Gail Peck is a freshman in high school when her older brother Steve, a senior, brings home his new girlfriend. Actually, the first time Steve brings home Holly, who'd just moved to Toronto from upstate New York, Gail isn't home at all. She's at cross-country practice, an activity she only joined to get her mother off her back. But all she hears about for the next several days is how nice Holly is, how smart Holly is, how pretty Holly is. The "I wish you'd be a little more like Holly, Gail" is inevitable, and Gail actually has to bite her tongue the first time her mother says it so that she doesn't respond with some sarcastic remark. Something like "Well, then I'd be dating my brother, mom." Or worse.
The first time Gail actually meets Holly, she's already half-way to hating her. Except Holly is just too damn nice to hate, no matter how hard Gail tries. She has this way of brushing off every sideways comment, every under-the-breath mutter that Gail throws her way. She is just as nice and pretty and smart as Elaine yammered on about. She says please and thank you, and offers to help with the dishes. She talks about wanting to be a doctor, and she should be a junior but she skipped a grade and is going to graduate just after her seventeenth birthday.
And unlike Gail, who is just losing the last of her childhood chubbiness, and is having a hard enough time figuring out who she wants to be much less what she wants to look like, Holly seems to have never had an awkward period. She's tall and thin and her long dark hair falls in waves over her shoulders. She has a style that's all her own, jeans and long sweaters and shirts that hug the breasts that Gail catches Steve staring at one night at the dinner table. Gail immediately falls in love with the dark brown leather boots that Holly wears most days, and tries to think of a non-weird way to ask where she got them so she can blow her leftover babysitting money on a pair for herself.
Holly's around a lot, hanging out in the basement den with Steve, reading in the hammock while he lifts weight on the patios, or studying at the kitchen table with him. She becomes a pretty frequent dinner guest, something Elaine doesn't complain about like she had for his previous girlfriends, dropping halfway offensive comments into every conversation. Things like wondering if the girl's parents even noticed that she wasn't home, or didn't she have better things to do. But Holly, it seems their mother has decided, is an excellent influence on Steve. And on Gail as well.
And therefore Holly can stay as long as she wants.
In fact, after finding out that her daughter was having trouble in her maths course, Elaine enlists Holly's help as a tutor. And so after dinner, Holly and Gail sit at the kitchen table and work through proof after proof. Because apparently it's not good enough to say something's a triangle or a circle.
Apparently Gail has to prove it now.
And just pointing out that it has three sides isn't enough. There are all sorts of complicated steps.
It drives Gail insane.
Anyone can see it's a bloody triangle.
Holly just laughs at her when the blonde gets frustrated and, with her endless well of patience, walks Gail through the process again.
And despite her initial reservations, mostly spurred on by Elaine's approval of the girl, Gail grows to like Holly. She and Steve make a good pair, Gail thinks, and they seem to really enjoy each other's company, always laughing and poking fun at each other. And unlike Steve's earlier girlfriends, Holly doesn't ignore Gail. She takes the time to poke her head into Gail's room and say hello when walking past toward Steve's at the end of the hall. She asks Gail how cross-country is at dinner—how she enjoys the sport, and not just what her latest times are. And when Gail worked up the courage to ask about the boots, it was Holly who took her to the mall to buy a pair.
But for all they see each other at the Peck house, Gail and Holly don't cross paths much in school. Gail's mostly in the freshman classes and rarely has a reason to wander into the upper class hallways.
But on her birthday she finds Holly waiting by her locker with a frosted cupcake and a small wrapped box. The cupcake is delicious—chocolate chip with mint frosting—and Gail eats it with big bites. The best part, though, is what's inside the box. Two tickets to a concert that Gail has secretly been dying to go to but hasn't brought up to her parents yet. The bell rings at that moment, and Gail can only quickly stumble over a "thank you" before she has to run to her first period class.
She spends the day thinking about Holly and this unexpected gift. She only really knows about the band because of the cd her brother's girlfriend accidentally left in Steve's car one day. Gail had almost stepped on it getting into the front seat on the way to school one morning, and curious about what kind of band would put a naked woman in the bath and a stuffed tiger nursing at her breast on their album cover, she'd popped it into the car's cd player. Steve had groaned, his kind of music leaned more toward the Smashing Pumpkins and Green Day, but he didn't tell her to turn it off. When they pulled up in front of Holly's house, and Gail reluctantly dragged herself into the back seat, the cd was still playing.
"Oh," Holly had said as she kissed Steve's cheek, "I wondered where I left this. Have you finally decided to give some real music a try?"
Steve had laughed and rubbed his hand up against the side of his face, "Nope. Gail found it under the seat and put it on."
And that's how it started. Holly turned around in her seat, as much as the seatbelt would let her, and told Gail all about the band, Belle & Sebastian, and how hard she'd had to search to find a copy of their first album. Gail tried not to be interested, tried to pretend that she agreed with Steve about the music, but the truth was she really did like it. She liked the soft male voice, the hint of horns, the way all the notes seemed to glide together. It's what she imagined flying felt like, but with sound. Smooth, weightless, nothing but clouds and the horizon.
So when Holly offered to loan her the cd, and the two others she had, Gail took her up on it with a barely disguised enthusiasm.
Since then their morning rides to school have been filled with talk about the music they like, trading cds back and forth while Steve moans and groans about not being able to listen to what he wants to. But they ignore him, and go back to their discussions.
Two weeks ago Holly mentioned that Belle & Sebastian were coming to a club downtown for a concert during the school holidays. Since then Gail has been trying to think of some way to get her mother to let her go. Elaine would balk, she knew, at her fourteen-year-old daughter going to any sort of concert, much less one at a club in downtown Toronto. And there was no way that Gail was going to ask her mother to take her there, and have to sit through Elaine's complaints about what a waste of time it was, or make comments about the kind of people who listened to this kind of music.
Maybe, she had thought, maybe she could bribe Steve into offering to take her, and maybe Elaine would be cool with that. But Gail wasn't confident enough in any of the dirt she had on her older brother. None of it was big enough to trade for this kind of a favor, not even the story of the time she found empty beer bottles in the trunk of his car. And since he didn't even like the music, it's not like he would volunteer to accompany her to the concert.
It was still early though. And at least she didn't have to ask her mother for permission to buy the tickets now—something Elaine would certainly roll her eyes at and suggest, none-too-subtly, that Gail put the money in her savings account or toward something more reasonable. No, she had her tickets, thanks to Holly.
Thanks to a birthday gift that she wasn't expecting from someone with no obligation to do anything for her.
She thinks about the gift all day long. All through her classes, through practice after school. She forces herself not to look in the box again, to leave it in her backpack and pretend to be interested in everything else going on. But she can't stop herself from hearing the music in her head, louder than the voice of the teacher at the front of the class, the chatter of her classmates and friends. The familiar soundtrack accompanies her all throughout her day.
It isn't until much later, as she lays on her bed after forcing down cake with her parents and opening her presents—a check from her parents and a goofy alarm clock from Steve—that she notices the other object in the box. She's laying on her back, turning the small box over and over in her hands, noting how carefully Holly had wrapped it. Gail takes the cover off again, just so she can pull out the tickets and look at them, try to figure out how to get her mother to let her go, and a flash of silver catches her eye.
There, almost hidden under the tissue paper, almost like an after-thought, is a homemade cd. It's unlabeled but for the "For Gail, Happy Birthday," scrawled across the top in a surprisingly messy hand, and so Gail has no idea what to expect when she pops it in her portable cd player and slips the headphones over her ears.
As she closes her eyes and listens to the songs she's never heard before, she thinks of Holly. She can't stop herself from picturing the girl standing next to her locker, standing there and waiting for her. Holly with her nervous, crooked smile. The excited way she'd pushed the present into Gail's hands, how she'd pulled Gail into a hug before leaving, holding the blonde-haired girl close and tight for a few short seconds. The scent of lemon in her long, dark hair and the sparkle of her brown eyes as she gently wished Gail a happy birthday before turning to leave.
And as she lay there listening, falling in love with each new song that Holly had chosen for her, Gail feels her stomach twist and turn, feels it grow heavy and aching.
Too much cake, she thinks to herself as she rolls over and starts the cd again.
She ends up asking Holly to go to the concert with her. And because Holly is going, and because Holly has yet to do any wrong in Elaine's eyes, Gail is allowed to go to the club downtown.
They take the subway downtown to the club, which Holly has informed Elaine is really more of a coffee shop than anything else.
It's a Friday night a little more than a week before Christmas, and the subway is busy, but not overcrowded. After a few stops, two seats open up in the middle of the car and Gail rushes for them, elbowing a couple of college-aged guys out of the way while Holly laughs at her antics. They're both excited, and have been all day. It's not the first concert that Holly's been to—just the first for this band—but it is Gail's first, and she's been trying to play it cool, not wanting to seem lame. But she's pretty sure Holly can see right through her. She's probably been able to see through her all day long. Probably since the moment she arrived at the Peck's front door earlier that afternoon.
For once, Holly hadn't come over to hang out with Steve. Steve was gone for the weekend, out skiing with one of their cousins. This time Holly had come over to spend time with Gail, to hang upside down off the couch in the basement and listen one last time to the cds before hearing the music live at the concert that night.
They ate grilled cheese sandwiches and listened to every track, singing along, trying to guess what the playlist for the concert would be. Gail hoped they'd play "Is It Wicked Not To Care" from their latest album, but Holly was hoping they'd hear "Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying."
No matter what, they were both sure that the night would be one they'd never forget.
Now, sitting on the train, sharing the ear buds to Holly's cd-player and listening to their favorite songs one last time, Gail is having a hard time keeping still. Her fingers dance along with the song's rise and fall on her jean-covered thighs, and her feet tap along with the bass. She's not a fidgety person, but for some reason, sitting so close to Holly, feeling the warmth of the other girl's thigh against her own, smelling the sweet fragrance of her shampoo, her hair, it makes Gail anxious. It makes her want to move—not away, she can't explain it but she doesn't want to lose that heat, that scent—but move her body.
She can't wait until they get to the concert.
She just wants to dance, to let the music move through her and take over.
The concert is extraordinary. Gail's never experienced anything like it.
It wasn't wild or full of pot-smoking hippies, like Elaine predicted. It's a bunch of college-aged people drinking tiny espressos and lounging back on old beat-up couches. The kind of couches you see on the side of the road, just waiting for the garbage people to come and pick them up.
She and Holly grab a love-seat covered in a dusky rose velvet. It's just big enough for the two of them, and it's so old and worn-in that Gail kind of falls into Holly if she stops paying attention to what her body's doing. Holly grabs them some coffee, and they sink back into the comfy cushions while they wait.
Soon enough the band is out onstage, and then they're playing the first song, and Gail, again, just can't seem to sit still.
She taps her fingers along with the lyrics, singing along in her head, as gently bobs her head. No one else is dancing, so she stays where she is, just enjoying the music that she loves with the girl she's starting to think of as a friend.
But a few songs in, her jitters must start to bother Holly, because the older girl gently takes her hand and folds it into her own. And for the next several minutes they sit like that, hand in hand, the warmth of Holly's fingers radiating up Gail's arm, until Holly jerks and slowly pulls her hand away.
And maybe it's nothing, maybe it's just that the band has started to play one of their more upbeat songs and people are starting to stand. Or maybe Holly realized what she'd done and thought better of it, maybe she's used to holding Steve's hand and wishes he were here instead. But whatever the reason, Gail feels the absence of Holly's fingers against her own keenly, feels the ghost of their warmth in the draft from the door.
And because she's not sure why it bothers her, because it bothers her that she's bothered, she stands with the rest of the crowd and starts to dance, leaving Holly to sit on the couch alone.
The subway station is packed on the way back. Gail's still burning off the energy of the concert, eyes closed and swaying back and forth on the platform as she replays her favorite moments in her head. Holly, though, is alert, and quiet. She's been quiet since that odd little moment on the couch, when she shivered and yanked her hand out of Gail's. Not unfriendly, just different. Maybe a little distant, like there's something on her mind that's taking up most of her attention.
It's making Gail feel odd, making her wonder if she's done something wrong. But she's pretending everything's okay.
Gail Peck is very good at pretending everything's okay.
Their train arrives and they squeeze into one of the cars. Gail pushes through the full car and finds a little bit of space near the back. But it's not much, and at every stop more people get on than off. She finds herself pressed tightly between Holly and a pair of guys a few years older than Steve.
They smell of beer and sweat, and look down at her with loose grins. And Gail would be uncomfortable, but before she knows it, Holly's switching places with her, putting Gail up against the wall of the car and herself in front of the men. "She's fourteen," Holly says, glaring, and their smiles wilt away as they turn, stuttering apologies into the hot mass of bodies.
Convinced that the men will leave Gail alone now, Holly turns again. They're face to face now, and Holly dips her head to say something in Gail's ear, but someone else must have stepped into the car, because the bodies surrounding them shift and jostle them until Holly's front is pressed tightly against Gail's.
She laughs, and dips her head again so that Gail can hear her speak over the din of the people around them.
"We probably shouldn't have turned down your dad when he offered to pick us up," she says, and Gail laughs in response.
"Nah," Gail answers back, rising on her toes to speak into Holly's ear, "this is more fun."
And it is. It's an adventure. Something that Gail hasn't really been allowed to have much of yet. Not with the short leash Elaine keeps her on. This, though, first the concert and now the busy trip home? This is fun. This is exciting.
The train takes a curve, and the change in momentum throws Holly against Gail again. Holly must lose her footing, because she doesn't recover right away. The train shifts again, and Gail feels Holly's leg tangle with her own, feels her own thigh trapped between the older girl's as she struggles to help Holly stay on her feet.
Gail feels the heat build in deep within her belly like a sinkhole, feels the charge of electricity shoot out from her center up her back, into her fingertips, her toes. She knows what the feeling is, has felt what it means to be aroused before, has felt little tides of warmth at the sight of intertwined bodies in the movies or on tv. But never this, never like this. Never so powerful and intense.
She's embarrassed and ashamed, and grateful that the lights in the back of the train car seem to be burnt out. She hopes Holly can't see the flush of red bloom over her face.
This is Holly. This is her brother's girlfriend. This is a girl.
She shouldn't be feeling this, shouldn't be wanting to shift and slide herself along Holly's strong thigh. Shouldn't want to lean into the other woman, wrap her arms around her and hold tight. Shouldn't be wondering what it would feel like to kiss her, to have Holly's lips brush against her own.
Eventually Holly regains her balance and some people disembark, giving them a little more room.
But as much as Gail had hoped and prayed that Holly didn't notice her reaction to being so close, she knows the other girl did. There's no other explanation for the awkwardness between them now, for why Holly won't meet her eyes, why the other girl's hands are curled into fists and shoved forcefully into the pockets of her jacket.
Everything had been perfect tonight. Everything had been amazing, wonderful, a dream.
And now Gail's ruined it. Now the memory of her favorite band is tainted by the horror of what happened in the train car, how she'd acted when Holly had fallen against her.
Holly must hate her. Must be dying to go home and call Steve and laugh about how stupid his little sister is, how embarrassing.
They don't speak for the rest of the ride home, and when Gail's father picks them up from the train station and asks how the concert had gone, Gail gives him a half-hearted "fine."
In her bed later, finally home, Gail resolves two things. First, that she'll never listen to Belle and Sebastian ever again. And second, that she'll avoid Holly as best as she can, and ignore her completely when she can't.
It's the only way, she thinks, to forget that any of this ever happened.