Diva (13 page)

nice, and he must be safe since he's Sean's friend. Not everyone's a stalker. And I met him at church. Not

to mention his complete hotness. "Sure."

He loads my bike into the trunk of his old Camry and I give him directions. I want to ask him a million

questions, about college, about opera. About Sean too. But I end up sitting there dead, stupid silent.

We're almost at my house when he says, "You hang with Sean much at school?"

"Not really. I was actually surprised when we got assigned to do a duet together. At school, he's always

simulating sex with his girlfriend."

Rudy raises an eyebrow. "You mean Madame Misty? She's not his girlfriend."

"Could have fooled me."

"Nah, she's… not his type. He's mentioned you a lot, actually."

"Really?" This, together with the info that Sean isn't dating Misty, is incredible.

"Yeah. He thinks you're really talented."

"Oh."

I smile and try not to be disappointed. I mean, I want people to think I'm talented. Right?

"Do I have a college fund?"

Mom's in the living room, watching QVC. She glances up from the fire opal pendant they're displaying,

but doesn't reply. Okay. Let's try something else.

"Is Dad going to pay for college?"

Still nothing. The screen switches to a Dooney & Bourke bag. Mom leans forward and takes down a

notepad to write down the info.

"Oh, god. So we have no plan?"

Mom looks away from the television. "Well, of course I have a plan, Caitlin. That's what I've been telling you. You think I don't worry about this stuff?" She looks back at the bag. Two hundred dollars.

I walk between her and the television. She can't buy two-hundred-dollar bags when I'm going to have to

work as a singing waitress at Macaroni Grill after high school. "I missed the part where you told me."

She actually takes the remote and clicks off the TV. "With Arnold, baby. When I marry him, it will be like a built-in life—the house, the cars…" 1 he man.

"Well, of course the man, Caitlin. But he'll help with your future."

"Do you love him?"

She doesn't answer right away, and I wonder what I hope she'll say. If she loves him, that's pathetic

because he's using her. But if she doesn't love him and is screwing with his marriage, that makes her…

can't say it.

"He's a sweet man, Caitlin. We'll have a good life with him."

It makes her a… I think about asking the question again, but I decide I don't want to know the answer.

"Who was that nice-looking young man I saw you with?" she says.

Typical. Let a hot guy drive me home and
that
she notices. "He's just a friend."

"Well, he was very… presentable. I was worried that everyone at that school was like that girl you

brought home last week. The one with the… eyebrow ring."

I remember how Gigi described Mom: "Stepford wife without the husband."

"So I'm glad you've made some nice friends."

Not that you know anything about him, except that he's "presentable. "

"Yeah, I'm glad too." I turn the TV back on, trading QVC for a way out of this conversation. She missed the purse—ha! I wait until she zombifies in front of the screen, then leave.

Opera_Grrrl's Online Journal

Subject: Raised by Apes

Dote: October 11

Time: 3:00 p.m.

Listening to:
La Traviata

Feeling: Happy Weight: 116 lbs.

Remember in the movie
Tarzan
when he doesn't think there are any other creatures like him…then he

meets Jane. That's how I feel today…there are whole *departments* in universities where people actually

"get" opera & don't think it's weird… won't think *I'm* weird.I can't wait for college…but I hope we can afford it w/out Arnold!!!

I'm on my mothers computer. QVC's still on in the living room, so I think it's safe. Mom has this program

she uses for real estate, where you can get information about different properties—like look up an address

and get the owners name and how much they paid for it, or look up a person's name and find out where

they live.

I type in MIKLOSHEVSKY, ARNOLD.

Three addresses come up. One's an office building near downtown. Another's a condo—probably an

investment property. I know Mom would say it's good he has investments. The third is a house in Coral

Gables, near where Dad lives.

I write that one down.

In Drama, Gigi and I are doing this scene from
The Glass Menagerie
. Gigi plays Laura, a shy girl who's

such a mess she can't even go to a typing class without puking on the floor. I play Amanda, Laura's witch

of a mother, who lives in this dreamworld of the past where she was belle of the ball. She can't handle

that she's stuck with no husband and a loser daughter.

Yes, I'm playing my mother
. Miss Davis assigned the parts.

I definitely reek
less
at acting than dance (I mean, I can
speak)
, but I still… well, suck. And I hate everything about Amanda, from her Southern accent (which I absolutely cannot do) to the all-too-familiar

way she bullies her daughter. I'd never have chosen this scene. Even the lines are pretentious. Example:

"… little bird-like women without any nest—eating the crust of humility…"

Like, hello? What does that mean?

So it's not a huge surprise when Miss Davis says, "No. Thats not it at all."

"What's wrong with it?" Gigi says.

"This is a powerful scene," Miss Davis says. "A powerful example of an irresistible force meeting an immovable object. Amanda is motivated to make Laura change, and Laura is equally motivated to

maintain the status quo. But it only works if each character's motivation is crystal clear." She turns to me.

"How would you describe Amanda?"

"She's a complete… um, witch."

Giggles from the few people who weren't asleep.

"Would you care to elaborate?" Miss Davis says over them.

Not really.

I say, "She pushes her daughter around. She wants to run her life. She thinks she's really smart and comes up with schemes."

"Why?"

"Because she's… she wants to marry Laura off."

"Why?"

I think of Mom the other day, talking about marrying Arnold. "She wants Laura to marry some rich guy to

support them."

"Why?"

Don't you know another word
? "So she doesn't have to keep working or move in with their relatives. She doesn't care about Laura or think how hard it is for her to talk to people or do new things. She's

completely selfish."

But Amanda wouldn't see herself that way. Someone once said, A villain is the hero of his own story' So

you have to see Amanda's side. What is her side?"

I think about Mom, about how she rationalizes. "She'd *prob-ably say she's doing it for Lauras own good.

She wants Laura to be happy, and if Laura keeps being such a wuss, she's going to end up old and alone

like…" I stop.

"Like her mother?"

I nod. "But Laura doesn't want those things. She wants to sit home and play with her glass animals. She

wants to be alone."

"Does she really want that?"

"Yes. It would be so easy, only her mother doesn't care what Laura wants. She keeps talking about all the

boyfriends she had when she was young, to show Laura she could get a man and Laura can't. She thinks

Laura's a loser."

I'm not doing a very good job, seeing Amanda's side. But Miss Davis nods.

"Do you think Amanda ever had any dreams, Caitlin?"

But the bell rings, so I don't have to think about Amanda and her dreams. People run like rats from a

sinking ship. Miss Davis says, "Okay, we're going to start rehearsing for the show in class, so we don't

have any more time for scenes, but I think you girls should work on this on your own time. Friday,

everyone come prepared to rehearse the first act finale."

Gigi elbows me on the way out. "Our
own
time. Like we have all this free time."

"She's doing it for our own good."

We break into unreasonable laughter.

Gigi's number
(one of her
numbers)
is
a duet with Sylvanie, a tribute to Judy Garland, who did movie musicals in the 1940s. So now, we sit with Sylvanie and her friends in the cafeteria, or sometimes go to

the pit, where I try to avoid GrandMa's cookies. I thought it would be weird sitting with them, like when I

started dating Nick and sitting with his friends at lunch. We didn't have anything to talk about. But now I

know that when you're in a show with people, you can talk about the show… endlessly.

Except today, Gigi's talking about what I'm eating. My new plan (after the baking chocolate incident) is to

bring a nutritious lunch from home—like a sandwich on pita bread—and a bottle of water. Maybe the

reason I'm pigging out is I'm not letting myself eat enough. Anyway, I've been doing it for a few days now,

and I'm down to 113.

"That's all you're eating?" Gigi says.

"My jeans are tight."

"Well, yeah, Caitlin. That's because they're a size zero."

I think of Peyton and Ashley. "They're a two."

"There's a difference?"

"There's a huge difference. Like ten pounds."

Gigi rolls her eyes. "I think you could do at least a size three without the marching band playing the "Baby Elephant Walk" when you walk along the sidelines."

Of course this school doesn't have a marching band, much less sidelines.

"I wear a seven," she says. "Am I fat?"

Of course she's not fat. But she's also tall. I never notice anyone else's fat.

"Caitlin thinks I'm fat," Gigi announces, pouting.

"Girl, you're way too fixated on weight," Sylvanie says.

"I didn't say she was fat!"

"No, but you're always sitting here with your celery," Sylvanie says. "Makes me feel like eating more, just watching you."

I take a bite of my sandwich and look at them like,
Happy
? I try to chew real slow to make it last longer.

Peyton and Ashley could take an hour to eat a side salad. "Can we talk about something else? Please?"

"So, are you, like, singing opera in the show?" Sylvanie says.

"Um, yeah. I have a duet." I glance over to where Misty's sitting, assuming Sean's there too. He isn't. It's Wednesday and we haven't practiced since Sunday.

"You have the prettiest voice," Sylvanie says. "I wish I had a voice like yours."

"Thanks." I figure she's just being nice, to make up. Sylvanie's like Gigi—one of those people who's good at everything so she can afford to be kind to mere mortals. Two weeks into rehearsals, my screw-ups in

dance are legendary. She probably feels sorry for me.

But Gus's sidekick, Rex says, "How high can you go with that thing? Can you break glass?" He holds up his watch, a digital one.

"Not that glass. It's plastic. I hit an E-flat the other day, though. A high one."

"Prove it," Gus says.

"Nope." I learned early—and the hard way—that people may say they want to hear you sing in public

places, but if you actually do it, they'll think you're tremendously weird. Nick told me that, actually, but

even Nick could be right sometimes.

"Please," Gus says.

"Please," Rex repeats. "I think I'm in love with you."

I laugh and shake my head. "No way. You'll have to wait until dress rehearsal." Then in case they think I'm being a snob, I say, "Okay, so how bad did we suck today in Drama?" Because I also learned early on that if you're good, people think you're a snob, and the best way to keep that from happening is to put

yourself down.

And it works.

"You were fine," Rex says. "Davis doesn't appreciate brilliance. I mean, she gave me a C on my scene."

"The
noive
!" Gigi says.

And then everyone starts talking about how mean Miss Davis is, and, for the first time since I've been

here, I feel like maybe, just maybe, I'm not the weirdest person around.

Subj:Practicing

Date: 10/14, 10:35 p.m., Eastern Standard Time

To: [email protected]

From:[email protected]

It was fun practicing the other day. Don't
you
think we should get together again sometime? There's no

rehearsal tomorrow.

It took me an hour to compose that e-mail, so I don't sound like I'm nagging or stalking him or anything.

And then I saved it in
Mail Waiting to Be Sent
for another two before I decided to go for it.

The next morning, there's a reply.

Subj: Practicing

Date: 10/15, 2:03 a.m., Eastern Standard Time

To: [email protected]

From:[email protected]

we could do it tomorrow (actually today) if you don't mind coming here.

"I can't do my homework if you're going to scream like that!"

I'm in Sean's actual room in Sean's actual apartment. The voice comes from the kitchen. "Learn to

appreciate great music!" Sean yells back.

"You call that music?" says the voice from the kitchen.

It's after six, and we barely started singing. It took ninety minutes to get here from school—an hour to

drive here, and another half hour to pick up Sean's sister, Desi, from aftercare. Then it took another half

hour to get Desi started doing her homework. Now she's stopped again.

"Can you come help me?" she asks.

From Sean's bedroom window I see a guy working on an old Toyota, and a group of boys playing

basketball with a hoop made from a milk crate. The place looks like the type of apartment complex you

live in if your dad stops paying child support. For the first time ever, I appreciate my dad. Well, maybe

just for a second. No, I can't help you," Sean says. "I'm trying to sing."

"
Trying
is right," his sister says. "I need heelllllppp!"