Chapter Thirty-Eight
CHAPTER
THIRTY-EIGHT
Jae
I sit up at the sound of feet thundering up the stairs. A rhythmic knock on my door.
“We come bearing gifts,” Swan’s voice calls from the other side. When I open the door, she’s flanked by William and CJ, and she’s holding a plate of glazed donuts. The sugar-sweet smell wafts into my nose and makes my mouth water. “Homemade apple fritters from chez Cho.”
I didn’t think they’d actually come. After Friday night, after ignoring them for the past three days, I was sure they’d never want to see me again.
“Little pig, little pig, let us come in?” William says.
“Oh.” I step aside. “Thanks. For coming.”
“Thanks for not fleeing the country,” William answers, giving my neck a tight hug.
“I considered it.”
CJ hands me a jar filled with origami stars in sparkling construction paper. “A stockpile of songs and quotes and poetry. All the pick-me-ups you could ever need.”
“Hey, thanks, CJ.” I’m afraid to say anything more, lest I get emotional.
“It’s a win-win. Had to do something with my hands, you know? Anxiety in high gear.” He pauses. Adjusts his glasses over thoughtful green eyes. “We missed you at school today. I was worried about you.”
I apologize, but he’s already throwing himself onto my plush pink rug like he’s about to make a snow angel.
William’s tracing his fingers along my bookshelves, his usual blond ponytail in a single braid.
Swan’s sitting cross-legged on my bed with big hoop earrings, a high ponytail with a kente headband, a leopard-print camisole, and shredded black jeans revealing skin all the way up to her thighs.
She has that same jean jacket from the first club meeting, the one covered in buttons and pins and favorite things.
And to top it all off, she’s wearing spicy ramen socks.
I think how cool it is to know these people who are so unafraid to be themselves. Now that everything has blown up around me, maybe I can be unafraid.
Swan nods absentmindedly as she glances around the room. “So pink.”
“Uncle Rowan. He forgot that I aged nine years since he last saw me.”
She props a pillow against the wall and leans back.
I grab a donut and bite. It’s warm and melts against my tongue and my fingers. I must have let out a happy moan, because William whips his head around, shoving a book back in place.
“That good? Lemme have one. CJ?”
“Yes, please,” he calls from the floor.
And then we’re all quiet, lips smacking, glazed mouths and fingers.
“Mm!” William says once he’s finished his off and popped his sugary fingers into his mouth, one by one. “So, shall we call the meeting to order?” He looks at me with a soft smile. “Jae, would you like to start?”
I bite my lip, not knowing what to say. There’s so much.
Swan crosses her arms and tilts her head to the side, looking at me. “Okay. Start here. What the fuck happened?”
I sigh. Does she always have to be so … Swanny? “You were there,” I say.
“Yet I still have no idea what happened. Like, we found out from Valeria Montero at a Halloween party that you had a baby and gave it up for adoption. At a Halloween party. From Valeria Montero.” Her eyes dart around the room in confusion, exasperated arms in the air.
“Like, where were we this whole time? Just, you know, sitting in a grove, pouring out our hearts to each other in poetry.”
I sink farther into the bed, pick at a loose thread in the comforter.
“We came by, you know,” CJ says from his half-comatose state on the floor. “After the party on Friday. You weren’t answering your phone. I was seriously, like, worried sick.”
My heart breaks a little. “I’m sorry,” I say.
“I just can’t believe you kept something so big to yourself,” Swan adds, eyebrows stitched together. “It’s not like we’re owed every detail of your life. We just want to know you. And it’s, like, something that you and I could have shared. I mean, we kinda knew the truth already, anyway.”
“Wait. How?”
“It doesn’t take a genius. The way you ran off at the banyan tree when I asked about the picture? You wouldn’t have done that if she were your niece.”
“Well, you know what? I might have told you. Maybe. But you hated your birth mother for not keeping you. What chance did I have of you liking me?”
“But who said I hate her?” She frowns. “I just wanted her to love me. Is that too much to ask?”
“I’m sure she does, Swan.”
“She doesn’t know anything about me.”
“Trust me. That’s not how it works.” I take a deep breath through the rising tide of sadness. “Do you really think we’re unforgivable? Because we didn’t keep our kids?”
Swan sinks deeper into the bed, like she’s melting. “No. And I’m so sorry. It had nothing to do with you, okay? That’s just how I deal with my stuff. I get angry. I rage. I shake my fist at the world. The old Swan did a lot of crying and I’m just sick of crying.”
“Me too,” I say.
CJ pokes his red head over the side of the bed and climbs up like he’s the creature from the black lagoon. He lies down on his back, hands crossed over his chest, and turns to look at me.
“Why did you call the meeting, Jae?” he asks. “Do you wanna talk? Write poetry? Go for a walk?”
“Honestly,” I say, taking a deep breath, “I’m pissed. Valeria shouldn’t have done that. She can’t get away with it.”
Everyone’s quiet.
“I agree,” Swan says slowly. “She shouldn’t have done that. But Jae. It’s done. The cat’s out of the bag, so to speak. Valeria wins if you let it get to you. If you don’t take control of the narrative. It would bring her so much joy to know you’re hiding out in your room consumed by her.”
“I agree,” William says, leaning against the shelf.
“And in any case, you’ve already been avenged,” Swan says, smiling. “As soon as you got in the car, we called the police on the party. All that underage drinking. Tsk tsk. We sent their asses home.”
William nods. “It’s true. And a certain bully with a penchant for dramatic readings,” he says, pronouncing penchant the French way, “ended up in the back of a squad car. Apparently, throwing up on an officer is considered assault.”
My jaw drops. “Valeria? You’re kidding!”
“No.”
“Derek?” I ask with hesitation. “He got in trouble too?”
“Derek left when you did,” Swan says. One eyebrow tilts slyly as she holds my gaze.
“What?” I ask.
“You look relieved.”
“Well, yeah. Maybe. I guess I’m glad he left.”
“Look, the only reason Valeria went after you like that is because you and Derek … you clearly like each other. And she’s super possessive and doesn’t wanna let him go. Even though they dated, like, years ago.”
“Why’d they break up?”
“No idea, but they started dating after the Monteros got divorced, and if you ask me, Derek’s heart went all mush for her. But she’s so insufferable, it didn’t last.”
His heart went all mush for her. I bite back a tinge of jealousy, wondering what Derek felt inside when he looked at her. What about her made his heart go mush. Then I remember Valeria’s stuffed corgi, and the blue Popsicle on her ribbons, and their history built with forts and imagination.
“He wrote me letters, you know,” I say. “Letters and poems and everything. And CJ. He told me about his mom. Her addiction.”
William and Swan both lean forward. “What?”
“She’s been abusing painkillers since the accident.”
CJ sighs heavy. “Yeah. I get why he reacted so badly to me being at his house.”
“What happened exactly?” I nudge his shoulder.
He pulls a lock of hair from its mousse-y mold and wraps it around his finger. “Someone ordered pizzas. And when I got there, his mom asked me if I had pills on me.”
“Nooo,” Swan groans, putting her head in her hands. “That’s not good. That’s not okay. You should have told us, CJ.”
“Well, I didn’t wanna piss him off any more.”
“Does Derek know his mom did that?” I ask.
“Yeah.” He nods, lips pursed. “I was trying to leave and she followed me to the car. That’s when Derek showed up. He looked so embarrassed, I didn’t think he’d say anything. We’d just pretend it never happened. But no. Not Derek. He wanted to pulverize me.”
We’re all quiet, taking it in, except William, who keeps repeating, “Wow. Wow.”
My mind starts leafing through its own book of memories, and I’m stuck on that moment at the beach, when Derek’s hard shell cracked and I saw inside, the shimmering. Him calling me into the water. Him dancing with me in the sand. His laugh.
I sigh deep. “What now?” It’s a question, only two words, that contains all the uncertainty of my life.
Swan looks at me intently. “No more hiding. Life is too ruthless. We can’t make it out alive if we hide from each other.”
“No one makes it out alive,” CJ laughs.
“You guys don’t think, like … You don’t think I’m …” I swallow the words.
Swan leans forward again. “What are you asking? If we think any less of you? Jae, it could happen to anyone.”
“More than anything,” William says, “I’m amazed at how well you’ve held yourself together, all things considered. Can’t be easy, especially hiding it from everyone. But do you feel a little bit, the teeniest bit, better? Now that we know?”
Maybe it’s the way William looks at me when he says it. But my eyes become pools of tears and I swipe at my face furiously to catch them. “Umm …” I quiver. “I feel … supported. I never had that.”
“No? Why not?” William asks, crossing the room to bring me a tissue from my desk.
So I tell them. All of it. And I feel like a vine, wrapping myself around a well-rooted tree, tasting oxygen, holding rain, feeling sun.
And when I’m done, Swan whispers, “I don’t know how you did it. You obviously love your baby. It’s like you gave her up because you love her.”
I nod. “The adoption counselor told me to say placed. So yeah, I placed her with another family. Because I love her.”
“Do you want to see her again? I mean, I’m sure you do, but what if you, like, ran into her somewhere? How would you feel?”
I pause and stare down at the pink rug. “I’d be scared. And happy. I don’t think I could ever be completely ready, but I would love to see her again.”