head back, hair flying out like a butterfly. The way I want to be.
“What a perfect day!” she says, clapping her hands together when she stops. “All this, and stars and planets, too!”
Dad laughs and calls, “And which constellation are you, Charlotte?”
“Hmmm. How about, Cassiopeia, the Queen?”
“Too weighty,” Dad says, catching up. “I know. Apus, how ’bout? Bird of Paradise. Never with two feet on the ground.”
Mom laughs and takes his hand. Maybe I want to be that instead. A Bird of Paradise.
No, papillons sound so much prettier, I think as we make our way down to the cool, quiet insides of the planetarium.
The show is my favorite: One World, One Sky. It starts with a sunrise over a neighborhood that looks and sounds like ours, with birds chirping and children playing in yards, and dogs barking, and parents leaving for work. But when the sky grows larger and the Earth smaller, as the camera pans out wider, the yards change so there are chickens and oxen and dry desert sand, and when they zoom in again, it’s clear they’re not in our country anymore, but in China or Africa or India.
“We are all one world, when the stars come out,” the narrator says, as daylight fades, and the whole entire room fills with twinkling stars and constellations, and you’d bet a million dollars you were floating outside in the night sky.
When the show ends and the lights come on, Dad gets up, but Mom sits there, unmoving. Her cheeks are wet, and her eyes are glossy with tears.
“Charlotte, really? Now?” Dad asks, impatiently, but I get it, how the stars like that, all swirling and infinite and dizzying, can make a person feel like they need to cry.
Back out in the daylight, we make our way through the rose garden labyrinth, and Mom’s mood improves. She stops every few steps to scoop handfuls of peach and lemon-yellow and magenta petals that have fallen to the ground.
At the stone wall that blocks us and the land from spilling down the cliffside into the Sound, Mom reaches over, Dad holding fast to the back of her blouse, to pick some sort of tall, stiff grass with a feathery bit on its end. It looks like wheat stalks, only greener. She threads the rose petals onto the stalks, and ties them into circles that she places like fairy crowns on our heads.
Toward the back of the property, we move past the small building where the mummy is housed—Dad knows I won’t go in there—to the reptile and insect house. There, we visit the tanks of geckos, iguanas, bearded dragons, and rat snakes. Like a magnet, I am drawn to the exotic butterfly wall. Blue Morphos, Goliath Birdwings, and Giant African Swallowtails, their majestic wings pulled open to full span and pinned there, captive art against black velvet boards, behind dusty glass panes.
Dad and I read the names aloud, debating which is prettiest, most like the papillon he thinks I am. When we turn to go, Mom isn’t here, and we find her sitting on the ground outside, knees up, crown petals at her feet, weeping.
LATE JUNE
TENTH GRADE
The Hager Planetarium is magical in the gray-purple dusk. To the Prom Committee’s credit, the trees along the path down to the main building are strung with pink lanterns and tiny green and gold lights, giving the grounds an even more romantic feel.
Max lets go of my hand, reaches into his jacket pocket, and retrieves a small silver flask. He takes a swig, and offers it to me, but I’m already buzzed, so he passes it to Bo, who drinks and passes it to Dean.
Midway down the cobblestone walkway, Max says, “Hold up,” so I do, but those guys ignore him, cutting across the grass and disappearing behind the main rotunda.
“They’re not going in?” I ask.
“Guess not,” he says, and my heart sinks. I got all dressed up to spend the night behind some building drinking and smoking weed. But Max says, “Okay, let’s do this.” I look up at him, questioning, and he says, “I told you, Jailbait, I’m here to show you off, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I have no intention of following those bozos, or making this anything but a perfect night for my girl.” And with that, every fear I’ve had crumbles and disperses into the lilac–scented air.
Inside is a different story, and a new surge of panic rises to my chest. People are surprised to see Max