Beware of Love in Technicolor (23 page)

“So, we’re back to thinking we can walk on water?” I asked coyly, with one eyebrow raised. He scooped me up,and threatened to throw me overboard. Instead, he placed me down in front of the controls.

“You wanna drive for awhile?” he asked.’

“You know I do,” I answered.

We spent the next forty-five minutes speeding about the lake. I liked driving and going fast, but I preferred to sit in the front and watch the water go screaming underneath us, feeling the boat skim the surface as we glided along, the wind whipping our hair all around. It felt like we were the only two people alive.

***

Back at home a few days later, my mother made a similar inquiry as John into my diet plans.

“Exactly how much weight have you lost?” she asked me one morning as she scrambled an egg for me.

“Not too much,” I replied, from behind the latest
Cosmo
. The pounding rain outside made my daily tennis game impossible. I had time before reporting to the pool house.

“How much?” she pressed, adding a handful of shredded cheese to my eggs. She thought I wouldn’t notice.

“I’m a size four, mom,” I answered. “Don’t call the Doctors or Oprah just yet.”

“I just don’t want to see you do something unhealthy,” she said softly, sliding my food onto a plate. She placed it, along with a napkin, next  to my Diet Coke on the island.

              “I know,” I said, feeling a pang of guilt. “Believe me, I really don’t want to lose any more, just keep it off now,” I assured her. “I know how much I ate last year, and how hard it can be with studying and everything, to work out and eat right. The food at the cafeteria is so fatty. I want to be able to be a bit lazy, and still fit in my jeans, you know?”

             
How could she not know? I learned all my wacky eating habits from her. I don’t remember a time in my life when my mother wasn’t on a diet. No point in arguing, though. There were only a few more weeks left until I was back at school.

***

              Later that afternoon, after Penny and I had cut our day short due to rain-induced apathy, my mother popped her head in my bedroom, where I was reading
Wuthering Heights
for about the millionth time.

             
“Greer, a letter came for you,” she said, handing me a green envelope with a Texas return address. It was from Molly. My mother saw what I was reading and lit up. “It’s on tonight,” she said. “On AMC.”

             
“I know,” I said. “That’s what made me pick this up. I thought we could watch it together.”

             
“I’ll make the popcorn,” she said, closing the door and leaving me to my letter.

             
It really should come as no surprise to learn the gist of the letter was explaining Molly’s decision not to return to New Hampshire in the fall. She chose a horse over a degree, remaining in Texas with dreams of making it to Atlanta in ‘96. When the Olympics finally did roll around five years later, I checked for her name in the newspaper, but did not see it listed among the other Olympic equestrians slated to compete in the games. Her letter promised to stay in touch, but I never heard from her again.

***

              With only two weeks to go until classes resumed, John finally got around to getting himself a car.

             
“It’s no beauty,” he said to me over the phone. “But she’ll get us where we need to go.”

             
“So, when are you picking me up?” I asked, surveying myself in my full-length mirror.  My mother and I had just returned from a back to school shopping and lunching trip in Boston, and I was trying on my new wardrobe, piece by piece.

             
“Are you sure you want to paint with me tomorrow? It’s messy work.”

             
“I’m dying to see this house of yours,” I answered. “I think I can manage to throw a few coats of paint down in your room. As long as it’s not black paint.”

             
“Gray,” he said.

             
“What?” I was busy admiring my thin-again frame in  short plaid skirt.

             
“The paint is gray,” he said. “Are you even listening to me?”

             
“Only half,” I admitted. “I’m trying on new clothes.”

             
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow. Early,” he said. “Be ready.”

             
“God, you’re sexy when you get all authoritarian,” I teased. “Will any of your roommates be there?”

             
“Don’t know,” he answered. “We just got the ok to start moving in this weekend. Look, my mother is calling me for dinner. Tomorrow morning. Early.”

             
“Ok,” I said, and waited.

             
“See you in the morning.”

             
“Ok,” I said. I waited.

             
“I love you.”

             
“I love you too,” I said, and smiled.

***

              As John had told me the night before, his new car was something shy of beautiful. Sitting in the passenger seat, I fiddled with the visor mirror, trying to keep it at an angle where I could see myself without bending like a pretzel to do so.

             
“I hope there are still some rooms to choose from,” John said as he shifted the little car into fourth. “Whoever takes the smallest room doesn’t have to pay for heat, though.”

             
“How small is the smallest room?” I asked, popping a Jane’s Addiction tape into the cassette player.

             
“I have no idea,” he answered.

             
We continued along the back roads that led us toward Rutland, past numerous farm stands with handwritten signs along the sides of the road, baskets overflowing with zucchini, tomatoes, and corn. I had my window rolled all the way down, with one arm outside, riding the wind. The buckles on my baggy overalls clanked every time I moved.

             
When we reached the house, John pulled into the dirt driveway, and we sat in the car, assessing the exterior. There were steps leading up to a deck, where a pair of sliding glass doors provided entry inside. The landscaping was bare, a few neglected shrubs clung close to the foundation for protection from the elements. There was a patchy, balding lawn surrounding the house, and thick woods flanking it on three sides.

             
The house itself was not so bad. It was painted a pale yellow, with dark green shutters around the windows, and a dark green front door that I never saw anybody actually use. After gathering our painting supplies, we entered by way of the sliding back doors.

             
Upon entering, we found ourselves standing in the middle of the kitchen-slash-living room combo. Off behind the living room was a hallway with one bathroom and two bedrooms.  To the left of the kitchen, a doorway led to two moderate sized bedrooms, another bathroom, and stairs leading to the basement. Jared and Ben had already lay claim to these two rooms. We continued down the stairs. At the bottom, to the right, was a large, partially finished basement. To the left was one more bedroom, converted from what once had been a one car garage. It was still free. John walked in, and I followed.

             
“What do you think?” he asked, surveying the room.

             
“It’s pretty big,” I said. “And the carpet is new.” I looked around the room. It had a decent sized closet against one wall, and a large window on the other. It looked out to the quiet street outside.

             
“All my furniture would fit in here,” he said, walking the perimeter. His parents were letting him take his full bedroom set, so that his mother could transform his bedroom into a sewing room.

             
“Probably more quiet than upstairs,” I said. We were too young to understand just how cold that room would get, down in the basement, come January.

             
“I’m taking this room,” he said decidedly. “Definitely.”

Chapter Twelve

             
The last two weeks of summer passed quickly. Gwen Kade and I talked on the phone, and discussed what each of us could bring to the relationship. I had a mini-fridge, and a better stereo; she had a bean bag chair. Neither of us had a computer.

             
Penny and I said our goodbyes and she headed back to school a week before me. I told her to be sure Tim watched his temper, and she assured me he was a sweet guy. I had my doubts, but what could I do? I never met the guy, just like she never met John.

             
I reviewed my class schedule. I was a master of scheduling my time, and had Monday and Fridays completely class-free. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I had two big, lecture hall-type classes. My two English classes met only once a week, on Wednesdays. Newswriting, which I was looking forward to, in the morning, and fiction writing in the afternoon. I knew I was there at the university for the long haul. Whereas a year ago I was bemoaning my college in the country, I had come to learn that I was actually in one of the best English departments on the east coast. I still didn’t really know what I intended to do with my education, but I was at least in the right place to try and figure it out.

***

Move in day the second year around was a different experience than the first. There was none of the apprehension, the nervous excitement of a new adventure, and thankfully, none of the puke. Gwen arrived before me, and was busily trying to shove her chest of drawers into the closet next to the window. She looked up from her task when my parents and I entered the room.

“Hi there!” she called out, blowing a curly strand of light brown hair out of her face. She was tall, at least five inches taller than me. I introduced her to my parents, and I could tell they liked her right away. She was bubbly and talkative, assuring them that she and I were going to get along great that year. My dad asked if she needed help with her closet.

“Oh! No, thank you,” she told him. “I’ve got it. Did you see how big the closets are? If we both put our dressers in our closet, we’ll have more space in the room.”

I peered inside the closet, and saw that she was correct. There was plenty of room for hanging clothes and a chest of drawers. My dad
I moved mine into place. They helped me bring a few more things in, slipped me a hundred bucks, and left me so they could meet friends for dinner back home.

Gwen walked to her bed and began pulling clothing out of her large suitcase. Pair after pair of jeans, polo shirts in every color, and long sleeved, button down shirts, the kind men wear to the office on Casual Friday. She noticed me watching, and laughed

“I’m such a retard when it comes to dressing myself,” she said, pink striped oxford shirt in one hand, faded jeans in the other. I laughed along with her.

Despite the baggy, shapeless men’s polo shirt she was currently wearing, she was a pretty girl. She had a bit of an exotic look, with warm amber eyes shaped like a cat’s. Her frame was thin, but she hunched from being so tall. I wish tall girls would stop doing that. It drives us little ones, who would do anything for a few more inches, crazy.

“Your clothes are so much cooler than mine,” she said as she watched me carefully hang my new collection of skirts, sweaters, and blouses.

“It’s sort of my thing,”
I said sheepishly. “Sometimes I wish I could just wear a pair of sweats to class, like everyone else, but I just can’t bring myself to do it.”

“Not me,” she said. “Sweats and a baseball cap. There’s no way I’d make it to my early classes otherwise.”

“That’s why I never schedule a class before ten am.”

“I like you,” she grinned. “You’re funny.”

***

As dinner time approached, there came a knock at the door. It was Topher. He had only marginally better luck than I when c
hoosing a new room, landing in Rice Hall, one of the better dorms on campus, but in a double with a roommate instead of a single by himself. Rice Hall was just a short walk from where I found myself in Bristol. This year, we both lived in Area 2.

“Topher!” I cried out happily. I threw my arms around him. I had missed him over the summer, having only seen him once at the Lollopalooza show. I had missed how he made me get over myself and relax and be ridiculously silly. Even if he tried to be edgy and punk rock cool, it almost always failed. It is hard to be tragically hip when you remind people of ice cream and lemonade. He surveyed the room, nodding in approval.