“Well,” Barrett says, walking back with Maggie’s wine. “I wouldn’t say star—”
“Now, what do you do?” Christine asks. “You work, right?”
“I’m in real estate.”
“Aren’t we all?” Maggie says, and the two women laugh, but Barrett doesn’t get it. They start to discuss properties they know of and who of their friends are “in a rut” because they want to move but can’t because it’s such a poor time to sell.
Barrett figures she could do a little networking. She has already scanned their fingers, ears, shoes, and hair, and is pretty sure of their friends’ price range.
“For most people it’s a bad time to sell,” Barrett says, “but it really depends. Homes in the three-, four-, five-million-dollar range and up—homes in that bracket are still going strong.”
“I should have Trey call you,” Maggie says.
“Tray?” Barrett asks. “As in, ‘Carry this on a’?”
“He’s dying to move.”
“Sure,” Barrett says, “I’d love to talk with him.”
She walks to the bookshelf and grabs a bunch of business cards out of the bowl that holds business cards, miniature plastic toys, dust, and change. “Give one to your friend, and here’s some extra.” She hopes to God this could generate some new business, yet the people they know must have their own agents, top agents, Previews agents, agents that make you feel bad for walking into an open house. But you never know. Sometimes those agents are too busy for them.
“Would you guys like something to eat?” Barrett asks.
“Oh,” Christine says. She looks at her watch. “Then we wouldn’t have to drive all the way to Nob Hill and come all the way back,” she says. The two women eye-conference, and Barrett looks away.
“Sure!” Maggie says.
“Great. I’ll just put some plates out in the kitchen and come help yourself. There’s salad and fish. Hope you eat fish. And I’ll get another bottle of wine downstairs. I’ll peek in on the kids!”
She thought this would make them want to sneak down the steps with her, but they’re already immersed in another conversation.
“You’re kidding me.”
“No!”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes!”
It’s because they’re used to seeing their children with other children. They’re used to seeing them at parties, or admired by their peers. Barrett has been dying all night to see this, to creep downstairs and behold her son finally getting the attention he deserves. He’s like Cinderella. There the whole time, but denied the opportunity to mingle.
At the top of the stairwell she hears the deep bass of the music. It’s so loud that by the time she reaches the bottom of the stairs she covers her ears. How can they have conversations like this? Before she walks by the family room to the garage, she prepares herself. She will walk quickly and glance casually toward the party. Then she’ll get four bottles of wine so that on the way back she can pretend to have trouble carrying them all, and will have to move slowly by the scene while appearing to be completely occupied.
She makes her move, taking a quick glance up, and then she stops and steps back toward the stairs to hide.
What was that?
She peeks back out, then pats herself down for her phone, a typical reaction when faced with danger. She reaches for her husband, for communication with him. Everything has to be shared with Gary or else she is alone. Her need is similar to wishing you had your camera when you see something incredible. Her husband is the camera, an instrument that helps her capture things she appreciates, fears, or doesn’t understand.
They are dancing. The kids are dancing. And yet they aren’t really dancing. She thinks of It’s a Wonderful Life, the scene where the kids are dancing on the platform over the pool, all quick and hoppy, like they’re high on malt powder. The music is lively—you can actually identify instruments—piano, saxophone. That’s dancing. She listens to this music from the last step on the stairwell—Booty, booty, booty, booty knocking everywhere—and sees her son gyrating his buttocks so rapidly it’s like watching a hummingbird hovering over a honeysuckle. Then he slides to the right with his arms spread apart as if presenting a magic trick. After this arrangement he lifts his leg, a move she’d call the Pissing Dog if she had to give it a name, and gyrates with jackhammer speed.
She is so stunned to see Jake in this fashion that it takes her a moment to register the other kids. Girls are backed up against the boys, their asses gesturing wildly and their faces making fucking expressions. She finds herself envying this for a second—I haven’t made that face forever! But this doesn’t last long as she remembers that these girls are twelve and thirteen and just imitating someone making faces that a director in Hollywood says are fucking faces. Actual fucking faces aren’t nearly as appealing, she thinks, thinking of her own and of Gary’s face when he’s mid-o, a kind of stroke-like cry for help.
She’s sure the boys are all bonafied, or whatever the expression is—bonered up? Fully boned? Their expressions are very serious and focused, as if this were some kind of final exam. It’s then she grasps what everyone’s wearing. Basketball jerseys and baggy jeans, gold chains and baseball caps cocked over their eyes. The girls are in tight jeans, some in little shorts and tube tops; Christine’s daughter wears a purple basketball jersey that’s knotted below her breasts. She has on low-riding jeans, and a purple thong coasts over her hips. Barrett thinks of the show Jake watches about rappers’ houses, how some will end in the “family room” with a shot of “how we do,” which involves playing video games on a monstrous TV while scantily clad women dance around them, and by dancing she means humping nothing but dust motes, much like the scene before her. She doesn’t want to embarrass her son, so she just gapes. She’s gripped by fear that those women, those mothers, will come down and see what’s going on. Or maybe they already know? Maybe this is “how they do,” too? No. Not possible.
She peeks out and raises her arm, hoping the gold glint of her jewelry will catch Jake’s eye. She feels like she’s stranded and trying to get the attention of a rescue plane. He finally notices her.
“Come here,” she mouths, using her pissed and publicly humiliated nonvoice.
He wades through the stream of teenage waste. She composes herself, then takes a step back so they’ll be out of ear- and eyeshot.
“What the hell is going on out there?” she says in a loud whisper.
“Nothing,” he says. “We’re just dancing.”
Oh, his beautiful eyes. Just like Gary’s. Where is he anyway? She has a hard time reprimanding this child—Jake has always repeated her admonishments from the time he was two. “Oh, I not listening? I was bad? I’m sorry.” Damn him.
“But, what kind of dancing? Did you tell everyone to dance this way, or—”
“We’re just dancing. It’s how people dance.” He holds up his arms as if preparing to box, makes a kissy face, and moves his hips.
“Stop that,” she whisper-hisses. “Why is everyone dressed that way?”
“What way?”
“You know what way. Like—” Oh, boy. She tries again: “Why aren’t they dressed the same as they were when they first walked into this house?”
“Because it’s a hood party,” Jake says.
“A what? A what? A what-the-shit-did-you-just-say party?”
He covers his mouth and laughs because she just said shit, which is so minor right now. She could say all sorts of things and it wouldn’t matter.
“A hood party,” he says, like it’s no thang. “Like we’re people in the hood having a party. It’s something everyone does now.”
“Oh my God,” she says. “Oh, my flapping God.” She’s not sure what’s worse—that they’re doing it here or that it’s something everyone does now. What the big balls is wrong with everyone?
She looks up the stairs, swats Jake to the side, then peeks around the wall. A girl dances, looking over her left shoulder, then her right.
Barrett sees Maggie’s son by the flat screen eating a piece of fried chicken.
“Oh, my God!” She presses her back against the wall. She thinks of the mothers talking about her on the SFMC forum or the whole night being filmed by some sleuth kid, the footage going to the school, the news, Dateline, Primetime, YouTube! A disturbing new trend among white, suburban teens. Are parents promoting racism at private schools? The NCAA would sue them, there would be death threats, the cereal would pull its ad—wait. Is it NCAA? That doesn’t sound right. Isn’t it A something? Oh, fuck it. Some organization is going to beat her ass.
Jake’s forehead is gleaming with sweat. He smells a little. She has never noticed that before. He’s starting to smell like a boy.
“It’s fun,” Jake says. “What’s wrong?”
“No,” Barrett says. “I don’t think so. This is not fun. This needs to stop. God, Jake!”
“What?”
“Just. I won’t make a scene. But turn the music down, suggest a game, or a movie, or cake! I bought a cake. Have at it. All you can eat. Please come up and have cake. You guys can do whatever with it. Do shots of cake! I’m cool.”
Her son looks back at the scene with longing, then at her with desperation and hatred, as if his life hinges on the ability to thrust and do the Pissing Dog.
“Find a segue, Jake,” she says. “Make a natural transition into some other activity. You’re smart. You can pull it off. But I’ve got two mothers up there, and if you don’t put a stop to this I’ll come back down here and I won’t be nice about it. I’ll make a scene. You know how I do. And I want everyone’s normal clothes back on.”
“But why?” he asks. “Why is it wrong? Jay and Cassie are here. They’re black and they’re doing it.”
“They’re rich! Strike that—it’s just wrong! On so many levels.”
“But why?”
Perhaps he really doesn’t know. Perhaps she doesn’t know either.
She remembers when she and her sister wanted to get those big gum balls in the machines at Safeway. They asked a girl their age if they could borrow two quarters. She could write down her address and they’d pay her back, which they would have done. The girls’ mother came out of the store, witnessed the transaction, and completely freaked out.
“Shame on you,” she said. “How could you take advantage of her like that? Shame on you.”
The girl had Down syndrome, but Barrett and her sister didn’t take this into consideration. They just needed two quarters and she was a kid like them and she was there. They would have asked any kid who was there.
These kids in her den—aren’t they still innocent? Do they really know what they’re doing? Or are they imitating what they see on television, the music videos? They aren’t like frat boys, blatantly making fun, but it’s just too hard to explain.
“It’s wrong because I have a feeling it’s wrong,” she says. “That’s why. I’m going with my gut. You’re ridiculing. You’re enforcing bad stereotypes.”
Barrett listens to the music in the background, a new song: I got hoes, you got hoes. Let’s call the whole thing off.
“We aren’t ridiculing anyone,” Jake says.
“Then it’s appropriation or something,” she says.
“What does that mean?”
“It’s just bad, okay? I have to get back up there. Find a transition, okay? Redirect. Hell, spin the bottle for all I care. Do Seven Minutes in Heaven.”
“What’s that?”
Barrett walks back up the stairs. “Just stop,” she yell-whispers. Her heart is pounding; it’s gyrating. She takes a deep breath at the top of the stairs and looks back to see if Jake is gone. He’s still standing there, but facing away from her. She can see his profile. He looks stricken and confused, but she continues on despite the strange feeling that she’s abandoning him.
She’s relieved to see Christine and Maggie in the kitchen. Everything is normal. Everything’s okay.
“This looks fantastic,” Christine says.
“I know. I can’t believe you cooked this,” Maggie says. “I never cook.”
“Never,” Christine says.
Well, how nice for you, Barrett thinks. To save money she doesn’t even buy presliced cheese or snack-size anything. Snack-size means you are paying someone extra to put less food into a smaller container.
“How were they down there?” Maggie asks.
“Great!” Barrett says. “They’re having some dinner, too. Some . . . chicken, and they’re listening to music, but they’re going to come up soon and have some cake. Sing ‘Happy Birthday.’ ”
“It’s so hard to plan a party,” Maggie says. “It’s like they don’t want the cake and the song, but you have to have the cake and singing to make it a birthday! Matt just had his thirteenth and they did the same thing—went right downstairs and blared Lil Wayne, Lil’ Kim, Little Richard, God only knows.”
Du dum dum chi. God only knows how often she repeated that joke. Barrett puts some food on her plate, torn over what to do. She supposes she can tell these moms what’s going on, tell them what the kids are really doing downstairs, and not just at her house, she’s sure, but in basements all over San Francisco. It’s crucial these parents know about this activity, yet does it have to be at her house? She needs to sell real estate. She needs to get to know other mothers at Jake’s school. Most of all she doesn’t want to hurt her son’s social life. He has just been given a portal she isn’t about to block.
“It’s such a hard age. They’re embarrassed by us now!” Christine says. “So you just have to back off.”
“I know,” Barrett says, resolved to aid and abet. She thinks of the girls’ behinds pressed against the boys’ crotches. “It’s a very hard age.”
* * *
The fish is excellent, and Barrett believes more needs to be said about this. The fish. How excellent it is. Maggie is well on her way to becoming trashed. She’s trying to hide it, but her eyes are all glassy and googly. Barrett likes her better this way. She always finds herself liking people more if they drink a lot, even though it means they’ll be driving their children home buzzed. It is one of those moral dilemmas she doesn’t really know how to get around.
In the living room she fake-laughs at the things Maggie and Christine find to be funny. Maggie insists her son loves Frank Sinatra. Christine insists her daughter loves foie gras.
“It’s the weirdest thing,” she says, “but she loves it.”
Like they know, Barrett thinks, smugly. Their kids are downstairs pretending they’re in Compton and these chicks are telling me what their kids love. I mean, blow me. She doesn’t know everything either, of course, obviously, yet accepts this as part of life. She won’t be familiar with supersize pieces of her son’s world. How sad, she thinks. How very sad.
“I love this table!” Maggie says. A bit of wine sloshes over the rim of her glass and onto her beige sweater. “Damn it,” she says. “I always do that. I can’t go through one day, not one day, without spilling something or another on my shirt. It’s ridiculous. I’m like a walking wet T-shirt contest. Hello! I’m surprised I don’t get dollar bills from strangers . . .”
Barrett waits patiently. She wonders where Maggie’s going with all of this and if she’ll get out okay.
“. . . Yoo-hoo! Mommy gone wild. Oh, it’s absurd. Ab. Surd.”
Barrett dares to look up. Christine looks worried and eager, as if she’s watching someone do hurdles with a sprained ankle. When Maggie appears to be done, Christine shakes her head. “I know, I know,” she says, but Barrett prefers to let Maggie feel like an idiot and says nothing.
Finally. What she’s been waiting for all night. The sound of children coming up the stairs.
“I’ll get the cake!” she says and jumps up so fast you’d have thought she’d been zapped. She goes to the kitchen to light each candle with a long match. Thirteen candles, thirteen years. Her boy, her love bug. A skateboard on the chocolate cake, resting against a tree. It is really quite
lovely, and cake is something you can never outgrow.
She turns the lights low so the candles burn brightly and walks toward the dining room table. She launches into the birthday song, realizing she’s in a fairly low register and it sounds like she’s moaning, but the kids join in, their voices surprisingly soft so the whole moment feels like a séance, a plea to some ghost, an elegy to childhood and times you once fiercely knew. She watches Jake through the candlelight, his sweet face, his awkward stature with its latent hunkiness. He looks exactly the same as he did when he was four years old, shyly watching his friends singing to him, watching his mother moving toward him with a lump of pride in her throat. Exactly the same look. But not the same, of course. Not exactly. Not at all.
She stands in front of him. She doesn’t need to bend down anymore. Jake blows out the candles.
Everyone claps. The boys whoop, and then she hears that sound she loves. The door opening. Gary and Tara finally coming home.
“Gary!” she says, a tremor in her voice.
* * *
Later that night, after everyone has gone, Gary tells her about the funeral for the baby whose name was Thomas. Every time his name was spoken during the service Tara yelled, “Thomas? Thomas! Thomas the Train!”
“I said, ‘Shhh.’ I said, ‘No, not the train. He’s a boy. A boy.’ Then Tara said, ‘Thomas the boy,’ but kept yelling his name.”
“That’s horrible,” Barrett says.
Tara walks to Gary, who is sitting cross-legged on the floor, waiting for the assigned book. Tara hands him her choice, then plops down onto his lap. Instead of cleaning up, Barrett sits beside them and listens to the story about the green sheep. She wants to tell Gary about tonight, but doesn’t know how. It could be a funny story. It could be worrisome, horrific. It could be nothing. It is nothing compared to the funeral.
“Here is the moon sheep. And here is the star sheep,” Gary reads. “But where is the green sheep? Where IS that green sheep?”
“Where is Thomas?” Tara asks.
The question brings tears to Barrett’s eyes, and she and Gary exchange glances. What do they say? When do you start telling your children the truth?
How to Party with an Infant Page 15