Fire with Fire

IT’S SNOWING OUTSIDE. TEENY TINY FLAKES THAT barely stick, but it looks beautiful. I always did love Boston in winter. The city looks like something out of a Charles Dickens novel.

We’re waiting for a table at Salt, my mom’s and my favorite restaurant. They have the best lobster bisque; the waiter serves it tableside in a silver urn. We had a seven o’clock reservation, but Mrs. Lind took so long getting ready we missed it, and now it’s almost eight and we still haven’t had dinner. I feel faint.

“This is ridiculous,” Mrs. Lind says loudly, so everyone can hear. She’s in a fox-fur coat and black stiletto boots that go up past her knee.

“They should have one for us any minute,” my mom says. “I see them clearing a table for four now.” Even though she sounds as serene as ever, her lipsticked red lips are a thin line, and I know she’s annoyed.

“We’ve been waiting for half an hour,” Mrs. Lind huffs. “On a Wednesday.”

“It’s a five-star restaurant,” my mom reminds her. “And this isn’t the island.”

Mrs. Lind shakes her head from side to side, her coppery hair swishing around her shoulders. “I’m going to say something to the hostess.”

“Celeste,” my mom pleads.

Luckily, the hostess comes over to us then and says our table’s ready. “At last,” Mrs. Lind huffs, and Alex and I exchange a look.

It’s been like this since we got here—just shy of tense. Like, my mom wanted to stop by her old interior-design office before dinner, so she and I could say hi to Bert and Cleve, her friends who’ve known me since I was a baby. They’re partners, and they travel all over the world getting inspired by rugs in Marrakesh and ceramic tiles in Provence. They send Nadia and me the nicest Christmas gifts—lavender oils and crystal bracelets and jars of Dead Sea mud.

But we couldn’t go because Mrs. Lind was all, Grace, we need to stop by Hermés before it closes; I want to get your opinion on that end table I’ve got my eye on. So we did that instead. Alex kept making a pretend gun with his fingers and pretend shooting himself in the temple. I kept lingering by the enamel bracelets, hoping my mom would notice and add one to my Christmas wish list. I super-casually pointed out one I liked and she was like, Not going to happen, Lilli; you do not need a six-hundred-dollar bracelet. Mrs. Lind tried to tell the saleswoman to add it to her bill, and my mom said absolutely not, which Mrs. Lind made a face at. I felt guilty about that, because if I’d known how much it cost, obviously I never would have said anything. Though I had to admit, wearing it to school and seeing the look on Rennie’s face would have been worth the six hundred dollars.

And then, when we were touring the BC campus, my mom wanted to look at the library and the art building and Mrs. Lind kept complaining about her feet hurting. I knew what my mom was thinking because I was thinking the same thing—why would you wear four-and-a-half-inch stiletto heels on a campus tour? So impractical.

The hostess ushers us toward the back, to a sleek leather banquette. I sit down next to my mom, and Alex and his mom sit down across from us.

Mrs. Lind picks up the wine list. “Red or white, hon?” she asks my mom.

“I might have a glass of sauvignon blanc,” my mom says, reaching over and tucking my hair behind my ear. To me she says, “You look so pretty tonight, honey.”

“Oh, Lil’s always a knockout,” Mrs. Lind says. “God, I wish I could still dress like that.”

I smile a humble smile, through my lashes. I did take extra care with my outfit. I feel like on Jar Island it’s whatever, but people get more dressed up in Boston. They care more. I’ve got on a snug heather-gray sweater dress with a white patent-leather belt that cinches around my waist and a pair of platform booties that I bought for this trip. I curled my hair and pushed it all over to one side in a low ponytail. When I came out of the bathroom, Alex told me I looked nice. He was wearing a navy cashmere sweater, but after he saw me, he went and changed and put a light blue button-down and a tie underneath.

As soon as the server comes over, before he can say a word, Mrs. Lind says, “We’ll have a bottle of sauvignon blanc and a bottle of Veuve Clicquot.”

My mom looks alarmed. She’s not a big drinker. “Celeste, I don’t know—”

“Live a little! We’ll let the kids have a sip of the champagne. The wine is for us.” Mrs. Lind winks at me, and Alex and I shrug at each other.

“A tiny sip,” my mom says to me.

Alex and I drink a thimbleful of champagne each, and our moms finish the bottle. With each new glass they get sillier and sillier, and the tension from before fades away.

“To the future!” Mrs. Lind says, waving her glass in the air.

“To our babies!” my mom says, clinking her glass to Mrs. Lind’s.

Mrs. Lind touches the top of Alex’s head. Mournfully she says, “Where have our babies gone?”

I swear, everyone in the restaurant is looking. That’s when they start sharing stories about us. My mom tells the table about the time she took me to the zoo. I was scared of all the animals, and when Mom paid for me to ride one of the elephants, I completely lost it and peed on him.

“She ruined her dress,” my mom chokes out, sputtering with laughter. “It was the sweetest dress, too—it was white, and it had a lace pinafore and puffy sleeves. I bought it in Paris when she was tiny. . . . She looked like an angel in it. Lilli, do you remember that dress?”

I cross my arms. “No.” In a lower voice I say, “Please, no more stories, Mom.”

“Ooh, wait, I’ve got a good one,” Mrs. Lind shrieks. She proceeds to tell us about how hard it was to get Alex to stop breastfeeding, and the whole time Alex is glowering at her like he wants to take her out with his salad plate.

While the moms are busy cracking up, Alex kicks me under the table. He mouths, They’re so wasted.

I mouth back, I know.

We share a secret smile, and I wonder—what would it be like if we were here together? At the same college, I mean. I think it would be like having a piece of home with me.

The next night, Alex and I are hanging out in the den of my family’s Boston apartment, the TV flashing a show that neither of us is really watching. I think it’s because we’re so beat. Thank God we go home tomorrow. Even if I have to go straight to school.

Alex is in the middle of the couch, his legs folded underneath him, in a pair of his track pants and an Academic Decathlon T-shirt from last spring, when we lost the championship by two stupid questions. I’m draped sideways on my dad’s favorite leather armchair in leggings and a baggy sweater, under one of the snuggly cashmere throws my mom is obsessed with. She’s bought at least ten of them, all in cream.

We’re flipping through the glossy university brochures that we got on our tours today, laughing at the obviously staged photos. We went to Tufts in the morning, BC in the afternoon; then we split up so Alex could go suit shopping and I could go to Wellesley, the girls’ school.

“Oh, come on,” Alex says, and presses his lips together to stifle a laugh. “Lil, tell me what’s wrong with this picture.” He turns the brochure around and points at a page-size photo of a student in a lab coat and goggles, proudly holding up an empty glass beaker.

I crack up when I figure it out. “Oh my gosh. They couldn’t even put anything inside the beaker? Don’t they have a prop guy or an art director?”

Alex starts laughing so hard he can’t breathe. “It’s like, dude, I don’t know what you’re smiling about. You’re going to fail your experiment unless you put something in that beaker.” He shakes his head and then puts the brochure down on the coffee table with the others. “Pass me a cookie?”

I toss him a new sleeve of Chips Ahoy!, since mine has only five left inside. The brochure in my lap shows pictures of students in their dorm rooms. There’s one where four girls are smiling up from a pair of bunk beds inside a room that looks about as big as a prison cell. “I don’t know how I’m going to live in a dorm. My bathroom is bigger than that room we saw today.” I take the last sip of milk in my glass and kick off my blanket. “You want something to drink?”

Alex nods. “Water, please. You’ll probably join a sorority, don’t you think?”

I shrug. “Maybe. It depends on where I end up, I guess. What about you? Do you think you’ll pledge a fraternity?”

“Ah, I don’t know. I think a lot of those guys are meat-heads.” Alex watches me get up. “Maybe you could live here. This apartment is sick, Lil.”

“Shhhh,” I say, and nudge my chin toward the hallway where the bedrooms are. My mom’s in the master bedroom; Mrs. Lind’s sleeping in the guest room. “Mom’s already freaking out about me leaving, and my dad would love to keep me under lock and key here with him.”

Alex reaches for the remote and puts on sports. “I doubt anything will wake our moms up tonight.”

He’s probably right. They popped open a bottle of red wine once we got back at the apartment. I swear, they’ve probably consumed more alcohol in the last two days than the freshmen we saw in the dorms. Their wineglasses are on the table, still relatively full, with two different colors of lipstick on the rims. I stick them in the dishwasher, empty what’s left from the bottle, and put that in the recycling bin. Hopefully, my dad won’t be mad at my mom for opening it. Every word on the label is in French. He keeps all his best wine and champagne here.

On the way over to Tufts this morning, I could tell my mom was getting annoyed at Mrs. Lind. Mrs. Lind was running the GPS on her phone, trying to navigate us out of traffic, even though my mom knows Boston like the back of her hand and obviously had the best way to get across town. Mom had wanted to get us there early, so we could park at one end of the campus and walk to the admissions hall, but Mrs. Lind kept saying that the spots Mom tried to park in were too small for our SUV. We were almost late, so Mom used the valet parking at a nearby restaurant and tipped the guy big since we weren’t actually eating there.

It takes me a few tries to remember which kitchen cabinets have the glasses. I pour us both waters. I haven’t been to the apartment in over a year, but Dad’s here all the time, working at the hospital. We have a cleaning lady, and a person whose job it is to keep the house stocked with food and stuff, so he doesn’t have to worry about anything. God forbid he’d actually have to go to the store and buy a carton of milk.

When I get back to the den, Alex is staring out the windows at the city below. I put our glasses down and stand next to him. It’s snowing again.

“It’s pretty out there,” I say, leaning forward so my forehead is against the glass. We’re on the thirtieth floor of a huge high-rise, and you can see everything. It’s still another couple weeks until Thanksgiving, but lots of people have holiday lights already strung up on their roofs or their balconies. The trees down in the park are all bare and spindly, and the sky is super inky black with flecks of white. The people walking around look like tiny ants.

Alex turns to me with a big grin on his face “You want to go for a walk or something? I’m not tired.”

“Now?” It’s after midnight, and I’m basically in my sleeping clothes. “But we’ve got school tomorrow.” Plus, my feet kind of hurt from all the walking we did today. I’ve got two blisters coming, one on each pinkie toe. I didn’t want to wear heels, but Mom insisted because I was going to an interview. And when we were strolling around Wellesley’s campus, she leaned in and whispered, “Never, ever, ever, Lillia,” and pointed to a group of girls who were walking to class in PJ bottoms and slippers. I rolled my eyes, because yeah, right, like I would ever.

“Come on, Lil. Let’s have an adventure without any chaperones.” He groans. “This was supposed to be a trip about our futures, but I haven’t felt more like a little kid in a long time.”

I laugh. I know what he means. Both our moms were completely on top of us today. They asked, like, double the questions Alex and I did on the college tour. Mom picked every restaurant we went to, not that I minded. I love the homemade gnocchi at Sorrento’s. I sometimes ask Daddy to bring it home for me when he takes the hospital’s private plane, but it never tastes the same when it’s not fresh fresh fresh. And Mrs. Lind kept fussing with Alex’s hair or his tie.

I’m about to admit to Alex that I’ve never actually walked around Boston alone, and definitely not at night. But he looks so excited, and I’m not that tired either, especially not after all those sweets. So I say, “Okay.”

I tiptoe into my room, trade my leggings for a pair of jeans. I put some Band-Aids on my pinkie toes and slip on a pair of boots. Before I walk out the door, I grab my phone and I see that I have a text from Reeve. It says, So did you and Lind go to the opera or are you having a spa day? I laugh out loud at the thought of Alex and me getting mani-pedis in matching robes. I text back, Spa day. Duh!

When I come out, Alex has cleaned up our mess in the den. He’s changing in the corner, where he’s put his duffel bag full of clothes. He’s wearing jeans too, and he’s putting on a pair of sneakers, but he doesn’t have a shirt on yet. I can see every muscle in his shoulders and arms. I pop around the corner and pretend like I don’t see him, and give him a few seconds of privacy.

We’re so quiet as we sneak down the hall and open the front door. Alex shushes me as I unlock the dead bolt and slowly pull the door open. Once we’re in the elevator, I let out a deep breath. We walk past the doorman together and out onto the street. Alex gives me a high five.

Boston is even prettier at night. It’s an old city, with a lot of charming details, like gas streetlights and wooden signs.

“I like this city,” Alex says. “So much to see and do. I’ll probably die of boredom in Michigan. “

“Do you think that’s where you’ll end up going?”

Alex shrugs. “My dad’s donated a bunch of money. And his best fraternity brother is on the board of directors. I think it’s inevitable.”

I rub his arm. “You’ll make the best of it,” I tell him. Because that’s the kind of guy Alex is.

Our apartment is somewhat close to Harvard Square, so that’s where we walk to. At first I’m a little scared, because there aren’t a ton of people out, and the street we take has a bunch of dark alleys. I keep close to Alex, my arm threaded through his. But the closer we get to the school, the more kids we see out on the streets. I guess it doesn’t matter that they have class tomorrow or that it’s snowing out. We follow a flow of them to a street where there are a lot of bars.

He takes my hand so we won’t lose each other in the crowd. “They should put this on the tour,” Alex says with a laugh.

I start to say something back when a pack of drunk frat guys stumbles out the double doors. A wave of nausea and abject fear crashes over me, and I freeze up. For a second I think I see him. Mike. But then he turns around and it’s not him after all.

“Are you okay?” Alex asks me, and gives my hand a tender squeeze. I can barely hear him through the sound of my own heart beating in my ears.

What if I did run into Mike? Would he remember me? Would he apologize for . . . what happened? Or does he think it was nothing? That’s probably it. He probably doesn’t even remember me.

My chest feels so tight it’s hard to breathe. Amherst is a few hours away from Boston. That’s what I say to calm myself down. But they could be here. It’s not a crazy idea; it’s totally possible. I bet lots of college kids come to Boston to party.

Maybe I don’t want to come to school in Boston. Maybe I’ll apply to a school on the West Coast—UC Berkeley maybe, or UCLA. I’ll run as far as I have to to never see his face again.

I think I finally get what Mary has been going through all these years. Why she left, and why she came back. She wants closure. It’s not something I’ll ever get, but I can help her get hers.

“Are you okay?” Alex asks me again.

I nod. “Let’s keep walking, okay?”

My pace is decidedly quicker, but Alex keeps up with me fine.

When I get back to my room, I check my phone and there’s another text from Reeve. It says, What are you up to for real? Bored out of your mind? I text back, We just got back from a walk in the snow! So beautiful here! There. Let him chew on that.