Now, Cody and I stroll toward the science building, crossing the busy square of grass like two geckos dodging their way across a city sidewalk, while I fill him in on the horrors of listening to my dad snore all night. Sawing logs doesn’t even begin to cover it.
“Come on.” Cody tugs me to a halt in front of the table with two student-council reps selling tickets. The eternally perky Becca Waters and her ultra-perfect boyfriend Kent Something are smiling matching too-bright smiles. I have never seen them apart. I have never seen them not smiling.
“Hey, Abby!” Becca calls. We—Becca-Kent and me—had Freshman English together last year, but this is the first time she’s talked to me since then. “Don’t you want to buy your tickets now?”
No, I do not. I lower my eyes and move forward, but Cody blocks me with a strategic elbow.
“We should buy our tickets early. At the door, they’re almost twice as much.”
I guess he listened to my pep talk after all, but I just wanted to show up at the dance all last-minute. Like, Oh, the dance? We were supposed to buy tickets? Well, since it’s so late anyway, couldn’t you just let us in? Thank you so, so much Becca-Kent. You’re the best! Hey, it worked for the Spring Fling last year.
“Cash poor,” I say. “Maybe next week.” It’s always better to ask for money after a payday.
“I got it. Two for you, two for me.” Cody pulls out his wallet and a wad of cash. Then he buys six tickets.
“Six?” I question. “Your parents coming, too?” Hard to believe, but they’d once been Union Coyotes themselves.
Cody pockets the tickets without answering and walks ahead. I’m forced into a half-jog to catch up. He doesn’t stop until we are in front of the admin building. Other students stream past us, the heavy double doors banging behind them.
“Look.” He points to the giant bulletin board mounted on the outside wall. It’s inside a hanging glass case. The words MAKE OUR NEW STUDENTS WELCOME! march across the top of the board in cutout letters. Underneath are pictures of all the transfer students, with names and former hometowns typed underneath.
“Six tickets?” I say again. “That’s hardly enough for all these people.”
“Pick one,” he says. “Any one.”
I hold up my hand. “This is your idea of matchmaking? Choose someone off the new-student bulletin board?”
“Or you could ask a freshman.” He tilts his head to indicate a trio of frosh boys coming our way, all lanky and freckly and much too short.
I laugh at this. “Yeah, right.”
“There’s nothing against freshmen in your Rules. Some of them are very tall.”
“Everyone knows girls mature faster than boys. I’m not trading down.”
“Urban myth. Besides, you’re not trading anything. This would be a first-time purchase, yes?”
I ignore the last. “I’m pretty sure it’s been scientifically proven. Girls are definitely more mature than boys. For example, I’m mature enough to know you don’t pick a boyfriend out from a picture lineup.”
“It says to make them feel welcome.”
I shove him. “Seriously, Cody. Even if I chose someone to ask out, we don’t need six tickets. What gives?”
“Two for you, two for me, two for Jackson.”
Jackson? He must see the next question coming because he adds, “Homecoming, remember? They actually send the alumni invitations to this thing.”
And he needs two tickets because he’s going to ask someone to go with him. Someone who’s not me, thanks to the mutual-avoidance pact that’s been in place since Sunday morning. My sisters are former Coyotes. I pray to God it’s not one of them.
“What about you?” I say, not looking at the board and not asking who Jackson’s taking. Because it doesn’t matter, right? This is how I wanted it.
Two teachers come out of the building, balancing coffee mugs and stacks of papers. One is on her cell phone, which seems unfair since we’re not allowed to have them in school.
“You gonna pick someone off this thing?” I ask.
A slow smile takes over his face. “Nope, I’ve already got a date.”
“Oh my gosh!” I jump up and down. “Is it Brian?”
Scuffing his shoe on the pavement, he says, “No. I asked that freshman. The one I told you about.”
“Hickey Girl? That freshman?” I’m stunned. Now that he’s out, I thought things would change. Like he’d stop hiding the fact that he’s gay.
“Actually, her name’s Jenna.”
“She’s a girl,” I needlessly point out.
“So? Doesn’t mean we can’t have a good time.”
“Cody, what’s going on?”
He shoots me a stubborn glare. “I’m taking my driver’s-license test in three days. I want to drive. Is that so wrong?”
“No.” Doesn’t explain what Jenna has to do with this. I wait.
“Abby, it’s not like I’m gonna find the perfect guy here. I told my parents I was confused, not gay.”
It takes a moment for the words to penetrate my brain. “What? How could you?”
“We’re talking about my car. My freedom. My chance to get out of here every once in a while. They said they’d take back the car if I didn’t ‘get my head on straight.’ Now that I’m so close to driving, I can’t live without that car.”
“But you lied.”
“Not really. I mean, it’s not like I’ve ever been with a guy, so I’m not technically gay yet. Maybe I’m wrong. And if I’m right, well, I can always be gay in college.”
“You’ll be gay in college?” My voice raises. I hear an echo of my sisters’ hysteria, so I tone it down. “How can you say that?”
“Why does this one thing have to define me? I’m a lot more than gay, you know that. But it’s like once I say the g-word, that’s all anyone sees. It’s all so stupid.” His jaw is set at the stubborn angle. The no-backing-down angle. “Besides, it’s my decision. And I’ve decided that I don’t want to be tormented for the next three years just because no one can see past the gay thing. You don’t want me to be miserable, do you?”
New York is looking better and better. There, he could be who he is and not worry about what anyone else thought. “Okay, Cody. I get it. I want you to be happy.”
He smiles and throws an arm over my shoulders. “So I decided to help you find your perfect guy.”
“I can find my own guy,” I say, although truthfully, I haven’t been trying very hard. Or at all.
“Trust me,” he says with a grin. He reaches into his navy backpack and pulls out his gigantic binder with all the tabs and color-coded labels. Opening it, he extracts two sheets of paper and hands them to me. “Here’s everything I found out about the transfers.” He gestures at the bulletin board. “You’ll have to judge for yourself which ones are ugly enough to make your cut.”
“Shut up.” I smack his arm. “I’m not looking for ugly, just unremarkable.”
“Same diff.” He studies the pictures.
I look at his spreadsheet. A list of names runs down the side of the page. Boxes extend to the right. Rules #2, No Baggage from Past Relationships Allowed, and #5, Get Out of Town, are labeled across the top. Notations fill most of the boxes. “Has a cat,” “Plans to be a marine,” “College-bound,” “Ex-girlfriend in CA.”
“Wow,” I say. “How’d you find all this out?”
“I have my ways.” He smiles, proud. “So, who’s it going to be?”
My eyes roam the bulletin board, scan the spreadsheet. But all I can think about is that Jackson has two tickets. Closing my eyes, I wave my finger over the bulletin board and point. “That one.” I hope it’s not a girl.
“Guess again,” he says. “Here, I’ll spin you.”
I open my eyes. My finger is on Brian’s picture. I think it’s fate.
“One more time,” Cody urges, but I shake my head.
“Nope.” I tap the glass. “He’s perfect.”
Chapter 15
It’s
weird to even think it, but although it’s only been one day since they moved out, I miss Kait and Stephanie. And not just because Kait took most of the clothes, including a few pieces that were mine, from the closet when she left.
I suppose if I wanted to, I could dip into Dad’s side of the closet, do the cross-dressing, gender-blender thing. He has a couple of shirts and a suit neatly lined up on the far left. His jeans are folded over wooden hangers, and his polos and button-downs take up a foot of space. My clothes are on the right, and there’s a great rift in between, a stretch of empty space between hangers that was never there before.
Stranger yet, there’s men’s shaving cream by the side of the bathroom sink and the toilet seat is up. I used to wish Kait was a brother, but now I miss her predictable bad moods. With Dad as a roommate, I can’t quite relax.
Case in point. I walk into the room and he is on my bed reading. My bed. Even Kait, selfish roommate that she was, knew to stay on her side of the room. I am about to make some comment about personal space when I notice what he’s reading. My journal.
More specifically, my very private poetry-filled, hidden-under-my-bed journal. Which means he’s also found Mr. Manly, so I’m not so sure I should say anything.
He looks up and says, “Some of these are good.”
A lie. I know my poetry pretty much sucks. That’s why it’s personal and private and hidden under my bed.
“That’s mine.” I snatch the book out of his hands. Then I don’t know what to do with it. Or him. “How could you?”
“I’m not kidding. Have you shown those to someone, like an English teacher or something?” He actually looks proud, tucking his hands behind his head and beaming at me like I’m gifted.
“You had no right”—I shake the journal at him—“to read this. To go through my stuff.”
“I know, I know.” He sits up and plants his feet on the floor. “I was moving the furniture around, trying to make some room for my desk, when I found that box. I was worried it might be drugs.”
“Drugs? Are you crazy?” My body trembles, like the beginning of an earthquake. I pace to the window and back. “How could you read my journal?” I knew I should’ve gotten one with a lock, but those had all been so pink and sixth-grade-looking.
“Sorry,” he says, although he’s clearly not. He leans forward, wrists on his knees, hands dangling in the air, and smiles at me like everything is made okay by an insincere apology. “But about my desk? I think we can fit it there under the window.” He points to where Stephanie’s crib used to be. Kait picked it up on one of her many trips back to get stuff. It is the only three feet of wall with no furniture pushed against it.
“No,” I say, still pacing. I make a quick turn on my heel whenever I get to the window, pivot again when I reach my bed. Back and forth, back and forth, like a coyote waiting for a deliciously plump pocket mouse to reemerge from its underground burrow.
“Oh, it’ll fit.” He acts like measurements are the problem.
“No,” I say again. “No desk.”
“I need somewhere to work.”
“You have a house.”
He blows out a breath. “Shevon wants the house. You know that.”
“It’s your house. Tell her leaving you means leaving. Period. Put your foot down, for God’s sake.” I stomp my own foot to help make the point.
“Don’t take that tone with me, Abby.” He folds his arms across his chest. “I’m the parent here.”
“Since when?” The earthquake inside me intensifies. I fling my journal across the room. It hits the wall, spine breaking, pages falling out in clumps. I can’t take this, him, anymore. I pull a Shelby, slamming the door behind me and then yelling through it, “This is my room!”
I don’t know where I’m going when I leave the house, but fifty-eight steps aren’t enough. I walk the neighborhood until sweat plasters my T-shirt to my skin. When I get back, my room is empty and Mr. Manly sits on my pillow. Whatever. I shove him back under the bed, rescue my journal, and carefully tape the pages back together.
“Abby, help me with this, will you?” Dad pushes a desk down the hallway. As he turns it into our room, it jams against the doorframe and sticks. He motions at me with his hand to grab one end of the desk, clearly forgetting our argument of just a few short hours ago and the fact that I’m completely pissed at him.
I don’t get up from my bed. “It won’t fit.” It’s not the desk from his house but some IKEA reject that’s seen better days. “Where’d you get that thing?”
“Yard sale,” he pants. “Down the street.” He backs up and rams the doorframe again. A sliver of wood flies free.
“Take it back,” I say. I’m scribbling out a new poem, one about asshole dads and their stupid-ass stupidness.
There’s a loud thunk and a whole chunk of doorframe peels off.
“Damn it, Abby, get out here!”
“No!” I’m shouting now, even though I hate to sound like one of my sisters. “You will not bring that thing in here.” I get up, cross the room, and slam the door shut.
“Abigail Savage, open the door right now!”
I get behind Kait’s bed and shove it in front of the door. “No!”
There’s silence on the other side. No yelling, no desk sliding on the wood floor. Then I hear a tentative tap on my door.
“Abby?” It’s Mom. She would take his side.
“Forget it. The desk’s not coming in.”
“Abby, be reasonable. He needs a place to work.”
“What work?” I grumble. It’s not like hardware salesmen have briefcases to take home, clients to call, campaigns to prepare.
Mom’s sigh is loud enough to penetrate the door. Cody can probably hear the disappointment all the way at his house. “He’s starting his own business, Abby.”
I respond with a sigh of my own. How many get-rich-quick schemes can one man have? This will end like all the others— in a fizzle of debt. Mom, though, never learns, and my silence catapults her into babble mode. “Imagine, a high-end store, selling kitchen and bathroom fixtures for all those new developments going up everywhere. Isn’t that a great idea?”
She takes my continued silent treatment as agreement and continues. “There’s a lot of research to do, things to organize. He needs some space.”
“How about his house? There’s plenty of room to work there.” It’s true, too. He and Shevon had a house bigger than ours. Why he has to mooch off us, I don’t understand.
“Abby.”
“Mom.” Her heels click down the hallway. I press my ear to the door and hear Mom say, “Give her a little time, Carl. Maybe in a day or two, she’ll be more reasonable.” The desk scratches away.
I watch from my window as Mom and Dad half-carry, half-shove the thing down the driveway. I’ve won, but I wonder at what price?
I have to say one thing for Dad. There’s better quality beer when he’s around. He’s not shy about using it to buy forgiveness, either. He hasn’t come out and said it, but I can tell from the fact that he bought imported beer instead of domestic that he realizes our earlier fight was his fault. I’m feeling mellow, like maybe I was slightly overreactive about the desk and maybe he wasn’t as horrible as I recall. Lucky for him, writing non-rhyming poetry in erratic meter always makes it easier for the amnesia to set in.
“This Steve guy, he’s all right?” Dad asks. We sit in the kitchen, each nursing a Heineken. Everyone else is in bed, so it’s unnaturally quiet. The tick-tock of the clock over the archway punctuates each second as it passes. The fork and spoon hands point to the different vegetables. We started at broccoli—eleven—and now the spoon has passed carrot—twelve—and is heading toward the green pea that is one o’clock.
I shrug because I don’t like to talk about the Guitar Player. Not that anyone in this house has ever asked for my opinion about him before.
“I’m worried about your mother.” His hand clenches and unclenches the can so that his words are punctuated with an ir
ritating crackle. “She’s had some bad times, y’know? I want to be there for her.”
“You’re divorced,” I remind him. “And still married to Shevon.”
“Your mom’s a hard woman to get over.” His mouth droops, and I think he’s trying to squeeze a tear out.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” I say. “No need to cry in your beer for my benefit.”
“But he treats her right?” He gets that tear out and lets it run down to his chin.
“I don’t know.” My beer is no longer cold, so I slug the rest back before it gets any warmer. “I guess so.”
What I really think is that the Guitar Player is a total schmuck and a loser, but if I say that, Dad might decide he has to do something about it, and frankly, just having him in my room is all the tension I can stand. I may have won the battle of the desk, but he’s still living here.
“How’d they meet again?” Dad thoughtfully gets us both another beer while continuing the Guitar Player Quiz.
“He subbed at our school one day. Kait found out he played guitar and arranged to take lessons from him. They dated for about a month, until she brought him over and he met Shelby.”
“Shelby looks just like your mom,” Dad says. “Beautiful women are hard to resist. Used to getting whatever they want, too.”
I continue my story. “He dumps Kait for Shelby. Kait announces she’s pregnant with his child. He takes off for a few weeks then comes back ‘to do the right thing.’ But Mom was here that day, and he took one look at her and decided the ‘right thing’ was for him to give Kait money for an abortion.”
“It can happen like that. One look’s all it took for your mom and me.”
The fact that my mom flings herself from one love-at-first-sight relationship to another is no news flash. The fact that Dad is not outraged by the Guitar Player’s callous treatment of his daughters is also unsurprising.
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