Kissing in America Page 12

  “You’ll probably be really busy in LA?” I asked her across the row.

  “Oh, very. My business is thriving. I tell everyone, the internet and its lack of rules and safeguards is the best thing to ever happen to my business. I’m hiring a staff soon, you know. The more engagements I book, the more I realize I can’t do it all myself.” I tried to picture who Janet would hire. A whole staff dressed like eggplants.

  “It’s good you’ll be busy. Because we’ll be busy with the show,” I said. “Really busy.”

  “I understand,” she said. She kept writing notes and typing on her laptop.

  Annie was having her own texting drama with her sisters. I looked over her shoulder.

  Mom just told me she worked back-to-back shifts because you forgot yours??! You promised you’d take over while I’m away. DO YOUR SHIFTS! YOU PROMISED!

  Jenny and Lala both wrote back, “Sorry!” with about twelve goofy emojis.

  Annie sighed and returned to her books.

  I took out my lit notes—I was making a set of flash cards for Annie about literary figures—and I looked out the window. The city coasted by, and the land became dotted with barns and silos again, and I thought about how I’d describe our trip to Will, how I’d tell him about my worried mother, Annie’s sisters, Aunt Janet’s disease talk, stopping for chili, and the cows and cornfields—and I realized I wasn’t only living the trip, but also taking notes for the tales I’d tell him afterward.

  There was one sentence I couldn’t get out of my head, though.

  They only want one thing.

  I looked over at Janet. Her voice had invaded my brain.

  Will didn’t only want one thing. He wasn’t a beast. (Although, if I was completely honest, maybe there was something a little beasty about him—his arms, strong and wide and bracing, the weight of him as he kissed me.)

  Maybe a little beastiness wasn’t a bad thing.

  We’d made out for hours, all night, but we didn’t do it. Why didn’t we?

  A part of me wished we had done it, despite Janet’s pictures. Maybe it would’ve cemented things between us, bound him to me. The communion of souls. The dance as old as time. The delicious paradise of two becoming one. Maybe if we’d done it, he would’ve found a way to stay in New York all summer.

  But how did it feel to have a raging wild dagger inside you, making you bleed? A throbbing moisture missle? A flaming javelin? A heat sword?

  We didn’t do it because I was scared to. I didn’t need Janet’s gonorrhea eyeballs to frighten me—I was already totally freaking terrified.

  I was scared not only of it hurting physically, but of it hurting my feelings, or changing them, or crushing them. It seemed like such a momentous thing, too enormous to even figure out. During the night, I told him, “I’m a—I haven’t—I never—” I was too scared and embarrassed to even say the word virgin. (Would it make me sound like a loser? Did he somehow know that the only guy in high school who’d liked me so far was David Dweener, who probably kept his Cats T-shirt on in bed? That I’d barely even kissed anyone ever? Would he think I was pathetic and weird?) But he said gently, patiently, “We won’t do anything you don’t want to. We’ll take it slow,” and our clothes stayed on, I spent the whole night in his arms, and though he seemed a tiny bit disappointed, I kept thinking, We’ll have time for more later. We’ll have plenty of time for more.

  In romance novels, sex seemed kind of ridiculous, with its orbs of flesh and manhoods, but then why, in real life, did it seem so serious? On the roof with Will, each touch and kiss made me feel more in love. Did he feel that also? Is that what his kisses meant? Would sex feel like that—an even bigger expression of love?

  Would I ever have the guts to do it with Will?

  I wanted to talk to Annie about it again. We’d rehashed the night on the roof dozens of times, but I never stopped wanting to talk about it. I waited till Janet had fallen asleep, the bottle of sanitizer still in her lap, and I turned to Annie and whispered, “Do you think there’s really a chance of getting all those diseases? Do you think it hurts to . . . do it?”

  She put down her book and checked to see if Janet was asleep, too. “Have you ever seen a video of elephant sex?” she asked quietly.

  “No.”

  “Let’s just say it doesn’t look like the most comfortable thing on the planet. Their penises are four feet long.”

  “I’m not planning on having sex with an elephant.”

  “I know,” she said. “My point is it doesn’t look so comfy when humans do it either. I don’t think it’s about being comfortable or easy—it’s a totally different thing. Don’t worry. We’ve got plenty of time to have tons of sex and figure it all out. In college.”

  In college. Her mantra again. Sometimes I thought Annie was afraid I’d become like her sisters, wasting my life away, obsessed with boys—I loved romance novels, after all, and I’d fallen for Will, but my grades were good. I told her you could fall in love and get into a good college and be a success, but she never seemed to believe me.

  “You should take a break from thinking about him,” she told me, “and focus on the show.” She tapped her study schedule spreadsheet.

  I picked up the flash cards again.

  She paused and gazed out the window, then turned back to me. “I’m worried about whether we even have a chance of winning at all.”

  “Of course we do,” I said.

  Her eyes shifted briefly to the floor. I thought of Annie’s parents working nights and weekends at the laundromat, and her mom’s shrine to Annie’s success. I had to stop thinking of Will and focus on winning Annie the scholarship.

  I checked the map. We’d be in Tennessee soon. One hour left to study.

  Annie’s phone buzzed. Her cousin had texted:

  See you soon! Have SOMETHING BIG to tell you!

  “What’s she talking about?” I asked.

  Annie shrugged. “She probably won some school prize or something. Her dad loves to call my mom and compare our grades and stuff.” She rolled her eyes. “I haven’t seen her in two years, but she’s really nice. You’ll love her. I can’t wait to see her.” We’d be in Tennessee for two nights before the longest leg of our whole trip—the fifteen-hour bus ride from Tennessee to Texas.

  She went back to American historical trivia, and I made a stack of flash cards about feminist philosophers. She had her own method for memorization—she’d translate whatever she read in textbooks into her own shorthand. Right now she was memorizing suffragette history. I peeked over at her notes:

  1848 LMott & ECS = 1st pblic mtg. 1866 LS & SB = AERA. 1869 WY Trtry = 1st rt vote.

  “It’s like a mad gibberish,” I said.

  “It works,” she said.

  In northern Tennessee, we stopped at a rest area with a gas station and a shop called Lammy’s SpeedyMart. They sold live crickets and pie milkshakes (“Drink Your Pie!”)—and romance novels. After looking through the racks I picked up one called American Amour. It was about a Revolutionary soldier named John Peter LeVere who falls in love with Dorothea, the daughter of a British officer. I stuck it in my backpack and then joined Janet and Annie at a picnic table. We’d already eaten our chili on the bus (Janet had pinched her nose at the smell), but we were hungry again. We ate the freeze-dried strawberries that Janet had brought from home.

  When we got back on the bus, Janet checked her watch. “We’re making good time,” she said. “For a nine-hour bus ride it’s not as bad as I thought.” She took a moment to glare at the other passengers.

  Just pretend she’s not there, Annie had said. I took out American Amour and turned to page one.

  “You’re not still reading those,” Janet said. “I thought you would’ve outgrown them by now.” When Janet had visited us over Passover last spring, she and my mom had mocked my romances together. Of a cover featuring Gurlag, she’d said, “He looks like he needs his shots. You’d have to take him to a veterinary clinic, not a doctor’s office.” My mom had
laughed. “In my day, in high school, I read mostly Shakespeare,” Janet had said.

  Now Janet told me, “I don’t know if it’s wise to read those in public. You don’t want people to think you’re not smart.”

  I squinted at her. “I want people to think I like boys with rabies who won’t get their shots.”

  “Hysterical,” she said.

  PART FOUR

  TIME DOES NOT BRING RELIEF

  Time does not bring relief; you all have lied

  Who told me time would ease me of my pain!

  I miss him in the weeping of the rain;

  I want him at the shrinking of the tide;

  The old snows melt from every mountain-side,

  And last year’s leaves are smoke in every lane;

  But last year’s bitter loving must remain

  Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.

  There are a hundred places where I fear

  To go,—so with his memory they brim.

  And entering with relief some quiet place

  Where never fell his foot or shone his face

  I say, “There is no memory of him here!”

  And so stand stricken, so remembering him.

  —Edna St. Vincent Millay

  Real

  Ladybug!” Annie’s cousin Grace cried as we stepped off the bus in Nashville; she raced toward Annie and enveloped her in a giant hug. I’d expected Grace to look like us—another person of the dorky persuasion—but she was gorgeous: tall and thin with long tanned legs. She’d tied her satiny ponytail with a green ribbon that glimmered like Christmas wrap.

  She explained that Ladybug was Annie’s nickname from third grade. A ladybug had landed on top of her head one day and stayed there for their entire lunch period. I’d never heard this story before. I hadn’t met Annie until fourth grade, when her family moved to our neighborhood of Sunnyside, Queens, from Jackson Heights.

  Grace saw my whistle; she frowned, looking like the hosts of makeover shows do when they’re about to dump someone’s entire wardrobe in the garbage.

  “I have to wear it—my mom is kind of crazy and—” I started to explain with a nod toward Janet, but Grace had already skipped off, arm in arm with Annie, ponytail swinging. I shoved the whistle into my backpack. As soon as I could, I was going to throw that thing in the trash.

  We climbed into Grace’s parents’ SUV; Grace and Annie sat in the middle row. I sat behind them, next to Janet and the family dog.

  Annie and Grace had seen each other only a few times since the Youngs had moved to Tennessee four years ago. “Do you remember Mrs. Lee from church camp?” Grace asked. “And her kid with the ratty knee socks?” They giggled. Grace said something in Korean and they laughed even harder. “So what’s the big news?” Annie asked her.

  Grace looked coy. “I’ll tell you when we get to the restaurant.”

  Janet seemed relieved to be off the bus and in the Youngs’ giant clean car. “Thank you so much for hosting us,” Janet told them. “This is such a wonderful opportunity to expand my business to the South.” I pitied the poor teens of Tennessee. They had no idea what was in store for them.

  We drove to Shawnee, the town where Mr. Young worked for a data storage company; Grace’s family had moved here for his job. Giant oaks shaded the streets, and kudzu covered the hillsides, lush and thick. We stopped to pick up Grace’s boyfriend, Nick, on the way; he’d be joining us for dinner. He lived in a giant white house with columns in front. He had a shiny, porcine-pink face and blond hair cut so short you could barely see it. He squeezed in beside Grace and pinched her butt.

  Her parents didn’t see; they were absorbed in a conversation, and Janet was busy checking email on her phone. Apparently Nick found their obliviousness encouraging, because he leaned over and kissed Grace. Slurped her would be a more accurate description—he attacked her face like a squeegee tool. I tried to exchange looks with Annie, but she was staring out the window, studiously ignoring the display.

  I missed Will. He didn’t kiss like a squeegee tool. He was the opposite of a squeegee tool.

  When Nick’s hands finally released Grace, her eyes drilled into me, scrutinizing, as if asking, Don’t you wish you had this?

  Was she trying to make me uncomfortable? Because it was working. I looked out the window.

  When we reached Grace’s house, we gave them their gifts—Grace applied the lipstick in the hall mirror with a satisfied smile, and her parents oohed and aahed over the cookbook recipes for black-and-white cookies and Junior’s cheesecake.

  Grace’s mom showed us to our rooms—Janet had a guest bedroom on the top floor, Annie would sleep in Grace’s queen bed, and I’d sleep in Grace’s brother’s room—he was away visiting relatives in Korea. As Janet unpacked, Grace, Nick, and Annie and I sat on the porch and watched the sunset. Vines dripped from the trees, and everything glowed as if it had been dipped in honey.

  “So,” Grace said, holding Nick’s hand, her gaze moving from my face to my hair (had it turned frizzy in the humidity? Was it a Jewfro all over again?). “You got the idea for this whole trip because of a guy, right?” Her tone was skeptical, almost accusing.

  I nodded.

  Annie gave me a Sorry—maybe I shouldn’t have told her look.

  Grace tilted her head. “The guy’s your boyfriend, right?” she asked me.

  Boyfriend was too much of a leap. “Kind of,” I said. My voice sounded weak. I tried to sound more certain. “Sort of.” Why did she make me so nervous?

  “How long have you guys been together?”

  “Um—” I shrugged. “A little while.”

  I couldn’t say the truth. Actually, I’m not exactly sure if I’d use the word “together.” We kissed on a street corner and made out in a roof garden and now we write letters. It would be too humiliating to say it out loud to her. All of a sudden, I felt like a fraud. What was I thinking, going on this trip?

  Annie rescued me. “He’s an amazing guy. He sends her famous poems. She got one yesterday. In the mail.”

  Grace considered this. “Sending a poem is so—” I thought she was going to say romantic, but she said, “Weird. Why doesn’t he text or email it?”

  “He’s . . .” How to explain it without making him sound even weirder? “He likes . . . regular mail,” I said.

  She looked at me as if I’d said he liked to parade around in eighteenth-century knickers and a waistcoat while shouting Heigh-ho! and Odsbodikins!

  Grace leaned on Nick’s shoulder. “I don’t think I could put up with a kind of anything myself. I mean, you love each other. Or you don’t. If Nick and I never texted or emailed and lived thousands of miles apart, I’d just worry whether it was real.”

  Well, your real has a face like a raw ham, I wanted to say. But I didn’t say anything. Annie changed the subject.

  A few minutes later, we got back in the car and drove to Pop’s Happyland, the Youngs’ favorite restaurant. Inside were rustic wooden tables and sawdust on the floor. I sat as far away from Grace as I could. Janet passed her sanitizer around, and Mr. Young ordered plenty for everyone to share: wings ’n’ waffles, chicken-fried steak, biscuits and gravy, cheese grits, mac and cheese, red beans and rice, and fried okra. I told myself to forget Grace. At least the food was delicious.

  I ordered iced tea and the waitress asked, “Sweet or unsweet?”

  “Um . . . unsweet?” I’d never heard the word unsweet before. I’d never heard of chicken-fried steak either—I pictured a chicken wearing a chef’s hat, throwing a steak into the deep fryer.

  We’d been eating for five minutes when Grace whispered something to her father. He grinned, and they sat back in their seats.

  “Grace has something important to share,” Mr. Young said.

  Had Nick given her syphilis on her eyeball?

  Grace took a breath. “My dad wanted me to wait till dessert to tell you, but I can’t keep it to myself anymore.” She spoke slowly. “You’re looking at one of the Smartest Girl
s in America.”

  I almost choked on my biscuit.

  “You didn’t tell me you auditioned!” Annie raised her eyebrows.

  Grace smoothed her hair and beamed. “When you told me about the show, I thought, Why not? My dad said I should give it a try. I never thought I’d get picked. I’ve been waiting all this time to tell you. I wanted it to be a surprise.”

  Mr. Young tore into a chicken wing. “It’s a great opportunity. Only in America can you get a college scholarship from being on TV.”

  Annie looked taken aback, and a small storm began to brew inside of me.

  “You’ll have some tough competition,” Janet said, smiling. She patted Annie on the shoulder.

  “I know you’re going to win,” Grace told Annie. “I just thought it would be fun to get the free trip. We fly out in three days—my dad’s my official companion. My lifeline. We’re getting there early so we can meet with a media consultant and a buzzer-skills coach. I guess these kinds of shows are all about the buzzer skills. You guys are staying at the Mirabelle too, right?”

  “I have a client in LA with a lovely condo,” Janet said, “so we won’t be needing the hotel room. We’ll have a kitchen there, and we can do laundry, and there’s even a swimming pool.”

  My neck was too frozen to move.

  “I can’t believe you’re going too,” Annie said. “When Eva first found out about the show, I didn’t even want to do it. Now I think I’m more excited about it than she is. Did you hear about the internship stuff?”

  They chattered about MIT and Princeton, and Annie folded her arms in a way I’d seen lots of times before—her competitive You think you might beat me but you are so, so wrong to even try look—and I tried to stifle the inappropriate things in my head. I wanted to say, What are you doing on our show? Annie is my best friend. Mine.

  Like a three-year-old.

  They kept talking, and eventually I calmed the voices in my mind.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about what she’d said about Will and me, though. Real. I thought about it through dinner, the drive home, and while eating the entire box of Goo Goo Clusters that Mrs. Young had given me. I thought about it as I spent the night staring at wet bikinis and boobs, women with their mouths half open, grains of sand clinging to their lips—Grace’s brother had plastered the walls of his room with an entire Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. It was a cave of soft porn.