The Starboard Sea: A Novel (26 page)

On my way to Whitehall, I imagined Windsor and my father having a boozy time together reminiscing about their Princeton days. The kind of thing Cal and I would never have the chance to do. I was torn between going to sleep and coming up with a costume for the dance. Unlike Chester, I wasn’t a fan of Halloween. I got to my room and stretched out on my bed staring up at the ceiling. A few days after Cal died, I’d heard one of the guys on the sailing team joke that if your roommate committed suicide, you got an automatic 4.0 GPA. “Prosper’s one lucky bastard.” No one laughed, but still, the comment made me furious. I’d threatened the kid, Donald Fisher, and he’d apologized.

Kensington had a real stiff-upper-lip mentality and no one thought I needed any counseling around Cal’s death. Until I met Aidan, I’d never trusted anyone with my feelings or believed that talking about them could help. Cal had killed himself; Aidan had probably done the same. Full of self-pity, I thought, “Why not join them?” I knew I could fashion a sturdy noose without much effort, but there were no pipes in my room. Nothing to secure the rope around. Pills seemed too passive and unreliable. Slitting my wrists required privacy and a bathtub. Stretching across my bed, weighing the various methods for suicide, I began to feel a strong pressure on my bladder. I had to piss. I started to get up and then it occurred to me that if I was serious about ending my life, if I was really that sick, then it shouldn’t matter where I peed. I should just do it right there, wet my bed. The image of a nearly grown man pissing himself didn’t strike me as sad or pathetic. It struck me as pure comedy. I got up and went to the bathroom.

There was still the question of a costume. After searching my room, I changed into a dark navy L.L. Bean Norwegian sweater with white Vs woven into the blue knit like bird’s eyes. From there I pulled on some well-worn khakis and a pair of Sperry Topsiders. I stuck a notepad in my back pocket. It might not have seemed like much of a costume, but if anyone asked, I was
The Preppy Handbook
.

Back at the Dining Hall, an actual mirrored disco ball had been temporarily installed on the ceiling, sending prisms of light over the dark room. The ice sculptures remained, but the tables had been pushed clear so that students could dance. No one was dancing. Everyone was lined against the wall or sitting on sofas. Coach Tripp and the Spanish teacher, Ms. Alvarez, made a halfhearted show of chaperoning. The two were camped out on the stairs leading up to the girls’ dorm. Coach Tripp kept taking sips from a red plastic cup and handing it to Ms. Alvarez.

A DJ played “Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” while Kriffo and Stuyvie imitated Archwell slipping and falling. Tazewell worked a butter knife against the ice sculptures, skimming the frosty shavings across the dance floor.

All three guys had on the same dark sunglasses, black suits, and thin black ties. Diana sat on a sofa and watched. She wore black tights and a black leotard with a red paper heart broken into two halves pinned to her chest, a single teardrop painted in the corner of her eye.

“Who are you supposed to be?” I asked.
“I’m Misery.” She pointed to Taze, Kriffo, and Stuyvie. “And they’re my company.”

Tazewell handed me a business card with the company printed in the center. He kissed Diana’s neck and said, “Misery loves company.”
“Clever,” I said.
Taze strutted out onto the dance floor and chest-bumped Kriffo.
“It was Aidan’s idea.” She spoke as though Aidan were in another room, watching. “Don’t tell them,” Diana whispered to me. “My little tribute.”
“I saw her mother,” I said.
“The drama queen. Aidan couldn’t stand her.” Diana got up from the couch and swayed, nearly fainting.
I helped her sit back down. All of the other girls were dressed in tight sequined clothes with lots of glitter on their faces. Sexy fairies, slutty witches. I saw Nadia in a pink tutu and tiara. Brizzey wore high heels and a polka dot bikini. She had a sash around her body that said in shimmering letters, miss fucking america.
I wanted to ask Diana if she had been out on Powder Point that night, if she knew anything. She bopped her head to the music, her eyes rolling back. “Have you seen Chester?” I asked. “He told me he has a killer costume.”
“Was that his mom you were sitting with at dinner?” she asked.
I told her that Chester’s mother was nice and that my father seemed to have developed a crush on her.
“She’s really pretty.” Diana bit her nails. “Wish my dad hadn’t come.”
“I met him,” I said. “He seemed pretty cool.”
“He’s a freak.” Diana sat up. “At least he’s given up on buying my love.” She slouched back down again and asked, “Have you ever milked a goat?”
Diana mumbled something about her father leaving New York to become a farmer in Vermont. I couldn’t tell what drugs she was on. She was too animated for pot, not quite amped up enough for coke. She slurred her words but didn’t smell like she’d been drinking. My bet was that it was a combination of pharmaceuticals. Beads of sweat collected at her temples. With her teeth, Diana tore half of the nail from her pinkie. She stared at the blood rising off her skin. “Are you going to be okay?” I asked.
“Not for a long time,” she said.
I wrapped a napkin around her pinkie and propped Diana up on the couch, then looked around for Chester, thinking he might be able to take care of her. She needed a guardian, someone to lead her away from the bad company she was keeping. I saw Chester across the room. He wore a jacket made out of a stiff, glittery material that shone in the strobe of the disco ball. Before I could reach him, Race walked up to me, wearing the same black suit and sunglasses as his buddies.
“Let’s talk.” He flipped his sunglasses onto his head.
“Not now.” I said. “Diana’s sick.”
“Taking care of girls,” he said. “That’s your weakness. Heard you told Warr about the party. Pretty uncool.”
After days of wondering what to do, how to confront my friends, I decided to simply be direct. “Was she there?” I asked. “Did you see Aidan?”
“Look.” Race placed his open palm flat against my chest. “I can’t keep track of everyone who comes to my house. It’s possible she gate- crashed, but I didn’t see her.”
“Well, someone did.”
Race lifted his hand from my chest. “So what if she was there? No one remembers her. Maybe that’s why she killed herself.”
We stared at each other until Race put his sunglasses back on and looked away. In that moment I wondered how easy it would be for me to tackle Race, pin him to the ground. I weighed the costs and benefits of this violence. The DJ segued into the Cure’s “Why Can’t I Be You?” I placed my own hand firmly against Race’s chest. “I’m sorry,” I said, “if I caused you trouble. But if you’ve got nothing to hide, you’ve got nothing to worry about.”
“I’ve got college to worry about.” Race removed my hand from his chest.
Before Race could say anything else, Diana let out a shriek. Race and I both looked up in time to see Kriffo force Chester into a headlock, dragging him out onto the empty dance floor. Kriffo pulled at Chester’s shoulders, tearing his shiny suit. I thought he might rip Chester’s arms from their sockets. Before I could break them up, Kriffo lost his footing on the slick wet floor. Kriffo fell backward, torquing Chester’s body underneath his own, using Chester as a cushion. Even with the music blaring, with Robert Smith imploring, “Oh, why can’t I, I, I be you?” I heard Chester hit the floor, heard a snap as Kriffo smashed the burden of his weight onto Chester’s trim body.

Lorraine came to Whitehall the next morning. She needed to collect some clothing and belongings for Chester. The snap I’d heard was the sound of his humerus fracturing. “We’re taking him to a specialist for surgery. He’ll be in rehab for weeks, months, even.”

Everything had happened so quickly. I kept trying to explain what I’d seen. How Kriffo had twisted their bodies together. “Will Chester be back?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I hope so, for his sake.”

Coach Tripp had been reluctant to move Chester. “Just stay still,” he warned. Ms. Alvarez ran off to call an ambulance. I waited by Chester’s side as the adrenaline surged through my friend’s body, temporarily blocking any pain. I crouched beside him, promised everything would be okay. Diana stayed for a bit before leaving with Tazewell. I wondered if the fight had anything to do with her. Chester watched her leave, his eyes tearing up.

I said, “She’s not worth it.”
“She’s worth it.” He winced. “Just doesn’t know that she’s worth it.” Chester’s coat, his costume, was made out of a weirdly textured

material. I reached out and rubbed my fingertips along the hem. Sandpaper. He’d covered one of his sport coats in sheets of the stuff. “What is it?” I asked.

“I think my arm’s broken.”

“No, your costume. What are you supposed to be?” I felt the roughness of the sandpaper.
“Oh,” Chester said. “I’m abrasive.”

I carried Chester’s suitcase down the stairs and out to his mom’s car, explaining how I’d inspired her son’s costume. Lorraine laughed and I was happy to see her smile.
Out by the Flagpole, Diana stood alone watching us from a distance.

She had on a long white button- down and one of Tazewell’s jackets, her legs bare, ballet slippers on her feet. Diana waved. I nodded at her, then said to Lorraine, “That’s Diana. She’s Chester’s lamppost.”

Lorraine looked at Diana and said nothing. In her silence, I once again heard the snap of Chester’s arm. Kriffo had barely apologized. “He started it,” he told Coach Tripp, the sandpaper from Chester’s suit having scraped and bloodied Kriffo’s cheeks and hands. “I was just defending myself.”

Lorraine gave me a tight hug. Despite spending the night in the emergency ward, she managed to smell like vanilla, like cookies cooling on a rack. “Tell your father it was a plea sure to meet him.” She wrote down a phone number. “It would be nice if in a few days you could call Chester and check up on him. He likes you. He hasn’t liked anyone in a long time.”

I was on my way over to speak to Diana when a station wagon with wood paneling pulled up in front of Astor. Diana’s father slinked out of the car wearing the same corduroys and flannel shirt he’d had on day before. Diana left the seawall and joined her dad. From that distance, I couldn’t hear their conversation, but they didn’t seem to have much to say. Her father opened the trunk of the car, pulled out a stack of empty cardboard boxes, then disappeared inside Astor.

Diana returned to the seawall. Her hair was greasy and mussed while her lips shone bright red from the cold. I could still see the faint tracing of the tear she’d drawn in the corner of her eye. She put me in mind of a fabulous hotel room some rock star had trashed. I sat down beside her and waited for her to say something.

She asked me about Chester and his arm. She too had heard the snap, knew instantly what it meant. How it might change his life. “Maybe it will help his tennis.”

I said, “I don’t see how.”
“I used to do ballet.” Diana flexed then pointed her feet inside her slippers. “My teacher was Russian. When she was little, someone broke her feet on purpose. It was supposed to strengthen the arch.”
“That’s crazy,” I said.
Diana asked me if I had a cigarette. I didn’t. She pulled out some ChapStick and ran the wax over her lips. “Maybe Chester will get stronger. You know, in the broken place.”
I lied and said, “Aidan told me you really liked Chester. She thought you two made a good couple.”
“When we were roommates, Aidan and I used to stay up all night. We’d talk about the stuff you can never mention during the day.”
Her words sounded familiar, reminding me of something Chester had once said.
“Aidan was a good listener,” Diana said. “No judgments, no interruptions.” Diana leaned back onto the cement walkway. She put her arm over her face, kicked her feet against the seawall.
I took a chance and mentioned that I knew Aidan had gone to the party. “Were you there?” I asked. “Did you go to Race’s that night?”
Diana rubbed her face, smudging her mascara, racooning her eyes. “My father,” she said, “he came in his fancy red convertible and rescued me from the hurricane.” She pointed to the station wagon. “Now he’s tooling around in that shit box.”
The water was glassy and calm. It wouldn’t be easy to sail in this weather, hard to find wind that wasn’t there. I imagined myself out on the water heeling my boat to leeward to fill the sails.
Diana’s father came out of the dorm carrying a floor lamp and an enormous stuffed toy elephant.
“What’s he doing?” I asked.
“Isn’t it obvious?” she said.
Diana stood up, towering over me.
I took a chance and asked Diana directly, “Do you think Race and Tazewell had anything to do with Aidan’s death?”
“I don’t know about that.” Diana rubbed her ballet slippers against the asphalt.
“What
do
you know?”
“Look.” Diana blinked. “I don’t know if Aidan made it to the party or not, but what I do know is that she was pretty upset about you. The last thing I heard is that she kissed you and you made her feel like a fool.”
“It wasn’t like that,” I said.
“I’m not saying she killed herself over you. Aidan was pretty messed up all on her own. I’m sure it wasn’t your fault.”
Diana’s father called out to her. Hoisting more empty boxes from the trunk.
“Shit,” she said. “I have to go.”
I stood up. “Can we talk later?”
Diana shook her head and laughed. “You won’t want to talk to me. No one will. Soon, I won’t even exist.”

TWELVE

In the remaining weeks of the semester, I wrote an essay for Mr. Guy on the cold war and managed to earn an A– on a calculus exam. On my paper, Mr. Guy wrote, “Your hopes for perestroika are admirable if not a little naïve. We most likely will not see an end to these tensions in our lifetimes.” I received a B– and was told I could rewrite the paper. When I didn’t bother to hand in a revision, Mr. Guy stopped me in the hallway and said, “Jason, I’m disappointed. When someone offers you a second chance, it’s rude not to take it.” I no longer believed in second chances. Maybe that was my problem with Bellingham. For me, all of the second chances I’d been given had created opportunities for me to tell another lie about myself. At first, I’d thought of Aidan as a kind of second chance. A distraction from Cal. She’d turned into something else.

The question of Aidan’s death overpowered me. Like Cal, she’d become a mythical, faithful companion. I feigned interest in my own encroaching future, but always I was thinking about Aidan, wondering what had happened to her. Most mornings, I imagined Aidan coming in through the window of Mr. Guy’s classroom, standing up at the lectern and staring down Race.