“Friends to this ground.”
—HAMLET, ACT 1, SCENE 1
Mom leaves for work at seven, so there’s time for me to phone my father before school. It’s already evening in Bangkok. He knows I’ll be calling because I messaged him on Facebook. I told him I had something I needed to ask him and that I didn’t want to ask it over Facebook.
“Iris!” he says when he picks up. It’s as if I can hear him smiling. “How’s everything going over there?”
I need to swallow before I answer. “Great. Everything’s great.”
“And the play? How’s that coming?”
“It’s getting a little better with every rehearsal. Thanks for asking.” I nearly call him Dad, but I stop myself.
“So what do you need to ask me?”
This is harder than I expected. I take a deep breath. “Was naming me Iris really your idea?”
“It sure was. Don’t tell me that’s what you couldn’t ask me over Facebook.” His voice is gentle. He must know I’m working my way up to the real question.
I take an even deeper breath. “If what you said is true and my mom wouldn’t let you see me…” I’m finding it hard to go on. To formulate the question. But I don’t have to.
“Oh, Iris,” he says, and now I know he isn’t smiling. “You want to know why she prevented me from contacting you…that’s it, isn’t it?”
I can barely say, “Uh-huh.”
“I’m sorry, Iris, I really am.” I know from his voice that he means it. “But your mom’s the only one who can answer that question. You’re going to have to ask her.” He pauses. “When you’re ready.”
I can’t stop thinking about the phone call. Not even when I’m in Theater Workshop and, later, in Economics class. Why won’t my father tell me what happened—and will I ever be ready to ask my mom?
The Economics teacher calls my name twice before I look up. “Iris, can you answer the question, please?”
“Uh, I’m sorry…but I don’t think I heard it.”
Lenore’s arm shoots up. “I think the term you’re looking for is the law of diminishing returns.”
“I’m glad to know some of you are paying attention,” the teacher says.
Lenore turns her head just enough to give me a condescending smile.
After school, Katie and I hurry along Monkland Avenue, on our way to the Villa-Maria metro station. Our arms are linked, and we keep our heads down to protect our faces from the gusty November wind. “I can’t believe you couldn’t answer that question about decreasing returns,” Katie says.
“Diminishing. Not decreasing.”
Katie doesn’t seem to notice that I’ve corrected her.
“You know what else I can’t believe? That you didn’t take a picture of him! You should’ve known I’d want to see what he looks like.”
“I know it’s dumb, but I only thought about it afterward,” I tell her. “He sent me a picture on Facebook—I’ll show you that later. You’ll see he looks like me. I mean, I look like him. Same cheekbones, same wide-apart eyes. And we have the same laugh. He’s taller than I expected, and handsome. Well, kind of. I can sort of see why Mom fell for him.”
I can almost feel Katie shiver under her jacket. “You still haven’t told her about Plattsburgh?”
“I don’t think she could handle it. Did I tell you he used to act?”
“That’s pretty cool. So maybe acting’s in your genes.”
“She could’ve told me.”
Katie knows I mean my mom. “So are you happier now that you’ve seen him and he’s your Facebook friend?”
We’re crossing Girouard Avenue. At least it’ll be warm inside the station. “Do I seem happier?”
Katie does something unusual for her. She stops to think about the question. “You seem different. Not necessarily happier. But definitely different. You’re not hanging out with Mick what’s-his-name, are you?”
I can’t believe Katie has just asked me that. It’s a good thing she can’t see my face.
“Of course not.” I figure I should go on the offensive. “Why would you ask me such a weird question?”
“Antoine said he thought he saw you two—at the mountain. In a pedal boat.”
“In a pedal boat? That’s insane! Hey, I thought you said Antoine was dead to you.”
“He is,” Katie says. “Usually anyway.”
The metro is late. Katie grabs my arm. “D’you think there was a jumper?”
“Do you have to call them jumpers?”
I hate the dirty-socks smell of Montreal’s underground city. But as long as there are no mechanical difficulties—and no suicides (what Katie calls jumpers)—you can usually set your watch by our metro system.
It was my idea to take Katie downtown shopping. I want to buy us friendship bracelets. I told Katie I wanted to make it up to her for missing her party and for saying no the last few times she wanted to go for coffee. “I’m over it, Iris. I know how obsessed you get when you’re writing a paper for English. It totally sucked that you missed my party, but hey, your mom had food poisoning. It’s not like you could’ve abandoned her. Not when it was coming out both ends,” Katie said.
“It was pretty gross.”
I’m getting better at lying. Probably because I’m getting so much practice. But I still don’t enjoy it. Mostly because I’m worried I’ll screw up and let the truth slip out. I don’t worry about that happening when I’m onstage. Onstage, lying’s allowed.
I see the white headlights of a metro car coming down the tunnel. The car pulls up, the silver doors slide open, and Katie and I grab facing seats.
“Can you imagine ever being so depressed you’d jump in front of a metro?” Katie can be kind of morbid sometimes—and loud too. “Just like that. Splat.” She smacks her thigh to demonstrate.
“I can’t imagine. I think the people who do it must have serious mental problems. They’re not just regular depressed.”
“I guess it’d be over quickly,” Katie says. “That’s probably the appeal.”
“Yeah, but think of all the people you’d traumatize. The ones who saw your splattered remains.” When I’m with Katie, I get a little morbid too.
“Even worse,” Katie says, shaking her head, “think of all the people who’d be late for their appointments downtown, all because of your splattered remains.”
I shouldn’t laugh. It’s a bad joke. But it is funny, so I do. Katie bumps her knee against mine. For a minute, it feels like nothing’s changed between us. I bump knees back.
“I miss you, Iris,” Katie says out of nowhere.
I’m afraid to look at her when she says that. Afraid she’ll know I’ve been keeping something from her. “I miss you too,” I say to my clunky black boots.
“Has it ever occurred to you,” Katie asks, “that maybe you study too much?”
“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe you study too little?”
Katie rolls her eyes. “Nope, that’s never occurred to me.”
She only brings up Facebook when we’re transferring at the Lionel-Groulx terminus. So much for my hoping she hasn’t been online. “I saw you changed your status to In a relationship and then you changed it back to Single. What’s up with that? Don’t tell me you gave Tommy another chance!” Katie has never had a very high opinion of Tommy. “I would so never give Antoine another chance.”
“Then how come you two are back on speaking terms?”
“That’s different. We don’t do much speaking.”
“Katie!”
It could be worse. Katie must not have seen what I wrote about feeling tuned in to “M.”
“I kind of did give Tommy another chance,” I tell her.
“I thought you hated him.”
“I never said I hated him. I just said I wasn’t in love with him.”
“You really need to come out dancing with me one of these nights,” Katie says. “It’d be good for you.”
How can I tell Katie that going clubbing with a bunch of silly underage teenage girls trying to act grown up is the last thing I’m interested in? They go to clubs to meet guys, and I’ve already met the perfect guy. If anything, I feel sorry for Katie. What if she never meets anyone who makes her feel the way Mick makes me feel?
“You’d have totally loved the after-hours club we went to Saturday. I didn’t get home till ten in the morning.”
“You must’ve been wrecked. What’d you tell your parents?”
Katie nudges me. “What do you think I told them?
That I slept over at your house.”
Thank God our moms don’t compare notes. Katie’s mom gets her hair blown out every week and has long lunches with her girlfriends at expensive restaurants downtown. My mom’s too busy working to worry about her hair. And she’s really careful with money.
“Which club did you go to?” I don’t ask because I’m interested, but because I know Katie is dying to tell me. It’s like someone asking me how it feels to be onstage. Clubbing is Katie’s passion. Mick says everyone should have a passion. That if we follow our passions, we’ll always be headed in the right direction.
“It’s called Circus. I’ll bet you never even heard of it, right? It’s in the Gay Village. The music was awesome, techno mostly. We never stopped dancing.” Katie’s eyes are shining. All I can think about is how tired I’d feel if I stayed up all night. Were Katie and I ever in the same world?
Katie is just getting warmed up. “There’s usually a twenty-dollar cover charge, but they let us in for free. The bouncer said, ‘Pretty girls bring in business.’” Katie laughs when she imitates the bouncer. “The place was packed.”
“Wow!” I try to sound excited. “Hey, d’you know any rice recipes?”
“Rice recipes?” Katie peels off one of her gloves and makes a show of feeling my forehead. “Are you all right, Iris?” You’d think I’d told her I was pregnant with triplets.
“Most people just boil water and add the rice. But I think there are better ways to do it. I meant to look online. Did you ever—”
“Did I ever research rice recipes? Who do you think I am—Martha friggin’ Stewart? You really need to get a life, Iris. I swear, sometimes I think you’re turning into some old lady. Going to bed early, studying nonstop and now, talking about rice recipes. Don’t you ever just want to be seventeen?”
I don’t tell Katie what I’m thinking: No, I don’t ever just want to be seventeen. Not anymore. Not since I met Mick.
Accessories are on the ground floor at H&M. I like the pink and silver bracelets—they’d go with everything—but Katie chooses one with turquoise crystals. “It’s more fun than the pink.” I know she’s found another way to say I’m turning into a little old lady.
So I end up buying two turquoise bracelets. When the salesclerk asks if I want them wrapped, Katie says, “We’re gonna wear them. They’re friendship bracelets.” She slips hers on, holding it up to the fluorescent lighting so the crystals shimmer. “We’ve been besties since pre-school.” Katie squeezes my elbow.
I slip mine on too. I wish I’d bought the pink.
“Listen,” Katie says when we’re leaving H&M, “Lenore was gonna be downtown this afternoon. I said we’d meet up with her for a bubble tea.”
“You did? Since when did you start hanging out with Lenore?”
“She came to Circus with us on Saturday. She was actually pretty cool.”
“I need to get home. To make that rice. It’s for my mom. Ever since that business with the food poisoning, she’s been trying to eat light.” My lie is starting to feel real.
“I totally love my bracelet, Iris.” Katie twirls her wrist. “Call me later, okay? Promise?” She blows me an air kiss. I can feel her looking over my head—probably for Lenore.
“I promise,” I tell her. Only I know I won’t.