Tears (11 page)

I stared at Gaia tonight,
watched her pretend to sleep, remembering all the times I sat beside her bed when she was just a little girl and watched her sleep and dream. Happy dreams, her small mouth curling in a sleepy smile. But she is no longer a little girl, though it is hard for me to accept that she is almost a woman. She is navigating her way through the world. And tonight she did not sleep. She just lay there, perhaps sensing my thoughts, my doubts, and my fears.


She has great instincts, Gaia. The road is still treacherous ahead of us, and sooner or later there will be more difficult choices to face. It is only a matter of time.


She wondered why she had to torture herself with a visual representation of how her reality was swirling down the drain.

“LOSING YOUR EDGE. BIG TIME.”

Renny smiled and nudged one of Gaia's pawns off the board with his bishop in one graceful swipe.

A Metaphor for Life

Renny. He had the face of an angel, eyes like two big, chocolate brown M&M's. A scrawny body swimming somewhere underneath his trying-too-hard Fubu jeans. He could also make you look stupid if you weren't careful. Like now. It was the second time in a week that an opponent had caught Gaia completely off guard. But she couldn't help it. She was too caught up in her own funk. Half miserable and tired from her lonely night in the Meat-Packing District, looking for God knows what. And half hopeful that the sun had cracked through her thundercloud. That her father's gooey French toast breakfast signaled that all was not lost in the world.

It was more than homemade French toast with an overload of Aunt Jemima, though. Her father had asked Gaia to invite Sam out to dinner with them for tomorrow night. He said it could be their very first dinner party. And he wanted to meet Ed, too.

Though Gaia had woken up ready to nail her fist through the wall, her father's dinner party idea had disarmed her.
Touched her. For a while it had seemed like he might always have to lie low and not be a part of her life in the way that other dads could be, meeting boyfriends and best friends. Losing the dark glasses.

Because now that her father had offered, it could only mean that he was here to stay—and the secrecy that cloaked his life was finally on its way out the door.

Gaia smiled as happy images drifted through her mind. Her dad, challenging Sam to a chess match. Talking films with Ed.

“Excuse me?” Renny asked. “You playing or not?”

“I'm in recovery,” Gaia said as she made her move.

Renny raised an eyebrow. But he couldn't know what her plan was. It was still several moves away from completion, an attack on Renny's castled king through the bishop sacrifice at h7.
And that little thirteen-year-old punk sitting across from her, whom she also grudgingly happened to adore, was about to get his ass whipped sorry.
Because Gaia was hanging on to the good vibes produced by her dad's interest in Sam and Ed. Her chess game was taking a turn for the better, as was her life. Wasn't that what people said about chess, anyway? That it was just a metaphor for life?
On the up. . .

. . .
and down.

A thought occurred to her.

Sam and Ed would probably be about as interested
in meeting Gaia Moore's dad as they were in hanging out with Gaia Moore.

“Don't you think it sucks that Kasparov lost the world championship to Vladimir Kramnik?” Renny asked. He nudged a piece forward, then folded his hands in a steeple.

“Yeah. No. Haven't really thought about it,” Gaia muttered sulkily. She chewed on her thumbnail as she stared at the board and she realized she'd been over-hasty and overconfident in her play. Renny had preempted her next move. He knew exactly what she was up to—and why shouldn't he? This was shoddy strategy on her part. Way beneath her level.

“Sneaky does it.” Renny grinned. With a swift move he pushed Gaia's game in tight after she'd been forced to change her play. No more fun strategies now. It would be defenses only, no hope of winning. Just a long drawn-out claustrophobic march toward inevitable doom. Gaia smirked.
Chess really was a metaphor for life.
Better to just die fast. Her face creased into a mask of resignation as she appraised the chessboard. She wondered why she had to torture herself with a visual representation of how her reality was swirling down the drain. Overconfidence leads to vulnerability leads to. . .

“Checkmate.”

Gaia forked over a twenty, clipped Renny lightly on the side of his head, and then stood up. “Bite me,” she
said with a smile, jamming her fingers into a pair of ratty brown fingerless gloves.

“Love to,” Renny replied.

Gaia shuffled off through the park toward LaGuardia Place. Only one thing could alleviate the status quo: a biggie box of Good & Plenty. Gaia had become addicted to the stuff in the last few days. The chewy pink and white candies gave her an excellent, vivifying sugar hit—even better than Krispy Kreme doughnuts. Besides, there was no reason to feel self-conscious about the black licorice stain on her teeth. It wasn't like she needed to look kissable.

“Gaia!”

Except
. . .

The voice was as familiar as the footsteps drawing near. Why couldn't Sam find another park? She glanced up at him. There was a better question, actually: Why the hell did those windswept curls still have the lame effect of intoxicating her—even as she felt a knife plunging through her heart? A knife that twisted on sight of Sam's tentative smile?

“Hey,” he offered.

Gaia didn't answer.

“I never really understood the point of fingerless gloves,” Sam murmured. “I mean, it's the extremities of the fingers that feel the cold most, right? So insulating everything except for the tips will only make them feel worse.”

“If you say so.” Gaia stepped away from him. What was this? Med school moments? If he wanted to make small talk, he was even more of a coward than she'd given him credit for.

“No. Gaia, wait.” Sam reached for her arm. “I came here to find you. I've been crazy knowing how much I upset you. I'm so sorry about yesterday.”

I'll bet.
But Gaia didn't move. She waited, even though she knew she shouldn't give him the chance to explain himself. But what did she have to lose that she hadn't already lost?
Pride had long since been tossed out the door.
She'd left it on Canal Street, in fact. It was probably on its way to China by now.

“I can't tell you what's happening right now, but I swear, Gaia, this is not about us. I need you. I—”

Sam broke off. Gaia turned to him. She shivered momentarily, struck by how ghastly he actually looked up close. His eyes were bloodshot, filled with nervous energy and the kind of glazed look that only comes from not sleeping. His cheekbones protruded, too, underscored by bruiselike shadows. When had he gotten so gaunt?

“What's happening to you?” Gaia whispered softly, forgetting herself, suspended by Sam's obvious distress. She saw it in his face again—the same emotion she'd seen on Mott Street. Fear.
For some twisted reason, the inability to feel fear herself
only made her hyperaware of its presence in others.
And then she felt like kicking herself. Seeing Sam so spooked, she suddenly felt like she'd been walking around in a blind stupor for the past week, if not longer.

“You have to know you can trust me.” Sam's voice was low and strong. “And I know you're worried, but you have to believe I've got this covered. But if you leave me, Gaia, I—”

She threw her arms around him, cutting off his speech, cutting off the need for speech itself. She felt absurd doing so, but it was the only option left. She was worn out from playing hardball. Whatever Sam was going through, he needed her support, not her anger or interference. And if he needed her to trust him and keep out—then hard as it was going to be, she had to give it a shot.

Or something like that.

Gaia tightened her arms around him, wondering if she'd just made a huge mistake in this single act. But it was a bit late to backtrack.
And there were worse things to be than a complete sucker.
A complete cynic, for one. Of course, that was something the old Gaia would never cop to. But this was the new Gaia, for better or worse.

“This is just a temporary thing that I have to get through,” Sam whispered into Gaia's hair. “And when it's over, I promise there won't be any more secrets. Ever.”

“Okay,” Gaia whispered. She stepped away from him. “But only if you do something for me. It's going to be difficult. Maybe even painful.”

“What?” Sam asked, edgy.

“Have dinner with me and my dad. Tomorrow night.”

He blinked. “That's it?”

“That's it,” Gaia said. She could feel a smile curling on her lips.

Sam laughed, heaving a sigh of relief. “Of—of course,” he stammered. “I'd love to have dinner with you and your dad.”

Gaia tilted her head to kiss him. “Swear you won't let me down,” she demanded, staring into his eyes. “Don't screw me over here, Sam.”

“I swear,” Sam murmured. Gaia felt a flare of warmth somewhere deep inside her chest. Oddly enough, she felt it on her head, too.

Something warm and oozing and wet. She reached up and touched it.

“Crap!” Gaia cried. Her face wrinkled. Her hand came back dripping with a runny, chalky substance. It smelled like ammonia. “A pigeon just shat on my head!” She glanced up, searching the gray skies, but the offending bird had fled.

Sam smiled and put a hand to Gaia's cheek. “That's good luck.”

“No, it's not. If bird shit lands on your
shoulder,
it's good luck.” Gaia fumbled in her messenger bag for a
shred of Kleenex she'd once spotted lurking inside. “I think on the head is a bad omen.”

Sam didn't say anything. And that was good. Because in those kinds of situations, it was best to keep one's mouth shut.

“I'M BORED,” HEATHER COMPLAINED,
sitting against the wall at the back of Ed's bed.

Wide Open

Ed rolled his eyes and looked back at her from the front of the bed. That was no surprise.
Nor was it a huge surprise that she was picking her nails.
Every little thing she did tonight seemed to be more irritating than the last.

“Just try to get into this.” Ed groaned. “It's
The Last of the Mohicans.
It's a totally famous old book, and this is a Michael Mann classic.”

Heather snorted, without even bothering to look up at him. “Why is that guy always running up a mountain with no shirt on?”

“He's an Indian. He's trying to save his people, for God's sake. Watch the movie.”

“Whatever.” Heather groaned, too. “I
am
watching the movie.”

Ed turned back to the screen, scowling. Actually, that was the problem. They
were
watching the movie—instead of using it as a background to drown out the sounds of making out, as was tradition. He tried desperately to think of ways to cut through this endless tension. If he didn't tell her how truly pissed he was, he was likely to explode.

And if you really didn't want to talk to her, you wouldn't have invited her over.

True. There was no arguing with himself.
He always lost.
Anyway, he didn't enjoy the fact that things were so awful between them. Because he was positive that there was a huge part of Heather that wasn't about money at all. That was the Heather he'd known before—the Heather he'd fallen in love with years ago, before the accident. He just had to find her inside
this
Heather. He just had to dig a little.

“Intermission?” Ed asked.

Heather nodded curtly.

He pressed pause, then reached over to the bars above his bed and hoisted himself into the air. “And now ye shall be entertained by the smooth orthopedic maneuvers of Shred Fargo, all the way from his wheel-chair...and into your heart!”

Heather smiled wanly. At least she'd stopped picking her nails. If he could show her the progress he'd made, then maybe she would perk up. After all, she hadn't actually seen what he could do. Maybe she
would be more enthusiastic after the show. And maybe then they would cut through this impasse in their relationship—blow everything wide open so they could put it all back together piece by piece. Get back on track.

“Watch,” he instructed.

Slowly Ed pulled himself up on the walking bars, ramrod straight. Then gently he lowered himself, using his arm muscles to keep himself in the air.
Focus,
he ordered himself—imagining Brian there by his side, screaming and blasting music. Ed's biceps bulged with the pressure. He looked down, watching as his feet floated toward the floor. Then touched the floor. Biting his lip in concentration, Ed forced his fingers away from the bar, transferring weight from his upper body to his legs in a mental leap of faith.

Standing.

One second...two...three—

“What are you doing?” Heather shrieked.

“What does it look like I'm doing?” Ed croaked. He glanced at her with a red-faced grin, his entire body shaking from the strain. “I'm standing, that's what I'm—”

“Well,
stop it!
” Heather jumped off the bed. Her eyes were wide, her forehead creased. She ran to Ed's door and flipped the latch to lock it. “Are you crazy?” she hissed, enraged. “Your folks might see you.”

“Heather.” Ed emphasized each syllable of her
name. His concentration was beginning to wane.
The pain in his legs was swiftly turning to torture.
He would have to sit in a second or two. But not yet. Not until she understood the magnitude of this event. “I'm standing on my. . . own. . . two. . . feet,” he choked out, quavering.