The Precious One (14 page)

“It most certainly was. And she learned from her mistakes, too. You can’t say she married Will for the wrong reasons. In the end, she realized she was an ordinary person in that way: falling in love. If she was a wee bit arrogant to begin with, she found humility later, right?”

“Okay, you’re right,” said Luka. He looked at me, shook his head, and laughed again.

“What?”

“‘Wee bit,’” he said.

He gave me a thumbs-up, and I gave him one back, without a thought to whether doing so was in keeping with thumbs-up etiquette, about which I had not the slightest idea.

Luka and I stayed under that tree for almost an hour, not making all that much progress on our paper, but, even though I had previously bemoaned the time-squandering aspect of group work, I found I didn’t mind. There was no reason on earth for it to be so, but talking to Luka was the easiest thing I’d done in such a long time. These days, I was almost never relaxed, not at school, not at home, not even with Mr. Insley, around whom I was happy, yes, oh, so happy, but far too—I don’t know—
exhilarated
, perhaps, to ever really relax. Somehow, the lawn beneath that oak tree felt the way my house used to feel, like breathing space, like a sanctuary so safe you forgot there was anything to be safe from. When Luka got out his cell phone to check the time, I had the wild urge to wrest the damn thing from his hand and fling it to the four winds.

“Shit, I have to go,” he said. “I have swim practice in less than an hour. Totally lost track of the time.”

“Oh, sorry,” I said.

“Nah, it was good.”

He stood up, a tall shape against the sky—the silhouette of his spiky
hair looking remarkably like the Sydney Opera House—and reached out his hand to help me up. For a blank split second, I stared at it; I had never held hands with a boy my age, even in a comradely, matter-of-fact, entirely non-boy-holding-hands-with-girl way, but, before he noticed my hesitation—I hoped—I grabbed hold (it was a good hand, much larger than mine, not especially rough or smooth, not sweaty) and he helped haul me to my feet.

“Thanks,” I said.

It would amaze me later, how I wasn’t paralyzed with awkwardness about what to do with his hand once I was upright. In a move that I fancied almost qualified as smooth, I let go of it and, in the same motion, brushed the grass off the backs of my legs. “Are you practicing here at the school?”

“No, high school swimming doesn’t start for a while. I swim year-round with a club team.”

“Oh, my. Every day?”

“Twice a day, during the week. In the morning before school and again in the evening.”

“Holy smokes. You never miss?”

“Not that much, but if I have a lot of homework, I usually try to grab a quick workout by myself in the school pool and skip my real practice. Coach Wheelwright, the Webley coach, gave me a key.”

We started walking toward the door to the library. In the distance, I could see some girls running, the cross-country team I guessed, and felt a pang of longing. But it was hard to truly long to be somewhere else when where I was was so pleasant and normal-feeling.

“Well, that explains it,” I said, nodding.

“What?”

“Your hair.”

He smiled wryly and scratched his head, making his bronzy, goldy hair stand even more on end.

“Yeah, right, it’s pretty rough. My mom says it’s no color known to man and that the strands break off like glass, which is true.”

“It reminds me of a hedgehog, except metallic.”

“Wow. No one’s ever called me a metallic hedgehog before,” said Luka.

“I find that very hard to believe,” I said.

Luka laughed. “Hey, how are you getting home? You want a ride?”

And that’s when I stopped being relaxed because I remembered that I was supposed to have a quick driving lesson with Mr. Insley. Afterward, he’d do what he always did, which was to drop me a few hundred yards from my house, and I’d walk the rest of the way. I had told him I had a group meeting after school, but I hadn’t told him it would last over an hour. Like Luka, I’d lost track of time. I was gripped by the sudden, worrying thought of Mr. Insley sitting in his office, fiddling with his wristwatch, waiting, but was simultaneously gripped by the idea of just forgetting the lesson and riding home with Luka. I suppose I just wanted the easiness to go on a little longer. What to do, what to do? But my dilemma only lasted a few moments because right then, the cross-country team got close enough so that I could see Bec leading the pack (of course!), her hair streaming behind her, and when she caught sight of Luka, she started waving the wave of a person on a deserted island who spots a ship and broke into a dead sprint. In a matter of seconds she was upon us, although if she saw me, she never let on.

“Lukey!” she yelled and leaped gleefully onto his back, her arms wrapped around his neck.

And, just like that, I became invisible.

“You’re killing me, here. God, what do you weigh now?” said Luka, pretending to stagger. “One eighty? One ninety?”

I gave Luka a quick wave, which he didn’t see because I was invisible, jogged over to the library door, and was inside before anyone noticed I’d left. Or, in the case of Bec, noticed I was ever there in the first place. For some stupid reason, I found my chest was heaving in the short, jerky way that meant I would cry if I didn’t calm myself. So I stood for a little, trying to subdue my heart, breathing in the papery, dusty smell of the library with slow, careful breaths.
They don’t matter
,
silly girl
,
not Bec, not even Luka, not one student at this godforsaken school matters. How could you ever have thought otherwise? Did you forget what you have, what is all yours and no one can touch?

Of course, I hadn’t forgotten. How could I? None of them mattered, none. I stood in the back of the library, drawing myself upright, easing my shoulders back, reminding myself of the truth I had so recently learned: nothing can touch you, not guilt or fear or sisters who are not sisters; no one can hurt you, not enemies or loneliness or friends who stop being friends when other people show up; you can rise above anything, anything, everything when you are in love.

And I was—oh, was I ever—in love.

WE DIDN
’
T HAVE THE
driving lesson that day and not because Mr. Insley was upset with me for being so late. As it turned out, he had gotten trapped into a conversation with the dean about an unruly student and came striding briskly into his classroom a full two minutes after I’d gotten there. He was so charmingly out of breath and apologetic, and I was so exhausted from the encounter, or non-encounter as it were, with Bec (and, if I’m honest, still smarting from Luka’s having dropped me like a hot potato) that I didn’t even mind his canceling the lesson and simply taking me to the usual drop-off spot near my house. I didn’t say much on the ride home, just listened to Mr. Insley make fun of Dean Fogerty (“he of the bombast, rulebook rigidity, and copious potbelly”) and felt grateful to be with someone who liked me enough to make fun of his superior in my presence. Before I got out of the car, though, Mr. Insley’s mood shifted to serious, and he laid a hand on my arm. Even through my coat, I could feel the jolt of electricity.

“Willow,” Mr. Insley said, his eyes locking with mine, “I think—and I hope you’ll agree with me—that we’re ready to go further.”

My heartbeat broke into a gallop, and a little tinny buzzing started in my ears that might have been fear and might have been joy.

“Oh. I. Um, well, that’s fine,” I managed to say. “I mean, yes, that sounds like a good idea.”

“Excellent! We’ve stuck to parking lots and short jaunts, but I think we should take the plunge and go for a real ride.”

Twin waves of relief and disappointment washed over me, and I couldn’t for the life of me say which was the bigger of the two. I smiled.

“You really think I’m ready?”

Mr. Insley’s prominent, light blue eyes twinkled at me, full of the spirit of adventure.

“I do! But we’ll need a sizable block of time. Any chance you can get away this Saturday? Is there perhaps something you could tell your parents?”

I nodded my best sharp, saucy, can-do, WAC officer nod.

“You bet,” I said.

“Good,” he said, giving my arm a squeeze and leaning closer to me. “Grand. How about eleven
A
.
M
. at the park? Are you sure you’re game?”

When Mr. Insley looked at me that way, so rapt, waiting with bated breath for my answer, I felt more special, more interesting than I ever had in my life. The man could have suggested anything, a balloon ride across the Pacific, a whirl on the flying trapeze, and I would have agreed to it with all of my heart.

“The gamest!” I said.

His face changed again, then, grew—I didn’t just imagine it—tender, unmistakably tender.

“That’s my girl,” he said, softly, and as I walked down the shoulder of the road toward home, outwardly walking, but inwardly dancing, leaping, flying, these last words of his went off like fireworks, like bursting blossoms of pure light, over and over again inside my head.

Oh, I was his girl. Was I
ever
.

I DIDN
’
T KEEP A
diary, and if I did, I would not have dared to write about the days that had passed since the first time I’d met Mr. Insley
in the park, but the driving lessons, all four of them, each more bright and precious than the last, were written on my soul as surely as anything ever had been. In fact, my soul held two versions of every lesson, the long and the short. I had stored every detail and, at night when I’d go to bed, I would take the long versions out, unfurl them, one by one, and bask in every second, every word and glance. But each lesson also contained a moment or two, high points, jewel-like, utterly full, supersaturated, and when I had less time, when I was sitting at dinner, say, or in class, I would release this shorter, highlight version, let it fly across my memory like a comet.

One: My foot on the gas pedal, jerking the car forward like a racehorse out of the gate. Slamming on the brake, so that both our heads bobbed hard. Humiliation rising in my chest and then Mr. Insley’s splendid laugh ringing through the darkness, making everything, every single thing in the world, all right.

Two: Right after school, pale, intermittent sunlight wafting through the car windows. Seeing Mr. Insley with new, shy, excited eyes because he is wearing aviator sunglasses and a flannel newsboy cap. After we practice driving all around the parking lot, we park and sit on the hood of his car, drinking coffee from a thermos he’s brought; he gives me the cup, drinks from the thermos itself. Steam hovers over my cup like a tiny ghost, and the sun disappears behind a cloud, and I shiver, and Mr. Insley takes my scarf from my lap, winds it carefully, two times, around my neck, and I see myself in his sunglasses, and he says, “There.”

Three: We practice backing up, parking, using the turn signal. When I look into the rearview mirror, I can feel him watching me, and his gaze is like something hot pressed to my cheek, the side of my neck. Sitting atop the car afterward, the hood warm through my jeans, he asks if I’m happy. I cradle my coffee in both hands, tip my face to the sky, and say, “Yes. I love driving with you,” when what I really mean is “I love driving
and
you.” He says, “Good. I do, too, but I meant in general.” “In general, I don’t know. Not ever as happy as this.” He says, “If
it is not overstepping to say so, sometimes, I feel that you’re a trapped bird, waiting to be set free.” I realize, the second he says it, that I do feel that way. I look at him, thinking
Set me free
. He smiles, reaches out, lifts a lock of my hair, and says, “And oh, what feathers. In all my thirty years, I’ve never seen hair like yours.”

Four: We go for a longer ride, a few miles down the road and back. I’m scared, gripping the wheel hard, but also thrilled at his faith in me. When we get back to the parking lot, I get out and spin in circles, laughing with joy. Driving is awful and miraculous, and I am good at it. He catches me by the hand, and I think—oh, good God, please—he is going to pull me to him, and then he grins and gives me a hearty handshake of congratulations. “Thank you so much for teaching me, Mr. Insley,” I say, and he keeps hold of my hand, touches the tip of my nose with two fingers, and says, “Please. Call me Blaine.”

ON SATURDAY MORNING, EVEN
though I wasn’t scheduled to meet Mr. Insley until eleven, I told my mother I was doing homework with some “school friends” (Ha, an oxymoron if ever there was one!) at a nearby coffee shop at eight thirty. I told her we would eat breakfast together and then head to the library to study, and that one of them would drop me off later in the afternoon. Muddy was so happy about this, her face all aglow at the thought of my having friends at school (“Breakfasting together! How chummy!”), and so eager to accommodate me, even offering to drop me at the coffee shop, that my stomach tightened with guilt. Although I had been lying to her fairly regularly lately, this lie was especially elaborate and so felt especially wrong. But there was nothing for it; I had to get out of the house early, before my father woke up and wanted to see me because if lying to Muddy was hard, lying to my father, as he lay in bed, still slow-moving, hoarse, and creased from sleep, would’ve been unbearable. No, scratch that. Not unbearable. I would have borne it because I would have borne anything to buy precious hours with Mr. Insley, but the guilt would have burned like coals of fire.

I need to stop here in order to state for the record that I would have given anything to speed my father’s recovery and that I cherished, with all my heart, every sign that he was getting better. When I came home from school and went to his room to find him out of bed, sitting at his writing desk or in his red velvet armchair, safely encased in the cone of light from the bronze gooseneck floor lamp, a book in his lap, I was filled with gratitude. I wanted him to be his old self, I did, I did, I did, but I had to admit that the fact of his not being quite there yet made meeting up with Mr. Insley much simpler than it would have been. Or, rather, than it would
be
, when my father got better. But I would cross that bridge when I came to it.