Chapter 3 Bird #2
I laugh involuntarily, hating myself for how much I love this. “No, not quite.” I watch her pour me a glass of juice from the fridge. “But I wrote a lot of non-epic poems.”
“Don’t be so humble,” she says, smiling. “You know, I still have that sweet Mother’s Day poem you wrote for me when you girls were, what, eight or nine.”
“You kept that?”
“Of course! I’m not letting it go; it’s going to be worth something one day.” Even though I know she’s got to be leaving for work too, she pours herself some more coffee and sits down with me anyway. “So, how was it?”
“Um, it was fun. It was—it was nice. I really learned a lot. Honestly, I miss it there already.”
She nods enthusiastically, encouraging me to keep talking—something I’m not used to.
“Actually, I think I might apply there next year,” I lie.
There would be no way I could go there, not for real.
I got a scholarship for the summer writing workshop because my English teacher filled out the paperwork and sent it in for me.
This summer was probably the closest thing I’ll get to college—at least for writing, anyway.
“Really?” she asks, wide-eyed. “You liked it there that much?”
I nod. “I did. I really did. I met some great people—the professors, and the other students were just… very cool, I guess. I’ve never—”
“Not cooler than your BFF.” Kayla’s voice echoes behind us. I stand up quickly, not wanting her to catch me trying to steal her mom. And when I turn around, I barely recognize my friend.
“Oh my god, Kay,” I begin, but I can’t think of what to say next. “You—you look…”
“Yeah…?”
“Y-you look so different. I mean, wow, your hair,” I say, instead of Holy fucking shit I can see your hip bones and clavicles through your clothes!
“It’s really cute.” I reach out and touch her formerly dark, formerly long, now bleached-blond Gwen Stefani bob and baby bangs, and try not to gasp when she hugs me and I feel her ribs against my chest and her shoulder blades under my arms.
“And you look…” She holds me out at arm’s length and smiles. “Exactly the same, except, well, your hair’s longer and more… mermaidier.”
Kayla’s mom gives me a wide-eyed mom look as she scoots behind us to place her coffee mug in the sink.
“Girls, I’m heading out to work but I’m leaving some cash here—so why don’t you go to the mall and get some pizza or burgers or fries, or you know, whatever.
My treat. Okay?” she says, nodding at me pointedly.
“Okay,” I answer. “Thanks.”
“Kayla, did you hear me?” her mom says loudly. “I want you to get some food. Real food. I’m serious.”
“Yeah, okay,” she mumbles, not looking at her mom.
So, this is new.
Kayla waits until her mom is out the door before she grabs the twenty-dollar bill and stuffs it into her pocket.
Then she’s pulling me into the living room to sit on their plush oversized couch, which, unlike ours, hasn’t endured years of butts flattening the cushions and improperly cleaned food spills.
I thought my first question would be about that watercolor class she was supposed to be taking; ask to see what she’s been working on.
I’d show her some of the new stuff from my notebook and she’d drive us to the mall and we’d get some Panda Express and Mrs. Fields and try to find a way to sneak into a matinee.
But no, that can’t be my first question now.
Because this is all wrong. Her. She’s all wrong.
“Sorry. But did you, like, lose a bunch of weight?” I ask stupidly, because it’s so freaking obvious, yet how am I supposed to not ask?
“Yeah, girl! Twenty-seven pounds and counting!” She does a little catwalk sashay and twirls with her spindly arms over her head.
This from the girl whose ideal Friday night used to consist of Pizza Hut buffet followed by movie theater jumbo extra-butter popcorn.
This from the creator of our lunch-table battle cry: Chunky girls unite!
“Thank you, Dexatrim and Crystal Light,” she adds with a grin.
“What?”
“And the demonic-possession side effects of fat-free Olean Doritos that had me shitting my brains out for an entire month.”
“What?” I repeat.
“Yeah, it was totally gross, but I lost the first thirteen pounds that way.”
“You didn’t need to lose anything, though,” I try to tell her, which is something she’s told me and our other friends a million times.
“Please. Yes, I did. Besides, there’s no thinspiration like someone seeing you naked to wanna keep the weight off.
But, I mean, well, I guess you know how it is…
I mean, judging from your letters. Which, okay, spill already.
Did you end up having sex with that guy from the summer thing?
I mean, that’s what it sounded like, anyway. Are you still, you know, a virg—”
“Hold on, hold on.” I raise my hand, take a moment to try to digest everything she’s said. Like, did I just seriously hear her say thinspiration? “Can we just pause for a sec and back up? You know those pills are really danger—”
“Okay, Mom.”
“No, I’m serious. You’ve lost a fuck-ton of weight. Like, do you even realize how skinny you are?”
“Thank you!” she shouts, arms raised toward the heavens.
Then quieter, “Yeah, I do realize. I’m finally rid of the baby fat—I was disgusting.
” The way her face twists up, I can’t help but think, does that mean she thinks I’m disgusting?
Because we’ve always shared clothes and we’ve always said we didn’t care about all those magazine girls and beauty-myth bullshit.
“Dade thinks I’m beautiful,” she continues, crossing her rail-thin arms over her concave stomach.
“And hot and sexy, and you know what? I actually feel good about myself for once in my life. So please don’t—”
“Are you okay?”
“Are you okay?” she mimics, a sharp edge to her words that makes her sound nothing like the best friend I said goodbye to only two and a half months ago. Her arms unfold and her shoulders soften. “Ugh, Birdie, don’t look at me like that. Come on. Just be happy for me, will you?”
I literally have to bite the inside of my cheek to shut myself up.
“So, this guy, Dade?” I try to smile even though I already hate everything about this guy Dade, who apparently thinks women are all supposed to look like fucking waifish Kate Moss clones. “Soulmate, huh? So does that mean you… you and him have had… you know, sex?”
“Yeah. Well, almost. I don’t think it really counted, because we sort of started, then stopped.
He said he wants our first time together to be special.
And I do too. More special than in the backseat of my car, anyway.
” She stops and laughs, and I get this sinking feeling in my stomach like I’m in the process of watching my best friend walk off the edge of a cliff.
“So, then. You didn’t have sex?” I ask.
“No. Not really. There was a lot happening and I was kind of”—she moves closer to me and whispers—“high.”
“High?” I repeat. “Like on drugs high?”
She nods, smiling like she’s delighted with herself. “Me, high. I know, right?”
“Are you high right now?” I try to laugh, just to let my body release some of this tension I feel stitching itself between us like cobwebs.
“No! I only smoked a couple of times—with Dade and his weird friend. It wasn’t a big deal.”
“Um, o-kay. If you say so.”
“All right, enough about me. This writer dude. Tell me. Tell me everything.” She leans forward again, practically falling off the edge of the couch, and there’s something about her eagerness that makes me want to keep it all close to me. Warm and safe and secret.
But she’s my best friend; how can I not tell her everything?
“What’s his name, anyway?” she asks, but the questions keep tumbling out. “What happened? Did you do it? Or, okay, what did you do together exactly? I want details. Come on, Bird. Your letter was so cryptic.”
“I don’t know… I—”
“You don’t know his name?” she scoffs, tilting her head.
“It’s S-Silas,” I manage, my stupid old stutter surfacing, and it occurs to me this didn’t happen to me all summer long. “Silas,” I repeat, with too much effort.
No. This is not how I want to tell her about Silas, or Kat, or the entire lifetime’s worth of emotions I felt this summer.
“Sexy name,” she interjects while I take a breath.
She knows I need the pause. She remembers from elementary school days, after my dad was gone and it was so bad I could barely get two words out and how it took me three years of speech therapy to get it under control. “Aaand?” she asks, more gently.
“And I’m still trying to figure out what happened or how to describe it. It’s w-w-weird.” Pause. Deep breath. “This whole summer was weird. I feel like I was in an alternate reality and I was this totally different version of myself, but also more like myself than I’ve ever been.”
“And you’re still being cryptic!” A slow grin turns her mouth into a curved line. “So, does that mean you did or didn’t?”
“I—I—we—did. Yes,” I admit. “We did, but…”
But before I can explain, she’s keeled over her lap, howling, “Oh. My. God. I cannot believe it! You really did, are you serious? I can’t believe you’d be the first of all of us.”
“What? Wait, why?”
“No, it’s not a bad thing. It’s just that you don’t let people in very easily—no pun intended.
” She reaches forward and grips my arm, her bony fingers digging into my flesh so hard it hurts.
“I’m impressed. I’m in shock. But it really shouldn’t be a surprise after that poem you sent.
About the kiss. That kiss—” She fans herself and exhales.
I bite my lip to keep from smiling because… that kiss.
“You’re blushing!” she shouts. “You have to tell me everything.”
I shake my head, place my hands over my cheeks. “That k-kiss, though. It wasn’t him. Silas. It was…” It was Kat. It was a girl. I could say it right now. But I don’t want this to change anything, and it will. It has. “It was,” I begin again, “someone else.”
“What?” she shrieks. “Who. Are. You?”
“Stop, stop. Really, I’m embarrassed.”
“If it wasn’t him, who?”
“Just another student at the workshop. It—it just happened. It was just… a great kiss,” I lie—it was so much more than that. “But can we stop talking about this? I’m still figuring out how I feel about everything and I don’t wanna get all carried away and, like, confused.”
“What are you talking about? What’s confusing? Two guys want you. Poor thing.”
“They don’t want me, first of all. The kiss. It didn’t go anywhere. It was just a thing that happened. And second, I’m probably never going to see either of them ever again, so… yeah, it’s sort of sad.” But what I really mean is I’m sad.
She nods and looks down for a moment, and when she looks back up at me, I feel like it’s the first time I’ve caught a glimpse of her old self all morning. “Sorry. I’m sorry. Yeah, that is sad.” She pauses, then asks, more earnestly, “Do you love him, Silas? I mean, do you love either of them?”
“No. I don’t think so. I mean, I’d probably know if I did, right?
But I liked them.” That much I can be sure of, at least. I liked them both.
And they liked me, too. I’ve never had that before.
And there’s part of me that’s scared maybe I didn’t try hard enough with either of them.
A deeper part of me scared that maybe I can’t love.
I shake my head and try to smile, pushing those thoughts away. “What about you? Do you love Dade?”
“Oh yeah, definitely. Yes. He’s so cute and funny and he will do anything for me.
Seriously, anything. I can’t wait for you to meet him.
Oh!” She stops abruptly and claps her hands together.
“I know! Oh, I know, I know, I know. I’ll invite him to the poetry reading thing tomorrow night. It’ll be perfect.”
“I don’t know, Kayla. I’m not really—”
“No, don’t say that. You’ll see. It’ll be perfect, okay?” she says, holding my hands too tightly. “It’s perfect. I promise.”
I’m shaking my head no, but the words coming out of my mouth are “Okay. I guess.”