* * *
Nobody had ever thought I was anybody’s girlfriend. Except Marxy. Some people could tell we were boyfriend and girlfriend, since we held hands. Neither of us was normal. It was like we were doing battle together. A lot of people, like AK47 and Dr. Laird and Pearl, wanted me to know that Marxy and I were still very different. He would never be as smart as me, and even if that wasn’t a problem for me now it might be later.
Hendo was very beautiful. Men are not usually called beautiful. They are called handsome. Hendo had a kind of beautiful face that was like a movie star’s. I looked at him and started to think about what it would be like if I was his girlfriend. We would go out places and talk about the books from the library, and we would kiss and nobody would say, “Look at those retards,” the way they said that to me and Marxy.
He was very cool too, and was not embarrassed to be with me and have people see me.
“What?” Hendo said as we drove away from his angry Baby Mama.
“What?”
“You’re looking at me weird,” he said, and one of his eyebrows went up. He asked what I was looking at and touched his face and asked if he had food on it or something.
I took all the spit in my mouth and swallowed it back down.
“Are you in love?” I asked.
“With Artem?”
“With your Baby Mama?”
Hendo laughed. “No. In fact, I can’t stand her. The only reason I even bother is Artem.”
We were coming close to my neighborhood. My body felt like it was two hands being rubbed together, getting warmer and warmer. My pulse was getting powerful and I could feel it in my neck, thump thump thump.
He turned on the music, to a song that I liked. He nodded his head and left his arm hanging out of the window. As we drove out of the neighborhood people waved to Hendo, and I realized that he was legendary with many people. While we were driving I thought about how Hendo said that his Baby Mama thought I was his girlfriend.
I had thought about having a family, but so many people said that two people like Marxy and me shouldn’t be allowed to have babies. Hendo was normal, and if his Baby Mama thought I could be his girlfriend, maybe I could be someone who has a baby too.
Like Mom. If I was AK47, I don’t know if I would have gotten an abortion.
“She has big boobs,” I said.
He laughed. “Yeah, yeah, I guess they are big. But I’m an ass man. And legs. You got nice legs. Do you run?”
“Sometimes,” I said.
“Anyway, Gert doesn’t need to know about that compliment, right?”
Hendo pulled his car in front of our building. He shut the car off and we sat there for a second. My seat belt got sucked up by the car. In movies, people are always asking people they like to come upstairs. They also kiss in cars. I wasn’t allowed to kiss Hendo, since I was Marxy’s girlfriend and that was cheating, which I hate. Hendo’s fingers made a drum on his leg.
I closed my eyes and made a movie in my mind about Hendo leaning over and putting his hands in my hair. I saw him move my face and hold my head and we kissed. And then I thought about the stand-up thing AK47 said never happened in real life and I laughed.
“Cool,” Hendo said, reaching across my lap to open the door. “I guess I’ll see you around. Good hanging.”
There was exactly eleven seconds, which I counted in my brain, where we looked at each other in the car, not making moves, not saying anything. This was the time I should have kissed him. I did not realize this time was perfect until he was gone.
chapter twenty
I was meeting with Dr. Laird, who must have had psychic powers. He always seemed to know where I was going with something, or what I was going to say, even before I said the thing. I guess that was why he had been to school for so long, to be able to do that. His walls were covered with proof that he had gone to a million schools.
One of our rules was that I could tell him anything, but that I wasn’t allowed to ask him things about his life. Our meetings were about me, not him, he said. I could talk about Gert if I needed to, and he promised he wouldn’t tell Gert what I said.
“Except in extreme circumstances,” he said, like if I was in danger.
When I was younger and Gert was my legal guardian, he got to hear everything. Since I turned into an adult, I had a lot more that I could say without worrying about Dr. Laird telling him.
Dr. Laird had been talking a lot about Marxy and how I felt about him, since he was my first boyfriend and since sex was something that boyfriends and girlfriends did.
“All right, Ms. Zelda,” Dr. Laird said. “Lay it on me.”
I told him that there was a new person I found sexy. “Even though I’m still in love with Marxy,” I said.
“This new person in your life.” Dr. Laird wrote in his notebook. “Does Gert know?”
I picked up Dr. Laird’s squeeze ball. “You are always saying I should stop asking permission from Gert.”
“Of course. That’s important. But I’ve never heard of this person before.”
When I put the squeeze ball down, it took a long time for it to go back into the shape of a ball. We watched as the lumps my hand had made turned smooth until the ball was perfect again.
“So tell me about him.”
I shrugged. “He’s a normal person.”
Dr. Laird moved his hands in a circle. “Normal as in…?”
“He is not like Marxy,” I said finally.
“Got it. Tall? Short? Fat? Skinny? Blond hair, brown?”
“He’s taller than me but not as tall as Gert. And he has veins you can see on his arms. Where the muscles are. Which is sexy.”
“Is he your age?”
“I think he is older, but not older like you. He is around Gert’s age.”
“Where did you meet?”
We had met at Toucan’s, but I was not supposed to mention that. Since I knew Dr. Laird would want me to explain who Toucan was, I decided to tell a half-truth and told him that I met Hendo at the library. I said that Hendo hung out with me when he got bored of the Sunday Bunny Reading Hour, and that sometimes he just hung out to read about basketball. I told Dr. Laird that he treated me like I was normal too and that he was into Vikings.
“But not as much as ninjas, which is okay, because they are badass too.”
Dr. Laird’s pen went crazy writing notes. I tried to see, but it was too squiggly for me to read any of the words.
When I was done talking, he said, “How does all of this make you feel?”
“I feel good, and also I feel gross.”
“Why?”
I closed my eyes and tried to ask my heart why it was telling me to feel bad, even though it was also telling me to feel good at the same time.
“I love Marxy,” I said. “And we are going to have sex and it’s dishonorable for me to be finding someone else sexy. That is one of the big rules about being in love.”
“Okay. And how has that changed? Do you still find Marxy sexy?”
I nodded. “Very sexy, but not in the same way. With Marxy I find him sexy to look at, and also sexy as a person. He is very honorable.”
Dr. Laird said that was good. “But it’s not against the law to feel attracted to someone new, Zelda.”
I asked him if he ever thought about having sex with people that aren’t Mrs. Laird. He laughed and said, “Oh boy. You’re not going to tell her, are you?”
“No, sir.”
“Like I said, Zelda. Everyone has sexual fantasies. Which is not to say that you always act on those thoughts. But it’s good they’re there. Otherwise you’d just get bored. Right?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t think Marxy is boring.”
“Okay, fine. I’ve got a soft spot for Julia Roberts.”
The movie Pretty Woman stars Julia Roberts who has sex with Richard Gere for money and in the end she stops being a hooker and they finally kiss on the lips.
“So this is the week,” Dr. Laird said
. “For you and Marxy.”
Dr. Laird asked me if I was ready. I took a deep breath and told him I was.
“I know all about sex.”
“And Marxy? Does he know all about sex?”
“He knows everything too.”
He asked me to tell him everything I knew about sex. I told him how it happened, and I also told him what I had seen in the porno videos, and before he could say anything I told him what AK47 had told me: those are fantasies and real sex is different. That made Dr. Laird happy. I told him about putting condoms on the carrot, and that I would bring a bunch with me, and that Marxy would bring some too.
“AK47 will be there, in another room, and so will Marxy’s mother.”
We stared at each other.
“There will be no Gert,” I said.
I expected Dr. Laird to tell me to tell Gert, but he didn’t. He read over his notes and then asked me about what else was new. I told him about the library, all the different books, and how even though there were not many books about Vikings, I could order them, and that I had already ordered a book on Vikings that Carol said was brand-new.
“Nice work,” Dr. Laird said. “How’s Gert doing?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Fine.”
“You don’t know?” Dr. Laird raised his eyebrow.
I did not know what to say, or what he was really asking me, because I had just told him I didn’t know what Gert was doing.
“Is Annie still his girlfriend?”
“They got back together.”
A big smile came across his face. I asked him why he was smiling.
“Because you are not talking about Gert anymore.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Do you know why that’s important?”
I told him I did not. His smile stayed on his face and he leaned forward, like he was going to tell me a very important secret. I leaned forward so that our faces were having a meeting in the middle of his desk.
“Because you are living your own life,” Dr. Laird said. And then he sat back in his squeaky chair. “You have a job, you have your own bank account and your own money. You could have your own apartment one day. And you have a boyfriend.”
My face started smiling too. I did not ask it to start smiling. But I could feel it smiling and then I started smiling inside of my body when I understood what Dr. Laird was saying.
“In other words,” he said, “you are finally living your own legend.”
* * *
When I got home from Dr. Laird’s I took out my list and looked at it:
THINGS LEGENDS NEED
A hero who is skilled in hand-to-hand combat
A powerful weapon for the hero to use
The hero must win the love of a fair maiden in danger
Every hero needs a wise man
Pillaging rival villages for treasure
The hero must defeat a villain who threatens the tribe
Dr. Laird was right. I had accomplished almost everything on the list. I still did not have a villain to defeat, but maybe sometimes legends don’t have villains. Maybe mine would be the kind of legend where the hero is good and just, like Knud the Great, a Viking king who brought his people many years of peace, so that they could trade goods with other tribes. And I was the hero of my legend, where the next step was to have sex with Marxy.
* * *
However, I wanted to talk to Marxy in secret. The secret to secret meetings is to make sure that nobody finds out about them, so you need to make sure it is in a place that is secret, and also make it so that nobody asks questions. I did not want to lie, so AK47 said that the best way to do something secret and to not lie is to make sure nobody asks questions that make you need to lie.
I texted Marxy and told him to call me, but only when he was sure he was alone and his mother or father was not around.
He called that night.
“I am calling because I’m alone and nobody is around,” Marxy said, almost whispering.
“Why are you whispering if nobody is around?”
“Oh.” His voice got normal. “Okay. I am home alone, so I guess nobody can hear me.” He made a noise that was like a smaller sneeze. “Sorry,” he said.
“Did your mom talk to you about our secret meeting?”
“She did.”
He said that she had told him everything about sex, including how to use condoms. “I’ve been practicing,” he said.
That made me smile.
I told him I wanted to meet him in secret, before we had sex. “Without anyone knowing. Just us two.”
“Without AK47 or my mom?”
“Yes.”
He got quiet. It was not a good quiet.
“Hello?”
“I don’t like this,” he said. “I don’t like hiding things from her.”
I sighed. “But when we have sex, she won’t be there, in the room.”
“I know.”
“It will just be me and you.”
He got quiet again. “Yeah.”
I told him that having a secret meeting would be like practice, being alone without his mother or AK47 or Gert. I said that for Vikings, you are a man when you are able to ride horses and drink with other men, and when fifteen winters have passed.
“I don’t know how to ride a horse,” he said. “My dad lets me have beer sometimes.”
“You have passed fifteen winters,” I said. “And nobody rides horses anymore.”
We agreed to meet alone, without telling anyone where we were meeting, or what time. It was not a very special meeting spot, the way secret places are always special and dark and scary in movies. This meeting place was a McDonald’s by the Community Center.
I got there first and ordered fries for us to share.
We always spent time together with other people around, watching us. We had not been alone very much since we first met at the Community Center exactly eleven months and fourteen days ago. All of the things I read on the Internet say that boyfriends and girlfriends that do not spend a lot of time alone with each other often break up. And Marxy’s mother did not let him be free. I believed Marxy could do more than she thought he could. It was like when I started working at the library, after people thinking I was too retarded. I proved them wrong.
I ate the fries and made sure to have lots of ketchup in the little paper cups for Marxy. I put two of the paper cups in front of the chair for him, and a small packet of salt and pepper, which I knew he would like. Two old people, a man and a woman, were sitting across from me and the man ate his fries with his mouth open. The old woman wiped his face with a napkin. He kept his mouth open while she wiped around his lips.
I reached out to take the longest fry, and a hand reached for it first.
The hand was not Marxy’s. It had tattoos of eyeballs on the knuckles.
“These are my favorite,” Toucan said, dipping it into the ketchup.
“Mine too.”
“Oh. Shit, sorry.” He held out the half he had not put in his mouth. When I did not take it, he said, “What, you think I have germs?”
“You do have germs. Everyone has germs.”
He shrugged and put it into his mouth. Then he sat down. “Relax,” he said when I started to tell him he couldn’t sit there. “I’m just waiting for Jumbo over there to order the food.”
The Fat Man was waiting in line.
“How are things?” Toucan asked.
“Things are fine. Can you go?”
The door to McDonald’s opened and Marxy came in. A stranger was with him, and he patted Marxy on the shoulder and I waved to Marxy and Toucan turned around to see who I was waving at.
Toucan took another fry and watched Marxy come over. “What the fuck is this now?”
“Hey,” Marxy said, out of breath. His shirt came up just above his stomach, showing little black hairs, and he pulled it down.
“Who was that man you were with?” I said.
“Oh. I got lost and he helped me.” Marxy t
urned to Toucan and stuck out his hand. “Hi. I’m Marxy. Who are you?”
Toucan finished chewing and wiped his hand on a napkin. “Toucan. I’m a friend of Zelda’s.”
“Of Gert’s,” I said.
“Oh. I’m Zelda’s boyfriend.”
Toucan stared at him. “No kidding.”
“You can go now,” I said to Toucan, who kept staring at Marxy.
The Fat Man brought over the McDonald’s bags and Toucan got up. “Good seeing you,” he said, and as he left he patted Marxy on the shoulder, and Marxy flinched, because he does not like being touched.
“I didn’t like him,” Marxy said as Toucan left.
“Yeah,” I said. “He’s a real shit-heel.”
* * *
We ate our fries and then Marxy was still hungry, so we got hamburgers too. He told me about how his mother hadn’t told his father about us having sex, and I told him that Gert did not know either. He ate his hamburger very quickly and asked if I was going to eat the rest of mine.
Marxy started telling me everything about sex that he had learned, about spermicide and condoms, and all the different ways to do it.
“I wrote it all down,” he said, and took out a piece of paper that had been folded a lot. There were words by the pictures of naked people.
“Wow,” I said.
“This one is my favorite,” he said, and pointed to one where the woman and the man faced each other. “Because you can kiss while having sex.”
He was getting “riled up,” which is what AK47 said whenever Marxy got too excited. He took out his asthma puffer and inhaled.
Some of the people in the McDonald’s were looking over but I didn’t care. I thought it was very sexy how excited Marxy was getting about us having sex. I thought that this was my boyfriend, and he loved me so much that he couldn’t breathe.
chapter twenty-one
On the day of sex, AK47 didn’t pick me up in the school bus. She came in her car and told me to be ready to go before she got there.
“In and out,” she said on the phone, and I made sure before she came over I had my shower and shaved my armpits and legs. Even though Marxy didn’t care, I wanted to be smooth.
When We Were Vikings Page 17