intermission, as if I were in a school play. I had been in two plays, one in junior high and one when I was a sophomore and then I stopped trying out even though my drama teacher kept asking me to audition. Maybe I thought if the spotlight hit me, really concentrated on me, everyone in the audience would know I had been turned into a shadow.
Taking a deep breath, I began again.
"I had dinner by myself the night of the Honor Society induction. Mrs. Caron, feeling sorry for me, made my favorite meal: veal cordon bleu."
"What's that?" Star asked, grimacing. "Blue veal?"
"No," I said. "It's veal rolled and stuffed with ham and cheese. It's French."
"Pardon my ignorance," she said. "I'll take my grandmother's fried chicken. That's American."
I raised my eyes toward the ceiling.
"May I continue?" I asked.
"By all means," Star said.
"Thank you. I felt bad for Mrs. Caron, but I really had no appetite. She asked if I was sick and I apologized and told her to save the leftovers for me. She rarely did. My mother has this thing about leftovers. Every week we would throw away enough to feed a family like ours for another week. My father complains a lot about that, but my mother accuses him of wanting to take risks with our health just to save a dollar and he backs down.
"I rose from the table and wandered through the empty house. I could swear the echoes of a hundred recent arguments were bouncing from wall to wall in practically every room. I imagined the house itself taking on a dreariness, the colors fading, the windows clouding as if the storm of my parents' divorce was raining gloom and doom over furniture, pictures, and decorations. Cold hate was dripping down the walls in the house I once thought was my perfect little world.
"It made me laugh to think about that and I guess I laughed so hard and loud, it brought Mrs. Caron and Rosina out of the kitchen to see what was happening.
"'Are you all right?' Mrs. Caron asked.
"'What? Oh, yes,' I said. 'I'm fine. I was just laughing at the rain.'
"'Rain?' She looked at Rosina and they both looked at me with concern. 'It's not raining, Jade.'
"'No? I guess that's just tears then. The house is crying. Yes, that's it, Mrs. Caron, the house is sobbing. Don't you hear it? Listen,' I said and tilted my head.
"They stared at me with questions in their eyes. I smiled and told them not to worry. My father had designed the house so it could withstand months and months of weeping.
"Then I turned and pounded up the stairway, holding my hands over my ears, and shut myself up in my room. For a while I just sat on the bed and stared at myself in the vanity mirror. I tried to go through the motions of preparing for the Honor Society reception, but after I put on my dress and looked at myself, I just burst into tears.
"It's catching, I told myself. The house is infecting me. I've got to get out of here before it's too late, I told myself. I rushed around my room and threw some clothes together into a small backpack. Then I called for a taxi. First, I had the driver take me to the bank where I withdrew five hundred dollars from the ATM. Then I had him take me to the airport. I bought a ticket to San Francisco on the next flight. I remember looking at my watch during the flight and thinking I would have been sitting on the stage at this moment, gazing out at the audience of parents and friend
s, looking vainly for my own. I closed my eyes and fell asleep.
"When I arrived in San Francisco, I took a cab to Craig's home. I had no idea what I would say or do when I got there. I just wanted to talk to him, to spend time with him
"He lived on Richland Avenue near Holly Park. I had been to San Francisco before, but I'd never been to his neighborhood. Craig's house looked as old as he had described it. It was a three-story Italianate with a low- pitched roof. The bottom floor had bay windows and the stucco exterior had faded into a brownishyellow.
"It was just after nine when I arrived. Most of the windows were dark with just a dull glow in one of the first-floor windows. No one's home, I thought, but went up to the door and rang nevertheless. It took so long for anyone to answer that I had already started back down the short stairway.
"'Yes?' I heard and turned to see a tall, lean man with thin, graying light brown hair, some of the strands so long, they drooped over his eyes and hung down over his ears. It was hard to make out the details of his face because the light was so dim behind him.
"'I'm looking for Craig Bennet,' I said nervously.
"He simply stood there, gazing out at me as if I hadn't spoken. For a moment, I wondered if I had only imagined asking for Craig. I repeated Craig's name just in case.
"'Who are you?' the man asked in return. I told him and again, he just stood there staring.
"'Oh,' he finally said. 'Craig mentioned you to me. You're the computer girl.'
"'Yes,' I said, smiling at the label. 'I'm the computer girl.'
"The way I was feeling, I might as well have been something created in a computer.