Page 20 of Next Time Will Be Our Turn
“Nineteen. A very old and venerable wise woman.”
“Ancient.”
By now, we’d gotten to a traffic light and were waiting for it to turn. Before I knew what was happening, there was a weight on the top of my head. Ellery was resting her elbow there.
“Okay, kid,” she said.
“Uh…” Delicious laughter bubbled up from deep in my belly. “Don’t rest your elbow on my head!” I cried, but I was laughing so hard the words came out garbled.
“Don’t be the perfect elbow-resting height,” she said.
Still laughing, I grabbed her arm and lifted it off my head. Then it hit me that I had Ellery’s elbow in my hands and, oh my god, I was touching Ellery and also, oh my god, her arm was soincredibly toned, and what the hell should I do with it? Because she wasn’t pulling away and, oh no, I—
The light turned. “Let’s go.”
I dropped her arm and scampered after her.
Something had changed between us, a tiny change, barely perceptible. I wasn’t sure what it was, exactly, but the rest of the walk, the conversation flowed easily, so much so that when Ellery checked her watch and said, “Oh shit, it’s almost six,” my mouth dropped open. We’d been walking close to two hours. It was only then that I realized how tired my legs were.
“I should go back,” Ellery said.
“Me too.” Not that I had anything to go back to aside from homework, but it seemed like the right thing to say.
We walked down the street in amicable silence. “This was nice,” Ellery said after a while.
“Yeah.”
When we got back to the apartment complex, she opened the side gate and once again motioned for me to go through first. Yet another tiny gesture that somehow managed to be so incredibly sweet.
From Iris, I knew not to let goodbyes linger, so I said, “See ya,” and turned away before Ellery could reply.
“Same time tomorrow?” Ellery called out.
I stopped and looked back at her over my shoulder, joy unfurling like a flower in my chest. “Yes.”
And just like that, our friendship sprouted its first roots.
Chapter 8
MAGNOLIA
1998
Over the next few weeks, Ellery and I went on walks almost every day. I’d never had a friendship like that before, not even with my old school friends. For one thing, Jakarta wasn’t a city built for walking; outside of the business districts, there were often no pedestrian sidewalks. And the tropical weather made walking outside an ordeal, more cardio and endurance than relaxing stroll. But walking in LA was different, especially in the evenings. When the sun started setting, it turned the sky into a riotous mix of colors I’d never seen before—violet and pink and orange and blue, a tapestry you couldn’t possibly tear your eyes away from. Ellery and I would stare up at it, and I’d steal glances and drink in all the minute details of her face. The curve of her jawline and the angle of her nose and the look of childlike wonder on her face. She’d been here forawhile nowand still she savored everything about LA, and through her eyes, I fell in love with the place.
We talked about nothing and everything. We’d tell each other about our days at school, how our classes were going and which of our teachers were pricks. Ellery was undecided about what to major in. I’d pretty much decided on psychology. She knew she wanted to do some kind of writing, so she took Journalism and English Lit and Creative Writing and all sorts. At every stoplight, she’d rest her elbow on my head. I’d tell her that her arms were freakishly long and heavy, like an ape’s, and she’d tell me that my head was wonderfully flat, like a side table. She continued calling me Tulip, and I started calling her Bellery.
After the first week of school, Ellery started giving me rides home. Iris was suspicious at first.
“Who keeps giving you rides home?” Iris said after Ellery drove me home for the third time in a row.
“My friend. Her name is B—Ellery.”
Iris frowned. “Why’s she bothering to give you rides?”
“She lives here too, so it’s not really out of her way.”
Iris sniffed. “Mm-kay. Well, works for me.”
