Oh, dear.
I had to admit . . . that was actually quite a bit more creative than Jake usually got. Emily’s eyes flashed with something incited, though it was dim. Again, Dominic lowered his head—in laughter or respect again, I couldn’t tell.
Maddie threw the ruined napkin she’d used to clean Jake into the air and crossed her arms over her chest. “This is getting old, guys,” she said, staring pointedly at each of them. “Old and really immature.”
Emily turned so I could no longer see her face. “That’s true, Jake,” she agreed, her speech slow, steady, and even. “Coach would never have to special order you a bathing suit, would he? Because none of your body parts are too big.” For a moment, subtlety was lost on Jake: a wrinkly brow, slack jaw. Then you could see understanding stretch out like fingers, spreading across his forehead, stinging his eyes with outrage.
“What?! Uh—yeah they are!”
“Seriously?” Maddie growled, and if she had a whistle she would have blown it. “That’s it! Enough already!” She tried to grab Jake by his tank top and pull him toward her, but weighing ninety pounds didn’t offer much of an upper hand against someone twice her size and suitably incensed. “Jake! Be the bigger person!”
Jake whirled around, and I’d seen the wounded look on his face just before he did. “What is that supposed to mean? ‘Be the bigger person?’ Bigger how?”
Laughter surrounded us.
“What?” Maddie’s said from between clenched teeth. Her eyes narrowed into dark brown slits. “Are you kidding me? Are you really going twist my words and make them into something they’re not?” Her voice dropped to a low monotone. “Don’t—go there, Jacob Anthony.”
“You—” Jake spluttered, mass of anger once more aimed toward his sister. “You think you’re so perfect, don’t you?”
“You said it, not me,” Emily returned, running a hand along the back of her neck, scooping the long, damp strands into a high pony tail.
Jake’s hair was in disrepair, streaks of pink and darker clumps of red strewn throughout. Now it really did look like cotton candy. “I did not say it,” he said adamantly. “You do stupid stuff all the time.”
“Really?” Emily asked, raising an inviting eyebrow. “Like what?”
“Like . . . super-gluing your ankles together so you could be a mermaid.”
“Jake,” she said with a small laugh, leaning back to remove her turquoise ring from her pocket. She slipped it on her index finger and rolled her eyes. “I was six.”
“Okay—fine. How about when you were thirteen and you used Kool-Aid to dye your hair red.”
Emily countered instantly. “And you believed in Santa until you were fourteen.”
Jake inhaled, puffing up like an inflatable ball . “Well, you—”
After that, I just tried to be thankful. Thankful that this could have been Emily and Dominic at each other’s throats. Thankful that, while not exactly receiving the stamp of approval, Dominic had been accepted. In a perfect world, Dominic wouldn’t have been exposed to the contention and chaos so soon, but watching him as he watched Jake and Emily, I was certain he wasn’t the least surprised or bothered by it. Fascinated, yes.
Shortly thereafter, things calmed down considerably; poking into my pasta salad with the spoon I’d brought from home, I noticed we no longer had an avid audience, but were left to talk among ourselves with only the occasional eye wandering toward Dominic from a curious passerby. After all, he was not only a new student, but with altercations involving Emily Donahue, Dominic was amassing quite a colorful reputation for himself. We were all, I thought, able to see the humor and perhaps even appreciate the paradox of the whole thing; there had been a massacre today; someone had ended up bloodied and livid. Turns out, it just wasn’t the person we all thought it would be.
Maddie, the group’s referee, wasted no time in steering the conversation toward a neutral topic: movies. With very little to offer on the subject, I chose to remain quiet, enjoying the nourishment each bite provided to my barren stomach. I hadn’t intentionally delayed eating, but the chaos of the day had left very little consideration of that particular organ. I hadn’t realized just how voracious my appetite had grown until swallowing the first mouthful of noodles. The hunger pains quelled and the groans subsided, transforming into gurgles of pleasure and content. Pronging a thin slice of red bell pepper, I laughed quietly to myself; the last time I’d been to a movie theater was over ten years ago, on a field trip to see Toy Story 2. Talk about out of the loop. Thankfully, conversation bounced around easily without my added input. With my guard lowered, my mind began its usual discursive routine.
I glanced around, smiling at all four of them, and stopping lastly on Emily. Knowing that what she had done, was done for me, filled me with a mix of feelings not easy to articulate. It wasn’t that I had underestimated Emily, or discounted the genuineness of her heart, but rather I had never seen Emily be anything but genuine—brutally honest and forthcoming whether the situation merited tact or not. Emily would not, could not lie. Neither could she throw a soft blanket over the truth and make it easier to bear. It wasn’t who she was. So, in all my fretting today, knowing she would tell Dominic exactly how she felt about him, I hadn’t even considered another possibility besides public ridicule and defamation. But at some point today—or maybe at the very last moment, I didn’t know—she had surprised us all, doing something I had never before seen her do: she changed her mind.
Purloined the opportunity to respond, Dominic had no choice but to turn with the tides, inducted into the insanity without a proper harbinger. Now I couldn’t help but wonder what he might have said to Emily . . . something polite, I would have imagined; though I suppose it didn’t really matter, not if things continued to go well. He was here—a part of the group, and that’s what mattered.
“So, Dominic,” I heard Emily begin, a tone of voice that instantly cut short my thoughts. “What’s your favorite movie?”
Of course I couldn’t expect it to be that easy.
I glanced at Dominic, unable to tell whether or not he knew he was being insidiously baited with this question. Having left the table momentarily to peruse today’s meal options—returning with a piece of baked tilapia, a baked potato loaded with melted cheese, chives and sour cream, and an enormous chocolate chip cookie—he too was enjoying the moment to relax into a hearty meal. At Emily’s question, he pressed his knuckles to his lips; a subconscious gesture indicating apparent thought, and to obscure the lips moving in slow forward motions. I didn’t question the authenticity behind this gesture; though had it been me, I likely would have done something similar, all for the direct purpose of stalling.
One’s taste in music and movies said much about a person’s character—at least as far as Emily was concerned. To this day I’m still not entirely sure I ever passed this test . . . it must have been over a year ago now that she found my iPod on my nightstand, after inviting herself over the first week we met. I could vividly remembering standing off to the side, feeling like a stranger in my bedroom as Emily grimaced, thumbing her way through the albums composed mostly of Classical, Jazz, and Blues artists. My saving grace arrived as she neared the end of the alphabetized roster, Stevie Wonder restoring me to good standing. Luckily for me, “I just called to say I love you,” was her parent’s wedding song.
“My favorite movie, hm . . . I don’t know if I can narrow it down to just one.” He tapped the fork against the plate lightly as he went on thinking.
“Sure you can,” Emily countered, with a smile no less evocative than the intent behind the question.
“My favorite mov—”
“I didn’t ask you, Jake.” Emily quickly cut him off, flashing him a sharp look. “Besides everyone at this table, other than him,” she said pointing a finger at Dominic, “knows your favorite movie is Kazaam.”
Jake flashed a wide grin at Dominic, beaming. “You seen it, bro?”
Dominic laughed and finished swallowing a
bite of food before answering. “I have,” he said with a nod of acknowledgment. “Good stuff; doesn’t get much better than Shaquille O’Neal as a genie.”
“It really doesn’t,” Jake agreed with equally solemnity. “Have you seen—”
Emily wasn’t about to let her question go unanswered. “Maybe Dominic would like to give us his favorite movie now, Jake.” She fixed her attention on Dominic, and I began to squirm a bit.
I blinked hard, caught between wanting to pass Dominic a note with suitable answers written in an A) B) C) sequence, and then feeling tremendously guilty for allowing such thoughts. It was neither fair nor right to impose solicitation on him; Dominic shouldn’t have to formulate responses based on Emily’s preferences. She was steadfastly looking for a reason not to like him, though, and the desire to not grant her that was heady. I saw that it was too late to attempt to do anything about it. Dominic leaned forward endearingly eager, his fingers splayed in the air as he prepared to list off his favorites.
“Okay.” He’d grown very serious, though, this was for effect. He released a quick breath. “I think I’ve narrowed it down to my top five—one for every genre,” he explained, closing every finger but his thumb. “Classic would definitely have to be Casablanca. Humphrey Bogart is a stud.” He shrugged. “Enough said.”
I wanted so much to be able to enjoy this; Casablanca was one of the few movies that I not only owned in my incredibly limited collection, but like my books, treasured as well. Instead of speaking up and sharing this commonality, or simply appreciating learning more about him, all I could do was stare at Emily from the corner of my eye, intensely scrutinizing every flicker and flex her face gave me. As far as I knew, old movies held very little interest to her, so I had no idea what she thought about this. I studied her with unblinking eyes, searching for anything that might give me access to her private thoughts. To my dismay, her face remained expressionless, a perfectly smooth piece of stone.
Dominic’s index finger flicked out of his fist. “For comedy . . .” He clicked his tongue, then sighed. “Okay, so this is tough because I believe there’s a fine line between funny and stupid, and for whatever reason the majority of the movies I’ve seen lately are just stupid. Not in all cases, but for the most part the humor should come subtly, you know?” He turned his hand over, raising his palm into the air. “It should make you think a little, not be so obvious. Personally, I think sitcoms are where it’s at right now. I can’t get enough of them. But you wanted a movie, so . . .” He paused, nodding definitively. “I really don’t think anyone does funny better than Will Smith; I’m going with Hitch.”
“Agreed!” Jake announced in ebullience, not bothering to cover his mouth full of chocolate pudding. “I like his movies, too—just not that one—the golfing one.” Jake grimaced, looking into the pudding cup as he scraped up the last remaining glob onto his spoon. “I was asleep in like a minute.”
Dominic laughed. “Yeah, that one was a little slow.”
A spark of relief ignited inside me. I didn’t know his movies personally, but I was pretty certain Emily had seen a few, and at the very least had nothing overly negative to say about them. Her face gave away nothing, though, exhibiting no signs of endorsement. She looked bored if not completely unimpressed.
Come on, Em. Play fair, I wanted to say.
Dominic grinned suddenly, and I felt my heart glow in response. I forgot my examination of Emily, momentarily distracted with astonishment. He’s actually having fun, I thought to myself. Not threatened at all. His eyes sparkled as he unfolded his third finger.
“I’m going with the underdog on this one, even though I have a close contender. But for action I have chosen . . .” He paused deliberately, closing his eyes for dramatic effect. He opened them, stopping to look at each one of us with mock seriousness. “Terminator 2 Judgment Day,” he declared solemnly.
“Figures,” Emily said, making it clear how she felt about his choice. She shook her head in disapproval, but let him continue without verbal reproach.
“Ooo, me too!” came an emphatic outburst from Maddie, rapping her small hand on the table. “Excellent cinematography and plot.”
The way each of us turned to gawk at her, you would have thought she’d just confessed to murdering someone. She shrank back a few inches, taking in our expressions before defiantly straightening back up and resting her weight on her elbows. She twirled one of her braids, bowed at the end with a yellow ribbon, obviously having picked that color to correspond with tiny yellow daisies on her white ruffled shirt. When her hair was down and she wore indiscriminate clothes, she could pass for fourteen years old. Today—no more than eight. This was not a girl who I’d believe enjoyed post-apocalyptic films about Cyborgs and a dystopian society. That was the extent to which I knew of this movie.
Maddie stared at the four sets of eyes regarding everything from surprise to disbelief. “I happen to enjoy all sorts of movies—just so you know,” she said and sniffed delicately. “And furthermore, I don’t appreciate the looks of judgment each of you are giving me right now,” she added primly.
“Have I told you lately you’re the coolest girlfriend ever?” Jake squished Maddie’s round cheeks together so her lips puckered, then kissed her softly on the mouth.
Maddie flushed, but didn’t pull away. “Yes,” she said, “But I don’t mind hearing it again.”
“I do,” Emily said succinctly, “so spare me, please,” then turned to look at Dominic, smirking. “Your action pick blows, I’m sorry to have to tell you.” Dominic smiled at Emily, a full, broad smile that lit his face up like a blazing sunset that touched his eyes and made them phosphorescent. Was I the only one that noticed this?
“No, you’re not,” Dominic said, a laugh in his voice.
Emily rewarded him with a prominent grin of her own. “No—I’m not,” she agreed unabashedly. “Its crappiness ranks up there with The Scorpion King.”
“Yeah?” He gave Emily a look that reeked of challenge. I shook my head furtively, but fervently. A look he did not see. “Well, I am going to have disagree with you. Arnold Schwarzenegger may have tanked as Governor, but I gladly welcome the reprisal of his role as the quintessentially undefeatable Cyborg. He cannot be touched,” he finished reverently.
Emily rolled an impatient hand in the air, signaling him to move along. To my great relief he did.
“Horror is another difficult choice for me,” he said, biting down on his lip. He pounded his fist lightly against the table, the gesture aiding him in thought. “Give me a sec.” He leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest.
As he deliberated, my insides wrapped around one another, forming a soft, but knotted pretzel in the pit of my stomach. Indisputably, horror was the biggie for Emily. This would decide everything. I was so nervous I couldn’t bear to look at Emily, though I knew she must be just as eager as me to hear what he was about to say. Dominic sat forward, placed both palms flat and wide against the table, staring at Emily with the utmost seriousness.
“To give you a true, definitive answer, I would need to look at my collection.” His face projected the dilemma to which this caused. “But since I didn’t bring them all with me . . .” I held my breath as he paused, ran a hand quickly through his hair, and then suddenly dropped it. My heart went with it. “It’s going to have to be a tie—a toss-up between The Shining and The Exorcist.” Like a red rubber ball, my heart bounced back up into my chest cavity, a ridiculous grin replacing the frown. This time I was confident. There would be absolutely no deprecation from Emily, I was sure of it!
“Dude, I couldn’t finish The Shining,” Jake said with a puckered face. “Left ‘bout halfway through. And I still had nightmares for like a month.”
I peeked at Emily, almost smiling, awaiting her response. The faintest approach of a smile flickered across her mouth. I relaxed finally, twisting my torso that had begun to cramp along the sides. The relief was immense. He’d survived this crucial rite of passage. “Okay, well those
don’t blow,” Emily offered, breaking off a piece of her brownie.
“I’m glad you approve.” He gave a wry grin, reaching for the bottle of Gatorade in front of him.
“But you forgot to give us your romance pick,” Emily said casually, popping the dark nibble into her mouth.
My gut locked, and I lifted my eyes toward her, unfairness crying out silently. It was the ultimate setup; Emily detested nearly every movie that fell under the genre “Romance.” To say she was a non-traditionalist would have been putting things mildly. It wasn’t so much that she was put off by the ideology of a boy and girl ending up together at the end of the movie, but all that which happened in between. If it didn’t make sense to her, if there wasn’t a definitive reason why the two people should be together, something intricate and approaching nonsensical—or worse, if their love felt in any way manufactured, with every nuisance wrapping up neatly with a last-minute confession or a sudden epiphany—then the film was deemed as cheap and trite.
Dominic laughed, unscrewing the orange cap and palming it in his left hand. “Finally—an easy one,” he said and raised the bottle to his lips.
I could think of only one movie Emily wouldn’t mock or have deprecating commentary to share. Dominic dropped his head back and guzzled, eyes shut, throat muscles working vigorously, pulling the liquid down his esophagus. More than anything else, possibly, it was that movie I had to thank for the onset of our friendship. Finished drinking, Dominic placed the bottle softly down on the table, flecks of light blue droplets speckling the inside. He looked at me first, then Emily.
And standing in my garage in a white bikini and jean shorts, looking very much like a real-life version of the dolls the little girls in first grade used to bring to class for show and tell, fortune had landed upon me. For if Emily had not glanced down, happened to see the book lying there atop a mountain of other books my parents and I hoped to sell, or give away at the estate sale, then she might never have asked me if I had seen the movie the book had been made into, which would never have led to the evening she knocked on my door—a storehouse of candy, snacks, and a movie shoved inside a Shorecliffs duffle bag.
Awakening Foster Kelly Page 48