Between Us and the Moon (18 page)

“It’s easy for you,” I say, dropping my gaze from the world above.

“What is?”

I cross my arms over my chest. Andrew’s frown is gone and instead, there’s interest in his eyes. This is the Andrew I know.

“Being you,” I say. “Being who you are. You know what you want to be. I don’t mean for a job, but on the inside. You know
who
you are. I don’t. I see pieces of myself now and then.”

“I find that hard to—”

“Believe it,” I interrupt. “I know who to be when I track comets. When I talk about science. I guess . . .” I have to stop and gather my breath. My cheeks warm and I bring my fingertips
to my face. I didn’t think I would be so emotional. Not about Andrew being hurt, that makes sense, but because I am confessing something so deeply true and I’ve never said it out loud before. Maybe I didn’t really know how to say it before today.

Scarlett, Tucker, and Dad were right about me.

“I just assume no one likes me,” I say but can’t bring myself to meet Andrew’s eyes. “I just automatically assume it. It’s easier than putting myself in a situation where someone . . .”

“Could reject you?”

“Bingo.”

“Who are those girls? Who cares what they think?” Andrew says. He sounds like Scarlett.

Andrew reaches out for my hand and the warmth and tender grip of his skin nearly makes my knees buckle I’m so relieved.

“They’re really nice, actually. Those girls? That was
all
me. They were coupled up and I felt stupid.”

“You never did that with me, did you? Show off because you were nervous?”

I make another split-second decision. I tell another lie, simply adding and adding to the countless number I have told.

“No,” I say. “I’ve never pretended to be someone else with you.”

A wave of nausea flows over me. These words are sour so I have to couple it with something true.

“You always remind me how much I matter. The me on the inside. The one I’m piecing together,” I say.

Andrew turns me toward him and bends his knees so our eyes meet.

“Can I just add that I have never felt so stupid in my entire life?” I say.

Andrew doesn’t let go of my hand. He gestures to the sand and we sit down just as the first firework explodes in the sky. The blast vibrates deep in the center of my belly. The tiny glittering arcs fall slowly back to the Earth.

“I told you this already,” he says with a shake of his head. “You are so different than anyone I’ve ever met.”

“My strangeness is interesting. Great.”

The second firework explodes above his head in a red burst and now tiny glitters of crimson lights rain down from the sky.

“Anyone who goes to a library to research my tattoo is a girl I want around.”

I gasp. “What? I . . .”

“Curtis told me.” Andrew is smiling now.

I bring my palm to my forehead with a smack. Andrew’s laugh echoes in the street and the fireworks
pop, pop, pop
in a silver and gold finale and the whole beach lights up.

“I wanted to be able to talk to you about it,” I say and rub at my forehead. “About something other than science.”

A succession of gold and yellow fireworks explode above our heads.

Andrew reaches his arms around my waist. I let him. It’s familiar here with his warm hands around my body.

“I’m really sorry,” I say.

He nuzzles his mouth into the nape of my neck. I turn to face him completely and we kiss so deeply that I wonder why people don’t kiss like this every chance they get. Andrew lays
me down on the sand next to him.

“Andrew,” I whisper, and he pulls away. He looks in my eyes and brings his palm to my cheek. “I can’t catch my breath.”

Andrew’s warm breath tickles my ear. “Let’s swim to the moon, uh-huh,” he sings, but it’s soft. “Let’s climb through the tide . . .”

I giggle. “Okay so now that the secret’s out, why that tattoo?”

“Mike loved Morrison’s poetry,” he replies, and he twists his arm so the tattoo faces me. “It just stuck with me once I started reading it.”

“Swimming to the moon is scientifically impossible.”

“But isn’t that what makes life great? Something unexpected?” Andrew asks.

I search for an answer in his eyes.

“I don’t know,” I reply, and it’s the truth. “Everything in my life has been perfectly planned. Meticulously organized.”
Until you
, I want to say but don’t. “You know Jim Morrison has been dead since 1971. That’s over forty years,” I say.

“Yep,” he says and squeezes me. “He’d be in his seventies by now. Maybe I love their music so much because I can never see Jim live or read new poems. That’s what makes someone so untouchable, you know? When you know you can’t really have them.”

I squeeze Andrew because I know he’s talking about Mike, too.

It just comes through me; I don’t even know why I say it. Maybe I say it because it’s true and right now saying anything true roots me to the ground.

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” I say. “All the time.”

He kisses me again and we only pull apart when a group of women laugh up near the stairs. Their voices echo over the beach.

I feel alone with Andrew even though there are people around. We decide not to bother with the bonfire party tonight with all of his friends. Who needs a beer keg and a drum circle when there’s Andrew and me under the stars?

As the last of the Technicolor sparks rain back to Earth, we spend hours on the beach. I don’t even know what time it is when the beach starts to empty out. All I know, all I
need
to know is this: Andrew, the constellations, and me.

“BEAN!” MOM SAYS THE NEXT MORNING AND OPENS
the door my bedroom. “Phone!”

I’m still in bed with one eye squinted open at my cell phone; I missed a text from Claudia at 11 p.m.

CLAUDIA: Details on that guy? Beach soon?

She doesn’t seem weirded out by last night’s fiasco. I am about to text her back when Mom calls me again, “Beanie! It’s Gran!”

Gran! Thank God! I’m out of bed, down the stairs, and when I hit the bottom all the glass chandeliers shake. Nancy’s face scrunches when she looks up from flipping through an address book. On the table in front of her are RSVP cards. I bring the phone outside to the patio and shut the door behind me. I sit
down on my favorite Adirondack farthest from the door.

“Finally! Someone with some sanity!” I cry.

“Break on through to the other side!” she sings through the phone.

And on cue, the truth serum is in effect.

“Gran. I think,” I whisper, “I think I’m in love.”

“It’s a little too late, dear. Jim Morrison is dead,” she whispers back.

“Har. Har. No, with a boy. He loves The Doors.” I’m back to speaking at a normal decibel.

“And I just thought you missed your granny.”

Nancy opens the patio door; I am sure she’s trying to eavesdrop, but I don’t think she can when I’m all the way down here. Even though she’s Gran’s sister, she doesn’t understand our relationship.

“And now you do too?” Gran asks. “Love The Doors?”

“It’s more than that. I want to talk to this guy, connect with him, you know what I mean?”

“Sure do.”

Gran talks to me about the ’60s, the Vietnam War, and space travel. She tells me about The Doors and other bands she liked during that time. I tell her all about the Comet Jolie. I don’t tell her about Andrew and me on the beach. But I do ask this.

“Do you think . . .”

I have no one to ask. And let’s face it, what we did on the beach has been on my mind since it happened and I want it to happen again. But I’m not sure what you’re supposed to do or when you do it or how you ask for it again.

“Do you think . . . ,” I try again.

“This is a sex question isn’t it?” Gran asks. I open my mouth but nothing comes out. “You took too long to respond, dear,” she says. I can imagine her at her house in San Diego, overlooking the water. “I guess we have come to that magical age. Spit it out,” she says, and I wish I was there sitting with her and Gracie.

“Well, are you supposed to
want
to touch a boy? I mean, when you love him?”

“Hell, honey, you can want to touch him even if you think he’s a complete ass!”

I laugh at this. It echoes out to the trees and bay in the distance. I haven’t laughed in this house in a long time.

I take a breath of salty air to ask something else but can’t find the courage to admit I would lie to someone about my age. I want Gran to tell me it’s natural, that people lie all the time. I want her to invent some way that I can be with Andrew and continue to let him think I am going to MIT in the fall. I never thought the lie with Andrew would go this far. I never thought he would want to be with me.

“Have you ever—” I start.

“Oh, just ask,” Gran says, laughter still on the edge of her tone.

“Have you ever told a lie?”

“Depends,” she says. “What kind of lie?”

“One you couldn’t get out of without admitting that you’ve lied?”

She’s quiet. She and Gracie are probably sharing some kind of “knowing look” and Gracie has sat down from whatever task
she is doing to hear the whole thing recounted when Gran gets off the phone.

“Yes,” she says. “But I was a little younger than you.”

“What happened?”

She sighs deeply before she talks again and it’s the exasperated sigh I love. She’s probably at the kitchen table with her hand resting on top of Gracie’s. I scoot into the chair even more and the breeze slips by, bringing with it the aroma of another dinner that Nancy’s chefs made for us.

“I wanted a classmate to like me,” Gran says. “She was the most popular girl in school. What was her name?”

“Missy Thomson!” Gracie says in the background.

“Right! Missy Thompson. So I told her I was getting a dog, which of course, I wasn’t.”

“Why did you do that?”

“I wanted her to come to my house so the other kids would know just how fun it was to hang out with me. Anyway, one day during class, I bragged about getting this wonder dachshund named Mustard. I had a whole story. Where Mustard was from, his size, and what we would do with him when he got here.”

“But there was no dog.”

“Nope. No dog.”

“So what happened?”

“She came over and nothing I could come up with made any sense. I thought I could say the dog was getting delivered in a couple weeks, but we had nothing to prepare for the dog’s arrival. No crate. No food or toys.”

“Wow. Did you feel terrible?”

“Within five minutes, Nancy told Missy I had lied. So I had to tell the truth. No one talked to me at school for a long time. It took people months to trust me again.”

Gran’s quiet and there’s a clank of something in the background, which means Gracie’s up from the table and probably fixing something to eat.

“Telling a lie is tricky business,” Gran says.

I knew she would listen. Gran talks to me like I’m an adult and not like a kid who has her head stuck in every science experiment she’s ever conducted.

“Want to tell me about it?” she asks. Her mouth must be close to the phone because it makes the speaker on my ear vibrate a little.

“Not yet,” I whisper.

“Maybe some other time?” she says.

“Definitely. Some other time,” I repeat.

“I’m really good at giving sage advice. Can I give you some super sage advice?”

“Sage me up.”

“You should only give someone what you think they deserve,” Gran says.

“What they deserve?” I ask.

“You are on the inside. Deep in your muscles. That’s you. The body is the extension of you. Only give someone your fingers, your skin, and toes if they deserve to touch your soul.”

“Wow, Gran,” I reply. “You should be silent for a week all the time.”

She laughs and it’s so familiar, something I can completely
count on no matter what is happening in my life.

“And one more thing?” she says. “If you’re lying to someone you love, well then they aren’t getting the real you. They’re getting a fraction of you.”

A fraction of me. It feels exactly the opposite with Andrew. Because of the lie, he’s seeing the real me in a way no one ever has before.

“I can’t wait to come see you,” I say.

I tell Gran I love her and when we hang up, I sit on that lounger looking out at the water for a long time.

Andrew isn’t getting a fraction of me. The lie about MIT is just circumstantial. It was just a dumb thing I said to get him to keep talking to me on the beach to test the Scarlett Experiment.

I shuffle the peas on my dinner plate a couple of days later.

Who am I kidding? The lie about my age and MIT wasn’t a big deal before, but now, it’s bothering me. It’s becoming a wedge that I have to make fit into so many of our conversations.

“Tomorrow’s the best beach day of the season so far!” the newscaster’s voice echoes from the TV.

“Coming to work with me tomorrow?” Dad asks. “You can finish your essay in my office. We’ve got about a month until it’s due, right?”

“One month exactly,” I say but don’t know if I really want to go to WHOI.

“That reminds me!” Nancy says with a jump. She waddles to her desk in the corner of the kitchen. “I have to reserve the tent at least two weeks in advance.”

This party is all she can talk about. I stab another pea. Scarlett comes home August 5th. One month until she comes back too. Less than that, actually.

This is all going by too fast.

I’ve been waiting for Andrew to text me with our plans for the night. It’s been kinda quiet between us since the debacle on the Fourth.

“Ettie called,” Mom says. That’s one call from Claudia and two calls from Ettie that I have to return. I don’t know what to say to Ettie. I feel like I can’t talk to her if I don’t tell her Andrew’s real age. I don’t want to lie anymore than I have to.

“Want me to proof your essay this weekend, Beanie? That’ll give you time to revise,” Dad asks.

I stab another pea. Stab. Stab.

“That would be great,” I say, just wishing we could talk about something else. Anything else.

What this means is I actually have to start the essay. My phone beeps.

Yay!

“Haven’t we gone over this?” Nancy asks.

“It’ll just take a second,” I say and slide it out of my pocket. I am about to read my message when Nancy snatches the phone and places it down next to her knife. I rub at the top of my stinging hand where her talon fingernails scraped my skin.

“Really, Bean. I don’t know what’s gotten into you. Bringing a phone to dinner. You can have it when we’re done eating.”

Dad’s eyes narrow past me on the television in the other room.

“First, you whine about the gorgeous dress you have to wear to the party,” Nancy says.

Actinium, aluminum, americium . . . antimony, argon . . . what’s after argon?

“You didn’t show any interest when we mentioned going to a cake tasting the other day. It’s like you didn’t even hear me.”

I didn’t.

“And
I
haven’t seen you working on your scholarship.”

“I work on it in my room. And when did you become an expert on my work habits? I thought you
wanted
me to socialize?” Nancy only notices what she wants to see and that’s every single detail that proves just how unlike Scarlett I am in every part of my life. I talk on my cell and hang out with my friends just like Scarlett, but to Nancy, it’s not the right
kind
of socialization.

Mom says nothing. Dad watches the TV.

Nancy’s face is all geometric shapes, pursed lips, and squinted eyes.

“What’s going on with you? Are you even listening to me?” Nancy says.

I slam my fork down on the table. Mom and Dad jump in their seats.

“Nothing’s
going on
with me,” I say.

“Oh, I understand perfectly well.” Nancy points at me. My chest heaves, I’m so mad. Nancy turns to Mom. “This is all that boy Tucker’s fault. You better get those two in a room to talk to each other at the party.”

“He’s not coming to the party,” I yell. “You’re like the dictator
of extracurricular activities. Why can’t you be more like Gran?”

“Scarlett! I mean, Sarah!” Mom scolds. She can’t even be angry with the right person.

“Wait, what?” Dad says. He raises his eyebrows—he’s trying to catch up.

“My sister is a burnt-out hippie!” Nancy says.

“You don’t know Gran and you don’t know me. And I don’t want to wear that stupid cupcake dress either!”

“Beanie, calm down!” Mom yells.

“Cupcake?” Dad asks.

“It’s a beautiful dress!” Mom says.

“You’ll do what you’re told,” Nancy says, still pointing. “If you want any help from me, under my roof, you’ll do what I say!”

“Do you even hear yourself? Do you even actually know anything about me?”

“Bean, calm down!” Mom says.

I get up so fast Nancy’s bajillion-dollar chair hits the floor. I walk to Nancy and snatch the cell phone so quickly she flinches. I lean in close to her and fear prickles behind her eyes.

“I hate that dress.” I say it quietly, but my voice shakes. “And I won’t wear it!” I turn and my feet clip against the wooden floor.

“Where are you going?” Mom calls.

“For a walk,” I say without looking back.

“You get back here! You will wear that dress!” Nancy yells after me. Just as I am about to pull the door closed, she squawks to Mom, “You need to control that girl!”

I slam the door and bring my hands to my mouth because the noise is really, really loud. I run my fingers over glass to feel for
cracks. On the other side, Dad says, “What’s a cupcake dress?”

They are all silent for a few seconds then everybody talks at once. Their muffled voices rise and fall within the house. I can’t tell what they are saying. It doesn’t matter. I could script it accurately.

I lean my forehead against the cold glass.

“See? I told you.” Nancy’s voice is
right
next to the door. I shoot up and back away to the next step in case she opens it up. “She has been cooped up in a science lab much too long!” Nancy says, but her voice retreats farther away back into the house.

I move down the front steps to the street.

The street lamp highlights my chipped toenail polish. I can’t believe I talked to Nancy like that. I’m just so tired of swallowing my words all the time.

Also, Mom and Dad don’t need to control me.

Something in the corner of my eye catches my attention. I look toward the street lamp at the end of the cul-de-sac.

Andrew sits on the hood of his pickup.

I almost forgot I got a text message. My cell phone is still clenched in my hand; I open it.

ANDREW: Am I a stalker if I’m on your street?

Relief flutters through me and even makes my cheeks tingle. For a second, I think he might be a hallucination because he’s exactly who I need right now. The hazy blue light of his cell phone just barely shines on his beautiful features. With each step to him, my chest releases. I ache to be closer to him, to someone who doesn’t classify me, who doesn’t put me in neat, labeled boxes. Andrew looks up from his phone and scoots over
to make room for me. By the time I make it to him, I can smile. He doesn’t have to know about the fight with Nancy.