Who's Your Daddy? (14 page)

At the risk of repeating myself, he is a famous musician! HELLO!!

Besides, I’m sure if Tibby Lee wanted to produce someone’s single, HIS people would call THEIR people and
blah, blah, blah
… lunches would be had, martinis would be downed. I mean, what the heck do I know about how musical deals happen?
Nada
. But my sense was, there wouldn’t be a letter at all.

I narrowed my gaze. Might as well lay down some ground rules before I potentially signed my freedom away. “Do you promise, if I sign this, that you’ll stop your nutso, stalkerish preoccupation with Bobby? I mean, if something comes of it”—
yeah sure
—“then fine. I’ll even say you were right and I was wrong. But until then, you have to promise to let it go and see what fate has in store. AND, you have to start looking at guys our age and within our universe.”

Caressa clapped and bounced in her seat. “Fine, yes, whatever. Just sign it.”

“Promise, Caressa.”

“I promise!”

“Swear on something important!”

“I swear on something important!” She laughed. “Just kidding. I swear on … Sephora.com.”

My brows shot up. Whoa. She really
was
serious if she swore on THAT. I held out my palm and snapped my fingers inward with feigned impatience. “Give me a pen, then. Make it quick.”

“You won’t regret this, Lila.” She fished in her handbag, then handed over a pen. “I promise.”

“Ha. I regret it right now. I don’t have a license or a car fund-matching deal, and I’m wearing man pants, thanks to my last foray into forgeryland, if you’ll recall.” I scribbled down Mr. Thibodoux’s signature, which was firmly implanted in my brain files. “But I’ll do anything to bring you back from the brink of Bobby Slade psychosis. Plus I’m going to deny ever having done this if it comes down to it.”

“That’s okay. I’ll back you up.”

I finished, checked my work—which was perfect as always—then handed the letter over. “There. Now drive me home. I’ve got to get out of this repulsive outfit before I freak out.”

Caressa giggled. She slipped the letter carefully back into the envelope, set it aside, then put her car into drive and pulled away from the curb. As we drove off, she flicked me a mischievous glance. “So. Dylan was looking hot back there.”

God, not again. I rolled my eyes. I SO didn’t want to get into this beating-a-dead-horse conversation. “And I’m sure Jennifer Hamilton cares,” I snarked. “Good thing I don’t.”

I turned toward the window and focused on a little herd of elk—who were getting superfuzzy for the winter—grazing by the road. I had to. If I’d looked directly at Caressa, she’d have seen the lie in my expression.

Okay, okay, I was warm for Dylan’s form.

That DIDN’T mean I planned on doing anything aboutit!!

meryl

There were good aspects and bad aspects to my post-dumb supper life. On the good side: Ismet and I had sort of become friends since the big flat tire/epiphany night. On the bad side: every time I started to think that maybe he liked me, too—in THAT way—he’d do something to remind me, in no uncertain terms, that I was fooling myself. Ismet Hadziahmetovic didn’t have any romantic interest in me whatsoever. When I said we were
friends
, I meant it literally.

Buddies, pals, school friends. It really was depressing.

I mean, I suppose he simply wasn’t attracted to skinny, pale, tragically unhip, blue-eyed redheads with freckles. But I was really, REALLY attracted to him, and I just
wanted it to be reciprocal. Was that too much to ask? I couldn’t help my genetic make up. Redheads need love, too.

Despite the depressing lack of romantic action on the Ismet front, however, I’d still managed to become a frequent guest at the Hadziahmetovics’ house. Not as Ismet’s girlfriend (bad part) but because I’d begun to tutor Shefka in Spanish (a good part, despite the no-Ismet deal). Initially, I’d agreed to the tutoring thinking it would be a foot in the door, literally. But soon I counted Shefka as one of my friends, and our friendship didn’t hinge on her brother at all. The more I visited, the more I came to enjoy hanging around the whole Hadziahmetovic family, especially their little sister, Jenita, who was seven and adorable. Plus, tutoring Shefka was a breeze, and it was keeping my Spanish skills fresh.

Shefka already spoke the Bosnian dialect of Serbo-Croatian, English, and Russian, and she could hold her own in Turkish. If our study sessions were any indication, she would soon be fluent in Spanish as well. To say she had a real knack for foreign languages was a gross understatement. The best part of our budding friendship, though, was the long, interesting conversations
we shared about what it was like living in Sarajevo and how it felt to leave permanently.

After every tutoring session, Shefka and I would sit around and talk about her homeland while little Jenita stood behind me putting sparkly butterfly clips and various ponytail holders in my hair. (She was absolutely enthralled with my stick-straight, bright red locks, and I was happy to let her style it.)

I’d been doing my own studying about Bosnian life, but hearing details from someone who’d actually lived there was invaluable. Shefka explained how there are actually three languages spoken in Bosnia—Bosnian, Serbian, and Croatian—but that most people could get by speaking any of them. We also discussed the ongoing political arguments surrounding the languages: what they should be called and so forth. I was totally intrigued by it all.

I learned that many Bosnians spoke either Russian or Turkish or both, in addition to their native languages. That blew my mind. I was glad my parents had pressed me to learn other languages, because I was happily fluent in Spanish and getting better in German every day. Don’t get me wrong—I don’t think I’m better
than anyone because I speak foreign languages, I’m just glad I do.

The widely accepted American belief that we didn’t need to speak anything except English in the U.S. was embarrassing to me, especially around people from other countries who came here to study. I felt like I needed to explain the American reluctance to learn other languages, and yet I could think of no good reason for it.

Ethnocentricity? Ignorance?

I mean, most of my peers barely spoke proper English, and if they were bilingual, their second language was something like Pig Latin. That was a generalization, of course. We do have quite a few Spanish speakers at WPHS. But, still. They take all kinds of flak for wanting to speak both English and Spanish, which frustrates me. It’s dumb!

But, I digress.

In addition to language stuff, Shefka shared a lot with me about how it was living in a war zone. Snipers Alley, for example, is a street riddled with craters from the shells that rained down on it when Sarajevo was under attack. Shefka told me they paint some of the craters red, always to mark the exact spot where a passing
civilian was struck down. These memorial craters are called “roses.”

It made me sad for her and all the Bosnians, but it also put things into perspective for me. You never think of regular old teenagers like Ismet and Shefka living in war-torn regions, but they do. And little kids like Jenita, too. She probably didn’t remember much, but even so. Sometimes, we Americans don’t have a clue how lucky we are. Myself included. We take everything for granted. Safety, privileges, wealth, food, shelter—even HOPE.

Get this: Apparently the famous eternal flame in Sarajevo wasn’t as eternal as it could’ve been. Sometimes the government had to turn it off because they couldn’t afford to keep it running. They turned OFF an
eternal flame
. I can’t imagine how that made the people feel, especially in the midst of war and instability.

Anyway, I loved talking to Shefka about Bosnia, and I loved the attention little Jenita showed me. I always tried to draw Ismet into our discussions, but he wasn’t nearly as forthcoming about his past. At first I put his reluctance down to guy-versus-girl communication-style differences, but the longer it went on, the less sure I became. Maybe it wasn’t talking about Bosnia that
spurred his aversion, maybe it was talking about Bosnia
to me
. Maybe it was talking to me,
period
.

Depressing thought.

In fact, the whole Ismet deal started to really get me down after a while. I decided I needed a break from the constant rejection, so I made up an excuse about having to write a research paper and told Shefka we’d resume tutoring in two weeks or so. Jenita cried when she heard I’d be away for a while, which was sweet. But I had to do it. I needed time to clear my head and come to terms with the fact that Ismet wasn’t the least bit interested in me. I wanted to be okay just being ME again. I suppose I’d been expecting things to happen with Ismet on my terms, within my time frame, and so on. That was my downfall. I was learning quickly, you just couldn’t force fate. I decided to let go and see if my luck would turn around.

The first few days of avoiding him went well, but then I got the Ismet email that weakened my resolve and made me rethink my evasiveness:

FROM: [email protected]

TO: [email protected]

SUBJECT: Wednesday afternoon

TIME: 4:45:03
P.M.
, MST

Hi Meryl,

How’s the paper going? I know you’re busy but do you want to come over tomorrow after school and check out some old TRLs with me, Shefka, and Jenita? My friend gave them to me. We have not seen you for a while, so we thought it would be fun.

Ismet

I was so thrilled by the invitation to go hiking, I barely noted how strange it was to see Ismet use an abbreviation—TRLs—instead of writing out
trails
. I gave it a brief “huh” kind of thought and then blew it off as a quirk. I quickly wrote back and accepted.

It wasn’t technically a date considering it would be all four of us, but I didn’t mind. Shefka was as much a friend as Ismet, if not more, and we all liked hanging around Jenita, who was the happiest, most optimistic kid I’d ever met. The fact that Ismet had reached out was the important point. It showed me that letting go had
worked. He and I would be spending time together—that’s all that mattered!

I didn’t really understand the part about his friend giving him the trails, but I figured he meant that his friend TOLD HIM about the trails. He did have some idiomatic challenges with English now and then (which was SO adorable).

I didn’t mention the invitation to Lila and Caressa, because I didn’t want to jinx myself. I decided to just believe that things were looking up in the Ismet department, and I went on my happy-go-lucky way. DUH.

In typical Meryl fashion, I had been reading up on Ramadan, which I knew was the ninth month of the Muslim calendar and started on October twenty-seventh this year—in just a few days. I found the custom fascinating and decided I’d ask Shefka and Ismet more about it while we hiked. I mean, they would have to fast for a month! At least whenever the sun was up. During Ramadan, Muslims were only allowed to eat or drink after the sun went down. How did you keep from eating or drinking during daylight for a whole month? I wondered if Jenita had to participate too, and I assumed the answer was yes. It had to be even harder for a kid.

From talking to Shefka, I knew the Hadziahmetovics were very liberal in their Muslim beliefs and practices, but they did celebrate Ramadan. Discussing this most important religious holiday would show them, hopefully, how much I respected their culture and differences. Once Ismet realized that I was truly interested in him and his heritage, he’d eventually come to view me in a more romantic light. That was my theory, at least.

Who wouldn’t want that when they were in a new country?

I mean, a lot of the girls in school still referred to him as That Bosnian Guy, without any respect at all for his individuality. They even made fun of his supersexy accent, which annoyed me.

Social cliques were ridiculous, and the whole “who-is-boyfriend-material” thing struck me as rigid and idiotic. It seemed that most girls my age just wanted generic American guys who fit certain sports and popularity profiles, regardless of whether they were decent people or not. Those girls wouldn’t give Ismet—or anyone different—the time of day.

Which, come to think of it, was WAY better for me.

The last thing I needed was a bunch of competition.

The afternoon of the hike, I hurried home from school and bundled myself up against the weather. I wore my expedition-weight long underwear, fleece, outer shell, ski pants, gaiters, hat, gloves, and my winter hiking boots and YakTrax. Hiking the Rocky Mountains in winter was great fun as long as you were properly dressed for the conditions.

I got to the Hadziahmetovics’ house at about three, and knocked on the door. Ismet answered, and he looked at me in surprise. “Cold?”

I laughed. “No, but I don’t want to freeze on the trails. I’m wearing layers.” On that note, I checked his outfit. Jeans, a short-sleeved T-shirt, no shoes. Huh. And they said girls were bad about being ready on time. All I knew was, he had better get a move on, or we’d run out of daylight.