Be True to Me Read online

  With every moment that passed, the night was shriveling, becoming something shameful and sour. It reminded me of last summer, stepping out onto the tennis court, feeling that harsh force of Fritz’s serve. I’d thought we’d have a good game. She had dismantled and humiliated me in minutes. But perhaps I should have known better. After all, tonight had even come with its very own bad omen. Fritz had shown up at the library wearing those very same Christmas earrings that I’d tried to make disappear by giving them to Thriffaney’s.

  I couldn’t throw them away. But I’d hated owning them, too. So I’d donated them. And I thought I’d seen the last of them. It had been a thunderclap shock to rediscover those earrings on Fritz. I’d stared across the room at her, and she’d looked right back at me, and it had been one of those disturbing mirror moments, as we’d tried to judge each other across the rift.

  Lobster was being served now, along with salad and grilled corn on the cob and potatoes. Wine glasses were refilled, talk got loose, and a few couples stood up to dance. It was half past seven, and still Gil hadn’t come back. I felt tricked and stupid, like in that Peanuts cartoon when Lucy snaps the football away from Charlie Brown so that he lands on his back with his head in a spin.

  Weeze, talking on her other side with Dr. and Mrs. Bird, one of the New York couples who’d come to Sunken Haven especially for tonight, now turned to me. She kept her face a careful mask. Her anger was only in her voice.

  “He’s gone off with her, hasn’t he?”

  “Mrs. Burke, I really don’t know.”

  “It really wasn’t much to ask him.” Her words were warmly wine slurred. “One night. He’d been doing so well with us. That girl has some cheek.”

  I was conscious of Junior, across the table, listening.

  “I’m sure he’ll be back soon,” I murmured.

  “I opened my heart,” said Weeze. “The least he could have done was respect my wishes. I’m surprised that hanky panky would be the order of the night. Aren’t you?”

  “Well, we don’t really know . . .” My voice trailed off.

  Mom, seated one table away with the Forsythes, was looking pointedly over at Gil’s vacant place next to mine. Obviously, she’d noticed that Fritz was also gone. Who hadn’t? I lifted my shoulders—I had no answer for anyone. But my cheeks burned, because obviously Mom had lit on the same conclusion as everyone else. Gil and Fritz had rejected Lobster Party—which meant that Gil had rejected me, too—so that the two of them could be with just each other.

  That day in the Coop with Weeze, I should have been stronger. I should have said no. I should have said thank you, but no, thank you. I should have said please leave me out of it, I was coming here with dear Bertie.

  Instead, I ran as fast and clumsily and unheedingly as I could toward my same old fate, hoping for a different outcome. I’d even told Bertie that my date with Gil was “socially important for the Burkes.” And I’d watched his eyes cloud with hurt, and I hadn’t cared.

  Over at the Forsythe table, Bertie’s back had been to me all night. It shamed me now, maybe because there was something so vulnerable about the back of Bertie—the thin bird bones of his neck and that slight bend in his one ear. It depressed me that I wasn’t right next to him, listening to his compliments, accepting his offers for how to make me more comfortable and happy.

  I’d hurt Bertie. I’d hurt everyone.

  Junior had been staring at me for the longest time. When I looked up and let him catch my eye, he picked up his wine glass and made a sweeping gesture in the air. Careful to speak quietly enough so that his mother didn’t hear.

  “To rematches,” he toasted.

  FRITZ

  “How could you have spent one easy day?”

  “I’m sorry, Fritz.” We’d been drifting out for a while, past the place of conversation. The hurt between us felt as wide as the ocean that surrounded us. The words he offered sounded so small.

  Jean Custis had always been the little itch lurking in a place that I couldn’t find to scratch. It wasn’t only that Gil defended her whenever she came up in conversation. It was the way he did it, with genuine affection and maybe even a little awe. It had never struck me as more than a bother that Jean represented so much about Sunken Haven—including, and mostly, Carpie and Weeze’s approval—that I couldn’t give him.

  Now here we were, slap-bang in the middle of all of this blue sea and sky and silence and overwhelming truth. Maybe I hadn’t wanted to see the power of what Jean had. And I sure hadn’t wanted to see the piece of Gil that craved it.

  After a while, I set back the oars, letting the boat drift, looking at him. “Talk to me,” he finally said.

  “There’s not much to say. I’ve never felt so bad in my whole life.” The emotions felt wrung out of me. “I thought you were mine. I know I was yours. I was sure we’d picked each other. Somehow, it seemed that simple. But I guess I was stupid and naïve and wrong to believe in it.”

  “You’re not wrong. It’s always been you. Christ, I’m here with you right now. Do you know how much I’ve screwed things up with the Burkes, by leaving their party?”

  It bugged me that he’d even bring up the Burkes. I leaned forward, gripping my elbows. “Here’s the thing I care about the most. Now that I know you’ve been lying to me all along, how do I trust anything you might say? You’ll figure out your future with the Burkes on your own. I’m not part of that. But how do I figure out a future of us?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know how you trust me again, after this. All I know is that I want you. I love you. And I’ve always, always chosen you.”

  “But you’ve never chosen me enough.” I didn’t say: You’ve never loved me enough.

  He went quiet. “I messed up,” he said. “I completely messed up. I never, ever meant to hurt you.”

  Tears began to seep from my eyes again, rolling fast and warm. “But you did. How did you imagine I’d feel about you and Jean? How would that not hurt? How could you look me in the eye? How could you have spent one easy day? How could you have told me that you loved me and ever felt happy about it?” My voice was undependable, trembling all over the place. I stood up. “To be tricked like this—it feels so mean, Gil. Like maybe you hated me all along.”

  The boat wobbled dangerously beneath my feet. But it felt good to stand above him. To catch my balance and then to use it to rock the boat, as I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. Creating just enough tip that he had to hold onto the hull.

  His eyes never left me. “That’s insane—how could you say that?”

  “And do you love her? Even a little bit?”

  “Fritz, sit down!”

  “Do you love her, too?”

  “It was more like I wanted to protect her.”

  “Protect Jean Custis? She has everything! Did you love her?”

  “I might have felt . . . something for her. Even if it was only, I dunno, an envy or a wish for everything she had. Is that unforgivable? To want more than what you’ve got—Fritz, can you sit down, you’re acting all kinds of crazy.”

  I’d edged up to the bow of the boat. He might have loved her, even. I wanted to jump. I wanted out. I wanted to clear my head. “You shouldn’t have needed more than me. So yes. I guess I think it is unforgivable, in a way.”

  “Fritz, don’t you even dare—”

  The boat tipped hard as I went for it. Gil cried out, grappling for balance, and I sensed the slide of an oar as I was quickly submerged in deep, dark, tugging ocean, boundless and real. I popped to the surface, to hear him yelling in my ear.

  “Fritz! Enough with this hissy fit, get in the boat, you’re putting yourself in danger—grab hold of my hand!”

  But I couldn’t. Even with the shock of water on my skin, even with the voice in my head telling me girl don’t be dumb, my hurt trumped my fear.

  No. No way was I taking Gil’s hand. Not a chance.

  I started to swim away from him. Maybe it was dramatic, but it wasn’t dangerous
. I had visible land on my left and we were less than half an hour out.

  Behind me, I heard Gil’s oar splashing clumsily at the water. “Look, quit your fuming so we can talk for real. We need to get this worked out between us. Climb back in the boat. There’s nowhere to go, and we lost an oar. Let’s just row in, and go somewhere safe and nice, please? Just us?”

  “Row yourself in.” I could hear all that Southern charm in his talk, buttering me up, but now it felt like a trick. And I knew Gil, who hadn’t grown up around the ocean, was shy about it in a way that I wasn’t.

  My breaststroke skimmed the water, as I began to swim away from him.

  “Arright, then, have it your way. I’ll meet you at the shore, okay, Fritz? Are you fixing to swim into Ocean Bay Park? You just tell me what you’re doing! You owe me that, at least, Fritz—look around or raise your hand that you’re leastways acknowledging that you hear me. Ain’t you even listening to one thing I say?” The deep South that Gil had been taming in his voice all summer was pushing its way through in his panic.

  “I don’t owe you so much as a plug nickel, Gil Burke!”

  “Fine, fine, but you’ve gotta come in! Jesus, Fritz, I can’t keep up with you! You’re going over into Ocean Bay, right? I’ll meetcha there, okay? Ya hear me, Fritz? Fritz?”

  “Yeah, I hear you.” But I didn’t look back. I kept swimming.

  “Meet me at Ramps!” Gil’s voice was more distant; he was making himself hoarse. I was a much faster swimmer than Gil was a one-oared rower, and I was pretty far away from him now.

  “Ramps!” he called.

  “Yeah . . .”

  Or maybe I’d swim all the way to Seaview. I’d swum that much distance before. Maybe I’d make Gil sweat it out at Ramps, and then loop back to him. Or maybe I’d walk all the way to Sunken Haven without him.

  I needed to get my wallet, anyway. Pack a small bag, call my parents, and explain everything to Julia.

  The ocean was doing what it needed to do. Swimming was restful. My head and my plan were both steadier.

  “I’m going in . . . I can catch up . . . going to shore, Fritz . . . turn back . . . safe.” Gil’s voice tuned in and out.

  Soon the pounding of my heart and the sound of my breath became all I needed.

  With the water so flat, I probably could swim past many more towns than Ocean Beach. I could swim all the way out to Lonelyville, if I wanted.

  Past the reef, the ocean was a liquid embroidery of warm and colder currents. I closed my eyes. My voice was sore from shouting, my body finally emptied of tears.

  I only needed to swim.

  I didn’t look back.

  Gil was receding, dealing with his hobbled boat.

  It wasn’t for another few minutes that I became aware of a problem. A cross-current, no matter how hard I swam against it, was moving me farther from the left-hand strip of sandbar. Treading, floating, actively pushing in a crawl stroke toward shore, still I couldn’t reorient.

  Another five minutes and I was even farther out.

  My breath shortened. My nerves tightened a notch, my muscles kinked with effort on each new stroke. I had to stay calm. Because I knew what this was. This was a deep rip current, and I was caught in it. And now a flood of panic rushed my body. I’d made an impulsive, dumb choice, jumping out of that boat—and now I was face-to-face with its consequences.

  JEAN

  Or maybe I had seen her?

  Something was wrong. I knew it as soon as I saw Gil brake his bike, then toss it against the side of the boathouse when he saw all the bike stands were crammed full. Dusk was washing soft blues over the sunset. Through the shadows, I could see that every muscle in Gil’s face was locked, though his eyes were roving. He was in his same clothes, but they were sodden, and he was barefoot. I felt a moment’s flash of relief that he wasn’t with Fritz—but where had he been?

  My stomach was a leaden weight of dread.

  What had happened?

  Throughout dinner, everyone had been on Gil Watch. But now dinner was over, and The Lamplighters had changed over from playing their usual oldies to covers of hit songs, to get more people out on the parquet dance floor, which had been specially assembled for this night. It was a successful strategy, as a few couples were now bumping around, smiling, fumbling, occasionally going into a dip to show that it was all in good fun.

  Along with the gathering darkness, the noise of the crowd and the music had swelled, so at first, nobody noticed Gil’s return.

  Gil didn’t sense me observing him, as I sidled out from behind my untouched plate of corpse-cold lobster. My cup of drawn butter had hardened with a top layer of waxen fat. I skirted the other tables, people lingering over their berry crisp and coffee, though many of them had left their table to dance or mingle.

  I approached Gil where he was pacing on the far side of a dessert buffet table. His gaze was fixed in concentration on the bay.

  “Hi, Stranger.” I reached across the table and tapped him gently on the arm. “Dinner’s over. Where’ve you be—?”

  “Have you seen Fritz?” he asked on top of my question. “Is she here? Did she come back?”

  “Fritz?” I repeated. I hadn’t ever really been looking for Fritz—only Gil.

  There was sand stuck to Gil’s pants’ legs and chest, his neck and jaw. I saw a welled, dark crescent of blood at the base of his thumb that thinned to a scratch down his forearm—a recent cut.

  “What happened to you?” As I reached for a stray napkin, the song ended, and the tempo changed as the band shifted into another tune.

  Oh! That song! The dark cave where I kept my precious memories of that night was suddenly lit by the torch of this song, as past and present collided. My heart began racing with a kind of elated madness. Did he hear it, too?

  “Listen, Jean, I don’t think Fritz has come back to Sunken Haven. But I can’t think where else she might have gone.”

  “Oh my gosh, Gil, they’re playing ‘Young Americans!’ ” I practically shouted it over his words, as I darted around the table and quick pressed the napkin to his cut. “Do you hear it?” My fingers tightened to a clamp around his wrist.

  “Hear what?”

  “Our song!”

  The humiliation of this night, Junior’s smugness, Bertie’s distance, my mother’s and Weeze’s dismay, my complete and utter failure—and now our song. It was spinning above us in the air like a reminder of everything I’d sacrificed for this night, while marking the possible promise of another chance.

  Gil looked down at my fingers locked around his wrist, as if surprised by my pressure. “Jean, I’m not kidding—have you seen Fritz tonight? She was supposed to meet me in Ocean Bay Park, at Ramps. But she never showed. She’s really upset with me. We took out a boat and she jumped in the water. I haven’t seen her anywhere on shore, it’s been a while now, and I can’t think where else—”

  “Yes, she’s here!” I interrupted.

  I wanted to stop his worry. That’s all I knew for sure when I thought about it, after. It wasn’t about my own profit, and it wasn’t about a trick. It was a white lie, and I’d meant only to soothe him. That’s what I swore to myself.

  “When?” He was immediately, visibly relieved. “When did you see her?”

  I made a face of thinking about it. “Oh, about fifteen minutes ago?” Or maybe I had seen her? In a wet dress, barefoot, her hair unraveling from those terrible, zigzaggy braids. There was so much room in the space of my memory as I’d sat alone all evening. All those happy couples on the dance floor, and all the kids running by. Surely I could remember her, if I needed to! Had I seen her? Had I? Hadn’t I? “She’s around.”

  Gil exhaled a long, pent-up breath. Then he looked at me with eyes like bullets. “You sure?”

  “Yes yes yes! Let’s dance to this one, please, Gil? Remember this song? From Hollander’s?” And in my imagination, in my molten desire, I could almost see Fritz streaking past us, calling for Julia, her hair and dress sopping wet
, upset over whatever silly thing she was upset about. It wasn’t my problem.

  Not this one, Fritz. You can’t win every single game of every single match.

  I pulled him by the hand in the direction of the floor. “I’m sure she’s with Julia. We’ll go get her right after this song. Gil, you abandoned me all night!” My voice plaintive, semiteasing. Because I wouldn’t mention Carp and Weeze’s fury yet. He could deal with them later.

  “Listen, I’m all wet . . .”

  “One little dance.”

  He took my hand, but he continued to seem dogged, shadowed by his doubts. His eyes combed the darkness.

  “Young Americans” sounded so marvelous live. It gave the song an extra-nifty little kick and warmth. As Gil swung me out, I could feel him trying hard to click into the moment.

  “I’m super-glad you didn’t miss the dancing! It’s my favorite part.” I spun in and pressed close against him, the front of my dress dampening against his wet clothes. His body felt warm and strong beneath.

  Gil nodded. “Yeah.”

  “You’ve been gone so long, I thought you weren’t coming back at all.”

  “Sorry, Jean. I’ve sure got some apologies to make tonight.”

  “Oh, it’s all right. You’re here now. And this song! It’s strange, isn’t it? Of all the songs!”

  “Yeah. It is strange,” he said. Then he seemed to take it all in, with a new readiness and attention to the details—me, the dance floor, the lit lamps and the band. He looked down at me, and I could feel him weighing my remark. “Maybe—maybe it’s a sign of something.”

  It was the first real encouragement he’d ever given us since New York. I didn’t even know what to think, I was so dazzled by all the things he might mean by it, and I knew I’d never forget anything about this moment. The clean-cut, trustworthy handsomeness of Gil’s face, the heat in his hands, the long shadows we cast in the blue evening, the chill of the bay breeze light against the backs of my legs.