“No, thanks,” I said. There was only one place I wanted to be, and I needed to go there alone.
I heard the music first, the strumming of the sitar.
On this side of the world there were no spices in the air, not that kind anyway, but it was a sitar all the same. When he saw me, he stood up. “Why, if it isn’t Sienna Jones,” he said in a fake cowboy drawl, dangling the wooden instrument from one hand.
I couldn’t help but grin. “In the flesh,” I said, adopting the same tone.
As he stood on Sunny Cove’s towering cliff, Spider’s back was against the moonlit sea.
He hugged me, and it was totally awkward for a second, but in one of those funny ways, so we both laughed.
“I thought you were in Mexico?” I asked, by way of small talk.
“I was. Just got home a couple hours ago.”
“Me too. I mean, I just got home too.”
“I know,” he said. He played a few more notes on the sitar and then set it down.
“This is cool,” he said, looking at the sitar.
“You like?”
“For sure. No one in the history of twelve-year-old musicians has ever butchered ‘Stairway to Heaven’ worse than me,” he said, referring to his old guitar.
“I figured on the sitar, you could pummel it even worse,” I joked, surprised how easy it was to be with him again. Remembering after such a miserable past few days how nice it felt to smile.
“I have no doubt,” Spider said.
“I’m glad you like it. Haggling with street vendors and then mailing something from Indo is no small task. I had to drag Dad with me to help.” I remembered that day going into town, finding the perfect thing to send back to Spider.
He avoided my eyes, looking at the sitar instead. “So how was your trip?”
I wasn’t sure how much he’d heard, so I shrugged. “Good. Bad. Crazy.”
He eyed me closely. “You look different.”
I felt different.
“Jet lag?” I guessed casually.
He shook his head, his sandy blond hair moving in the sea breeze.
“That’s not it. Something else.”
“So, am I taller? Shorter? Wiser?” I teased. It was nice to see him. I had planned on coming down here, crying, moping alone.
“Wiser.” He nodded. “Certainly. Taller?” He shook his head. “Still way shorter than Spidey-Man.”
We were standing really close to each other. It seemed so weird, after being with Deni, being so close to Spider again.
“So ... how was Mexico?” I thought about that whacked-out irony. Spider was out chasing waves while Deni and his friends were dealing with the trauma of running away from them.
“Okay. I hit the road right after you left. Too boring here without you.”
“Really?” I smiled, disbelieving.
Spider scratched his head and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “But you weren’t bored, right? In Indo?” His eyes narrowed slightly. “I heard you ran off with some guy.”
I bit my lip. “That’s not really the whole story.”
“What
is
the whole story?” Spider raised his eyebrows.
“Um.”
“You don’t want to tell me, do you?”
“It’s not that I don’t.... I just feel weird telling you. About another guy, I mean.”
He moved closer to me. The ocean breeze was cold, and I shivered.
He wasn’t smiling anymore. “Why do you feel weird?”
“Because,” I said, flushing in the chill. “You know.”
“I know what?”
“I don’t know. Because of us. I mean, it’s not like that with us. I mean, we’re just friends, but still I feel weird.”
Now he was rubbing my arms. “Want my sweatshirt?”
He didn’t wait for an answer before pulling off his hoodie, exposing his tan stomach. I tugged his T-shirt down before the whole thing went over his head, my fingers accidentally touching his skin.
“Here,” he said, sliding the sweatshirt over my head.
“Thanks.”
He held on to my arms again, this time tucked snugly in his sandy sweatshirt. He bit his lip and then let me go. “Before you run off again, I have something for you.” Picking up a small comics-wrapped package from a crack between the rocks, he grinned. “Your birthday present—it wasn’t ready before you left. Sorry ‘bout that.”
“A birthday present? Wait a minute, did you know I’d show up here tonight?”
He smiled shyly. “Well, Bev told me what time your plane would land and I just thought, ‘If I’ve ever known her at all, the first thing she’ll do is walk to the cove.”’
I
will find you.
Maybe Deni and Spider weren’t so different after all.
“So open it.” Inside, sitting in perfect lotus position, was a tiny clay Buddha holding a flat tray. “It’s a candleholder ... for your room.”
I couldn’t believe it. “You made this for me? It’s so ... perfect.”
He waved off my compliment, but I could tell he was pleased. “I’m sorry it wasn’t ready on your real birthday. I had to wait in line for the kiln, which was totally annoying, and blah, blah, art geek talk.”
“I didn’t even know you were into sculpting. It’s really cool,” I said.
“Hmm. Well, maybe you should stick around,” he said. “Who knows what else you might find out?”
“You know, I went to an ancient Buddhist temple in Indo. It was so amazing. I took a ton of pictures. There were these stone Buddhas that you could only see through these tiny cutouts in the wall.” I held up my fingers in the shape of a diamond to give him a visual. “It was one of my best days there, so this gift is just so ...”
Apa?
I heard Deni’s voice in my head, searching for the right word.
“Perfect?” Spider helped me remember.
“Yeah.” I nodded.
“I didn’t know you were going to a temple.” He shrugged. “I just thought you’d like it.”
Neither did I.
“It’s really sweet. Thank you so much.” I held the candleholder to my chest like I was cradling a Buddha baby. “I have something to show you too.” I pulled the shell Spider had given me out of my sweatpants pocket. The wind whipped my hair around my face. I was suddenly so hot, and the cool air felt refreshing.
“You still have that?” he asked, surprised.
“Can you believe it? It survived the whole trip—and so did I, so I think you were right on about the luck.” I set the sand dollar in his palm and he examined it.
Waves lapped against the cliff. In the distance the light-house curled on its slow, translucent rounds. I chewed on the skin next to my nail.
Don’t lose it
I thought.
just because you’re home, don’t chicken out. Tell him the truth.
“Hey, Spider?”
He looked at me gently. “Yeah?”
“I’m sorry I was so weird before I left. I’m sorry for a lot of things, but mostly ... I’m sorry because I didn’t let you know me anymore. After my mom died, I should have let you help me.”
“That’s okay.... That was a long time ago.”
“No. It ... That was dumb. I just didn’t get how dumb it was until I was in Indo. I was afraid if you knew how scared I was of everything, you wouldn’t like me anymore ... and I just ... couldn’t deal with losing someone else.”
“But that’s not what I thought at all. I knew you were scared, and you had every reason to be. If that had been me? I can’t even imagine. I thought you were so brave.”
“You did?”
He stepped closer. “Yes.”
“But then ... why did you always ignore me?”
“I didn’t ignore you. I just gave up ... trying. And it was stupid. I shouldn’t have given up on you. And hanging out with you before you left just reminded me how awesome you are, how I’ve never known anyone else like you.”
“Like me?”
He pulled me into him. “Sea, give me a break. It’s always been you.”
Spider and me. Spider and Sea.
Then it suddenly dawned on me why we couldn’t be us before, why it was so much easier to be with Deni, not just because we shared something, but because he didn’t know the old me, what I was like before.
And Spider. Well, he knew it all.
Even the stuff I tried so hard to forget.
In the quiet we both watched the waves. Sneaking looks at each other.
Then finally I whispered to him, “Spider?”
He looked at me. “Yeah?”
“I saw it, you know.”
“Saw what?”
“The Orange Popsicle Haze—from the plane window at dawn and in Indo, except it was more like the Fudge Popsicle Haze over there, the air was so polluted....”
Spider raised his eyebrows. “Told you it was real.”
“You made me a believer.”
We looked at each other for a second, almost daring the other to chicken out and look away. Neither of us did.
“So I’m going out at dawn, if you’d like to come along,” I said nonchalantly.
“Going out
where
at dawn?”
I pointed out at the ocean—the moonlight reflecting on the frothy waves.
“Out? Out surfing?
You’re going surfing?”
His eyes narrowed suspiciously. “You didn’t surf with that dude in Indo, did you? I’m a mellow guy, but that might piss me off just a little bit.”
I laughed. “Deni didn’t even know how to swim.”
“Really? I thought Indonesians were really into surfing.”
“I think that’s mostly in Bali. He told me no one swims for recreation up in Aceh. The sea is strictly for fishing and boating.” Then I stopped.
Spider’s face got all serious. “Someday you’ll tell me about it, right?”
“I’ll tell you, Spider. But not today. And maybe not even real soon, okay?”
“Okay, but pinky swear you’ll tell me?” He held out his tanned pinky finger, so different from Deni’s, but the way he was looking at me in the moonlight was the same.
“Pinky swear,” I promised as our fingers twisted in the cool ocean air. “So are we on? For tomorrow?” I asked hopefully.
Spider taunted me. “Six thirty?”
I grinned. “What are you, wimpy? Make it six. I’ll be up. Jet lag.”
He nodded happily. “You’re on.”
He leaned down, our fingers still twisted in the air.
He whispered in my ear, “Hey, Sea.”
“Yeah?”
I turned and he kissed me.
Not once, but twice. Right on the lips.
He tasted like salt. He tasted like the sea.
He pulled me close. “Hey, Spider,” I whispered as we pulled apart, our fingers curled together. “It’s good to be back.”
Back to me.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Writing and revising this book felt like an epic journey. Not as epic as Sienna’s but close. I have so many people to thank. First off, I’d like to thank my wonderful agent, Sara Crowe, who fell in love with this story and then found it the perfect home. Thanks for believing in me.
To my incredibly hardworking editor, Stacey Barney, who invited us into her home and then swiftly destroyed us, only to help glue us back together in a much stronger way. Thanks for your dedication.
To the art department at Putnam: you are cover gods.
I believe we are really the accumulation of those we’ve met along the way. And I’ve been blessed with truly amazing people in my life. From Santa Cruz to New York to Palo Alto and all the stops in between.
Special thanks goes out to my real-life critique group, Debbie Duncan, Christy Hale, Kirk Glaser, Kevin Kiser, SuAnn Kiser and Cynthia Chin-Lee. My online communities: the 2009 Debutantes and the Tenners. My life-journal friends and readers who’ve been with me from the very beginning, Jennifer Laughran for jazzing up my query, the Summer of Seven for always listening and making me laugh, the Gothic Girls for puppet mayhem, and the Teen Lit Bloggers for the Waiting on Wednesdays, especially my intern extraordinaire, Mitali Dave.
To the talented alumni of H & D’s Children’s Theatre who have grown from soulful kids to lovely adults, perhaps you’ll see flickers of yourselves on the pages of this book. Thanks for bringing magic into our lives and reminding me how awesome teenagers can be. Hey, now we can bring
Lalaina’s Rose
to Broadway.
To my childhood family: my parents, John and Deborah, for instilling an early love of reading, letting me pick out as many books as I wanted from the Scholastic Book Fair and never suggesting I get a “real major.” I’m so happy I’ve made you proud. To my beautiful sisters, Bridget and Gretchen, for being my first and favorite readers.
To Grammy, a fellow writer, who turns ninety June 10, the day this novel is released. We’ll celebrate the birthdays together.
To my in-laws, Mark and Ann, for unconditionally loving me and treating me like your daughter from the beginning.
To my creative-writing teachers and colleagues at both UC Santa Cruz and The New School.
To my English and drama teachers, who taught me not all of the school part of high school is boring.
To my early readers who read cold in one sitting, my stepmom Vicki (who is nothing like Vera), Molly and Rica. Thanks for two early enthusiastic thumbs-up.
Special thanks to some of my favorite authors who gave me early advice and encouragement, most notably
Nancy Farmer, John Green, Coe Booth and Laura Ruby. You have left extraordinary footsteps for me to try and follow. Thanks for paying it forward to a newbie like me.
To Rahmat and Sky Lee, for fielding my questions about horse sate and everything else.
To Usuludin, for outriding a tsunami and for sharing your story. Your bravery and your strength breathed life into Deni.
Terima kasih,
my friend.
To my beautiful children. You are the most charming creatures on the planet. You are beloved and make me want to be a better person. I’m sorry Mommy is so “boring typing on the computer.” I’m finished! Now we can have a dance party.
And finally, to my incredible husband, Daryn, who is my best friend and my love muffin. Thank you for writing entertaining and heartbreaking journals. For fielding all my questions and for inspiring this story. Thanks for doing your best to make this world a better place for our children and for people everywhere.