carefully everywhere descending (4 page)

I give Mrs. Ederlee, Amber's mom, a hug when I get to their house and see she's already home. She's still in her work clothes and going through a sparse stack of mail.

“How was school?” she asks and listens to our answers. It's nice. My mom's attention comes and goes, and my dad is rarely home when I am. I feel guilty about how much I idolize Mrs. Ederlee. She's always dressed so sharply and professionally: suits and feminine camisoles and heels. She's pulled-together in a way I want to be. I hope it doesn't mean I love my mother less. Sometimes I worry that it might.

“You've got an hour and a half until dinner,” she says, glancing at her watch. “If you get done with your homework by then and have time after we eat, we can watch a Mark Sizler production of your choosing.”

Amber gasps and her eyelashes flutter. Mark Sizler is a young movie star she's obsessed with. She has his picture plastered everywhere and has already seen his most recent film (currently in theaters) three times. I used some of my gift card to see it once with her and then drew the line.

We settle in her room and she hands me the family's spare laptop. I check my e-mail first, and I'm startled to see “Scarlett West” in the list of names. I had forgotten she sent something at lunch. It's titled “Hey,” and I click it open to read.

 

Hey,

Thanks again for helping me with English. Me no right so gud.

S

 

I laugh-snort and draw Amber's attention. At her questioning gaze, I flip the computer around for her to read it. A grin spreads slowly until it overtakes the lower half of her face.

“Well,” she says, cat-with-the-cream like. “Well, well.”

Then she says, “Can you help revise the last two lines?” and tosses the notebook with the poem we had been working on at lunch back to me.

“I can try,” I sigh. “But you'll have to put up with me cursing e. e. cummings while I do so.”

For a guy who flouted writing conventions, it's incredibly difficult to accurately imitate his style. You'd think it would be a bunch of sticking in commas where they don't belong and lowercasing the crap out of everything, but it's tougher than that. We had to select one of his poems to model ours on, and Amber and I picked “somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond,” which I had enjoyed right up until I spent so much time trying to rewrite it.

I take a shot at revising the last two lines, but my brain is still tired from working on it all through lunch, so I give up and switch to my other classes. Amber plays one of her favorite singers low in the background, and the sun filters into her pink-painted room with its plush carpet. I barely notice the time passing until Mrs. Ederlee, changed into comfortable clothes, is rapping on the door and telling us to get to the table before Pallav eats everything.

We trample downstairs. I like the sound our feet make on the wooden stairs as we go down at a half run. Pallav, Amber's brother, adopted from India nine years ago, is sitting with his head on the table, staring tragically at the spread.

“It smells
soooo gooood
,” he moans pathetically.

“Sit up,” says Mrs. Ederlee, grabbing his shoulders and playfully pretending to pull them back into an upright position. I love dinners with the Ederlees. Her dad makes dumb jokes and Pallav glances at me shyly (I think he has a crush), and they let me and Amber talk like we're both adults. Amber says they save their fights and snippy remarks for when I'm not around, but I have a hard time believing they ever get that angry with each other.

After dinner Amber, Mrs. Ederlee, and I gather in the living room to watch
The Dust of Stars
, in which Mark Sizler is a young, brash rock star who learns some tough lessons about life and love. Since I've seen it twice already with Amber, I fetch the laptop and only half listen as I resume my homework. At this point I've finished everything outstanding in all my classes and have worked ahead in all but one. I'm finishing up some extra credit for AP World History when I check my e-mail and see Scarlett has sent me her essays.

I quickly wrap up the extra credit assignment (writing a journal entry from the point of view of a peasant during the Russian Revolution) and open the first of her papers. I decide to read through it before looking over Mr. Welsh's comments in red at the end and along the margins.

Right away I see the issue. Scarlett has advanced personal persuasive skills that will do her well as a politician, business CEO, or saleswoman, but they don't translate to writing. I can easily picture her debating the topic of her first paper—
Should the death penalty be outlawed?
—behind a lectern with her charming grin and rapid wit, being tossed question after question. But on paper her ideas have no flow or organization, and her jokey asides undermine her credibility. She seems to have foregone heavy research, used to the force of her personality carrying her point. I close the lid and drum my fingers on the top, trying to think of how to approach this with her. In a way I'm relieved. She's not dumb. She's definitely not dumb. But now I have to convince her to learn a new way of thinking to write a persuasive essay.

I read through the other two essays, and they suffer the same problems. I'm about to e-mail her back when a piece of chocolate cake with fudge frosting is waved under my nose.

“Come back to earth, star child,” Amber says with a grin, which is the nickname of Mark Sizler's love interest in the movie. “You're just in time for the big concert song where he woos her back.”

I set aside the laptop and take the plate and fork she offers. The cake is painfully good. And the concert scene in the movie is kinda fun. It's a big number in which Mark Sizler allegedly did the singing himself. I watch Mark drop to his knees as he wails through his power ballad, face screwed up with emotion. A series of fireworks go off behind him during the last, long note. Amber rewinds the scene to watch it again, and Mrs. Ederlee starts to sing along quietly.

I collect everyone's empty plates and set them in the sink. When I return, I go back to my open reply to Scarlett.

 

Hello, Scarlett,

I reviewed your essays and I see where the problem spots are. I can meet tomorrow at lunch or immediately after school. To be honest, I would prefer after school because I tend to use my lunch breaks for homework. We can meet in the study room of the library at 2:30, if you are amendable.

Thank you,

Audrey

It isn't ten minutes after I hit Send that I get back:

 

Sounds good. See you soon.

S

 

 

A
MBER
DRIVES
me home on days I go to her house after school. My family has two old vehicles, used primarily by my dad and Jimmy for work. My dad works security in a massive building on the outside of town, and Jimmy's pet store is too far away for walking, especially in bad weather. My dad taught me to drive on the old Toyota, and I got my driver's license with flying colors, but I rarely have the opportunity to use it.

When she drops me off, I notice the house at the end of the road, where it dead ends, is lit up for the first time in a year. I look at it while I wave at Amber. Her headlights illuminate me, and then the road, as she backs out of the driveway and drives away.

I start walking toward the house, curious about my new neighbor. Deep bass music pulses from the interior of the place rented out by three young twenty-somethings two doors down from our place. It fades behind me as I approach the last house. Just as I do, the door swings open and a man emerges with a black trash bag. He freezes when he sees me walking up. I open my mouth to greet him, but before I can, he backs inside and slams the door shut, trash and all. A second later the lights go out.

I'm startled by this reaction but not astonished. Like I said, this isn't the greatest neighborhood, and in the dark he couldn't see that I was basically a harmless kid. I shrug and go home.

The next day seems to creep by. My meeting with Scarlett is never far from my mind, making the hours seem to drag. I'm starting to really regret what now seems like an impulsive decision. What if this is all just a cruel prank to humiliate me in front of her group of friends? I'm not sure exactly how, but visions of the prom scene in
Carrie
keep popping up in my head. At the same time, I have a hard time visualizing Scarlett anywhere in that scenario. A jerk, yeah, but she's never struck me as malicious.

When the final bell rings at last, I'm relieved to gather up my stuff and head to the library.
Let's just get this over with.

Our library has a study area enclosed by glass walls. There are two other people in it when I arrive: a frantic-looking female freshman, and a senior boy with earbuds in and a massive textbook in front of him. They both look up when I open the door.

“Hi,” I say. “I'm going to be tutoring someone. Would that disturb you?” The boy gives me an uncomprehending look and pulls out one white earbud. I repeat the question.

“No, go ahead,” he says shortly. He replaces his earbud and goes back to work. The girl is gathering up her stuff.

“Oh, I don't want to chase you out,” I start, but she waves a hand.

“It's fine. It's better for you to talk in here, and I wouldn't mind a change of scenery.”

I thank her as she goes to claim a table outside the study area. I sit down, getting out the papers I had printed during lunch and arranging them in front of me in chronological order. I'm unaccountably nervous. I've tutored students before, even volunteering at my public library for some ESL help last summer, so it's not that. It's who I'm meeting. I'm suddenly irrationally angry at Amber for putting ideas in my head.

I'm not in the best frame of mind when Scarlett finally arrives, twelve minutes late. I have my arms crossed when she rushes in, banging open the study room door and causing everyone in the library to look up at the noise.

“I'm really sorry I'm late,” she says, loud in the quiet library. The librarian gets up to come over, and I forestall her by shushing Scarlett myself. She turns around and mouths
Sorry!
at the rest of the room.

“I'm sorry I'm late,” she says again, sotto voce, sinking in the seat next to me. “Serhan's battery died and I had to give him a jump.”

“That's fine,” I say flatly. I pull her first essay over. “Are you ready to get started now?”

“Yeah, yeah. Hit me with your wisdom, Obi-Wan.”

I thaw a little in light of her good-natured, almost earnest, face. I'm always trying to put my finger on exactly what it is that makes her so good-looking. The eyes and the mouth, yes, but it's also the way all her features are proportioned so entirely well to each other. Her nose on its own would be too broad in the center, but it leads perfectly to her interesting, expressive lips. Her hair picks up natural highlights from the sun, making it an interesting spectrum: dark, chocolate-colored with lighter strands seamlessly woven through. She's of a medium build and nicely toned from all the soccer.

One of her hands, confidently feminine and bearing a black ink mark on one knuckle, reaches for the essay and centers it between us. I force myself away from reflecting on her looks and back to her work.

“All right. Where is your thesis statement?” I start.

She hesitates and then points to a sentence, looking at me like it's a multiple-choice question she thinks she failed. I soften even further.

“How does this drive your paper?” I ask. “Right now, it's not connected to anything else you write.”

I start deconstructing her essay, looking at her frequently to gauge how much she understands as I go. Her brow furrows as I start each point, the right eyebrow dipping lower than the left. As I talk it starts to slowly even out, finally lifting a little with comprehension. I don't get tired of watching this procession over and over as I go through her second and third essays as well, tracking the movements of her blue eyes across the pages. She looks up and catches me watching her as I'm discussing her third paper's conclusion, and suddenly we're staring at each other with less than a foot between us.

“So, so, b-be sure—sure to hit that point ag-again…,” I stammer, flustered and feeling blood pool in my cheeks. I look down at her paper, but my train of thought is gone, and my mind is horrifyingly blank. What had I been saying?

“This has been extremely helpful,” she says, saving me from sitting like a stupid, silent lump while she watches and waits for me to speak. She leans back and stretches her arms above her head, fingers interlocked and palms facing the ceiling. The muscles in her upper arms and biceps move in definition, and I watch helplessly.

What is
wrong
with me?

“I really can't thank you enough,” she says, dropping her arms and looking me in the eyes. I search them for any hint of laughter or mockery, but I detect none. I nod.

“If you send your next drafts to me, I'll look them over again,” I say, thankful my voice is back to normal.

“Another
draft
? You mean this isn't it?” she says, scandalized.

I laugh, thinking she's making a joke. She keeps staring at me.

“Well, yes,” I say uncertainly. “I usually go through at least three drafts before submitting my final version.”

She groans and drops her head to the desk with a
thunk
.

“This is going to be
so much work
,” she says, voice muffled.

“Yes, it is,” I say sternly.

She lifts her head and threads the fingers of one hand through her long hair, tipping her chin up and smiling at me with something that almost looks like affection.