Gina Linko - Indigo

My self-imposed silence was kind of half-assed. The no-touching rule, I followed that religiously. But I still talked, a little. The old me knew how to commit to things. But because the new me didnt, because I wasnt that brave now, my life kept hobbling along. I did keep to myself. Mom made me see therapists and psychologists. They talked a lot about post-traumatic stress disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder. But I knew that was garbage. I knew I had to keep myself quarantined, distanced.

Once in a while, I could still feel it in me. Starting to heat up right there under my sternum, churning in my ribs, wanting to come out.

Mom and Dad never bought it. When we moved down to our summer home for good, Mom fell in with our old friends Sarah Rawlings and her daughter, Mia-Joy. I wanted to keep away from them, from everyone. But I learned pretty quickly that if I could put on the facade of normaleven the tiniest bitwith the Rawlingses, Mom would let up on the counselors and shrinks. And Mia-Joy didnt need to ask me a zillion nosy questions. She didnt mind that I didnt talk much, or that I never touched other people. In fact, Mia-Joy barely seemed to notice. It just gave her more time to talk, which is exactly what shed been doing since I could remember.

But after Sophie, after everything, Mom felt a calling to come work with New Orleans Congregational, and Dad decided that post-Katrina New Orleans would be a boon for his construction company. The second big oil spill kept New Orleans in the news, and people wanted to rebuild the city even more, Dad said. People needed a new start here. Mom and Dad agreed; Dad would build their strip malls, and Mom would rebuild their shaken faith. So we left our old life in Chicago.

Thats how they sold it to me. And Mom told me, in a hushed voice, her eyes crinkling in that worried way at the corners, that we would start over too. We needed to. Sophie was gone.

I just nodded.

I wasnt even doing that today while Mia-Joy went on talking at breakneck speed as we sat behind the counter, peeling shrimp in the twinkling-clean white-tiled kitchen of the Rawlings Crawdaddy Shack. Mia-Joys mother stood at the large steel stovetop, her hair a mass of russet curls like Mia-Joys. She stirred the gumbo pots, the lunch rush less than an hour away. Mia-Joys ancient-looking Granny Lucy sat in her rocking chair next to the screen door, chewing on her black licorice, eyes closed as always. But just when you had forgotten she was even around, she would jump into the conversation and remind us that she was still here and, yes, she did know everything. The late-July air hung hot and damp against my skin, and the kitchen smelled of sweet onions, red peppers, and fresh bread pudding.

My daddy doesnt seem to want me to go, but Mama doesnt mind, Mia-Joy explained. The shrimp were slippery in my hands, and they made my mouth water. Seafood in the bayou was a different experience. The buttery crab legs. Red beans and rice with paprika shrimp. In Chicago, in my regular life, seafood had tasted more Midwestern stale bland. It was out of its element.

Much like me.

But Mia-Joy was New Orleans in every sense of the word, even if she was itching to get out. French Creole, with a father who fished on a shrimp boat, a brother who headlined at a jazz club on Bourbon Street, and a granny who taught her the finer points of twenty-first-century voodoo. When Raymond Kanzler stood Mia-Joy up for the Turn-About last year, Granny Lucy had told her, You give that boy a headache he aint never gonna forget. Just turn his picture upside down. Keep it that way for a week. Mia-Joy did it too. But she was already on to another boy, another adventure. She was sparkling, alive, colorful, just like New Orleans itself.

You mind your grades, Mia-Joy, her mama said, keeping her back toward us, her attention on her stove. Then well talk about your summer in New York.

What did I tell you? Mia-Joy squealed at me, popping one of the boiled shrimp into her mouth. She would go to New York after our senior year. She would model. I didnt doubt that. I smiled back at her. Forte. Allegretto. These were my musical descriptors of Mia-Joy. Loud. Up-tempo.

I pictured a mash-up of my old life and my new one right then. Mia-Joy hanging out with Annaliese and Cody from back home. Mia-Joy cackling with laughter when we pulled pranks on the swim team. No, scratch that. Mia-Joy would never be able to keep any secrets, would never be able to keep a straight face. Mia-Joy was a lot of things, but subtle was not one of them.

Corrine, youre scratching your palm, chrie, Granny Lucy called over.

I looked down and she was right. I wondered what she was going to tell me that meant: Was I going to kiss a fool? Inherit a windfall? But the old fishing lures hanging on the restaurant door clinked and clanked as it openedG-sharp, E, C, E. I didnt catch what Granny Lucy said. Sounded something like catching an old train.

A middle-aged couple walked in, heads together, laughing. He made me sweat just looking at him, a bushy beard and a sport jacket in this heat. She was a tiny woman, but her shoes made this great little slap-clap noise on the tile floor, and when I looked I saw that she had on ridiculously high heels, bright red. I caught a look at her face thenquickly, because I didnt like to make eye contact anymoreand I realized that it was Sylvia Smith, the professor from Tulane.

She had curly red hair, moved like a bird. You couldnt mistake her.

A flush crept up into my neck and ears. Mom had made me meet her during those first few weeks when I had been nothing more than a hot mess. Mom had probably envisioned things getting better, me eventually taking lessons again, needing a tutor here.

I slunk down into myself. But it didnt matter. Professor Smith would have no reason to remember me. I had refused to play the violin for her, refused to even speak. Mom had apologized like crazy, and we had never spoken of it since.

Where yat! Mrs. Rawlings called, her voice booming throughout the little restaurant.

Mornin, Professor Smith answered. Mrs. Rawlings met her at the counter, and they began to small-talk. The bearded man chuckled and his ample belly jiggled. I couldnt tell if Mrs. Rawlings knew Professor Smith or if they were just doing that whole Southern-friendly thing. I still couldnt tell the difference.

She stayed, Mia-Joy said, elbowing me in the ribs, nodding toward Professor Smith. During Katrina. People say she saved like three different neighbors. Tracked down insulin for this one old lady who was in a wheelchair.

I nodded. This was how it was now. People in the French Quarter defined themselves by Katrina. I knew what that was liketo define yourself through some kind of catastrophe, through loss. I kept my eyes cast down, working at peeling shrimp, but my gaze kept wandering back to those red high heels. She had stayed here. Weathered the broken levees and destruction and somehow lived through it to wear red high heels again. That was something.

The door jangled, and I immediately felt weird. Bothered. I didnt really know why. The heat? Thinking of my violin?

I stole a look at the door. Beat-up old black Converse gym shoes and frayed, too-long jeans. I told myself not to even look up. No interaction.

But then I noticed rain clattering against the window. The sound. Shoosh, whoosh, shoosh. It wasnt just a midday summer drizzle but more like a sheet of slanting rain, right here in the middle of this sunny New Orleans afternoon. The sky was blue, the clouds cottony white, and yet it rained, beating a rhythm on the restaurant windows.

Something about that didnt sit right with methe sunshine along with the rain. That should have been my first clue.