NORTH SHORE
NARCISSUS DAY SPA
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 27TH
4:09 P.M.
Skye settled her tired back against the massage bench of the day spa steam room, her posture relaxing as the steam soothed her aching calves. Like Tweety and Ophelia, who lay on either side of her, each on her own massage table. A heat-activated towel wrapped tightly around her torso sent targeted tea-tree gel deep into her pores. She took a deep breath as the bench’s auto-shiatsu targeted her neck, and closed her Tiffany box–blue eyes. Sighing deeply, Skye swept first one taut leg and then the other in a wide circle through the opaque air, wiggling her freshly pedi’d toes.
This should have been the perfect end to her day. She’d had a great dance class: Triple was still their instructor Mimi’s favorite dancer, but Mimi hadn’t stopped to humiliate or yell at Skye during class this time. It was a glissade in the right direction. But Skye was drowning in other worries, and her ocean of anxiety was so turbulent that even a change of heart from Mimi couldn’t calm the waters.
“So now that we’re finally alone,” trilled Tweety, a petite olive-skinned brunette with a birdlike voice. “We’re waiting for the dirt on you and Syd.”
Skye sighed, unfastening her platinum wavelets from their coil on the top of her head and letting her hair fall around her shoulders. Now that her hair was free, maybe she’d finally be able to confess her real feelings. “The truth?”
“Don’t leave anything out!” Ophelia grunted from the other bench. Skye could see her flame-red bun wiggling through the white of the steam as she executed an endless series of Pilates crunches.
Skye closed her eyes again and tried to organize her crazy thoughts into something coherent. If she told the bun-heads, would it get back to Shira? Could Skye afford to take the risk?
“Syd must be super-intense, like Altoids after a week of Doublemint,” purred Tweety, flipping over on her massage table to do a quick cow-cat yoga sequence.
“He’s intense, all right,” Skye spat bitterly, then continued in a flat voice. “Intensely annoying!”
Both bun-heads sat up in the thick steam, sensing they’d hit more dirt than they’d known to dig for.
Skye wrapped her slender, toned arms around her own shoulders and gave herself a pity-hug. “I’m totally into Taz. But Shira caught me on camera breaking things off with Syd. The camera showed us together, and Syd was acting happy, so Shira put two and two together and came up with five! She thinks Syd and I are a perfect couple, and she said that if I ever hurt her son, she’d send me home.”
Once a chunk of Skye’s internal dam was chipped away, the whole river of truth came rushing out. Skye took a deep breath of hot steam after spilling her guts, and noticed that she already felt better. She still had Syd hanging over her like a cement cardigan, but now at least she wasn’t hiding it from everyone. Tweety and Ophelia weren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, but maybe they’d be able to help Skye devise a solution, or at least provide an umbrella during the storm.
“So… you got back together with Syd and ditched Taz because of Shira?” Tweety shook her head sadly, her black-brown eyebrows knitting together in sympathy. “Poor Skye!”
“I don’t want a pity party.” Tweety’s sympathy was nice, but Skye needed a practical solution. She had enough self-pity to last a lifetime. “I want help! What should I do?”
A beat of silence passed in the steamy spa as each girl thought the question over. Skye stared miserably at the billows of white steam surrounding her. The air in here reminded her of Syd—cloying and dense.
“If he dumps you, Shira can’t kick you out,” offered Ophelia.
“Uh-huh,” nodded Skye miserably. “I came to the same conclusion. But Syd is like a hungry puppy, and I have a porterhouse steak stuffed in every pocket.”
“We can figure this out,” said Ophelia firmly, sliding off her massage bench to come sit next to Skye. “Boys always hate me. How hard could it be?”
“Okay, got it!” chirped Tweety, grinning at Skye and Ophelia on the bench across from her. “Tell him he’s kissing wrong. Guys hate to be bossed around.”
“Can’t,” cried Skye. “He’s too sensitive. He’ll just do what I say, or cry.”
Ophelia sat up straighter. “Keep talking about how cute his brothers are!”
“Can’t. Too sensitive. See above.”
“Shave your head!” yelled Tweety.
“Can’t.”
“Why not?”
“He thinks I’m beautiful no matter what.”
Both Ophelia and Tweety gasp-gushed. “Aw!”
Then Tweety tried another angle. “Okay. What is he into? Other than you, I mean.”
“Poetry.” Skye rolled her eyes. She never wanted to hear another poem as long as she lived. Syd had ruined the English language for her. “Romance. Crying.”
“Okay, I’ve got it.” Tweety jumped off her massage table and opened the door to the steam room. “You just need to be as un-poetic and un-dateable as possible.”
Skye pictured the un-dateable girls she’d known back in Westchester. They’d had bad hygeine, bad grades, bad clothes, or bad attitudes. Skye nodded. She could become un-dateable. She just had to be as ugly and hateful, inside and out.
“Tweety, you’re a genius!” Skye grabbed her spare towel and smiled as she wrapped it around her head, already coming up with gross ideas for her new un-dateable alter ego.
As she followed Ophelia and Tweety down the pink leather-lined hallway to the locker room, Skye’s mind relaxed along with her limbs.
Half an hour later, the three dancers stepped out of the Pavilion and into the still-bright late afternoon. Skye squint-smiled at her two companions. “Operation Gross-Syd-Out starts now.” She winked and high-kicked a sandaled foot gracefully in the air.
“Good, because here he comes,” Ophelia whispered, chin-thrusting toward the gravel path in front of them.
“Hey,” said Syd, shuffling toward them and clutching a huge paper cup from the Alphas café. Skye fake-smiled at him, wishing for the millionth time that he had as much edge as his clothes did. His navy Alphas blazer looked like he’d run over it with a lawnmower, and dozens of safety pins sat clustered on his shoulders like punk epaulettes. Under the blazer, he wore a vintage Def Leppard T-shirt. “How was the spa?” His angular face crumpled into an eager smile, exposing the tiny gap between his two front teeth. His green eyes were stuck to Skye’s face like a set of cheap false eyelashes.
“Great,” Skye muttered, shooting a half-guilty smirk at Ophie.
“For my superstar.” Syd’s deep, gravelly voice didn’t match the cloying words he spoke, but his beaming smile did. He thrust the sweating cup into Skye’s hands. “I got you a strawberry-banana smoothie to rehydrate.”
Here goes nothing, Skye thought, channeling Milly Vanderhooven from back in Westchester. Milly spoke exclusively in acronyms and loved discussing her digestive tract.
She smiled at Syd, her teal eyes meeting his green ones “OMG, TY!”
She wrapped her glossed lips around the straw, took a huge gulp of the smoothie, and then forced a burp, praying Taz wasn’t lurking anywhere nearby. Then she snort-giggled and snuck a look at Syd, who seemed unfazed. Tweety and Ophelia covered their mouths, both girls struggling not to burst out laughing.
Skye studied Syd’s face for a reaction. Nada! His green eyes still shone with Skye-appreciation. “Nice one, babe. Once, I burped an entire Fugazi song.”
Skye needed to turn up her gross-o-meter, fast.
“Ew, my burp smells like salami!” Skye screech-giggled, fanning the air in front of her face with her hand. “OMG, Syd, tell me there isn’t salami in my smoothie!” She burped again, for good measure.
This time Syd’s thick eyebrows furrowed like kissing caterpillars and his full lips twisted into a grimace. Surely he was grossed out enough by his burping belle to take off running? Skye crossed her fingers on her right hand and held them behind her back.
“Is something wrong?” Skye grinned at him, practically tasting her freedom underneath her nasty burp.
“I’m going to talk to the chef ASAP. They need to make another one of these, or check the blender, or something. I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Wait, Syd!” Skye tried, but he’d already broken into a jog and was headed straight for the café. She stared at his skinny jeans disappearing back into the Pavilion, her mouth hanging open in a bewildered O.
“Let’s ditch him in the cafeteria,” sighed Skye. “I need to think. And to think, I need to walk.”
“This is going to be tougher than we thought.” Ophelia frowned and threw her arm around Skye’s slumped shoulders. “But at least you got rid of him for now.”
Skye shook her head dejectedly, spraying a few water droplets from her damp hair onto her shoulders. “Yeah, but he’ll be back.”
Like salami, Syd couldn’t be kept down for long.