The Color of Silence Read online

  She sits down, as I had hoped she would, and looks at me for a second. I try a smile. I know that my smiles do not look exactly the same as other people’s. They tend to twist my face up into strange shapes. I imagine that it would confuse someone not used to me. I have had other visitors who immediately think that I am having a seizure and call for the nurse.

  Alexandra is different from most visitors. Most people feel the need to fill up silence with words. I wonder, though, if the words that come out into the air get in the way of the ones inside our minds. Maybe if silence was a more comfortable place, people would be able to hear each other’s thoughts and feelings, and everyone could communicate.

  I could communicate.

  Alexandra is almost as silent as I am, but it doesn’t seem to be the kind of silence that would let us share our thoughts. Her silence seems solitary, a place that only has room for her.

  “So,” she says finally, as if the word means something. She holds up something that she has in her hand. I can’t see it very well from the angle she’s holding it at.

  “Music.” She shrugs her shoulders a bit, making the object jiggle so I can’t see it at all. I guess it’s a CD, though. I have a player in my room that no one uses.

  “Broadway.” The word sounds forced out into the air, reluctant to leave her mouth. She looks at me with the question in her eyes. I do my best to answer, and I think she understands that I am saying yes. Or maybe she doesn’t understand but had already decided to play the music, anyway, and was just asking me to be polite. Either way, I love music, so it works out fine for me.

  Alexandra’s eyes turn sad just before she turns away to put the CD on the player over in the corner of my room. I know lots of kinds of music, but I’m not sure what Broadway is.

  I think I’ve heard the word before, but I’m not sure right in this moment. I hope she tells me when she finds a few more words. It doesn’t seem like her favorite music, judging from her eyes, but perhaps I didn’t understand. Words aren’t always enough.

  The music fills the room, and I wonder how long it will take for someone to come and tell her to turn it down. I love the volume up like this, filling the room from floor to ceiling with sounds that swirl around me, seeping inside of me until they fill me up from my toes to the top of my securely held head. The voices sing a story, just like the musical plays that I used to watch at school. I wonder if those were Broadway too. The last one I saw was The Wizard of Oz. It was wonderful. Maybe when Alexandra leaves, I can go back through my rainbow to watch that again.

  “Hey, how’s it going?” The music is so loud, I didn’t even hear Patrick come in. Oh, I hope he isn’t here to tell us to turn it down! I smile at him so he can see I like it. Alexandra doesn’t smile. She just looks worried, as if she thinks we’re in trouble.

  That would be interesting. I’ve never been in trouble before!

  “Nice tune. You look like you’re enjoying it, kid. Have fun.” He taps me on the nose with his finger and walks out of my view. Alexandra looks relieved he’s gone. I don’t think she likes people very much. Not the kind who talk anyway.

  Alexandra listens to the music intently, her eyes closed at times, her head moving in perfect time. How wonderful it would be to do that, make your body move with the music, feeling the rhythm and letting it take you over. I have often thought that my body should be quite good at keeping time with music because it certainly doesn’t want to keep time with me!

  Alexandra doesn’t look all that happy about the music, though. Her face looks sad and her hand keeps on straying up to her forehead, rubbing gently as if she has a pain she’s trying to erase.

  The song we are listening to ends, and the music drains out of the room, replaced by silence. This time I watch her as she sits with her eyes shut. I don’t think she is asleep, though. A few moments slip by quietly and then her eyes open slowly. She looks at me, and I get a chance to see her eyes for just a moment. They’re a beautiful shade of green, like the grass in spring time, but there are shadows moving across them that block out her light. She looks so sad that I’m afraid she’s going to cry. She shakes her head and breaks eye contact, stopping me from seeing any more.

  “Sorry.” She looks at me and smiles. The smile doesn’t make it up her face to her eyes. I smile back. Why is she sorry? The music was lovely.

  Having her visit me is lovely too. I rather like having someone here who understands about silence.

  It makes me feel…connected to her somehow.

  She stands, gathering up her things. I’m sorry to see her go, but my legs are starting to feel sore, and I should get back into bed. I’d rather do that after Alexandra leaves.

  She opens her mouth as if to speak, but no words come out.

  She just gives me a tiny wave and walks out of the room, the tapping of her shoes somehow muted by her sadness.

  Chapter 11

  I run out of Joanie’s room and head to elevator, keeping my eyes down so none of the staff can see me.

  I can’t believe I was stupid enough to pick West Side Story! That was the very first musical Cali and I were in together, back in the very first term of high school.

  I wouldn’t have been in it at all if it weren’t for Cali. She made me go to the audition and then made me stay there when I panicked and wanted to run.

  She ended up playing Maria. I was Jet Girlfriend Number Three.

  It was the first time I actually took my singing out of my bedroom and onto a real stage. It was the most awesomely wonderful thing I had ever done in my life.

  I knew that listening to music now would be a bad idea.

  Now Joanie likely thinks I’m crazy on top of being boring.

  I just made everything worse. I’m doing it all wrong.

  Just like I did before.

  I don’t want to think about before.

  I start to walk toward home quickly, trying to keep my mind in neutral so that I don’t have to think about it. But the memories slip into high gear again, before I have a chance to push them away.

  “It’s almost three o’clock!”

  “Yeah, I know. It almost always comes right after two thirty.” I laugh at my own incredible funniness. Cali does not.

  “Let me know when you say something funny so I can laugh.”

  “Cali. Alex. Do you have something to share?” Mr. Shaker. Cali looks at me and rolls her eyes.

  We both hate it when teachers say that. And they all do it. It’s so grade school. Even in grade school I hated it. Obviously, we have something to share or we wouldn’t be talking. Obviously, we don’t want to share it with the teacher or we wouldn’t be whispering.

  “No, sir. Sorry. We were just discussing the problem on the board.” Cali lies better than anyone I know. She looks the person right in the eye and just says whatever comes into her head. I am the world’s worst liar. My dad always knows I’m trying to lie when I stare at his shoes.

  Mr. Shaker is wearing shiny black shoes. I can almost see myself in them.

  Cali pokes me in the side and puts her index finger over her mouth. Telling me to be quiet. I shake my head at her and try to pretend to be working until the bell rings.

  “OK, we made it! We’re done, and now we have to get moving. You go home and get your stuff and come over to my place. We can get ready there, and Mom said you can stay for supper and then she’ll drive us to the party. I told her your dad was picking us up. Did you ask him about the time?”

  “Yeah, but he won’t budge. He’s obsessed with curfews. He’s got this idea that whatever bad things happen to kids our age, they only happen after a certain time. Sorry. I tried.”

  “That’s OK. My mom’s just as bad on that one, so there’s not much we can do. Anyway, we can’t go too early or we’ll look like rejects, but we can’t go too late or we won’t get any party time because w
e have to leave so early. So, what time do we go?”

  I don’t think she’s actually asking me for advice, because she’s the one who does all of our social planning. I don’t answer, and she doesn’t notice. She just answers herself.

  “The sort of official start time is like, seven, I think, so we can’t go at any time with a seven in it, like seven fifteen or seven thirty, so I guess we wait until eight something. Not exactly eight o’clock, because that would look anal, but maybe like eight ten or eleven or something. Yeah, that will work. We’ll leave here at around ten to, because Cory’s house is out in the country a bit.”

  She’s talked her way to my house. She stops and looks at me.

  “Thanks for coming along, Lexi. I know it isn’t really your thing. But you’ll have fun. I know it. I’ll see you in half an hour. ’K?”

  “Sure.”

  She runs off down the street, probably still making plans out loud to any passing bird or bug who might be interested.

  I head inside and grab my stuff, which consists of nothing much, and head back over to Cali’s house. She already found a sweater of hers that would fit me and doesn’t look too bad with my good jeans. She also threatened to loan me some of her makeup so that I would look more “sophisticated” than usual. Her word, not mine. That left me with nothing to bring but my hair brush and my cell phone so I end up back at her place before the half hour is up.

  “That was quick! If that’s all you have, you can just put them in my purse.”

  She holds up a purse big enough to carry a small child.

  “If I get tired, you can just carry me in there too.”

  “Ha ha. Stop with the bad jokes and get changed. We can do our makeup after supper so it’s fresh.”

  “You mean, you can do our makeup.”

  “Right. I can’t believe there’s a sixteen-year-old girl in this world who doesn’t wear makeup every day.”

  “My dad doesn’t like it.”

  “Well, we’ll wash it off before he comes to pick us up.”

  My dad always tells me my face is perfect the way it is.

  He says my mother “never wore anything but her own beauty.”

  I don’t think I actually remember what my mother looked like. I think my memories of her are made out of the photographs I’ve seen and the words my father uses to describe her. I guess that means that my memories of her aren’t my own at all.

  In pictures, she is as beautiful as my father says. Her face is perfect, and nothing could possibly make it better. I don’t look like my mother at all. But I still don’t bother fighting my dad on the makeup thing. I kind of like that he thinks I’m like my mother, even if it isn’t true.

  I think about telling Cali all of this, but I don’t think it would make any difference to her plans for me, so I keep my mouth shut and follow her down to the kitchen where her parents are waiting for us to have supper with them. Mealtimes are noisy and fun at Cali’s house. Everyone talks at the same time, and no one seems to be listening to anything anyone else is saying. And no one seems to mind.

  My dad and I eat pretty quietly. We mostly just talk about passing the butter.

  “Don’t worry about the dishes, girls. I know you have lots to do.” Cali’s dad smiles at us over the last crumbs of dessert. Cali gives him a big smacking kiss on the cheek.

  “Thanks, Daddykins. I have to create my masterpiece now!”

  “OK. Good luck, Alex!” He grins at me, and I try to smile cheerfully back. I’m not so sure that being Cali’s masterpiece project is a good thing.

  Three minutes later I’m sitting on a chair in front of the bathroom mirror trying to memorize my face, just in case I never see it again.

  “Relax! It’s not scary. It’s called makeup. All of us big girls use it.” She picks up a tube of pale-colored cream.

  “I know what it is. I have used it before, you know.”

  “Stage makeup doesn’t really count. This is the real deal.”

  “It looks like mud.”

  “It’s foundation. I have to work it into your skin. It’ll even out all of the splotches.”

  “What splotches?” I push her hand away and try to see what she’s talking about. She moves her body so that she’s between me and the mirror.

  “You need to relax and trust me. I know what I’m doing. My mother taught me how to do my makeup when I was twelve. And I always look perfect, right?” I look up at her perfect face and shake my head.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “OK then. Just shut your eyes—and your mouth. And let me work my magic on you.”

  “OK. Just please don’t make me look like Sarah Jane.”

  Cali laughs.

  “Lexi, I like you. I would never, ever make you look like Sarah Jane Cooper. I’m pretty sure she puts her makeup on with a shovel. I’m going to make you look like a princess. Or maybe a princess’s assistant or something.”

  “A lady in waiting, you mean?”

  “Waiting for what?”

  “I don’t know. Waiting for the princess to stop talking and finish tormenting her, I guess.” I take one last look at my foundation-soaked face. Guess she’s trying to rebuild me from the ground up.

  I close my eyes and prepare to be reconstructed.

  Cali bustles around the table, picking things up and brushing them on my face while we both listen to music pouring out of the speakers that sit on the shelf. In the bathroom! I don’t have music in my bathroom at home. Cali has music in every single room of her house. It’s always playing when I’m here. She and her mother dance around the house all of the time, singing while they do whatever else they’re doing.

  I love coming to this house.

  “I feel like you’re pretending we’re in one of those Hollywood movies where the hot girl remakes her best friend, the geeky one, so that she’ll be hot too.”

  “Oh, I love those movies!”

  “Of course you do. That’s because you’re the hot girl.”

  “I am definitely the hot girl. But I don’t think of you as the geeky girl! I mean, you are kind of a geek sometimes, but that’s not why I’m doing this.” Cali sounds mildly offended.

  “No?”

  “No! I’m doing it because I think you are totally pretty in your own way, and I’m just helping you to enhance what’s already there.”

  “You sound like a makeup commercial.”

  “Nah. I just sound like my mom. That’s what she told me about makeup. It shouldn’t be changing you into someone else. Just taking what you have and making it show more.”

  “Unless you’re Sarah Jane.”

  “Unless you’re Sarah Jane!” We both laugh.

  “Anyway, you’ll still look like you, but maybe a bit older. There’ll be lots of upper-year guys at the party.”

  “It’ll take more than foundation to make upper-year guys interested in me!”

  “First of all, I’m using a lot more than just foundation. And second of all, stop putting yourself down. It’s stupid.” I open my eyes to look at her, and she grins at me. I shake my head and smile back as she picks up a brush and starts putting pink streaks across my cheeks. The touch is gentle, feathery, and it feels kind of nice. I shut my eyes again and just give up and give in. I listen to the music instead of worrying about my face. It’s an unusually mellow CD for this house, probably one her mom’s. Cali is singing while she works, and I almost drift off to sleep by the time she finishes.

  “Ta daa!” She yells it in my ear, and I jump. “Open your eyes and feast upon yourself!”

  “What?”

  “That didn’t come out quite right. Just look at yourself and tell me how wonderful you look and how wonderful I am!”

  I open one eye at a time and sit looking at the new old me. My skin looks a differen
t shade than usual and is all smooth and even looking. I used to have a few freckles that my dad says

  I inherited from my mother, but they seem to have been erased with the new skin painted on. This skin feels kind of tight, and I’m afraid it might crack if I move it too much.

  My cheeks are slightly pink, making me look like I’ve been out in the sun for a while. My lips are shiny and soft looking. They taste like the strawberry-flavored medicine that my dad used to force down my throat when I was little. My eyelids are blue and shimmer gently in the bathroom light. My eyelashes look long and black.

  Everything is different.

  But I still look like me.

  I like it.

  I open my mouth to tell Cali that, but she’s busy doing her own paint job and babbling away about how great I look and how much fun we’re going to have, so I just shut my mouth and try not to touch my face.

  “OK, I’m ready. Let’s go.” She grabs her giant purse, and we head down to her mom’s car. She looks exactly the same to me as she did before she started.

  “You look lovely, Alex,” Cali’s mother says as we climb in.

  I try to smile, but I’m afraid that my cheeks will fall off.

  “Thanks, Mom! I do good work, don’t I?” Cali grins at me. I’m still afraid to smile back.

  But I do it anyway.

  And that’s as far as I let myself remember. I don’t want to go further into that day. I want it to stop right there with the two of us grinning at each other in the backseat of the car. I want reality to stop right there so that we don’t have to live the next few hours. I want it to be a normal Friday night, a boring Friday night that leads into a boring weekend that leads us back to another boring week at school. I want there to be endless boring weeks of school that Cali and I have to suffer through together.

  They told me at the hospital that Joanie doesn’t go to school anymore. I wonder if she thinks that’s a good thing or a bad thing.