Losing Johnny

by Rachel Dunning

  “And Tiago’s the prom king?”

  “Isn’t he?”

  “Hey, I don’t go to your school.”

  “Well, he is. He’s not jock-material. But he’s definitely the hottest dude there. Except for maybe Jase. He’s also good looking, butch. But Tiago has that whole Latino-thing going. You know, the whole dark and mysterious gig.”

  I made a raspberry sound. “You’re really drunk.”

  “Am not! I’m...communicative. I’ve had enough for it to act like truth serum, but not enough to spread my leg—”

  “STOP! Please!”

  “Man, I’m gonna love seeing Simone’s face at school on Monday.”

  “You’re making too big a deal of this.”

  “Am not. The bitch wouldn’t stop talking to him at school, flirting, running her hand down his shirt. I mean, all the girls talk about him, but Simone was actively planning on jumping him tonight. And then, well, he just ignored her.”

  “Christ, it sounds like high school all over again.”

  “Only the bitch this time isn’t me.”

  I looked meaningfully over at my best friend. “You’re not a bitch. You just pretended to be.”

  She fluttered her eyes sarcastically. “Why, thank you.”

  “Bitch.”

  -6-

  Nicole had stayed in touch with Johnny since that call to him in December. She hadn’t made much “progress” with him in her secret plan to get us back together. So the calls had mostly been hello-and-goodbye-thanks-for-checking-in-I’m-still-dating-Susana calls, usually with Johnny being snarky and making fun of her for trying so hard.

  He’d moved on.

  I remind you that I only found about these calls much later.

  The day after I met Tiago, Saturday, Nicole called Johnny again. The following excerpt is from her diary, rewritten in third person to reduce confusion.

  -7-

  “Wadup?”

  “Nicole.”

  “That’s a friendly greeting.”

  “I’m expecting it to be a friendly phone call.”

  Sigh. “OK, fine. How’s whatshername?”

  “Susana.”

  “Yeah, the one and only.”

  “She’s...OK.”

  “Just OK?”

  “If you’re looking to see if my love life is in trouble, I’ve asked you before to stay out of it.”

  “Is it? In trouble.”

  Silence. “Maybe.”

  “C’mon, J. Talk to me.”

  “Talk to you. Nicole Fermann of all people. Why the hell should I talk to you?”

  “Hell, you’re uptight today. Come on, say it. What’s up with Suzie-shoes?”

  “It’s...nothing.”

  “Hmmm. When are you coming back to the states, J?”

  “What’s it to you?”

  “You just...don’t seem happy.”

  He said nothing.

  “Are you happy?”

  “I’m happy enough.”

  “You gonna break up with this Suzie?”

  “It’s not working,” he said. “I think that should be good enough an answer for you.”

  “And then? Will you come back to the states?”

  “No. Not now. I’m running the European side of my dad’s business. He needs me here.”

  “You really dug yourself in there.”

  “I had to get away.”

  Silence.

  Nicole: “Do you want me to...do anything? I mean, I know trying to get you to date Cat again is like asking you to swallow hydrochloric acid, but there’s a window of opportunity here. Should I nudge her to call you?”

  “Cat and I are over, Nicole. If we’re meant to be together, it’ll happen on its own.”

  “Johnny.” Nicole’s tone was disappointed. “You know that’s a load of bullshit, don’t you? I got you in high school because I went for you. It’s crap that people just randomly gravitate to each other or some bullshit.”

  “And are you and I still together today?”

  “Touché.” Pause. “OK. Fine. Whatever. At least let me know if you break up with your Suziekins.”

  Five days later, Johnny would text her that they’d broken up.

  For those of you counting the days, that text would come in on Thursday. Tiago and I would have our not-date on Wednesday.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ~ A Daughter ~

  -1-

  Saturday, May 16

  It was the first “real” dinner we were having at the Abreus’ in Long Island since getting back. Mom had seen them all already. She would come by once or twice a week to talk business and figures with Johnny’s dad.

  But it was the first time that all of us were together again. Tonight, Saturday night, we were in full guest mode.

  Nicole was the only “newcomer,” but Pat Abreu had a knack of making everyone feel welcome, of making everyone feel important. A knack which he’d passed so well on to Johnny, and which had made Johnny so popular at school.

  I wanted to be the adult, so I brought it up: “How’s Johnny?” I asked in between delectable bites of butter-covered seafood.

  “He is good,” Pat said. “And business is good. He has a natural eye for deals. In January he made me buy three new dry-goods ships. Just asked me to trust him. I haven’t bought a new dry-goods ship in ten years—too expensive. Well, I took his word on it, and even before the ink was dry, he’d single-handedly closed a seven-year multi-million Euro steel contract for Abreu Logística.” Pat shook his head proudly, forked a baked potato. “Not so, Alice?”

  Mom nodded, looked caringly at me. She’d obviously been more apprised of Johnny’s activities than I’d been over the months.

  “That’s, uhm, cool.”

  “Who knows? Maybe it’s just that CEOs today don’t like dealing with old men like me. But I like to think he has a gift. You should call him. He would love to hear from you.”

  “We’re in touch,” I said. “Through Facebook.”

  “That’s not the same as a phone call,” Pat insisted.

  After dinner, we bonded with Daniela on the couch. I hadn’t seen her in ages and I was interested to know how she was doing. She had grown. She was thirteen but looked sixteen, maybe even seventeen. She was almost as tall as her brother, which means she was taller than me. Daniela was one of those girls which, in my high school days, I would say “mushroomed” into adulthood. She had a boyfriend now (fifteen, from what she told me) and had spent most of dinner with her nose in her phone, making full use of the unlimited text plan her father had gotten for her.

  “I like your hair,” she said to me.

  I’d always been “jealous” of her own hair, a thick tumble of brown beauty that had so much bounce you could use it as a trampoline. Hair like her mother’s.

  “Thank you,” I said, pulling a strand and looking at it.

  “Brings your eyes out,” she said.

  “That’s what Nicole told me.”

  Danny looked at Nicole hesitantly. I’d changed Danny’s diapers as a kid, and watched her grow up. I’d dated her brother for years, spoke her language. Nicole was someone Danny probably just remembered as having come to the house when Danny was nine or ten. No doubt she’d heard us bitch about Nicole as teenagers. It would take time to accept her.

  Daniela showed us Instagram pics of her and her beau. He was pretty decent-looking for a fifteen year old. Blond hair, whiskey-brown eyes, a cocky smile. “His name’s Matthew,” she said wistfully to us. Her gaze didn’t leave her phone. “This one was in Red Hook—you know, by the docks.”

  I knew them all too well.

  “You guys seem tight,” Nicole said.

  Daniela stared at her phone, scrolling down her timeline. “Yeah, we’re good together.”

  When Nicole looked at me, I think we exchanged the same thought—young love, so innocent, so beautiful. So free of hurt.

  Iliana and mom talked forever in the kitchen. I heard the word “Thunder” several times, and some
giggles. Pat came and sat with us and then made jokes about Danny’s boy. He ruffled her hair and then stood, looked at me. “Let’s go outside, Catty. We haven’t talked in so long.”

  He poured me a glass of Portuguese red and we went out into the familiar hood; stared at the house across the street which mom and I had once called home. Every light was off, and it looked cold.

  I stood exactly where I’d stood two Christmases earlier, when dad and Pat and Johnny had unveiled the car they’d built together for me. The car which would eventually take my father’s life.

  The memory was knife-sharp.

  “How are you doing?” Pat asked quietly.

  I swallowed hard, understanding all too well the nuances of the question. “Better. Much better.”

  “Quite a bit of interest in the place,” Pat said, gesturing across the street with his wineglass. “Lots of people coming over to see it. Your mom’s agent is working her butt off.”

  “It’s a good house,” I offered.

  “I noticed you haven’t come by to pack any of your things like your mom’s been doing. Every time she’s here she goes by and checks on things, puts a few things in a box.”

  “I know.” My voice was hoarse. “I’ll get it done when the house is sold. I don’t have a lot of stuff. So long as I have my diaries and my camera, I’m cool.” Besides, I’m not ready yet to say goodbye. “Any new neighbors?” I asked, changing the subject.

  Pat rolled his eyes, pointed to a few houses down. “Number seven there. Reticent. Reserved. Keep to themselves. Danny is friends with their daughter, but it was no friendship like you and Johnny had. They talk and text—even though they live right next door.” He shrugged. “Nothing special. We’ve missed you, Catty. We wish you would come by more often.”

  In my mind, I heard the roar of the first generation Camaro the night I’d first started it on Pat’s driveway. I heard the custom speakers booming to life. I heard my dad: OK, babe, they’re gonna call the cops if you don’t put that down.

  I heard the screech of metal and the splash of a shattered windscreen on the I-95.

  “It’s hard...” I swallowed. “...to be here.”

  I shut my eyes tightly and bowed my head. Pat pulled me to him, held me. We stayed like that for a while until he said, “How about meeting us at the docks again? I’ll get my men together and you can do a photo shoot. We’ve seen your work. You are talented.”

  “The docks sounds good. It’s just...here... This place.”

  “No need to explain, my Catty.” He held me at arm’s length. “You were always a second daughter to me. Always. Do you understand what I am saying?” He gripped my shoulders firmly. “Do you understand?”

  I understood.

  I understood so well that my cheeks became drenched.

  He was telling me I still had a father.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ~ Tiago and Catherine ~

  -1-

  Wednesday, May 20

  I only noticed Tiago’s presence after I felt someone tugging at the camera around my neck.

  Hot sun sent rivulets of sweat down my sides as I held on to the hundred or so release forms in my hand (I had extras, just in case) and handed them out to the troop of NYU students who’d volunteered for a shot under the Arch. R&B, soul, and jazz music wafted through the air conflictingly, each being sung or played by a different group of performers in the park. The voices of toddlers wailed into the sky as they ran around the fountain, laughing, swimming in it (despite the sign forbidding it).

  Tiago, dressed casually in shin-length jeans and a vest, pulled the camera from my hand, and I almost dropped my forms! “Please guys, I need all of you to sign this before you go or I won’t be able to put them online.” I sounded like a teacher. I caught Tiago laughing to my right.

  He held the camera poised, but only after I turned my head to him did he take a shot.

  I wasn’t oblivious to the jaw-on-the-ground look of every girl in the NYU group as each caught sight of him. And some of the guys as well...

  A buxom girl in braids came over and said, “Let me help you, miss. Deez idiots don’t know shit ’bout art!” She took the forms from me. “Yo, dumbasses! Now y’all are goan sign deez forms now, o’ I’m goan find you an’ hunt you down in yo dorms tanight! And doan think I won’t bust up some booty call because you know I doan give a shit who you doin when deez forms need to be signed fuh Miss Cat Ramsey here!” Her face changed from stepmother to Cinderella when she turned to me, and she said softly, “Go be witchyo man, honey.”

  “Oh, he’s not—”

  “Go on! Scat!” She actually shooed me away with her hands.

  Tiago stepped backwards as I approached him, snapping away. “Hey,” I said, “I don’t like being photographed.”

  He almost walked into a pole, but just kept firing.

  I laughed, and I could see the photos already in my mind. They would be photos of a girl smiling, gold sunlight through the dyed brown of her hair, and glimmering down through the green leaves above her. She would seem carefree, hopeful, naive.

  I was none of these things.

  “Stop it,” I said, covering my face. Click. Probably another good shot.

  He stood back, confident, lean. Stretched out the camera to me. I noticed more ink then, one tattoo of a knife down the inside of his right forearm, stabbing a butterfly, just above the barbed wire around his wrist.

  I reached for the camera and he snatched it away, laughing.

  “Oh, we’re playing this game now?” I said.

  He waited. Stretched the camera out slowly to me.

  “And when I reach for it, will you yank it away?”

  He only grinned.

  I shook my head, positive that’s exactly what was gonna—

  I snapped my hand to the camera!

  He pulled it away. Laughed.

  I shook my head and laughed as well. “OK, you win.”

  “What have I won?”

  “Huh?”

  “What have I won? The camera? Or something else?” His statement was thick with double meanings.

  “What do you want?”

  He looked up at the leaves, thinking. Put a finger to his lips. “Can I get back to you on it?”

  “Hey—it’s my camera!”

  He said nothing.

  “Your time is running out, you know. I’m a working woman, and when it’s time for me to leave, I’ll leave.”

  “But we’re making progress. I’ve seen you smile more in the last five minutes than I did all of Friday night.”

  I turned my head, embarrassed.

  He came closer, and a little hammer started hitting me inside my stomach. When he was right up against me, hot breath escaped my mouth as I opened my lips unwillingly.

  “Here,” he rumbled. He held the camera right by my chest.

  I grabbed it hesitantly. For a moment, he wouldn’t let it go, and we both held it in equilibrium in mid-air, lightning sparkling between us.

  He walked me to a bench, put his rucksack next to him. His arm went behind me on the bench.

  “I saw your photos. Read your poetry. Facebook.” He looked straight ahead at a girl with purple hair and more earrings and piercings than I could count, reading a book on a bench across from us. “It kept me up most nights this week. I’m still not through with them. You write a lot of poetry.”

  “I see.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  “You write a lot of beautiful poetry. It was very moving.”

  “Thank—thank you.” I had on a sundress. Played with the hem now, straightening it. “So, you...wanted to show me some of your stuff.”

  He smirked. “And then you’ll show me yours? Sorry, bad joke.”

  “You’ve already seen mine.”

  “Only the public version. I was hoping for a...private showing.”

  I shook my head, felt the heat at my cheeks. “Have the lines not gotten any better in the last two years?” I dug into my rucksack for my iPad.


  “Lines?”

  “The pickup lines.”

  “You think that was a line?” He seemed shocked.

  “Oh, I... Sorry, I thought you were—”

  He was suddenly incensed.

  “I see,” I said, contrite. “I’m sorry, I’m just not used to this.”

  And then he grinned masterfully. “You’re right. It was a line. A lame one.”

  Before I knew it, I’d hit him on the shoulder with my fist!

  He laughed. The purple-haired girl looked up from her book at us. I think we were ruining her concentration.

  “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” I said. “Your accent...”

  “Not thick like you’d expect it?”

  “No.”

  “My father’s a dentist. He worked in a practice in England for a few years. I did quite a bit of schooling in London in those formative years when you’re still developing your language.”

  “Is London...nice?”

  “I was young, so I remember it only through a child’s eyes. It’s cold. And rainy. And cloudy. I don’t think I ever saw a day of morning-to-evening sunshine while I was there.”

  He pulled out a tablet, not an iPad. Big screen. Incredible color. Started showing me his photos.

  The initial shots were...disturbing, dark. Gangs, poor kids, poor neighborhoods. Guys with guns, gold teeth, tattoos. Oh my God—one of a gang member putting a gun to someone’s head! “These are posed,” he said. “Just in case you were wondering.” More disturbing ones. “They get better,” he said. “I just keep these up front because art critics like looking at them first. They’re not my favorite.”

  “They’re incredible.”

  “They’re...sad.”

  And then, finally, came a completely different set of shots: the Carnaval, a lot of sexy women. More sexy women. More women. One shot of him surrounded by luscious Brazilian dancers. One of him deep-kissing an extremely voluptuous golden-skinned goddess, his hand on her butt. Great shot, but—yikes—it made my stomach tighten with jealousy.

  “Self portrait?” I joked.

  “You could say that.”

  “Quite the Casanova.”