Love Letters to the Dead (10 page)

“Yeah,” I finally replied.

“You look like her.”

“Really?” I felt like someone was waving sparklers inside my chest. I could feel hot stars jumping off of them. He thought I looked like her.

I never want to talk about May with any of my friends. But now, with Sky, it felt good almost, like he was part of her secret world. And he didn’t ask any questions he shouldn’t. He just said, “Yeah. You have her eyes.”

Then we were quiet again, until he said, “I don’t know if I’ll show up.”

“At the dance?”

“Yeah.”

“You should.”

“Why?”

“Just ’cause. What if it does actually turn out like it’s supposed to? You know, like Christmas when you were little and it didn’t make you sad.”

Sky laughed a little and said, “You think a lot about that, don’t you? How it’s supposed to be.”

Before I could answer, Sky was at the front of the line. He ordered his pizza, which came in a tinfoil triangle. When it was my turn, Sky looked like he didn’t know if he should wait for me or carry his shiny pizza away. I looked at him as the lunch lady tapped her fingers impatiently on the counter. I was holding up the line. I knew there was something to say. But he just smiled, a smile that seemed to understand, before he walked away.

Yours,
Laurel

Dear Kurt,

The night of the dance, I ate cold potato pancakes with Dad. That sounds sort of depressing, but I didn’t mind really. The only thing is I didn’t have a dress. I tried on a few old ones, but they were all stupid and frilly and didn’t fit right anymore. I wanted to look pretty, in case Sky came and saw me. So I went into May’s room. I opened the closet, which has her cut-off-at-the-neck sweaters folded on the shelves with the arms behind them and her stuffed animals stuffed into the back, and I found the dress, the red silk one. I tried it on. It fit almost right. It was longer on me, and the open top hung lower on my chest (because I don’t have that much of one), but I felt almost beautiful. The hem was cut in flowy spikes with sequins on them. I turned around and around until I was dizzy, in a good way. I put on eye shadow until my eyes seemed to smolder.

The bad part was I had to ask Dad to drive me. I think he thought I was lying when I said my date was waiting for me at the dance. I think he felt sorry for me, because he thought I was going alone. I told him that I’d get a ride home later, since I know he likes to go to bed early, but he made sure to say that I could call him if I needed to be picked up. Then he said, “Sweetie, you look beautiful,” the way a dad does. I wondered if he remembered it was May’s dress.

When I got there, I stood in front of the double doors of the gym, waiting for Evan. He’d texted me that we were supposed to meet at eight thirty. It was 8:43 when he finally came up behind me and grabbed my sides. I let out a little yelp, pretending to be surprised. He was wearing a black shirt and a purple tie.

“Hey. Did I scare you?” he asked. His eyes were red, like he was stoned. I realized that our clothes didn’t match at all.

“Yeah. A little.”

He looked like he already regretted asking me to the dance, but he tried to cover for it. “Are you ready?” He linked his arm in mine and we walked in. I felt bad for him, having to go with someone who is so not good at this stuff, and I thought I’d try to make the best of it for us both. But I just couldn’t make myself say the right things. When he said, “You look pretty,” I mumbled, “No, I don’t.” What I meant, I guess, was that he didn’t understand. It was my sister’s dress.

We got inside and I wasn’t sure exactly what to do. Finally Evan asked if I wanted some punch.

“Sure,” I said. He said he’d get some and left me standing alone in the middle of the bright room with the entryway and the picture booth.

I am usually good at finding things to look busy with, but there was nothing. I unstuck a bobby pin from my hair and stuck it back. I could hear a muffled version of “Bad Romance” coming from inside the gym.

Finally, I saw Natalie walk in with this boy Brian, who sits alone at the double lab table in Bio and raises his hand all the time. She had on a floor-length black dress that fit perfectly on her body. Her skin was smooth like usual, with no makeup. Brian trailed behind, wearing a bow tie and too much hair gel. She looked as relieved to see me as I was to see her, and we rushed over to each other.

“Why do people do this?” I asked.

Natalie laughed. “No idea. But I guess we’re as stupid as the rest.” She pulled out a little flask from her purse and handed it to me. “Schnapps?”

I took a swig. And another. Natalie loved May’s dress, and I spun in it for her, and spun again and again. I spun until I was almost happy.

Natalie did a bang-up job of more or less ignoring Brian until Hannah came in. She was wearing satin like most of the girls there, but it looked beautiful on her. Her pale freckled shoulders stood out against the straps of the midnight blue dress. She was holding on to Kasey’s arm. It was the first time I’d seen him. He’s short, and even without heels on, Hannah must be taller than him. But he’s made of big stocky muscles, the kind that you only get if you work really hard on them. As she maneuvered him over to say hi to us, all of a sudden Natalie pulled Brian closer. Clearly Hannah didn’t feel the way we did about the dance, or she didn’t let it show, or her piña coladas weren’t virgin, or all of the above. Because she was a perfect girl on a college boy’s arm, chatting and giggling at a private triumph, and finally dragging Kasey off to the photo booth.

When Evan finally returned and handed me a half-drunk glass of punch, I didn’t ask what had taken so long. He shifted from foot to foot, looking unhappy about the company. Finally he said, “We’re here to dance, yeah?” Then he reached his hand out to me. “Shall we?” I tried to be a good date and followed him into the gym. I was high enough on the swigs of Schnapps that I had stopped caring that this was not the way my first dance was supposed to be. They were playing a Jay-Z song. Evan was mouthing along, except he sang the real “Can I get a fuck-you” lyrics over the bleeped-out “Can I get a what-what” version they had on. He thrust around from foot to foot and put his hands halfway into his pants.

I tried to go with Evan’s rhythm, but when it came down to it, he had none, and when he put his hands on me and tried to move me around, all I wanted was to wriggle away. Evan kept thrusting his hips, and the more I danced away from him, the more he tried to grab me, and the harder I danced away. As the song was ending, I saw him watching Britt, his ex, across the room. She was blowing pink bubble gum that matched her pink satin dress and shifting from foot to foot. He wanted her satin and watermelon. Evan probably asked me to the dance ’cause he thought I’d say yes, and then he’d have someone to make Britt jealous with. I should have been mad, I guess, but it didn’t matter.

I said, “You should go ask Britt to dance.”

He looked at me, caught off guard.

“Look,” I said, “she’s staring at you, too.”

“Are you sure?” Evan asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “She totally is. Go for it. Anyway, I’m kind of thirsty.” And I walked off.

I went to the punch table and took a long time choosing one of the identical glasses. I put the pink stuff to my lips and let the ice clink on my teeth before I chewed it. And do you know what happened then? They started playing “The Lady in Red.” I saw Evan across the room, dancing with Britt now. I must have been a good ruse, because they looked like they couldn’t get close enough. Her watermelon gum had probably made its way into his mouth. I saw Hannah, dancing with Kasey. She looked over his shoulder at Natalie, who was dancing with Brian. Natalie was looking back. Hannah blew her a kiss. Natalie turned her face away. But then she changed her mind and reached her hand and caught the kiss from the air behind her. She put it softly to her lips. But Hannah’s face, by then, was hidden in Kasey’s shoulder.

I couldn’t watch them anymore. I stared into my punch glass. I picked a sequin off the hem of my dress and folded it between my fingers. I licked my lips and tasted the crayon color of the lipstick I had on. I thought of May wearing this dress at her first dance, brown curls all falling around her face, gliding across the floor in someone’s arms. I tried not to cry.

Then, out of nowhere, Sky came up beside me. “Hi,” he said.

I turned. He still smelled of the clean cold of the night outside. He was wearing his leather jacket over suit pants and a button-up shirt.

“Hi.”

“You’re wearing red,” he said. “Like the song.”

“It’s my sister’s dress.”

Sky smiled a little half smile that made me feel like he understood what this meant. He held out his hand to me.

The touch of his fingers sent everything that was electrical in us toward each other. And then we were dancing. The bleachers with their wood smell, the perfume of everyone, the twinkle of the white Christmas lights, all of it came together to build a place that was just for us. Somewhere I’d never been before.

I wished I could stay forever inside of the song with him, but it was over too fast. Sky whispered, “Thank you for the dance,” and I watched him start to disappear into the crowd.

But then he turned back. “I’m going to get out of here,” he said. “Do you want a ride?”

“Sure.” I could hardly hide the excitement in my voice. I felt giddy as I followed him out of the gym, just as they started playing the electric slide song. I caught Natalie’s eye as I was leaving and waved bye. She grinned back at me, because she could see I was with Sky. As we walked through the parking lot, I quickly texted Dad that I was getting a ride home. I told him good night and sweet dreams, and that I wouldn’t be late.

When we got in his truck, Sky turned on the stereo, and “About a Girl” came on. It was the beginning of your
MTV Unplugged
album. A little part of me thought that maybe Sky had planned that on purpose, because he knows that we both love you. Maybe he cared that much.

We sat there in silence for a moment, listening to the song. I wanted to think of something to say out loud. Finally I said, “It’s like part of what’s so great is he’s not afraid of his voice.”

“You mean Kurt?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

Sky turned to look at me, his eyes amused. “Are you?”

“Afraid of my voice?” I laughed, nervous. “Yeah, I guess.”

Then Sky tilted his head to the side a little and got more serious. “I think we all are. With Kurt, it’s more like he just faces the fear, you know?”

“Yeah,” I said. “You’re right.”

“I think that’s why he’s so
loud
. I mean, he has to be. Because he’s staring the monster in the face, and the only thing to do is fight back.”

“Do you think,” I asked, “do you think he won?”

“The obvious answer is no, ’cause he died. But I think he did in a way. I mean, listen.” Sky turned up the stereo. “We have
this
now. And we’ll always have it.”

I knew then that I was right when I used to sit by the fence watching Sky and thinking that we were connected somehow.

I pointed ahead, to our exit off of the freeway. “You get off up there,” I said. “Rio Grande.”

“You live pretty far from school.”

“Yeah. I was supposed to go to Sandia, but instead I go in my aunt’s district. I live with her part-time.” I paused a moment. “May went to Sandia…” I said, trailing off. I waited to see if Sky would say he went there, too. Did he? I wanted to ask him how he knew May, but I was afraid of breaking the spell.

He just said, “I transferred to West Mesa, too. Only two more years left, and then I’m free.”

“What are you going to do after that?” I asked.

Sky shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s funny, if you’d asked me that at the beginning of high school, I’d have told you my whole plan of escape, all laid out.” He paused. “Pre-law at Princeton or Brown. Amherst, maybe. Somewhere far away, with snow.” I could tell by the tone of his voice that it was an ambition he’d created for himself, not one handed down by his parents. “But now,” he said, “well, I don’t exactly have the grades for that anymore, or the permanent record. I don’t know … maybe it wasn’t meant to be.” He was quiet for another moment. “I guess I sort of want to be a writer now.” He glanced at me. “But it’s not like I’ve ever written anything. And that’s not something I tell most people.”

“You’d be a really great writer,” I said.

“Oh yeah? How do you know?”

“By the way you talk. Like when you said that Kurt is so loud because he’s staring the monster in the face, and how you’ve got to fight back.”

Sky smiled a little bit, like he was happy that I’d really been listening.

I pointed ahead. “Oh! Turn left up here.” We’d almost missed my street.

When we parked outside of my house, we were quiet a moment, my breath clutched in my chest. I watched the sequins on my dress catch the glow from the street lamp. And then I looked up at Sky. He reached out and took my face in his hands. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered. I closed my eyes and let him pull me in. It was a perfect first kiss, like a gust of wind that swept through me, taking my breath away and letting me breathe again all at once. A kiss to come alive in.