by Pamela Ribon
“Oh, thanks,” I stammered, mentally ordering myself to stand still.
“Yep,” Tucker said, clearly enjoying making me turn red. “You’re looking real good, California. Enough that I just had to say that again. Must be all those salads and movie stars rubbing off on you.”
I resisted the urge to tell him all the ways he was wrong about how I’m “looking.” I could have easily pointed out my various patches of dry skin that were one doctor’s visit away from being labeled eczema, or show him the location of the mini-constellation of brown spots I had recently found near my right temple—some kind of unfortunate birthday present my body gave itself after I turned thirty-five. Honestly, all I really had to do was gesture toward the coffee stain I got on the plane. It looked like I’d painted a nipple onto my tank top. Luckily I’d strategically placed my purse over it, grateful the oversize nature of my carry-on protected me from possible ridicule.
I had an immediate wish for Smidge to materialize right there in front of us, just so she could hear Tucker’s kind words about my appearance. She was the reason I’d even bothered to compose myself before a seven-hour red-eye that included a harrowing layover in Houston that was more of a full-throttle sprint to reach the gate on time. If I’d been flying anywhere else, I would’ve just hidden under a hat and zonked out on the strongest pills I could find. After all, it’s a red-eye, not the red carpet. But Smidge had a way of making my life take a few extra steps.
The usual criticism she would give upon first seeing me would range anywhere from “Hey, Puffy! Did you leave any sodium back on that plane?” to “Are those ankle socks you’re wearing with those heels? Are you in the fifties? Do you need me to put some Buddy Holly on the jukebox, Mary Jane?”
Nicknames and body slams. Smidge is half stand-up comic, half disappointed football coach ordering a few extra laps.
Tucker and I hadn’t seen each other in at least two years, and even then I seem to remember it was only briefly, as he was heading out with the boys to go golfing. That would’ve made it the night of the fireworks, the last time James came to Ogden with me before we separated. They got him drunk and chased him around with Roman candles, because he was dumb enough to tell them that he’d never played with fireworks before.
Do you remember James? You must. You had such a crush on him when you were little. One night you made him sleep in your princess bed, and as you tucked him in, shoving those pink Tinkerbell sheets under his shoulders one at a time, you solemnly told him that when he woke up he’d have magically turned into a prince, and you’d be married forever.
I couldn’t blame you for falling in love with him. He called you Prettygirl. All one word like that. If you were in the same room with him, you demanded to sit in his lap. The first time you saw him holding my hand, you were mad at me for days. You simply refused to share, even when I tried to pull rank with “Finders keepers.”
“He loves me more,” you insisted. Eight years old and ready to settle down for the rest of your life. I was more than three times your age at that moment and nowhere near as sure as you were about him.
You were our flower girl. The only flower girl in history to weep hysterically down the aisle. You hurled clumps of petals at the ceremony like you were lobbing grenades.
You were eleven or so when you found out James and I had separated. I remember you had this smile on your face that made me momentarily wonder if you’d caused it to happen through some sort of spell or potion preteen girls are prone to conjure. I could easily imagine you writing the perfect antilove chant combined with just enough wishes to finally get your prayers answered.
I hated you a little bit right then, Jenny. Because James never loved me the way he loved you. He never loved me just as I was.
It dawned on me that the reason Tucker was acting so friendly, so overly full of praise, patting me on the shoulder like I was a good horse, was because he’d heard my divorce was final. He never was a huge fan of James. It was kind of an instant aggression. “Any guy who’d wear a newsie cap is an asshole,” he once told me. We left it at that.
The rubber belt for the baggage claim lurched to life, giving Tucker and me somewhere else to turn our focus. The other nine people from my flight took a few steps forward, claiming space.
We settled into a spot near the bend as it occurred to me why he might be there. “Did Smidge send you?” I asked.
“No, ma’am,” Tucker said. “I was dropping my mom’s friend off. She’s on her way to visit her sister in Chicago.” He pointed toward the tarmac, which you could easily see through the window. It was only a hundred yards or so from where we were standing. “I saw you coming down the steps of your plane and figured I’d like to say hi. Welcome you home. You still call this home, right?”
“Of course I do.”
“Liar.”
I went to grab my suitcase, but Tucker jumped in front of me, his gentleman button activated. I thanked him.
“I’m jealous of my mom’s friend,” he said. “Getting to go north of here, anywhere that’s cooler, escaping this stank heat. Why would you leave La-La Land for this place in the summer? I thought you were supposed to be the smart one.”
I spotted my second suitcase. Again, Tucker grabbed it before I even had a chance to lean forward. “I can’t believe it’s been a year already since the last time y’all were gone,” he said. “Where was that again? Italy?”
“No, last year was China. I’m not sure where we’re going this time. She says it’s a surprise.”
“Well, I hope it’s far. And I hope you get to pet a monkey.”
Smidge would never pet a monkey.
“I’m guessing we are either going to end up in Mexico or she’s planning on trapping me on a damn cruise ship like she’s been wanting.”
I glanced down at the cell phone in my hand, as if I’d somehow missed her message. I thought about renting a car, but it seemed like a waste of money.
Picking up on a cue I didn’t mean to give, Tucker said, “I can take you to Smidge’s.”
“If it’s not too much trouble.”
Tucker reached up to fiddle with the frayed brim of his cap. “Lucky for you, it’s Help a Pretty Girl Day,” he said, superhero-proud of himself.
“Well, shucks, Tucker!” I drawled, mocking his accent. “That’s mighty neighborly of you.”
“Or you could just walk,” he said. “It looks like real nice walking weather out there, don’t it?”
“I’m sorry. Thank you for the ride.”
Exiting the Ogden airport always felt like a punch line. All the cars are lined up at the curb just outside the exit door. That’s the extent of the parking lot at this place: the curb.
Some people find the small size of Ogden comforting, but it made me feel like I was choking in a turtleneck sweater. I need space. Variety. The feeling of lots of things going on all around me. At any time in Ogden, you really only have about six choices. Smidge thrived in that world, maybe because she always found a way to make all six of those choices revolve solely around her.
Tucker tossed my suitcases into the back of his rusty brown Jeep with an easy carelessness, as if my luggage was filled with pillows. “Sorry about the state of this thing,” he said, giving the side door a whack. “It hasn’t had a good hosing since the last time my dog was in it.”
I rolled a few patchy tennis balls from the passenger seat onto the floorboard. They bounced softly before nestling between two empty Gatorade containers. In order to make space for my feet, I kicked up a pile of empty Chick-fil-A bags and crumpled receipts.
The Jeep pitched with Tucker’s weight as he dropped into his seat. As he turned the key, he rotated his ball cap with his free hand, resting the brim against the top of his sunglasses. He didn’t bother to buckle up until long after he was in gear. I could hear music playing, too softly to recognize much more than a steady beat.
The backs of my legs were already sticking to the vinyl, sweat beading on my shins. I pulled my hair back with
one hand, pressing it to the crown of my head.
“Hot,” was all I could manage to say.
“Let me get some speed so we can cool down,” Tucker said before taking off at an intersection. I closed my eyes and tried to ignore this outdoor sauna of a city as I prayed wherever Smidge was taking us would be frigid compared to this. Let’s go to Moscow, Norway, Alaska—someplace where the summer wouldn’t matter, where we could wear lots of clothes and drink way too much.
If she even for one second tried to get me on a cruise ship, I would kill her. I would wrestle her to the ground and choke her with my two sweaty hands.
TWO
You were already trotting down to meet us—your focus firmly downward on your cell phone, midtext—as we pulled into your driveway. That sparkly, pink-and-purple machine never left your grip. During meals, when you were brushing your teeth, even in your sleep you held on. It was as if you’d accidentally installed it into your palms and you were pushing any and all combinations of numbers, desperately trying to find the code that would detach that thing from your hands.
Bumping your butt against the dusty front of Tucker’s Jeep, you rested there, watching me peel myself from the vehicle. You leaned languorously like a pinup, strings dangling from your frayed denim short-shorts along your tanned, lean thighs, making me simultaneously uncomfortable and depressed.
You had curves. Woman curves. And I have to tell you, Jenny, even after all we’ve been through, I still think of you as a tiny, young thing. Six years old, asking me with the utmost amount of intellectual curiosity if Iceland had a vanilla section. It was difficult to watch you morph into a woman, sometimes because of how old it made me feel, but mostly because I watched you shift from “Prettygirl” to a stunning young woman. Your innocence and sweet nature were in sharp contrast to that dangerous body you were acquiring. All I could do was picture your future heartbreaks. I wanted to keep you in a closet, locked away from the boys who had the power to turn you into something harder, jaded, and worn.
You have always been my walking proof of time, the tangible evidence of life inevitably moving forward.
“Ooh, you had to get a ride!” you sassed, practically dancing with excitement, shaking your head, sucking your cheeks, lips pursed. I recognized in your face the one that used to meet me at my locker before dance practice. “Are you mad?” you asked. “I’d be mad. Mama didn’t even text you back and—hey, listen: she saw you texted.”
Family documentarian, historian, and amateur paparazzo, that’s the smarty-pants known as Jennifer Cooperton. Always on to what the grown-ups were doing. We had to start spelling things over your head before you were four. If there was a secret to be found, you sensed it, rooting it out like the furriest cat finding the party guest with the most sensitive allergies. This is why your mother wouldn’t let you have a blog.
“Wait until I’m in the loony bin before you start writing trash about your mother,” I remember her saying. “I know you’re scribbling it all down somewhere. I’m not stupid. ‘Dear World: Life is so unfair and my mom’s mean and please send help because this is child abuse, how I can’t have a Coke with my breakfast. Send.’”
Tucker groaned as he stretched his large frame toward the sky. “Your daddy ready?” he asked you.
“He’s coming.”
Tucker and Henry had their furniture restoration business going for about a couple of years at that point. Smidge would tease them that they spent their weekends antiquing like old ladies, but often they were out there searching for a credenza or a china pattern Smidge had fallen in love with online. I can’t even count the number of times she pressed a printout into Henry’s palm as she kissed him good-bye, whispering, “Fetch me this.”
And, you know, he usually did.
“Danielle Meyers!”
Slight with a dark tan, always in jeans with holes at the knees and a white T-shirt, wearing the same belt he’d worn since the seventh grade (something he liked to brag about), Henry often looked like he’d just walked off the set of a teen-rebel movie. He even slicked his hair back on the sides, which shouldn’t look good on any man, but always worked for him. He smelled of almond oil and beer.
“You sure did pack a lot more than Smidge,” he noted in his soft drawl as he helped Tucker with my second suitcase.
“Well, she wouldn’t tell me where we were going, so I brought everything,” I said. “From bikinis to snow boots.”
Henry had gained a little weight around his tummy, which finally made him look old enough to be someone’s dad. It looked good on him, like he was happy.
Henry patted Tucker high on his back. “Thanks for going to pick up Danielle,” he said. “I knew my wife wasn’t going to get her anytime soon, so I appreciate it.”
“Tucker, you liar! You were there to pick me up!”
Tucker lifted his chin, looking away in mock pride. “Maybe,” he said. “Maybe I did tell a small untruth. But it made you feel special, so it was worth it.”
And another successful superhero moment hits the history books.
THREE
Once Henry and Tucker took off in search of something vintage, you and I walked back up to the house. You hooked your arm around my waist and dropped your head onto my shoulder. The heat of the sun soaked your thick, blond hair, which had that impossible shine of youth. Your hips kept knocking into mine as you walked, once again proving you were no longer a little kid—your center of gravity was lowering, and you were still getting used to your new body. You smelled like cheap perfume, which meant you were rubbing magazine ads against your forearms again.
“Oh, hey, I got you something,” I said as I remembered, pulling back to reach into my purse.
“Yay.”
I handed you a small bottle of Chloé perfume. “Hide it immediately before she finds this and throws it at my head.”
Smidge had been known to suddenly declare the most random, innocuous things offensive, tacky, or dangerous. There was the time she outlawed cheese, the month she banned hiphop, and the unforgettable winter she tore all the carpeting out of her house. With her own two hands.
Smidge would then change her mind in what would appear to be just as abrupt a decision. She’d never just admit she might have been wrong or made an irrational decision. There was no regret, no remorse. Rather, it was always a choice to go in the other direction, as if she’d done some consulting from a more learned advisor.
“I guess listening to a little hip-hop won’t kill anybody,” she might have said. “If it’s the good kind with Kanye West in it. Y’all, that man knows what he’s doing.”
As if he’d called her himself and talked her out of the ban. “Shorty, why you trippin’? How can Kanye fix this?”
Smidge never did change her mind about Capri pants. I learned that the hard way when she cut mine into shorts while I was wearing them. While I was wearing them. In her backyard, surrounded by guests, a barbecue in progress, your mother attacked me with a pair of scissors she’d grabbed from the kitchen, shrieking, “This is for your own good!”
Perfume became contraband when Smidge was on a tear about the way things smelled, often stopping a conversation midword to flick her head to the side and sniff.
“What in the hell?” she’d mutter to herself, glaring at any unfortunate nearby stranger. Everyone was a suspect as her senses were continually assaulted.
She’d gag on the smell of gasoline, strawberry milk shakes, and chewing gum. One day she stared into her backyard for almost half an hour, positive she’d found a skunk. It got to where even the idea of certain smells were upsetting to her; the thought of someone striking a match made her queasy.
But Jenny, you were not having this perfume ban. I have to admit I got a bit of a thrill watching you stand up for yourself, recognizing injustice when it encroached on your own body.
“It’s not like I’m always around her nose,” you said to me. “If she’s so sensitive, she should just wear one of those surgical masks, like an Asian lady at th
e airport.”
Still, I made you promise to keep the bottle safely hidden in whatever place you were keeping your secrets those days. You swore you would, tucking that small, golden bottle into your shorts pocket, patting it gently as you shot me your mother’s smug expression. “I love you, A.D.,” you said.
Remember when you called me that? For Auntie Danielle?
You wandered away from me, headed toward the backyard, your head down as you rapidly thumbed keys on your phone, somehow already in the middle of another conversation.
Standing at the front door, I prepared myself for the familiar sound of your family’s chaos. I always had to take just a second before I stepped inside.
It still seems impossible only three people lived in that house. Three people and that old dog and I know somewhere there was allegedly a hamster named Quiche Lorraine, but I hadn’t seen it. The amount of electricity, energy, and sound surrounding that place made it seem like a hub for a family of ten, or maybe a squad of fifteen cheerleaders. Perhaps some kind of adult day-care center. A television was on in almost every room, with each set tuned to a different channel, even if nobody was watching. In the kitchen next to the microwave, an iPod rested in a speaker system, blasting twangy songs I never recognized.
The house was always impeccably clean. What it lacked in serenity, it more than made up for in order. Your mother arranged her cereal boxes by hue. The refrigerator bore no magnets. All cords were sheathed in a tube the same color as the wall behind it. So loud and yet so empty—like everybody had been kidnapped. Or perhaps all just got up and left.
The Rapture.
That was it. What it will look like after the chosen ones have been summoned, when people disappear. Since I’m certainly going to be one of the heathens left behind, I always said I’d beeline it straight to Smidge’s during End of Days, as her cabinet had the expensive snacks.