by Sasha Hibbs
“Are you ready?” Mickey said.
“Ready for what?”
“Thoreau debate today?”
I slid my gaze over to him briefly before looking back to the road. “What are you talking about?”
“As much as I enjoy Thoreau in general, there was a reason I was reading his work last night. The debate today makes up ten percent of our grade,” Mickey said.
“What!” I was going to go into a full on panic attack. “Please tell me you’re joking?”
“Someone didn’t study, did they?”
I shot him a heated glance.
“Don’t sweat it. Good thing Mr. Douche Bag Romano paired us together,” Mickey said. The smile on his face told me he was enjoying this.
I couldn’t believe, I, Autumn Chamberlain, forgot about a debate that would determine ten percent of my grade.
“Why do you hate Principal Oliverio and Mr. Romano?” My gaze went between Mickey and the road trying to get a feel for his mood.
“Why did you paint the school wall that day?”
I opened my mouth to respond, but I had to actually think about why I did it. I knew why. I knew it then, but since that day, I had put it behind me.
“That’s not fair. I asked you first,” I said, redirecting the conversation.
“You answer me and then I’ll answer you.” He looked at me expectantly.
In those few seconds, I thought about my life. On the outside it was perfect—untarnished. We had money, connections, a home owners’ association that answered our questions should we be in doubt about our appearance being up to standard. I’d never questioned those guidelines I’d been raised with. I knew my place. But I lived inside the walls of the perfect house. I knew what really went on. My dad was a workaholic and my mom was an alcoholic, and I felt lost in the shuffle of our existence.
I had to stay after school that particular evening to work on my chemistry project. I wasn’t the only one who had to stay behind. There was a group of kids everyone called the emo-Goth kids that stayed to finish their project too. Our assignments, at least how well we did on them, were our midterm final grades.
I always worked solo. I was slated for valedictorian of my class. I didn’t need any help. But the emo-Goth kids—Becky, Chad, Joey, and Kye did. After I tested my formula and turned in my paper, detailing all my work, I passed by their group. As I walked by they all huddled up together and started laughing. They kept eyeballing me as though I was the punchline of some joke.
Normally I would’ve walked off and not thought anymore about it. I wasn’t popular by any means, but I was a Chamberlain. I had everything at my fingertips and most people knew that. Apparently these black-clad Goths didn’t know and it got under my skin. I stopped in my tracks and asked them what was so funny. Kye straightened up in his seat. Posture wasn’t something in their genetic makeup.
“We were just taking bets,” Kye said.
His dark eyeliner was distracting, but I didn’t flinch when I asked him, “On what, exactly?”
“You,” Kye said.
“Excuse me?”
“We were trying to figure out how to configure and finish this formula so we could leave a present for the school,” Kye said as Becky leaned over and pulled out a few cans of spray paint from her satchel.
“What does spray paint have to do with your final project or me?”
Chad and Joey started chuckling. Their eyes were blood shot. They looked high. I rolled my eyes and started to walk off.
“Hey! Stop! Don’t be like that. I brought up the idea of asking you to help us finish this since you know what you’re doing, and we don’t, and Chad and Joey dared me to ask you. So here I am asking you for help.”
“Looks like you win,” I said and took another step toward the door.
“Wait!” Kye said, jumping out of his seat.
“Look, I’m not interested,” I said, crossing my arms together taking no trouble to hide the annoyance in my voice.
“That’s only part of it. It’s our senior year and we wanted to leave the school an early parting gift so that future generations could see our greatness, but we need you to pull it off and Chad and Joey bet me I couldn’t talk you into it,” Kye said.
“Talk me into what?”
“We’re artists. So we wanted to do some … art. In a big way. But we’ll never get past the janitor. So I bet Chad and Joey that I could get you to help us finish our project and get us past the janitor and they bet I couldn’t talk you into it. But everyone trusts you. If you’re with us, no one will question our motives for going through the locked cafeteria exit.”
“I’m confused. What’s so funny about that?”
“When I made my suggestion, Chad and Joey said—”
“Forget it, man,” Joey said, his beady red eyes glazed over. “She’s too stuck-up. Does everything she’s told. Mommy and Daddy are waiting for you at home, aren’t they, princess?”
I looked at Joey, then Chad. My gaze slid over to Becky who was trying to mask her smile. They’d been talking about me, assuming things about me they didn’t know, laughing at my expense. They thought my life was glamorous, flawless, and obviously that I was a spoiled rich kid. And maybe to some degree, that was true. But the real truth was somewhere in the middle. My parents had money. I had the appearance of perfection, but on the inside I had pent-up frustrations without being at liberty to taint our family name. So I kept them there—buried deep—festering, boiling like the tubes of chemicals in front of these Goth kids. But there was a dare in their gazes that broke through to those feelings I had caged inside of me.
I was mad I was being made fun of. I was angry these losers thought my life was perfect. I was pissed my life wasn’t perfect. I hated that I knew the flaws of my family and we covered them up with our smiles, with attending church every Sunday, with being the most prominent family at the Country Club.
Something inside me cracked. I shoved Joey out of my way, snapped on a pair of goggles, made easy work out of their chemistry project, left my notes on the teacher’s desk and like a hall monitor, told them to follow me.
As expected, we met up with the janitor—Mr. Cutright—but I didn’t miss a beat. While he eyeballed the Goths behind me, he never questioned me. Nobody did. Instead, like everyone else on the faculty, my word was gold.
I led them outside through the cafeteria. Becky pulled the cans of spray paint out and handed one to each of them. When she offered me a can, I hesitated. But then I thought of my mom, my dad, the formal and cold exterior of our life, and I wondered if this would get their attention. I snatched the can of spray paint from Becky’s hand, and as I popped the top and took aim at the outside of the school wall, I thought about my life.
Cold. Unfeeling. Proper.
I pretended that wall was the back of our family, its flesh staring up at me. Each line of black paint was a lash of pent-up frustration and anger. We were not perfect, and in that moment I felt a release, a thrill for leaving a mark. Those black lines that seeped down the side of the school wall were tangible to the eye. People couldn’t see what my life was like on the inside, but they could see this.
I was caught up in a frenzy, spraying black paint as though my life depended on it when I heard Becky scream. I turned at the sound of cans dropping and feet scurrying when I saw Mickey leaned up against the far end of the school wall watching me and Mr. Romano running after the rest of them.
Mickey and I locked gazes.
I was caught. I knew it. When Mr. Romano came back, I was there waiting for him. I was still clutching the can of paint in my hands, breathing heavily.
He didn’t catch Kye and the rest. But it didn’t matter. He saw them, had their names. While I stood there in my stupor waiting for him, I knew he’d be waiting for the rest of them tomorrow.
Clutching onto the steering wheel, my thoughts turned back to the present. Until this moment, I hadn’t given any real thought to why Mickey was there, why he stood there watching me, why he
never ran when he’d never been part of the desecration. He took punishment for something he never did. He was an innocent bystander.
I pulled into the school parking lot. After I parked, I turned in my seat to look at him. “What were you doing there?”
“You haven’t answered my question.”
He wanted to know why I decided to graffiti the side of the school, but how could I tell him my mom was an alcoholic? My dad was too apathetic to care? And I wanted to do something that would gain their attention? How could I tell him that I’d been frustrated, feeling like something was missing from my family all along, and it took me going to his house, to witness the love they all had for each other, to see that was what was lacking in my own? I couldn’t lay out all my demons. They were scary. He was a fighter, but he couldn’t fight my battles. I had to do that.
“I just got caught up in the moment. I guess I was at the wrong place at the wrong time,” I answered. “Now it’s your turn. Why were you there?”
Mickey looked at me long and hard.
“Mr. Romano wanted to have a meeting with me after class.”
“Wait a minute. He’s the one that reported us. He knew you weren’t involved?”
Mickey didn’t reply, but his silence confirmed it.
“He lied about you?”
“I think he preferred calling it an opportunity to gain my compliance in his class.”
“I’m sorry, Mickey. That’s not fair. You didn’t do anything.”
“It worked out in the end,” Mickey said. His voice dropped to a faint seductive whisper.
“How so?”
“It brought me you.”
Chapter Eighteen
“You were incredible!” I said to Mickey as we both slid down into the Jetta.
I was completely unprepared for the debate over Thoreau and Emerson, all thanks to the cute boy sitting beside me. But he didn’t let me down. Instead he stepped up to the plate and argued flawlessly. In the end, Mr. Romano gave in, arched a brow at Mickey, looked between both of us and said, “Job well done.”
“I have my moments,” Mickey said with a lopsided grin.
With the knowledge that Mr. Romano and Principal Oliverio were Mickey’s uncles, my curiosity about their history was mounting with each day. I didn’t know the origin of Mickey’s distaste for his uncles, but some piece in the puzzle was missing. Mr. Romano wanted Mickey to graduate among the top of his class so it could maximize his chances of being accepted into a variety of colleges. That told me the hate was one sided. But why?
“Well, you saved me,” I said, giving him the genuine smile I felt.
I, Autumn Chamberlain, had never been blindsided. I was always composed, poised, and ready to strike at a great debate. But I’d been too wrapped up in thoughts of Mickey to even think about the assignment waiting for me the next day.
I pulled up alongside the curb in front of Mickey’s house. Mickey opened his door, and when I didn’t shut the car off, he leaned down and said, “Can you stay for a little bit?”
His voice coupled with those pretty blue eyes peering at me through the wisps of dark hair made my heart somersault.
“Sure. I can probably stay for an hour. Let me call my mom real quick.”
I turned the Jetta off and held my breath as I dialed my mom’s number. It went to voicemail, thank God. I left her a quick message telling her I’d be home in around an hour. Later, when I got home, I’d tell her I had to stay after school for a last-minute project. I was risking my parents’ wrath as the last time I stayed behind at school I damaged school property. But looking at Mickey, I felt a mix of excitement at being near him and a pang of guilt that I was indirectly lying to my parents, afraid of them discovering this boy who melted me on the inside. I would tell them the truth eventually. But not today.
I got out of the car, shut my door, and lagged behind Mickey. We walked into his kitchen. He grabbed a banana and glass of orange juice.
“Want some?” Mickey asked as though manners just occurred to him.
I smiled. “No, thank you.”
Mickey sat his empty glass down and wiped his mouth off with the back of his hand. There was something extremely unrefined about the act as well as seductive. With his gaze latched onto mine, he pulled his shirt off over his head.
“What are you doing?” I asked as I bumped into the countertop. “Where’s Jimmy?”
“He gets off the bus around four and Mom won’t be home until an hour after that. So we’ve got a solid hour to ourselves,” he said, one side of his mouth curving up into a teasing smile.
“An hour for what?” My heart pounded as completely impure thoughts trailed through my head like a fiery blaze.
“Come with me.”
I should’ve bolted from the house, and yet I found myself obeying him. It was cold outside. Mickey had to feel the chill of winter air against his bare skin, but he moved undeterred and with ease. He opened the door to his building and I followed him in. He started working his iPod until Led Zeppelin started blaring from the speaker. He turned toward me and sat down on the edge of his weight bench. He pulled out a small box from underneath his bench. With the box between his feet, he removed long pieces of gauze. He started wrapping a piece of gauze around his left hand then stopped.
“Could you help me out?”
“Sure.”
I stopped in front of Mickey. He looked up at me from the bench with heat in his eyes. I kept my gaze lowered to his hand. I took the gauze and began wrapping his hand.
“Am I doing okay?” I lifted my gaze long enough from my task to watch Mickey assessing my skill.
“Perfect. You’re perfect.”
I could feel the heat between us simmer. I finished with his left hand and brought his right one into my grasp. As I started to wrap the gauze over and under, he stopped and laced his fingers between mine. I held my breath and looked into his eyes. He stood from the bench and towered over me. I could feel his breath against my shoulder as he dipped his head toward my neck. He placed his free hand on the small of my back and peppered small kisses against my neck, my jawline, and then he kissed me fully on the lips. My head was dizzy and my knees weak. I felt his bare chest against my sweater as I pressed myself closer to him.
He withdrew and gazed down at me. He rested his forehead against mine. He whispered, “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.”
I was dazed, but as his words sank in I couldn’t place them.
“What is that from?”
“Muhammad Ali,” he said, gently putting some distance between us. “It reminds me of you.”
“How so?” I cleared my throat and tried to do the same with my head.
“You’re like a butterfly. You glide, so pretty, so smart.” He moved in closer to me and picked up a few strands of my hair, rubbing it between his fingers, studying it as though it held the answer to some great mystery. “Your hair is like the wings of a beautiful butterfly.” He slowly let my strands slip through his fingers. “I watch you flitter by—like a butterfly—and I want to touch your wings, but wonder if you’ll sting me in the end.”
His insinuation wasn’t lost on me. Nor was his ability to see within. I didn’t say anything as he turned and walked outside.
Was this an omen? Was there some part of Mickey that knew our relationship would end in disaster? I would figure out how to confess to my parents what I dreaded most—that there was a boy who wasn’t a star football player. That he didn’t come from money, but his mom had scratched out a meager living for them. Didn’t that matter? There was a boy who wasn’t welcome at the Country Club for its abundance of parties as an attendee, but as a boy who was dropping off his mother’s purse who worked there. There was a boy on the other side of the tracks who I was trying so desperately to reach. My parents were a barbed wired fence charged with electricity. And I didn’t know if I was strong enough to climb it to get to Mickey. But for now, I would follow him around back and watch him dance among a maze of strings and bound
aries.
There were thick red ropes crisscrossed and tied to a big tree several feet from Mickey’s building. They were configured in a way that reminded me of a life-sized detective’s board with maps, red yarn, and thumbtacks. This arrangement must’ve made sense to Mickey, but it looked like someone dropped a bunch of clotheslines from the sky and they stayed where they happened to land.
“What is all this?” I asked.
Mickey stopped in front of the tree where the ropes originated and turned facing me and the maze. He balled his hands up and rolled his shoulders, flexed, and then brought his fists up to protect his face as though he were fending off an invisible opponent.
“This is where I train,” Mickey said and then went on to whisper techniques to the wind. “Tap, tap, block. Tap, tap, jab.”
He kept one fist up to his face, his shoulder crouched to one side, and the other fist darting out to jab the air. He moved in and out of the ropes without ever touching them. It was a boxer’s dance—eloquent, fluid, and graceful.
“Why do you fight?” I asked. Although I was mesmerized watching his routine, the reality of what he did and how dangerous, still was in the front of my mind.
“For my family,” he answered as he continued to dodge the ropes as he wove in and out of them.
“I don’t understand. Your mom knows about these fights?” I asked him this, and thought about the two matches I’d been to. There wasn’t anything about them that seemed legit or would be condoned by his mother.
“No.”
“Then why do you do it? How did you even get started? What if you get caught?” A torrent of questions fell from my lips.
He made it through the obstacle of ropes, standing inches from where I stood. His breathing was a bit exerted, no doubt from the routine he just underwent.
“It’s what I’m best at,” he said, those blue eyes boring into mine.
“I don’t know, Mickey. I think you’re best at using this,” I said, lifting my hand up to his temple, tracing a finger across his forehead, moving my way down to his jawline. “You’re so smart, Mickey. Why fight at all?”