She Has Your Eyes (20 page)

“But you know it, right?”

“Pretty well, yes. It was one of the only books I liked in school. Reread it several times. That, and
The Outsiders
. God, I
loved
that one.”

“We read that one already.”

“Hard to believe schools are still assigning the same things we read,” I said.

“I know, right? How long ago was that?”

I did the math in my head. “About thirty years.” Holy crap.

Wylie seemed just as shocked as her eyeballs widened and rounded. “Seriously? Wow, you don’t seem that old.”

I laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment. So,” I said, patting the book as if to signal the official start of our session. “What’s your assignment?”

“We have to choose a theme and write about it, tying in the book. My teacher gave us a list to choose from, so I decided to go with ‘the perils of conformity.’ ”

Wylie showed me the list and I made a disapproving face. “Ugh. These are the same kinds of themes I had to write about. You’d think they would have gotten more original over the years.”

Again Wylie was happy to see me seemingly betray my profession. “They’re the worst. And all they’re doing is testing to make sure you read the book.”

“I agree,” I said. “So, did you?”

“Read the book? Yeah.”

“And what did you think?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. What am I supposed to think? It was a bunch of animals who take over a farm. I mean, I get that it’s symbolism and all that—we read
A Tale of Two Cities
before this, and let me tell you, that was super-boring—”

“Reread it when you get older,” I interjected. “You’ll have a whole new appreciation when you read it because you
want
to and not because you
have
to.”

Wylie grinned. “See, that’s why I wanted
you
to help me—you’re so
honest
about these things. I like, totally believed you
just now. Like, you suddenly made me want to read it again. And it was like torture getting me to read it the first time! Why can’t teachers in school be this way?”

I’ve experienced the joy of getting through to students many times—nothing matched the high of a student telling you they “got” it, or seeing the look on their face that said it for them. Or, better yet, because of you they grew to
like
it, wanted to do more of it, be it writing or reading. Like getting an injection of
This is who I am
. But something about Wylie’s approval was different—it swept through and sent ripples of validation to every part of me. No, not validation—something more, something I couldn’t put my finger on. Almost as if a wound I never knew I had closed up and finally healed.

I couldn’t help but return her grin. “Thanks. Most of them want to, believe me. They just can’t.”

“Why not?”

“That’s a conversation for another day,” I said rather than unleash my diatribe about the status of American public education. “OK, so here’s what I want you to do: Write for ten minutes, nonstop, about
Animal Farm
—everything you know and don’t know and think and feel and whatnot. You can write whatever you want—how much you loved it, hated it, didn’t get it; you can even summarize it if you want. But you have to write for ten minutes
without stopping
.”

“What if I suddenly freeze up and can’t think of anything to write? That happens to me all the time.”

“Then that’s what you write about:
This stupid person is making me write for ten minutes about
Animal Farm
and I can’t think of a single thing to say.…
”

Wylie laughed. “Yep, that sounds about right—except for the part about being stupid. You’re totally not that.”

Again I felt that wave wash over me.

“Ready? I’ll even do it with you, if you want,” I said, clicking my pen and opening my legal pad to a fresh page. She held her pen to the page, as if taking her mark on a racing track and waiting for the starter pistol. I made note of the time and waited for the second hand on my watch to hit twelve, then announced, “OK, start writing.” It didn’t even surprise me when, fifteen minutes later, I remembered to check my watch again and found Wylie locked in concentration, scribbling away, her pen not leaving the page. An image of Devin flashed before me: our first tutorial session; his freewriting about his relationship with reading and writing; my restraint from pouncing on him in a horny fit.… I took a sip of the bottled water I brought with me, flushed by the mere memory. It bothered me that I thought of Devin on this particular day. Sam and I had had plenty of our own writing rituals.

“Time’s up,” I said.

“
Already?
” said Wylie. “Geez, I feel like I just got going!”

I practically clapped my hands in triumph. “That’s an excellent sign, Wylie.”

“Now what do we do?”

“Now we read what we wrote.”

She groaned. “But what if it’s, like, really bad?”

“It’s freewriting,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be even remotely good.”

“Still, can you not read yours? I have a feeling your ‘really bad’ is still ten times better than my really good.”

I smiled. “OK, deal.” Wylie read her freewrite out loud as I closed my eyes and listened to the sound of her voice, trying to find traces of David. With my eyes closed, she could’ve been any fifteen-year-old girl. But once they opened and I looked at her,
she was unmistakably David’s daughter—the color of her hair (minus purple skunk stripe, which had faded in the last month), skin tone, even the shape of her nose, I noticed, and, of course, those piercing, electrifying, take-over-a-room eyes. I asked her to read it again and I focused more intently the second time, jotting down words and phrases, and afterward responded to what I called “the center of gravity”—specifically, what parts of the freewrite interested me, what interested her, and within the hour we found a way to write about
Animal Farm
and conformity that was more than a standard assignment, something of genuine interest to
her
. From there we sketched out more ideas and an outline. I loved the process of invention, loved how ideas appeared out of the ether, along with the words to go with it, and the excitement that came with it when you knew you were on to something good. The process wasn’t always this easy; but when it worked, it was like falling in love.

By the time we finished, Wylie was giddy. “Ohmigod, I am actually psyched to write this paper! I like, wanna do it
right now
!”

Music to my ears.

“In that case, I’m going to let you do just that—and for now, just go with the momentum. The moment you lose it, stop writing. Don’t worry about whether you’re doing it the ‘right’ way or whether it’s what you think your teacher wants. Just write it the way
you
want, and send it to me when you’re done, OK?”

Wylie jumped out of her chair. “Thank you—thank you, thank you, thank you!” On the last thank-you, she practically bowled me over with a hug. And at that moment, I wanted to wrap my arms around her and pull her to me, cling tight, and not let go. Maybe it was the emotion of the occasion. I’d been wanting to cling to Sam all day. I could feel myself getting choked up. And just as I fully hugged her, I caught Janine at the
entrance of the den, watching us, horrified by the sight. I couldn’t even begin to imagine the betrayal she felt.

I diverted my attention away from Janine in that way strangers do when they’ve unintentionally made eye contact with each other, and let go of Wylie quickly. “You’re welcome,” I said politely, and began to pack my notepad and pens and reading glasses. “Maybe I should get going.”

Wylie looked at the time on her cell phone. “What’s the rush?”

I looked up and Janine was gone. “I don’t know, I just thought…” I stalled, at a loss for what to say. “Was there something else you needed help with?”

“So, was everything OK when you saw your mom? You said it was important.”

I was taken aback by this new line of questioning. I didn’t want to tell her about my mother’s illness, but I didn’t want to shut her down either.

“Well…” I stalled again. “She needed to talk to us about some important family things.”

“Did you have someone to talk to when you were my age? You know, because you said your mother didn’t really get you.”

I was astonished by how much she’d paid attention.

“Not really,” I said. “I had books. I used to read a lot. And I’d make up stories.”

“What kind of stories?”

“Well, for example, I had a crush on one of the guys who was in the movie version of
The Outsiders
.”

“Ohmigod, we saw that movie after we read the book! The movie wasn’t that good, but some of those guys were really cute!” said Wylie. “It’s hard to believe they’re like, my parents’ age now and have kids and whatnot.”

I deleted the image and smiled. “True. They were all pretty
boys. So anyway, I used to make up stories that one of them was my boyfriend, and he would listen and pay extra-special attention to me.”

Wylie giggled. “Which one?”

“Sodapop Curtis.” She outright laughed this time, and I rolled my eyes just like one of her teenage friends. “I know, silly, right? I also loved all of Judy Blume’s books, and I used to pretend she was my mother. I imagined all these conversations we’d have.”

“Did you ever show anyone the stories?”

“Never.”

“Do you think that’s why you’re a writer?”

“I guess so,” I said. “Isn’t that why you paint? To tell stories?”

She pondered this. “I don’t know. I just like it. Like, I feel like myself when I paint. Like it’s something that comes easy to me. When I was little, I used to
love
to color. Painting feels more like a grown-up version of coloring.”

I smiled. “I used to love to color too.” The more she confided in me, the more I wanted to confide in her. And yet, the image of Janine in the doorway loomed, even if she didn’t.

Wylie smiled back. “And it’s not just painting. I like making things too.” She switched gears without warning. “Is your relationship with your mother still complicated?”

I chose my words carefully. “It used to be.”

Wylie tapped her pen on the table as we talked, and put it down for the first time. “I really like you, Andi. And I really like David too. He’s, like, so well traveled and stuff.”

“He really likes you too.”

“And my sister thinks he’s totally hot, which is like, totally gross to me.”

I laughed. “You have to admit that he’s handsome, though.”

“He’s probably someone you would’ve written one of those
secret stories about,” she said. It was a perceptive, insightful observation.

“Better still,” I said, “I got to live it.” Was I referring to David, or Sam? I wondered. Maybe both.

Her eyes sparkled and turned dreamy. “What made you fall in love with David?”

Oh, Wylie. Not now. Not today. I just can’t go there.

I traced little circles on the notebook paper in front of me, and couldn’t get my voice to work. She either intuited my resistance, or rambled on out of impatience. “He’s so different from my dad—I mean my stepdad. I’m trying to picture him and my mom together. You know, like, married. I mean, I get that he’s good-looking and all that, but I’m wondering if there was something more to it for her.”

And then I understood. She was trying to piece things together, trying to understand where she came from, how she’d come to be, was playing out the
what-if
s in her mind. Maybe by learning about me, she’d learn more about David, those little nuances that didn’t require direct contact with him.

Or maybe she was acting out full-on teenage rebellion, choosing to align herself with the one person who could be the biggest threat to her mother. Not that I thought she was consciously aware of this, or deliberately using me.

A voice permeated the room. “This is English tutoring?” We both looked up, and I found Janine at the doorway again.

Wylie gasped in outrage. “God, Mom, have you been eavesdropping? We’re talking about writing stories and stuff.”

I hastily collected my things and said to Wylie, “I’d probably better get going. You’re all set. Just send me your draft and I’ll look at it. And next time I’ll teach you all about revision.”

“Thanks,” she said. “Next time you can read your freewrite. Now I kinda wish you did.”

I was touched by this, and ripped the page out of the notebook. “Here,” I said, and handed it to her.

“Wylie, I’d like to speak to Andi alone. Say good-bye now.”

Wylie shot her mother a threatening look. “Mom,” she said through clenched teeth. But her mother’s expression was more foreboding. Wylie looked at me apologetically, grabbed the freewrite and her notebook and
Animal Farm
and one of the straps of her backpack, and sang, “Seeya,” to me before she bounded out of the room.

Janine took Wylie’s place at the table without sitting down. “Don’t think for a minute that I don’t know what you’re doing,” she threatened, the volume of her voice turned down, lest Wylie had decided to linger and do some eavesdropping of her own, I guessed.

“Mrs. Baker, I—” I started, but Janine cut me off.

“Just because
he
wants a relationship with my daughter doesn’t mean you get to weasel your way in too. Tell me, are you doing this whole little
Dead Poets Society
act to suck up to him, or to her?”

I was floored. “I’m just a writing instructor, Mrs. Baker. A coach. That’s all.”

“You can cut the ‘Mrs. Baker’ crap too. What, you think that formality somehow makes you better?”

“No, I don’t. You never gave me permission to call you anything else.”

She seemed momentarily flustered by this, but recovered quickly. “Nevertheless, you just taught your last lesson with my daughter. You have no right coming into
my
house and talking to her about things that are none of your business.”

“With all due respect, your daughter confided in me. I wasn’t prying, and I wasn’t egging her on. I was listening, that’s all. Sometimes the writing process makes students open up.”

She looked at me in a manner that insinuated I was making things up, and she was intimidating as hell. But I knew exactly why her claws had come out.