Every Day (22 page)

I shed my borrowed life for an hour and put on the borrowed life of the book I’m reading. Rhiannon finds me like that, in the selfless reading space that the mind loans out. I don’t even notice her standing there at first.

“Ahem,” she says. “I figured you were the only kid in the building, so it had to be you.”

It’s too easy—I can’t resist.

“Excuse me?” I say somewhat abruptly.

“It’s you, right?”

I make George look as confused as possible. “Do I know you?”

Now she starts to doubt herself. “Oh, I’m sorry. I just, uh, am supposed to meet somebody.”

“What does he look like?”

“I don’t, um, know. It’s, like, an online thing.”

I grunt. “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

“Shouldn’t
you
be in school?”

“I can’t. There’s this really amazing girl I’m supposed to meet.”

She looks at me hard. “You jerk.”

“Sorry, it was just—”

“You jerky … jerk.”

She’s seriously pissed; I’ve seriously messed up.

I stand up from my carrel.

“Rhiannon, I’m sorry.”

“You can’t do that. It’s not fair.” She is actually backing away from me.

“I will never do it again. I promise.”

“I can’t believe you just did that. Look me in the eyes and say it again. That you promise.”

I look her in the eyes. “I promise.”

It’s enough, but not really. “I believe you,” she says. “But you’re still a jerk until you prove otherwise.”

We wait until the librarian is distracted, then sneak out the door. I’m worried there’s some law about reporting homeschooled kids when they go AWOL. I know George’s mother is coming back in two hours, so we don’t have much time.

We head to a Chinese restaurant in town. If they think we should be in school, they keep it to themselves. Rhiannon tells me about her uneventful morning—Steve and Stephanie got into another fight, but then made up by second period—and I tell her about being in Vanessa’s body.

“I know so many girls like that,” Rhiannon says when I’m done. “The dangerous ones are the ones who are actually good at it.”

“I suspect she’s very good at it.”

“Well, I’m glad I didn’t have to meet her.”

But you didn’t get to see me
, I think. I keep it to myself.

We press our knees together under the table. My hands find hers and we hold them there. We talk as if none of this is happening, as if we can’t feel life pulse through all the spots where we’re touching.

“I’m sorry for calling you a jerk,” she says. “I just—this is hard enough as it is. And I was so sure I was right.”

“I
was
a jerk. I’m taking for granted how normal this all feels.”

“Justin sometimes does that. Pretends I didn’t tell him something I just told him. Or makes up this whole story, then laughs when I fall for it. I hate that.”

“I’m sorry—”

“No, it’s okay. I mean, it’s not like he was the first one.
I guess there’s something about me that people love to fool. And I’d probably do it—fool people—if it ever occurred to me.”

I take all of the chopsticks out of their holder and put them on the table.

“What are you doing?” Rhiannon asks.

I use the chopsticks to outline the biggest heart possible. Then I use the Sweet’N Low packets to fill it in. I borrow some from two other tables when I run out.

When I’m done, I point to the heart on the table.

“This,” I say, “is only about one ninety-millionth of how I feel about you.”

She laughs.

“I’ll try not to take it personally,” she says.

“Take what personally?” I say. “You should take it very personally.”

“The fact that you used artificial sweetener?”

I take a Sweet’N Low packet and fling it at her.

“Not everything is a symbol!” I shout.

She picks up a chopstick and brandishes it as a sword. I pick up another chopstick in order to duel.

We are doing this when the food arrives. I’m distracted and she gets a good shot in at my chest.

“I die!” I proclaim.

“Who has the moo shu chicken?” the waiter asks.

The waiter continues to indulge us as we laugh and talk our way through lunch. He’s a real pro, the kind of waiter who refills
your water glass when it’s half empty, without you noticing he’s doing it.

He delivers us our fortune cookies at the end of the meal. Rhiannon breaks hers neatly in half, checks out the slip of paper, and frowns.

“This isn’t a fortune,” she says, showing it to me.

YOU HAVE A NICE SMILE
.

“No.
You will have a nice smile
—that would be a fortune,” I tell her.

“I’m going to send it back.”

I raise an eyebrow … or at least try to. I’m sure I look like I’m having a stroke.

“Do you often send back fortune cookies?”

“No. This is the first time. I mean, this is a Chinese restaurant—”

“Malpractice.”

“Exactly.”

Rhiannon flags the waiter down, explains the predicament, and gets a nod. When he returns to our table, he has a half dozen more fortune cookies for her.

“I only need one,” she tells him. “Wait one second.”

The waiter and I are both paying close attention as Rhiannon cracks open her second fortune cookie. This time, it gets a nice smile.

She shows it to both of us.

ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER
.

“Well done, sir,” I tell the waiter.

Rhiannon prods me to open mine. I do, and find it’s the exact same fortune as hers.

I don’t send it back.

We return to the library with about a half hour to spare. The librarian catches us walking back in, but doesn’t say a word.

“So,” Rhiannon asks me, “what should I read next?”

I show her
Feed
. I tell her all about
The Book Thief
. I drag her to find
Destroy All Cars
and
First Day on Earth
. I explain to her that these have been my companions all these years, the constants from day to day, the stories I can always return to even if mine is always changing.

“What about you?” I ask her. “What do you think I should read next?”

She takes my hand and leads me to the children’s section. She looks around for a second, then heads over to a display at the front. I see a certain green book sitting there and panic.

“No! Not that one!” I say.

But she isn’t reaching for the green book. She’s reaching for
Harold and the Purple Crayon
.

“What could you possibly have against
Harold and the Purple Crayon?
” she asks.

“I’m sorry. I thought you were heading for
The Giving Tree
.”

Rhiannon looks at me like I’m an insane duck. “I absolutely HATE
The Giving Tree
.”

I am so relieved. “Thank goodness. That would’ve been the end of us, had that been your favorite book.”

“Here—take my arms! Take my legs!”

“Take my head! Take my shoulders!”

“Because that’s what love’s about!”

“That kid is, like, the jerk of the century,” I say, relieved that Rhiannon will know what I mean.

“The biggest jerk in the history of all literature,” Rhiannon ventures. Then she puts down
Harold
and moves closer to me.

“Love means never having to lose your limbs,” I tell her, moving in for a kiss.

“Exactly,” she murmurs, her lips soon on mine.

It’s an innocent kiss. We’re not about to start making out in the beanbag chairs offered by the children’s room. But that doesn’t stop the ice-water effect when George’s mother calls out his name, shocked and angry.

“What do you
think
you’re
doing
?” she demands. I assume she’s talking to me, but when she gets to us, she pummels right into Rhiannon. “I don’t know who your parents are, but I did not raise
my
son to hang out with
whores
.”

“Mom!” I shout. “Leave her alone.”

“Get in the car, George. Right this minute.”

I know I’m only making it worse for George, but I don’t care. I am not leaving Rhiannon alone with her.

“Just calm down,” I tell George’s mother, my voice squeaking a little as I do. Then I turn to Rhiannon and tell her I will talk to her later.

“You most certainly will not!” George’s mother proclaims. I take some satisfaction in the fact that I’m only under her supervision for another eight hours or so.

Rhiannon gives me a kiss goodbye and whispers that she’s
going to figure out a way to run away for the weekend. George’s mother actually grabs him by the ear and pulls him outside.

I laugh, and that only makes things worse.

It’s like Cinderella in reverse. I’ve danced with the prince, and now I’m back home, cleaning the toilets. That is my punishment—every toilet, every tub, every garbage pail. This would be bad enough, but every few minutes, George’s mother stops in to give me a lecture about “the sins of the flesh.” I hope that George doesn’t internalize her scare tactics. I want to argue with her, tell her that “sins of the flesh” is just a control mechanism—if you demonize a person’s pleasure, then you can control his or her life. I can’t say how many times this tool has been wielded against me, in a variety of forms. But I see no sin in a kiss. I only see sin in the condemnation.

I don’t say any of this to George’s mother. If she were my full-time mother, I would. If I were the one who would shoulder the aftermath, I would. But I can’t do that to George. I’ve messed up his life already. Hopefully for the better, but maybe for the worse.

Emailing Rhiannon is out of the question. It will just have to wait until tomorrow.

After all the toil is done, after George’s father has weighed in with a speech of his own, seemingly dictated by his wife, I head to bed early, take advantage of having the silence of a room all to myself. If my time as Rhiannon is any proof, I can construct the memories that I will leave George with. So as I lie there in his bed, I conjure an alternate truth. He will
remember heading to the library, and he will remember meeting a girl. She will be a stranger to town, dropped off at the library while her mother visited an old colleague. She asked him what he was reading, and a conversation began. They went for Chinese food together and had a good time. He was really into her. She was really into him. They went back to the library, had the same conversation about
The Giving Tree
, and moved in to kiss. That’s when his mother arrived. That’s what his mother disrupted. Something unexpected, but also something wonderful.

The girl disappeared. They never told each other their names. He has no idea where she lives. It was all there for a moment, and then the moment unraveled.

I am leaving him with longing. Which may be a cruel thing to do, but I’m hoping he will use his longing to get out of this small, small house.

I am much luckier the next morning, when I wake up in the body of Surita, whose parents are away, and who is being watched over by her ninety-year-old grandmother, who doesn’t seem to care what Surita does, as long as it doesn’t interfere with her programs on the Game Show Network. I’m only about an hour away from Rhiannon, and in the interest of her not being called to the principal for repeated attendance violations, I meet her back at the Clover Bookstore after school is out.

She is full of plans.

“I told everyone I was visiting my grandmother for the weekend, and I told my parents I would be at Rebecca’s, so I’m a free agent. I’m actually staying at Rebecca’s tonight, but I was thinking tomorrow night we could … go somewhere.”

I tell her I like that plan.

We head to a park, walking around and playing on the jungle gym and talking. I notice she’s less affectionate with me when I’m in a girl’s body, but I don’t call her on it. She’s still with me, and she’s still happy, and that’s something.

We don’t talk about Justin. We don’t talk about the fact that we have no idea where I’ll be tomorrow. We don’t talk about how to make things work.

We block all this out, and enjoy ourselves.

Xavier Adams could not have imagined his Saturday was going to turn in this direction. He’s supposed to go to play practice at noon, but as soon as he leaves his house, he calls his director and tells him he has a bad flu bug—hopefully the twenty-four-hour kind. The director is understanding—it’s
Hamlet
and Xavier is playing Laertes, so there are plenty of scenes that can be run without him there. So Xavier is free … and immediately heads toward Rhiannon.

She’s left me directions, but she hasn’t told me what the ultimate destination is. I drive for almost two hours, west into the hinterlands of Maryland. Eventually the directions lead me to a small cabin hidden in the woods. If Rhiannon’s car weren’t in front, I’m sure I’d think I was hopelessly lost.

She’s waiting in the doorway by the time I get out of the car. She looks happy-nervous. I still have no idea where I am.

“You’re really cute today,” she observes as I get closer.

“French Canadian dad, Creole mom,” I say. “But I don’t speak a word of French.”

“Your mom isn’t going to show up this time, is she?”