What We Keep - Elizabeth Berg [47]
When I came into our bedroom, I found Sharla sitting on my bed, holding a black box in her hand.
“Is that it?” I asked. “The bracelet?”
“Shhhh!” She nodded.
“Well, let me see.”
She opened the box, lifted up a round gold bracelet, slipped it on. It was a bangle type, thin.
“I don’t see any diamond,” I said.
“It’s here.” She pointed to a place on the bracelet. I came closer, looked. It was there all right, a small stone.
“How do you know it’s real?” I asked. “It looks just like a rhinestone.”
Sharla looked at me, disgusted.
“It does!”
“Would Jasmine have a rhinestone bracelet?”
“She might.”
Sharla sighed, took the bracelet off, put it back in the box. “I knew it.”
“What?”
“I knew you would just be jealous.”
“I’m not jealous.” In fact I wasn’t, but only because of Wayne.
Sharla sat, head bowed over her ruined prize.
“Could I try it on?” I asked.
Her spirits seemed to lift. She opened the box, held the bracelet out toward me. I slid it onto my wrist. It did have a certain something. I raised my arm, moved my wrist back and forth. The diamond flashed, fractured its light into small rainbows. “Fancy,” I said. “Wow.” I handed it back. Sharla returned it to its box, but kept the lid open, continued to look at the bracelet.
“Why don’t you wear it?” I asked.
“I can’t. If Mom and Dad see it, they’ll make me give it back.”
“What will you do with it, then?”
“Put it in the closet. When I get my own apartment, I’ll wear it.”
“That’s so long to wait,” I said. “Why don’t you wear it just when you sleep?”
She thought about it, then put the bracelet on, smiled. “It feels good, huh?”
She nodded, went over to her own bed, crawled in and turned away from me. “Night,” she said, yawning.
I went to the window, looked out into the backyard to see if Wayne was there yet. He was. He sat still as a statue right in the middle of the yard, cross-legged, waiting. I was grateful my parents’ windows faced the street. I put a nightgown over my clothes, got into bed, turned off our bedside lamp, listened for the sound of my parents talking. When they stopped, I’d wait a good fifteen minutes, then sneak out. I turned my head toward their room, held still, heard nothing.
But then the toilet flushed, the bathroom door opened, and someone walked down the hall. I heard my parents’ bedroom door close softly. Now they would talk awhile, they always did: the soft rise and fall of their voices had always sounded to me like a lullaby; I rocked slowly to it in my bed, sometimes. I listened intently, heard nothing; listened harder, heard nothing still. I watched the clock until ten minutes had passed, then pulled off my nightgown, snuck down the stairs, and went out into the night.
Wayne stood up when he saw me coming, held out a hand, and I took it. We walked toward the woods, saying nothing. When we reached the tepee, Wayne went in and I followed.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
I nodded, felt my breath catch on a jag in my throat.
“Do you want me to start, or do you want to?”
I shrugged.
He pulled me close to him, lowered his face toward mine. “Close your eyes,” he said.
“Why?”
“It’s better that way.”
“I want to see.”
“You’ll see,” he said. “Close your eyes.” And then, softer, “Close them.”
I did. And I felt his breath on my face, then his mouth pressing down on mine. The effect of such absolute intimacy made me feel jerked from soft black into bright white, from my own backyard into someplace I’d never imagined. I felt as though I were drowning, unable to rise up from under his lips or his invisible spirit, which felt bigger than mine, and stronger. He ground his hips into me. It hurt, and I pulled away. “That’s enough!”
He stood still. His breath came quick, as though he’d been running.
“That’s all I want to do,” I said.
He nodded, sat down.
I sat beside him, stared straight ahead, breathed in once, twice. Then I pulled his face toward me again, closed my eyes, and found his mouth. This time, I relaxed; and I thought if I wanted to, I could die a good death this very moment, float up as my whole self in