IT FEELS A BIT AWKWARD WHEN WE GET BACK, LIKE we don’t know how to part. I drive up to the main house, realizing that I’ve completely forgotten about the possibility of Danny being in her room, and I’ve forgotten about Will. What happened with Will had just recently consumed me, entertained me, but today all thoughts of him vanished. The whole event seems like it happened long ago, or even to a different person. And what now? I just wait until he comes around again? And when he does? I hate that I can’t talk about this with Whitney.
I park near her room, but keep the car running as she gathers her stuff.
“Fun,” she says. “Thanks for today. For driving.” She opens the door and gets out. “Oh, my board,” she says. “How do I—” She looks up at the racks.
“I’ll get it,” I say.
I turn the engine off and get out, then stand up on my car to undo the straps. She gets up on her side, and I edge the board to her.
“Can you carry all that?” I ask.
“Yeah, yeah,” she says.
“I’m going to go rest,” I say.
“I know,” she says. “I’m beat.”
We both stand there. I’m going to ask her about the hotel. “I’m just going to watch a movie or something tonight if you want to—and—”
“That sounds so good,” she says. “But I told Mari and the girls—”
“Cool. See you later, then!” I say. I enthuse. I can feel myself enthusing all over the place. Mari, the very person she was complaining about over hamburgers. All her friends, in fact, who she can’t be herself with—she’s always playing a role. Quote, unquote. Is that why she didn’t invite me? ’Cause I fit with her, but I don’t fit with them? I’m not sure what’s more insulting. The fact that her friends won’t accept me or that Whitney’s not making any efforts to include me. Is it like my mom and Melanie? I’m only allowed to hang with the others when I’ve done something right?
Whitney shrugs the board up onto her hip, then makes a sound of enthusiasm, a half woot, to sum things up. She closes her door with her foot, and I drive back to my house, seeing her in the mirror struggling with her board and the bags.
I was having so much fun, but now the whole day feels crossed out. I wasn’t a friend, I was a tour guide, a frickin’ sherpa or something. These West kids are making me go up and down, up and down, and it hurts.
• • •
That night I pace and I snack, all while enduring the blaze of headlights that indicate people leaving, going somewhere, doing something with friends, having destinations on this Saturday night. One flash must be Whitney, one flash must be Will, one belongs to the parents who have taken my parent with them. The cast of my mom’s show is attending an event for the Hawaii International Film Festival, and of course the Wests are also going to the very same event, so Melanie exclaimed, “Why don’t we just go in the same car?” I imagine Melanie there now, edging close to my mom whenever the photographers come around.
After such a long day, I’m still wired, as if waiting for guests to arrive at my long-planned party. I’m even dressed cute, in a long, low-riding cotton skirt that hugs my thighs and a tight top that tucks into the skirt, fitting like a one-piece bathing suit. All dressed up and nowhere to go. All dressed up and hoping (though not admitting to hoping) that someone will come over. I wait for Will while telling myself I’m not waiting for him.
And then I think of Danny, how I haven’t really hung out with him in so long. I want to tell him that we can all be friends even if he’s hooking up with or likes Whitney. There’s room.
I call him, and he actually answers. “Yo,” he says.
“Yo,” I say.
“Where you at?”
“I’m at home,” I say. “Like a rock star.” I look in the fridge at the same things I saw when I looked in the fridge just moments ago. That’s what tonight feels like. Like I’m expecting something to change, for some kind of treat to suddenly appear.
“Did you have a good day?” I ask. “We haven’t hung out forever.”
“Stellar day,” he says. “You?”
“Same,” I say, picturing him standing there, running his hand through the tips of his hair.
“Let’s cruise soon,” he says, and I hear some guys in the background and know he’s drinking and having fun like every other kid in the whole wide world. I liked picturing him alone. Aha! I think, and pour some wine into a cup from my mom’s open bottle in the fridge. I take a big sip.
“Yes, I want to,” I say. “When?” I ask after I take a huge sip and then another. “When should we cruise?” I’d like to think that the drink is loosening me up, making me assertive.
“Whenever!” he says. I hear the music in the background, and I walk to the stereo to put something on. Ideas all over the place. I’m virtually partying.
“Or I’ll see you at the hotel,” he says, then sings, “Hotel, motel, Holiday Inn, say what?”
Before I can say, Um. Yeah. Not invited ’cause I’m a rock star, Danny says, “Whit said you’re coming. I just talked to her.”
“I haven’t heard a thing about it,” I say.
“I’m sure you’ll get the four-one-one.” Why am I even hearing this from Danny? Why does she tell him things? I was just with her.
“When did you talk to her?” I walk like a toy soldier across the room.
He shouts to someone, “One for me too, ’kay shoots!” then says, “Like just now. Downstairs. We’re at Mari’s house.”
I take a sip of the wine, then another. Why wasn’t I invited to Mari’s house?
“’Kay, it’s too loud,” he says. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Were you at Whitney’s last night?” I ask, moving my hips side to side.
“Say what?” he says, but since I can’t see him, I can’t read him.
“Are you guys going out, or what?” I ask.
“No, we’re not going out. Aren’t you with ill Will, anyway?”
The question is phrased weirdly. Anyway, meaning if I weren’t, then . . . Anyway, meaning why should I care about Danny?
“Where’d you hear that?” I ask, glad he can’t see me smiling.
“I don’t know,” he says, sounding annoyed. “Around. The coconut wireless. Watch out, though, Little Donkey. Lissa’s bigger than you.”
“Whatever,” I say. “They’re not together.”
“Yeah, when you’re with him, they’re not together. That’s true.”
My heart beats something fast and ugly. I want to talk, milk all the details. Do people know about me and Will? And am I totally embarrassed or totally proud? Proud. Happy. I love the idea of him talking about me.
“What else?” I ask. I do a pirouette.
“What else about what?”
“Like exactly who—” The music goes up on his end, and I hear guys yell in unison as if someone scored a goal. I want Danny to be here so we can talk about the things we’re experiencing without each other, and so we don’t have to talk in riddles. We’ve never spoken to each other this way before.
“Are you there?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’m here,” he says and I’m surprised how near he is, like he’s been just listening to the phone and nothing else, thinking and waiting just as I had been. I hear someone call his name. I’ll let him go.
“Hey, what’s the song you were just singing?” I ask. “The hotel motel one.”
“‘Rapper’s Delight,’” he says. I smile and imagine him doing the same.
“Okay, I’ll talk to you later, then,” I say. Let’s just be like we’ve always been.
“Bye, Lei Lei,” he says, and a warmth rises in me. He hasn’t called me that since we were little.
• • •
I search for the song on Sonos. There it is. “Rapper’s Delight.” Sugarhill Gang. The name itself already makes things better, and when I play it, the beat and funny lyrics automatically cure what ails me. Forget Mari’s house and the hotel and the fact that I’m alone. Forget waiting for Will. Though I do wish Danny were here, because he’d be doing what I’m doing—rapping and dancing like an idiot. I wouldn’t have to hold anything back.