Dreamology (9 page)

“HEY, ALICE!” I
hear Celeste call out after Terrarium Club, just as I'm unlocking Frank to head home. It's moments like these when I really wish I had my earbuds in and could peel out of the parking lot and never look back like I hadn't heard her at all. I'm exhausted. Between the dean and Delilah and Celeste, there's a lot I need to process. But my earbuds are, as always, tangled in an impossible knot at the bottom of my bag.

“Hey!” I say, turning and putting on my biggest smile.

“I have kind of a big favor,” Celeste asks, biting her lip as she walks over to me. “Is there any chance I can come to your house before the party tonight? You must live nearby if you biked here, right? It's just that I live pretty far outside the city, and I don't really want to go out and back. It could be kind
of fun! We could get ready together and I could give you the lowdown on who will be there . . .”

There are a lot of thoughts running through my head. For example, as one of the most adored girls in school, doesn't Celeste have about a million people she could be hanging out with? I wonder if she's doing the whole “keep your friends close and your enemies closer” thing but wipe the idea from my mind almost instantly. She's just not that girl. Does she actually just want to be my friend? I push all those questions out of my mind, because there's only one that's actually on the tip of my tongue.

“What party?” I ask. Then, “Are you sure I was invited?”

Celeste laughs. “Oliver's thing,” she says. Then she looks nervous. “Wait, aren't you guys friends?”

I close my eyes, letting my head fall back in exhaustion. “Is it Friday already?” I ask.

“I know how you feel,” Celeste says. “But you should go! I'm making Max go, too. And then you could get to know him better, so he can prove he's not as much of a
doof
as you saw this last week.” She raises her eyebrows and laughs.

I force a laugh, too, but something about this statement sends a tiny flame through my limbs. Yes, I am well aware that Max and Celeste are dating. We've been talking about him all afternoon. But the idea of him making a date with her, an actual prearranged time to see her, when I can practically still feel his head resting on top of mine below the Jenga tower,
when the image of his stare in the hallway is still so fresh in my memory, makes me want to throw up, or break something expensive, or both.

Don't freak out, Alice
, I say to myself.
You can do this. Celeste is genuinely cool, and she's asking you to hang out, and you could use some friends. And besides, you deserve some answers.

“I'd love to,” I say, even if it is the last thing I want to do.

“This is better than Newbury Street!” Celeste exclaims for possibly the tenth time, looking around with awe. We're camped out in the middle of Nan's giant walk-in closet, a box of pepperoni pizza on the floor between us. “Your grandmother had impeccable taste.”

My dad wasn't kidding when he said that Nan saved everything. We're surrounded by clothing on three sides. And he wasn't kidding about the color-coding either. It's a ROYGBIV of textiles. The beautiful wool suits she wore in her older age, creams and fine tweeds and moss greens. And pieces she couldn't have possibly worn in years, like silk strapless gowns and mod minidresses and heels she could never have managed after the age of eighty.

Celeste and I were getting ready in my room when she asked if she could borrow something “funky,” and I, too afraid to tell her I don't own anything even remotely interesting, directed our attention here.

“What's so great about Newbury Street?” I ask. I'd been
there a few times since we moved, once to pick up some decent coffee at a French bistro when our grinder broke, and another time to buy a new pair of leather booties.

“It's arguably the best vintage in the city,” Celeste says, getting up and rummaging through a vanity that's built into the wall, with giant lightbulbs rimming the mirror like you'd see backstage at a Broadway theater. “By the way, this light makes your skin look flawless. Okay, what about these?” She whirls around from the mirror, waving her arm with a flourish, a series of chunky art deco bracelets extending up her arm.

“I love it!” I say, and take another bite of pizza. Whoever invented pizza, I'd like to kiss them on the mouth. “Take them.”

“Alice.” Celeste looks scandalized. “I will
borrow
them. I can't take them! Don't be ridiculous.”

I shrug. “It's not like anyone's going to claim them,” I say. “My mom's not around.”

Celeste takes a seat across from me on the floor, tucking her legs underneath her body. “Is it okay to ask why?”

“She's a primatologist,” I explain, just enough to hopefully skirt the issue. “She's studying lemurs in Madagascar.”

But then Celeste asks the dreaded question, the question I hope most people will just let slide. “Well, when will she be back?”

“Um . . . she left ten years ago and hasn't come home yet . . .” I shrug, then glance over at Celeste from the corner of my eye. But she doesn't look uncomfortable at all.

“So your parents are divorced?” Celeste asks.

“Not really . . .” I say. I can't believe I'm telling her all this. These are the kinds of things I only tell Sophie about. “They just sort of never dealt with it. Their marriage. But they definitely aren't together.”

“So you have not seen your mother in ten years.”

I want to be annoyed at this statement, and at Celeste for pushing the issue, but oddly I'm not. There is judgment in her tone, but I can tell it's not at me.

“I mean, I've
seen
her . . .” I stretch my legs out, knocking my feet together like a little kid who's just been asked a tough question. “We Skype once in a while . . . but it's usually too awkward. We do better in writing. I get a letter or postcard from her every couple of months, telling me about her latest adventure and any new exciting findings in her research.”

“And what do you tell
her
?” Celeste asks.

I pick up another slice of pizza. “She never really asks,” I explain. Then I take a huge bite so I don't have to say any more. But Celeste doesn't say anything, either, and I feel a need to fill the silence. “So the point is, the jewelry is up for grabs,” I say, waving my slice toward the vanity, my mouth still a bit full. “I mean, look at me—it's not like
I'm
gonna wear it.” Currently I'm wearing a worn-in chambray shirt, black jeans, white Keds, and zero “funk.”

Celeste gazes at me, resting back on her hands with her head tilted to the side. “Actually,” she says, “you are going to
wear it. And while we're at it, you're going to wear some eyeliner, too.”

I smile and wish I wasn't growing fonder of Celeste by the second.

When Oliver told me he lived a few blocks from my house, I assumed he meant a house just like mine. Old and dusty, with so many stairs a real estate agent could advertise guaranteed glute definition in the listing. I did not assume what he actually meant was the penthouse apartment at the Taj Hotel, with suited doormen, a gracious concierge, and an elevator that moved so smoothly and soundlessly that at first I was afraid we'd gotten stuck.

When Celeste and I arrive, pushing our way through a lushly carpeted, crowded room of our schoolmates, we find Oliver alone on the balcony overlooking the Public Garden, a glass of something dark balanced perfectly in his left hand.

“Yes, that's correct,” he says politely into his phone, as though making a dentist appointment. “I want thirty-six pizzas delivered to the Taj. Half cheese, half pepperoni and onion. Oliver Healey. You have my card on file. And what's your name? Denise? Thank you ever so much, Denise. You're an angel.”

Oliver hangs up the phone and turns around, his eyes lighting up at the sight of us. “Laaaadies!” he says, wrapping an arm around each of our shoulders. “Welcome to the Bat Cave. May I offer you a beverage?”

“It's just that he's so dreamy,” Leilani Mimoun gushes, and I can barely hear her. We—she, Celeste, and I—are wedged into a tiny corner of the kitchen counter as the party continues to grow around us, because apparently the whole world knows about it. “He knows
everything
. And oh my
God
. When he wore that Black Watch shirt and Levis on Tuesday? I thought I would faint.” Leilani fans herself with a stray oven mitt. “I love a man in good denim. I know he's our teacher, but it's not like he's
that
much older, you know?”

“What's Black Watch?” I ask.

“It's a type of plaid,” Celeste explains. “Anyway, I dated a college guy when I was fifteen. Summer camp. It was no big deal.” She takes a swig of beer. Celeste is totally the girl who dated a college guy when she was fifteen and knows so much more about life than any of us ever will.

I open my mouth to say something when Max walks through the doorway to the kitchen, stopping dead when he sees me and his girlfriend shoulder to shoulder in conversation.

“You think I'm super creepy, don't you?” Leilani pesters when I don't respond.

“No!” I assure her. “That's not it at all. I totally get it. Levy is adorable.”

“Hi, babe!” Celeste coos, slinking over to kiss Max on the cheek. “You remember Alice, right? We met on the quad. I guess you know her from psychology, too. Duh.”

And the time we broke into the Louvre and had a picnic with the
Mona Lisa
. And the time we raced a 1960s Porsche through back roads in Italy. And the time we rode pink elephants along the Great Wall of China.

“Hey,” I say, smiling with just my mouth.

“Hey,” Max says back, smiling with even less of his, and I blink. I know things are awkward between us, but why is he being so cold? After all, he's the one who broke
my
heart, and after all that, I'm the one standing here being nice to
his
girlfriend.

And that's when I realize: He's
scared
. When he first saw me in psych class and walked the other way. When he was cold to me on the quad. When he slammed his tray down in the cafeteria. And now, here, when he thinks I'm becoming friends with his girlfriend. Max hates uncertainty, and I make his world less certain.

And he has no idea how to handle it.

“Alice was cool enough to have me over before the party tonight to play a little dress-up,” Celeste says, brandishing her arm candy once more. “Cool, right? Oh my God, Max, you should see this house. And her grandmother's closet. It's like that store I love, Second Time Around, but better!”

“Nice,” Max says, raising his brows as his eyes bounce from Celeste to me, trying to look happy but still looking panicked.

“What'll it be, Wolfe?” Oliver asks.

Max blinks. “Excuse me?” he asks Oliver.

“What do you want to drink?” Oliver replies slowly. “It's not rocket science.”

“Oh,” Max says, swiping a hand through his hair. “I'll just take a Coke. I have a game tomorrow.”

“Bo-ring,” Oliver says. Then he turns to a tall kid with dark brown hair who is leaning against the fridge. “Jonathan, one Coke.” He holds up a single finger, and Jonathan obediently opens it and begins rummaging inside.

“As long as it's not diet,” Max and I say at the same time, before glancing at each other uncomfortably. Max would rather drink acid than drink Diet Coke.

Celeste laughs. “That's so weird! How did you know Max only drinks regular?” she asks.

“I didn't,” I say quickly. “I just want one, too.” I clear my throat. “Um, Jonathan, one more, please?” I call out, and Jonathan tosses two cans from the fridge.

Celeste pulls Max to her and wraps her arms around his waist, leaning her chin on his chest and looking up into his eyes like a baby deer. My stomach starts to churn, and I feel like I'm watching it all in slow motion, like a violent scene in a movie I just want to fast-forward through. I thought I could handle this. I thought I was angry enough at him to show up, maybe stay long enough just to make him feel awful. But Max is smiling down at Celeste, and now he
is
smiling with his eyes.

You've never been good at hiding how you feel
, I hear Sophie
say in the back of my mind.
It shows on your face like turquoise eyeshadow.

The can of Coke is shaking in my hand, and I know I have to get out of here.

In the grand scheme of things, I would say I'd rather be almost anywhere in the world than in an elevator. The definition of claustrophobia has never made much sense to me, because that's like saying it's the space itself that bugs you. Small spaces don't necessarily bug me as long as I have a way to get out of them. I would rather be in a small room with an open roof than in a stadium with the doors locked. I just don't like to be in a spot that I have no control over getting out of. It goes against my natural composition or something. I need to run free.

So I am already preparing myself for a heart-fluttering ride back to the ground floor as the doors to Oliver's elevator slide shut, when a hand reaches in between them. Max gets on, his eyes boring into me, as I resolve to glare straight ahead. The only problem with this plan is that the interior of the elevator is completely mirrored, so when the doors shut, a thousand versions of me just end up looking back at him anyway.

“I offered to make an ice run,” Max says, and then pauses. “Are you okay? I know how you feel about enclosed spaces.”

I ignore him.

“Alice . . .” he starts.

But I interrupt him. “Don't.”

“You don't even know what I was going to say.” Max sighs. “I was going to say, this is hard for me, too.”

“I don't want to hear it,” I reply. “I'm sorry it's hard for you. But have you thought about how it actually feels for me? To watch you with her?”