My Last Innocent Year(59)
After a few minutes, Debra stumbled outside, cradling the roll of paper towels. Her eye makeup was smudged and there was a run in her stocking.
“So, what? You’re mad at me now?”
“I don’t know, Debra.”
“I can’t believe you’re letting him off the hook. It’s like you’re friends.”
“I’m not—” I put my face in my hands. “Forget it.”
“Forget what? Stop being so passive-aggressive.”
“There’s no point in even talking to you because you never listen.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Like that night with Zev. I just needed you to listen to me.”
“I did listen.”
“No. You didn’t. You pounced.” I unwound the boa from my neck. “I don’t know what happened that night. Zev just did what guys do, you know? He had the chance to fuck me so that’s what he did. And I let him.”
“Well, that’s the saddest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.” She sat down next to me. There was glitter in her hair, embedded in the line of her part. She sniffed several times before speaking. “I’m sorry, Iz. I was just trying to protect you.”
“I know. But I don’t need you to.” I looked down at my hands and shirt, both streaked with blood. “Despite all evidence to the contrary.”
Debra laughed. Her face, wide and smooth and full of everything, shone in the moonlight. Above us, the sky was dark and vast, dotted with tiny pinpricks of light. I would never have the words to describe this part of Wilder, the quiet, majestic part, but it was the part I wanted most to remember.
“You know why I wanted to come to Wilder?” I said.
“I have no fucking clue.”
“Because it had its own T-shirt.”
“I think a lot of schools have their own Tshirts. You could’ve saved yourself a lot of trouble.”
“Yeah, but it’s the only place where people actually wear them. When I first visited with my dad, I remember seeing all these kids in their Wilder Tshirts, and I wanted to be a part of that.”
“Yeah, so?”
“It’s just, this place, Debra—it isn’t all bad. You always talk about changing it, ‘burning it to the motherfucking ground,’ but I actually kind of love it.”
“I love it, too.” I looked at her. “No, I do. What I hate is that it feels like it will never be ours. I thought being here made us equal, you know, but we’re always on their turf, playing by their rules. I worked just as hard as Zev did to get here, as hard as all these assholes. So did you.” She sniffed again, louder this time, and I realized she was crying.
I reached for her hand and held it as she told me how she was feeling. The ground was slippery, she said, and she was losing her footing, the way she had freshman year. It started the night we’d gone back to Zev’s room, and I realized there was a pattern: Debra usually broke down after a stunt like that, as if the things she thought would destabilize Wilder only succeeded in destabilizing her.
“I’m so angry, you know?” Debra said, and I put my arms around her and told her that I forgave her, of course I forgave her. Because even though Debra was impossible and difficult and messy and careless—not to mention certain about things she knew nothing about—she was also my friend and even then I knew she always would be, even when I didn’t like her very much. Later, I’d drop people for far less, but Debra had imprinted on me. It’s like that with the people who know us when we’re young, when we’re still figuring out the world and how we might fit into it.
After a while, we headed back to the dorm. Fireflies were passing secret messages to each other, and I thought about something my grandmother’s rabbi said when I asked him what happens to us after we die. His answer was unsatisfying to me at the time, something about stardust and energy and how nothing is ever wasted. “Yeah,” I said, “but what does that mean?” I didn’t care about energy; I just wanted to know if I would see my mother again. But now I thought he might have been on to something. I could feel a kind of energy swirling around me, not just my mother but Debra and Crashy and Zev, Connelly, even Amos. We would all leave parts of ourselves behind after we were gone. Nothing we’d done here would be wasted.
* * *
WE NEVER FOUND out who told Dean Hansen about the spray paint on Zev’s door—a janitor, Debra thought; there were probably procedures for things like that. And I never saw Zev Neman again. I heard he moved back to Israel, went to work for his father, married Yael. This last part I read about in a Hillel newsletter that arrived the day Bill Clinton was acquitted by the Senate. When I imagine Yael telling their origin story—dinner party, candlelight, glass of merlot—I have nothing whatsoever to do with it. I am facedown on the floor at their feet.
18
ABE was coming for graduation. Benji was ready to watch the store, along with Manny, and Abe was looking forward to getting away.
“Are you sure?” I said. “It’s such a long drive and it’s not like I’m doing anything special.”
“Isabel, there’s enough tsuris in this life. Let’s celebrate when something good happens. Besides, it’ll be good for Benji. I can see how he does without me.”