Star-Crossed (14 page)

He slid the basket over; I took a bite. It was good. It was also the very first real hamburger that I'd ever had in my entire life.

When we left, I tipped the only guy that I could see running the place; undoubtedly our age, unarguably exhausted.

“Hey,” I said, handing him two crisp, folded twenties. “Thank you.”

His eyes lit up; he thanked me immensely. I thought to myself,
he has no idea who I am, or where I come from. I'm just like everyone else here.

But beyond that, it was almost like the guy had never been thanked before in his life. Those two twenty-dollar bills equated to something much more; and really, they probably were.

I had simply become numb to the constant opulence; expectant, really.

Greedy. Unintended or otherwise; my face burned with a fleeting sheet of red-stained shame as we slid away; I acknowledged, briefly, that I would likely never see the man behind the stand ever again.

“What do you think a place like that runs you?” I asked. “Salary-wise.”

“Minimum wage at best,” Tyler spat, sucking fountain Coca Cola through a red-striped straw. “Shit work. Shit pay.”

“Doesn't seem like much of a life.”

“Essentially,” he agreed. “But we all have dreams, Kait. Maybe that guy over there will invent the next set of robot eyes for people that can't see.”

We bought flavored ice and sat by the water; the bench cold, long-neglected by the busy walkers who were much too preoccupied with the cheap food and inexpensive thrill of this beautifully-expansive, glitter-dusted island.

In the shadows, bodies were pressed against decaying walls; passionate kisses and negotiated prices for a temporary escape in forms of pills or powder - or something a little more intimate.

From our spot, I watched the Ferris Wheel turn; the lights a blur of purple and yellow; blinking, beckoning. Radio music poured from every speaker on the boardwalk.

“You know, I've been dreaming of it,” he said, spooning blue-raspberry ice into his mouth. “California sunshine.”

“California sunshine,” I echoed. “You know, Tyler. I can feel it. Everything's going to work out for you with Stanford.”

“You really think so?”

“You bet,” I told him. “Believe me, Tyler. The socialite, prim-and proper, tailored suit and Preparatory pedigree life isn't all that the outsiders make it to be. There's a lot of horrible, debauched bullshit; a relentless insincerity in our breed.”

I took a sharp breath; Tyler touched my hair. The music silenced.

“But you're something real,” I said. “You've got a real story that isn't built out of status or money or any of that garbage. You're the real deal.”

“You mean real as in really poor. The classic made-for-TV movie scenario about the down-trodden, struggling boy who achieves all his hopes and dreams.”

He drank down the remnants, all melted electric-blue sugar water; his lips were stained in a mildly disarming corpse-like shade.

I wiped his mouth like he was a child, and he let me.

“I want to take you somewhere,” he said. “There's this dive-bar nearby. My cousin, he tends bar. We can't get white-trash wasted or anything. Besides, I'm driving. But he'll slip us a drink.”

We tossed our trash in the neglected bin; garbage surrounded it in a halo of
fuck off
. People didn't care.

I pointed to the Ferris Wheel.

“I'd like to ride that, first. I've never been on the ol' Ferris Wheel before.”

“You're kidding me.”

“On the contrary, Mr. Dawson,” I smiled. “I was never really one for jokes.”

I bought pastel-pink cotton candy, wadding up the cottony-stuff and letting it melt on my tongue; sugar-coated, artificially sweet. I shared it with Tyler, and at the very top of the Ferris Wheel, we looked out over the entirety of the island.

“Almost like you can see all of New York from up here,” he said. “And far as I'm concerned, that's practically the whole world.”

We sat in silence; eyes on the water; the sound of laughter was weighed with a heavy, drunken stupor. One girl, who was seated right behind us, was yelling at her boyfriend, who yelled back; only his voice, strengthened by what likely some hard-hitting mix of amphetamines and tap-beer, was much louder. Various volumes of the same insults:
slut, bitch, bastard
. Eventually she started to cry.

Tyler smiled, uncomfortable.

“Do you believe in real love?” I asked him. “The forever kind.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I mean, I think it can work if you really want it to. Sure, the infatuation stage doesn't last forever and everything, but with effort, it can change and endure and become something lasting.”

He sighed; I understood. At least, I tried to.

“But it kind of makes me sad; the whole thought that what we have right now is really just so temporary. Like, eventually you get tired and cynical,” he said. “I do believe in it, though. I believe love can last forever. Or, at least, as long as we're alive.”

He took my hand, and I thought of my parents. My mother, my father. I thought of Vivian.

I thought of Marius, oddly enough. I wondered what kind of husband he'd make to whomever he ended up marrying. The idea of him making any kind of covenant was almost laughable, but still.

“I want to,” I told him. “It's just hard. Honestly, everything I know is just so broken and messed up that it's hard to believe that anything will last.”

“You've never been in love?” he asked.

I considered the question as the Ferris Wheel turned, wondering what exactly I had felt for the few men that had entered my young life.

Had I loved Henry? No. No, I hadn't.

Was I in love with William Tennant?

My face grew warm, but the sensation, the emotion - warm, stirring - evoked something inside my stomach and chest that was excruciating. It felt like in my body there lived the trapped ghost of a girl sitting on an amusement-park ride; waiting for that breaking moment where she would be set free.

Tyler was watching me; fixed, soft.

“No,” I said quietly. “Not yet, at least. I don't think so.”

Jumping off the ride, we brushed the invisible lint from our clothes and hurried off into the heady night that was still slightly cool. Tyler gave me his jacket, which smelled of watered-down body-spray. I'd seen the bottles:
Phoenix
, the potion was called.

The dive-bar was small and crawling with kids. When Tyler spotted his cousin, and they hugged for ages before he introduced us. His cousin's name was Greg: a high-school drop-out who tended bar in the evenings and sold electronics (
huge-fucking televisions
, he said) at Sears in the afternoon.

He gave us two cups of Coke spiked with what Tyler said was rum.

“Cheers,” Tyler said, raising his plastic cup. I immediately thought of Will, and a feeling of sheer
I miss you
flooded over me. “To being young, and all that other stuff.”

“To being young,” I said. “And all that other stuff.”

We clinked cups, sipping slowly. There was karaoke going on; most of which was completely terrible. Girls were stumbling over-themselves; over-eager men were slurring their words.

Tyler told me, motioning to the empty spot on stage, that I needed to sing something. It was absolutely necessary.

“Are you kidding?” I said. “You sing. I'll stay here and guard the drinks.”

“Come on,” he insisted. “There's got to be one song. Pick something typical – cheesy, even. Just sing.”

“I don't know,” I said. “This just feels a little nerve-wracking.”

“Well, welcome to my side of the fence,” he grinned, touching my cheek. “Stay as long as you like. Or don't. If you wanted to run, I wouldn't blame you.”

He handed me my cup, and I downed the rest of it. It moved slowly, like cough syrup, and I coughed, laughing.

“Now get up there,” he said. “I'll pick the song. If you don't know it, then I'll have to second guess our friendship. Everyone knows this song.”

Friendship
. I liked the word; and for the first time, it had been linked to me.

“Alright,” I said. “I'll give it a shot.”

I wobbled up the old steps and onto the stage; whistles ensued, reassuring cheers. Everything was lit and on fire; everyone was excited.

I took the microphone, and the song started to play. A song that – Tyler was right – I already knew. No Doubt's
Don't Speak.
I loved the cover; bleached hair, rotting peaches. Gwen Stefani was my golden girl. Soft-lighting and flashing cameras and old, polka-dot dresses.

I felt alive – as if I could do anything. The span of just three minutes seemed to pass too quickly; the words making my lungs and chest and heart ache, too. Everything ached; but I was so, so happy.

I looked up, my eyes blinded by the dancing lights, and smiled. Everyone cheered; drunken, thrilled. When I jumped from the stage, Tyler caught me, spinning me around in his arms. We were both dizzy, delighted; stretched-out Cheshire cat grins plastered on our faces.

“How do you feel?” he asked, electrified. Sweat glistened over his face like a gentle dew.

“Alive,” I said. “I feel alive.”

The car-ride home was filled with loud music and street-static; the windows down; wind whipping through the space between our fingers.

At the house, he idled in the driveway, and I asked him if he wanted to come inside.

“At some point I will,” he promised. “It just sort of feels overwhelming, the thought of actually going into your house. I'm sorry.”

“You can say it,” I said. “You feel out of place.”

He didn't say it; his lowered eyes gave everything away.

He touched my hand, and even though the part of me that knew how he felt wanted to draw away, I didn't. I let him.

“Tyler,” I said quietly. His eyes met mine. “I hate myself for saying this. But, I hope you don't think I'm leading you on. I had a great time with you tonight, but I'm not looking to fall in love.”

His face fell, and my heart-strings pulled.

“I'm not in love with you,” he said. “Well, maybe I'm a little bit in love with you. Just a little, though. But I'm also in love with a lot of pretty girls, so I'm not sure what really counts, and what doesn't.”

“What's the rest of your feelings composed of?” I asked.

He smiled.

“It's like when you meet someone, and you just want to know that the entire span of their life is going to be filled with good, happy things. No misery or bullshit,” he said. “I know that when you go inside that giant palatial house of yours, that you're not happy.”

We sat in silence. Our fingers locked; not like lovers, but like two people who simply understood.

“So I'm just a little bit
in
love,” he said. “But mostly, I just love you. No strings attached. No judgment over what you might have inside those gates; the things I lack.”

When he released me, my skin felt cold; exposed and strangely naked. I watched him speed away until I could no longer hear the rattling clatter of his decaying white bullet.

The house, as I walked down the path, was lit up; every window emitting the everlasting warm and hospitable champagne-colored lights. Music was playing, which I could only faintly hear through the grass that was humming with crickets; the blades, soft, supple; an emerald blanket beneath the benevolent sky that in all of its temporary wonder reminded me of one person, and one person only.

I had no photographs; nothing physical to carry with me as a relic to remind myself that he, in his lonely apartment full of frozen clocks, was thinking of me. But I knew. I knew he was thinking of me.

My father welcomed me with open arms; boisterous and drunk. I could smell the brandy on his starchly-ironed blazer. The music, now louder, was unbearable; guests attending this party that seemed to stretch the seams of every wall and corner of the mansion were dressed in pearls and lace. Eyes sunken; driven by an intoxicated stupor into laughter and dance.

“Where were you?” he asked.

From a corner, I spotted Vivian, giggling and leaning over the grand piano; the musician, an older, silver-haired gentleman, was busy playing and seemed to pay her no mind.

“With my friend. His name's Tyler. Tyler Dawson,” I said. “He's on scholarship at Trinity. We're doing the play together. I'd invite him inside, but you should know that he already feels terribly unwelcome.”

“Excuse me?”

He stood, arms-crossed. I sighed; my shoulders falling slowly. I let the air out through clenched-teeth.

“It doesn't matter,” I mumbled. “Anyway, listen, I put the date on your calendar and told your secretary to remind you, in the event that you happen to forget. I know what an incredibly busy man you are.”

I gave a small nod, dismissing myself with the excuse that he was obviously preoccupied with his impromptu soiree. Still, I made the point of smiling to every set of eyes that locked with mine; manners, as always, were a non-negotiable thing.