Signal to Noise(60)

“I have a feeling it might be easier.”

Magic happened like that for them: in feelings and hunches and surprise insights which came in the middle of the night.

“Okay,” Daniela said. “Who will we imitate? A movie star?”

“Can I see one of your magazines?” Meche asked.

Daniela grabbed her purse and pulled out one of her teen magazines. Meche thumbed through it, finally ripping out a page and holding it up.

“This one,” she said.

Her choice was a pretty girl wearing a black leotard. Her hair was in a ponytail. Sebastian looked carefully at the photo, trying to memorize her face, her expression.

“Who are we focusing on?” Sebastian asked.

“How about Daniela?”

“Fine.”

Meche fiddled with a record. A song began to play. Take On Me. Sebastian tapped his foot, picturing Daniela as the girl. Erasing Daniela and sketching a whole new face on her, a whole new body. Clothes stitched themselves together, hair changed colour and grew, Daniela gained height and the contours of her body were reshaped. The final result was a good approximation but though it looked like an accurate copy of the picture, it also looked a bit glossy, perfect and two-dimensional; too much like the picture in a way, their imaginations producing a young woman whose skin had the rubbery quality of a mannequin.

Daniela walked around the room. It was like she had become a large Barbie doll, taking extremely long steps with her new slender legs. Then the outlines of Daniela’s body seemed to fizzle—like one image had been superimposed upon another. Streams of colour cascaded down Daniela’s shoulders, tumbling down; the threads of the illusion came apart, golden dust drifting towards the floor and disappearing as soon as it touched the ground.

The three of them sat down in unison. That had been interesting but not exactly what Sebastian had imagined.

“We need to keep working on it,” Meche said.

“It’s almost four,” Daniela said, putting the crafts she had been working on back in her big market bag. “I need to go to my tutoring session.”

“Really?” Meche said. “It’s Saturday.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t matter,” Daniela said. “I’m paying for it. We can meet tomorrow.”

“Can we come by your house around noon?”

“Sure.” Daniela rubbed her eyes and yawned. “My mom will make us lunch. Anyway, my sister’s picking me up. I better go.”

“Bye.”

Daniela waved a happy, cheerful goodbye and clomped down the stairs. Meche locked the door behind her and looked at the picture from the magazine, biting her lower lip.

“Maybe we need to look at a moving picture instead of a still image,” Meche ventured.

“What are you getting me for my birthday?” Sebastian asked, flopping onto the couch and grabbing hold of the blanket again.

“You’ll have more than enough with Daniela’s awesome birthday present. Did you see all that glitter?”

“I did.”

“I think she mistakes you for a five-year-old girl,” Meche said.

“She means well.”

“Of course she does.”

“Come here,” he said. “I want to show you something.”

Meche sat down next to him, propping her legs over the arm of the couch and resting her back against his arm.

“What?”

He cracked open his copy of The Ambassadors and pulled out a cut-out from a magazine.

“I got it the other day. It’s from a National Geographic. The Northern Lights.”

“Cool.”

“We have to go to the North Cape to see them.”

Meche handed back the clipping. She grabbed the blanket and pulled it over herself so that they were both covered. Things were back to normal between them—the December incident vanished—except when they weren’t; moments like this when Sebastian felt there was a little splinter in both of their brains.

He opened his mouth to ask Meche something. The trouble was he wasn’t sure what question he wanted to ask.

Sebastian sighed.





DANIELA’S SISTER DROPPED her off in front of Mr. Rodriguez’s place and told her she’d be back in a couple of hours. Daniela rang the bell and hummed as she waited for him to come down the stairs and let her in.

Her teacher had told her she was progressing well with her essays and Daniela felt proud of herself. She was not a brilliant student, rather average in her achievements, and it felt good to know she could shine at something.

Mr. Rodriguez let her into his apartment and smiled.

“Hi,” he said. “How are you doing today, Daniela?”

“I’m good,” she said, peeling off her sweater and putting it in the entrance closet, before following Mr. Rodriguez inside.

He had a little apartment with potted plants by the windows. The living room/dining room combo contained numerous shelves crammed with books. Photographs of a girlfriend Daniela had yet to meet adorned one shelf. The furniture was all a bit worn but it all looked rather chic and effortless.

Daniela sat at the dining room table and took out her notebook and her books, piling them all neatly.

“Do you want a soda? Some water?”

“No, sir. I’m fine.”