The Appearance of Annie van Sinderen

He’s fighting to understand, I can tell. I reach for him, to soothe him maybe, or to reassure myself that he’s really there, I’m not sure which. When he sees my hand coming, he cringes away.

“Wes,” I say his name. It feels so good, to talk and know that someone can hear me.

“What,” he pants, pulling the sheets up to his chest. “What. How did you get in? How did you know where I . . . What are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry,” I say. I bite my lip. Maybe I shouldn’t have come.

“How did you get in here?” he whispers with a glance across the room, where I observe another boy sprawled on a matching bed, abandoned to sleep.

“What do you mean?” I ask. “But I told you I’d be right back.” I’m hurt, that he doesn’t remember. He said he’d wait for me, after all.

“What?” he says.

“Wes,” I say, and I’m so anxious to feel him there that I impulsively put my hand on his foot and hold it, hard. “Can you help me?” I sound desperate, I know I do, but I can’t help it. I’m afraid.

He stares hard at me.

“Please?” I say, my voice shaking. “Could you? I’m sorry to have to ask, but . . .”

“What’s going on?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” I say with urgency.

“What do you mean?” He puts a hand atop mine, and it feels so warm and reassuring that it’s all I can do not to sob with relief. I don’t know where to begin. I don’t know how to make him see.

“I,” I stammer. “I’ve lost my cameo.”

I show him my naked hand.

“You’ve . . . what?” He doesn’t understand.

“I don’t know!” I wail, burying my face in my hands and letting the sobs come. I didn’t think I could have any more tears, after today, but they spring into being anyway, filling my hands.

“Oh, hey, don’t do that,” Wes says, and before I know what’s happening he’s put his arms around me and pulled me to his naked chest. I weep into his neck, coiling my arms around his waist. His skin feels smooth and warm.

“It’s okay,” he soothes me. His fingers comb through my hair.

I can’t stop my sobbing. I’m too overcome to talk.

“What’s going on, Annie?” he says, and I hear his voice through his chest.

I can’t say it. I can’t make the words that are the truth. Instead I say the only thing I can bring myself to admit.

“I’ve lost my cameo!” I wail.

“Okay,” Wes says, concerned but uncomprehending. “We’ll find it. Okay? We’ll find it.”

I disentangle myself from him, wiping my nose on the back of my wrist. My cheeks are hot from weeping.

“I said I’d come right back,” I plead. “Why didn’t you wait for me?”

He just stares into me, his eyes stricken.

“Wes,” I gasp. “I came right back.”





PART THREE




   WES AND ANNIE





CHAPTER 1


I’m a Rip van Winkle,” Annie says dully, sprawled on her back on my bed, feet dangling just above the floor, staring up at the ceiling of my dorm room. Her eyes are so dazed that she could be counting the divots.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

She kicks one foot and then the other, letting them swing. The dawn is starting to break outside, and the pigeon that’s nested on my air conditioner for the past couple of weeks coos as she stirs awake. We’re talking quietly, so as not to wake up Eastlin. I don’t think he’ll freak, finding some random girl in our room, but you never can tell.

“You know. Rip van Winkle. From the Knickerbocker book.”

“You mean, like, Washington Irving? The guy who fell asleep?” I ask, half remembering a story I read as a kid. A picture book of a guy in breeches and long shaggy hair.

“Yes,” she says, closing her eyes and putting her hands over them. “The guy who fell asleep.”

I’m sitting on the bed next to her, hiding my boxer-shorted self under a pillow. It’s completely awkward, having a girl wake you up when you’re not expecting it. I reach down to find a T-shirt to pull on, since it’s kind of weird to just be sitting here with only my boxers on while she’s in a crazy dress. How the hell did she get into my room?