Lola and the Boy Next Door

chapter twenty-nine

It’s the Sunday night before school resumes, and my parents are on a date. I’m hanging out with Norah. We’re watching a marathon of home decorating shows, rolling our eyes for different reasons. Norah thinks the redesigned houses look bourgeois and, therefore, boring. I think they look boring, too, but only because each designer seems to be working from the same tired manual of modern decorating.

“It’s nice to see you looking like yourself again,” she says during a commercial break.

I’m wearing a blue wig, a ruffled Swiss Heidi dress, and the arms from a glittery golden thrift-store sweater. I’ve cut them off, and I’m using them as glittery golden leg warmers. I snort. “Yeah, I know how much you like the way I dress.”

She keeps her eyes on the television, but that familiar Norah edge returns to her voice. “It’s not how I would dress, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it. It doesn’t mean I don’t like you for who you are.”

I keep my eyes on the television, too, but my chest tightens.

“So,” I say a few minutes later as the show recaps what we’ve already seen. “What’s happening with the apartment? Has Ronnie set a move-in date yet?”

“Yep. I’ll be gone by the end of the week.”

“Oh. That’s really . . . soon.”

She snorts. Her snort sounds like mine. “Soon can’t come soon enough. Nathan’s been suffocating me from the moment I arrived.”

And there’s the ungrateful Norah I know. Suddenly her impending departure is welcome. But I only shake my head, and we watch the rest of the episode in discontented silence. Another commercial break begins.

“Do you know the secret to fortune-telling?” she asks, out of the blue.

I sink into the couch cushions. Here we go.

Norah turns to look at me. “The secret is that I don’t read leaves. And palm readers don’t read palms, and tarot readers don’t read cards. We read people. A good fortune-teller reads the person sitting across from them. I study the signs in their leaves, and I use them to give an interpretation of what I know that person wants to hear.” She leans in closer. “People prefer paying when they hear what they want to hear.”

I cringe, sure that I don’t want to hear whatever’s coming next.

“Say a woman comes in,” she continues. “No wedding ring, tight shirt, cleavage up to her chin. Asks about her future. This is a woman who wants me to say that she’s about to meet someone. And, usually, if the shirt is tight enough and with confidence gained from a good fortune, guess what? She’ll probably meet someone. Now, it may not be the right someone, but it still means her fortune came true.”

My frown deepens. I stare at the television screen, but the flashing commercials are making it hard to focus. “So . . . when you looked at me, you saw someone who wanted arguments and confusion and partings? And you wanted it to come true?”

“No.” Norah scoots even closer. “You were different. I don’t have many chances to talk to you when you might actually listen to what I have to say. Reading your leaves was an opportunity. I didn’t tell you what you wanted to hear. I told you what you needed to hear.”

I’m confused and hurt. “I needed to hear bad things?”

She places a hand on mine. It’s bony, but somehow it’s also warm. I turn to her, and her gaze is sympathetic. “Your relationship with Max was waning,” she says, using her fortune-teller voice. “And I saw that you had a much more special one waiting right behind it.”

“The cherry. You did know how I felt about Cricket back then.”

She removes her hand. “Christ, the mailman knew how you felt about him. And he’s a good kid, Lola. It was stupid of you to get caught with him in bed—you know your parents are strict as hell about that shit—but I know he’s good. They’ll come around to it, too. And I know you’re good.”

I’m quiet. She thinks I’m a good person.

“Do you know my biggest regret?” she asks. “That you turned into this bright, beautiful, fascinating person . . . and I can’t take credit for any of it.”

There’s a lump in my throat.

Norah crosses her arms and looks away. “Your fathers piss me off, but they’re great parents. I’m lucky they’re yours.”

“They care about you, too, you know. I care about you.”

She’s silent and stiff. I take a chance and, for the first time since I was a little girl, burrow into her side. Her hard shoulders melt against me.

“Come back and visit,” I say. “Once you’ve moved.”

The lights of the commercials flash.

Flash.

Flash.

“Okay,” she says.

I’m in my bedroom later that night when my phone rings. It’s Lindsey. “On second thought,” she begins, “maybe I shouldn’t tell you.”

“What?” Her unnaturally disturbed tone gives me an instant chill. “Tell me what?”

A long, deep breath. “Max is back.”

The blood drains from my face. “What do you mean? How do you know?”

“I just saw him. My mom and I were shopping in the Mission, and there he was, walking down Valencia.”

“Did he see you? Did you talk to him? What did he look like?”

“No. Hell no. And like he always does.”

I’m stupefied. How long has he been back? Why hasn’t he called? His continued silence means that he must have been telling the truth: I’m nothing to him anymore.

Lately, I’ve gone several hours—once, an entire day—without thinking of him. This is a fresh dig into my wounds, but somehow . . . the blow isn’t as crushing as I thought it would be. Perhaps I’m becoming okay with being nothing to Max.

“Can you breathe?” Lindsey asks. “Are you breathing?”

“I’m breathing.” And I am. An idea is quickly mushrooming inside of me. “Listen, I have to go. There’s something I need to do.” I grab a faux-fur coat and my wallet, and I’m racing out my door when I hear a faint plink.

I stop.

Plink, my window says again. Plink. Plink.

My heart leaps. I throw open the panes, and Cricket sets down his box of toothpicks. He’s wearing a red scarf and some sort of blue military jacket. And then I notice the leather satchel slung over his shoulder, and this blow is crushing. His break is over. He’s going back to Berkeley.

His arms slacken. “You look incredible.”

Oh. Right. It’s been a month since he’s seen me in anything other than black. I give him a shy smile. “Thank you.”

Cricket points at my coat. “Going somewhere?”

“Yeah, I was on my way out.”

“Meet me on the sidewalk first? Would your parents would mind?”

“They’re not home.”

“Okay. See you in a minute?”

I nod and hurry downstairs. “I’ll be back in an hour,” I tell Norah. “There’s something I have to do. Tonight.”

She mutes the television and raises an eyebrow in my direction. “Does this mysterious errand have to do with a certain guy?”

I’m not sure which one she means, but . . . either is correct. “Yeah.”

She studies me for several excruciating seconds. But then she un-mutes the television. “Just get back here before your parents do. I don’t wanna have to explain.”

Cricket is waiting at the bottom of my stairs. His willowy figure looks exquisite in the moonlight. Our gazes are fixed on each other as I walk down the twenty-one steps to my sidewalk. “I’m going back to school,” he says.

I nod at his bag. “I guessed as much.”

“I just wanted to say goodbye. Before I left.”

“Thank you.” I shake my head, flustered. “I mean . . . I’m glad. Not that you’re going. But that you found me before leaving.”

He puts his hands in his pockets. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

We’re quiet for a minute. Once more, I smell the faintest trace of bar soap and sweet mechanical oil, and my insides nervously stir.

“So . . . which way?” He gestures in both directions down the sidewalk. “Where are you going?”

I point in the opposite direction from where he’ll go to catch his train. “That way. There’s, uh, some unfinished business I have to attend to.”

Cricket knows, from my hesitation, what I’m talking about. I’m afraid he’ll tell me not to go—or, worse, ask to escort me—but he only pauses. And then he says, “Okay.”

Trust.

“You’ll come home soon?” I ask.

The question makes him smile. “Promise you won’t forget me while I’m gone?”

I smile back. “I promise.”

And as I walk away, I realize that I have no idea how I’ll manage to stop thinking about him.

The dread doesn’t hit until I arrive at his apartment and see the familiar brown stucco walls and pink oleander bush. I glance up at Max’s apartment. The light is on and there’s movement behind the curtain. Doubt creeps in like a poisonous fog. Was it wrong of me to come here? Is it selfish for me to want to apologize if he doesn’t want to hear it?

I climb the dark stairwell that leads to his front door. I’m relieved when he opens it, and not Johnny, but my relief is shortlived. Max’s amber eyes glare at me, and the scent of cigarettes is strong. No spearmint tonight.

“I—I heard you were back.”

Max remains silent.

I force myself to hold his stony gaze. “I just I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry. I’m sorry for lying, and I’m sorry for the way things ended. I didn’t treat you fairly.”

Nothing.

“Okay. Well. That was it. Bye, Max.”

I’m on the first step back down when he calls out, “Did you sleep with him?”

I stop.

“While we were together,” he adds.

I turn and look him in the eye. “No. And that’s the truth. We didn’t even kiss.”

“Are you sleeping with him now?”

I blush. “God, Max.”

“Are you?”

“No. And I’m leaving now.” But I don’t move. This is my last chance to know. “Where have you been for the last month? I called. I wanted to talk with you.”

“I was staying with a friend.”

“Where?”

“Santa Monica.” Something about the way he says it. As if he wants me to ask.

“A . . . girl?”

“A woman. And I did sleep with her.” Max slams his door.