When I finally found the Schwinn under a pile of wooden lobster traps, something in me loosened. There it was, faded by sun from hot pink to a pale-salmon color, the basket splintered, the banana seat covered in a thin layer of mold.
I grabbed the handlebars, ran my fingers through the fraying plastic ribbons, and pulled the bike out into the driveway.
* * *
—
I looked ridiculous riding my Schwinn, even though it was too tall for me when I was seven and I’m still short.
No one was watching, though. Almost all the lights were out in the houses, and we didn’t have streetlights on this side of town.
The bike was so rusty that it wailed as I pedaled. I’d had this feeling that it was lonely in the garage, that it missed me, but I was the one who already missed everything. I don’t mean Hopuonk itself, exactly, but more like the time when I was little, when Susan wanted to be around me and let me touch her hair, when I still wanted that too.
I switched on the transistor radio, which picked up a fuzzy signal of “Hunger Strike” by Temple of the Dog, which PJ sang an acoustic version of sometimes.
When I got to Corvis’s house, I saw the lava lamp glowing in her bedroom window. I tossed the bike on her lawn. This act was one I’d done hundreds of times as a kid, and it felt both strange and completely normal to do it now.
I pressed my face to the glass of her window and saw her curled in her desk chair, hugging her knees to her chest. I couldn’t see her face, but she was bent over, writing something.
I rapped on the window.
Corvis turned to face me. Her face was splotchy and red, her eyes bloodshot. I’d gone there for some kind of comfort, and it had never occurred to me that Corvis might need that too.
I’d never seen Corvis cry before. Not when her grandmother died in fourth grade and they called her out of class. Not when she fell off her bike in fifth grade and plummeted into a ditch, breaking her arm. Not when everyone egged her house.
I waved, and she put her forefinger to her lips, quieting me. She stood and came to the window, yanking it open.
“What’s up?” she said. She tried to pretend she hadn’t been crying.
“Can I come in?” I asked.
“It’s really late,” she shout-whispered.
“Duh,” I said.
Corvis sighed, then pulled the window open wider and helped me inside, holding me by the armpits. We both toppled onto the floor. This sneaking in through the window thing was much easier when we were eleven.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, picking herself up off the rug. In Corvis’s house, they didn’t have wall-to-wall—they had hundred-year-old Turkish rugs everywhere, in all shapes and sizes and color combinations.
I stayed on the floor.
“I couldn’t sleep,” I said. “Why were you crying?”
“I wasn’t.”
“Yes, you were.”
I looked her up and down. She wore long pajamas and a red bathrobe. Her hair was, as always, a mess.
“What are you writing?” I tried, hoping for a different response.
“A letter,” she said.
“To who?”
“Kristen, okay?” said Corvis. Fresh tears swelled in her eyes, and she clenched her jaw, trying to hold them in.
“It’s okay,” I said, looking at her. “You can cry.”
She sat on the floor again, facing me.
“I broke up with her yesterday,” said Corvis. “I decided to go to Sarah Lawrence early. You know, take a summer class. Get out of here.”
“Okay,” I said. A twinge went through my stomach, imagining Corvis somewhere else. Even though I was leaving, too, I still felt abandoned.
“She wanted to come, like I said, but that’s a terrible idea. She needs to go be on her own, to find a boyfriend, to forget about me. But she begged me not to break up with her. She begged me. Then she turned our friends against me.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. It was difficult not to reach out and touch her, to comfort her.
Corvis shrugged and wiped her cheeks with the palm of her hand.
“This was always going to happen, but it still feels awful.”
I thought of their friends—the kids from band, art class, and drama. They were either too skinny, too short, too fat, or too sweaty, wore ill-fitting dark clothing dotted with holes, and dyed their hair blue or purple. They pierced body parts that had no business being pierced. But they were just as petty, just as backstabbing as we were—and, just like us, they looked alike. They wore the same clothing. They left people out.
“You’re going to Sarah Lawrence,” I said. “You’re going to meet people that are so much cooler than everyone here. It’ll be okay.”
“I know that,” she said, “but it doesn’t stop me from feeling bad.”
“Everyone’s against me too,” I said. “Only they’re pretending not to be just because my dad is Johnny Moon and he’s coming here. I don’t want to do this photo shoot. I don’t think I want to be on the cover of a magazine.”
“Why not?”
“People don’t take him as seriously as he wants them to,” I said. “Now they’re making this into a big reunion, to help get him more publicity, and it feels like a scam.”
Corvis nodded.
“Yeah,” she said. “Fuck that.”
“But I have to do it,” I said. “I just wanted . . .”
“A dad?”
I took a deep breath.
“Yeah,” I said.
“You don’t have to do it,” she said.
We sat in silence on the rug for a few minutes. It didn’t feel right to touch her, even though she was still crying a little. I didn’t think I had that privilege. Then I thought of something.
“Listen,” I said. “We’re both about to leave, and it’s almost my birthday, and we’re both feeling like shit. Let’s do something crazy—let’s go have an adventure.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“Scottie’s car,” I said. “Let’s go mess it up.”
Corvis narrowed her eyes.
“Nothing permanent,” she said. “No keying . . . nothing that will actually do damage, okay?”
“I pinky-promise,” I said, holding out my pinky finger.