Life, Love, & Lemons

by Vernon, Magan

  “Um, I would, but I’m kind of busy…” She looked away, trying not to meet my eyes and I knew that there was something she didn’t want to tell me.

  I let out a deep sigh. “Brett’s having a party isn’t he?”

  “No…” She dragged out that ‘no’ a little too long for it not to be a lie.

  “Gabby, come on be honest with me. I’m not going to get mad.”

  She stopped browsing in the closet and finally looked at me. She thrusted her hands into the pocket of her shorts and swayed back and forth. “Okay he is, but like I didn’t want you to get mad. I mean I wanted to ask you to come, but well…”

  “Taylor didn’t want me there, did she?” I interrupted.

  “No,” she whispered.

  That one kind of stung. We hadn’t spoken or even seen each other since I saw her at Burgers’R’Us. She definitely didn’t call me for sushi Wednesday and I had no intention of calling her either. I just couldn’t believe that this girl who I had been friends with since preschool could just suddenly turn on me like that.

  “But how about that kiss that rocked East High?” Gabby giggled, trying to change the subject.

  I playfully swatted Gabby with a t-shirt. “It wasn’t that bad.”

  “Um, I think I literally heard Brynne’s tongue ring fall out of her mouth she was gawking so hard.”

  “Oh, stop it.” I took a hanger from the closet and hung my shirt back up.

  “So ,since you and Kai are like official now is he taking you to Homecoming?” she asked as she picked a piece of lint off of her halter top.

  I shrugged. “I don’t know’ it’s not something we’ve talked about in the whole twenty-four hours that we’ve been official and it’s not like I can even afford a dress to go.”

  “But you have tons of dresses in here!” She pulled out a teal, halter dress that was pleated in the front and a circle skirt with a big, black tulle layer on the bottom.

  “Um, that was my sophomore year Homecoming dress. I can’t wear that again,” I scoffed.

  “Why not?” She held the dress out. “It’s really cute ,and it’s a new school, new people, so no one has actually seen you in it.”

  “Well, if Kai asks me then I’ll wear this dress. How does that sound?” I took the dress from her and admired it. It actually was pretty and for what I spent for it, I guess I should wear it again.”

  “Girls, dinner’s ready,” Dad called from the kitchen.

  I put the dress down before Gabby and I walked the short distance from my bedroom to the little nook we had by the kitchen where our table sat. Our old kitchen table and chairs was too big for our little apartment, so we were currently using our old patio table as a kitchen table. I was kind of embarrassed to have Gabby see it, but she was really unfazed by everything.

  The kitchen reeked like smoke, and Dad set the table with paper plates and plastic cups full of milk. Without a dishwasher Dad wasn’t too big on doing the dishes. On the middle of the table he placed a warn dish towel and on the towel sat the frying pan full of eggs, cheese, and what looked like hot dogs.

  “It’s the Evans special!” Dad beamed as he placed a piece of half burnt toast on each of our plates.

  “Um, it looks…”

  “Wow, I love breakfast-for-dinner night.” Gabby cut me off as she sat down in one of the wrought iron chairs. Dad started having a bit of a coughing fit, but it quickly subsided as he spooned out some of the gooey eggs onto each of our plates.

  “Dad, you really need to get to a doctor or something. That cough sounds really bad,” I said as I played with the eggs on my plate.

  “Oh I’m fine.” Dad waved his hand in the air before taking a bite of his toast. “But what you girls need to be doing is drinking your milk.” He swallowed his toast. “It’s good for your vagina.”

  I almost choked on my own spit as Dad just stared at me with a confused look, like he thought that he didn’t say anything wrong.

  Gabby just started chugging her milk, so I followed suit. I guess milk was good for at least keeping us quiet and maybe for something else.

  Chapter 16

  The Foreskin Bandits

  Soon after dinner, Gabby left. I was pretty mortified by the whole ‘milk’ talk and was happy to be getting out of the house. As I got dressed, the sound of Dad’s hacking could be heard through the paper-thin walls. Kai was supposed to be coming over around 6:45. Dad insisted that Kai pick me up at the door so he could meet this ‘young gentleman that was taking his daughter out’. I hoped he wouldn’t make any comments about how some other dairy product was good for boy parts.

  Even though I was worried about Dad’s cough, I still had to figure out what to wear. It was my first concert, aside from a boy band in sixth grade, and I didn’t want to stick out like a sore thumb. After much deliberation and deciding that most of my clothes definitely weren’t ‘punk rock show appropriate’ I came up with an outfit that seemed okay and would hopefully make Kai think that I looked good as well. It’s not like I didn’t know that he liked me, but I was just waiting for that moment when he would see me and just have that ‘wow face.’

  I remember the first time that Jake got that face when he saw me. It was Junior prom and after spending hundreds of dollars to do my hair and nails and to buy a dress, I knew it was all worth it once I saw that look on his face. The one, where they make an ‘O’ with their mouth and just can’t stop staring. Yeah, that has still never happened with Kai. I didn’t know if he just didn’t like my preppy-chic look, or if he just thought I dressed bad. Either way I didn’t want to dress like his ex. Corsets or fishnets just weren’t my thing.

  Instead I wore a pair of dark low-rise jeans, a plain black scoop-neck shirt, and since the only pair of tennis shoes I owned were my gym shoes, my black Steve Madden flats would have to do. I was just curling the last bit of my hair when I heard Dad answer the door with a huge hacking cough. I knew it couldn’t be good.

  I quickly checked the mirror to make sure that my mascara hadn’t smeared before running out to the living room. Kai was standing in the door way looking nervous as ever with his head down and his hands shoved in his pockets. I thought he might try to wear something to, you know, impress Dad the first time he met him, but no, that wasn’t Kai’s thing. Instead he wore his usual tight jeans and Chuck Taylors, but I was pretty mortified when I saw his shirt.

  “So what’s a Foreskin Bandit?” Dad folded his arms across his chest and let out a big sniffle.

  Kai’s shirt was lime green and had a big black gorilla drawn on the front that was holding, what looked like, a giant penis.

  “Uh, it’s my friend’s band, sir.” Kai’s face couldn’t have gotten brighter as he answered.

  “Dad…” I kissed his cheek. It was warm and clammy. I secretly hoped that Mom would get home soon and maybe talk him into going to the doctor. “We have to head out or we’re going to be late.”

  “Bent, are you really sure that you want to go and see a band called the Foreskin Bandits?” Dad let out a pretty loud cough as he covered his mouth.

  I groaned. “DAD.”

  “All right,” He said and then let out a loud sigh. “You kids have fun.”

  “We will, Dad, bye.”

  As soon as we were out of Dad’s line of sight, Kai took my hand into his. “So do you usually get this dressed up for shows?”

  “I’ve never been to a rock show, but I didn’t think I dressed up.” I swung our hands back and forth as we walked to his car.

  “I guess it’s good that you at least weren’t wearing a shirt with a penis on it.” He blushed as he opened the passenger door of his car for me.

  “Yeah…kind of an interesting band name.” I muttered while Kai slid into the driver’s seat.

  “You’re face is kind of interesting,” he quipped and backed out of the parking spot.

  I pouted out my bottom lip and looked at him with puppy dog eyes. I knew he was joking, but it didn’t hurt to play the flirty card. “That wasn�
��t very nice.”

  He put his car into drive, but stopped and looked over at me before he started moving again. “You’re cute.” He kissed my forehead before turning his attention back to driving.

  It wasn’t exactly the ‘wow face,’ but I would take it.

  ***

  The warehouse the band was playing at was almost on the other side of town, so it was a pretty long ride filled with Kai’s punk rock music.

  “Is Brynne going to be there?” The question had been on my mind all day. The truth is that the girl still scared me to death and I didn’t want to be anywhere near her or her spiked bracelets.

  “Well, her band is kind of opening up for Grant and Brody’s,” Kai said and winced as if my reaction was going to hurt him.

  I had almost completely forgotten that the guys mentioned that at Perkins the other night. Great, I get a night out with Kai and I have to deal with the wicked ex-girlfriend.

  “But don’t worry, Bentley.” He put his hand on mine. “You’ll be fine. She has a new boyfriend now or something. She’s pretty much a serial monogamist.”

  “If you say so, then I trust you.” I squeezed his hand reassuringly.

  The warehouse was packed with grungy looking teens in all black or various shades of dark colors. There was a cover charge of three dollars, and I really wasn’t sure why. The whole warehouse looked like it only cost about twenty bucks to rent it, but Kai paid it.

  I had gotten paid that Friday as well. It was a lot less than I was expecting, after taxes were taken out and I put a big chunk in my college savings, there really wasn’t much left over. Though I had enough to pay the cover charge, Kai still was the gentleman and paid.

  The first band on stage was really hurting my ears. The lead singer sounded like a cat getting its tail stepped on, but the people there seemed to be really enjoying it. There were a bunch of kids in the center moshing and even some girls crowd surfing—something I definitely was not going to be doing. It just looked like an excuse to grope someone you didn’t know.

  “Hey, you made it!” Brody rushed over to us and practically tackled Kai onto the hard cement floor. I let go of his hand to make sure that I wasn’t taken down with him.

  “And it looks like you brought little Miss Tongue Tied.” Grant came out of nowhere and was standing next to me, almost too close for comfort actually. I could almost feel the sweat dripping off of his forehead.

  “Hey, now.” I scooted back a little bit to end up with my back against Kai as he instinctively put his arms around my waist.

  “Maybe if you joined the band again, you would get a lot more than that.” A really tall, skinny guy with blue hair said as he came and stood next to Grant.

  “You were in the band?” I looked up at Kai, but he was busy glaring at the blue-haired guy.

  “Yeah, didn’t he tell you?” Brody put his elbow on Kai’s shoulder. “Then his mom said that our music was blasphemous or something and made him quit. I’m actually surprised she still lets you wear that shirt.”

  Kai shrugged. “Yeah, well, I guess she can’t control everything I do, no matter how much it goes against her beliefs.”

  The other guys nodded in unison as silence fell over everyone for about five seconds. Then the horrible band on stage ended and a very large guy covered in piercings and tattoos approached the stage.

  “All right everyone, give it up one last time for Spit Swap!” Everyone clapped wildly, and I tried not to seem annoyed and clapped with them. That band was worse than anything I had ever heard. I didn’t know how anything could sound worse.

  “Now everyone put your hands together for the all girl explosion of Garage Sale Panties!” He bellowed as four girls stormed the stage.

  I immediately recognized Brynne with her bleached-blonde and hot pink dreads swaying as she approached the mic. Teegan was on bass guitar with the straps matching her fiery-red hair. Over on drums was a rather hefty girl, who looked like the Michelin Man with her white tank top being a little too tight. Then the band was rounded out by a very slender black girl who had blonde hair that looked like a lion’s mane.

  “Get up off your asses and take a big whiff of some Garage Sale Panties!” Brynne shrieked into the microphone. Her high-pitched little baby voice was even more annoying when she raised her tone.

  “Get ready to cover your ears,” Kai whispered into my ear.

  I reached my hands up just as Brynne started up a very bad rendition of a Joan Jett song. Ugh, they were even worse than I thought they would be. The drummer was obviously a beat behind everyone, Teegan was playing the bass way like she was trying to claw it to death, and Brynne’s voice sounded like Alvin and the Chipmunks trying to talk like Darth Vader.

  Lucky they only did about three songs before they were kicked off after Teegan jumped from the stage and started beating the tar out of some random girl.

  Gulp. At least it wasn’t me…yet.

  The boys went to set up the stage for their set. The blue-haired boy, whose named turned out to be Gavin, was really nervous about going on so much earlier than he thought, but they did it anyway. This left Kai and I alone. I think we had even more people staring at us during the show than we ever did at school. It was weird how many people seemed to really know Kai, but looked at me like I was some sort of disease. It was getting really old; up until this point I thought I was getting the whole Catholic-school-girl-turned-public-school-bargainista thing down, but now I just felt lost.

  “Hey, doll, long time no see.” Brynne slithered her way over to Kai yanking him away from me.

  “Uh, hey, Brynne,” he stammered, as he reached for my hand and pulled me closer.

  “Kai you remember my band mates, Roxy and Zoey.” She nodded her head back in the direction of the two girls. The hefty one ended up being Zoey, and the girl with the lion mane was Roxy. Roxy scared me, but Zoey looked like she was too dumb to even know which end of her fist was up. I tightened my grip on Kai’s hand. If I was going down then he was going with me.

  “Ladies.” He nodded. “And I’m sure you all know my girlfriend, Bentley.”

  “Hi Bentley, I’m Zoey!” Zoey piped up all too eager before Roxy nudged her hard in the stomach.

  “What?” Zoey cried. “I was just being nice.”

  “Zoey, this is the man stealer that Brynne was talking about!” Roxy spat.

  “Ohhh.” It looked like the light bulb finally went off in Zoey’s head. “Fine, I take back my greeting.” She crossed her arms over her chest and tried to look angry, but she just looked even more confused.

  “Man stealer?” I questioned before backing down. I was the last person to start a fight. Making fun of Brynne in class was a total fluke since I knew she wouldn’t fight me in school, but the truth was that I cried in dodge ball. I could never take a real hit.

  “Yeah, you know Kai and I were together for like seven months.” Brynne crossed her arms and made her chest pop out even more of her blue corset top. “Until you moved in.”

  “Brynne, what are you talking about?” Kai threw a hand in the air. “You cheated on me with Jeff, John, Brian, and Roxy,” he said the last part with emphasis as he glared in Roxy’s direction.

  Roxy just smirked and shrugged like it was no big deal.

  “But, baby, you know they didn’t mean anything to me,” Brynne cooed as she stepped a little closer.

  “Don’t you have a new boyfriend or something anyways? Some guy from West?” Kai raised an eyebrow and tried to lean as far back as he could.

  “Yeah, but she already totally cheated on him with Roxy last night,” Zoey piped up.

  “Zoey!” Brynne screamed, not taking her eyes off of me.

  “Well, you’d better watch it, Miss Dark Roots, because a better stylist is the least of your problems now that Brynne’s got your number,” Brynne barked and stared me down like no one else was in the room.

  “Come on, Bee, let’s get out of here.” Kai tugged on my hand as Brynne and her friends walked away.


  “But we didn’t even see your friend’s band play…” I protested.

  “Yeah, but I’d rather miss them play than have Zoey sit on you.”

  Chapter 17

  Goldie Locks

  We didn’t have school on Monday because of Labor Day, which usually meant that I would have two days to relax. Except in post Dad’s lay-off world I ended up working all day on Sunday and Monday. At least Kai was able to get the same day shift as me on Monday, so I wasn’t completely alone with the usual group of guys who would try and make passes at me, not caring that I was obviously with Kai.

  “Man it’s not fair, bro. The first hot chick in a long time starts working here and she hooks up with bean pole,” Clint said to another grill worker, Tony.

  “Hey, baby, I got something long and skinny for you.” Tony licked his lips as he looked me up and down.

  “Ew.” I wrinkled my nose and tried to hide my body as much as I could behind the shake machine.

  I was working an eight hour shift, so I was really busy from seven to nine and then again from noon to one, but around basically everyone was just standing around and trying to figure out something to do.

  “So, what are you doing after work tonight?” Kai swayed and bumped me with his hip.

  “Well, if Mom’s not home, which she probably isn’t, I’ll be making Dad tea and trying to convince him to go to the doctor, again.” I shook my head. “He’s had a bad cough and fever for almost a week now.”

  “Do you want me to come over and help you out?” Kai leaned against the cash register.

  Before I could even answer him, Jason came out with that stupid clip board. I learned that every time Jason came out front with his clip board he was going to make us do something. He acted like being the manager of a fast food restaurant was some grand honor and that the clip board gave him power.

  “Since we’re slow here up front, Bentley, why don’t you go and clean both bathrooms?” He looked at me with his glasses magnifying his eyes to about three times their normal size.

  “The boys and the girls?” I raised my eyebrows.