Jersey Tomatoes are the Best (9 page)

I got hold of a totally authentic Teletubbies suit and came as Tinky Winky.

At first no one knew who I was, which is a remarkably liberating thing. I could go up to the cutest guys in our school and body-slam them with my enormous, plush purple bottom, and they’d start to dance with me. They thought it was way fun to grind with Tinky Winky, and they’d laugh. With me, for a change. Not at me.

The fact is I’ve been getting laughed at since I started going to school with my hair in a ballet bun. Since I started getting excused from gym because my mother felt it might lead to a dance-career-ending injury. Started carrying umbrellas on sunny days, or wearing Capezio leggings and short, flowing dresses instead of jeans and T-shirts to school. I’ve been the object of other kids’ jokes from the moment they figured out I wasn’t like the rest of the pack.

What Henry doesn’t
get
is that if you want to survive that sort of thing, you have to make it work for you. Play up the things they mock, like sliding into leg splits at inappropriate moments, or wearing eccentric styles of dress. Then they start
to think you’re in on the joke. They think you like them, and they like you, and they never realize they’re mean little bastards who lacerate your feelings every day.

Here’s the thing: Henry’s a competitor who never lets her game face slip. I’m a performer. A master performer.

At some point that Halloween night I started to actually dance: a run of
soutenus
, a split. Kids went wild, applauded, and I heard, “Oh my god, that’s Eva!” The cute girls reclaimed their cute boyfriends at that point, but the dance was nearly over, so it was fine.

Footsteps creak on the wooden stairs outside my bedroom. Henry sits up and pulls off the tomatoes T-shirt.

“Girls? Burgers are ready,” I hear my dad say through the closed door.

“Coming,” I answer. Henry is staring at the T-shirt in her lap.

“I wish I were more like you,” she finally says. “But I’m only brave when I’m holding a racket and firing balls at someone.” I place my hand over hers.

“Just bring it,” I say. “Deal?”

“Deal,” she agrees.

We head downstairs, and happy party sounds drift up to us. The sliding screen door opening and closing. The clink of ice in glasses. Smell of meat sizzling on the grill. My mother’s sharp, high-pitched laugh. I stifle the urge to turn tail and run back to Facebook. All lined up properly on my computer screen.

If I’m so brave, why do I always feel like I might just … scream?

Chapter Nine

B
oca is
so
not New Jersey.

For one thing: palm trees. I’ve never seen one in real life, and now I see them everywhere. Lining the highway, dotting the gazillion golf courses we drive past and shading the entrances to these walled, gated developments that look like private clubs from the outside and have names like Bella Terra, or Golden Grand Harbor.

Another thing: the birds. I’ve already fallen in love with this funny white bird that has a long, curved beak. Mom calls it an ibis and tells me it’s practically the symbol of South Florida. For a girl whose entire bird experience is limited to sparrows, blue jays, crows, robins and an occasional cardinal, watching an ibis step with its long, pencil-thin legs through marsh grass, and poke that unlikely nose in the water, is completely fascinating.

Finally: the light. It’s so different from the light up north that you’ve got to wonder whether a whole other, way more
intense sun hangs over Florida. It makes the colors different. Red in Jersey doesn’t burn the way red burns in Florida. Yellow, orange, green … they seem brighter and weightless down here. Plus everyone wears these colorful clothes that just
go
with the sun. You see all these grandmas in teal, lime and magenta. Dressed in fruit-yogurt-colored golf shorts, with leathery faces bronzed burnt umber.

Eva would be horrified. I imagine her strolling the streets of Boca Raton dressed in a snow-white burka, carrying a parasol.
And
slathered with sunblock.

I’m determined to get a picture of a really tan person and email it to her. I’ve got my camera out now, as Mom and Dad and I sit at this little outdoor café, looking over lunch menus. We’re a few miles away from Chadwick, near the ocean, and our table is shaded by a big awning. We’ve been on the road for three days, driving straight on through from Bergen County to Palm Beach County, stopping only for bathroom breaks, meals or sleeping in a motel off the highway. Check-in is one p.m.

I’m trying to calm my nerves by looking through the viewfinder of my camera. I am absolutely surprised by myself. Henriette Lloyd, Tennis Terminator, is officially freaked out. My hands, attempting to hold the camera steady as I survey the other patrons through the tiny peephole, shake noticeably.

“You know,” I say, scanning the patio, “I feel like L. L. Bean at Paris Hilton’s birthday party.”

“Excuse me?” Mom asks.

I gesture to our clothes. We each wear some shade of tan shorts, and primary-colored, short-sleeved shirts. My parents wear sneakers with ankle-high socks; I’ve got my favorite Teva flip-flops. The other diners are dressed like tropical parrots. Men wear shirts with dizzying patterns. Women wear bright sundresses and glittery jewelry. Their sandals are studded with colorful beads. Every female toenail and fingernail is painted.

Dad chuckles. Nice to see
some
semblance of a smile on his face.

Mom looks at her watch. She swivels in her chair and her eyes dart impatiently.

“I’m going to find out whether anyone plans to take our order,” she announces, and walks briskly from the table. Mom’s usually pretty patient in restaurants, so this surprises me. Dad doesn’t seem to notice anything odd. He looks like he has something else on his mind.

“Henry,” he begins. I recognize the tone. “You know I haven’t been too keen on sending you to this school.”

Oh god, not this again. Can we please not have a scene in a restaurant right now?

“Uh, yeah, you weren’t shy about how you felt,” I reply dryly.

“I’m still not sure this is the right thing for you,” he says firmly. “But as I’ve said, and as I’ve promised your mother, I’m willing to give it a try. At least for the summer.”

“Dad, it’s just camp,” I said. Repeated, for the millionth time. “How many kids go to summer camp?”

He puts up his hand. Stops me, right there.

“No, Henry, it’s not just summer camp. I don’t want you to be naïve about this.” I shift in my chair.

“This is the big leagues, Henry. Kids here are getting groomed.”

Poodles get groomed. Horses get groomed. But kids?

“You’re not used to this heat. You’re not used to this level of physical pressure.”

“We’ve been through this, Dad…,” I try.

“If something hurts, stop. Go to the trainer right away. Never play through pain.”

“Dad?”

“Hydrate. Lots of water before, during and after workouts.”

“I’ll be the Poland Spring Queen, Mr. Lloyd.”

“Most of all: trust your instincts. You’re a good kid. You have good instincts. If something doesn’t feel right, say it. Never be afraid to say no.”

I say no all the time. You just never listen
.

Mom returns, ending the lecture. She flashes Dad this knowing look.

“The waitress is coming,” she says to me. Then she reaches into her bag and pulls out a small, gift-wrapped box. She hands it to Dad.

“Henry, we thought that since you’re going to be so far away, you might like to have something to help you stay in touch.” He hands me the box.

“Oooh,” I say. Medium light. Nothing rattles when I shake
it. I know what I
hope
is in here, but I’m afraid to let myself in for disappointment, so I just rip it open fast and …

“Yes! Oh, awesome! Thank you
so
much!” A cell phone. Not just a cell phone: an iPhone. This is a complete and total great surprise. Then, as I remove the phone from its box, it rings. It blares Krystal Harris’s song “Supergirl.”

And a photo pops up. A girl in a ballet leotard.

“Hmm,” Mom says. A very exaggerated “hmm.” “I wonder who could possibly be calling you?”

“Better answer it,” Dad says, grinning.

“How?” I exclaim, laughing. He leans over and taps the photo with his finger. I lift the phone to my ear.

“Hello?” I say, hesitantly.

“Assure me you are wearing sunblock,” says a familiar voice.

“Oh my god!” I laugh. “Were you in on this with them?”

“Are you kidding? I advised them all the way,” Eva says. “They went all out; I think they’re going to miss you. So, tell me: how’s Florida?”

“Flat. Sunny. Hot. Very cool birds, very colorful clothing. The natives are stylin’.”

“Would I hate it?”

“You’d like being warm.”

“Where are you now?”

“We’re at this lunch place near the ocean, sitting outside, and it’s around ninety. How did you know to call me?”

“Your mother just phoned. How does it feel to be completely set up?”

“I’m getting used to it. Especially after the Facebook thing.”

“That phone takes pictures. Send me some. Tonight. Promise.”

“How ’bout now? I’ll show you this restaurant.”

“Excellent, but I want the dorm room, too.”

“You’re amazing, Eva.”

“I know. So go back to your French fries. I miss you.” I press “end.”

“That was very cool,” I say, smiling at my parents. “Thank you.”

*   *   *

The thing I can’t get over is their bags. I’ve seen some of these bags before: advertised in
Tennis
magazine. Enormous, with capacity for five rackets, not to mention all the water, food, towels, extra clothes, extra shoes and who knows what else you could possibly want during a match. Naturally, each has a logo in big, splashy letters: Wilson. Fila. Head. These are the sorts of bags I assumed six-figure professionals carried, not kids at a summer camp.

We’re standing several campers deep in the registration line, beyond the shade of the awning set up over the long table where smiling Chadwick people are handing out room keys and directing players to the dorms. It’s hot in the sun, and I’m dying to move forward, but some mother is holding up the line, asking a million questions about the vegetarian options in the dining hall.

I don’t know anyone who has five rackets. I think Mike Adams has two. Only last week Dad bought me a second, and that’s because the camp requires it.

Stop it, Henry. Deep breath, girl. Just because they accessorize like pros doesn’t mean they play like pros
.

“Excuse me. Are you Henriette Lloyd?” A girl’s voice speaks behind us.

I recognize Yolanda Cruz instantly from her Facebook photo. But even without the photo I would have identified her and her family in this lineup of disproportionately trim, blond people.

Yolanda’s little brothers and sisters all look like mini versions of her. Black hair, complexions like creamy coffee, brown eyes so dark you can’t see the pupils. They cluster close to their parents, and in addition to being remarkably well-behaved for a bunch of children forced to wait on a line in the hot sun, they are impeccably dressed. Even the next-to-littlest, a guy who might be all of four, wears pressed shorts, a belt and a shirt neatly tucked in.

“Umm, yeah. But it’s
Henry,
” I reply, surprised at how awkward I feel. “Yolanda, right?” She’s short, this Yolanda Cruz, and … stocky. Not fat, although when she smiles her cheeks look like these two round apples. I can’t imagine she moves very well on the court.

She puts out her hand, which seems a little formal, but her face melts into this expression of relief. I notice that she stands beside
two
rackets, each zipped into individual covers, and leaning against a square, brown suitcase.

“Excuse me, can we move forward, please?” Some mom standing behind the Cruz clan sounds impatient, and I realize we’ve advanced in line. As we shuffle toward the table, nudging
our luggage ahead with our feet, my mom introduces herself to Yolanda’s mom.

“You look just like your Facebook picture,” Yolanda begins. “I recognized you right off.”

Hmm. I don’t think that looks anything like me, but okay.…

“Did you fly into Fort Lauderdale?” she continues.

“Actually, we drove.”

“
¡Ay, Dios mío!
” she exclaims. The family standing in front of us turns and looks. “Straight through?”

“Oh, no, we stopped at night. Twice,” I add. Yolanda turns to the little brother with the belt.

“How would you like that, Mr. I-Get-Carsick?” she says to him. “Three days in the car?” He looks at me shyly, shakes his head no, then buries his face in his sister’s hip. I hear him whisper to her. “
Sí, es muy bonita,
” she replies quietly.

“He thinks you’re very pretty,” she tells me.

“Tell him he can be my boyfriend,” I reply seriously. “I like younger men.” Yolanda whispers to him again, and he squeals. He runs to hide behind his mother.

“He’s really cute,” I say to Yolanda. “I don’t have any brothers and sisters.”

“I have a few you can borrow,” she says, and we both laugh.