Diva (17 page)

should be happy, happy, happy because practicing for our duet went super-well—"It'll be a highlight of

the show," Rowena said—and also because Rowena didn't mention anything about the New York summer

program in front of Sean. I still haven't decided what to do about that. But instead of being happy, I'm

bummed about what Mom told me about Arnold. I don't want to go home—particularly because I don't

want to have to go shopping with her on the biggest shopping day of the year.

"Um…" Sean fiddles with his car keys. "I'm meeting Rudy at around…" He stops. "What's wrong, Caitlin?"

And that's all it takes for me to pour out the whole pathetic Mom/Arnold story. Even while I'm doing it,

I'm thinking,
What are you, stupid
? I'd never have told any of my old friends something this personal and embarrassing. On top of the Nick thing too. But I've known Sean and Gigi a couple of months, and they

already know all the gory details.

When I finish, Sean says all the appropriate,
It'll be okays
, then adds, "Know what I'm in the mood for?"

"A break from me and my problems?" But I'm hoping he'll say,
I'm in the mood to kiss you
or
I want to
scrape the dust of this sorry town off my shoes and fly with you to Paris
. Not likely.

He laughs. "A Slurpee. Is there a Seven-Eleven near you?"

We drive to a 7-Eleven near the beach. They have a machine with eight Slurpee flavors, but two spigots

are broken. Sean says we should both get a large and both get three flavors, so we can try them all. So I

get white cherry, Coke, and blueberry, while Sean gets what he calls a "tropical blend" of lime, banana, and Spongebob pina colada. "You should work for Seven-Eleven," I say. "In the flavor development."

"Right. And after I design the perfect flavor, they'll pay me a lot of money and finance my opera career."

He holds out his cup to me. "Want some?"

I take a sip, wondering if sharing his straw is the closest I'll ever get to kissing him. Pretty gross, right,

wanting to suck someone's spit off a straw… Most girls I know would rather sleep with a guy. "Try mine

too," I say.

"You kids plan on paying for those?" the counter guy asks.

We do, and we decide to cross the street and drink them on the beach. "Should we drive?" I ask. "The weather looks pretty bad." The clouds are hanging low, making different shades of black against the sky,

so it looks like steps to heaven.

"Nah, let's walk. It'll be okay."

So we do, skipping across the six-lane highway toward the roaring ocean. The clouds seem dark and the

breeze is cool, cooler still with the Slurpee. I shiver.

"You're cold?" Sean asks.

"I don't want to go home."
BIG understatement
. My teeth chatter. "I'm f—fine."

"Here." He unbuttons the long-sleeved shirt he has on over his T-shirt and hands it to me. It's old, soft, and smells like Sean, and as our feet crunch the sand, I hold the collar to my nose and know that, forever and

ever, when I smell that smell, or even smell the ocean, or a pina colada Slurpee, I will think of him.

"But take your shoes off," he says. "No point walking on the beach with shoes."

I sit and remove them, obedient, and leave them by the roadside. I let my toes sink deep into the cold sand.

Sean takes his off too. He stands and holds his hand out to me. I reach for his fingers, thinking,
Kiss me.

Kiss me
.

He doesn't. I take a sip of my Slurpee, a small one because I don't want it to end.

"Know where I was Thanksgiving Friday last year?" I say.

"Where? Some football game with your cool cheergirl friends?" He mimes lame-looking pom-pom

moves.

I make a face. "Close. In Key West with them. We went snorkeling one day. I remember one of the guys

saw a shark under the reef." I'd almost forgotten about this. It seems so long ago.

"Cool. Did you see it?"

I nod. "It was just this little lemon shark, but I was freaking out. I was petrified. And Nick, my boyfriend, he was telling me don't worry about it, I didn't have to dive down if I didn't want to, but…" I stop. It's hard to explain so Sean will understand, and I don't even really know why I'm telling him this. "But I

wanted
to see the shark, even though I was scared. I didn't want to let being afraid make me miss out on something. I wanted to face it and know that I would be okay. You know? So I dove down and saw it."

"Yeah?" Sean offers me his Slurpee. "I like that story."

"Yeah, I do too." I take a sip of his Slurpee and give him mine. "It makes me sound sort of brave."

"You
are
brave."

I feel a drop of water on my face. I don't say anything, hoping maybe it's just a spray from the ocean. But I

feel another drop—a fat one—then another.

"And… you were right," Sean says. "We should head back."

"Guess so." I turn real slow, as four more drops splash my face and shoulders.

"We'd better run," he says. "Sorry."

We begin to run. The drops are harder now, too many to count. I feel them soaking through Sean's shirt,

making it cling to me. It's hard to run in the sand—harder still in the rain—and we're really far from

Sean's car. I stumble and drop the Slurpee. It falls to the sand, and I fall after it. "Sorry. You go ahead! I'm sorry."

"Right. I'll just leave you here." He holds out his hand. The rain is getting into my eyes, my mouth. He pulls me up. I'm drowning, and Sean's hand is pulling me to safety. "I don't think we can get any wetter,"

he says. "Let's just walk."

We stumble along, holding each other, giggling.

"I'm sorry," he says again when we reach the car. "I'll remember from now on—take Caitlin's advice on weather issues."

"I don't mind. It was an adventure."

"I was hoping you'd see it that way, instead of seeing it as stupid Sean making you get all soaked just to drink Slurpees on the beach."

He turns on the car's heater to dry us off. My shoes are still back on the sand, but I don't bring it up.

Instead, I move closer to the heat and to him. We're so close, and I can feel how it was with his hand on

me. Again, I think he should kiss me.

He says. "Great practice today, huh?"

"Yeah." The rain is coming down outside, but the heat inside is warm and nice. I lean closer.

He sits straight instead, and aims the vent toward me. "Want some more of my Slurpee?"

"What?"

"Do you want some of my Slurpee—since you dropped yours?"

And suddenly it all comes together, and I get it: He's never going to kiss me.

I pull off the now-soaked shirt he lent me and look out the window, letting that piece of knowledge sink in

like a thousand raindrops. I don't say anything. Sean doesn't either, and I'm glad. It's like a head-slap

moment. I've figured out what was right in front of me the whole time. Duh.

I shake my head. "So you're going out with Rudy today?"

"What?"

I'm still not looking at him—I can't—but he sounds surprised, like he forgot I was there. "Oh, yeah. It's his sister's birthday. It'll be me, Rudy, and a cast of thousands of his cousins." He laughs. "I think they're roasting a pig in the yard."

"How long have you and Rudy…" I make myself look at him and finish the sentence. "… been together?"

He smiles. "Choral Camp last summer. We met the first day and it was… You ever meet someone and just

click with them? Like, everything about them is interesting, and you know it's the same way for them with

you?"

"Not yet," I say.
Except with you
. Outside the car, the rain's still pounding, drowning us, and I feel so completely stupid I can barely speak.

"Well, someday you will, I bet. You'll meet someone who even likes opera." He grins again. "I wasn't sure if you knew about Rudy and me."

I have to say something. "Oh, sure. It's completely… obvious you two are a… couple."

He nods. "Well, at my old school, it wouldn't have been completely obvious. It's still pretty… weird

there. Most people there thought Misty and me were together, since we were such good friends. And when

I got here, I figured people in the arts are more, you know, accepting, but I still thought I don't have to give people info they don't need."

I nod. It's still hard to talk and look at him too. I mean, yeah, I figured it out, but I was still hoping I was wrong. So I put my arms around his neck and hug him hard and manage to get out, "I know."

And I do.

But for some reason, I still feel exactly like that day with the shark.

Opera_Grrrl's Online Journal

Subject: What Would a Diva Do?

Date: November 27

Time: 12:58 p.m.

Listening to: "Avant de Quitter" ("Before I Quit") from Faust

Feeling: Bummed

Weight: 115 lbs. and holding. I'm very proud of myself for not pigging.

Can you believe it? Sean's gay! I'm *seriously* bummed . .

In real life, when someone's in love w/someone unattainable (4 whatever reason), they sit around and

mope. In opera, they take action. Maybe that's better. Let's see…What do people in operas do???

MADAME BUTTERFLY—
Commit ritual suicide (but I don't know any rituals).

RIGOLETTO—
Step in the path of a hired assassin (don't know any of those either).

PAGLACO
—Murder (trying to find a solution that avoids jail and/or death).

CARMEN—
Ditto

IL TABARRO—
Ditto (Seeing a pattern here?).

CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA—Gei
someone else mad enough at the guy that *they* commit the murder.

In UN
BALLO IN MASCHERA
, Amelia goes to the graveyard & picks some special plants 2 make her

forget the guy…but then he sees her & they make out…all of which leads to…

…MURDER.

It seems like an awful lot of operas end with murderers singing sorrowfully over the bodies of their

beloved victims. I don't want to kill Sean. He's my best friend, and I love him.

Okay, so I'll mope.

On Sunday, Sean makes his long-promised visit to come help me with my dance steps. Now that the

possibility of romance is zip, zilch, zero, nothing, nada, I would have thought I wouldn't be as excited

about having Sean over. But it's really weird because I am excited. Maybe it has something to do with the

fact that our performance is in two weeks and there's still the constant threat of having to sing on the side

of the stage like a defective. Or maybe I just love being with Sean that much, even if I can't
love-
love him.

Mom has an open house which actually (yessss!) does happen. We practice our duet, then go over dance

steps about fifteen times. We even get out the camera that Mom uses to make "digital tours" of the homes she's listed. I film Sean dancing. "I promise to watch it every day."

"You'd better," he says. "You can do it."

"I will, I will." I actually think I can.

Then, since it's still an hour before Mom gets home, we order a pizza, and film each other singing. We're

making up an opera about school. I play Ms. Wolfe, and Sean does a hilarious Miss Lorraine Davis,

staggering on tiptoe, singing, "Art is suffering, my children! Suffer for art!" in a falsetto voice.

Later, while we're eating pizza, Sean says, "Caitlin, you may be the perfect girl."

A week ago, when I was thinking of Sean as the possible Man of My Dreams, this would have caused my

stomach to lurch like I'm on the Tower of Terror ride at Disney, where you don't know if you're up or

down. I may have actually been unable to speak. Now I smile and say, "Why?"
Like a normal person
.

"Well, you're not only beautiful and talented. You are also the only girl on the planet—maybe the only

human being—who likes pepperoni and olive pizza like I do."

I laugh. "You're right. Usually, if people like pepperoni, they aren't into olives, and if they like olives, they want a veggie and think the pepperoni is too fatty."

"Not us, huh? We're naturally skinny."

I stare at him like,
Are you blind, boy
? "Not me. I was fat for years."

"Really?"

"I was hideous."

"I doubt that."

I reach across him to the end table where Mom keeps our old photos. A week ago, I wouldn't have done

this either, but I find my freshman class picture. "See?"

He takes it. I expect him to recoil in horror.
No! No! This swamp thing can't possibly be you
! Instead, he grins. "You look so cute with pigtails."

I stare at him. "Right."

"Yeah." He looks at the photo again. "I mean, maybe you're not a model type like now. What do you weigh, a hundred pounds? But you were so cute. Look."

He shows me the photo. I stare at it, at me, trying to look like Lizzie McGuire in braids, grinning like

crazy. It's like I've never seen the photo before, or that person. Sean's right. I
was
cute. I weighed more than twenty pounds more than now—thirty-five pounds more than my thinnest—which is not
that
big. I

wasn't a beast. I was cute. I say, "You really think I look like a model?"

He nods and hands back the photo. "You're beautiful."

That's when the door flies open and my mother does a happy dance across the living room. "Someone

made a full-price offer, Caitlin! We get to eat this month!"

Which is, of course, an exaggeration. We eat every month. Dad pays.

She sees Sean. "Oh, you have company." She walks closer. "And pizza… oh, but you got pepperoni. I'll have to pick that off. Too fatty."

I see Sean stifle a laugh, then wink at me. Of course, that's exactly what we said everyone does. I wink

back, and it feels good to be with him, good and warm and comfortable.

"What?" Mom says. "What?"

"Nothing, Mom. Get a plate. There's a slice here with hardly any pepperoni. We should've gotten a