Almost, Maine Read online

  “Kay.”

  “And I know a couple constellations, like the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper.”

  “Well, those aren’t constellations. They’re asterisms.”

  “Huh?”

  “Just—star patterns we all recognize. They’re inside constellations, which are bigger. Like … both of the Dippers are inside the Ursa Major constellation.”

  “What’s Ursa Major?”

  “The bear.”

  “I don’t see a bear.”

  “No one does. Just like no one sees Cassiopeia—but everyone sees the W.” Ginette swiveled southward and pointed out a W-shaped asterism that is the identifiable part of the constellation Cassiopeia. Pete swiveled southward, too, and saw the W, and nodded, because he had seen that W before.

  Then Ginette pointed out the Pleiades, or the Seven Sisters, a small, bright cluster asterism that is part of the constellation Taurus, the bull, which Orion, the hunter, was fighting. Ginette helped Pete see Orion’s shield and his weapon—a club, which he was going to use to subjugate Taurus.

  “Wow,” said Pete.

  “What?”

  “I guess I just didn’t know you knew all that,” said Pete, nodding skyward.

  “It’s just stuff my dad taught me.” Ginette shrugged. “He used to take me here.”

  “My dad thinks this place is hippie-dippie,” said Pete.

  “That’s too bad. Everybody should come here. Or at least look up once in a while. To help them remember that things are possible. Everybody needs help with that from time to time.”

  Pete wondered if Ginette needed to be reminded that things were possible. She seemed like the kind of person who thought anything was possible.

  But Ginette’s mom wasn’t great at seeing what was possible. She was a great person and a great mom, but she was very practical and too often dwelled on what was impossible. And that had been wearing on Ginette lately.

  “It helps me remember to dream, coming here.” Ginette missed her dad again, because he was a dreamer. But not a doer. Which was why Ginette’s mom had to ask him to leave. “You know,” continued Ginette, “I want to go up there someday. Space.”

  “Really?” asked Pete.

  “Yeah.” Ginette felt like she belonged up there, among the stars and planets. More than she belonged on Earth, sometimes.

  “Wow.”

  “You’ve gotta be really smart to go, though,” said Ginette, wondering how a girl like her would ever get to space—and then wondering if she should have shared her secret dream with Pete.

  “You’re really smart,” said Pete. “You could totally go,” he added, looking up at the stars.

  And Ginette looked at Pete and watched him as he stargazed. And she couldn’t have been happier that she had shared her secret dream with him. And that strange lightness surged through her body again. This time, it felt like it was giving her the courage to come right out and ask him if they were going out or dating or if they were boyfriend and girlfriend or what.

  And she almost asked right then and there. “Pete?” she started.

  “Yeah?”

  But then she chickened out. And said something that wasn’t the question that she wanted to ask Pete. It was a statement—something she wanted him to know.

  “I just … had a lot of fun today.”

  “Me, too.”

  “I always have fun with you.”

  “Yeah.” Pete smiled. “Me, too. I mean—I always have fun with you, too. Not with me.”

  “I know what you mean,” laughed Ginette. She was happy to hear that Pete always had fun with her, too. And it made her feel that strange lightness again. And the lightness gave her the courage to try—again—to ask him if they were dating or going out or if they were boyfriend and girlfriend or what.

  “Pete?” she asked.

  “Yeah?”

  The lightness she was feeling grew inside her and seemed to take control of her body and she felt like it was hijacking her head and her heart and it suddenly pushed three small, immense words out of her mouth.

  “I love you.”

  Whoa. That was not quite what Ginette had intended to say. She had intended to ask Pete something like, “Are we dating?” or “Are we boyfriend and girlfriend?” or “Do you like me the way I like you?”

  But she didn’t ask any of those questions.

  Or any question at all.

  She went straight to another statement: “I love you.”

  And she felt like some sort of cosmic shutdown was happening. Like all motion in the universe was ceasing. She could have sworn it made a sound—like the vvvrrrmmm of a giant machine losing its power.

  And she just stared at Pete.

  And Pete just stared at her.

  And neither of them breathed.

  And then Ginette suddenly gasped for air as if someone had just revived her with CPR, and she laughed a loud laugh.

  And couldn’t believe what she had just said.

  And her laughter decrescendoed into a hopeful smile.

  And she looked at Pete and waited for him to say something.

  But he didn’t say anything.

  And then Ginette’s smile turned into a look of concern.

  And then it turned into a pained frown.

  Because Pete still wasn’t saying anything.

  He was still just staring at her. Like a deer frozen in headlights.

  He stared at her for so long like that, that Ginette felt like she had broken time.

  And then Pete suddenly gasped and sucked in some air as if he, too, had just been revived by CPR.

  And he turned away from Ginette. And looked out at the horizon, his eyes still wide.

  And then Ginette turned away from him. And looked out at the horizon. Her eyes were wide, too.

  And Ginette and Pete sat in the silence. And the stillness. For a while. And the stillness felt like it was full of motion. And the silence felt like it was full of sound.

  Ginette had stopped breathing again, so she suddenly had to suck down some more air so she wouldn’t pass out. She turned to Pete, who was still staring out at the horizon, and grunted a throaty, frenetic laugh again, hoping to coax some kind of a response from her best friend. Or former best friend. Or future boyfriend. Or whatever Pete was. And her laughter seemed to echo around in the still, quiet night. Even though there was nothing for the sound to bounce off, so there couldn’t have been an echo.

  And Pete didn’t respond to Ginette’s weird laugh.

  So she looked back out at the horizon. And felt her mouth dry up, as if all of her saliva was racing up into her eyeballs and becoming tears. No, no, no. No tears, Ginette pleaded with herself. No tears.

  But it was too late. Tears were falling.

  They were hot.

  And her neck and her head were, too.

  And she could hear her heartbeat loud in her ears. And she could hear the sound of her blood whooshing through her veins and arteries. And she felt prickly all over. And like she might start sweating. Even though she was cold.

  She wished Pete would say something. Anything.

  But he didn’t.

  And Ginette’s heart suddenly got so heavy.

  And it sank.

  And sank.

  And sank.

  And she decided that she just needed to get out of there—and fast. But when she tried to get up to go, she couldn’t—because her body wouldn’t move. Because that strange lightness she had been feeling had been replaced by a strange heaviness. It made her feel like she had a black hole inside her—and it was going to suck her body inside of itself.

  Oh, what had she done?

  She wished she could unsay what she had said. But once something is said, it can’t be unsaid. And Pete had heard it. She knew he had heard it. And anything that’s heard can never be unheard. That’s one of the greatest tragedies of being human. Once something is heard, it lives inside the hearer’s head and heart and can do good or do damage for the rest of their life. />
  WHY ISN’T HE SAYING ANYTHING?!? screamed Ginette to herself.

  Pete would have been able to answer that question had he been able to hear it.

  And his answer would have been that he was simply shocked by Ginette’s confession. It was nowhere near anything even remotely close to what he was expecting her to say. So it was taking him a long time to process what she had said.

  But after maybe a minute—the longest minute of Ginette’s life—Pete had finally processed what Ginette had said.

  And had figured out how he felt about what she had said.

  And that strange lightness he had been feeling filled up his insides and seemed to course through his body and made his heart swell and seemed to force four words—urgently and breathlessly—out of his mouth: “I love you, too.”

  And everything stopped even more than it was already stopped.

  And Ginette and Pete felt like they were suspended in time and space—not breathing, not thinking, not moving.

  And then … Ginette felt like some sort of cosmic upshifting was setting the universe in motion again.

  And Ginette and Pete were breathing and thinking and moving again.

  And both of them were feeling that strange lightness fill up their insides again. And this time it was reconfiguring their chemical compositions and molecular structures. Which may have explained why they were both feeling tingly all over. And why they were feeling weak and powerful all at the same time. And more alive than they’d ever felt.

  Ginette suddenly shivered. Not from the cold. But because her natural state had been disrupted and she had too much energy and nowhere to put it. Like when a charged particle from the sun collides with an atom in the Earth’s atmosphere and disrupts its natural state. The energy it creates has to be manifested in some way. In the case of an atom, as light. In the case of Ginette, as a shiver.

  “You okay?” asked Pete.

  “Yeah.” Ginette shivered again. She felt depleted—but exhilarated. And like she had just been revived from a deep sleep.

  “Are you cold? Do you wanna go?”

  “No, no, I just wanna sit. Here. Like this. Close.” She realized that she wasn’t actually sitting close to Pete at all. So she slid closer to him.

  And they sat in the stillness and the silence. And the silence no longer seemed like it was full of sound. And the stillness no longer seemed like it was full of motion.

  And neither of them knew what to say. Maybe because so much had just been said.

  And for a while neither of them knew what to do.

  Until Ginette decided that she wanted to be closer to Pete. So she slid a little closer to him and said, “I feel so close to you tonight.”

  “I’m glad,” laughed Pete. He felt close to her, too.

  “It’s nice to be close,” continued Ginette. “Like we are.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Pete.

  Ginette slid closer to Pete. And they both chuckled as she did.

  And then she slid closer to him again. And Pete chuckled with her as she did.

  And then she slid closer to him again. Until she was sitting right next to him.

  And then Pete lifted his arm and put it around Ginette and pulled her in even closer to him.

  And Ginette tucked herself into Pete’s long torso and leaned her head on his shoulder, chuckling some more as she did so.

  “What?” asked Pete.

  “This is just … really nice.”

  “Yeah. It is.”

  Ginette laughed a funny little laugh. And her heart raced.

  And Pete laughed a funny little laugh back. And his heart raced.

  And then their hearts stopped racing and they felt a calm like no calm they had ever experienced.

  And Ginette took Pete’s hand in both of hers. And held it.

  And they sat in silence and took in the night sky.

  And enjoyed the serenity.

  And Ginette wondered if maybe this was the great thing that she felt like she was about to experience. Because it sure was great.

  After a few of the best moments either of them had ever experienced, Ginette said, “You know, right now, I think I’m about as close to you as I could possibly be.”

  And she laughed a little, wondering why she had said such a thing, and looked up and out at the night sky.

  And Pete thought about what Ginette had just said—that she was as close to him as she could possibly be.

  And then said something that could only be described as unexpected: “Well, not really.”

  Pete’s words were like the sound of a needle getting scratched across a record on a turntable—a jarring interruption of some of the most beautiful music Ginette had ever heard. She turned to Pete. And wondered if she had heard him correctly. “Huh?” she asked, puzzled, but smiling to cover the hint of concern she felt.

  “Not really,” Pete repeated.

  “Not really what?” Ginette asked.

  “You’re not really close to me. At all.”

  Ginette pulled her head away from Pete and looked up at him, searching his eyes for an explanation.

  “If you think about it a different way,” Pete explained, “you’re really actually about as far away from me as you can possibly be.”

  More confused, Ginette recoiled a little from Pete.

  “I mean,” continued Pete, “if you think about it technically—if you’re assuming the world is round, like a ball…” Pete gathered some snow, and the heat from his hands melted it enough for him to make a decent-size snowball. His hands felt like they had an ice- cream headache. He reached into his bag and pulled out his flashlight and clicked it on and tucked it under his arm to illuminate his makeshift globe. “See,” he continued, “if you’re assuming the world is round, like a snowball, then the farthest away you can be from somebody is if you’re sitting right next to them.”

  Ginette wasn’t following.

  “See, if I’m here…”

  Pete pointed out a spot on the snowball facing them that represented him.

  “And you’re here…”

  Pete pointed out a spot on the snowball that represented her, just to the left of him.

  “… then…”

  Pete traced a path with his finger all the way around his miniature globe to demonstrate the immense space between them.

  And when his finger returned to the point on the snowball that represented him, he said, “That’s far.”

  And he looked at Ginette, in awe of what he felt like was an important discovery.

  Ginette looked up at Pete, puzzled. “Huh?” she queried, her face all screwed up.

  Pete demonstrated again, this time with more props. He reached into his backpack and grabbed his bag of gorp and took a peanut and a green M&M out of the bag and tucked his flashlight under his arm again and continued. “See, if this is me…” He held up the peanut. “And I’m here…” He shoved the peanut into the snowball, facing them, to represent himself. “And this is you…” He held up the green M&M. “… and you’re here…” He placed the green M&M directly to the left of the peanut, but then moved the M&M in the opposite direction of the peanut—all the way around the snowball—until it was close to the peanut again—but on the other side of it. And then he shoved the M&M into the snowball next to the peanut and said, “That’s far.”

  And then Pete looked at Ginette, in awe of his discovery.

  “Yeah,” Ginette muttered, wondering why Pete was telling her this. She looked to him, hoping for more of an explanation.

  But none was forthcoming. Pete was just smiling goofily, excited about his new definition of what it means to be close to someone. To him it was a happy revelation: He and Ginette had just confessed their love for each other. And they were going to have to get to know one another in a brand-new way. He suddenly felt like the space between them was enormous, because their world had changed—they were in unknown territory and had so much to learn about each other. And he couldn’t wait to learn all about Ginette and fill
that space. And get close to her again—a new kind of close.

  But Ginette didn’t know that this was what Pete was thinking. Because she felt like he was saying—in a cruel, cryptic way—that he felt like he was far away from her. Or didn’t want to be close to her. Or something.

  So she moved away from him. Because she didn’t want to be close to him if he didn’t want to be close to her.

  Pete clocked Ginette’s move away from him. And explained brightly, “But now … you’re closer!” And this was true, according to his newly formed theory on what it means to be close.

  Ginette turned to Pete. He was still smiling goofily. Which irritated her. “Pete…” she said, hurt and confused. And then said nothing more. And exhaled—a little exasperatedly.

  Pete kept smiling and earnestly asked, “What?”

  “Nothin’,” Ginette said, sliding farther away from the guy she had just professed her love to.

  Pete responded to Ginette’s second move away from him by triumphantly repeating, “And closer!”

  Ginette looked back at Pete and wanted to ask him what the heck he was saying. So she could understand what he was saying. But she was so irked by him that she didn’t want to understand what he was saying and decided that she just needed to leave.

  She leaned over and grabbed her backpack, unzipped it, pulled out her flashlight, and clicked it on. And then zipped up her backpack and stood up to go—but stopped. And felt a deep sense of loss—like she had just missed out on experiencing the greatest joy she would ever know. It made her feel hollow. And heavy. Both at the same time.

  But then she shook the hollow heaviness off, slung her backpack over her shoulders, and started to leave.

  She didn’t really know where she was going. Wherever it was, it was going to be somewhere Pete wasn’t.

  Home, probably.

  When she had taken barely one step, Pete called out hopefully, “And closer!” Because, to a conventional thinker, Ginette was getting farther and farther away from him. But to an unconventional thinker, she was getting closer to him with every step away from him she took.

  Ginette stopped and turned to Pete and shone her light on him.

  “Right?” Pete asked, shielding his eyes from the light but still smiling and expecting Ginette to be wowed by his radical new theory on what it means to be close.