Fans of the Impossible Life (10 page)

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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I showed up at Mira's front door after being summoned by a text from Sebby. He was standing on her porch when I got there, wearing blue sparkly wings that made him look like a defiant nighttime butterfly.

“Did you bring anything?” he asked.

I opened the plastic bag that I was carrying. A bag of popcorn, a pound bag of M&Ms, and a box of fruit roll-ups.

“My dad's a secret junk-food eater,” I said.

“Great,” he said. He rang the bell.

Mira came to the door in a sheer pink dress with a large collar and tiny clear plastic buttons that looked like glass if you squinted. A lacy slip was peeking out from the bottom. She was wearing purple wings that matched Sebby's.

“Jeremy,” Mira said. It was a statement, not a greeting.

“Hey,” I said. “Hi, Mira.”

“I think he can help,” Sebby said.

“Really?”

Sebby nodded.She seemed to make some quick decisions about a few things.

“Okay,” she said.

The house was dark except for strings of Christmas lights lining the stairs. We stepped inside and closed the door behind us.

“Beautiful.” Sebby said, adjusting Mira's wings. “From one fairy to another.”

“I convinced my parents to go on a date night by doing my best impression of my bossy sister.”

“Well done,” Sebby said.

We went upstairs to Mira's room. Vintage scarves were tied together into a long garland that was threaded throughout the room, ending in a canopy over her bed. Her closet was overflowing with piles of shoes and belts and rejected outfit options. A few dresses hung in places of honor on hooks on the wall. In the corner a small table with a sewing machine on it was partially covered with scraps of fabric and strewn spools of thread.

“Wow,” I said.

“Sorry about the mess,” she said

“No, I just didn't know you had . . . all of this.”

“She's a hoarder,” Sebby said.

“There's more in the basement, unfortunately,” she said.

“She's going to be, like, on the show
Hoarders
. About hoarders.”

“Shut up, Sebby.”

Mira had decorated any part of her room that wasn't already covered in things with silver and blue hanging ornaments for the occasion.

“From our Christmukkah tree,” Mira said. “Mom lets us have a tree but it has to be in all Hanukkah colors, or else her Jewish guilt sets in and she starts force-feeding us rugelach.”

She had covered her dresser with tiny tea lights and incense, and she and Sebby lit them until the air was thick with smoke. I breathed it all in, worried that at any moment they would realize that they had made a mistake in allowing me to be there. But Sebby had taken my hand at the diner the night before, and it seemed to mean that he knew me now. That I was permitted to witness this.

We sat in a circle on the floor and presented our offerings. The bags of snacks from me, a container of glittery gel and a pint of whiskey from Sebby.

“You're not much of a fairy without wings,” Sebby said to me. “We'll have to make do.”

He opened the jar of glitter and dipped his fingers in it, holding it out for Mira to do the same.

“You must prove yourself worthy of the gods' attention,” he said.

“Close your eyes, Jeremy,” Mira said to me.

I closed them and felt their fingers on my eyelids, cold glitter spreading out down the sides of my face.

“Perfect,” Mira said.

I opened my eyes and watched them put glitter on each
other's faces, as we became three of a kind. Tiny tribe.

Sebby opened the whiskey and held it up in a toast.

“We are here to draw out the demons,” he declared.

He passed the bottle to Mira.

“Drink,” he said, “and speak the name of that which you must defeat.”

She smiled and sipped from the bottle.

“Depression with a side of chronic fatigue syndrome,” she said.

“Mira,” Sebby said. “More poetic.”

She took another drink and thought about it.

“The demons of sadness,” she said. “The aches of daily life. The reasons not to live.”

“Good. Jeremy?”

Mira passed the bottle to me.

“What do I say?”

“Your own thing, if you want,” she said.

I took a sip. The whiskey burned going down. “I don't know,” I said.

“Something you would give anything to get rid of.”

I took another sip.

“Being afraid,” I said. A tiny part of me, like a knot in the back of my throat, wanted to cry when I said it. But something stronger held it back. Something that knew that in this moment I wasn't afraid.

“Good,” Mira said. “That's really good, Jeremy.”

I handed the bottle to Sebby.

He contemplated it for a moment, then said, “Being alone,” and drank.

It was only much later that I would understand what Sebby meant by this, how the presence of other people could not be counted on to protect him. And that even though you could touch someone it did not always mean that they were really there.

“And now,” he said, taking our right hands and placing them on the bottle, “we have to replace it with something good. The life we wish for ourselves.”

He looked at each of us.

“How about one where I'm allowed to eat pizza?” Mira said.

“The demons have made you think too small.” He closed his eyes as we sat in that circle, all of us holding the bottle together, the warm burn of the alcohol feeding something that was growing inside each of us, an energy joining where our fingers touched.

“May we live impossibly,” Sebby said when he opened his eyes. “Against all odds. May people look at us and wonder how such jewels can sparkle in the sad desert of the world. May we live the impossible life.”

Sebby waved incense over the snacks to bless them and we lay on the floor and ate and passed the bottle around until we gave ourselves stomachaches.

When the incense burned down, Sebby lit a new stick and pointed it at Mira's bed.

“The demon lives in here!” He got on her bed and waved
the smoke around it. “Why do you keep my best friend prisoner in your comfy folds? Don't you know she needs to be out at the mall with me?”

Mira climbed on the bed with him and laughed. “Don't yell at my bed,” she said. “It's not Bed's fault.”

“Lie down,” he commanded. “Close your eyes. I feel the gods are here with us now.”

She did as she was told, and I watched from the floor as Sebby swirled the incense around her limbs, letting a smoky outline of her dissolve into the air.

“Better,” he whispered. “They have heard our calls for help.”

He leaned over and kissed her on the forehead, then on the mouth. The smoke from the incense hovered around them as I watched him lie down next to her, curl his body around hers, breathe deep into the space between her neck and the pillow. She played with his hair, letting her legs entwine with his, as if their bodies were meant to fit together. An ache formed down in the bottom of my lungs as I watched them.

Mira looked over to me.

“He looks lovely in glitter, Sebs,” she said.

Sebby looked up and smiled. Mira held out her hand to me.

“Come here, Jeremy.”

I did as I was told and she pulled me onto the bed next to her, the three of us lying there in the smoke, my body pressed against hers.

“You have to kiss him, Sebby,” she said. “To make the gods happy.”

Sebby smiled, leaned himself up on his elbow and looked at me, his eyes sparkling like real magic there in Mira's candlelit bedroom. A breeze was creeping in through the half-open window. The ornaments hanging from the ceiling fan swayed gently.

“She says we have to,” he said.

He leaned toward me and something, some boldness that to this day remains a mystery to me, brought me to him, Mira lying between us as we met in the space over her. And then his lips were on mine and the universe fell into a perfect, white heat. I had been nothing before that moment and one day I would be nothing again. But there and then my life was real. With his lips, and his lovely mouth.

He pulled away and Mira curled her body back into his, turning away from me.

“Good,” she said. “The spell's complete.”

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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I felt myself panicking before I even woke up the next morning, my barely conscious brain already taking stock of the events of the night before. This was the part of me that knew that no matter how happy I had been with Mira and Sebby in that moment, I was sure that I had embarrassed myself. I had been too bold by thinking that I had the right to be there with them, and now I would be punished with my own signature style of self-shaming.

I hid under my blanket at the memory of Sebby's kiss, Mira's body between us, and felt a stirring in my stomach, the kind of desire that could only lead to more opportunities for me to do and say the wrong thing. Other people were not a good idea for me. I had always known this. What did I think I was doing?

I looked at my phone on my nightstand. One new text message. It was from Mira.

Meet us at the bus stop on Bloomfield and Ridge. 3pm.
They were sitting in the bus shelter when I pulled up on my bike.

“Excellent,” Mira said. “You made it.”

“Where are we going?”

“Arc's,” Sebby said. He turned to Mira. “Or Goodwill?”

“Goodwill's closed on Sundays.”

“Arc's it is,” Sebby said. “We have to thrift immediately in order to solidify our good moods. We have no patience for those who insist on observing the Lord's Day with a somber lack of activity.”

I locked up my bike.

“We're going to a thrift store?”

“We are going to a place of former victories,” he said. “No reason to get overconfident, but Arc's has literally never failed us.”

“Plus I'm wearing my lucky one-dollar outfit,” Mira said. “One-dollar dress, one-dollar coat, one-dollar shoes.”

She stood up to show me. It was a vaguely nautical navy-blue dress with tiny white polka dots and white piping along a boatneck collar. A navy fitted trench coat flared out at her hips. Battered brown cowboy boots finished up the ensemble.

“Nice,” I said. “Really only a dollar?”

“Technically the boots were two dollars, but I figure they were a dollar each, so it still counts.”

The bus pulled up and we got on, made our way to the higher seats in the back.

“How far is it?” I asked.

“This is a pilgrimage, Jeremy,” Sebby said. “It should take years of your life. You must prove yourself worthy of the gifts which are to be bestowed upon you once you reach the promised land.”

“Twenty minutes,” Mira said.

Arc's was an unremarkable-looking storefront in a strip mall off the highway, flanked by a craft store on one side and a pawn shop on the other. Mira immediately started rummaging through a rack of coats outside next to the front door.

“Heavenly,” Sebby said, looking at the sign declaring
HALF OFF ALL RED TAGGED ITEMS ON SUNDAYS, HALF OFF BLUE TAGGED ITEMS ON MONDAYS
.

He pulled me inside, a bell on the door announcing our entrance to a disinterested populace. Rows of racks of clothes filled the store lengthwise to capacity, with a section for shoes at the front and toys and books at the back. Large women in sweatpants pushed shopping carts from row to row, examining floral nightgowns and used children's Halloween costumes before replacing them on the rack. There was no décor beyond what was needed for the purposes of display. This was a place with a mission. No need to sugarcoat it. These were the castoffs of a disposable society, semiorganized for those with either the patience to sift through it, or the financial need to find a bargain.

“Are we looking for something specific?” I asked.

“You haven't thrifted before, have you?” Sebby said.

I shook my head.

“We are looking for everything and nothing. We are looking”—he picked up a giant red platform shoe with palm trees painted on the heel—“for inspiration.”

Mira came in the door behind us and immediately disappeared to the back of the store.

“Best to give her the first half hour alone,” Sebby said. “She doesn't really like to talk until she's got a good pile going.”

“You guys do this a lot?”

“Mira more than me. She's obsessed.” He put down the platform shoe. “Unfortunately not my size,” he said.

Sebby took me to the men's section and picked out some T-shirts and sweaters for me to try on. For himself he found a leather motorcycle jacket with a skull painted on the back by someone who didn't seem to have much familiarity with human anatomy, and insisted on wearing it around the store.

“So none of these badasses will mess with us,” he said, eyeing an old lady with a rusty Cuisinart in her basket.

We met up with Mira at the fitting rooms, three tiny stalls in the corner with swinging saloon-style doors that exposed your feet at the bottom and your head and shoulders at the top. Mira had an armful of dresses and some belts slung over her shoulder.

“Fashion show,” she said.

I took the room next to her while Sebby raided the rack of accessories nearby, attaching as many clip-on earrings to his ears as he could.

“Okay, this has potential I think,” Mira said. She pushed
open the doors of her fitting room and stepped out wearing a purple lacy prom dress with a poufy skirt. The back zipper was open, showing the latch of her bra.

“Too small on the top,” she said, “but I could cut it off at the waist and make it into a skirt.”

“You know how to do that?” I said.

“She's handy with a needle and thread,” Sebby said. He wrapped a few scarves around his neck. “Mira used to do the costumes for the illustrious Mountain View Players. Her Pippin was very daring.”

“You did?”

“Just some stuff for the plays at my middle school. It was dumb.”

“That sounds cool.”

She shrugged.

“It was nothing.”

I pulled on one of the cardigans Sebby had picked out for me. It was blue with brown buttons down the front.

“It's good,” Sebby said.

“But will he wear it?” Mira said.

“Will you wear it?” Sebby asked me.

I turned around to look at myself in the mirror. The sweater looked like something we might have found when we cleaned out my grandfather's closet after he died, fussy and a little ratty. But Sebby had picked it out for me. And that made me want to wear it every day for the rest of my life.

“Thrifting's no good if you just accumulate things with
good intentions,” Mira said.

“Yeah, that's how you end up with a closet like Mira's,” Sebby said.

“I have a plan for everything I get,” she said.

“You collect projects that you don't do,” Sebby said.

“Yes, fine, some projects later seem less worthwhile. But it's not my fault. Stupid school uniforms have taken all of the fun out of things.”

She looked at herself in the mirror.

“But this I'll work on, I think.”

“You think?” Sebby said.

“Yes, Sebby, don't be such a nag,” she said, heading back through her swinging doors. “I'll decide once we've seen everything. Jeremy, you're getting that sweater.”

“I will wear it,” I said.

“Of course you will,” Sebby said. “It looks great on you.”

Two hours later Mira had decided to pass on the purple and go with a hand-sewn, forties-style black-and-white dress and an original Girl Scout Scoutmaster's uniform, complete with patches and troop number. Sebby returned the fifteen-dollar leather skull jacket to the rack, explaining that “nothing at Arc's should ever cost more than ten, not even this exquisite work of wearable art.”

I bought the cardigan and a distressed brown leather belt that Mira picked out for me. We were almost out the door when
she stopped at a rack of men's accessories.

“Look at this.” She picked up a tie, navy with lines of white script and white sketched flowers on it.

“What does it say?” I asked.

“It's Shakespeare quotes,” she said. “‘To thine own self be true.' ‘Romeo oh Romeo.'”

Sebby examined it. “Totally random Shakespeare quotes.”

“We should get this for Peter,” Mira said, turning to me.

“Peter Sprenger?” I said.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Doesn't it scream ‘English teacher' to you? A tie with flowers and random Shakespeare quotes?” She turned it over to look at the price tag. “It's only fifty cents. I'm getting it.”

Back on the bus we reviewed our purchases.

“You didn't get anything,” I said to Sebby.

“I'm just the wingman today,” he said. “Plus my room is a little crowded at the moment with tiaras that surprisingly don't belong to me.”

“I thought Tilly promised you a closet,” Mira said.

“I don't think she even remembers that I live there.”

“Who's Tilly?” I asked.

“Otherwise known as Big Momma,” Sebby said. “She runs the brothel where I work.”

“His foster mom,” Mira said.

“Oh,” I said.

“It's true,” Sebby said, holding up Mira's new Scoutmaster uniform to see if it would fit him. “I am a ward of the state. Pretty sexy, right?”

“You don't have, um . . .” I wasn't sure what to ask.

“Dead mom, as you know. Nobody else. Joined a brothel.” He folded the dress carefully and put it back in Mira's bag. “Share room with fellow tiara-obsessed prostitute.”

“Probably not great to call a nine-year-old a prostitute,” Mira said.

“Fine. Filthy whore, then.”

Mira rolled her eyes and pulled out the tie she bought for Peter.

“Do we know when Peter's birthday is?”

“We have to give it to him today,” Sebby said. “So he can share in the joy of discovery.”

“He won't be at school on a Sunday,” Mira said.

A minute went by before I decided to say, “I know where he lives.”

Peter lived a few blocks from the school, in half of a two-family house with a neglected backyard and a peeling paint job. He answered the door in cutoff jean shorts and a white T-shirt and stared at the three of us standing on his front stoop like underprepared but expectant trick-or-treaters.

“Hello there,” he said, looking bemused as always, as if one
of us had just said something insightful about
The Sun Also Rises
.

“We brought you something,” Mira said.

“A present,” Sebby said.

“Hold on a second.” He went back inside. The door fell open a crack and we could see him gathering up some bottles in the living room, letting them clank into a recycling bin in the kitchen.

“Come on in,” he said when he came back, pulling the door all the way open.

His living room looked the same as I remembered it from the last time I had been there, a little messier since he hadn't been expecting anyone. A basket of unfolded laundry lay on a lumpy futon couch next to a beat-up recliner. A large flat-screen TV had a football game on mute. A stack of student essays lay on the coffee table next to red and blue pens.

“Aren't you supposed to have
the guys
over to watch the game, Peter?” Sebby asked, making himself comfortable next to the laundry.

“What? A man can't sit folding his laundry alone on a Sunday night and not be seen as pathetic?”

“You said it, not me,” Sebby said.

“I'm starting to regret inviting you in.”

Mira sat down on the futon next to Sebby.

“We do actually have something for you,” she said.

She took the tie out of the bag and handed it to Peter.

“Literary neckwear.”

Peter examined it. “‘Neither a borrower nor a lender be,'”
he read.

“Shakespeare,” Sebby said with authority.

“I see that.”

“We saw it at the thrift store and thought you would like it,” Mira said.

“I do.” Peter smiled. “I love it, thank you.”

“You're very welcome,” Sebby said.

Peter's kitchen was separated from the living room by a counter with some uncomfortable-looking stools, as if breakfast should only be eaten while perched on the edge of the day's possibilities. He went to the fridge.

“Can I get you guys something? I have juice, I think.”

“I'll have a Diet Dr Pepper with a lime twist,” Sebby said.

“Like I said, I have juice.”

“We're good,” Mira said.

I was standing by the window, looking out at the porch that led to Peter's backyard. I was worried that I might have betrayed some kind of secret trust between me and Peter by leading Sebby and Mira here. Or else visiting him with no reason other than to bring him a present could be a way of saying thank you for how he had helped me. It was difficult to find a way to say thank you for something like that.

“This is the Patriots?” Sebby said, watching the TV.

“Yeah. I just have it on for background noise while I'm grading,” Peter said. “I'm more of a basketball guy.”

“WNBA?” Sebby said. “That is some hot action right there.”

“Peter is actually our teacher,” Mira said, “so if you could
avoid talking about ‘hot action' with him, that would be great.”

“Listen, this is man stuff,” Sebby said. “You wouldn't get it.”

Peter came and sat down in the recliner.

“Am I right, dude?” Sebby held out a fist for a fist bump. Peter met him halfway.

“Totally, bro,” he said.

Mira rolled her eyes.

I felt awkward suddenly. The memories of this place were something that I felt needed to be processed in private before I could act like it was normal that Sebby and Mira were here in Peter's living room with me, making jokes and demonstrating in some way to Peter that yes, maybe things had gotten better for me. Maybe I would have friends after all and not continue to be that boy from last spring that he needed to look out for. But it was all so new. The dance had only happened two days before, and I felt sure in this moment that it couldn't last. I was already anticipating my own shame at an inevitable future when Peter would ask why he never saw me with Mira and Sebby anymore.