Girl Defective (23 page)

“He's not talking. He hasn't said a word for four days.”

“What's in the water, kid?”

“I don't know.”

She turned from the mirror and reached for a joint in the ashtray. She lit it and toked and passed it along. I dragged deeply, had to bury my cough in her pillow.

“Can I stay here?”

“Bad timing. I've got someplace to be.”

“Can I come?”

She shook her head.

“Is it a date or an assignation?”

Nancy's eyebrows went up, and she allowed a small laugh.

“It's a party.” She seemed to be looking at me from a different angle and reassessing the situation. “It's a very grown-up party.”

I rolled my eyes, faked insouciance. “What are we talking? Plushies, hot tubs, swinging suburbans?”

Nancy laughed her donkey-honk laugh. Then she sorted out her hair, and I stared at the collage on her cupboard door. It was like a map of her desires: cave houses, Greek islands, wild-looking artists, and femme fatales. One picture showed a tattooed man; he was so inked I could hardly see his face.

“Jack Dracula,” Nancy said. “I always used to wonder what he looked like naked. I used to imagine I was his girlfriend. We'd fuck and then he'd tell me the story of each tattoo.”

Nancy saying “fuck” like that—as a verb—suddenly made me dizzy. When she said it, I saw it. I saw it so
clearly I had to work to lose the image of Nancy and Jack Dracula going at it. My eyes raced around the cupboard. I took in the chips in the wood, the ornate handle. I fixed on a photo of a girl in a communion dress, flanked by smiling parents.

“Is that you?”

“In another life.”

I became conscious of the music then. It was the bent, kerplunky intro to “Wishing Well.”

“That's so weird,” I said.

“What's so weird?”

“That song. It's the Millionaires.”

I started to explain the significance, Dad and his Holy Grail, the single that Rocky had sold in, but Nancy had already tuned out.

“A guy gave it to me. You know what it means when a guy gives you a mix tape? True Fucking Love.”

“Was it Otis?”

“No comment.”

Nancy disappeared into the hall. I prowled around her room. My hands floated over tampons, Nag Champa incense, orphan earrings. I bent down and got level with the tape player, watched the spindles turn. The tape in there was one of ours—I could tell by the little wishing well. There was no writing on the label, but it bore the same mark as the tape that Luke had shown me, Mia's tape.

The Millionaires ended and a raga swirled up.
Nancy came back with her hair in a cloud around her head. She made a face, pushed stop. “I hate that hippie shit. Come on, dollbaby. Let's blow.”

We walked along the canal. Nancy walked a four-four beat. The click of her heels on the cement made me feel like we were in a movie. Around us the sky was turning dark corduroy-blue. Pigeons were returning to their palm tree caves. Gnats hovered above the water, which moved slow and shiny-thick as an oil slick. Suddenly, Nancy stopped. She turned slightly to face the wall. There, on the bricks, was a poster of Mia. This one had writing on it, though; someone had drawn a flower crown, the letters
RIP
curled among the flowers. Poking in the holes in the brickwork were candles of different colors and lengths; it was a shrine to match my own. It made me feel seasick.

Nancy produced a hip flask from her bag and took a sip. “This is where they found her,” she said somberly.

“How do you know?”

“Ray told me.” She seemed to be on the verge of saying more. She stayed there, silent. Then she toasted Mia's image and passed me the flask. I sipped. Nancy took her lighter out and lit the candles, and I let the flickering light lull me. I pictured Mia in her silver dress weaving along the road. Cars honking, her giving them the finger. I saw her standing over the canal seeking her reflection in the water. And then . . . did
she just fall in? Did she cry out at the shock of the cold?

“Dollbaby,” Nancy said.

The light from the candles danced on the water. I thought I saw something moving down there. I pictured Mia rising, ghostly and calm, but it was just an old beer can bobbing up.

Nancy reeled me back. “Otis asked me to go to America with him.”

“You don't sound very excited.”

“It's better if I do my own thing.”

“I think you're right.”

She started laughing. She didn't stop for ages.

“What?” I said.

“You don't know anything about it.”

Was she being mean? I couldn't tell. It sounded like she was. Was she mad at Otis or mad at me? I stared at the poster—Mia's dark, unknowable eyes. The Ugly Mug rose up then. I had pushed him away, but he wouldn't stay down.

“Nancy.”

“Sky.”

“Who was that guy from the Scenic Railway?”

“What guy?”

“You know.”

Nancy stopped. She shook her head. Then she started walking again, a little faster now. “Okay. I'll tell you. He's a mark.”

“A what?”

“A mark. A guy a girl can put the squeeze on.”

I didn't get it.

Nancy tutted. “I only went with him once. Don't judge.”

“What did you do?”

“
I
didn't do anything. He did it all himself. Then he called me a slut and gave me twenty dollars.” She looked at me sideways. “He knows Ray. That's how it happened. Sometimes, to pay the rent, I do Ray a favor.” She stopped again. “I shouldn't have told you. You're shocked. Look. It's not emotional. It's not even me—it's like . . . You want to know who Lisa is? Well, now you know. She's my alter ego. Every girl should have one. You let her do the stuff the real you wouldn't think about.”

“It's ugly,” I blurted.

“Yeah, well.”

“Is that what tonight is?”

In the shadows Nancy's mouth looked like a cut in her face.

“Go home, little sister.”

I couldn't help following her, though. Even as she stepped faster, and shook me away with the backs of her hands. Across the highway, along the beach toward the marina—Nancy had stopped acknowledging me, but still I followed her. I was lagging behind, or she was moving faster. When she reached the gate, she turned and gave me a blank smile and slipped through. Some of
the boats were lit up but not all. I took my shoes off and left them on a bench and trod soundlessly behind her. Water moved beneath the wood and slapped against hulls. It was warm out, but I was shivering. Nancy burled up to a white yacht. It had “ZAZEN” scrawled on the side in Japanese-y font. I felt disappointed. Why hadn't she just said she was meeting Otis? She marched up the steps and rapped on the door. The door opened—all I saw was a dark triangle—and in she went. After a while the light in the yacht went out. I stared at the dark space for a few seconds more before making my way back to my shoes.

I could have gone home. It wasn't much after ten. But the joint had made my mind expansive. People. The World. We were all such liars. We didn't want what was right in front of us; we wanted other realities. Gully wanted to be cracking codes and collaring bad guys. Nancy wanted to be a heartbreaker with a mink stole and a smoking gun. Dad wanted to go back to when he could drink without a hangover and his only responsibility was to himself. Luke wanted to go back too, to do it all again, only better. And what about me? What did I want? Skylark Martin, resident bird. I knew Mum's shadow loomed large. I looked for her in everyone.

Nancy's collage floated through my mind. The array of pictures presented themselves as on the walls of a gallery. The real Nancy dwelled somewhere between
Jack Dracula and the girl in the communion dress, but I would never know her.

And then something clicked. Nancy's collage, Nancy's cupboard. Suddenly I knew why it looked so familiar. The gilt handle was the same gilt handle behind Mia Casey in her ecstatic self-portrait.

Nancy had a tape. Mia had a tape.

Nancy stayed at Ray's. Mia stayed at Ray's.

Nancy had never told me how she'd ended up as Ray's flatmate, and I'd never asked. But it seemed to me a certain type of man would always find a certain type of girl. Before Nancy there was Mia; before Mia there was probably some other lost girl.

Ray collected books and fallen robins. He put the former on a blanket and the latter on the job. The world turned on need and gratification, want and get, and if we weren't working one, we were wrangling the other.

I could have gone home, but I didn't. I went to see Luke.

I
KNOCKED ON THE
tin door, and the echo bounced around, almost scaring me into retreat. Luke opened the door, wearing shorts and a look of rumpled contentment that quickly turned to surprise.

“Were you asleep?” I asked, pushing past him, Nancy-style.

“No, just reading. Where have you been?”

“Everywhere.” I headed straight for the camp bed. His sleeping bag was open. I climbed into it. He hesitated and then squeezed in next to me. It was the loveliest shock to feel his limbs against mine. We lay Siamese-ly staring up at the shadows of moths.

I could hear the waves rolling and the jar-and-clank marina music. After a while I started to talk, and then it was like I couldn't stop. I told him about the mix tapes with the matching symbols, about Otisworld and the website. I told him how Ray had said Mia was a party girl, but Granny didn't know her and that Nancy did stuff with guys for money and maybe Mia had too. Luke let me talk. He took it all in and when I finished, we were both quiet for a long time. Luke sat up. He put
his head in his hands. I watched his shoulders moving up and down, but I didn't try to touch him. His voice sounded warm and scratchy, like old vinyl. He said, “I came here because I wanted to say good-bye to Mia, but it feels like she won't let me.”

“She's still here,” I said. “I can feel her.” I leaned my head into his back and felt the vibrations of his breathing. “I hate good-byes.”

Luke turned around. His lips met mine and time did its slow elapse. My last thought before drifting off to sleep was that I needed to get home. A few hours later I awoke with Luke's arm under my neck. The light in the room was eerie. I tasted the sea in the air. The seagulls started early, their cries catapulting me up to a sitting position.

“Luke!” I shook his shoulder.

He smiled at me sleepily.

“I have to get home.” I hauled myself out and rearranged my clothes. Luke's arms went for my waist. He tried to wrest me back to the camp bed. I fell against him, allowed myself the sweet reprieve.

Luke sat up and sighed. “Do you have to go?” Then he reached for his shoes. “I'll take you.”

The sunrise came up fierce and pink. Outside the shop Luke took my arm.

“I dreamed about her,” he said. “That never happened before.”

I thought of my dreams of Mia and was almost too
scared to ask, “Was it a good dream?” Luke nodded. Above our heads the living room was illuminated. I saw shadows through the curtains. I kissed Luke good-bye, took a breath, and went for the door.