ask my new friend, “Is it me, or is everyone at this party kinda standoffish?”
“That’s just how they receive strangers.”
“It’s weird,” I say.
“Not really. It’s hard. You’ll understand soon,” she says. “Plus, it’s early. In another three hours, the place will be packed and everyone will be drunker and the mood will lighten considerably.”
“Good. Because it’s a little like a funeral in there.”
“What’s your name?” she asks.
We get to the table. I sit on the bench. She sits next to me. “Astrid.”
“I’m Kim. My ex should be here any minute, and I’m kinda not okay with it.”
“Bummer.”
We both spend half a minute looking up into the sky.
“Have you told your family yet?” she asks.
I laugh. “God no.”
“Anyone?”
“Just my two best friends. And my girlfriend,” I say.
She laughs. “I hope so!”
“Yeah.”
“Are they going to be okay with it, do you think?”
I nod. “I think so.”
“I thought mine would be cool. They are now, but they weren’t at first. I think it’s a shock.”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“You know, you’re really cute,” she says.
I let out a shy laugh. “Thanks. You too.”
She steps onto the bench and sits on the table and then lies down. “Is this how you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Look at the planes.”
“Well, yeah, but those trees don’t help,” I say, pushing her over so I can lie next to her.
“There’s one!” She points. “Can you tell what kind they are from here?”
“Sometimes. Not at night, though.” I spot the blinking white taillight. “Did you know that every plane has a red light on the left wing and a green light on the right for navigation?”
“So you’re cute and smart,” she says.
“So the white strobe you see”—I point—“is the tail.”
She softly pulls my hand down and onto her chest and holds it with her two hands.
We don’t say anything for a while. I can feel her heart beating.
“Do you mind if I kiss you right now?” she asks.
And my mouth says no, even though it knows I am dating Dee. (It also knows that Dee has never been polite enough to ask me anything before she does it.) As we kiss—and Kim is a spectacular kisser—I begin to think about what this means. This means I’ve kissed two girls in my life. Which is one more than the one boy I’ve kissed—if you don’t count Jeff Garnet, who I’m not really kissing. It means I am more of a lesbian than I was only a minute ago when I was just looking at Kim and thinking about how cute she is. It means that one day I will have to tell my parents. And Ellis, who says things like lesbian luncheon. It means that maybe I will finally drive my pseudo-agoraphobic mother into full-fledged hiding.
Or maybe I will save her from Unity Valley, and this will finally get her to move back to New York City, where we belong.
They’ll say: Good riddance to her. She thought she was so damn special.
“Wow,” Kim says.
Then we go back to kissing, and I clear my mind of all those thoughts and I just feel stuff. I feel aroused and happy, and kissing becomes harder when I smile a little, and when she feels me smile under her lips, she smiles, too. I bring my hands up to run them through her hair.
We stop and look at each other in the dim light. And then I hear “Asteroid!”
And I say, “Shit.” I roll off the table and sit on the bench for a second, and Kim follows me and sits next to me, and I can tell we’re both trying to look innocent and failing.
“Should have known I’d find you here,” Kristina says. She looks at Kim, who moves her hand in a wave. “Are you ready to go?”
“Sure,” I say.
Donna looks at her phone. “We’ll be really late if we don’t leave now.”
“And Dee’s waiting, right?” Kristina adds.
“Yeah,” I say.
Kim walks with us to Donna’s car. We fall behind them, and she says, “It was nice meeting you. Come back any time you want.” She slips her number into my back pocket and then says, “See you guys!” as if we had just played on the swing set in fourth grade together.
“She seems nice” is the last thing Kristina says to me.
ME: I just kissed someone else.
ME: True. Not very cool.
I bring my hand up to my face and see if I can smell Kim on my hands. I realize how stupid I am for doing this.
ME: You know what this means, right?
ME: No. Not at all.
ME: It means you’re gay, Astrid.
ME: Oh. That.
ME: Yeah. That.
Since Donna and Kristina are talking and listening to music up there as if I’m not in the backseat, I summon Frank to sit next to me. He winks as he arrives. Then he gives me a thumbs-up.
I have no idea why he’s so happy for me. I could have just ruined everything.
25
WELCOME ABOARD FLIGHT ATLANTIS.
BY THE TIME WE PULL INTO the bar parking lot, it’s 10:42. Earliest we’ve ever been. Dee is here, in her car, waiting for me. I make my exit while Donna and Kristina start making out in the backseat and Justin texts Chad because he’s not here yet.
When we kiss, it overflows into a longer kiss and then a longer one and then a passionate, sink-down-in-the-seats kiss, and I feel a blanket of desire over me like I’ve never really felt before. Not ever. She grabs my hair and twists it. She squeezes my hip, and I put my right hand up her shirt and touch her through her bra and then slide my index finger around her waistband. Just a little.
FACT: I WANT MORE THAN ANYTHING TO SAY ABRACADABRA RIGHT NOW.
FACT: I’D RATHER STAY HERE IN DEE’S CAR THAN GO INTO THE BAR.
FACT: NEITHER OF THESE THINGS IS GOING TO HAPPEN.
So I nibble on her ear and whisper other words. “Abalone,” I say. “Abercrombie.”
She chuckles and slips her hands into my jeans and down the sides of my legs. Under my panties, and then aims them around my ass and holds it like someone would hold a water balloon. Carefully. Skillfully.
“What were you saying?” she asks.
“Ab… dominal external oblique muscles.”
She removes her hands from my jeans and lifts my shirt a little. She kisses my lips. My chin. My neck. My collarbone. My belly. My ribs. She says, “I’m sorry. I wasn’t paying attention. Were you trying to say something?” She begins to unbutton my fly.
“I think it was abrasion,” I say. “Or maybe abridgment.”
She lifts my bra, and my breasts spill out. “Are you sure? I thought you might be trying to say something else.”
Brutally loud knock on the window. We lie and breathe for a second.
“Abrupt, abominable abuse. That’s all she’s good for at times like this.”
; Kristina keeps knocking.
I sit up and sigh. “Did you ever wonder if what you believe is reality? I mean, that beyond this is a real reality that’s more real than the reality you know?”
“Shit, Jones.”
“But did you? Did you ever get pulled in so many directions you weren’t sure which one was real?”
She bear-hugs me.
I say, “I love you.”
She kisses me on the forehead.
Kristina knocks again and says, “We’re leaving you here if you don’t come now.”
We straighten ourselves and get out of the car. I feel the cold more than I usually do. I realize that I was sweating. Parts of my body are damp. The right parts. I shiver. Dee and I cross the street and get in line and press ourselves together. Neither of us can stop smiling. I know this sounds stupid, but it’s like no one else is here. Justin’s and Chad’s lips are moving, and they seem to be having a conversation, but I can’t hear them. Same with Kristina and Donna. Blah blah blah. I feel 100 percent ready to say abracadabra.
Maybe even tonight. Claire would be so proud.
We are now experts at getting through the door. My heart rate doesn’t increase. My palms aren’t sweaty. I don’t even have exact change. I smile at Jim the bouncer and hand him my twenty-dollar bill. I say, “For two,” and hold up two fingers. Dee thanks me as he hands me ten dollars in change.
As I step over the threshold, I feel I am entitled to happiness, even if my best friend is acting weird and making me paranoid. Even if I just did what I did with a complete stranger named Kim. Even if I feel like an occasional dumbshit. I am in my own personal happy jet—in a wide seat and with the perfect mix of cool and warm air and the little pillow positioned perfectly in my lumbar region.
I look around at the other passengers. Biker lady is here. She is a leather-clad flight attendant. She brings me a bottle of water and says, “I know that’s the kind you like.” She takes Dee to the dance floor and dances with her during an old disco classic. Dee is probably more beautiful than I’ve ever seen her. It’s not just her clothes or how she’s put her hair back. It’s the cabin pressure in here. It’s making us worry-free. Timeless. Funny. Grown up.
The pilot puts on some more disco and says, “We’re playing your favorites until midnight! Drop by the cockpit and give me a request!”
It’s all so good, I don’t have time to feel guilty.
Dee and I drink lemonades and find a place in the back corner of the dance floor. Atlantis is particularly crowded tonight. There’s a line for the ladies’ room that stretches to the bar doorway.
When the techno comes on at midnight, more people crowd onto the dance floor, and Dee and I start to kiss again in the corner while our hips are pressing into each other and our hands are touching places that should not be touched in a public place.
We are right by an amplifier, so she has to yell. “You want to go back to the car? Maybe you could find that word you’re looking for.”
I really want to say yes, but I’m afraid of leaving now and what Kristina would say. “I do, but I… I don’t want to do it in the car,” I say. I don’t like quite how that came out, but she nods.
“Maybe you can remember the word tomorrow? I’ve got a free house.”
We pull away from each other and lock eyes. She nods. I nod.
We dance until we’re twice as damp as we were when we arrived.
I see Kristina and Donna over by the bar. Kristina waves at me and smiles. I wave back. After a brief rest, Dee grabs me for a slow dance, and we dance so close I think I’m losing circulation in my torso. Nothing ever felt more perfect. I think about telling Mom and Dad again. I think that it would be easy to tell them if they understood that I’m happy. All parents want their kids to be happy, right?
Right when I think this is when everything changes.
First, a loud voice. Then the music goes off. Then the lights come on.
26
OHSHITOHSHITOHSHIT.
THOSE OF US IN the middle—halfway between the street entrance and the back parking-garage entrance—start a surge toward the back door. But then we’re pushed back toward the bar by those who were in the back room, because there are cops coming in that way, too.
“Oh, shit,” Dee says.
I don’t know what to say.
“Can they arrest us?” I ask.
Justin and Chad whisper a few things to each other.
“They’re checking IDs,” Dee says.
“I don’t have an ID,” Kristina says. “Except my school ID.”
Donna says, “Babe, I don’t think that’s what you want to say when they get to us.”
I reach to my back pocket. I have my driver’s license and a ten-dollar bill.
Dee puts her head in her hands. I can see the color drain from her face. This might kill her hockey scholarship chances. Or maybe all of our everything chances.
The cop goes to Chad first. Chad reaches into his wallet and pulls out his license.
“Looks like a long drive for your folks tonight, all the way from Allentown!”
“Am I going to jail?” Chad asks.
The cop smiles and shakes his head. “Just a trip to the district justice with your parents. Go give them a call.” He points to the phone on the bar.
Chad nods. What a mixed-bag answer. No jail, yes district justice. What the hell does that even mean?
As the cop moves on to Donna, who has, unbeknownst to all of us, a fake ID, it begins to dawn on me that I am completely up Claire Creek without a paddle.
And then Kristina starts laughing. Like a crazy person. Just laughing and laughing. Donna tries to shake her out of it, but she can’t. The cops look disturbed. One of them asks if Kristina is on drugs. Instead of this making her stop laughing, it makes her laugh more. She even snorts a few times. Tears are pouring out of her eyes.
“Did she have a lot to drink?” the cop asks.
None of us answer because we can’t figure out what’s happening to Kristina.
It’s Justin who snaps her out of it. He makes her sit down on the bar step. “Kris, stop it. You’re freaking out. Breathe with me.”
They breathe together. She has to giggle in between. Then she gathers herself and stands back up, no longer laughing.
“Are you okay?” a cop asks.
She laughs again—through her nose—and says, “Yes, sir.” Another giggle. “I’m fine.”
She’s smiling so big you’d never know she was getting busted along with the rest of us.
27
OHSHITOHSHITOHSHIT PART TWO.
“HELLO?” Oh, thank God it’s Dad.
“Dad? I’m really sorry about this,” I say. I give him a minute to wake up. It’s now two thirty AM.
“Is everything okay?”
“Yes. Everyone is fine, and nothing bad has happened. Buuuut. Uh. I’m gonna need you to come pick me up.”
There’s silence.
“Dad?”
“Did that jerk just leave you there?”
“No. No. Nothing like that. Except, well,” I stammer. “He is a jerk.” I realize that Dad is so asleep/stoned/out of the loop that he thinks I’m out with Jeff tonight.
“Okay, which theater are you at? I’ll come get you.”
I hear him get out of bed and breathe heavily as he puts on his pants. He says, “You know, I’m really proud of you for calling. I’m glad you took us seriously when we told you that you could call if you ever needed help or if anyone was drunk or any of that.” He pauses. I can hear him zip his pants. “He didn’t drive drunk, did he?”
“No, Dad.”
“Good. You’re so smart. Thank God for that,” he says. “So are you at the mall or over at the Multiplex?”
I sigh and look at Dee. Kristina is still standing next to me.
“I’m actually in the city,” I say. “On Chestnut Street.”
I hear him put on his coat. “Chestnut Street? Is that where they put that new IMAX? I thought that was
farther downtown. Huh.”
“No. Uh, Dad, I’m at a bar. The cops just busted it, and I’m not allowed to leave unless you pick me up.”
Silence.
“Dad?”
“A bar?”
“Yeah.”
Huge, heavy sigh. “What the hell, Astrid?”
“Look. It’s at the corner of Chestnut and Fifth. Just get here.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“I know, Dad. Believe me. Just get here.”
“What’s the name of the place?”
I take a deep, jittery breath. “Atlantis.”
“Atlantis?” he says. Like he knows. Like he knows exactly what Atlantis is.
So I hang up.
28
THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT.
DEE’S MOTHER IS THE FIRST ONE TO get here. Well, the first one we know. There are at least fifteen other underage people here who we don’t know, and some have already been picked up.
She looks around and exhales in deep disappointment, signs the ticket and takes Dee out the front door without a word to her. I feel like following them out and apologizing and telling Mrs. Roberts that it was all my idea and my fault for dragging Dee out. But my feet don’t move.
Five minutes later, the door opens, and it’s Dad and Kristina’s mom at the same time. Dad looks around and gets a look on his face like he’s disgusted. Not sure why. There is nothing in here that looks too different from any bar, I don’t think.
Chad is waiting alongside Justin. Kristina says something to both of them before she goes toward her mother, who slaps her right across the face like in the old movies. The Houcks have a knack for that sort of thing. It’s like Gone with the Wind or something. Strictly the 1939 brand of slapping. It only works because the slapper loves the slapee, and the slapee knows it.
This wouldn’t work in my family.
My dad doesn’t say a word and just stuffs my ticket into his coat pocket and grabs me by the elbow and pulls me out the door.
I wiggle free when we’re outside and go to get into the passenger’s seat.
“Sit in back,” he says.
“What?”
“Sit in back. I don’t want to talk about this.”