Кэндес Бушнелл - Carrie Diaries

“Goodness. I do so many of those little readings.”

“I asked you to sign a book for my mother. She was dying.”

“And did she? Die, that is,” she demands.

“Yes. She did.”

“Oh, Carrie.” George shifts from one foot to another. “What a nice thing to do. Having her book signed by Bunny.”

Suddenly, Bunny leans forward and, with a fearful intensity, says, “Ah, yes. I do recall meeting you now. You were wearing yellow ribbons.”

“Yes.” How can she possibly remember? Did I make an impact after all?

“And I believe I told you not to become a writer. Clearly, you haven’t taken my advice.” Bunny pats her hair in triumph. “I never forget a face.”

“Auntie, you’re a genius,” George exclaims.

I look from one to the other in astonishment. And then I get it: They’re playing some kind of sick game.

“Why shouldn’t Carrie become a writer?” George laughs. He seems to find everything “Aunt Bunny” says extremely amusing.

Guess what? I can play too.

“She’s too pretty,” Aunt Bun-Bun responds.

“Excuse me?” I choke on my sherry, which tastes like cough medicine.

Irony of Ironies: too pretty to be a writer but not pretty enough to keep my boyfriend.

“Not pretty enough to be a movie star. Not that kind of pretty,” she continues. “But pretty enough to think you can get by in life by using your looks.”

“What would I use them for?”

“To get a husband,” she says, looking at George. Aha. She thinks I’m after her nephew.

This is all too Jane Austen-ish and weird.

“I think Carrie is very pretty,” George counters.

“And then, of course, you’ll want to have children,” MGH says poisonously.

“Aunt Bun,” George says, grinning from ear to ear, “how do you know?”

“Because every woman wants children. Unless you are a very great exception. I, myself, never wanted children.” She holds out her glass to George, indicating she needs a refill. “If you want to become a very great writer, you cannot have children. Your books must be your children!”

I wonder if the Bunny has had too much to drink and it’s beginning to show.

And suddenly, I can’t help it. The words just slip out of my mouth. “Do books need to be diapered as well?”

My voice drips with sarcasm.

Bunny’s jaw drops. Clearly, she isn’t used to having her authority challenged. She looks to George, who shrugs as if I’m the most delightful creature in the world.

And then Bunny laughs. She actually guffaws in mirth.

She pats the couch next to her. “What did you say your name was again, dear? Carrie Bradshaw?” She looks up at George and winks. “Come, sit. George keeps telling me I’m turning into a bitter old woman, and I could use some amusement.”

The Writer’s Life, by Mary Gordon Howard.

I open the cover and read the inscription:

To Carrie Bradshaw. Don’t forget to diaper your babies.

I turn the page. Chapter One: The Importance of Keeping a Journal.

Ugh. I put it down and pick up a heavy black book with a leather cover, a gift from George. “I told you she’d love you,” he exclaimed in the car on the way home. And then he was so excited by the success of the visit, he insisted on stopping at a stationery store and buying me my very own journal.

I balance Bunny’s book on top of the journal and randomly flip through it, landing on Chapter Four: How to Create Character.

Audiences often ask if characters are based on “real people.” Indeed, the impulse of the amateur is to write about “who one knows.” The professional, on the other hand, understands the impossibility of such a task. The “creator” of the character must know more about the character than one could ever possibly know about a “real person.” The author must possess complete knowledge: what the character was wearing on Christmas morning when he or she was five, what presents he or she received, who gave them, and how they were given. A “character,” therefore, is a “real person” who exists in another plane, a parallel universe based on the author’s perception of reality.

When it comes to people — don’t write about who you know, but what you know of human nature.

I write a short story about Mary Gordon Howard. Her maid puts poison in her sherry and she dies a long and drawn-out death. It’s six pages and it sucks. I stick it in my drawer.

I talk to George a lot on the phone. I take Dorrit to the shrink George found for her in West Hartford.

I feel like I’m marking time.

Dorrit is surly, but she hasn’t gotten into any more trouble. “Dad says you’re going to Brown,” she says one afternoon, when I’m driving her home from her appointment.

“Haven’t been accepted yet.”

“I hope you are,” she says. “All Dad ever wanted was for one of his daughters to go to his alma mater. If you get in, I won’t have to worry about it.”

“What if I don’t want to go to Brown?”

“Then you’re stupid,” Dorrit says.

“Carrie!” Missy says, running out of the house. “Carrie!” She’s waving a thick envelope. “It’s from Brown.”

“See?” Dorrit says. Even she’s excited.

I tear open the envelope. It’s filled with schedules and maps and pamphlets with titles like, Student Life. My hands are shaking as I unfold the letter. Dear Ms. Bradshaw, it reads. Congratulations —

Oh, God. “I’m going to Brown!” I jump up and down and run around the car in glee. Then I stop. It’s only forty-five minutes away. My life will be exactly the same, except I’ll be in college.

But I’ll be at Brown. Which is pretty darn good. It’s kind of a big deal.

“Brown,” Missy squeals. “Dad will be so happy.”

“I know,” I say, floating on the moment. Maybe my luck has changed. Maybe my life is finally going in the right direction.

“So, Dad,” I say later, after he’s hugged me and patted me on the back and said things like, “I always knew you could do it, kid, if you applied yourself,” “since I’m going to Brown…” I hesitate, wanting to position this in the best possible light. “I was wondering if maybe I could spend the summer in New York.”

The question takes him by surprise, but he’s too thrilled about Brown to actually analyze it.

“With George?” he asks.

“Not necessarily with George,” I say quickly. “But there’s this writing program I’ve been trying to get into...”

“Writing?” he says. “But now that you’re going to Brown, you’re going to want to be a scientist.”

“Dad, I’m not sure...”

“It doesn’t matter,” he says with a wave, as if shooing the issue away. “The important thing is that you’re going to Brown. You don’t have to figure out your entire life this very minute.”

And then it’s the day swim team starts again.

The break is over. I’ll have to see Lali.

Six weeks have passed and she’s still seeing Sebastian.

I don’t have to go. I don’t, in fact, have to do anything anymore. I’ve been accepted to college. My father has sent in a check. I can skip classes, drop swim team, come to school intoxicated, and there’s nothing anyone can do. I’m in.

So maybe it’s pure perversity that propels me down the hall to the locker rooms.

She’s there. Standing in front of the lockers where we always used to change. As if claiming our once-mutual territory for herself, the way she claimed Sebastian. My blood boils. She’s the bad person here, the one who’s done wrong. She ought to at least have the decency to move to a different part of the locker room.

My head suddenly feels encased in cement.

I drop my gym bag next to hers. She stiffens, sensing my presence the way I can sense hers even when she’s at the other end of the hallway. I swing open the door of my locker. It bangs against hers, nearly slamming her finger.

She pulls her hand back at the last second. She stares at me, surprised, then angry.

I shrug.

We take off our clothes. But now I don’t sink into myself the way I usually do, trying to hide my nakedness. She’s not looking at me anyway, wriggling herself into her suit and stretching the straps over her shoulders with a snap.

In a moment, she’ll be gone. “How’s Sebastian?” I ask.

This time, when she looks at me, I see everything I need to know. She is never going to apologize. She is never going to admit she did anything wrong. She is never going to acknowledge that she hurt me. She will not say she misses me or even feels bad. She is going to continue forward, like nothing happened, like we were friends, but we were never that close.

“Fine.” She walks away, swinging her goggles.

Fine. I put my clothes back on. I don’t need to be around her. Let her have swim team. Let her have Sebastian, too. If she needs him badly enough to destroy a friendship, I feel sorry for her.

On my way out, I hear shouting coming from the gym. I peek through the hatched window in the wooden door. Cheerleading practice is in session.

I walk across the polished floor to the bleachers, take a seat in the fourth row, and lean into my hands, wondering why I’m doing this.

The members of the squad are dressed in leotards or T-shirts with leggings, their hair pulled back into pony-tails. They wear old-fashioned saddle shoes. The tinny thump of “Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown” echoes from a tape-player in the corner as the line of girls shake their pom-poms, step forward and back, turn right, place a hand on the shoulder of the girl in front of them, and one by one, with varying degrees of gracefulness and skill, slide their legs apart into a split.

The song ends and they jump to their feet, shaking their pom-poms over their heads and shouting, “Go team!”

Honestly? They suck.

The group breaks up. Donna LaDonna uses the white headband she’s been wearing around her forehead to wipe her face. She and another cheerleader, a girl named Naomi, head to the bleachers and, without acknowledging my presence, sit two rows ahead.

Donna shakes out her hair. “Becky needs to do something about that B.O.,” she says, referring to one of the younger cheerleaders.

“Maybe we should give her a box of deodorant,” Naomi says.

“Deodorant’s no good. Not for that kind of odor. I’m thinking more along the lines of feminine hygiene.” Donna titters, while Naomi cackles at this witty remark. Raising her voice, Donna abruptly changes the subject. “Can you believe Sebastian Kydd is still dating Lali Kandesie?”

“I heard he likes virgins,” Naomi says. “Until they’re not virgins anymore. Then he dumps them.”

“It’s like he’s providing a service.” Donna LaDonna’s voice rises even higher, as if she can’t contain her amusement. “I wonder who’s next? It can’t be a pretty girl — all the pretty girls have already had sex. It has to be someone ugly. Like that Ramona girl. The one who tried to be a cheerleader three years in a row? Some people never get the message. It’s sad.”

Suddenly, she turns around and, with a patently surprised expression, exclaims, “Carrie Bradshaw!” Widening her eyes, she stretches her lips into an exuberant smile. “We were just talking about you. Tell me, how is Sebastian? I mean in bed, of course. Is he really as good a fuck as Lali says he is?”

I am expecting this. I’ve been expecting it all along.

“Gosh, Donna,” I say innocently. “Don’t you know? Didn’t you do it with him an hour after you met? Or was it more like fifteen minutes?”

“Really, Carrie.” She narrows her eyes. “I thought you knew me better than that. Sebastian is far too inexperienced for me. I don’t do boys.”

I lean forward and lock my eyes onto hers. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be you.” I look around the gym and sigh. “It must be so…exhausting.”

I gather my things and hop off the bleacher. As I walk toward the door, I hear her shout, “You wish, Carrie Bradshaw. You should be so lucky.”

And so should you. You’re dead.

Why do I keep doing this? Why do I keep putting myself into these terrible situations where I know I can’t win? But I can’t seem to help myself. It’s like having been burned once, I got used to the feeling, and now I have to keep burning myself again and again. Just to prove to myself that I’m still alive. To remind myself that I can still feel.