The Loose Ends List(64)
“Right they are, old chap.”
Enzo looks down at his bee. “Oh, no. Astrid’s mad at me.”
Enzo had invited the entire ship: You are cordially invited to a pool party in honor of Maddie O’Neill Levine’s 18th birthday. Cupcakes. Good music. 8 pm tomorrow.
Gram texted Enzo back: Enzo, we had planned to surprise Maddie with a formal dinner dance in the dining room and a proper cake for her 18th birthday. Astrid
I text, Gram, I want the pool party and cupcakes and 18-year-old music. Nothing proper. And no chicken feet. Love, Maddie
Gram texts, Suit yourself. But I’m bringing chicken feet.
Crisis averted.
I officially meet Heinz in the poker room after dinner. He shakes my hand and tells me he’s pleased to meet me. He and Vito are buddies now, and Vito has enlisted him to take down Dad and Bob in poker. I don’t know what to make of him. He doesn’t look like a scary Nazi. But nobody looks scary at ninety-three. He just looks like Gollum with heart failure.
When I stop by to tuck her in, Gram informs me that Gollum is kind of sexy. I inform her that slugs stuck to mushrooms are sexier.
“Happy birthday, you big whore bag!” Janie tackles me.
“You’re in a good mood.”
“Of course. It’s your birthday.” She throws a gift bag at me.
“I kind of forgot to get you something. But this is from Rachel and the E’s.”
There are two boxes inside. One is a book of photos from the E’s. The card says: By now we are living in a postapocalyptic world and only Maddie can save us. Come home, birthday girl!
The shower turns off. “Don’t come out naked,” I yell to Enzo. “We have a visitor.”
“Come out naked,” Janie yells.
I can tell Rachel wrapped her own gift because she wraps like a toddler. It’s a pair of granny underwear. Very clever. By now you’ve probably ruined all your pretty lace thongs with your Irritable Bowel Syndrome. Happy Birthday, Mads. Love, Rach.
“You guys have to stop with the IBS jokes. I’ve practically outgrown it,” I whisper.
“Oh, please. You’re the IBS poster child,” Janie says, just as the bathroom door opens.
Janie leaves me flipping through my birthday album with towel-clad Enzo.
“That’s Lizzie on our first camping trip.” I laugh. “This was taken after she got lost and claimed a possum showed her how to get back. And this is all of us at the lake.”
“Who’s the guy groping you?”
“That’s Ethan, my ex. He’s an idiot.”
Enzo grabs his crumpled shorts from the chair and pulls out a red velvet drawstring bag from his pocket. “I saw this in London and thought of you.”
It’s a delicate silver bracelet with a single starfish charm.
My eyes start to fill with tears. “I love it.”
“Why are you crying?”
“I just love it. Thank you for getting me.”
“You’re welcome, Maddie.”
Gram has arranged a refined-young-lady lunch on her balcony. I can’t stop touching my starfish bracelet.
“You outdid yourself, Astrid,” I exclaim in my country club accent.
“Wes did most of it.”
“Assy just barked orders from the chaise.” Wes jumps up and lifts me off my feet. “Happy birthday, gorgeous.”
They’ve hung tissue paper lanterns and set the long table with china and bud vases filled with flowers.
We eat omelets, potatoes, and fresh blueberry muffins. Mom and Dad sip “water with gas” and gaze at me with stupid smiles.
“I can’t believe our baby is eighteen. We are so proud of the lovely, smart woman you have become.” Dad raises a glass, and we toast to youth and good health and long life.
Uncle Billy sticks a candle in my muffin and they sing at the top of their lungs with Aunt Rose and Jeb two full beats off.
“Gifts, gifts,” Mom says.
Bob gives me a picture of us all on the Spanish Steps in a silver frame, and Aunt Rose gives me a bejeweled bookmark she made in the craft room. Uncle Billy and Wes give me a “Welcome to New York” gift card basket, and Mom and Dad give me an IOU for a future road trip with the E’s, all expenses paid.
This gift would have been a life-changer two months ago.
Jeb hands me a key.
“What’s this, Jebby? The key to your heart?”
“No. It’s a key to my apartment, in case you get lost in Brooklyn or chased by a predator.”
“Aw. That’s sweet. Thank you. Of course you know I’ll be stealing food.”
“I don’t have food.”
“My turn. It’s age after foolery,” Gram says. She hands me a package wrapped in plain brown paper. I open it slowly because I know it’s the last birthday gift I will ever receive from my grandmother. It’s a hard-cover, brand-new copy of Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth. I flip through and see that Gram taped a picture of the two of us in the lava tube inside the front cover. The words written on the next page pull at my heart:
Darling Maddie,
You are eighteen, which means you are still a baby and don’t know a thing about anything. But trust me when I say you are special. There is a light in you that guides people through things they can’t possibly get through alone. I know this, because I am one of those people. If Snaefellsj?kull is a mystical place, you, my dear, are a mystical person. Be brave. Be adventurous. Let people come to you. You’ll derive power from your own light. And I will be an eternal starfish chafing your ass all the years of your life. I love you, beautiful girl.