The Other Girl: A Midvale Academy Novel (5 page)

When my parents pulled up to the Buffalo train station in their snow-caked 1993 Volvo station wagon and saw me standing there by myself, my father reached for the radio dial and I saw my mother’s mouth form the words “Where’s her boyfriend?” Even my brother, who was five and in a car seat, was alarmed. “Mom, why is Molly alone?” he said as I got in the car. He looked at me suspiciously. “You said you had a boyfriend,” he said. “You lied.”

I’d recently read an article that claimed sarcasm makes young children feel unsafe and confused. That seemed like a satisfactory alternative to physical punishment. “Sorry to disappoint you,” I said. “But I killed him.” Indeed, his cherubic little face whitened with terror. Mission accomplished.

I snapped on my seat belt in the backseat. “We broke up,” I said.

My mother looked really sad. She’s one of those mothers who
gets really sad when you’re sad, which is nice at times, but at other times can make you think twice about being sad. She reached out and caressed my face, which just made me feel like crying.

My father watched me in the rearview mirror, and then his eyes shifted over to my mother. He was concerned about me, but he was probably mostly worried his wife was going to freak out if I freaked out.

I needed to say something. Something that would make them think I was all right but would also make them leave me alone.

“I direct you to the adage ‘Time heals all wounds,’ and ask for understanding and privacy. No questions, please, at this time.”

My parents kind of smiled at each other, relieved that I was the same old Molly.

I wasn’t the same old Molly and didn’t know if I ever would be, but at least I still knew how to act like I was.

My brother looked at my mother. She shook her head, and he busied himself with making his Mantax doll run up and down the window frame, making Mantax noises. That and the rain pattering on the roof were the only sounds during the short drive to my house.

Our house is old and white with green shutters and a big porch in front, a small yard on the side and a big yard in back. It’s decorated with leftover furniture from my grandparents’ houses, some antiques, some stuff that’s just sort of plain and functional. It’s a cozy, unpretentious house, with a lot of hooked rugs and Afghans and lamps. It’s a nice place to sleep, so when we got there, I went immediately upstairs to my single four-poster bed, which was my mom’s when she was a girl, and that’s what I did.

I woke up just before noon. A third of the day, already gone. Good. The tree branches were still bare and grayish brown here. Out my window fell a steadily accumulating snow, which had already fallen on Boston, where Gid lay in a fetal position on top of a hideous hotel bedspread. From his window he saw white rooftops, antennas, and a sign reading
DAYS INN SAUGUS LOGAN AIRPORT
—
NO VACANCY
. Nicholas sat in a flowered upholstered chair by the window, reading
The New York Times
on his iPhone. The sound of a running shower came from the open bathroom door.

“Wow,” Nicholas said. “The entire Eastern Seaboard is snowed in.”

The shower went off and Cullen emerged from a cloud of steam, wrapped in a towel. He rubbed his hands together with relish. “And half of them are prep school hottinas and hottettas stranded right here!” Cullen grabbed a handful of ice cubes from a black plastic bucket, dropped them into a glass, and dumped in about a cup of Cutty Sark. Cullen had a real fake ID, with his picture and everything, that said he was thirty-four. He drank from the glass like he was drinking water, and then asked, “How’s the patient?”

“He’s improving,” Nicholas said. “I got him to stop thinking about just jumping in a cab and taking a train to Buffalo.”

You didn’t get me to stop thinking about it, Gid thought. I just don’t want to stand up.

It was annoying to me that Gideon was so miserable I’d broken up with him when he was so obviously not completely in love with me.

Gid turned away from the window, closed his eyes, and continued his systematic inventory of our last moments together
to discover the cause of our breakup. He couldn’t make any sense of it. He just knew he wasn’t happy.

Gid rolled onto his stomach. He whispered, “I will be OK.” He then rolled back onto his side because the bedspread smelled.

Good for him. I was glad he was miserable. I was glad he missed me, even though I had no idea why, and he was obviously more interested in Pilar Benitez-Jones in a white bikini than reality with me. I was glad the bedspread in his room smelled like sweat and sag paneer, and I hoped he’d be there for his whole vacation, because that’s what guys who picture other girls naked while having sex with their girlfriends deserved.

Suddenly, I felt hungry enough for toast.

I didn’t expect to find anyone around, but when I entered the kitchen, there was my father sitting at the green Formica kitchen table, staring through frilly orange-sherbet-colored curtains at snow that was now falling in cotton-ball-sized clumps. He was doing bills: in front of him was a blue vinyl ledger book and in his hand was a black felt-tip marker. I thought about sneaking back upstairs. But our house was old and creaky and sneak-proof, and the second I set foot on the kitchen floor, my dad snapped to attention. He looked guilty, like I’d caught him at something.

I learned long ago that your parents do not need to know how you really feel.

“You have ink on your face,” I said, keeping it light.

“Oh?” He dipped a napkin into a glass of water and rubbed
where I was pointing. “I’m afraid that’s the least of my problems.”

Generally I didn’t like it when my parents were upset. Their best trait was their stability, and when things were awry with them, I had the sensation that the world was about to go hurtling into space. But I was so glad he hadn’t asked me about me that I sat down.

“What’s wrong, Dad?” I said.

He winced a little. I knew he didn’t want to bother me, but I also could see that he needed to talk. “The stock where I put most of your money for college funds is…well, let’s just use the word
underperforming
.”

I thought about my concrete-block dorm and the statistics requirement that Mrs. Gwynne-Vaughan had warned me about. My parents would be devastated if I didn’t go to a really fancy college. It was their whole plan for me. I was their special weird little genius. “It’s OK,” I said, “I mean, I’m sure that everything will get better in the next few years.”

My dad looked sad. “It’s not really OK,” he said. “Your sister is already in college, and we’re not going to make her go somewhere cheaper. And I think that she might use up a lot of what we already have.”

My dad got up and sat back down again. He reminded me of a dog you’d just yelled at.

“I just keep looking at the numbers, expecting them to look different,” he said. “But numbers have a way of always looking the same.” He rubbed his temples. His hairline was receding, his crow’s-feet deepening. I felt a surge of something primal. I was young, and my aging father needed my protection. Or at least that’s my excuse for the really big lie I told.

“I’m probably getting this really big scholarship,” I said. “Like, really big.”

I thought of that colossal pile of ATAT facts and figures in my room and felt a little sick to my stomach. But my father’s face lit up.

“Really? What is it?”

Further description would have shed light on the highly fabricated nature of my claim. “It’s pretty complicated…” I said. He looked upset again, so I added, “But it’s pretty much a done deal. But it’s weird. I mean, you know how all that nutty skull-and-bones prep school stuff is.”

This was complete bullshit, but my father nodded seriously. I was taking advantage of the fact that he knew nothing about prep school or the fancy world he worked so hard to have me live in.

“Jeez, Molly,” he said. “I don’t want to pressure you, but that sure would be amazing.” He shook his head, as if he were waking himself up from a bad dream. “Can I tell your mother?”

“Hmm.” I tried to think fast. My mother was a stress case, and I knew it would make life a lot easier for my dad to ease her mind about this. “Let’s just keep it our little secret. That way, we can really celebrate when I get the letter.”

“You’re such a good kid,” my dad said.

I nodded and hoped he couldn’t see my face turning red. “I’m going to go upstairs,” I said. I no longer wanted toast. “I have a lot of studying to do.”

“Of course,” my dad said.

I was halfway up the stairs when his voice stopped me.

“Molly?” he said.

“Yeah?” I turned around.

Not only was my dad smiling, but he almost looked young.
“Thanks for reminding me that I never have to worry about you.”

The ATAT folder sat on my desk in my room, looming like an enemy tower.

It hadn’t even occurred to me how my single-minded interest in Gideon might affect other people. Here my parents were making all these sacrifices to give me a better life, and I was the worse teen cliché ever…a stupid boy chaser.

I spread out the ATAT stuff on my bed. It was all divided into categories: history, science, math, literature, geography. This was all divided into subcategories: European history, American history, algebra, geometry, et cetera.

It was a vast, intimidating field of information, and it did remind me that, even though my head was having a lot of trouble focusing on anything but one boy lying on a bed in an airport hotel, there was, nonetheless, an entire world beyond him, beyond me.

I could try to join that world, if only for a second.

I picked up a list of facts about English kings: Jameses, Johns, Georges, Williams. I studied the sketches of their faces and reminded myself: these were all people who had been born, lived, and died without ever knowing Gideon Rayburn. Amazing.

Molly, Gid thought, far away in that snow-covered hotel. Molly Molly Molly.

I thought of my father, looking at me with all that fatherly trust. And I just pushed Gid as far as I could to the back of my head and started to do something I hadn’t done in a long time. Work.

I drew a crude map of Europe. Gid rolled over and I tried to ignore the feeling of his cheek on the cheap pillow. I made a list of all the English rulers from 1066 to 1848. I memorized the years of their births and deaths and the names of their wives and murderers. Gid picked out something to wear, and I tried not to notice if he was thinking about looking good and instead drew lines between the countries of their enemies in red, and their allies in blue. I didn’t feel cured, but entire seconds, then minutes passed when I was actually thinking of something else.

By the time I had taken out a pink highlighter to signify any two countries joined by a royal marriage, I was actually moved by the idea that I could be strong. Sure, I was miserable and heartbroken. Yes, my head was utterly occupied with the comings, goings, and thoughts of another human being with whom I was obsessed, but I was going to smart my way out of it. No matter how much Gid beckoned, I was going to learn every single fucking fact and date and equation in this pile of data. I was going to face every single encyclopedic mind at every prep school from Baltimore to Burlington, and I was going to crush them for the glory of Midvale. I was going to snatch my family from the jaws of financial despair, and my parents would drive me to Harvard in the brand-new Prius I got them after I had not only gotten a full scholarship to college but also invented a light bulb that heats houses in winter and cools them in summer.

And then Gideon’s phone rang.

He had a piece-of-shit Nokia hand-me-down from his dad, and the crappy LCD screen said
PILAR
.

Gid’s heart skipped a beat, and mine was right behind it.

It was one thing for Gid to think about Pilar. It was quite another for her to call him.

“Hi,” Gideon said. I didn’t like his tone. He sounded like he was thinking about being happy.

“Oh Geedeon,” Pilar said. I heard her take a deep inhale on a cigarette. She exhaled dramatically and said, “I heard you and Molly broke up. I am so essorry! Are you OK?”

Gid said, “I don’t know.”

I’d like to say that that was the moment where intellect and responsibility triumphed over girlish longing. If only I could convince myself that what I felt for Gid was just girlish longing. I put down my very important secure-you-and-your-family’s-future documents and turned my full attention to the criminally pretty, extremely curvaceous, somewhat mysterious, and almost certainly sexually licentious heiress and her never fully serious but nonetheless never-ending half-pursuit of my recent ex-boyfriend.

“Oh Geedeon,” Pilar said. “Ees there anything I can do for you? You know, we are also here. At the Days Inn. Our flight for LA doesn’t leave until the very early morning. I just wanted to make sure you were OK, not lonely!”

Gid hit mute. Then he hit it again. “Can you hang on a sec?” he said.

Cullen was standing right there, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

“Pilar’s here,” Gid said. “She’s in the hotel. She wants to know if I’m lonely. She’s on mute.”