“Did you ask them to dance with me, Bailey?” The realization slammed into her.
“Yeah . . . I did. Is that okay?” Bailey looked stricken and Fern sighed and forgave him instantly.
“Sure. It was fun.”
“Ambrose didn't ask though, did he?”
“Nope.”
“I'm sorry, Fern.” Bailey was well-aware of Fern's feelings for Ambrose Young and her despair after the debacle with the love letters.
“Do you think there's any way someone like Ambrose could fall in love with someone like me?” Fern caught Bailey's gaze in the mirror again, knowing he would understand.
“Only if he's lucky.”
“Oh, Bailey.” Fern shook her head, but loved him for saying it . . . and even more for meaning it. She and Bailey had agreed they weren't ready to go home, so they cruised up and down the dark Main Street, the darkened windows of the businesses reflecting the bright headlights of the old blue van and the dim prospects of the lonely pair inside. After a while, Fern turned off the main drag and headed for home, suddenly tired and ready for the uncomplicated comfort of her own bed.
“It's hard to come to terms with sometimes,” Bailey said abruptly.
Fern waited for him to continue.
“It's hard to come to terms with the fact that you aren't ever going to be loved the way you want to be loved.”
For a moment, Fern thought he was talking about her and Ambrose. But then she realized he wasn't talking about unrequited love . . . not really. He was talking about his illness. He was talking about Rita. He was talking about the things he could never give her and the things she would never want from him. Because he was sick. And he wouldn't be getting better.
“There are times when I think I just can't take it anymore.” Bailey's voice cracked, and he stopped talking as suddenly as he had begun.
Fern's eyes filled with sympathetic tears, and she wiped at them as she pulled the van into the Sheen's dark garage, the automatic light flickering on in sleepy welcome overhead. She slid the car into park, unlatched her seat belt, and turned in her seat, looking at her cousin. Bailey's face looked haggard in the shadows, and Fern felt a flash of fear, reminded that he wouldn't be beside her forever–he wouldn't even be beside her for long. She reached out and grabbed his hand.
“There are times like that, Bailey. Times you don't think you can take it anymore. But then you discover that you can. You always do. You're tough. You'll take a deep breath, swallow just a little bit more, endure just a little longer, and eventually you'll get your second wind,” Fern said, her smile wobbly and her teary eyes contradicting her encouraging words.
Bailey nodded, agreeing with her, but there were tears in his eyes too. “But there are times when you just need to acknowledge the shit, Fern, you know?”
Fern nodded, squeezing his hand a little tighter. “Yep. And that's okay, too.”
“You just need to acknowledge it. Face the shit.” Bailey's voice grew stronger, strident even. “Accept the truth in it. Own it, wallow in it, become one with the shit.” Bailey sighed, the heavy mood lifting with his insistence on profanity. Swearing could be very therapeutic.
Fern smiled wanly. “Become one with the shit?”
“Yes! If that's what it takes.”
“I've got Rocky Road ice cream. It looks a little like poop. Can we become one with the Rocky Road instead?”
“It does look a little like shit. Nuts and everything. Count me in.”
“Sick, Bailey!”
Bailey cackled as Fern climbed in the back, unhooked the belts that secured his chair and shoved the sliding door open.
“Bailey?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Fern.”
That night, after her shimmery dress was put away, her curls unpinned from the complicated twist, and her face scrubbed free of makeup, Fern stood naked in front of her mirror and looked at herself in frank appraisal. She'd grown up some, hadn't she? She was almost 5'2. Not that small. She was still on the scrawny side, but at least she didn't look twelve anymore.
She smiled at herself, admiring the straight white teeth she'd suffered so long for. Her hair was recovering from last summer's hair disaster. Convinced shorter hair would be more manageable, she'd directed Connie at Hair She Blows to cut it short like a boy. Maybe it wasn't short enough, because it had sprung out from her head like a seventies fro, and she'd spent most of her senior year looking like Annie from the Broadway play, further accentuating her little girl persona. Now, it almost touched her shoulders and she could force it into a ponytail. She promised herself she wouldn't cut it again. She would let it grow until it reached her waist, hoping the weight of longer hair would relax the curl. Think Nicole Kidman in Days of Thunder. Nicole Kidman was a beautiful redhead. But she was also tall. Fern sighed and pulled her pajamas on. Elmo stared back at her from the front of her top
“Elmo loves you!” she said to herself in her best squeaky imitation of the puppet's voice. Maybe it was time to get some new clothes, maybe a new style. Maybe she would look older if she didn't wear Elmo pajamas. She should buy some jeans that fit and some T-shirts that actually revealed that she wasn't flat-chested . . . not anymore.
But was she still ugly? Or had she just been ugly for so long that everyone had already made up their minds? Everyone, meaning the guys she went to school with. Everyone, meaning Ambrose.
She sat at her little desk and turned on her computer. She was working on a new novel. A new novel with the same story line. In all her stories, either the prince fell in love with a commoner, the rock star lost his heart to a fan, the president was smitten by the lowly school teacher, or the billionaire became besotted with the sales clerk. There was a theme there, a pattern that Fern didn't want to examine too closely. And usually, Fern could easily imagine herself in the role of the female love interest. She always wrote in the first person and gave herself long limbs, flowing locks, big breasts, and blue eyes. But tonight her eyes kept straying to her mirror, to her own pale face with a smattering of freckles.
For a long time she sat, staring at the computer screen. She thought of the prom, the way Ambrose ignored her. She thought of the conversation afterward and Bailey's surrender to the “shit,” even if it was only temporary surrender. She thought about the things she didn't understand and the way she felt about herself. And then she began to type, to rhyme, to pour her heart out on the page.
If God makes all our faces, did he laugh when he made me?
Does he make the legs that cannot walk and eyes that cannot see?
Does he curl the hair upon my head 'til it rebels in wild defiance?
Does he close the ears of the deaf man to make him more reliant?
Is the way I look coincidence or just a twist of fate?
If he made me this way, is it okay, to blame him for the things I hate?
For the flaws that seem to worsen every time I see a mirror,
For the ugliness I see in me, for the loathing and the fear.
Does he sculpt us for his pleasure, for a reason I can't see?
If God makes all our faces, did he laugh when he made me?
Fern sighed and hit print. When her cheap printer spit out the poem, Fern stuck it to her wall, shoving a thumbtack through the plain white page. Then she crawled into bed and tried to turn off the words that kept repeating in her head. If God makes all our faces, if God makes all our faces, if God makes all our faces . . .
Ambrose didn't like alcohol. He didn't like the fuzziness in his head or the fear that he would do something monumentally stupid and embarrass himself, his dad, or his town. Coach Sheen didn't allow any alcohol during the season. No excuses. You got caught drinking and you were off the team, period. None of them would risk wrestling for a drink.
For Ambrose, wrestling was a year-round thing. He was always training, always competing. He wrestled during football and track, even though he was on the high school team for both sports. And
because he was always training, he never drank.
But he wasn't training anymore, because he wasn't wrestling. He was done. And the town was in a quiet panic. Five of their boys, off to war. The news had spread like wildfire and though people professed pride and had clapped the boys on their backs, telling them they appreciated their sacrifice and their service, the underlying current was one of horror. Elliott had bowed his head as Ambrose had broken the news to him.
“Is this what you really want to do, son?” he asked quietly. When Ambrose said it was, Elliott patted him on the cheeks and said, “I love you, Brosey. And I will support you in whatever you do.” But Ambrose had caught him on his knees several times, tearfully praying. He had a feeling his father was making all kinds of deals with God.
Coach Sanders at Penn State had said he respected Ambrose's choice. “God, country, family, wrestling,” he'd said to Ambrose. He said if Ambrose felt the call to serve his country, that’s what he should do.
After graduation, Mr. Hildy, his math teacher had pulled him aside and asked for a word. Mr. Hildy was a Vietnam vet. Ambrose had always respected him, always admired the way he conducted himself and ran his classes.
“I hear you signed up for the guard. You know you'll get called up, don't you? You'll be shipped out faster than you can say Saddam Hussein. Do you realize that?” Mr. Hildy asked, his arms folded, his bushy, grey brows lifted in question.
“I know.”
“Why you goin'?”
“Why did you go?”
“I was drafted,” Mr. Hildy said bluntly.
“So you wouldn't have gone if you had a choice?”
“No. But I wouldn't change it either. The things I fought for, I'd fight for again. I'd fight for my family, my freedom to say whatever the hell I want, and for the guys I fought beside. That, most of all. You fight for the guys you serve with. In the middle of a firefight, that's all you think about.”
Ambrose nodded as if he understood.
“But I'm just telling you right now. The lucky ones are the ones who don't come back. You hear me?”
Ambrose nodded again, shocked. Without another word, Mr. Hildy walked away, but he left doubt behind, and Ambrose experienced his first qualms. Maybe he was making a huge mistake. The doubt made him angry and restless. He was committed. And he wasn't turning back.
The US and her allies were in Afghanistan. Iraq was next. Everyone knew it. Ambrose and his friends would enter basic training in September. Ambrose wished it was tomorrow. But that was what they'd all agreed to.
That summer was hell. Beans seemed intent on drinking himself to death, and Jesse might as well be married for as much time as he spent with his friends. Grant was farming, Paulie, writing endless songs about leaving home, working himself up into a blubbering mess. Ambrose spent all his time at the bakery or lifting weights. And summer dragged by.
Now, here they were, Saturday night, two days before they left for Camp Sill in Oklahoma, and they were all at the lake celebrating with every kid in the county. There was soda and beer, balloons, trucks with tailgates lowered, and food at every turn. Some kids swam, some kids danced at the water's edge, but the majority just talked and laughed and sat around the bonfire, reminiscing and trying to pack in one last summer memory to see them through the years ahead.
Bailey Sheen was there. Ambrose had helped Jesse hoist his chair and carry him down to the lake where he could mix and mingle. Fern was with him, as usual. She wasn't wearing her glasses and her curly hair was tamed into a braid with a few tendrils curling around her face. She didn't hold a candle to Rita, but she was cute, Ambrose had to admit that much. She had on a flowery sundress and flip flops, and try as he might, he found himself looking at her throughout the evening. He didn't know what it was about her. He could have started something with any number of girls he called friends who might like to send him off with a little something special. But sloppy coupling had never been his thing, and he didn't want to start now. And he kept looking at Fern.
He ended up drinking more beer than he should, getting pulled into the lake by a bunch of guys from the wrestling team, and missing the moment when Fern left. He saw the Sheen's old blue van pull away, crunching across the gravel, and he felt a twist of regret slice through him.
He was wet and mad and a little drunk–and not enjoying himself at all. He stood next to the fire trying to squeeze the water from his clothes, and he wondered if the regret he felt over Fern was just his way of digging in his heels at the last moment, grabbing for something to hold onto as his old life slipped away and the future dawned, scary and new.
He let the fire dry the worst of the wet from his jeans and T-shirt and let the conversation flow around him. The flames looked like Fern's hair. He cursed aloud, causing Beans to pause in the middle of introducing a new game. He stood up abruptly, knocking the flimsy lawn chair over, and walked away from the fire, knowing he should just leave, knowing he wasn't himself. He was such an idiot. He'd twiddled his thumbs all summer long with not a damn thing to do. Now here he was, the night before his last day in town, and he was just discovering that he might like a girl who had all but thrown herself at him more than six months before.
He was parked at the top of the hill, and the cars that were nestled close to his were empty. Good. He could just sneak away. He was miserable, his crotch was wet, his shirt was stiff, and he was all partied out. He headed up the hill only to stop in his tracks. Fern was picking her way down the path to the lake. She was back. She smiled as she approached him and fingered a strand of her hair that had come loose and was curling against her neck.
“Bailey left his ball cap, and I offered to come back for it after I dropped him off. And I wanted to say goodbye. I got to talk to Paulie and Grant, but I didn't get to talk to you. I hope it's okay if I write you sometimes. I would want people to write me . . . if I were leaving . . . which I probably never will, but you know,” she was growing more nervous as she spoke, and Ambrose realized he hadn't said a word. He'd just stared at her.
“Yeah. Yeah, I'd like that,” he rushed to put her at ease. He ran his fingers through his long damp hair. Tomorrow the hair would go. His dad said he'd shave it off for him. No use waiting until Monday. He hadn't had short hair since Bailey Sheen told him he looked like Hercules.
“You're all wet.” She smiled. “You should probably go back by the fire.”
“You wanna stick around, maybe talk for a minute?” Ambrose asked. He smiled like it was no big deal, but his heart pounded like she was the first girl he had ever talked to. He wished suddenly that he'd had a few more beers to take the edge off.
“Are you drunk?” Fern narrowed her eyes at him, reading his thoughts. It made Ambrose sad that she thought he wouldn't want her around unless he was smashed.
“Hey Ambrose! Fern! Come 'ere! We're starting a new game. We need a couple more players,” Beans called out from where he crouched by the fire.
Fern walked forward, excited that she was being included. Beans hadn't been exactly nice to Fern through the years. He usually ignored girls he didn't think were good looking. Ambrose followed a little more slowly. He didn't want to play stupid games, and if Beans was running the show, it was sure to be mean or stupid.
It turned out the new game wasn't new at all. It was the same old version of spin the bottle they'd been playing since they were thirteen and needed an excuse to kiss the girl sitting next to them. But Fern seemed intent on the whole thing, her brown eyes wide and her hands clenched in her lap. Ambrose realized she probably hadn't ever played spin the bottle. It wasn't like she came to any of their parties. She hadn't been invited. Plus, she was the pastor's daughter. She probably hadn't ever done half the things everyone else sitting around the fire had done, multiple times. Ambrose laid his head in his hands, hoping Beans wasn't going to do something that would embarrass Fern or make it necessary to beat the shit out of him. He really didn't want that strain on their relationship heading into boot camp.
When the bottle
landed on Fern, Ambrose held his breath. Beans whispered to the girl beside him, the girl who had spun the bottle. Ambrose glowered at Beans and waited for the axe to fall.
“Truth or dare, Fern?” Beans taunted. Fern seemed petrified of either one. As she should be. She bit her lip as twelve pairs of eyes watched her grapple with the choice.
“Truth!” she blurted out. Ambrose relaxed. Truth was easier. Plus, you could always lie.
Beans whispered again, and the girl giggled.
“Did you, or did you not, write love letters to Ambrose last year and pretend they were from Rita?”
Ambrose felt sick. Fern gasped beside him, and her eyes shot to his, the darkness and the dancing flames making them look black in her pale face.
“Time to go home, Fern.” Ambrose stood and pulled Fern up beside him. “We're out. See you losers in six months. Don't miss me too much.” Ambrose turned, clasping Fern's hand in his, pulling her along behind him. Without turning his head, he raised his left hand, hanging a big, ugly bird at his friend. He could hear laughter behind him. Beans was going down. Ambrose didn't know when, he didn't know how, but he was going down.
When the trees closed around them, hiding them from view of the beach, Fern yanked her hand out of his and ran ahead.
“Fern! Wait.”
She kept on running toward the parked cars, and Ambrose wondered why she wouldn't slow, just for a minute. He ran to catch up, reaching her as she clasped the handle on the door of the Sheen's blue van.
“Fern!” He grabbed her arm and she fought free. He grabbed both of her arms and pulled her against him angrily, wanting her to look at him. Her shoulders were shaking, and he realized she was crying. She'd been rushing to get away so he wouldn't see her cry.
“Fern,” he breathed, helpless.
“Just let me go! I can't believe you told them. I feel so stupid.”
“I told Beans that night, the night he saw us talking in the hallway. I shouldn't have. I'm the stupid one.”