I don’t know how I’m going to get to the glide rooms without people seeing me, but I know the first part of the plan is to get Paul to go away. When we get back to the room, I lie down on the bed and tell him that I’m too tired to do anything. He doesn’t really believe me, but he gives in. He gets his guitar from the room and leaves me to myself.
When he’s safely gone, I peek out into the hallway. It’s empty. The glide rooms are on the other side of the commons and I still can’t think of a good excuse to be going over there if anybody sees me, so instead I walk into the commons acting like that’s where I want to be.
It’s empty. I cut across to the glide hall as fast as I can, but just as I’m stepping into the hallway, I hear a door open behind me. I press myself against the wall, trying to stay out of sight of whoever it is that’s walked in.
I hold my breath. My heart is thudding hard. Nobody’s ever said I shouldn’t do this, but there’s no doubt I’m not supposed to glide on my own time.
The TV turns on. I peek around the corner to see who it is just as Damon stands up from the couch and turns to walk to the snacks galley.
I flatten myself back against the wall, watch him go.
He doesn’t see me.
While his back is turned, I edge farther into the hallway, out of sight, but then something I hear on the TV stops me—they’re talking about Jordan.
“ . . . made her political debut today in Des Moines, Iowa, by leading a two-day working congress tasked with developing the scope and master plan for the White House’s More to Life, America values education program.”
Des Moines. That’s where she met Will. She just met Will yesterday.
Tonight is when she’s going to talk to Grandma Bev and reach out to him.
It’s happening. “Go Jordan,” I whisper to nobody in particular.
Damon is crossing back to the couch, so I slip farther down the hall, to the last room, the one farthest away from the commons, and step inside. I don’t turn on the lights, and the room is nearly pitch black except for the square of light from the window on the door. I lie down on the couch without getting into a glide suit. I don’t imagine I’ll be down long, and it seems better to be a little out of breath than to have to explain an extra used glide suit. I don’t know what the penalties for what I’m doing are, but my guess is that they won’t be much worse for doing it in jeans.
I close my eyes and dip down past the Jungle of Guitars until I see the second path. My path. I ride onto it. There’s a noisy direction in front of me and I’m pretty sure that’s my future. I’m a little bit tempted, but I resist. Instead I picture myself turning around. The path I’m facing now is narrow and bright. I slide down along it.
Darkness. Light.
On the floor of the living room. It’s dark outside and I’m in my pajamas. They’ve got Thomas on them. I can see my hands in front of me, holding a plate with half a concha on it. The concha comes from the panaderia on Sunset and it’s my favorite thing in the world. I’m not happy, though. I’m mad.
At Pete, who’s next to me on the floor. We’re watching George Lopez and I don’t want to be watching George Lopez. I want to watch Toy Story again.
“Pete’s piece is bigger than mine.”
I look up from my piece of concha to Pete. He’s ignoring me. His half is nearly gone and I suddenly feel how urgent the situation is. If I don’t get some of Pete’s RIGHT NOW, I’m not ever ever going to get any more and it’ll be gone and I’ll only have my half.
I feel myself taking in a breath to say it again louder.
“Don’t!” I think it as hard as I can, but five-year-old me doesn’t listen. Doesn’t even know I’m here. I’m trapped in my own life. A passenger, just like Paul said.
Time Zombie.
“Mama, Pete’s eating it all!” I shriek. “Tell him to give me more. He got more than me.”
“Shut. Up,” Pete tells me. “I can’t hear.”
“Mooooommmmmmmmmmmm!” Things are unfair. My eyes start to burn.
I want to make myself stop. I know how this plays out, but there’s nothing I can do. I’ve already done it.
Then Pete’s foot catches me in the side, knocking me over. My piece goes flying onto the floor. “You haven’t even touched yours, you little brat.”
Benny sees the food on the floor. I can get to it before he does but I don’t. Instead I watch while mom’s little dog grabs it.
My life is over. Nothing is okay. I’m sobbing.
DON’T BE SUCH A LITTLE BRAT!
I think it, but I can’t do anything. I’m watching myself and all I can think is how stupid I am. I’m five. Pete’s thirteen. He’s going to be dead in seven years and I’m going to spend almost all of it as a whiny little brat.
I can’t watch any more. I pull back, ride forward. As I ride, I realize I can tell mostly what I’m passing. It’s like fast-forwarding on a DVD—flashes of scenes, totally out of context but that I recognize enough to tell me where I am.
A teacher from sixth grade. A stray dog I walked past on my way to get lunch in middle school. My mom and me washing Pete’s plate. Xeon laughing in the alley near the park.
Julio giving me a burrito at his school.
I stop. Dark. Light.
“But the letter,” I remind him, and I wave it at him.
“You wrote it, man!”
“The picture of me!” I shout at Beems. “I didn’t do that!”
He shrugs and shakes his head. “I don’t know what you did or didn’t do, man, but you need help.”
My dad is closing in.
DAD!
I see him through the glass in the doors.
I’M SORRY, DAD.
I’M SAVING THE WORLD, DAD.
I feel my body preparing to run. My legs stabilize under me. My body begins to turn. My heart breaks.
NO!!! DON’T GO HOME, DAD! STAY AWAY!! KEEP MOM AWAY!!!
But nothing changes. Nothing stops.
My dad falls out of my field of vision, lost behind me as I push out through the bushes and onto the road.
“Alex!” my dad calls after me as I run.
It’s the last thing I hear before I surface.
When I come to, my heart’s racing and I’m drenched in sweat. Even so, I keep my eyes closed for a while. I don’t want to open them.
For bare moments, I’m able to pretend that everybody’s still alive.
But then I can’t pretend anymore and I open my eyes. The glide room is completely dark. I don’t know how long I was down, so I don’t know what time it is. If I glided through dinner, then everybody’s going to be in the commons when I come out.
I get off the couch and open the hallway door as quietly as I can, then make my way to the end of the hallway where I can see a little bit better.
I don’t see anybody.
A little closer.
Nothing.
I step into the commons just as Corina is coming in from the patio doorway.
“Hey,” she says, looking at me. “Where were you?”
My heart thuds in my chest. My fingers tingle, but I don’t show anything. Instead, I shrug. “Didn’t feel like eating.”
She smiles. I like her smile and while she’s smiling I almost forget that I’ve got no way to explain why I’m coming out of the glide hallway.
But she doesn’t ask me why I’m there. Instead: “You need to talk about it?”
I shake my head, try to smile back to her. “Nah, just not feeling well. I think I’m gonna go to bed.” I start toward the dorm hall.
“Wait up.” I stop and she crosses the room to me. When she gets to me, she hugs me, pulls me against her.
I hug her back, breathing deep to get more of her smell, and for a moment I forget I’m covered in sweat. I even forget why I was sad.
When she lets me go, she touches my face. “You ever do want to talk, you know where I am, right?”
I nod. “Yeah, I’m okay.” I can only feel her hand on my cheek. Everything else is gone. I’ve been watching Corina from across tables and stuff, and listening to her, and talking with her, but with it there’s been something else, something scary strong and different from anything I’ve ever felt before with girls I went for. Before, I’ve always felt in charge, like I was the one making the decisions, but right now I don’t even feel fully in control of my own mouth, much less the conversation.
“You sure?”
I flash on Jordan, copying Will’s information off the contact list, pursuing him through Grandma Bev. Jordan tells Will things. She lets him see her . . . but the thought crumbles under Corina’s questioning eyes. I’m ridiculous. She’s smart, I’m fooling myself. I pull away. “I’m gonna go to bed.”
She takes her hand back and there’s a look on her face when she does it—like she’s done something wrong. “Sorry.” Then: “You may be sick, but you also look like you need to not be alone in your room right now.”
I don’t want to be alone in my room, but being here, with her, is asking a lot right now. “I’m good.” I try and look up from the floor, but it’s harder than I expect. When our eyes do meet: “Thanks.”
She smiles without parting her lips, shifts her head to the side. “G’night, then.”
I have to look away before I say, “G’night.”
When I get to my room, I keep the lights off and sit at my desk chair, lost in the darkness. The whole evening is collected in my mind, glued together with feelings into a ball that sits on my chest. I close my eyes and all I can see are unrelated parts of my day coming together: flashes of Jordan being afraid, me being whiny. Pete.
Corina.
Me.
A thought bubbles up from under the knot of feelings, words I heard in Jordan’s mind that I can’t stop forming in my own. The knot becomes heavier, makes it hard to get air. I sit up and open my eyes, try to breathe it away, but it won’t leave:
I told Corina I was okay. I lie about myself, just like Jordan does.
But Jordan doesn’t lie to Will. She has a person who knows her. All of her.
I’ve never been okay.
With everyone but Will, Jordan feels outside of things even when she’s inside them, like a secret agent without a mission who’s living under deep cover.
I know what she means. I feel like that, too. Not an agent, though. A baby. An infant in teenage clothes.
I was five when I had that tantrum about the concha with Pete, but I acted like a baby and I’m still a baby.
I’m scared all the time like a baby.
And like a baby I get feelings that I can’t explain that I shouldn’t have, like the ones I have for Corina, and I don’t have a single person left who knows me.
I’m about to turn seventeen and I still cry.
Happy birthday.