I see the tug-of-war going on inside her. As much as she wants to punish me, she still cares about what people like Levi, in the upper echelon of society, think. In her eyes I’m a reflection of our family, and our family is a reflection of all Cuban immigrants. The reputation of the motherland rests squarely on my shoulders. No pressure or anything.
“Please?” I add pitifully.
She looks at me, and I can see her resolve waning.
“You can go,” she says finally.
I sigh in relief. “Thank you.”
“But I’m going with you.”
“You want to come with me?”
“Yes.”
“You want to come with me to Sam’s.”
“Yes.”
“Or you don’t trust me to go to Sam’s?”
Her silence gives me my answer.
* * *
Sam’s Records is owned by an old potbellied hippie whose name is actually Fred. Why he named his store Sam’s is one of life’s eternal mysteries. Fred has a curvy naked woman tattooed on his forearm and a freakish memory for music. You can hum him a song, any song, and he’ll identify it in thirty seconds or less. I’ve tested him on this.
Taking Mom to Sam’s feels like letting her into this secret part of myself. The appeal of Sam’s can be lost on some people. It’s a cramped, split-level space in dire need of cleaning, and smells like a combination of mothballs and weed.
Mom lets out a giant sneeze as soon as we walk in. In Spanish, she mutters something about the dust, pinching her nostrils together.
I look around the space appreciatively. When you get past the layers of dust, you can find all kinds of treasures here. We’re surrounded by cassettes, CDs, and vinyls. They line the walls and sit inside boxes heaped on wooden tables. A fat gray cat lounges on an unopened box next to the staircase.
“Do what you have to do,” Mom says dramatically, still holding her nose, like the store is an affront to her entire existence.
I spend about an hour listlessly wandering through the stacks of vinyls. I’m itching to buy something for myself, but I know without being told that this is forbidden under my current punishment. It goes against my parents’ goal of making me wallow in my own misery.
Levi loves Sigur Rós, but he owns all their albums already. Sam’s has some other great albums, but none that would be meaningful enough to merit buying for him. Then, when I pass the Classical Music section, I’m struck by inspiration. The perfect gift. I find a copy of Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet, the music we listened to during our first date at Carnegie Hall. It’s poignant, it’s musical, and it’s under twenty dollars.
I have the album cradled under my arm when I go to get Mom, but she’s not in the spot I left her.
“Mom?” I call. I check my phone, thinking maybe she went to get some coffee and I missed a text, but I have nothing.
I finally find her at the back of the store, clutching Blondie’s Parallel Lines on cassette and looking at it in wonder.
“What have you got there?” I ask with forced casualness. It’s a standard question, one I wouldn’t hesitate to ask under normal circumstances, but we haven’t had a normal conversation in weeks.
She doesn’t look at me, just turns the cassette over in her hands. “What?”
“Are you buying something?”
“No, of course not. It’s just . . . I haven’t seen this in years,” she says. She stares at Blondie, almost like she’s talking to Debbie Harry more than to me. “It was the first album I ever bought here.”
It takes me a second to realize that by “here,” she’s not talking about Sam’s, she’s talking about the US. It’s weird to think of my practical, focused mom, feet firmly planted in reality, as a little girl who sang along to Blondie in broken English. Mom doesn’t listen to music now, doesn’t own any old CDs or have an online music account. I assumed she was always like this, too determined to prove herself to waste her time with frivolous hobbies like music.
“I like Blondie,” I say, although truthfully, I only know a few of their songs.
Mom is barely listening. It’s like touching the album has transported her back to 1979.
“Abi threw it away after I married your dad,” she says, brushing her fingers over the cover. There’s a reverence to the way she’s holding the cassette. “I forgot all about it.”
“You should buy it,” I suggest.
She looks at me now, and her face changes back to the stoic mask she’s been wearing since our fight at the hospital. It’s like she forgot she’s supposed to be mad at me.
“Ay, por favor,” she says, shoving the cassette back onto the shelf. “What the hell would I do with it now?”
* * *
The next morning I wait for Levi by his locker. He greets me with his usual quick peck on the lips. Always efficient.
“Happy Valentine’s Day!” I say so loudly that he flinches. “So what are we doing tonight? Dinner? A movie? Dinner and a movie? The world is our oyster!”
I don’t know if it’s the Blondie effect, but Mom and Dad have lifted one night of my parole so Levi and I can have a Valentine’s Day date. It’s like Levi exists in a sphere outside of the band. My parents consider him my responsible, intelligent, white boyfriend savior. In any case, I’m beyond excited to see a world outside of Evanston and my bedroom.
Levi opens his locker and shoves his books inside. “I don’t know. What do you want to do?”
“Why don’t we go to Celeste?” I suggest. “We always talk about going.”
“We won’t get a table at Celeste on Valentine’s Day. The wait will be crazy.”
I fight the pang of annoyance ringing through me. If Levi had thought to make a reservation somewhere, we wouldn’t have to worry about the crowds. As a noob to this whole boyfriend thing, I assumed Levi would have something planned.
Krina would say that’s not progressive of me. Why is it Levi’s responsibility to make all the plans? It takes two to be in a relationship, after all. I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. I blow-dried it for two hours last night so I could be frizz-free for our date.
“What about Casa Nueva?” I say.
“Also a ridiculous wait.”
“Not if we go early.”
“Yeah, but I have some homework to do.”
“I was thinking . . .” I reach out and play with the sleeve of his blazer. “Maybe we postpone the homework today?”
“Victoria,” he says, practically recoiling from my touch. “You know I have Mr. Yager’s essay due Friday.”
Maybe I did know. Since the band’s semipermanent hiatus, there’s been a drought of conversation between Levi and me. He’s taken to filling in the silence by telling me every last detail of his workload. This has become our daily ritual. My job is to nod, give the occasional “that sounds rough,” and look sympathetic.
Between his tests and essays and SAT-prep courses, I’m stressed out just listening to him. I don’t know why he’s so concerned about his grades. He has the highest GPA in his class, and his parents have a building named after them at Yale. I would say his future is entirely secure.
“We’ll figure it out,” I say brightly. “Here. This is for you.” I hand him the gift. He unwraps it carefully, turning the album over in his hands.
“Tchaikovsky?” he asks.
“Think back.”
He scratches his eyebrow before turning his attention back to the album. “Ummmm . . .”
“Our first date?” I press. “Carnegie Hall?”
“Oh! Of course! I’m sorry. That’s really sweet.”
“Now you can relive it. We can listen to it today, if you want.”
Levi looks a little guilty as he hands me a squashed gift bag from inside his locker. “This is your present. It’s not much, but . . .”
When I take the gift out of the bag, my first thought is that it must be a joke.
I dig around the bottom of the bag in case I missed the real gift. There’s nothing else insi
de. Which means this isn’t a cruel gag, this is the hard truth: all my boyfriend has gotten me for Valentine’s Day is a set of drugstore tights.
“I noticed the pair you wore to my apartment had a hole in them, so I figured you could use some new ones,” he explains.
“That’s very . . . practical of you.”
“I like to give practical gifts. It’s better to get something you’ll actually use, don’t you think?”
“Definitely,” I say, even though I firmly disagree. I’d much rather get something impractical and romantic. Hands down.
The gift is thoughtful, in a Levi sort of way. It was observant of him to remember the hole in my tights, even though I would love for him to forget it. It’s one of the many reasons I felt out of place in his home. Tights are a perfectly fine Valentine’s Day gift.
Besides, I should be grateful to have a valentine at all.
I repeat this in my head over and over again, like a mantra, then smile at Levi. “Thank you. I love the tights.”
I have a weird feeling that if I stop smiling, I may start to cry.
Chapter Forty-One
“STONEMILKER”
—BJÖRK
Our last quince rehearsal takes place the day Levi leaves for the Evanston Band competition, so Levi and I don’t have time to say good-bye. It’s better this way.
Ever since Valentine’s Day, I’ve been on edge. I’ve become someone I can’t stand—someone who wants constant affirmations of love from their significant other. It’s like without the band, the only identity I have left is Levi’s girlfriend.
Strand is spending the night at our apartment so we can leave early the next morning for the quince. Surprisingly, this is my parents’ idea. If I were a parent, there’s no way I’d allow a boy, especially one who looked like Strand, to spend the night with my teenage daughter.
We order pizza for dinner, marinara slices for Dad, and eat from our old mismatched plates. I guess my family doesn’t feel the need to impress Strand with our fine china.
“Are you Victoria’s new boyfriend?” Matty asks. He peels the cheese off his pizza and sticks a glob of it into his mouth.
I rest my head in my hands and close my eyes, but Strand laughs it off.
“Your sister and I are friends,” he answers.
“Then why are you her quince partner instead of Levi?”
“Levi had something else he had to do,” I say, raising my head. “Stop being so nosy.”
“Were you in the band too?” Matty asks Strand.
My parents become incredibly awkward at the mention of the B word. Dad coughs suddenly, taking a big gulp of his water. Mom clears her throat and digs her nails into the dining room table.
“I was,” Strand says.
“What do you play?” Matty asks.
“Guitar.”
Matty grins. “Awesome!”
“Do you play an instrument?” Strand asks.
“No. I wish I could play guitar, though.”
Strand folds his pizza and takes a large bite, then says, “I’ll teach you.”
Matty hops up and down in his seat while I say to Strand, “You don’t have time for that.”
“Sure, I do. Right, buddy?” He high-fives Matty. “You’ll be a regular Jimmy Page.”
Figures. Strand sits down for five seconds and he and Matty are best friends.
“Or Slash,” Dad says. I stare at him.
“You like Guns N’ Roses?” Strand asks.
“Use Your Illusion was my shit.”
“Jorge,” Mom says sharply. “Language.”
“Sorry. My jam.” Dad rolls his eyes at Strand like, Women, right? I would be offended, but I’m too busy digesting the new information about my dad. I mean, I knew he had eclectic taste in music, but I can’t imagine the man in front of me, wearing his salmon-colored company polo shirt with a Rodriguez Appliances logo on his chest, listening to a Guns N’ Roses album.
Mom steers the conversation to safer topics, like reality TV and new restaurants opening in the neighborhood. Somehow, Strand’s presence turns my parents back into themselves. They look at me without contempt. They even smile—not at me, not directly, but it’s progress nonetheless.
After dinner Strand rushes to help put the dishes away. Everyone is under his spell. Mom says she wishes she could adopt him. Dad teaches him about the hidden dangers of dairy, and Strand listens intently, saying things like, “You can barely taste a difference with soy milk.” And Matty follows Strand around like a lost puppy.
We all watch TV on the couch like a big, happy family, and an unpleasant thought pops into my head.
This should be Levi.
Levi should be the one charming my family, helping clean up after dinner. Has he ever cleaned a dinner table, or is he used to Rosa doing it all for him?
It’s ten o’clock when I excuse myself to go to sleep. I’m not tired. Mainly, I’m weirded out by my friend who is a boy, but not my boyfriend, sleeping over at my apartment and making my family feel normal again.
I brush my teeth, put on my pj’s (the ones without any holes in them), and crawl into bed. I pick up a copy of High Fidelity, which Annie lent me a couple of months ago. It’s been sitting on my nightstand collecting dust.
An hour into reading, the house has become quiet. I’m about to start a new chapter when I hear a soft tap on my door, so soft that I think I must have imagined it. I stick my nose back into the book, but then I hear an actual knock.
I open the door to find Strand standing there in a T-shirt and boxers.
“I can’t sleep,” he says. “Entertain me.”
Don’t look down. Do not. Look. Down. His boxers are blue with white pinstripes.
“Entertain yourself,” I say.
“Wow. Is this how you treat a guest in your home?” He feigns shock. “Come on, you can’t sleep either. I saw your light on.”
“I am not doing anything with you unless you put some pants on.”
“Seriously?” He looks down at his underwear. “It’s not like I’m wearing tighty whities. They’re practically shorts.”
“They are not practically shorts. They have a little slit in the front where your . . . thing can pop right out.”
“My thing?” Strand presses his forehead against the doorframe and starts cracking up.
I give him a shove. “Go put on your pants! I’ll meet you in the living room.”
He’s still laughing when I close the door. I wait a few minutes before I go out, because I don’t want to see Strand putting his pants on. It’s too weird. Intimate. The act of getting dressed. Like we just . . . you know. After a reasonable amount of time has passed, I tiptoe into the living room, where Strand is waiting for me, fully clothed.
“Does this outfit meet your standards?” he asks.
“It does, thank you very much.” I sit on the far side of the couch so there’s a cushion of space between us. Strand’s eyes crinkle up, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Okay, so.” He leans back and appraises me. “What do you want to do?”
Why is it that everything he says sounds like a come on? I sit up straight, refusing to melt into a puddle of uselessness like most girls would. I tap my finger against my chin. “Want to play a game?”
“Always.”
I grab a sheet of paper from the end table and scrawl MASH on the top.
“MASH?” he asks. “As in the TV show?”
“No . . . as in Mansion, Apartment, Shack, House. You’ve never played MASH before?”
“Nope.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“I would never.”
“Annie and I played this all the time when we were younger.” I write out the categories: Wife, College, State, Job, Kids.
“You get to pick two options per category and then I pick the third for you,” I say. “First is Wife, so you pick two girls. I know it’ll be hard for you to limit yourself.”
“Two girls . . .” Strand ignores my dig and props a
throw pillow under his neck. “So it has to be a girl I like?”
“Does such a creature exist?”
“I’m capable of feelings, you know.”
“For Rachel Levine?” I make a gagging sound.
“Very mature, Cutlet.” He looks at me in an uncomfortably direct way. “Serious question?”
“Shoot.”
“What do you have against Rachel?”
“She’s just so . . .” I suddenly don’t know what I have against her. “Blargh.”
“Oh yeah, I know,” he says, rolling his eyes. “She’s so totally blargh.”
“She always runs in a sports bra even when it’s cold. And during races she runs with her elbows out so people can’t pass her.”
He gasps. “That monster.”
“You can learn a lot about someone by paying attention to the little things.”
“You’re a harsh critic.”
“I’m just looking out for you.”
“Anyway . . . it’s not Rachel.”
“What’s not Rachel?”
“The girl I like.”
“So there is a girl!”
“There might be a girl.”
“Who is she?”
“No comment.”
“Oh come on, why?” I tuck my legs under me. “I’m proud of you, having a little crush.”
A twinge of . . . something flutters in my chest. Probably pity for this supposed crush of his. She should be warned that no girl could possibly hold Strand’s attention for longer than five minutes.
“Next category, please,” he says.
I sigh. “Fine. We’ll skip Wife.”
When we get to the College category, Strand’s top choice is “the College of Life.”
“What does that mean?” I ask.
“It means I’m not sure if I want to go to college. At least not right away.”
I’ve never heard anyone from Evanston consider life without college. It’s practically incomprehensible, but that’s Strand. Living like all these things that have been drilled into us don’t actually matter.
When I say this out loud, he says, “They don’t matter.”
“But—” I stop myself. Why am I arguing with him? Doesn’t that mean I’m no different from my parents, or Levi, or Annie? I’m spouting back everything they’ve said to me.
The Victoria in My Head Page 21