Romancing the Dark in the City of Light (16 page)

“Your dad,” Summer says, leaning closer to study it. The man looks intelligently through wire-rimmed glasses with a hint of mischief in his eyes, and probably a good sense of humor. He grins into the camera, gripping and clearly proud of his handsome, big-toothed son.

“That’s him.” Moony offers her some pistachios.

“Thanks. What do you call the headdress?”

Moony leans in over her just as she’s straightens up. His head dodges hers as their faces come within inches and her breast brushes his shoulder. “Sorry,” he says. “A
ghutrah
. In the Gulf.”

Summer steps back. “
Gu-tra.
Cool,” she says. Is her breath okay? “Lawrence of Arabia–like.” She
really
should have worn one of her new tops and put on some zit cover-up, at least.

Moony shakes his head. “Lawrence of Arabia was an imperialist interloper.” He crunches some cracked pistachios.

“Whatever you say. Do you see your dad very often?” She eats a couple, too.

“Not really. We talk, he sends YouTube links, money.”

“Is he rich?”

Moony smiles. “No. But not poor. Works for the Ministry of the Interior.” He pauses. “Go to Kuwait every year, usually Christmas break. Not this year.”

“Why?” She backs up against the armoire.

“Operation.”

She grabs her opening. “So what kind of operation are you having?”

“It’s boring.”

“Not to me.”

He plops down stiffly in his desk chair that’s only a couple of feet from the bed and frowns. Says nothing.

“But it would be good if he were here for it, wouldn’t it? Won’t he come visit you?” She hears that she’s talking all fast.

“Can’t this time.”

“Oh.”

“Not crazy about his second wife. Treats me like a freak.”

Her mouth falls open. How could
anyone
treat Moony like a freak? “That’s ridiculous! I’d like to gore her with my tusks.”

“Ha!” he says then coughs.

Balancing on the narrow bookshelf crammed with books, is a red felt board paved with Cub Scout patches, a signed baseball, a photo of the Paris-St. Germain soccer team, and a model of some molecule. And dozens and dozens of medication boxes and bottles. He presses two pills out of a blister pack as she stares, then swallows them without water.

“Meds,” he explains needlessly. “Have a seat.” He indicates the bed. “You’re pacing.”

A small photo of a full-faced, pretty but serious-looking twenty-something woman with glasses sits behind a yellow model Ferrari. A slight mustache shades her upper lip.

“Is she a relative?” Summer asks, sitting and crossing her legs.

“No. Old friend.”

“Hmm. An older woman.”

“Maybe. Time to work.”

Textbooks are lined up on his desk, along with his computer, calculator, stacks of notebooks, and index cards. Blue and red flyers from his part-time Web site design and computer trouble-shooting business, are stacked in the corner.

She pulls out the trig book and winces from the pain in her side. Moony looks at her funny.

“Sore rib,” she says.

He sits beside her on his bed and explains the chapter the test was on, drawing rough equations. He makes it easy. He smells like spring breezy soap, and … golden wheat. While he leans over their work and talks, she tries not to get distracted by his close warmth and how incredibly cute he is. How smart and patient. His brown eyes study her hair, and her neck, and her hands with the nails bitten to the quick, which she then folds into fists. He prolongs any closeness, pulling away slowly.

“What are you, like first or second in the senior class?” she asks, after successfully completing three problems for him and getting rewarded with gummy bears.

“Second.”

“What do you want to be when you grow up?” Summer asks.

“Help kids with rehabilitation.” Side by side, now their shoulders press together.

“A juvenile prison guard?” She grins. Body contact is so awesome. It’s weird she almost never touches anyone. With the unsettling exception recently of Kurt.

He laughs. “Physical rehabilitation. They’ll know if I can do it, anyone can.”

“Perfect.”

“I’m up for full scholarship,” he says. “University of Missouri.” His knee bumps hers and doesn’t leave.

“Moony, that’s fantastic! Congratulations.” She pats him on the back.

“Don’t have it yet. Will let you know.”

“I certainly hope so,” she says.

“You?”

“What?”

“Said you have to finish college by twenty-two. Then what?”

She scoots back on the bed. “I haven’t given it a lot of thought. I need to. Um, I guess I can do whatever I want.”

“Chicken business?”

“No way. Couldn’t even if I wanted to. It was sold.”

“So…?” He waits. “Interested in…?”

She pulls her knees up. “I don’t know.” She’s not going to say studying death across cultures. She snorts. A deathologist.

He nods, like that’s okay with him. He moves to his desk chair. “Truth or dare.”

“Goody. Truth,” says Summer.

“How many boarding schools have you gone to?”

“Uh, four,” she says. “Not counting PAIS.”

“Since ninth grade?”

“Since eighth grade. Truth for you?”

“Yep.”

“Who’s the lady in the photo?”

“My favorite nurse.”

“That is so sweet.” Summer could sit on her and squash her, too.

“My turn. Why five schools?”

She hugs her knees. “I was asked not to come back the next year, or I was kicked out.”

“Why?” he asks again.

“That counts as a separate question. But I’ll answer it. Getting caught with alcohol or drugs, failing grades, or all of the above.”

“Had a drink recently?” He raises that scarred eyebrow.

She hesitates, but decides against arguing with him about the rules of the game. “Define recently.” She glances at him. “Okay, scratch that. One gulp at lunch.”

He can’t hide his concern. “At school?”

“Um, yeah.”

Moony beams his good eye at Summer. “You don’t need help with trig,” he announces.

“What? Yes, I do.”

“You need help with drinking.”

THIRTY-TWO

Moony’s bright brown eyes are like the searchlights on the top of the Eiffel Tower. He knows how Summer is doing at school. He only knows the tip of the iceberg as far as her enthusiasm for brain-altering substances goes, although she did splash barf on his shoes.

His tidy room warms. Summer doesn’t mind lying to Mom. Or to herself. But she can’t to Moony. And strangely, she doesn’t mind him saying she needs help, despite the fact that her cheeks are radiating heat. She takes a breath. “You think?” She tries to sound sarcastic, but it doesn’t work.

“Do you
want
help?” is the next question, all relaxed and easy. He touches her hand. For a half-Arab kid, he has real American directness.

She shifts, crossing and uncrossing her legs as the bed squeaks. “What are you? Saint Moony, peer counselor?”

He waits patiently.

“I suppose it’s a, uh … possibility,” she says, smoothing the green stripes on his bedspread.

She’s snowed scores of teachers, counselors, and doctors. But what does she think? Like a tire someone’s let the air out of, the puffed-up-ness of her pride softens.

Help. Help. Help. She repeats it over and over in her mind until it loses its meaning, and becomes some mysterious Dutch participle. What does it mean exactly? Allowing someone who cares to do things that support her. Moony already is. Maybe allowing someone to get close. Moony already is. Pretty much, anyway.

Admitting the lies she tells herself? Yeah. Most likely.

If she
doesn’t
get it, and soon, it will cost her a fortune.

Literally.

She sighs. Hard to get worked up about that.

Getting out of the deep, dark rut she’s been in for so long would be freaking hard. But what about making choices for herself and what
she
wants, instead of what everyone else wants? That might be worth working for.

What does she want?

Moony’s friendship. She glances into his eyes.

That’s really all.

He’s watching her. She curls a page of her notebook in a tight little roll. She swallows. “Yes. Yes, I think I do.”

Pandora alights in her mind again. The illustrated bedraggled little fairy Hope left in the box. Who keeps humans around to suffer all those ills. But maybe it’s not a wimpy little fairy like she always thought. Maybe it’s one of those killer fairies with blinding strength. Hope with some horsepower behind her might be just what she needs.

Now Moony leans forward and takes her hand. His touch is warm and so right and reassuring her throat tightens. He looks away to spare her, but doesn’t let go.

“What about an AA meeting?” he asks, looking toward his bookcase.

She pulls her hand back. “What about it?”

“In English. Sometimes at the American church.”

He swivels in his desk chair to his computer and types fast with his good hand. Two seconds later he has the Paris Alcoholics Anonymous Web site, which lists all the meetings, in English, every day, all over the city.

“One there tomorrow night,” he says. “19:00.”

“Let me get this straight,” says Summer. “You’re saying you would come with me.” She gnaws her pinky nail. “Because I have no interest in going by myself.”

“Yes.”

She stands abruptly, then sits again. “Well. I … um, okay, then. We could check it out. If it’s horrible, we can leave, right?”

“Pick you up at 18:30.”

“Six thirty. Crap. Okay.”

Ms. Butterfield invites Summer to stay for dinner and to call her “Karen,” which Summer accepts. It’s lasagna, Moony’s favorite from Picard, the frozen food store, along with a lamb’s lettuce salad and Oranginas. Summer makes a big effort to eat and to hold up her end of the dinnertime conversation about Mars exploration, REM sleep, autism, and French labor law. Not one mention of someone’s appearance, something they did wrong, what school they went to or their pedigree or lack thereof, intrudes. It’s all interesting and normal, and Moony and his mom seem to enjoy each other’s company. She wonders what she would be like if she’d grown up with Karen as her mother.

Karen has a generous glass of red wine but doesn’t offer them any. When Karen gets up and Moony’s not looking, Summer seriously contemplates taking a quick glug. Jesus, she thinks. That’s truly pathetic.

When Moony double-cheek kisses Summer good-bye, he pulls her in for an extra-long hug. She involuntarily goes stiff and feels his shoulder blade jutting against her hand at a strange angle, like he has a metal can opener glued under his shirt. A desire to pull away and run out the door flits through her tense muscles. He holds her gently and then she relaxes against him and rests her cheek on his broad shoulder. Breathes in his wheaty-ness and the yum smell of that lime shampoo, his body so warm and solid against hers.

It feels like home. She and Moony twinned, a zygotic cell just split, at the center of Paris, and the world, and the universe.

The buff fairy Hope break-dances in her heart, with acrobatic leaps and rolls. She can be all right. She can get her life on track. Moony’s got her back.

The world seems so right, she takes the uncrowded M
é
tro, without incident other than shallow breathing. She proudly walks to Mom’s apartment in the drizzle. Her damp hair flaps her face. There she is again, the corner prostitute. Wearing a short vinyl skirt, a crocheted yellow and pink muffler, and gripping a black umbrella. Summer crosses the street in order to walk by her.

This time Summer says, “
Salut
.” Her attempt at
Hey, what’s up
. She doesn’t slow down and tries to sound casual.

Then she realizes it isn’t the same woman. And this one’s obviously thinking,
Cut the crap ugly-ass, honky rich-girl American. Who you think you are?
In French, of course.

Summer studies the sidewalk and picks up her pace.

She leans heavily against the teak panels in her building’s coffin-sized elevator as it ascends. What is it about bums and prostitutes? Dad became a bum, more or less. He just had enough money to stay off the streets. What is it about the ladies, though? Why does she think and worry about them?

Then she gets it. The only thing that separates her from the streets, and probably having to sell herself to survive, is money. What else could she do? Show up every day for work at a fast-food place? Drive a UPS truck? Telephone sales? Hardly. So far, she can’t even handle high school. If a pimp supplied her with enough alcohol and drugs, she’d be good to go.

Where are these hookers from? Probably not even France. Probably sold by their families, and held against their will. They have to do what they’re doing to survive.

What’s hard to imagine is wanting to survive that bad.

Having money warps and separates people. So does having none. The Buddha was a rich prince who gave up everything material, and then found enlightenment. And purpose. Jesus hung out with prostitutes and lepers. He certainly had direction.

She could give all the money away if she gets her inheritance. Or most of it. What would that woman she just passed do with a million dollars? Or maybe it’s too late for her now. What would she have done if she and Summer were switched at birth? She might be a flipping Busybody Without Borders. Or she might be like Summer is now.

THIRTY-THREE

The next day, Friday, during lunch, Summer trudges over to the lower school to Karen’s classroom. The wet-wool smell of kids’ coats hanging near the door and traces of lemon-scented bleach envelop her. She closes her eyes and she’s in her old elementary school hallway in Little Rock, standing with Dad, showing him her tempera portrait of their cat, Alma. It hangs for all to see. Dad holds her hand and beams at her, proud.

She hasn’t drawn or painted anything since ninth grade, and she used to do it a lot. Maybe she should again.

Summer raps on the door and sticks her head in. The third-graders are all bent over their desks writing furiously. Whoa—nothing more sobering than two-dozen eight-year-olds. What happens if they all decide to riot at the same time?