Everything You Want (20 page)

It doesn’t seem like any kind of trick to me, which only makes my head hurt more. Depressing and hilarious: that’s the story of my life. What I don’t understand is why, if you feel that way, you’d want to write it down. It seems to me your energy would be far better spent trying to forget.

Something else I don’t say. Maybe I’m getting smarter, learning how not to be so … my weirdest self
all
the time. Maybe next time I feel attracted to someone, I’ll be able to break him in gently as to who I am. I just wish I’d started to have a clue about some of this stuff before I met Gabe.

“So,” he says, when we get to the dorm.

“Listen. Thanks,” I say. “You know, for—”

He shrugs. “Hey, I wasn’t in the greatest shape myself. It might just as easily have been me who—”

Barfed
, we’re both thinking.

I feel sorry for him. He looks embarrassed for having brought us back to
that
. The truth is, he’s not much better at this dating thing than I am. I’m going to have to be the one to give him the exit he needs now.

“Well,” I say. “It was really great to see you again. But I’d better get some sleep. I’ve got to get up, get back to Indy before noon. I promised my dad—” I wave my hand vaguely in lieu of an actual plan.

“Oh. Sure,” he says. “Okay, then. See you.”

And he’s gone.

Thirty

Please, please, please, please,
please
don’t let Tiff be back yet, I pray, standing in the elevator with a bunch of girls who look as bad as I feel. But when I open the door and she’s not there, it’s as if I tumble backwards in time to last fall and I’m the miserable, lonely person I was then—which seems even worse than being the miserable, lonely person I am now.

At least I’m a rich miserable, lonely person now, I say to myself, still apparently unable
not
to be a comedian.

I don’t even turn on the light, just lie down with my clothes still on and try to sleep. But there’s laughter along the hall outside and the smell of spring drifting through the open window, and I feel so restless. Plus, I realize I’m still wearing Gabe’s sweatshirt. I lift my arm and breathe in what must be the scent of him. I can’t stop thinking about how great it was, the two of us walking along Tenth Street together for that little while, feeling like I could say anything. Was that
real
? Or was he just being nice when he said he had a good time with me?

And so what if he
was
telling the truth about that. Whatever good time we might have had occurred
before
I threw up and passed out and he had hours to sit in the yard on a lawn chair all by himself remembering the other times we were together and what a dork I was
then
.

What time is it in Paris, I wonder? What’s Mom doing? If I were to tell her about what happened tonight and how I feel about Gabe Parker, what would she say?

It seems to me at this moment that there’s not a single person in the world, not even Mom, who’d be able to understand how I feel—about anything. When Tiff finally comes in, near three o’clock, I pretend I’m sleeping.

“Emma?” she whispers. “Emma?”

I give a little moan. “Mmmm?”

“How was it? Did you have a good time with Gabe?” She giggles. “God, are you as tanked as I am?

“You are,” she says when I moan again. “Okay, I’m wasted too. See you in the morning.”

But there’s no way I can face talking to her about my date with Gabe. I’m not mad at her for telling me it wasn’t his idea. I know how she is. She wanted it to be his idea, so she twisted her mind around somehow and actually thinks it
was.
I’m just embarrassed—about everything. I don’t want to talk about Gabe. Or Josh and Amy. I just want to go home, find a good book and exit to a whole other universe for a while.

I can’t go till the sangria’s totally worn off. But I know Tiff. She sleeps like the dead; she’ll be out cold till at least noon. So I let myself drift off to sleep, knowing the sun will wake me. When it does, around seven, I get out of bed and scribble a note on the back of a concert flyer on her desk.
Tiff, Didn’t want to wake you up. But I need to be home before noon, so I’m heading out. Thanks for everything. I’ll call you! Love, Emma.

I leave it on her bedside table, and consider leaving Gabe’s sweatshirt for her to give back to him, but I don’t. I turn it inside out, though: my little secret. Halfway home, I stop at a Bob Evan’s for breakfast, where I sit in a booth for nearly two hours reading a bunch of outdated
People
magazines that have collected in my Jeep, passing the time so I don’t get home too early.

When I pull into the driveway, Dad’s waxing Gramps’ Harley, and the sight of it sends me to a whole new low. I love that turquoise bike as much as Gramps did, even though it’s the absolute tackiest thing you’d ever want to see, all got up in silver and fringe.

“Emma!” Dad calls, and throws the wax rag in my direction. It lands just short of Harp’s nose, and he opens his eyes, gazes at it suspiciously. Then he picks it up in his teeth and trots over to me, his tail wagging wildly, and drops it at my feet like a gift.

“Good boy,” I say, ruffling his warm fur.

“Good boy, hell,” Dad says. “He ate a whole box of chocolate donuts yesterday and then threw them up all over the living room carpet. That little shit! Knocked them right off the kitchen table. He’s got spirit, I’ll say that. Did you have a good time in Bloomington?”

I shrug, which he takes for an affirmative.

I walk over to examine the newly waxed bike and I can see myself, all wavery, in the gleaming turquoise tank. The chrome sparkles. The silver fittings on the saddlebags wink in the sun. Dad steps closer to the bike, then back, squinting like Michelangelo assessing the Sistine Chapel. He picks up the rag and rubs here and there.

“Can I sit on it?” I ask.

“Sure,” he says.

I throw my leg over the tank and get on, remembering how Gramps used to lift me up and put me on the seat when I was little. How I’d sit there, Emma Hammond, girl biker, for as long as he’d let me. Today Dad saddle-soaped the leather seat and it feels soft and warm against my bare legs. The very weight of the bike beneath me is exciting. I lean over and put my hands on the handlebars, just like I used to do then.

Dad smiles at me. “Do you remember asking Dutch if you could have his motorcycle when he died? You were maybe eight.”

I remember, all right. Mom’s horrified reaction to my request was my first real clue about what dying actually meant. She hustled me off into the kitchen and, kneeling so we were face-to-face, holding me tightly by the arms, she told me never,
ever
to ask such a question again. It was a terrible thing to talk about someone dying as if all it meant was a bunch of things going up for grabs as a result. It became one of those embarrassing family jokes afterwards. Jules would say, “Can I have your new skis when you die?” Or your Lenny Kravitz CD, or whatever.

Gramps and Dad thought it was funny, though. “I was kind of surprised he didn’t leave it to you in the will,” Dad says now. “Though he probably just assumed I’d remember and give it to you when the time came.”

“Wait a minute,” I say. “What are you saying?”

“You want it?” He nods toward the bike.

Yes, I want it! But the words stick in my throat. I can almost feel Mom beside me, hear her voice saying,
What in the world are you thinking about
? She’ll be furious with Dad if he gives me the Harley, making things even worse between them.

“I don’t know,” I say. “Mom—”

He shrugs. “Your mom’s not here, is she?”

That hangs between us for a few seconds. Then he says, “I wrote her a letter, told her what I had in mind. I told her I’d make you dress right: boots and leather jacket, all that. You’d have to wear a helmet. And you’d have to let me give you some lessons before you take the riding test for your license, too.

“I’ve been thinking of taking that trip west that Dutch and I always used to dream about,” he goes on. “Thinking maybe you might want to go with me. We could spend a couple of days riding around here, so you can get used to the bike. Then head out. Margaret will keep Harp for you; I already asked her. What do you say?”

I look at the bike, think of how Gramps would never, ever roar up the driveway on it again. That, somehow, gets all mixed up with Gabe being so nice about what an ass I made of myself last night, and I feel paralyzed with sadness.

“Emma?” Dad says.

“Yeah, I want to go,” I say, blinking back tears. “I just—”

“I know,” he says. “I wish Dutch could go, too. But we’ll have a good time. And he’d like it that we were going together. You know that.”

“Yeah,” I say. It’s true. But I don’t want to go on the trip because I think Dad and I will have a good time, or because I think it would please Gramps to know I was his substitute. Gramps is dead, way beyond pleasure or disappointment. I want to go west with Dad because going will put a half a continent between me and Gabe Parker’s humiliating kindness. But then, I figure, Dad’s motives aren’t totally pure either. Yeah, he wants us to have a good time together. But he also won’t be sorry about putting half a continent between himself and home, where every single thing reminds him of Mom.

“Can
I
have it when
you
die?” That’s the first thing Jules says when I call to tell her about our plans. “Let’s see,” she goes on when she’s finished laughing hysterically. “That ought to be …
when
did you say Dad wrote Mom that letter?”

“Very funny,” I say.

“Mom
is
going to be pissed.”

“She is not,” I say, feeling five.

“Is too.” Jules laughs again. “Well, anyway, becoming a biker chick ought to cancel out whatever points you got on account of saving that stupid goose. Speaking of which—”

“What?”

“The
money
,” she says, like I’m a dunce. “You know something, Emma? The other day I finally just sat Will down and said, ‘What’s the matter with us, anyway?’ And we ended up talking about everything. He was totally paranoid about the money. He was, like, ‘All my parents ever cared about was money, and I don’t want to end up like them.’

“God. And there I was, constantly trying to foist it off on him. ‘Let me invest in the gym,’ I’d say. ‘Let me pay for dinner.’ I couldn’t figure out why he’d get so upset every time I bought him a present. It hurt my feelings, you know? And I still don’t exactly understand why he’s so freaked out about it. I mean, we don’t have to be like his parents just because we have a lot of money. We can be any way we want—

“Anyhow, we decided what I could do for him is work at the gym,” she goes on. “That way, he and his partner can get by not hiring another person for a while. He feels comfortable with that. And I like it there, you know? We can schedule ourselves to work a lot of the same hours. Plus it’s like dance, in a way—only it’s about being strong and healthy instead of being strong and thin. Not that I mean to stop dancing,” she says. “For myself, anyway. I still have some thinking to do about that.”

I’m glad for her. She’s doing what people are supposed to do when they grow up: figuring things out, slowly making her own life. But that life seems so far away from what our life together used to be.

As for me, I feel like I’m in limbo: the past irretrievable, the future frightening, unknown.

I call Tiff, like I said I would, but she seems distant. We don’t mention the beach party. She doesn’t try to convince me how Gabe actually really likes me, but is shy. In fact, she doesn’t mention Gabe at all. She talks about how finals are coming up soon. I tell her about the trip I’m taking with my dad.

She’s tired of trying to prop me up, I suppose. Who can blame her? But I miss the Tiffany who drove me crazy most of the time. I feel sad when we hang up, like I’ve lost something that, till now, I didn’t quite realize I had.

Dad gives me my first lesson on the Harley on Monday morning, and, over the next few days, riding is the only thing that makes me feel okay. We set out early, take the old winding highways down through southern Indiana, spring bursting all around us. I love the sound of Gramps’ bike, low and throaty, and the way, when we pull up for a late breakfast at some small-town diner, the old guys sitting there get a kick out of the fact I’m a girl. I wear Gabe’s sweatshirt under my leather jacket, and I like thinking that even though he’s probably lost to me, too, some part of him is with me, seeing me in a way I’d like him to see me: adventurous, real.

Back home at night, Harp curled up in bed beside me, I think about Mom. Nearly a week’s passed since Dad sent the letter, and every time the phone rings, I’m certain it’s her. Surely she’ll call and let us know that what we’re doing is okay—won’t she? If she thinks it
is
okay. I half-want her to call and say, no way you can have the bike. It’s too dangerous, whatever. Anything to make me believe that she means to come home eventually and shape Dad and me up, after all.

Sometimes I go sit in her studio, add seven hours to whatever time it is, and think about where she might be. Having coffee and croissants in a café; in the Gare d’Orsay, breathing in some painting she loves; sitting on the steps of Sacré-Coeur at midnight, all of Paris laid out at her feet. Two letters come that she wrote before she would have heard from Dad. She’d met up with an English woman on a side-trip to Provence, and they’d gone to Cézanne’s studio together. Later, she’d gone alone to the little village, St. Mammes, where Sisley had painted. There were no tourists there, and she had wandered through the town marveling at the way the paintings in her guidebook appeared before her in a sequence of little scenes.

She calls, finally, the day before we leave. I’m just back from taking Harp to Margaret’s house, already missing him, thinking of the way he sat at my feet, tilted his head, and looked at me with those liquid eyes all the while I was talking to Margaret. He knew something was up. I felt so guilty I considered telling Margaret I’d changed my mind, I wasn’t taking the trip with Dad after all, but I knew she’d never stand for it. I’m in a blue funk by the time I walk in the door and hear the phone ringing.

“Emma?”

“Mom, hi,” I say, but there’s that funny little glitch you get sometimes on overseas calls, so I guess she doesn’t hear me.

“Emma?”

I wait a second, then say, “Yeah, it’s me—”

“Everything’s okay?”

“Yeah.”