Chapter One #3
Lucy lets out a quiet cheer. She’s made us watch countless videos of the guards changing, and we’ve always willingly joined in on her obsession.
The ceremony is beyond impressive, and I’m struck by the guards’ total concentration.
They seem oblivious to the crowd of onlookers, their focus devoted first to the movement and then to the stillness of their task.
I’ve never managed to be that focused on anything. It seems like there’s a dance of intrusive thoughts always ready to break out, always simmering in the back of my mind, no matter how immersed I wish I could be in the moment.
Even now as I gather with my cohort on the wide sidewalk in front of the building, only half of me is watching when we all crane our necks to catch our first glimpse of the coming guards.
A group marching in two lines appears around the corner.
Only two will ultimately stay to watch over the tomb and the square, but the change itself is a group affair: the guards, the audience, and the billion thoughts tap-dancing so loudly in my brain that I can barely hear the rhythmic click of the guards’ shoes as they stop in front of the tomb.
My classmates seem to have no trouble forgetting about the competition for now.
Amalia is still scribbling in her notebook.
Lucy is filming the three guards walking up to the tomb—two to take their places for the next hour, and one acting as the supervisor of the change—their legs extending with each step in the traditional movement for this moment.
Liam’s eyes are huge, as if he can’t stand to even blink.
I’m technically looking at the guards, but I’m only half seeing them.
My thoughts are tangible enough that they cloud my vision.
Or maybe it’s that they’re sucking me so far back into my brain that I’m not really here anymore.
I’m trapped in the coils of my thoughts, forced to play out the scenario the brain gremlin has invented for me today.
You’re going to do so bad on your project that the institute’s judging panel will recommend Ms. Barlowe dismiss you from the program. And then Liam won’t want to be your friend anymore because you won’t be in the same program together. And then you’ll be alone.
The two guards being relieved have made it back to the group, and the guards taking their places stand still at their posts on opposite sides of the tomb.
“It must be so hard to stand that still for an hour,” Liam breathes next to me.
I nod. I can’t fathom that kind of stillness, but I yearn for it. Being still in the moment, letting my surroundings take precedence over the slithering mass of thoughts always threatening to pull me deeper into the recesses of my writhing brain—that sounds like a kind of freedom I’ve never had.
If you don’t enter the contest, Ms. Barlowe will think you’re not serious about your work. And then she’ll dismiss you from the program. And Liam won’t want to be your friend anymore, and you’ll be alone.
Paige, the therapist my parents made me start seeing, recently named the gremlin OCD. But I’ve been living with it my whole life. Paige just met me a few months ago. What the hell does she know?
It’s not like I’m germophobic, nor do I count things. Paige is completely wrong on this one. Everyone worries sometimes. That’s just part of the human experience.
The only way to not end up alone is to do a perfect job on this project. Win the decathlon.
The group of guards marches back down the street, leaving the two by the tomb to their work. Some of the crowd burst into appreciative applause as they round the corner, out of sight.
Ms. Barlowe launches into an explanation about the history of the guard, which I barely listen to.
I’ve started back at the beginning of this thought circle, like my brain is a dog chasing its own tail.
Hyperfocused on its mission, with the end goal always out of reach.
Our cohort starts drifting away from her, and that’s when I realize we’ve been dismissed to Ermou Street for lunch and shopping.
“I will be having a gyro, and none of you can stop me,” Lucy informs us. “But you’re welcome to join.”
We all take her up on it, partially because a gyro sounds amazing right now and partially because splitting up in this lively crowd sounds more intimidating than any of us can handle just a few hours into the trip.
Lucy has no more idea where she’s going than the rest of us, but somehow she leads us to a small restaurant that smells like it invented the concept of food.
“Mia píta gyro chorís tyrí parakaló,” I say when it’s my turn to order. Without cheese, please is the first thing I learned how to say in Greek when I found out we were coming here. It’s the one place culinarily where I draw the line.
“Chorís tyrí?”
I start as I turn to meet the warm brown eyes of the girl in line behind me.
She’s tall, so much so that I have to tilt my head back to take in her expression even though I’m not short myself.
In a perfect Greek accent, she repeats my stumbled-through words, her lips popping at the ends of her words, and I want to melt into the honeyed curves of her syllables.
“That’s practically sacrilege,” she says in smooth English, correctly clocking from my accent that the rest of the conversation can’t be in Greek if it has any hope of survival.
“I fear I’m not a cheese girlie,” I admit.
Against my better judgment, I find myself racking my brain for something—anything—else to say.
There’s something so easy about this girl’s smile, the way it lights up her face.
I’m drawn in by the warmth of her, and even though I’m usually way too awkward for small talk with strangers, I don’t want this particular moment to end.
“To each their own,” she says with a grin. Before I can come up with something sufficiently witty, the cashier rattles off an amount in Greek, and I find myself scrambling to read his handwriting on his notepad to figure out how much I owe.
I navigate paying with the unfamiliar currency, and by the time I’m done, the girl is gone.
I sigh, letting my fingers close around the warm foil wrapping my pita.
Even through the packaging, I can feel the doughy softness of the bread.
It’ll have to be enough to soothe the bittersweet ache that comes with the yearning for a connection that’s now been missed.
Resisting the urge to down the pita before I’ve even left the line, I join the cohort outside.
We all take our first bites together, and I immediately rank this as among the best lunches of my life.
The gyro seems like it should be simple—pork, roasted on a rotating spit, tucked into the pita with tzatziki, tomatoes, fries, and a gorgeous absence of cheese—but it melts together into the perfect meal.
The right amount of grease sizzles against the crispiness of the meat, the tang of the tzatziki spicing up the crisp doughiness of the fries.
I could write books of love poems about this wrap and never run out of flowery metaphors to tell it how much I’ve fallen in love.
It’s almost enough to make up for the loss of the girl’s warm brown eyes smiling down into mine.
“I want to cry,” Lucy says. “Just knowing this can’t last forever is the saddest thing that’s ever happened to me.”
“I’m getting another one.” George finished his in three bites and, true to his word, is back in the line immediately.
“I’m so full,” Lucy says, looking after him yearningly. Then she sighs. “But my time here is so limited.”
And with that, she joins George. Liam laughs.
“I love them so much.”
I’m halfway through my wrap, and the edge of my hunger has been sated enough that I find my eyes wandering around the square, scanning against my will for another glimpse of the girl.
I can’t help myself—when it comes to impossible connections that have no hope of turning into anything real, I turn into a puddle of yearning, romantic goo.
It’s only when a crush could potentially be requited that it turns into something sharp and scary, to be handled with ginger delicacy.
But now that I’ll never see this girl again, what’s to stop me from imagining our entire future together unfurling under this hot summer sun?
Our hands growing sweaty as our fingers intertwine, neither of us caring.
Laughing together on a beach somewhere, our gradual sunburns going unnoticed because we can’t look away from each other’s eyes. Kissing the warmth of her smile…
Of course, she’s nowhere to be found. And even if she were, she’d be kept a safe distance away, a stranger passing by on the street. I give up my search and finish my wrap as George and Lucy return with their fresh hauls.
Eventually Lucy’s fears come to pass, and we all finish our lunches.
She perks up when she remembers that we still have an hour to wander Ermou Street, taking in the sights of the fancy Hotel Grande Bretagne and animated bars and cafes lining the street.
We walk down the cobblestoned street together, our voices overlapping as we discuss the month ahead.
“We have to make this the best month of our lives, guys,” Lucy says.
She’s one of the recently graduated seniors, and she’s spent the last few summers working as a camp counselor.
When it comes to summertime fun, she’s the undisputed leader of our group.
“I’m thinking we go through the itinerary and add our own spice to every event. ”
Spice sounds scary, but I let her go on.
“I’m talking side quests, I’m talking summer romances, I’m talking a fabulous end-of-trip party to celebrate this highlight of our young lives.”
My heart sinks, and acid floods my chest. Why do we have to bring romance into it?
Contrary to popular belief, summer is a decidedly unromantic time.
It’s sweaty, it’s humid, and it smells like sunscreen.
What about all that screams Get it on? I can feel blotches of red staining my pale neck and cheeks.
Looking yearningly for a girl from a gyro line is one thing, but actively seeking a real romance is another matter entirely.
One that comes with the mortifying ordeal of being known. Simply not for me, thanks.
But Lucy points right at me as she continues. “I mean it. Romance for all. I did not come all the way here not to have a fling with a Greek boy.”
“Me neither,” Bodhi agrees.
I look to Liam for help, but he provides none. “It’s low stakes,” he says to me quietly. “Just fun. It’s okay to let yourself have that. This is all literally hypothetical.”
“Easy for you to say.” I give him a murderous glare.
He’s not the one whose brain clams up every time someone gets too close to knowing how it ticks.
What does he know about the fears that crawl in relentless, spiderlike tendrils through me, dictating all the choices I make?
“I just don’t want to date anyone. Why can’t you accept that? ”
He sighs. “Because I can see you do. You’re just standing in your own way.”
This sounds like something Paige would say, so I give myself permission to ignore it. Indulging in the fantasy of a pretend summer fling is enough. Letting anything become real means involving the brain gremlin, and no one needs that.
“Shouldn’t we be focusing on our projects?” I ask the wider group, trying to appeal to everyone’s inner nerd.
“I can write love poetry and still find a hot summer boyfriend,” Bodhi assures me. “In fact, I’m sure the poetry will help.”
This is fair. His talent is beyond. Anyone who reads his work is bound to fall at least a little in love with him.
I shrug. “I’ll be focusing on my project.”
Lucy grins as she puts an arm around my shoulders. “Spoken like a true follower of Artemis.”
“Spoken like a true coward,” Liam adds, low enough that only I can hear.
I roll my eyes, but at least the group drops it as we make our way down the square. I refuse to give in to any of their nonsense. The only way I’m going to make it to next year is if I create a good-enough project, one that proves my worth. Which means I need to give it my full focus.
No matter what.
At least, that’s what I tell myself. But when we make it back to the bus after our hour of wandering, weighed down with shopping bags (everyone else) and needless worries (me), she’s there. The girl from the gyro line.
Standing by the open door of the bus, tanned arms folded across her chest, that warm smile lighting up her face as she talks to Ms. Barlowe.
“Welcome back,” Ms. Galanis tells us as we reach the bus. “I’m delighted to introduce you all to my daughter, Melanie.”
She gestures to Gyro Line Girl, and I might as well go straight into cardiac arrest given the way my heart explodes into a flurry of beats, bleeding one into the next. Melanie’s eyes sweep over the group, blinking in recognition when they land on me.
“Chorís tyrí,” she says, smiling at me. “We meet again.”
I can’t even try to come up with something witty this time. I’m in too much shock. This girl, the one I let myself look for, is joining us all summer? With her distracting tallness and gooey smile and honeyed eyes?
If I let myself yearn before, it’s paled in comparison to the reality of this moment. Because this could all be possible now. With the time ahead of us, all the things I let myself dream about—our hands, our eyes, our lips—could become true.
But now that I’m waking up into it, it doesn’t feel like a dream anymore.
The yearning curdles into a cold sweat that ticks down the back of my neck, and I drop my gaze to an old piece of gum congealing on the pavement.
This has turned so fast into something to be afraid of, to run from.
The brain gremlin tap-dances away, reminding me of all the fears that would come true if I ever let someone know me enough to love me.
Because I’m sufficiently messed up that I know that seeing me could never lead to loving me.
So instead of uttering any of the smooth one-liners I might’ve used in my fantasy of how this summer could’ve played out between Hot Gyro Girl and me, I smile politely at the reality of Melanie as I quickly push past her to make my way after Liam, back onto the bus.