The Liars

by Jennifer Mathieu

  I wonder if xoxoAmy knows my brother is planning on ditching her and us by moving to California at the end of the summer. In the same breath I wonder if maybe she can make him stay.

  I scowl at no one and push the thought out of my mind, putting the cassette tape back on the nightstand, but a little crooked this time. It’s bitchy and I know it, but I don’t care. Damn Joaquin for wanting to leave.

  Then I call Michelle and tell her I have a babysitting job so maybe I can come over after and visit her at work.

  “You don’t want to bring the kids down to the beach?” she asks.

  “In the heat of the day? No way. Those kids burn so easy.”

  “Yeah, Mrs. Callahan might have your head if they turn up with a sunburn,” Michelle says.

  “Yup. And I need this job,” I say, even though Mrs. Callahan would never get mad at me for an accident. To tell the truth, it’s hard to picture her getting mad at all.

  “Tell me about it,” says Michelle.

  My summer job is babysitting, but Michelle’s summer job basically involves getting paid to get tan. Families and couples show up in the morning and pay her cash, and she hauls umbrellas and chairs to wherever they want them on the beach and then sets them up, and at the end of the day she comes back and packs everything up for them. We haven’t been out of school a week, and she’s already brown as toast and looking a little more fit than she did at the end of May.

  “You know, I think some of the dads are staring at my ass when I stake the umbrellas,” Michelle says, taking a drag on her cigarette.

  “They probably are, but blow that the other way, would you?” I ask, digging my feet deep into the sand. “My mother gave me all kinds of shit the other day for coming home smelling like smoke. I had to say it was Mr. Callahan.”

  “Oh, so he’s a smoker now?” Michelle asks, peering out at the expanse of Mariposa Island sand in front of us. She takes another drag, and I notice that somehow she’s managed to keep her pink frosted lipstick on all day long.

  “No, he’s a health freak, but I had to come up with something,” I answer. Steps away a little girl and her mother are building a sand castle with a tiny yellow bucket and pail. Now that the sun’s worst rays are behind us, it feels good out here.

  Suddenly, something ice cold slides down my back. I yelp and jump in shock, then twist back to discover it actually is ice—and sticky soda—draining down my back all the way to the green-and-white-striped beach towel I’m sitting on.

  “Oh, shit, I thought you were Michelle.”

  The voice belongs to a guy I’ve never seen before. Trim, tan, with a flop of black hair drifting into his brown eyes. Orange-and-white-checkered board shorts. He looks like a skater from the neck up. From the neck down he’s a beach bum.

  “Jesus, J.C., be careful,” Michelle says, taking her towel from under her butt and blotting my back.

  “I’m really sorry,” says this mystery boy, pulling out a pack of Camels and sitting down next to me. He doesn’t seem all that sorry, honestly. But he sure is hot. He’s older than me, definitely. Maybe older than Joaquin.

  “J.C., this is my friend Elena,” Michelle says. “Elena, this is J.C. He’s Jack’s nephew.” Jack is the guy who runs the umbrella and chair rental place that employs Michelle. Sort of an old-guy version of J.C., with a potbelly where J.C.’s six-pack is.

  “Hey, Elena,” J.C. says, looking at me and nodding, a hint of a smile on his face. He lights a cigarette.

  “Hey,” I say, careful not to let my voice warm up too easily. After all, he did just spill a soda on me on purpose, even if he thought I was Michelle. The sticky residue feels gross on my back, and I’m glad at least that I’m wearing a dark shirt. I’m also glad I’ll get home before Mami so I can change and not have to think up a story to explain away the stain.

  “You work with Michelle?” J.C. asks, exhaling a long, straight stream of cigarette smoke toward the sea. I feel my cheeks pink up. He is cute. Even though I most definitely am going to go home smelling of cigarettes.

  “No, I don’t,” I answer. “I babysit mostly.”

  J.C. nods, then shoots us both a big grin.

  “So … you guys wanna go back to my place and smoke a joint?” His eyebrows jump up and he shrugs his shoulders apologetically, like maybe he just asked us to a movie or even to church.

  “What?” Michelle shrieks, cupping a handful of sand and tossing it toward him. “You’re fucking crazy, J.C. I’m working.”

  “So after?” J.C. asks.

  “No, J.C.,” Michelle says, rolling her eyes. “Your uncle would fire me.”

  “Aren’t you off the clock in, like, half an hour?”

  “Whatever, J.C.”

  At J.C.’s remark about the time, I check my wristwatch. I have about an hour before Mami will be home.

  “What about you, Elena? Wanna go burn one?”

  I shoot J.C. what I hope is a world-weary look and in my best bitchy-girl voice I say, “Uh … no?” So far as I can tell, it’s the voice that wins you points with boys. Maybe it works, because J.C. cracks up and shines such a beautiful, adorable smile in my direction that I get dizzy. My breaths start coming a little more quickly. I look away, sure I’m blushing.

  Michelle isn’t paying much mind to J.C. After a few more moments of silence, she dusts sand off her body and announces that she has to go start collecting umbrellas and chairs from customers.

  “I guess I’ll go, too,” I announce, half of me eager to get away from this weird hot boy and the other half of me desperate to impress him any way I can.

  “You need a lift?” J.C. asks, jumping up. He extends a hand and I reach for it. Once I’m standing, he holds on to me for two more seconds than he needs to. I swallow hard. God, he’s good-looking. A weird pressure starts building up from the center of me.

  “I was gonna walk or take the bus,” I say, “but yeah, I could use a ride.” I can feel the weight of Michelle’s gaze behind me. I don’t turn around to look at her.

  “We’ll talk later, right, Elena?” she says, her voice laced with something that’s maybe concern and maybe judgment.

  “Yeah,” I say, not turning back, and before I know it, I’m following J.C. to a bright yellow VW Bug in the parking lot, its back windshield covered in Grateful Dead stickers.

  “You’re into the Dead?” I ask, just to be saying something.

  “Yeah, I followed them for most of last year. My favorite show was at this outdoor place in Maryland last summer. We danced our asses off.” We slide into the car, the hot black seats briefly burning the backs of my thighs.

  “How old are you anyway?” I ask as J.C. starts up the engine. I just got into a car with a strange boy. Maybe a strange man. It sure beats being a teenage shut-in. For once I feel like the main character in a movie.

  J.C. laughs. “I’m nineteen. Why, how old are you?”

  “Old enough,” I say, because I think that sounds smart. Maybe even a little sexy. But also maybe a little bit stupid, so I immediately follow it by saying, “I’m just messing with you. I’ll be seventeen in October.” That sounds better than saying sixteen.

  “Okay, Miss Seventeen in October,” he says, and he grins again.

  With my heart thudding inside my chest, I manage to tell J.C. how to get to my house, already planning on having him drop me off by the corner of Esperanza and Fifteenth just in case.

  “So you’re going to be, what … a junior?” he asks, sliding a cassette into the tape deck. I recognize Jerry Garcia’s voice from beach parties and kids playing the Dead at school. The guy always sounds like he’s trying to catch his breath while he’s singing, but J.C. bobs his head along as he pulls out onto Esperanza Boulevard.

  “Yeah, a junior,” I answer. I notice J.C. doesn’t have any shoes on. The smile on his face grows as Jerry’s voice aims for the high notes. I wonder what it must be like to take a year off to follow your favorite band all over the country. I can’t even picture it, really.

  �
�I’m really sorry I spilled that drink on you,” he says. “I was just fucking around.”

  “It was no big deal,” I say as we pass clumps of tourists trudging down the main drag, their arms full of striped umbrellas and beach chairs and beach bags straining under the weight of too many plastic beach toys. It seems like way too much work for a vacation.

  “No, it was kind of a dick move,” he insists, “which is why I really wish you’d taken me up on my offer of a joint. I owe you.”

  I wonder what J.C. would say if I told him I’ve never smoked pot, not even once. But of course I would never admit this. It would be totally embarrassing.

  “Maybe next time,” I say, and then I motion toward the corner. “You can drop me off here.”

  “I do door-to-door service, you know.”

  I grin and shake my head. “No, this is good. I like to walk.”

  “Okay, but I still owe you,” J.C. says, sliding his car toward the curb.

  I want to get out and run away. I want to keep driving with him all the way to Houston and beyond. I want to never have to talk to him again because he makes me feel like a tongue-tied girl. I want to slip under my bedspread and think about what it would be like to let him kiss me on the neck.

  “I promise I won’t forget about that joint,” I say, already realizing that I will replay these words over and over in my head later, trying to figure out how stupid I sounded when I said them.

  J.C. grins at me. I shut the passenger door, and when I turn around, I find my older brother pulling up on his ten-speed. For the tiniest second it feels like I’ve been caught by Mami, because Joaquin has Mami’s bright blue eyes. But her eyes bore into you, and Joaquin’s just stare.

  As J.C.’s VW drives off, all Joaquin has to say, in a not unkind voice, is “So, hermanita, who the hell was that?”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  MAMI SLIDES THE BOWL OF SPAGHETTI ACROSS THE table and it skids to a stop. Then she drops the pasta spoon back in the pot with a clang. Judging by the amount of abuse the dishes are taking, Joaquin and I are in for a long night.

  “Thanks,” I say, trying to brighten my voice but not too much. Otherwise, she’ll think I’m sassing her.

  “I think it’s undercooked.” She puts both hands on her hips and frowns at the spaghetti.

  “I’m sure it’s fine,” I say, then recalculate. “I mean, I’m sure it’s great.”

  Mami sits down with a thud. She’s not a big woman at all, but she’s capable of moving with great heaviness. The kitchen chair squeaks underneath her. She sighs. Joaquin doesn’t say anything. He just reaches for a takeout container from El Mirador that’s been sitting on the counter and shoves it toward me.

  “Leftover nachos,” he offers. I catch his eyes, and he smiles broadly.

  Mistake number one.

  “Nachos,” Mami announces, like she’s the leader of a small country, which in a sense is true. Only the citizens of the country are just me and Joaquin. “Nachos are tacky.”

  Joaquin laughs out loud.

  Mistake number two.

  “How can a food be tacky?” he asks. Then he doubles down. “That’s absurd.”

  Damn, Joaquin.

  “When I was a little girl, my maid, Juanita, would have never served me something like nachos,” Mami says, wrinkling her nose. She turns and stares out the kitchen window. My heart picks up speed. Joaquin says nothing, but I can hear his response in my head. She probably wouldn’t have served you spaghetti, either. I pray he doesn’t say it.

  I twist up a huge pile of Mami’s noodles onto my fork and shove it in my mouth. It is undercooked.

  “This is good, Mami,” I tell her.

  “Mm-hmm,” she says, still staring out the window. Then she takes a sip of her rum and Coke.

  “How was work, Joaquin?” I ask, trying to move the dinner train forward to a more pleasant stop. Or at least a more tolerable one.

  “The usual,” says Joaquin, jumping up for a second and grabbing a beer from the fridge. It opens with a sharp fizz pop! He takes a slurp and then reaches for the nachos, biting down on one and chewing enthusiastically.

  “These are excellent,” he says. “Excellent nachos.”

  Here we go.

  Mami gets up, knocking over her chair in the process, then dumps her entire bowl of spaghetti into the trash can in the corner. Clash! Bang! Then she tosses her fork into the sink. Clatter! Then she grabs her drink and stomps off to her bedroom. Slam!

  I take a deep breath and push the spaghetti away. I wish I had a dog I could feed it to. I wonder if Mami will check to see if I threw mine away, too.

  “Thanks a lot,” I say to Joaquin.

  “Oh, come on, Elena. Just eat the nachos.” He rolls his eyes at me, but he glances in the direction of Mami’s shut bedroom door with something like regret. It’s like he can’t stop himself sometimes.

  I give in and slide a chip into my mouth. It’s not excellent, but it’s better than Mami’s spaghetti.

  “I wonder how long I’ll get the silent treatment for this one,” Joaquin mutters. He drains his beer. He acts like he doesn’t really care how long it will last, but I know he does.

  “If you didn’t want the silent treatment, you should have just eaten your spaghetti,” I say. “You knew she was in a mood. You pushed it with the nachos.”

  You pushed it when you wore that T-shirt.

  You pushed it with that comment after Mass.

  You pushed it with that look you gave her when we were driving home.

  You pushed it when you brought up our dad.

  You pushed it, Joaquin.

  “Yeah, I did,” Joaquin says with a sigh. “Sorry I screwed up dinner.”

  “It’s okay.”

  Neither one of us is really hungry but we make it through most of the nachos. Joaquin helps me clean up, including fishing Mami’s bowl out of the trash can. I wonder what she’s doing in her room. That rum and Coke was her third. Maybe her fourth. It’s hard to tell because she’s always freshening up her drinks.

  “So are you going to tell me about the guy in the VW or what?” Joaquin asks, wiping down the stovetop. I spy some spots he’s missed and take care of them.

  “I did tell you. He’s just a friend of Michelle’s and he was giving me a ride.”

  Joaquin takes my serving of spaghetti and heads for the trash can.

  “Hold on,” I say, and after I take it from him I lean against the counter and force down a few bites. Joaquin rolls his eyes.

  “So this friend of Michelle’s is into the Dead?” he asks.

  “I guess,” I say, handing him a half-empty bowl. “Like I said, he was just giving me a ride.”

  “The Dead suck.”

  “Okay,” I say.

  “What, you don’t think they do?”

  “I don’t have an opinion on the Grateful Dead,” I say. I don’t tell him that when I got home this afternoon I went into my bedroom and found the one Dead cassette I own—American Beauty—and listened to that song about sugar magnolias on my Walkman over and over again. It’s pretty, honestly.

  When the kitchen is finally clean enough for Mami’s standards, Joaquin and I walk the few steps it takes to get to the living room and flop down, Joaquin in the recliner and me on the couch. Joaquin clicks through the channels but there’s nothing on. I pick at my fingernails and think about Mami in her bedroom on the other side of the living room wall. It’s like her presence is pulsating through the Sheetrock. Is she sleeping? Stewing? Ready to come out at any moment and lay into Joaquin? Or me?

  “I’m going to go see how she is,” I say at last. Sometimes it’s better to defuse things early on.

  “Okay,” says Joaquin. “Better you than me.”

  He’s right about that.

  I push Mami’s bedroom door open just a crack. I see the lump of her on the bed, curled up on her side. One of her romance novels is open in front of her. Her rum and Coke is drained down to nothing. Even the ice cubes are gone.

 
; “Mami?” I ask, my voice soft.

  “Yes?” she answers, not looking at me but at the book. That’s not a promising sign.

  “I’m just checking on you,” I ask. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” she says.

  “The spaghetti was good. I finished mine.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Can I get you anything?”

  “No, thank you.”

  At least she said thank you.

  “I’ll get the glass for you,” I say. I walk to her nightstand and take the tumbler, its sides wet with condensation. Mami shifts and flips the page of her book as soon as I get close. Only Mami can turn the page of a paperback novel and make it the loudest sound on earth.

  I hear the phone ringing in the kitchen. Mami doesn’t move.

  “If it’s for me, tell them I’m not here,” she says to her book. We both know it’s not going to be for her because it never is. Other than the occasional call to confirm an appointment or try to sell her something, no one ever calls Mami. Especially not on a weeknight.

  “I will,” I say. The ringing has stopped. Joaquin has picked up.

  After I shut the door behind me, I walk into the living room and see Joaquin standing by the kitchen phone, his hand pressed over the receiver.

  “I think it’s Grateful Dead guy,” he says, raising an eyebrow. “Asking for you.”

  I’m not sure how I don’t drop Mami’s glass.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Like you didn’t hear me,” says Joaquin, snorting. “Grateful Dead guy is on the phone for you.”

  Since I make no movement, Joaquin walks toward me, takes Mami’s glass, and hands me the phone. It feels heavy and electric in my hand.

  “I’m going to watch television, so take it into your bedroom,” he says, gently turning me and pushing me in the direction of my room.