The Other Half of Me (2 page)

Sierra laughs harder as we walk past the gym and the dance studios with their mirror-covered walls and ballet bars. “I have to ask. Did you do it on purpose?”

“Excuse me?” I stop and pivot so I’m facing them. Sierra and Sage tilt their heads and raise their eyebrows as though they are the cleverest almost-thirteen-year-olds in the world.

I’m so annoyed and bursting with frustration I could scream, but I don’t. Instead, I say, “Yeah, that’s right. I purposely hosed myself down with the sink sprayer at the art studio so I could humiliate myself when I came to pick you up from your stupid day camp.”

Sage and Sierra are duly put in their places. However, as they blush I realize they’re blushing not only because I scolded them, but also because I have gained an audience of onlookers.

“I think you made your point,” Sage says, gesturing to the campers, counselors, and parents who heard my brief speech.

“Let’s go,” I say, and walk out. I’m fuming, but not so much that I don’t find relief when the crowd starts thinning out.

And I’m certainly not so lost in my annoyance that I miss him—a certain someone—lurking off to the side of the corridor. I try to pretend that he’s not there in the same way I have tried to blink him away for the past two years. But it’s a Herculean task, trying to forget how he smiles out of the side of his mouth, or not to notice how his brown hair has flecks of gold in it now. His skin is tan, too, most likely due to the hours and hours he spends outside, coaching peewee football. Blush creeps across my face. Maybe he didn’t hear my tirade. Maybe he was doing whatever it is jocks do at the end of the day. High-five? Drink Gatorade? Stretch?

One of his friends snickers and points in my direction as we walk by them. “Hey, Tate. Did you check out that girl’s—”

“Paint-splattered shorts? Yeah, they’re kinda cool,” Tate says just loudly enough, without making eye contact with me.

Tate’s friend shrugs and says, “Whatever, dude,” and wanders off.

I glance over at Tate for a millisecond, and he looks over at me. Then he stares up at the ceiling thoughtfully, just like he used to do before he’d answer one of Mr. Connelly’s questions in Am lit last year.

As I amble over to the car with the twins, I realize that, just like that, I’ve had my first, very indirect encounter with him. Tate Brodeur. The guy I like so much I can only say his name in my head. I wouldn’t even admit to Faye, my best friend, how much I like him until she beat it out of me a few months ago during one of our Revolting Dessert evenings at her house, where we mixed instant pudding and cake mix, added whatever we found in the candy drawer, and baked it. Suffice it to say, Betty Crocker would not be pleased. But as we ate it I told her about my crush on Tate, and how it persists like a cough.

I want to tell Faye about this run-in right away. Only she’s in the Berkshires in western Massachusetts doing some end-of-summer cooking program that sounds more like prison than cuisine class. While there, students are “not permitted any letters, calls, or e-mails” since that might “distract them from their goals.” Is learning to make hollandaise sauce so mentally taxing you can’t take a cell break for your best friend? But anyway, Faye’s off-limits, so I can’t tell her.

“Hello? Earth to booby.” Sierra taps her fingernails on the car door to shake me back to reality. “Are you gonna let us in, or do we have to ride on the roof?”

“You suggested it,” I say, and slide into the driver’s seat. The twins sit in the back, already gossiping about their day, ignoring me and speaking their own language.

I turn up the radio, tune out their talk, and think about what Sid said earlier. When will my paintings be better? I imagine a brilliant piece of art appearing in front of me. Then I imagine Tate in front of that art. I wish I’d said something to him, but I didn’t. I wish I’d painted something amazing, but that didn’t happen. And I wish I had someone to tell all this to.

But I don’t.

TWO

“Think fast!” Russ shouts to me before I’m all the way out of the car or I realize there’s a Frisbee headed toward my face. I have a quick choice to make: drop my painting supplies and catch the thing (which I might not even be able to do, given my lack of prowess in the hand-eye coordination department) or try to catch it while still holding all my crap (which seems doubly unlikely). So I duck, which causes the bright red Frisbee to sail past me and smack Sierra in the face.

“Ouch! What the…,” Sierra screams.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

“Why can’t you just catch the thing like a normal person?” Sierra quips.

“Yeah. Could you
be
any less coordinated?” Sage says snidely. She squeezes Sierra’s hand, showing more twin solidarity.

Russ trots over to us, shirtless and tan, all shoulders and smiles that make every girl in our neighborhood adore him. “Hey, leave Jenny alone. It’s not her fault. I snuck up on her.”

I look at Russ and give him a silent
thank you
with my eyes. He raises his eyebrows as if to say
no problem.
Russ is the type of nice that is sometimes too nice. He always sees everyone’s side, but isn’t really able to stand by anyone in particular, as evidenced by his next comment.

“Sierra? You okay? Just be thankful you got the good genes. I know if I’d snuck a throw in on you guys, you’d both be able to catch it with your eyes closed.”

And to think I was just about to ask Russ to come up to my room so he could see the mini sketches and paintings I’ve been working on in my room. Russ probably has no interest in that, though. I’m sure he’d rather not spend the last few hours of summer daylight inside when he could be running, chasing a ball, or doing anything where he can score a point or ten.

“Who’s up for a game of volleyball?” Russ asks while twirling the Frisbee on his finger.

Sierra and Sage nod enthusiastically.

“Count me in, too!” Dad shouts from the study window upstairs that overlooks the driveway. He can hear offers for pickup basketball games, mentions of volleyball, or whispers of softball from miles away. He braces himself on the windowsill with his palms. “Hey, Jen. You’ll spike for me, right?”

“No thanks, Dad,” I say, shaking my head. The last time I played a nice Fitzgerald family game of volleyball, I sprained my wrist and couldn’t paint for two weeks (except when I tried to use my other hand and my toes. I got the idea from this cool indie movie where the main character has to do that because of some accident and makes beautiful art that becomes internationally known. Let me just say that this is not what happened to me). “I’m going inside.”

Dad looks at me a second longer, maybe waiting to see if I’ll change my mind, but I shake my head again and slink into the house.

Inside, the house is cool and airy, scented with fruit.

“Smells good,” I say as I start up the stairs. I’m on the third step when I see my mom in the kitchen, sitting on one of the breakfast stools by the counter. She’s wearing a worn-in button-down rolled up to her elbows and a pair of running shorts. She turns around and bends a little in her seat so she can make eye contact with me.

“Want to taste?” Mom is already on her way to me with a wooden spoon before I can answer. When I
really
look at her, I see the twins—their slim frames, their grace and ease, their hair color (which reminds me of melting chocolate and butterscotch chips), their skin (which goes tan before summer has officially started), and their breezy way of walking (which is more like gliding). Even though I’m on the shorter side and have an average build, I always feel as though I’m clomping through life, splattering paint on clothing I just washed, managing to step in puddles I didn’t even know were there.

I take a short inventory of my features as my mom reaches the staircase. Light eyes cloudy with rings of dark blue and a few flecks of yellow, and sometimes green. Hair that’s usually kind of flat and stringy, but smooth to the touch when I get around to brushing it properly. Legs that are long and leanish, but not very toned or muscular, like the rest of my family’s. It’s only moments like this—just regular “would you like a taste” moments—that I am immediately hit with this sense of otherness.

Mom extends the wooden spoon, and I lean down for a quick sampling.

“Yum, it’s good.” I lick the marinade from my lips. “It stings, but in a good way. Is that chili powder?”

“Cayenne.” Mom finishes what’s left on the spoon herself. “We’re all eating on the lawn tonight. Yard picnic.”

I sigh. I wanted to paint. (And to daydream about Tate.) Picnicking will ultimately lead to games, which will lead to competition, which will lead to my being last picked for a team, or someone sighing because I’m on their team, or worse—being overly optimistic, like thinking
this
time I’ll really pull through and whack/hit/kick catch the ball/disk/mallet/birdie.

“Mom?” I call out when she’s back near the stove, flipping the chicken and drizzling the marinade on it in a haphazard fashion.

“Yes?”

“Did you…” I stop talking, but my feet take me into the kitchen for some reason. I’m wondering what exactly I wanted to say to her. I don’t frequently confide in my mom about my crushes and painting critiques. But maybe I should try.

“Did something happen today?” Mom wipes her hand on one of the towels (green-and-yellow pattern) she made to match the trim on the walls (green), which goes with the plates (yellow), and waltzes over to me.

“No, not really. I mean, Sid, the director at Downtown, he kind of said that—”

“Downtown. That’s the studio, right?”

“Right.” Sometimes I get the feeling that my mother has no idea what I’m really all about. “He’s just so pompous. He was like…” I put on my Sid voice, all arrogant and faux Brit. “Your work is drivel and you’ll thank me for saying so!”

I want my mom to console me. To laugh at Sid and hug me and say she knows he’s full of crap and that she has every confidence that my work
is
—not
will be
—great. But what she says is, “Well, honey, maybe Sid has a point.”

“What?” I can’t hide the surprise in my voice. My mouth slacks.

Mom takes dinner dishes from the cabinet and begins to roll silverware into yellow-and-green-striped napkins. “Don’t misunderstand me. You know Dad and I want you to do whatever makes you happy. But maybe…” She gestures at me with a fork. “Maybe painting isn’t your
thing.
”

“And maybe tennis or sled-driving or curling or skating
is
?” I can feel the annoyance bubbling inside my stomach. It burns more than the spices in the marinade. Of course it’s at this moment my dad comes bounding down the stairs two at a time, having left his work up in his office, and overhears my sports mention.

“You’re interested in tennis, Jenny? That’s fantastic! When do you want to start?”

My mom goes back to preparing for the picnic, and I roll the rest of the silverware in napkins while I let my dad down yet again. “Actually, I was saying that painting—you know, brushes on canvas and so on—that’s what I’m interested in. Still.”

Dad squints at me. He’s in his running gear: a faded Dartmouth T-shirt and yellow shorts that rustle when he walks. Soon it’ll be cool enough for him to throw on the matching sweatshirt. I look at him and realize he matches the decor in here—green and yellow. Then I look at my own pale skin, streaked with cerulean and gold and red—lip red. In mid-October, when the leaves turn, I might match something then. But for now I’m at odds with the decor around here. And honestly, I’m used to it.

“I have to go get cleaned up, and then I’ll help with dinner,” I say.

Dad pats me on the back. Maybe he means it as genuine affection, but it registers as if I’ve somehow let the team down.

THREE

Water washes the day off my skin, sends the art criticism and wet T-shirt issue sliding to the floor. Little rivulets of paint run from my arms onto the white tiles in the shower stall, and I enjoy the peacefulness of being alone with my thoughts before I have to go sit on the family sidelines at dinner.

As I think, I find myself looking up, staring at nothing. I wonder why Tate Brodeur does this, and if he even knows he does it. He actually defended me when his friend was going to make a joke about me. A fairly heroic gesture for someone who runs in a different circle and whom I’ve only admired from a distance. I’d watch him in American lit last year, how he’d read aloud from the text and then glance up, thinking about the words. Or maybe he was just spacing out. He did the same thing at our school’s spring fling last year. I remember eating a slice of pepperoni pizza near the refreshments table in the gym and watching him look up at nothing as he danced with pretty girl after pretty girl. I don’t know. My guess is that he must see some sort of fireworks in his mind.

I want to experience those explosions of color firsthand someday and know precisely what he’s thinking, but we would actually have to speak for this to happen. And we haven’t, because he is, of all things, a jock. Maybe we’re not at opposite ends of the social spectrum, but we’re not a natural overlap.

Still, he seems to be so much more than the category he naturally falls into. He’s always spouting obscure sports trivia to other jocky guys (example: What was the Mills Commission?) who never have the correct answer, so I know he’s smart, too. I want to tell him that I want to know him, or that I like the way I smile after he walks by. I want to tell him that the Mills Commission was appointed in 1905 to determine the origin of baseball (just because I eschew all activities sporty doesn’t mean the jumble of family talks hasn’t seeped in; I know more stats and facts than I’ll ever need). I want to show him how I paint fireworks on the canvas, all lights and colors spreading out into darkness.

It’s funny how you can’t exactly pick your crush. Well, you can, but once it gets hold of you it’s hard to shake off. I mean, Tate Brodeur isn’t whom I thought I’d like. Normally, I’m drawn to the brooding, slouching drama boys or their visual arts counterparts, all hip and retro with glasses or with accents from faraway places. But Tate’s about as commercial as you can get without being boring. I like his tilted mouth, the way he always appears to be looking closely at life, seeing the details like I do. Plus, he’s beautiful. Good-looking like the lead in a Disney dogsled-ding movie—all outdoorsy, but sensitive in his well-worn T-shirts and faded jeans.

I wrap myself in an oversized white towel and use the back of my hand to swipe the mirror clean. Outside, Russ, Sierra, and Sage are engaged in some sort of tag game that involves throwing whole lemons at each other. My mother is half-playing; my father is grilling the chicken. I can see them all, the five of them, from the bathroom window. They look happy. Complete. Matching. I imagine the same scene except with me in it and feel lonely all over again, imagining myself on the picnic blanket while they pound each other with citrus fruits.

I take a minute to study my face in the mirror. I’m maybe a shade darker than my winter self, meaning not entirely translucent. A knock at the door is followed by my mother’s face peeking through a slim crack.

“There you are.” Mom’s hand clutches the doorknob. “Good shower?”

“Yep, now I’ve moved on to questioning my existence.” I smile at her while I shake my hair out of its twist.

Mom smirks. “Oh, a little light pondering for the day?”

She gets me half of the time, and the other half it’s as if the only thing she recognizes is my exterior—the light brown swash of freckles over my nose and cheeks, the way my mouth has a full lower lip and two sharp points on top, how my hair is just a shade too light to be true brown and a few shades too dark to be interesting. “I didn’t mean to insult you before, Jenny. I only meant to say that sometimes when you have to struggle really hard with things—”

“I know; try, try again.”

Mom shakes her head. “No. I was going to say that every once in a while if you struggle and struggle and nothing happens, then maybe it’s time to move on.”

“So are you saying that Sid was right? That I have no artistic talent?” I watch my mother, wait for her to dispute what I’ve said. She doesn’t. “He said I’d get better.” Did he? Or did he only mean that I suck now and might not suck as much in the future?

“Okay,” Mom says, and starts to close the door. “But think about tennis. It could be fun. You and Russ could take on the twins.” She pauses to see if I’ll take the family-bonding bait. No chance. “Food’s almost ready.”

It’s not that I lack the guts to stand up for myself, because I could. I could stand here, hands on my hips in arguing mode, and try to convince her that painting is my passion, that I will succeed. But I acknowledge that perhaps I’d be suffering from the Shakespearean “The lady doth protest too much” syndrome—if I have to be so vehement about my feelings, maybe I’m just in denial about what’s real. Maybe one of the reasons I don’t express myself as well as I want to is because inside, shoved way down into an unseen pit, I’m not sure of what I want.

Left in the steam with my own reflection, I allow myself to wonder about what I wouldn’t vocalize to my parents back in the kitchen. The twins look like Mom, and Russet is my dad’s mini self. Maybe I have a little of my mother’s cheeks, and the freckles could be hers. But the artistic side? My hair that’s unlike anyone’s? The ring of green in my otherwise blue eyes?

They could be from him.

Mom and Dad were open from the beginning. They figured letting me (as well as Sage, Sierra, and Russ) all know about him would be better than our stumbling onto the fact of him later in life.

The fact being that my biological dad is Donor 142.

Mom had me back when she was super work-focused and single and thought she’d be alone forever. Of course, she got pregnant (after choosing 142 from the other donors), met my actual dad, and had me. They got married when I was one, and he legally adopted me and raised me, and here we all are. The Fitzgeralds. Russ shrugged when the early incarnation of Team Fitzgerald (me, Mom, Dad) told him. He was four at the time, and I don’t even know if it made sense to him. “Who cares?” he said while he bounced a rubber ball off the wall in his room. “We’re all the same.”

All the same. It’s pretty much what anyone says when they find out, although it’s not something I advertise. Regardless, no one in my family really seems to make the connection between this fact and how I’m different from them. But I do. I can’t help it.

I wonder about my genes and if they direct me toward paints and palettes rather than field kicks and playing center forward. Somehow, imagining who could be out there, where I could have come from, and how my DNA will play itself out makes me feel less alone. I love my family, of course I do. Only, I’m not totally connected to them. Like that circle I was painting today, kind of off to the side, almost falling off the canvas. When I think of where I came from, I imagine strings connecting me to someone else. And maybe it’s that wondering that will pull the sliding circle from the side of the canvas to the center.

“Jenny!” Russ shouts from downstairs.

I open the bathroom door and step into the hallway, the steam wafting behind me. “Just a second!” I hang up my damp towel, slide into flip-flops, a white tank top, and old jeans (the ones that fit so well I refuse to chuck them even though they are threadbare in places and hang a little low). They remind me of summer and beaches and feel cozy. Two weeks until school starts. Two weeks until the art show at Downtown Studios. Two weeks for me to cough up something real on the canvas and real in my life so this summer is memorable.

I look out the upstairs window to where my dad is juggling lemons while my mom runs sprint races from the patio to the edge of the unfinished area of our backyard with Sierra and Sage. They stop at the line of dirt and pile of gravel near the wooded area, then race back to the limestone patio and wooden deck. Dad is always meaning to finish the landscaping job, but with work and summer sports, I guess he hasn’t found the time. I half-expect to find Russ talking to Faye, my best friend, while he kicks at some loose gravel by the barbecue, but then I remember Faye’s still away at her gourmet chef classes. Cupping my hand to the glass, I peer closer to see who he’s talking to. A shiver creeps over my bare arms and jean-covered legs when I see that it’s Tate Brodeur, and he’s looking up, as usual.

Only this time it’s at me.