Splendor (21 page)

Then the tears came. I sniffed and sobbed and spilled out the story to Martin, telling him much more than I intended to share. I told him about watching Will beat the holy hell out of the man in the alley; I told him about the song that played at the ice rink, and the dream it recalled; I told him about how my most recent dream had seemed to herald tonight’s terrible string of events. I even told him about Gunner, and my father and Alice, and how pretty my mom had looked at the station, all dressed up.

And Martin listened. Honestly, he was probably the best listener I had ever met in my entire life. He listened and refreshed my tea and spooned sugar into my cup. At last I had emptied myself of all the weight of my worries, the burden of my secrets. And my tears were spent, too. In my hands I held my cup of tea, my head bent over it as if in prayer.

Martin said nothing for a good while after I’d finished speaking. There was no way Will was still in the shower, after all this time. Most likely he was giving me some space, which I appreciated. Really, I wasn’t ready to see him. Not right now.

Finally, Martin spoke. “Scarlett, I have known from the first that you are a remarkable young woman.”

“I don’t see what’s so remarkable,” I said. “I’m angry at my parents and ridiculously emotional and confused about just about everything.”

“And do you think your visions are run-of-the-mill as well?”

He had me there. “Probably not,” I said. “But it’s not like I can control them.”

“No. Not yet.”

“Wait. You think I could
learn
to control them?”

“Most probably yes. If you would like to.”

I considered. “I don’t even know what they mean.”

“I think
I
might,” said Martin. “What you’ve told me lends credence to a theory I’ve had for some time.”

“A theory?”

He nodded. “Would you like to hear it?”

“Of course!”

“In all your reading, Scarlett, the research you have undertaken in your Kabbalah studies, have you come across the term
yehidah
?”

I shook my head.

“Kabbalah teaches that there is more than one dimension to the human soul. In fact, there are five. Each of these five soul levels allows us to interact in a different way with the world around us. Some of the dimensions of our soul are grounded in the physical; others relate intimately to less tangible aspects of our world. And I think that each of us has developed these different soul dimensions to various degrees. What you or I might call the
highest
level of the soul—that which is most closely connected to the divine—is
yehidah
.”

“Okay,” I said. “So where do I come in?”

“
Yehidah
is a part of us that most people never tap into. Have you ever heard the old saying that we only use ten percent of our brain?”

I nodded.

“Maybe a Kabbalistic equivalent of that belief would be to say that we all have
yehidah,
but very few of us can access it.”

“I’m confused. What is
it,
exactly?”

“
Yehidah
is that which unifies. That which connects us to each other, to the God within us all. Maybe when you have one of your dreams, you are connecting that which is God in you to that which is God in Will.”

I didn’t know what to say to this.

“Incidentally,” Martin said, smiling now, “many call y
ehidah
the ‘world of will.’ ”

My head was spinning. Here was Martin handing me a far-fetched explanation that used terms like “God in you” and “soul dimensions” to explain my impossible dreams. And he was talking about it as calmly as whether or not it might rain tomorrow. “How can you be so mellow right now?” I said. “I mean, after what happened tonight with Will?”

Martin sighed, and his expression changed, growing weary. “I have many teachers, Scarlett, many scholars and philosophers whose advice I turn to when I feel lost. One of them once said, ‘The saddest thing in life and the hardest to live through is the knowledge that there is someone you love very much whom you cannot save from suffering.’ ”

I considered his words. “It’s not fair, is it?”

“No, it is not. Not at all.”

“Who said that, by the way?” I was thinking he’d answer with the name of some professor or rabbi.

“Agatha Christie,” he said. “Something of an anti-Semite, but she can write a hell of a good mystery.”

I laughed. Martin did, too. It felt good to laugh for a moment, after everything that had happened. Then I asked him, “Martin, if it’s true—about my soul—why would
I
be tapping into the
yehidah
part of it? Why me?”

“Ah, yes. The age-old question. Perhaps, though, Scarlett, the question should not be ‘why you?’ but rather ‘why not the rest of us?’ We all have
yehidah,
but so few of us can access it. Think of it this way: each of us has the door within us that leads to that place. But few of us possess the key that can open it. You have the key, Scarlett, whether it was something born to you or something you have developed, we cannot truly know. Only that you have it. There is something brilliant in that truth, Scarlett. Something full of splendor.”

My cup was empty. I was so tired. Will had not come back downstairs; I was beginning to doubt whether he planned to. Finally I stood. “Well, Martin, thank you.”

“What for?”

“For the tea. For listening. For being great.”

“Ah, yes. My specialties, all three. I have one more specialty—giving unsolicited advice. Might you take some?”

I shrugged. “Why not?”

Though his tone had just been light, he grew more serious before he spoke. He stood too, as if to indicate the importance of what he was about to say. “It can be tempting, Scarlett, to lose yourself in the search for truth, the search for beauty. Actually, one can become lost in the search for anything at all, no matter how significant or insignificant. But remember—to get lost is a choice. To lose yourself is a choice. We all make choices. And those choices lead to consequences.”

Martin was speaking to me, but I got the feeling that he was thinking of Will as well. And then he said, “The older I get, the more I find importance in balance. Lean too far in one direction, there is no balance. Lean too far in the opposite direction, and balance is lost as well. Try to remember, Scarlett, that too much of anything—even something
good
—results in instability. And without balance, all is lost.”

But I think by this point I was too tired to fully hear what he was saying. Suddenly I needed to lie down, to pull a blanket up over my shoulders and shut my eyes. So I said, “Okay, Martin, thanks for the advice,” and I set my cup in the sink, and I walked to my little room, weary to the bone. Too tired even to change, I stripped off my jeans and crawled into bed.

And then I slept, undisturbed by dreams, unvisited by Will.

I
had one day of peaceful solitude on the island. Dad was working in the garden, raking up the last of the late-falling leaves, and Lily was still making her way home from Australia. She’d sent me a text (
Australian boys are rad
), and we’d made plans to hang out at her place as soon as she landed.

I spent the day hand-walking Delilah on the trail. She seemed to enjoy the company. We stuck to the flat, easy trails just around the stable. Alice was in her office, but other than poking her head out the door to wave at me, she kept to herself. Maybe she could feel my vibe—not social—or maybe she had an idea that I knew what was going on between her and Dad. Or maybe she just didn’t feel like talking, either. Whatever.

Just seeing her face, the smooth winglike waves of her hair, her neatly rolled sleeves, made my insides roil. She had a husband! She had sons! Not to mention my mom, who was her close friend—sure, Mom had left Dad, but even still.…

Looking back, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised to find out that Alice wasn’t entirely who I’d thought she was. What was it she had said, the day of the Undersea Ball last year?

“I love Howard,” she’d said. “But there’s something about the first date…if it’s with the right guy, it can be magic.”

Was it magic she felt in the arms of my father? Did
he
feel the magic, too?

And
could
it be magical—this thing they were doing, this illicit affair? How could it be, when it stood to ruin Alice’s marriage, to disappoint and hurt her children?

Can one person’s magic be another’s horror show?

Apparently.

And of course this brought me back to Will, in the alley, smiting that little girl’s assailant. The look on his face, in his eyes…I couldn’t get it out of my mind. He’d been vengeance personified.

No matter what the circumstances, no matter how much the guy deserved it, there was something
wrong
about Will enjoying it so much.

By now Will was back at college. Maybe he would go out again, tonight. Maybe he would look for someone who deserved to be punished. Maybe tonight would be the night when Will would cross the line I felt so certain he should never cross.

Would I feel it, if he did? Would I know in my heart, through our connection, that Will had made a choice like that? If he chose to end a life?

Was there no one I could count on to remain the same? It didn’t seem like it. Mom, Dad, Alice, Will, Lily…all of them seemed to be changing, slipping away from me. Only Ronny remained the same—consistently, persistently dead.

Delilah was certainly changing. Just in the couple of days I’d been away from the island, she seemed to have grown. I wondered glumly if she would transfer all her affection to her foal when it was born, if she’d even nicker anymore when she saw me coming.

“Enough!” I said, sick to death of my own petulance. Delilah snorted into the grass she was chewing, as if agreeing with me.

When I left the stable, I honked two sharp blasts instead of saying goodbye, not even looking to see if Alice responded.

Lily got home on Friday, late; school would start back up on Monday. That Saturday night, some of the guys had decided to have a bonfire. I didn’t really feel like going, but there was no way Lily was missing a party, and moping around my place all alone didn’t sound like a lot of fun.

It was just past noon when Lily texted me.
Come over! Bring chocolate.

Luckily I’d spent the morning making brownies. Normally I’d leave a few for my dad, but I guess my passive-aggressive dark side kicked in, because I packed them all to take with me. The twins, I knew, could scarf down three each, minimum.

Laura answered the door. She smiled and hugged me. “Boy, will Lily be glad to see you,” she said. “Come on in.”

Lily was taking a shower, so I followed Laura to the kitchen. The house was strangely quiet. Jet lag, I figured, just one of the many drawbacks of being globe-trotting millionaires. Jack was sacked out on the couch in front of a football game, his head back and his mouth open. The twins curled on the oversized beanbags; it looked like they’d been in the middle of some building project when they’d passed out. A half-completed structure sat between them, and Henry still clutched a little plastic block in his sweaty palm.

Laura unwrapped my brownies and bit into one. “Mmm, still warm.”

“So how was Australia?”

“Hot. Dry. Beautiful. Want to see the pictures?” She tossed me her phone and I scrolled through about a hundred snapshots: the twins snorkeling; the twins kayaking; the twins sharing a gigantic platter of shrimp; the twins grinning hugely, flanking a kangaroo…in boxing gloves.

“Look at that!” I said. “They boys got their wish.”

“I know. Isn’t it great?” Laura had that particular look of satisfaction she wore when her children got their way.

“Not a lot of pictures of Lily,” I noted.

Laura’s expression went flat. “No,” she said. “Lily wasn’t feeling very photogenic, I guess.”

I have to admit, I felt bad for Laura. It seemed like all her everything was wound up in making sure things went just right for her kids. She and Jack were probably the most devoted parents I’d ever known; everything for them was about
family.

Why couldn’t Lily just enjoy what she had? Would it be that hard to pose for a few family pictures while on vacation in
Australia
?

“Scarlett,” said Laura, “maybe you can fill me in. Do you have any idea what’s going on with Lily? Do you think it has anything to do with this new boy she’s been seeing?” Her face wrinkled up. “I never thought the day would come when I’d have to ask anyone else what was going on with my own daughter.”

I squirmed a little. I loved Laura, and I wanted to help her out, but my first loyalty, whether or not she irritated me, was to Lily. Besides, I didn’t have any special insight into her inner workings. Lily was Lily.

“I guess it’s pretty normal, right?” I said. “Teenage rebellion?”

“For
other
people’s kids, maybe. Not
mine.
Honestly, what on earth could Lily feel the need to rebel
against
?” Laura spread her arms wide, indicating their beautiful kitchen, the homey stack of books and games on the table, and even, I thought, herself.

“I don’t know, Laura. Maybe it’s just a phase.”

She sighed. “A phase. I’m sure you’re right.” Then she brightened a little. “Well, in any case, it can’t last too much longer. None of Lily’s phases do. Remember when she decided in the seventh grade to be a vegan? That lasted only about three hours.” She put a half-dozen brownies on a pink plate and handed it to me.

“Sure, Laura,” I said. But as I headed up the wide blue staircase to Lily’s room, it occurred to me that maybe Laura should try to stop thinking of her daughter as the preteen she used to be. That was bound to lead only to disappointment.

“You are an
angel,
” Lily moaned as I entered her room with the plate of brownies. Droplets of water clung to the ends of her curls and dripped onto her bare shoulders. She was wrapped in a cloud-soft white towel. From her attached bathroom, steam seeped slowly into the room.

“Welcome home.” I held out the plate and Lily chose a brownie.

“Divine,”
she said. She took a bite and walked over to her dresser. Setting the brownie on top of it, she pulled open a few drawers and assembled an outfit: underwear and a bra, a black turtleneck sweater, a pair of charcoal jeans.

“
That’s
what you’re wearing?” The outfit she’d chosen was perfect for a bonfire, and it wasn’t all that different from my own jeans-and-sweater ensemble (though I couldn’t stand turtlenecks). But it was just so…sensible.

“You think I’ll be warm enough?”

“Uh-huh. But will you be
fashionable
enough?”

“I look great in sweaters, Scar. You know that. And besides, Gunner texted especially to remind me to dress warm. Isn’t that sweet, how he looks out for me?”

“Mm-hmm,” was all I said. I watched her shimmy into the jeans and smiled a little as she fastened a silver chain around her hips, almost like it would have pained her to forgo a little something fun.

“Shut up,” Lily laughed, catching my smile in the mirror above her dresser. She spritzed some stuff in her hair and leaned her head to the side, lightly tousling her curls. Then she retrieved her brownie and took another bite. “So,” she said, “spill it.”

I knew she wanted to hear all about my time with Will. But I didn’t know what to say. I could tell her about how we’d lain together in my bed, how he’d kissed my breasts, flicked his tongue into my belly button, how I’d worked up the nerve at last to stretch my hand down between his thighs, how the sound he’d made at my touch did as much to turn me on as any of his kisses.

Or I could tell her how we’d roamed the island together, sometimes sitting quietly, facing toward the mainland, and other days from other vantage points looking out at the open sea, the only boundary the straight line of the horizon, far away.

I could tell her about the look in Will’s eyes as he implored me to leave him alone in the alley, the look of desperation as he realized the sirens were drawing closer.

I could tell her how we said goodbye—awkwardly, Sabine and her family trying to look away to give us some privacy, David behind the wheel of the car waiting to take Will and Martin to the airport.

I could tell her that four days had passed since we had spoken. That I knew Will was waiting for me to call him. That I didn’t know what to say.

“I think Will and I might break up.”

“What?” Lily’s dark eyes were huge. “What happened?”

I shrugged, miserable. “I don’t know. Maybe things are just different, you know, after someone goes away to college.”

“Is there another girl?”

I remembered the girl who went to school “in Cambridge.” “No,” I said. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

I sat on Lily’s bed. She shook her head, thinking for a minute, and then she sank down next to me. “Here,” she said, holding out what was left of her brownie. “Have mine.”

There was a plate of half a dozen brownies resting on her desk where I’d set it. And Lily was offering me this one—half-eaten, the depressions of her front teeth carved clearly into its side.

That was why I loved Lily. That was why she was my best friend. Because she would always, always give me half her brownie.

I took the brownie. I bit into it. There was still a hint of warmth, just enough that the little chocolate chips burst open as I bit down. It was the sweetest thing, maybe, that I had ever tasted.

“Hey, Scar,” said Lily.

“What?”

“Let’s have fun tonight.”

The party was at the same hidden cove that Lily and I had gone to last year, the day we’d ditched school. The only way to access it was down a cliff, hard enough to manage in daylight but far more difficult on a moonless night like this one. Lily and I managed it fairly well; she scraped her hand on a rock and swore viciously, but other than that we arrived on the sand unscathed.

Down the beach a ways, the bonfire was already glowing, its orange and red flames a welcome beacon.

“Imagine having to carry firewood down that cliff,” Lily said, sucking on her hand where she’d scraped it. “I am so glad I’m not a guy.”

“Why? Because you don’t like carrying things?”

“Sure. Among other things. Come on.”

As we got closer to the fire, the silhouettes of my classmates began to come into focus. But even before the forms grew faces, I could tell who the main players were, just from the way they held their bodies.

There was Kaitlyn Meyers, perched predictably on a boy’s lap—was it Josh Riddell’s?—her legs crossed, her head thrown back in laughter. Andy was nowhere to be seen.

There was Connell, brutish, broad, stacking logs near the fire.

And Gunner. True to form, he stood apart from the rest of the people, who were all huddled pretty close to the fire—it
was
January, after all. But maybe he was kept warm by the tiny glow of the cigarette drooping from his mouth.

He turned toward us as we walked up the beach, though our feet were silent against the sand. Like he could sense us coming, or smell us.