Here Where the Sunbeams Are Green (26 page)

“A good omen,” Kyle murmurs. “It’s rare to see this. My grandparents will be glad.”

We stand there together staring at the chameleon.

“Don’t be scared,” he says.

“I’m not,” I lie.

“If we’re brave the plan will work.”

“I know,” I whisper, even though I don’t know.

I take a really deep breath and for a second stop feeling nervous about everything. Kyle tugs my hand and we turn back. At the gate he lets go of me.

“Roo already believes. She doesn’t need good omens,” he says. “I had to show you.”

“Thanks,” I whisper. But there’s something else I want to add, something I can’t find the words for. Instead, I just say “Thanks” again.

Kyle flashes me a brief smile, then turns and heads for the kitchen. I watch him as he goes, his straight posture and thin arms, and I have this weird little feeling like there’s something I know about him that no one else knows. I’m wondering what exactly it is, this thing I know about him, when suddenly Roo comes pelting across the concrete courtyard toward me, a trail of wet footprints behind her, her body slamming hard against mine. “I missed you I missed you I missed you where were you?”

“Jeez, Roo, relax,” I tell her, opening my arms to hug her. “I was just checking to see if they sell hair bands in the Selva Shop.” I can’t remember the last time I lied to Roo. Maybe never.

“They don’t,” Roo says cheerfully. “You shoulda just asked me. I looked for hair bands there
days
ago.”

“Oh yeah, Miss Know-It-All?” I give her a squeeze and together we hurry to our room, where I send her into the shower first. Roo may boss me when it comes to the jungle, but I boss her when it comes to hygiene.

“Did you wash between your toes?” I ask her as we swap places, me in the shower and her out.

“I can’t wash my toes too well right now!” she exclaims, as though I’m being ridiculous. “My
toes
are serving a
purpose
.”

I spend my whole shower grinning about that sentence. My
toes
are serving a
purpose
.

“Roo,” I say when I step out of the shower, “are you scared?”

“Scared of what?” she says.

“Things not working out tonight.” I stop myself from adding
obviously
.

“No,” she says matter-of-factly.

“Why not?”

“We have Miss Perfect,” she says.

“But what about Vivi? What if we can’t find her to give her the letter? What if she doesn’t want to help? What about La Lava and the way they’ve told Dad they’ll, you know …?”

Roo shrugs. Jeez. I will never understand her. She’s so much braver than I’ll ever be.

“The volcano goddess is on our side,” she says simply.

I roll my eyes at her, but she’s drying her hair beneath a towel and doesn’t see.

“Besides, Kyle’s the one who has to give the speech,” Roo continues. “If I had to give a speech then I might be scared. I hate giving speeches.”

I’m so focused on Roo that I startle when Mom bursts through the door of our room carrying the dresses we got for the gala back in Denver.

“An official delivery for my beautiful girls! Beautiful dresses for beautiful girls. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful girls!” I’ve never heard Mom say
beautiful
so many times in a row.

Roo goes first. Mom unzips the red taffeta dress and slips it over Roo’s shoulders, and I zip it up and tie the sash. With her messy hair and bare feet and cherry-red dress, she looks like a naughty little princess. There’ll be more than enough room for Miss Perfect under all that pouf.

“I
love
my red
dress
!” Roo chants, hopping around the room, so cute I want to grab her. I’m amazed that she can act this lighthearted right now—but I guess she’s not acting. She doesn’t feel the
same heavy weight of fear that I do. She starts jumping around on her bed and then bangs her head on the bottom of my bunk, but she gets over it after moaning for just a few seconds.

“Your turn, Mad,” Mom says, holding my dress open. I step into it and she zips it. It’s a grassy-green color, with slender shoulder straps and a green satin sash. A grown-up dress, no poufs or frills.

“Wow,” Roo says breathlessly, “you look like a tree!” Which I know is a compliment, coming from her.

“
Very
Audrey Hepburn,” Mom says to me as she gathers Roo’s hair into a high ponytail.

“
Way
pretty!” Roo adds, grinning at me.

And I can’t stop myself from grinning back at both of them like a fool.

After we put on our patent leather shoes, mine white slip-ons and Roo’s black with straps and buckles, Mom whips out a tube of light-pink lipstick (we
never
get to wear lipstick) and instructs us to pout our mouths. It sends a pleasant quiver down my spine, the feeling of Mom applying the pinkness to my lips. Then she cups our shoulders and steers us over to the somewhat foggy bathroom mirror. The phrase “a lovely young maiden” pops into my head as my eyes meet my mirror-eyes. Embarrassing, I know, but those are the words that come to me.

“
Wow!
” Roo gasps, gazing at our reflections.

If it weren’t for everything else, I’d be wildly excited about wearing the most beautiful dress I’ve ever owned, plus lipstick. Once upon a time, putting these dresses on would have been the highlight of our day. But now I have so much on my mind that the second Mom leaves I forget all about the dress and instead start worrying about the gala as I fold the letter for Vivi again, into ninths, and tuck it into what I guess you would call the bodice of my dress. Then
I look at Roo, and Roo looks at me, and Roo nods at me, and I nod back at her, because I guess we’re pretty much as ready as we’ll ever be.

Roo flings the door open, scattering neon lizards. Glancing over at the pool area as we rush across to Kyle’s room, I think,
Gosh, wouldn’t it be nice if we could just play at the pool, drink
licuados,
read fantasy novels, and then put on our party dresses and go to the gala and dance and stroll among the pools and eat lots of dessert?
What if we were just regular girls, not girls on a Mission? What if we still didn’t know anything about La Lava being evil and Dad being a prisoner and the LTVT not being extinct? What if I didn’t have to be worried? That would be great, wouldn’t it?

But then my heart of hearts responds: No. That wouldn’t be great. That wouldn’t be great at all. And I realize that something’s changed far inside me, that I’m not exactly the same girl I was when we first showed up here.

“By the way,” I say to Roo as we head up the spiral staircase to Kyle’s room, “I’m not scared anymore.” And at that moment it’s one hundred percent true.

“Big whoop, Mad,” she says. “I’ve never been scared.”

T
he late afternoon is at its most golden when Roo and I approach the golf cart. Roo’s red taffeta shines in the gushing sunlight, Miss Perfect silent and invisible beneath the puff of her skirt. My dress casts a delicate shadow across the gravel of the parking lot. I gaze down at myself, at the sheer green fabric of the first layer of my skirt, and feel light and lovely, as though I might rise up off the ground. We look like we should be getting into a horse-drawn carriage rather than a golf cart. But that’s life.

Ken/Neth is there with his camera, waiting, and as we walk across the parking lot he pretends we’re famous, taking pictures and calling out things like “Can I get a smile over here?” and “One, two, three, GLAMOUR!” For some reason he seems more charming than irritating to me right now. He’s wearing a black tuxedo with a bright orange tie. It’s a little dramatic, but no more dramatic I guess than the moments after La Lluvia, when all those plants release those crazily orange blossoms.

“Boy, is your mom ever going to love this shot!” he calls out as Roo twirls around me.

Speak of the devil, just then Mom comes rushing across the parking lot toward us. She’s wearing the most gorgeous dress. How is it possibly possible that Roo and I didn’t know about this dress of hers? It’s white, or I guess
champagne
, satin, long and slim, and Mom looks like a billion dollars, her hair swept up in a bun and her neck so long. Her skin like the moon, if I were writing a poem. Like she ate the moon and now it’s glowing inside her.

“Gosh, I guess we’re all set to go, right, kiddos?” she exclaims. Her words contrast so much with her goddesslike appearance that part of me wishes she wouldn’t say anything.

Wow, I’m so mean sometimes.

Ken/Neth seems as shocked by Mom’s appearance as I am. He stares at her in this stunned way, as though he doesn’t believe she’s actually there. As though she’s a woman stepping out of his dreams. I groan inside. We need Dad back, fast.

“Get a grip, Ken,” Roo commands under her breath.

But luckily Ken/Neth doesn’t hear. He just murmurs, “All set to go except for Kyle.”

“Wait, what?” I say, my stomach fluttering. “I thought he was going with his grandparents.” That’s what Kyle told us less than fifteen minutes ago, crouching still unshowered in his room, sliding Miss Perfect into the pouch hanging from Roo’s waist.

“I promised them we’d give him a ride. They headed over already,” Ken/Neth explains. “Kyle was taking too long to get ready.”

I’m trying to control the wild little moths playing around in my stomach when Roo yelps, “I’ll go get him!” Then she’s dashing off across the parking lot, her shiny black shoes sending pebbles flying. I hope Miss Perfect isn’t getting motion sickness.

Soon enough, Roo returns, leading Kyle into the parking lot.

And here’s what’s really crazy: For the first time ever, Kyle looks ridiculous.

“I don’t own a tuxedo,” he says to us before they’re halfway across the parking lot, “so I had to wear this.” I can’t believe it, but Kyle actually seems to be blushing about his appearance!

“Hey, man,” Ken/Neth says, “you look groovy.”

“It’s my grandfather’s wedding tuxedo,” Kyle mutters, avoiding eye contact.

It’s a three-piece thing, very old-fashioned, and baggy on Kyle (Señor V must’ve been a lot bigger and stronger back when he married Señora V), so he just sort of looks like a pile of brownish tuxedo. I’ve
never
seen Kyle not looking amazing. Even in the silly outfit, though, his eyes are as golden as ever and his face is sharp and smart.

Annoyed, he fiddles with the bow tie, his quick fingers turned sloppy on the silky maroon fabric. Ken/Neth comes over and works on it like an expert, and soon there’s a solid bow under Kyle’s chin. I look at Kyle, wanting him to look back at me, because he hasn’t yet gotten the chance to really
see
me in my dress. First he was busy with Miss Perfect, then with being embarrassed, then with the bow tie. But his eyes refuse to meet mine, and the moths in my stomach heave a little sigh of disappointment.

“Milady?” Ken/Neth says to Mom, gesturing to the front of the golf cart. It’s unpleasant to watch the way he helps her get settled into her seat before going around to take his place behind the wheel.

Meanwhile, Kyle and Roo hop up onto the backseat. It’s pretty tight, but there’s nothing for me to do but squeeze myself between them, so I do. Roo sits with her right leg extended to try to make it more comfortable for Miss Perfect.

“Funtastic!” Roo yells as Ken/Neth steers out of the parking lot.

“Isn’t this just fabulous?” Mom’s in a great mood. A creepily
great mood, otherwise known as her yoga mood, which is the mood she’s always in nowadays. She simply
adores
going to La Lava, she tells us.

The golf cart picks up speed until we’re sailing along in the warm golden wind. I’m shocked by the sudden flash of excitement that jolts through me—excitement at the thought of being at La Lava again … the way it smells of flowers and minerals … such a perfect place … paradise. I’m ashamed about feeling this way—I know it’s crazy, I know La Lava is evil—yet somehow I can’t help but look forward to every last detail that awaits us. I’m imagining candles and lilies and bubbly drinks and moonlight on marble.

I’m so far gone in picturing it all that when Kyle leans over to whisper something to me I don’t catch it.

“What?”

He repeats it, and I realize he’s speaking Spanish. Whatever he may be saying, it makes Roo giggle. My earlier magical moment of understanding Spanish has definitely passed.

“No,” I beg. “Say it in
English
. Please. I don’t understand you.”

“
Sólo español.
” He grins at me, looking devilish, his tuxedo-inspired awkwardness already vanished.

“
¡Por favor!
” I insist. I wonder why he’s playing this old game right now.

He refuses. Roo does her friendly wink/blink thing at him. The little brat! Then she giggles again and I realize he must be making fun of me.

“Tell me what he said, Roo! Tell me, please!”

But Kyle and Roo just grin at each other and I know nobody’s going to tell me anything. So I sit back and try to enjoy the golden afternoon and pretend that whatever Kyle said to me was exactly what I’d want to hear.