grl2grl (11 page)

“Thanks. I mean, you too.” This was happening. It was.

“Are you with me?” she said.

“I am.”

We lay together, breathing, connecting. After a minute, I asked the question. “When can we meet?”

Ceylon didn’t answer.

“Did you hear me?”

“Shh.”

“When is your spring break?” I asked. “Mine’s in two weeks.”

She said, “I’d have to look.”

A tingle of excitement under my skin. What if we could really be together?

She added, “But my family always goes to Majorca that week.”

Majorca? Where was that?

“It’s off the coast of Spain.” She read my mind again.

Spain. Wow.

“Where do you go on spring break?”

I clicked my tongue. “Dubuque. It’s a lot like Spain, minus the Spaniards.”

“And the beaches, the paella, the bikini babes.” She laughed.

Bikini babes?

“Just kidding.” Ceylon laughed again. She had a heady laugh. Low and husky. “Even though you’re far away, I feel you in my
heart. I sleep with you; dream with you.”

I wouldn’t mind sleeping with her — minus the sleep.

“Any possibility you can fly out here some weekend?” I asked.

She didn’t answer.

“Or I could come to you.” Yeah, right. That was going to happen. Ceylon owned that fully equipped silver XL convertible and
really did shop in downtown LA. We owned a broken-down ’63 Plymouth and I shopped at Target.

“Do you mind if I ask how old you are?” I said. Not that it mattered. It didn’t matter if I liked older women. Dylan was a
senior. Forget Dylan.

Ceylon said, “Seventeen.”

That’s all? She seemed…

“Let me guess,” Ceylon said. “You’re… fifteen?”

“Sixteen,” I corrected.

“Damn. I’m usually good at guessing. I hope I didn’t insult you.”

“No. Not at all.” What’d she mean “usually“?

“Carol just came in,” Ceylon said. “GG.”

“IM me later,” I blurted as she hung up. To myself, in the dark, I added in a whisper, “I love you.”

Carol was her mother. Ceylon called her mother by her first name. How cool is that?

Black_Venus:
I wrote a poem for you.

Me:
For me or for your beach babes?

Long pause.

Black_Venus:
Don’t be like that. I haven’t given you any reason to be jealous.

My face flared. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want her to leave for a week.

Black_Venus:
Do you want to hear it?

Me:
Yeh, of course. I’m sorry. I love U.

Black_Venus:
Here goes:

Curious mosaic

Continental drift

Parabolic metaphor

Elemental rift

Time and transposition

Conscious intermission

Assertion?

Desertion —

Black_Venus:
That’s all I have so far. You finish it.

Me:
How about “Spanish Inquisition.”

Black_Venus:
I don’t get it.

Neither did I. It rhymed. I didn’t understand one word of that poem.

Black_Venus:
How about, Esteem her/Redeem her. Something something lift.

Me:
Okay. Good.

That really cleared it up — not.

Black_Venus:
Can I ask you a personal question, Hayley?

Me:
Yeh

Black_Venus:
Are you a virgin?

My stomach clenched. Should I tell her the truth?

Black_Venus:
Sorry, didn’t mean to pry. That’s out of line.

Me:
No. No. I’m just wondering how many beach babes I’d be compared with.

She signed off.

I thought I’d die of loneliness while she was in Spain. I researched Majorca on MapQuest and calculated the distance from
Mason City to the coast of Spain. 81,000,000 miles, I think. That might’ve been air miles, or kilometers, or dots on the legend.
I’m not too good with maps. Halfway around the world, anyway. No distance at all if she’d IM. Or call. We spoke before she
left and she assured me I had NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT. I should think about myself, she said. She said she probably wouldn’t
have Internet access in the villa they were renting. She said I should finish the poem. I said, “Send it to me on a postcard.”

All I could think about was how she was lying on the beach in a string bikini attracting babes. Beach babes. I hated Iowa.
I hated being stuck here in Corncob, America, with no money or opportunity or beach babes.

Ceylon would be back Sunday. She said Sunday, I know she did. I’d been ticking off the days on my calendar. Thursday, Friday,
Saturday. Starting at six thirty Sunday morning, I logged on and IM’d her.

No answer. I stowed the phone in my room in case she called. If I had to go to the bathroom, I’d string the cord as far as
it would go. I’d have called her, but she never gave me her number. She wanted to, she said. She had a private number and
all the free minutes she could use because her uncle was CEO of a wireless company. She didn’t say which one.

Then she’d change the subject and I’d never get her number.

By nine a.m., I hadn’t heard from her. Nine a.m. in Iowa is seven a.m. in LA. She might have been catching up on sleep.

Seven, eight, nine. I IM’d her over and over.

Then it was noon LA time, two o’clock Iowa. No response.

When I hadn’t heard from her by seven p.m., I got frantic. I IM’d: R U there? U there? Ceylon. Are. You. There?

Monday morning, a blank screen. My eyes burned from staring at the monitor all night. Dad called up to me, “Hay-ley, school.
Get the lead out.”

I slogged to my door. “I feel sick today. Can I stay home?”

Dad appeared at the bottom of the stairs. He gazed up at me, studying my face. I know I looked like a corpse with my straggled
hair and bloodshot eyes. Dad set his slice of toast on the TV and jogged up the stairs. He felt my forehead. I had to be terminally
ill before he’d let me miss school. “Hang on.” He hustled back downstairs.

I curled on my side on the bed. Dad returned with the thermometer. “Open.” He stuck it under my tongue. We stared at each
other until the thermometer beeped.

He checked it. “Sorry, kid.” Dad patted my shoulder. “Normal.”

Whatever that was.

At school I kept ducking into the media center, logging on to the computers to check my e-mail illegally, to IM her. Maybe
her server was down. That happens, right? Wasn’t MSN the server? MSN worked for me.

At lunch I called home to see if she’d left a message on the machine. There was one call from George Finkel, Dad’s poker buddy,
about a venue change for the game Saturday night. I hung up. My stomach plunged. What if her plane crashed? That happens.
We’d never hear about it in Iowa.

There was a TV in the media center, so I switched it on. Soaps, talk shows, infomercials. It was the middle of the day. You’d
think there’d be news. ABC? CNN? We didn’t have cable at school. Finally, Fox News. Same old thing: weather, war, murder.

I snuck out and raced home. If I got marked truant, so what?

No mail. No postcards from Spain. One spam alert in my e-mail box. All I could think to do was log on to the chat board.

Scar_tissu:
Has anyone heard from Black_Venus?

Sunshine26:
Hi, Scar. How R U? I thought U were gone for good. I hoped U were.

What did that mean? She hoped I was dead?

Bikrchik:
bak so soon? wat u do? fk up again?

Sunshine26:
Tht’s not funny. What happened, Scar? She said you were ready to love.

Who?

Scar_tissu:
Black_Venus? Have U heard from her? Is she back from Spain?

There was a long silence. Then —

Bikrchik:
th rain in spain

Sunshine26:
She said U were saved. U didn’t need us anymore.

Bikrchik:
add 1 to her scorecard

Sunshine26:
That’s not fair. She’s here to help. U know that.

Bikrchik:
our savior

Willowwind:
Hi, I’m new here.

Bikrchik:
hey, sup, willo?

Willowwind:
My gf broke up with me

Bikrchik:
epidemik

Sunshine26:
Be quiet, bikr.

Saving_grace:
Hi, Willowwind. Welcome to the board. What happened with your gf?

Willowwind:
She said she wasn’t really “that way.” She thought she was bi, but after she tried it with me, she decided she wasn’t into
girls.

Bikrchik:
ow. bitch

Sunshine26:
Bikr. God. U R really insensitive sometimes.

Bikrchik:
shut up

Sunshine26:
Grace, make her leave.

Saving_grace:
Could we be more respectful, please? People are hurting. Willowwind, the same thing happened to me. I can’t know how you
feel exactly, but I wanted to die when I lost my gf. Sometimes it helps to talk about it. We’re out here. We’re listening.
TIAD.

W
hen I hit the summit of Red Mountain Pass, I had to pull over to the side of the road and hurl. Never, in all my years of
performing, had I suffered one anxiety attack, one wave of nausea, one skipped or hurried heartbeat. Ever since I’d made my
decision to come to camp, major stomach eruption.

I cleaned myself up, wishing I had a Coke or something to swish out my mouth. My throat was raw. I hiked down to a ledge overlooking
Wild Horse Canyon and gazed across the riverscape. Breathtaking view. I’d forgotten how beautiful it was up here. Remote.
Sweeping. How freeing, exhilarating, to play my music in the mountains. With Annika.

Wherever I played, though, my music transcended time and space. At home in my bedroom, in a stuffy practice room at school,
in a closet, garage, backstage. It wasn’t my music making me sick. It was the thought of losing it.

A long lenticular cloud sluiced across the sky. Was it last year we lay on the river rocks after morning practice conjuring
shapes and stories in the clouds? The ripple of water over stones filled the quiet moments.
Was
it last year? Or the year before? Hard to remember; all the summers jumbled together. Annika had said, “When I’m reincarnated,
I want to return as water.”

I’d laughed.

“What?” She’d angled her head up at me. “You don’t think I’m worthy of water?”

“Of course you’re worthy. You’re a drip.” It must’ve been last year because her hair had grown out and she was wearing it
natural. “I’m just not sure I believe in reincarnation.”

Annika had rolled over and propped herself on an elbow. “Really? Why not?”

“I’m not religious.”

“It’s not about religion.” She’d plucked a blade of grass and nibbled on the tip. “Is it?”

I’d focused on her face. Her skin, so warm and brown.

“I think it is. The afterlife. Belief, faith. I guess I’m more about making my life on Earth count. Not letting it elude me.”

“You mean using your gift.” Annika had nudged me with her foot, and we’d laughed. Our so-called “gifts.” Everyone always referred
to our “God-given talents.” I didn’t believe in such a thing. Sure, we might be born with a natural talent, an enhanced ability
for… something. In our cases,
music. But unless you worked to develop your ability, unless you worked your ass off, all your talent did was trickle downstream
and empty into the vast unknown of human potential.

Wow, that was deep for me. I’d have to tell Annika that one. No, she might tell Bryce.

Up here you could be the next Sarah Chang, the next Yo-Yo Ma — like Bryce thought he was — and still, talent alone wouldn’t
carry you. If you didn’t practice, didn’t reach, didn’t maintain your level of commitment, if you had an overblown sense of
yourself the way Bryce did…

Why was I thinking about him? He made me sick. Annika had mentioned him, again, in her last e-mail. “Bryce got a new teacher.
He sez ‘Fear Me Now.’”