Rene sits on her knees, on my bed. She hops and then shakes me.
“Chrissie! Get up. Get dressed. Pack. Let’s get out of here.”
I grab the pillow beside me and cover my face with it. “I don’t want to go to Palm Springs. It’s got to be a ten hour drive each way. We’ve only got a week off. I just want to stay in Berkeley. Or maybe go to Santa Barbara. I can’t decide which.”
“Chrissie.” That’s spoken as a growl. I lift the pillow and Rene stares down at me. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I don’t want to go to Palm Springs for spring break.”
Rene is studying me in that hyper-analytical way she has as if she’s trying to diagnose my mood.
“I’m not letting you stay alone in this condo for a week and have another spring break meltdown. Get over it already. You act like you’re only girl ever to be dumped by a guy. Are you going to be a mess every spring break over Alan forever? Let’s go have fun.”
I ignore the insult because I never told her about Alan’s detour to Berkeley.
“I’m not mourning anything. I don’t want to go to Palm Springs and get wasted.”
“Then we won’t get wasted,” Rene says reasonably.
“We always get wasted when we go out together.”
Rene arches her brow. “I always get wasted. You’re always no fun.”
I throw a pillow at her, hoping she’ll go away.
She glares at me.
“If I’m no fun then why do you want me along?”
Rene pretends to think about it. “Because you’re fun when you’re no fun.” She collapses beside me on the pillow. “Chrissie, come with me. Is it Neil? Is he being a jerk? Does he not want you to go?”
“Neil is never a jerk. I wish you’d figure that out and stop being so shitty to him.”
Rene’s eyes round and her expression shifts into disgust. “Oh, and thanks a lot, belatedly, for the heads-up last week that Josh Moss would be sleeping on our couch when I got home.”
“Was it awful?”
Rene’s brows pucker. “Not awful. Sort of a weird. But weird in a good way. We talked for hours. It was kind of nice.”
I stare at her. Rene does not like intimacy with guys, and talking for hours definitely falls into the intimacy cubby.
“Talked? Are you saying you spent all night with Josh when he was here and you just talked?”
Betraying color creeps across Rene’s cheeks.
“I didn’t say I didn’t fuck him later. It was really good.”
“Slut.” I only say it because it’s a joke.
“Prude.” Fiercely back at me.
I lie back down on the bed, she copies my posture and I turn towards her. “Are you still going to Palm Springs?”
Rene looks startled by the question. “Of course. Everyone is going to be there. I want you to come.”
“Nope. Not doing it.”
Rene gives me a hard stare. “I’m going with or without you.”
“Then go. You’ll have more fun without me.”
Rene springs from the bed. She stops at the door and stares back at me. “You can still pack and join me if you want to.”
I nod. “OK.”
She closes my bedroom door loudly behind her. Message received, Rene. You’re pissed and you want me to know it. I roll over in bed and tug the blankets tightly around me.
Rene pops back into my room two hours later. I’m still in bed.
“I’m heading out now. Sure you don’t want to join me?” she asks.
“No. I’m pretty sure I’m going to go to Santa Barbara. I’m kind of homesick.”
“Can I still take the car or do you want me to leave it? I can hitch a ride down with friends.”
“It’s OK. Take the car.”
“You sure?”
She crosses the room and gives me a hug.
“I’ll see you in a week,” she says, rushing from the room.
Five minutes later I hear the front door slam. I feel completed deflated and I don’t know why. My emotions cascade over me in relentless waves. I roll over in bed, agitated in my flesh.
It’s been seven months since Alan was here. Not one call. I didn’t expect that, though I probably should have. Stupid, Chrissie. Almost as stupid as thinking spending two days with Alan would change anything in either of our lives.
I close my eyes and begin to drift. Yes, sleep will be good. Very, very good.
~~~
At 9 p.m. I’m still in bed where I pretty much haven’t moved from all day. I reach for the bottle on my nightstand, pour a glass of wine, and then stare at the tin containing Alan’s letters.
I lift the lid. I pull out the most recent one. Please call me, Chrissie…I stare at the number printed so precisely beneath his name. Jeez, it’s over a year old. Just because Alan isn’t touring again until May, doesn’t mean I can find him. The phone number is probably not even good anymore.
I reach for the phone. Lame, Chrissie, so lame to call him. But Alan deserves to know I got his letters…finally… shouldn’t I at least tell him that I got them?
I punch in the numbers and wait. Ring. Ring. Ring.
“Hello, may I help you?”
I can tell by the voice it’s not a residence of Alan’s, but an answering service.
“I’d like to speak with Alan, please.”
“Whom may I say is calling?”
Crap. I don’t want to give my name. Not to a service. And what if I’m not on the call list? There has to be an approved caller list, and that would be an emotional blow, too much with all I’m feeling today, to call Alan and not even be on the list.
“Miss, can I help you?”
I scrunch up my face. “Tell Alan it’s Chrissie Parker.”
Click. Static. Click. Did she disconnect me? Oh, this is wrong. Stupid. Pathetic. Why am I doing this?
I’m about to hang up the phone when I hear, “Chrissie?” on a low, raspy voice.
I put the receiver back up against my ear and close my eyes tightly. “Hello, Alan.”
Silence.
“I didn’t expect you to call,” he says.
Weird, blunt Alan honesty. I don’t know how I’m supposed to take that one. Happy I called or irritated? I can’t tell. Every muscle in my body tenses even more.
More silence. Longer this time.
“I didn’t expect to call. But I did,” I say.
Alan laughs.
“Yes, you called. A good thing. Otherwise I would be standing here talking to no one, looking ridiculous.”
I force a laugh that I can hear is a little rough and nervous.
“Are you OK, Chrissie?”
I hug my legs with my arms, pressing my cheeks against my knees. “I’m good actually. It’s just…”
“Just?”
I take in a deep breath. “I wanted to let you know I finally got your letters.”
Another pause.
“I meant every word I wrote,” he says softly. Then, a small laugh. “Except for the mean ones. I was angry some days.”
I laugh. He says that with just the right amount of elegant inanity.
“I liked the mean letters. Those are the ones that say you still cared.”
It takes a moment for my brain to catch up with my words. Oh crap! Why did I say that?
“Are you really OK, Chrissie?”
His voice is different this time. I feel my heart accelerate. I feel my limbs go weak, and I just want to bury myself under the covers and cry.
“I’ve already told you. I’m good.”
“What are you doing?”
“Sitting home, alone, during spring break with your letters.” Oh god, what made me say that? I force a laugh, praying he takes this as a joke. “Pretty pathetic, huh?”
He doesn’t laugh. Damn. More silence.
“I should let you go, Alan.”
I start to hang up the phone, when I hear his voice in the receiver. I quickly put it back against my ear.
“…don’t hang up, Chrissie,” he says.
I wait.
Nothing.
“Alan, I think this was a mistake for us both that I called. Do you want me not to call again? I just thought…”
I can’t finish. The even breathing growing louder with each word I speak through the receiver makes it impossible to finish.