The Ylem (19 page)
After Owen and Dean joined us for lunch, I
decided to save time and go to my locker to get some books I'd
forgotten for next period. I played with my lock and wondered if
someday a brilliant scientist—or whoever invented these
things—would come up with something that didn’t involve so much
time and effort. Maybe a fingerprint scanning lock or a
voice-command one. I hated when it didn’t open on the first try, or
at the second, even third sometimes.
I pulled my French book out of my locker and
snapped the thin metallic door. I turned around and standing in
front of me was Chloe, holding a couple of familiar red flyers in
her hand. She looked at me as if I was some disgusting bug to be
squashed.
“Hi…Kalista is it?” she said in a scornful
way, one of her bangs hiding one cold blue eye.
“Yeah,” I told her, struggling to look
unaffected. I hoped she wouldn’t beat me up or pull my hair. Girls
were supposed to do that when they were furious, right? Anyway,
that’s how they did it in movies. Now I was trying to remember some
self-defense techniques—a karate kick in the groin or a jab in the
eyes?
What am I thinking? She’s just a
girl
.
But an evil looking one.
“I'm supposed to give you this.” She twirled
her hand, waving the paper a few inches from my face. “I guess
you’ve heard of Heidi’s party tomorrow.” She paused to size me up
from head to toe. “What a dummy…of course Dean’s new girlfriend has
heard of it.”
That’s what she wanted to get at. “I'm not
Dean’s girlfriend,” I assured her immediately, trying to sound
calm. I didn’t like the look of disgust she was giving me, but
something told me I should’ve been grateful for her “diplomatic”
approach.
“Oh really?” she said mockingly. “Then why
were you two kissing and snuggling yesterday?”
I opened my mouth to speak but stopped. How
did she know about what’d happened with Dean yesterday? The only
two people who knew about this were Valerie and him, and I was sure
none of them had spilled it out.
“What, wondering how I know your dirty little
secret?” she asked with a dark grin.
I stared at her.
“I’ll tell you this,” she stepped closer. “Be
careful with what you do and say. There are eyes and ears
everywhere, even in the places you least expect.”
Was that a warning? “There’s nothing going on
between Dean and me,” I gulped. “We’re just friends.”
“Just like you’re friends with Tristan?” She
arched her thin eyebrows. “Since you’re so cozy with him, too,
you’re probably expecting to pull him to the party and do what any
other girl in school hasn’t been able to.” She said, her somewhat
serene mask slipping away.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Oh pleeeze, don’t pull out your pathetic
good girl act with me. There aren’t any guys around, so don’t waste
it.”
“My wh—”
“I still can’t understand why it works so
well with them.”
“I don’t—”
“And unless you live in another world,
Tristan is out of bounds for you. You’ll never be able to be with
him. Ever.”
“We’re just friends!” I knew we weren’t
anymore, but it’d been the first thing that had come to my
mind.
“Friends? Ha,” she snorted. “You can’t be
friends with a guy like him. Unless you’re a lesbo.”
I took a deep breath and steadied myself.
“Look, I know you’re angry at me because of Dean, but like I told
you, I'm not with him. He’s a friend, just like Tristan. You can
sleep peacefully.”
“Whatever,” she said in a corrosive tone. She
turned her nose up at me and veered down the hallway, leaving me
shocked and alone.
I sighed. She was definitely hard to handle,
as in heavy-duty hard. Now I could see why Valerie couldn’t stand
her. Poor Dean. And I used to think he'd better be off with her.
Huge mistake.
I was about to turn around to head down to
French class when Tristan passed by me. I stilled. He glanced at me
for a heartbeat and then, lowered his eyes and strode down in the
same direction my feet were about to take. We had French together.
I swallowed. I remained there for a moment, debating whether to
ditch that class or endure the stomach-knotting hour.
Come on, Kalista. You can’t hide from him
forever
.
Once I got to the packed classroom, however,
I pinched myself inwardly for choosing to come. There was only one
seat left. At the back. On the last row. Next to Tristan. My heart
was pounding like a tribal drum. I swallowed again and walked
toward the seat, cursing silently. How much bad luck could someone
have in one day?
Was it bad, though?
Yes, it is bad Kalista. Really
bad
.
He never looked in my direction, fortunately.
As nervous as I was, I would’ve stumbled over the backpacks on the
floor and fallen flat on my face. I sat down and fished out my
notebook.
Easy. Easy
. I placed it on the table with a muted
sigh and tried to focus on the class.
Mrs. Delauney started talking about
“Faux-amis”—false cognates in French—words that looked pretty
similar in both languages but had different meanings. She wrote two
of them on the board, but I couldn’t focus on the loopy
calligraphy. Chloe’s words were incessant flaps in my mind.
Unless you live in another world, Tristan
is out of bounds for you. You’ll never be able to be with him.
Ever
.
It’s not that I wanted to be with him. I
liked him a lot, but I wasn’t sure I was ready to be with someone
like that—much less a guy like him. Giving my heart meant hurt and
pain. Perhaps betrayal. And that scared my heart to death.
A folded page slid to the corner of my table.
I turned to look at Tristan. His eyes were fixed on the board, but
I knew it was his. I grasped the page cautiously, my hands and
heart tickling at the contact, and opened it. A beautiful looped
writing, reminiscent of castles and waltzes, emerged at the top of
the page, soothing my eyes at the sight.
If angels could write, this was certainly
it.
Chloe can be really vicious sometimes, I
know.
You just have to learn to digest
i
t.
I frowned at his words. Had he heard my
"friendly" chat with Chloe? It definitely looked like it. But, he
hadn’t been around. So…how?
Whatever the reason was, his friendship with
her was clear. There was tangible proof. He’d encountered Chloe’s
temper before, and by the way he’d put it, he’d encountered it more
than once. Maybe I hadn’t been that far away from the truth after
all. And maybe I’d been wrong all this time. What if she’d been
angry at me because of Tristan and not because of Dean?
All the hatred began since the first day I
saw Tristan, not since my first day at school. That day she caught
me watching him at the cafeteria, she was glaring at me because of
it, not because I was sitting with Dean. And that other day when
Tristan was talking to me on the yard and his mood suddenly
switched, she was there, scowling at us. And he turned to look at
her, and then that silent conversation between their eyes…
Oh my God
. There was really something
going on between them. I wasn’t exactly sure of what, but it was
there. When she’d talked to me earlier, she’d meant to warn me to
stay away from Tristan, not from Dean.
How could I’ve been so blind! I should’ve
noticed it before.
“Mr. Winfield.” Mrs. Delauney said, unlocking
my mind from the startling revelation. “Could you tell me the
meaning of this word in French?” She pointed her hand to a word
spelling “location” on the board.
Tristan looked forward, serious. “Le mot
location est synonyme du fait de louer quelque chose,” he answered,
sounding like a real Frenchman.
“Exactly. Did everyone understand what he
said?” she asked the class.
Tristan’s eyes fell back on his table,
avoiding mine.
Was Chloe in love with him? Her words
replayed in my head once more.
You’ll
never be able to be
with him. Ever.
Her words finally made sense. She wasn’t going
to allow me to be with him. Ever.
“Where are we going?” I asked my dad once we
pulled out from the parking lot. He’d insisted on picking me up
today.
“Downtown.” He turned onto the main road. “I
want to go to that gourmet shop on Sudderth Drive to buy some
things for our little birthday dinner tomorrow. You could look
around and find yourself a gift. There are several shops around
there.”
“I can do it tomorrow.”
“No, I have a lot of cooking to do. And…” He
grimaced, pressing his lips as if about to spill something I
wouldn't like. “I'm leaving for Albuquerque this Saturday, just for
the weekend. But I will make it up to you. I promise.”
“It’s fine Dad. You’ll be here tomorrow.
That’s all that matters." Being alone in the house gave me the
chills, though. It was quite secluded. There weren’t any other
houses around and the woods were pretty scary. “By the way, I'm
going to the party after dinner. Is that okay?”
He wrinkled his forehead. “You’re going?”
“I have to. It’s Dean’s farewell party. He’s
going to pick me up,” I added.
My dad sighed. “Remember to be careful,
Kalista, especially with that boy…Dean.”
“You don’t need to worry about him. Or
me.”
“Just a reminder.”
“I already have a built-in reminder in my
head,” I said, pointing to my forehead. “It comes with an
ultra-perceptive antenna. And it has a lifetime warranty. So
worrying is pointless.”
“I hope so.”
A mismatched bunch of restaurants and shops
came into view. Their different sizes and colors a lovely picture
of lighthearted construction. Unlike New York, every business in
this town had a soul, a warmth that wasn't polluted with greed and
materialism. As if to preserve the uncorrupted glow that surrounded
this place, wooden lamp posts lined the edges like guardians from
another time—the only thing missing was the old man on his rocking
chair with a guitar between his hands, singing something
reminiscent of the good old days.
He parked the car next to a house-like shop
with a jade-green roof. It matched the doorway frame and the
squared logo on top of it. The words “End of the Vine,” with a wine
glass in one corner and a grape vine in the other, announced its
name.
“This is it,” he said like a small kid going
to Disneyland. He took the car keys from the ignition and pushed
his door open.
I closed the door and caught a glimpse of an
odd bookstore a few yards away, a very old one. I thought about how
I could definitely use some new books to freshen up my collection.
And by the looks of it, I could find first editions even.
“Dad,” I called. “I’ll go to that bookstore
over there and see if they have something.”
“Sure. If you find anything, I’ll be
inside.”
I nodded and crossed the road. I was eager to
see what I would discover on those shelves. One of the best smells
in the world was an old bookstore with a hidden story of its own. I
loved the way one could almost taste the books laying on the
shelves, waiting for someone, each one standing out in a special
way.
If books could come to life, I imagined they
would sit there, waiting for a new owner to walk in and fall in
love. If they could talk, each book would speak with the voice of
the main character, telling all the wonderful escapades it could
bring. But I knew not everyone was like me. For some, the thought
of old musty books meant headaches and stuffy noses. To me, that
smell was the true essence of a wonderful, secret story.
I walked down the sidewalk, passing some
antique shops and specialty boutiques on the way, until the
bookstore rose in front of my awaiting eyes. The warped wood
framing the door and windows, along with the wavy, distorted glass
dotting its facade, coated the store with more years than my father
had been alive. The store’s structure defied all standards. Its
four walls were slightly bent to the side, as if a sharp gust of
air had blown through and pushed the store out of its squared
shape. Two rock steps made way to the entrance, giving the store a
natural, fantasy-land look. It made me think of goblins somehow. A
black oval chalkboard, with looped decoration on the top, hung in
the middle of the door window. “Rare Books found here” was written
on it.
I climbed the steps and opened the door. It
was heavy. I stepped inside and the aroma of herbs and dust struck
my nose, a deep smell that filled my nostrils to the back of my
throat. Not quite the musty odor I'd been expecting. The entire
place was rather dark, dimly lit with yellow bulbs that could've
easily been mistaken for candlelight. Only a few strands of
daylight got through the jumbled books on the shelves near the
windows.
What was even the point of having windows if
you had them all covered like that?
“Hello?” I called. A small wooden chest, with
metallic patterns embellishing its top, lay in front of a wide
button leather chair. I turned around and spotted some jars
containing herbs—probably the cause of the mixed smell—resting on
the ground.
Slight rumblings from the back reached my
ears, and slowly, from out of the central book shelves, shuffled an
old lady—gray ragged hair, long clothes, necklaces hugging her
neck, and a wide copper bracelet with a strange symbol circling her
wrist—an ankh I think it was called—kind of mystical, as if she was
about to read my palm or take out her magical crystal ball.
“Hello, dear.” She smiled, stretching the
tiny wrinkles around her upper lip. “How can I help you?”
“I was wondering if by any chance you might
have Villeuneuve’s Beauty and the Beast.” She narrowed her eyes,
wrinkling them even more. “Perhaps Jack Zipes’ translation?” I
added, pulling up my shoulders.
