The Girls of No Return (26 page)

“You'd tell us if —” She pauses, wanting to be careful. “I mean, Lida, if you felt as though —” She sighs, annoyed with herself. “ ‘No more tiptoeing,' ” she says, repeating one of our newer family mottoes. “Just tell me if you're okay. Are you okay?”

“I'm okay.”

When she leaves, the door whispering shut behind her, I turn back to the page I was working on.
I'm running out of time
, I think. I have to get this down
now
, before I forget how easily it all unraveled in front of me, like a loose knot of yarn that needed only to be shaken out. No. That's not right. I wasn't an innocent bystander. When it unraveled, I was there, holding the knot, shaking with all my might.

 

 

THERE WAS AN INITIAL FLURRY OF GOSSIP ON THE DAY THAT
the parents left (Sasha's mom's eyebrows were tattooed onto her forehead; Lindsey's parents wouldn't speak to each other, forcing Lindsey to act as a kind of U.N. translator; Ronnie told her dad to fuck off in front of Bev). Everyone compared notes about their meetings with Bev, and it turned out that
none
of us had been deemed fit to leave Alice Marshall. Surprise, surprise.

But if the theme of Parents' Weekend was Good Clean Fun, then the theme of the week that followed was Pretend It Never Happened. I guess most girls, for their own reasons, wanted to put it behind them. I know I did. Terri's odd behavior, the news about Jules, Gia's absence, and what my dad had told me about my mother — there were too many things to decipher, like paintings on an ancient stone wall.

That's why we ignored it. But it's hard work, pretending to be unaffected all the time. Hard, hard work. No wonder there were some minor fistfights in the cabins (though not in ours) in the days following the visits. Name calling, hair pulling, even the No. 2 pencil that mysteriously found its way into the back of one Fifteen's head, sending her (briefly) to the Infirmary — we knew it was kid's play compared to what we felt like doing.

Needless to say, the Smokers' Beach was crowded after the parents left.

When I finally saw Gia on Monday, she didn't want to talk about the fact that her father hadn't been there; he'd been waylaid by business in Bangkok, she said. I dropped the subject. Jules talked about her parents incessantly for about two days before Gwen asked her (not very politely, I thought) to shut the hell up. Boone didn't say anything about what she'd done all weekend, but she did produce two new bottles of rye whiskey, so no one asked. Regardless of whether the weekend had been terrible or merely tolerable, we all emerged feeling like we'd escaped. At the very least, we all had to stay. And that was just fine with us.

By the time the next Saturday rolled around, everyone was exhausted from the effort it took to forget Parents' Weekend. Most of us stayed in our cabins, holed up on our bunks, not talking to anyone all afternoon. I wrote in my journal, an activity that was becoming rather habitual. I had already written about my Thing, and now that I had shown it to Gia, I felt like the worst was over. What else could I possibly write? Still, I couldn't forget the wave of stillness that passed over me once I had written it down, and so I kept trying, filling pages with my thoughts about the school, about my cabinmates, about Gia. I wrote about what it felt like to be around her, and the fact that I was scared (ridiculously so, I told myself) that she would tire of me.

Eventually, though, I ran out of things to say, so I decided to wander around the school grounds, grabbing a cup of coffee from the Mess Hall first. Flashes of Bob were visible through the trees as I walked, the lake calm and unrattled. I envied the lake its ability to thrash and roil one minute, causing docks and stray life jackets to toss about wildly, and to lie dormant the next, unflappable as a school principal. We thought there might be sturgeon or sharks hiding in Bob's depths, but when we fished,
if
we fished, we only caught lake trout and bottom-feeders, and were disappointed. Winter was another thing, or so I heard. Bob iced over, but not enough to skate across, and the wind cut across the rocks and moved the trees almost horizontally. You had to practically be an action hero to get in and out of Alice Marshall once the first snow fell.

So that Saturday, I was standing by the Mess Hall, having just returned my mug to the kitchen, when I heard the crunch and rustle of someone coming up quickly behind me. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I hadn't seen Gia all day and was hoping that she'd find me.

I turned. “Hi,” I said, trying to mask my disappointment.

Boone smiled at me conspiratorially. “Let's get the hell out of here,” she said. “This place feels like a sanitarium.”

“Where should we go?” I asked, even though I knew damn well what she had in mind.

Boone didn't say anything, but she pointed her finger toward the sky.

I squinted my eyes, peering into the trees. Maybe Gia was in the Rec Lodge with the I-bankers.

“What are you waiting for? A transcendental moment? Come on!” Boone started toward the path to Buckhorn. With one last glance behind me, I trundled after.

By this time, I had figured out that Boone slowed her pace down whenever she was hiking with me. Neither of us ever mentioned it. As we hiked, though, I realized that I was speeding up. Lately, I'd been spending more time watching Gia roll cigarettes than smoking them myself, and I could feel the difference. My legs felt stronger, more capable. Since I wasn't hunched over my shoes in a breathless contortion of pain, I was able to focus on the landscape around me: the dry, naked stalks of grass, the golden crust of pitch on the sides of old pine trees. I breathed in deeply. The thought flew through my mind before I had a chance to check it:
This is the life.
It was a cool afternoon, and I pulled the sleeves of my shirt down over my knuckles as we walked. Autumn, it seemed, was alive and well in the Frank.

Finally, when I felt the need to break the silence, I asked Boone about the book Ben had lent her. “How was
The Dharma Bums
?”

She stopped on the trail with one foot resting on a large rock. “How would I know?” she said.

“Oh,” I said, confused. “So you haven't finished it yet?”

Boone laughed. “I've finished it,” she said, pulling the book out of the back waistband of her jeans. “You could say I drank it up.” She opened the book so that I could see where the pages had been carved out in the shape of a bottle. A small, presumably empty flask rested snugly in the hollow.

“Some book club,” I said.

“I find it to be quite inspirational,” said Boone. “And refreshing,” she added, slipping the book back into her pants.

As we continued up the path, Boone told me that Ben often gave her little “pick-me-ups” like that one, because, she said, “he knows I can handle it.” He had always ordered wine and bourbon to be delivered on the back of a burro with the rest of his monthly supplies anyway, and he had taken to ordering just one or two extra bottles for her.

“Ben was wild when he was our age,” Boone told me. “He was a jock — a footballer — but he never felt like he fit into that world. So he did other stuff. Lots of other stuff.” She skirted around a fallen log in the path, pointing behind her so that I wouldn't trip over it. “He and I are more alike than you'd know. We're basically the same person.” She quickly added, “I mean, as far as that goes.”

I wondered about that as we got nearer to Ben's lookout. It was hard to imagine Ben — good-looking, confident — as ever having screwed up. Ben struck me as the kind of person who had
always
had his shit together.

“Why, hello, girls,” he said when we finally got there. Boone had let out a long, high whistle as we got near, and Ben was standing in front of the lookout with two glasses of water, waiting. “Glad to see you.” He looked at me and shook his head. “Lida, you're looking very rugged these days. Elsa must be rubbing off on you.”

I looked down. It was true that my arms were tan and strong, and that my legs no longer threatened to snap under the weight of a backpack. I
had
gotten more fit. I smiled.

“Well, you two are just in time,” Ben went on. “I was about to shoot my own foot for something to do.”

“I thought you were an avid reader,” Boone said, taking a long sip of water and handing him his empty book. “Don't tell me it's gotten that bad.”

Ben shook the book gently in front of Boone's face. “This is one of my favorites,” he said. “But even so, I need to hear real voices from time to time, not just the voices in my head. Wouldn't you agree, Lida?” he asked, turning to me.

He caught me off-guard, but I nodded. “You must have some pretty serious voices to be able to stay up here for so long.”

“You can't imagine what they say.” Ben laughed. “It's every lookout's curse: You're always alone, and yet you're never alone. I don't know anyone who has done a stint on a mountaintop without questioning their sanity two, three times a day.”

“You wanna talk bat-shit crazy, you should try the school,” said Boone. “It might give you a run for your money.”

“All those girls? Say no more; I'd lose my mind.”

We followed Ben as he walked back to the lookout. The wind had picked up, and it cut across the rocks and scrabble to slap us. I raised my hand to shield my face.

“I was just about to open a bottle of wine,” Ben said as he held the door for us. “An early happy hour. It's that kind of day.”

“Damn straight,” said Boone, plopping herself down in one of the chairs around the wooden table. “It's that kind of month.”

Ben walked over and put a hand on her shoulder. He laughed softly. “I think we could all take a breather here. Lida, I hope you won't be offended if we imbibe a little.” He winked at me. “You're more than welcome to join us, of course.” He pulled a box out from under his cot and reached in, grabbing a dusty bottle of red wine. Wiping it on his shirt, he set the bottle and three water glasses on the table. I guess he took my silence as acquiescence. Ben uncorked the wine and poured generous amounts in each glass. “To your health,” he said, raising his glass in a toast.

“To your liver,” Boone said, before tipping her glass and taking a long drink.

To be honest, I hadn't had much red wine before. Liquor, definitely. Beer, sometimes, those few instances when I stood outside of the 7-Eleven and asked dirty men to buy it for me “and my friends,” imagining what it would be like to carry the six-pack triumphantly back to a waiting car full of laughing girls. Truth was, I hardly ever finished all of the beer before throwing the remaining cans in the trash and walking home.

Wine was different. It was smooth and full, and it cut through the cool afternoon to settle warmly in my stomach. I felt distinguished. Maybe it was the feel of the heavy water glass in my hand, or maybe it was the way that the wind carried the smell of pine needles and moss through the thin walls of Ben's house. Whatever it was, I wanted more. I felt like I could stay up there forever, drinking wine and half listening to the banter between Boone and Ben. Everything else — Gia, the school, my dad and Terri, my mother — slipped away. The afternoon grew sweetly hazy and muddled.

“So, what's happening with the Princess?” Ben's voice broke my reverie. We were finishing our second large glasses of wine, and the bottle was nearly empty. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. “She up to more tricks?”

Boone narrowed her eyes at Ben and nodded toward me. “Let's drop it,” she said.

“Who are you talking about?” I asked. “Who's the Princess?”

“You must know her,” Ben said. “Some little lady who thinks she owns the school, right, Elsa? I don't know her name, and I don't really care. She's the Princess to me.”

“Ben, seriously. We didn't come up here to bitch and whine. Drop it.”

“Why?”

“Because Lida and I don't agree on everything,” she said, looking at me.

“Oh,” I said slowly. I knew who she was talking about now.

Ben turned to me. “Don't tell me you and this Princess are friends,” he chided. “She sounds like a real piece of work.”

I looked at my empty glass. “She's different when you get to know her,” I said quietly.

“Yeah, I'm sure Hitler's wife said that about him too,” Boone snapped.

Ben raised his hands in defeat. “Simmer down, ladies,” he said. “I was just making conversation. I'll stick to safer subjects from now on.”

“Good idea,” said Boone. “You don't want to mess with catfights.”

“Wise words, wise words,” Ben agreed, pouring the last of the wine in our glasses. “Let's wipe the slate clean with another toast.” He lifted his glass once more. “Lida? You do the honors this time.”

I raised my glass and looked at Boone. She shrugged. “No more drama,” I said.