Splendor (14 page)

I’d used the time to practice some of what I’d been reading about in other books I’d helped myself to over the past few weeks, techniques for finding God. Actually, I was surprised how closely what the writers recommended mirrored the practices I’d taken up the year before: attention to the details of living; mindful enjoyment of my own body, like when I ran a brush through my hair or let hot water course down my back in the shower. At the Cohens’ house I practiced sitting quietly and breathing regularly, and tripped across the mantra-like Hebrew name of God one of the books encouraged the practitioner to repeat. It still felt awkward, but easier each time I said it.

“Is that yours?” Gunner asked, raising his glass in the direction of the mystery novel.

“No. Yes. Sort of—I borrowed it from a friend.” It felt strange talking with Gunner about anything even remotely connected to Will.

He laughed. “You sound as guilty as one of Dame Agatha’s murderers.”

“I’m not guilty.”

“That’s what all the criminals say,” Gunner said.

“Have you read any of her books?”

“Of course. A few of them. She’s one of my own, you know. Another Brit.”

I nodded.

“And the most popular novelist of all time,” he went on. “She’s only outsold by the Bible and Shakespeare.”

I hadn’t known that. “Really? Are you sure?”

“Positively.”

I considered this. “Why do you think she’s so popular?”

He answered immediately. “People like simple answers to complex questions. They like everything neatly tied up. Resolution and all that. And they like to see the wicked punished.”

His glass was empty now. He poured more liquid from his flask atop the clinking ice cubes and added another splash to my glass, though I’d barely sipped my drink.

“What about you?” he asked, leaning across the table. His dark blond hair, pushed back from his face, looked tantalizingly soft. “Do you like to see the wicked punished?”

“Who doesn’t?” I tried to keep my tone light and leaned away. His breath had a sweet-sharp scent of liquor. And his eyes, blue and green and brown, were hypnotic.

“
I
don’t, particularly,” he said. Maybe it was the lilt of his accent, or maybe it was the dizzying effect that sitting this close to him seemed to produce in me, but I found it hard to tell whether or not he was kidding. “I think it’s much more interesting when the wicked walk among us unchecked. It makes for more…possibilities.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Don’t I?”

He swirled his drink in his glass, making a little whirlpool.

“I find it interesting,” he said, “the similarity between our names.”

The rapid change of subject left me a little confused. It took me a moment to respond. “Gunner and Scarlett?” I finally said. “They’re both two syllables, if that’s what you mean.”

He shook his head. “No. Not that. It’s their reductions…Gunn and Scar. You see it now?”

I did. One could cause the other. Both could be violent. Ugly.

“Why are you here?”

He smiled, slowly, and my stomach did a slow circle of fear…or anticipation. “I knew I’d find you.”

I shook my head, though he’d confirmed my suspicion that maybe he hadn’t really planned a study date with Lily. “That’s not what I mean. Not here at Lily’s. I mean why are you
here
—on the island?”

“Ah. You want a different answer.” He rolled his glass on its edge across the table, leaving a wet line like a snail’s trail. “I told you already—my father found it convenient for me to disappear.”

“What did you do?”

There was nothing warm in his eyes now, or his gaze. He was thinking about home, and his father. “There was a misunderstanding about a girl,” he said at last. “There was a party, and she and I were both in attendance. There was an accident—I wasn’t there when it happened, but I was close enough to the scene for it not to look good for my father. The media, you know, they like to create stories that embarrass public figures.”

“What happened to the girl?”

“Sadly, she died.”

“She
died
?”

“People do so every day.”

“What did she die of?”

“Such an American sentence construction, ‘What did she die of,’ don’t you think?”

I said nothing but took a nervous pull on my drink. The ice had melted slightly, thinning it.

“She fell, some say. Or perhaps she jumped. Either way, the result was the same. She was, you know, several stories up.”

I felt sick. “You don’t sound all that upset about it.”

“Should I be? I barely knew her. And people die every day. Do
you
feel emotionally invested in all their deaths? I doubt it. It was merely my bad luck to have been in the same place at the same time as that girl, that’s all. And worse luck that my father learned about it. So, here I am—exiled, as it were, to your island until such time as my father sees fit to call me home again.”

I shuddered. His cavalier attitude—the way he spoke of the girl’s death. As if it was an
inconvenience
to him.

But though I didn’t like to admit it, I felt the truth in some of what he said. People did die every day. And most of those deaths didn’t affect me. I didn’t mourn them all, only the deaths of people I loved. Really, the only death I’d ever truly mourned was Ronny’s.

Gunner said these things out loud. Things most people didn’t admit, even to themselves. Did that make him worse than me, or better?

But it seemed like something was wrong with his line of reasoning, something I couldn’t quite quantify. I hadn’t had more than a few sips of the alcohol he’d added to my glass, so I couldn’t blame my lack of clarity on drink.

It’s not the alcohol that’s intoxicating,
my inner voice whispered. I ignored it and focused on how I felt about his cold logic. I didn’t like it.

“I think you’d better go,” I said, pushing my drink away from me. “I’ll tell Lily you stopped by.”

He smiled slowly, as if he could feel the rhythm of my quickened pulse, as if he read my thoughts in my expression. He didn’t argue with me. He just slid his flask back inside his satchel and stood.

I followed him to the door, opening it for him and standing aside for him to pass.

He didn’t leave, not right away. Instead he leaned in close, bringing his lips down to my ear. His breath stirred my hair and I shivered.

“You can tell her whatever you want,” he whispered. “But we both know I came for you.”

O
n Monday in psychology class, Mrs. Antoine announced that our next unit of study would be on dreams. “The first thing you should know,” she told us, “is that there is virtually no consensus about the meaning of dreams. Some researchers claim dreams are solely the result of physiological changes that occur during sleep, and that any interpretation of them, while fun, is scientifically unsound. Freudians, on the other hand, argue that dreams are the gateway to the unconscious mind.”

Next to me, Lily wasn’t even pretending to take notes. She held her phone just under the desk and was doing something—reading a text, maybe—so she didn’t notice when Mrs. Antoine started up the row toward her seat.

I tried to warn her by coughing loudly, but whatever she was doing had her complete attention. Mrs. Antoine stopped next to Lily’s desk and stood quietly, waiting for Lily to notice her.

The whole class waited along with her to see what would happen next.

Finally Mrs. Antoine cleared her throat.

Still not looking up, Lily said, “Just a minute. I’m almost done.”

She typed something quickly and hit the send button. Then she looked up at Mrs. Antoine and smiled.

“I’ll take that,” Mrs. Antoine said, holding out her hand for Lily’s phone.

“Sure,” Lily said. “Perfect timing.”

Lily’s complete lack of chagrin seemed to amuse Mrs. Antoine rather than annoy her. After she’d walked back to the front of the class, Lily’s phone in hand, I grinned over at Lily. But she wouldn’t meet my eye.

Mrs. Antoine went on about dreams, filling the board with an overview of the psychiatrists and psychologists we’d be reading about, outlining each one’s core arguments. I took notes mechanically, filling up two pages in my notebook. But I wasn’t really paying attention, even though the subject matter was of particular interest to me.

What was up with Lily? Again, when Mrs. Antoine’s back was turned, I tried to get Lily’s attention, this time by flicking a little piece of wadded-up notepaper at her head. It stuck in her curls, where she left it. She didn’t even flinch, her pen moving smoothly across the paper she’d laid on her desk.

That was when I knew something was really wrong. Lily never took notes, if she could help it, which meant she never took notes in any of the classes that we shared. She always borrowed mine.

So if she was taking notes—and ignoring me—there was only one conclusion to draw.

The text had been about me. And Gunner’s weekend visit.

I had meant to tell her that he’d come over. But when Lily and her parents had gotten back to the island on Sunday, the atmosphere had just been all wrong. Jack’s forehead vein was pulsating again, and Laura, despite her excitement over seeing the boys, emitted a wave of fatigue.

Lily had seemed steely and had pulled me by the wrist up the stairs to her room without even saying hello to her brothers.

“Some weekend,” she steamed, as soon as the door was closed. She flopped backward onto the bed.

“What’s the matter, Lil? Where’d you guys go, anyway?”

“Oh, they took me to San Francisco. We stayed at this little boutique hotel in Union Square. Here…I got you something.”

She reached into the purse she’d discarded next to the bed and pulled out a long scarf. It was dark red, swirled through with tiny yellow-gold spirals. It was beautiful. The silk reminded me of Gunner, which reminded me of his visit. That moment would have been a good time to tell Lily about it.

But I didn’t. Instead I said, “Wow, Lil, it’s amazing. Is it from India?”

She shrugged. “It’s from Neiman Marcus.”

I laughed. “Yeah, but before that.”

“Maybe,” she said. “It reminded me of you.”

“Well,” I said, winding the scarf around my neck and admiring it in her mirror, “Frisco, shopping, how bad could it have been?”

“You can’t call it
Frisco,
Scar,” she said. “Everyone knows that.”

I ignored her tone. “Whatever,” I said. “What was so terrible?”

“Just
them.
”

“Ah. Them.”

“Scar, seriously, sometimes you’re as bad as they are.”

“I’m sorry, Lil. Tell me about it.”

“Well, it wasn’t anything in particular, you know? It’s just…everywhere I looked, there they were.”

I suppressed my laughter. “Well, you were on a trip together, weren’t you?”

“Yeah, of course, I get it. But, like, they wouldn’t leave me alone, not for a minute. It felt like I was on lockdown.”

“Maybe they’re still upset about Amsterdam.”

“No shit,” said Lily. “So am I.”

I suspected that different aspects of the trip bothered Lily and her parents.

“Scar, in three months I’ll be eighteen years old. A legal adult. And they still treat me like I’m a little kid. They don’t
trust
me, Scarlett.”

I didn’t know how to put it delicately, so I just said it. “Lil, last time they trusted you, you ended up sleeping with some random tour guide.”

Lily looked at me dolefully. “You really don’t get it, do you?”

I didn’t say anything. I just waited for her to enlighten me.

“I don’t want them to trust me not to sleep with tour guides.” She spoke slowly and carefully, as if to make sure that her words got through my thick head. “If I want to sleep with tour guides, I’m going to fucking sleep with tour guides. That’s
my
decision, not theirs. I want them to trust that if I’m sleeping with a tour guide, I’ve thought through the implications, I’ve balanced the risk against the possible reward, and I’ve made an educated decision. That’s what I want.”

The scarf Lily had given me had been cool when I’d first wound it around my neck. It had warmed as she’d spoken and I’d listened.

“Do you think that’s too much to ask for?” Lily asked.

I didn’t know. I’d never been a parent. Hell, it seemed that I’d barely been anyone’s
child
these past couple of years. Like it or not, I was a free agent. In a way, Lily’s point sounded strangely compelling.

So why was I angry?

“Maybe that’s asking a lot, Lil, of any parent.”

“I don’t think it is.”

“Well, when you’re a parent you can let your daughter sleep with all the tour guides she wants.”

Exasperated, Lily said, “You totally missed the point, Scar. It wouldn’t be up to me to
let
my daughter sleep with anyone, or forbid her from it, either. It would be up to me to support her and be there if she needed me.”

“That sounds good in theory,” I said, “but in practice that might be nearly impossible.”

“They shouldn’t have kids if they’re not up to the challenge,” she said. “There
is
such a thing as abortion, you know. Anyway, I’m not having any kids.”

That had been yesterday. And this was today. Someone, in between then and now, had told Lily about Gunner’s visit to her house, I was sure of it. And it hadn’t been the person who should have told her—me.

After class I waited while Lily collected her phone from Mrs. Antoine. She brushed by me on the way out of the room and I had to rush to keep up with her.

I didn’t bother asking her what was wrong. “I should have told you he came over,” I said as we pushed through the double doors at the end of the hall. The afternoon air was crisp and the sky was bright blue in that particular way of fall days. I was wearing the scarf Lily had given me and I wound it once more around my neck.

No response.

“Lily, I’m sorry. But it was no big deal. I swear.”

We were off campus and halfway down the street before she stopped to speak to me. When she finally did, it was to ask a question. “Scar, do you remember last year? When Will first showed up at school?”

I thought back to that day—the way he’d leaned up against the wall of the front building, the way his eyes had found me across the quad. The way his gaze felt upon my face. “I remember.”

“And do you remember what I asked you, just before the party at Andy’s?”

I swallowed hard. I did.

“I asked you if you wanted to keep him on the back burner. Remember? Even though you were with Andy.”

“I know, Lil.”

“So what did I do?”

“You stayed away.”

“Damned right. Friends first.”

“But, Lily, it’s not like I asked him over. He didn’t even stay that long. It wasn’t like that.”

“Bullshit,” she said. “If it wasn’t like that, you would have told me.”

There was nothing I could say to this, because she was right. If it wasn’t like that, I would have told her. I would have told Will. Instead I’d told no one. A lie by omission.

“I’m sorry,” I said, but Lily had already turned away.

I couldn’t make Lily forgive me. I knew her too well. She’d forgive me in her own time, in her own Lily way. But she wasn’t the only person I wanted to apologize to.

Will answered on the second ring. I guess it had been a little strained between us since he’d told me that he’d taken things into his own hands, so to speak, going out looking for trouble rather than waiting for it to find him. But just the day before I’d gotten a letter from Will in the mail—a real, old-fashioned love letter, written by hand, full of his particular voice and the amazing news that he and Martin would be coming to the island over winter break.

“Hey, Will,” I said when he answered. “I got your letter.”

“Did you like it?”

What was not to like? “Mm-hmm,” I said. “But I don’t think I deserve it.”

“Of course you do,” he said. “Why would you say that?”

“There’s this guy,” I said. The words caught in my throat, coming out more like a whisper. So I forced myself to say it again, louder. “There’s this guy.”

He was silent for a moment, but I knew he’d heard me. Finally, he spoke. “Oh.”

Tears stung my eyes. I was down by the beach and a bunch of tourists whose cruise ship was anchored just off our island were milling around, sipping lattes and snapping pictures of one another.

“Do you want to tell me about him?” Will said. His voice was tight.

I nodded, then remembered that he couldn’t see me. So I said, “I guess so. Nothing happened, Will, it’s not like I kissed him, or—anything. It’s just that…”

“You like him.”

“No!” I laughed, bitter. “I don’t actually. I don’t like him at all.”

“I’m confused.”

“Me too,” I said. Then, “His name is Gunner. He’s a foreign exchange student from England. He got here at the end of last month. And I didn’t tell you about him,” I blurted out, and the tears flowed down my cheeks.

“Okay,” said Will. “You didn’t tell me…what, exactly?”

“That he’s
here
!” I sounded hysterical now, and a little cluster of tourists looked at me quickly before taking a few steps away. “And that I like him.”

Will laughed, but it didn’t sound like he really found the whole thing funny. “I thought you said you
didn’t
like him.”

“I did. I mean, I don’t. I don’t like him; he’s kind of a bastard. But I’m attracted to him.” There. I’d said it. It hurt coming out, the truth.

After a minute, Will answered. It was a long minute, waiting for him to speak. Finally, he said, “Scarlett, you don’t have to tell me that you’re attracted to some guy. I don’t own you.”

“I know,” I said, “but it felt like a lie, not saying anything.”

“I see girls around campus every day. Attractive girls. Girls I’m attracted
to.
”

I had no words for this. Logically, of course he did. He wasn’t stuck on a tiny island; he wasn’t me. I felt a flame of jealousy shoot through me.

“Do you talk to them?”

“Sometimes,” he said. “But I don’t
sleep
with them.”

“Do you want to?”

Silence. Then, softly, “Sometimes.”

We were both quiet for a long time. I watched the water. It was dark blue under the day’s bright sun.
Entirely wrong weather for this conversation,
I thought.

“So now what?” I finally said.

“In three weeks, I’ll be back on the island for winter break,” said Will, “and all I want is to smell your hair and kiss your face and hold your hand.”

I choked a little on my sob. “Even though I like that guy?”

“I don’t care if you like
all
the guys,” said Will. “As long as you want me to smell your hair and kiss your face and hold your hand.”