Going Underground

by Susan Vaught

  Livia gives Fred a warm grin. “You’re really cute.”

  Fred basks, her eyes wide and the centers tinier than ever, meaning she’s really, really interested and paying attention.

  “Well, I should go and let you work.” Livia stands as she says this, brushing dirt off her jeans.

  Don’t. Wait. I really can talk about something more interesting than sandwiches. I can say something better, something funnier than “okay.”

  Will you come back tomorrow?

  But I stand there like I don’t have a tongue and she gives me a wave and walks away, and I let myself stare at her until she gets to Oak Section. Then I crank up the music and go back to digging, but I can’t stop thinking about her.

  Funny isn’t the right word for how I feel when she’s nearby.

  It isn’t wrong or right, or excited or nervous, or good or bad—it’s sort of all of that, all wadded up together.

  I don’t need to do this. I don’t need to get wrapped up in some girl. It’s nothing but stupid and dangerous.

  But how do I not feel what I’m feeling? Music’s not working. Digging’s not working.

  “Del?”

  The word slides into my brain under all the loud music, and I startle so hard I almost pull a Marvin and bash my mouth with the shovel.

  Livia’s back, still grinning, cheeks red again.

  My palms go sweaty in two seconds, and I do the whole bud-ripping, shutting down the iPod thing again, doing my best to focus on her and nothing but her. If I can’t say anything intelligent, I can at least look interested.

  “Why don’t I bring us dinner tomorrow night?” Livia asks.

  My mouth comes open. I could lift Harper’s lawn tractor with my pinky before I could squeeze out a single syllable.

  She looks even more embarrassed, but then that other look shifts across her face, the one that tells me she’s really strong inside, and not willing to let her emotions and worries boss her around. “Come on, my cooking’s not that bad.”

  Oh God. I can’t say yes to this. I can’t let her cook for me and get all nice with me when she doesn’t know. Not okay. Not allowed.

  My mouth moves. My voice works. And what I say is, “That sounds great.”

  Who am I?

  Why am I here?

  What’s the point?

  The next day at school, I’m a basket case, and I can’t stop going over those questions. You’d think by now, I’d have some solid answers. Every time I think I’ve got a little piece nailed down, though, something changes.

  I’m having dinner in a graveyard with Livia. And after I got home from the little high of actually making—well, accepting—my first sort-of date in three years, I found mail stacked on the table for me. The mail was nothing but generic rejection cards from over half of the community colleges Branson wanted me to try. The other colleges either haven’t responded or they’re not planning to bother telling me to cram my wannabe applications sideways and rotate in the most painful ways. It’s entirely possible that the answer to Why am I here? is simply … Nobody cares, so why do you?

  The sort-of date thing and the college crap distract me worse than ever, so once again, I don’t notice minor disasters in the making. The halls of G. W. are almost deserted before fifth period when Cherie stalks me down outside the bathroom closest to class. Marvin sees her coming, but he can’t help me. The best he can do is slide past her and stand at the corner scoping for Jonas, who should be headed out to the football field for his extra gym credits practice, but you never know.

  I shrug my backpack onto my shoulders so my hands are free to block blows, and I’m ticked because my heart’s actually beating faster than it should be.

  Cherie marches straight up to me, her black jeans and sweater tight against her curves and her black hair pulled back in a teacher’s bun. I catch a whiff of some light perfume, and I notice that her lipstick seems almost ruby. Nice shade on her. She looks sophisticated, if you don’t count the screw-off-and-die gleam in her eyes.

  “You’re an asshole, Del,” she announces loud enough for most of the people in Duke’s Ridge to hear.

  “Yeah. No problem. I am.” If that’s what she thinks and what she needs to think, I’m all for it. I keep my hands relaxed just like I did the most recent time her brother threatened to kick my ass. What was that, last week? “Total asshole, actually.”

  “Your parents? Shit. That’s just—wrong on so many levels.” She folds her arms and glares like she’s waiting for an explanation.

  Sunlight oozes off the yellow-painted walls and the blue-green tile floor, making Cherie way brighter than she should be. I figure if I try to go all high-handed and step around her, she’ll slug me, and then I’ll have Jonas and teachers and probably the police to deal with, so I agree with her again. “It was wrong. I feel bad about that part, but you won’t listen to me. I figured you might hear them.”

  Her eyes get so narrow I wonder how she can see anything. The faded blue lockers on either side of us seem too close, and I have to fight an urge to try to knock them with my elbows to make more room.

  “Is this where you do the I’m-no-good-for-you thing?” Cherie’s really red lips pull back like she’s about to show me fangs. “Stop trying to protect me. I don’t need protecting from you, Del.”

  Ouch. I am an asshole, because I’m not trying to protect her at all. I’m covering my own ass by trying to peel her off me. “I’m not deciding what’s good for you. I’m standing up for what’s good for me, Cherie.”

  Marvin’s whistling nervously. Kind of quiet. I recognize the tune as the theme song to a really old western—The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. It got played right before people got shot or hung or cut to pieces. I think I’ll hit him the next chance I get.

  Cherie’s eyes stay narrow and her arms pull even tighter against her chest. “How do you know I’m not exactly what you need?”

  Ouch again.

  God, I don’t want to do this, but I need to. I really have to. “You’re not what I need.”

  The words make my guts ache.

  Cherie’s eyes go wide and get sad, and her lower lip trembles, not like a pout, but like she’s really sad and hurt.

  Asshole. TOTAL asshole.

  “Why not?” she asks, and her voice is so quiet it doesn’t even sound like her.

  Oh, jeez.

  “I—I don’t know. I just don’t have those feelings for you.” I lift both my hands, palm up, like I’m begging for her to understand, and maybe I am. I hate hurting her, but I can’t pretend I’m interested in her just to keep her from crying, can I?

  “I’m just trying to be your friend,” she whispers, and that’s a lie, but I’m not totally sure she knows that.

  “You’re trying to be a lot more than that, and it can’t happen. Find some friends who appreciate you, who like the same things you do. I’m not who you need.”

  She looks away from me, and now she’s pouting on top of being truly sad. My total-asshole meter drops to mid-range, and my muscles relax a little bit.

  “Are you going to testify at those hearings about the juvenile sex offender laws?” she asks me without any hint that she’s turning left with the conversation, and I actually startle at the question.

  “What?” God, does she eavesdrop on everything about my life?

  “The hearings this spring,” she says like I’m going more and more stupid the longer she stands in front of me. “The legislative hearings on the law changes—your name’s on the schedule. Look it up online. It’s public record.”

  Love to, but all my time online is supervised, and I don’t want to get my parents’ hopes up by checking out my name on that schedule.

  Out loud, I can’t say anything, so Cherie keeps talking. “I was going to go, you know. To be there in the audience on your side—and bring some people. Show of support.”

  Back to full asshole now, I think. Maybe asshole times two or three. Is there such a thing as asshole squared?

  “
Duke’s Ridge is wack. It’s like—detached from reality or something. Nobody cares. Nobody really tries.” Cherie finally looks at me again, and she’s not sad anymore, at least not that I can see. She unfolds her arms and takes a step back like she’s about to leave. “You’re a pussy if you don’t testify—and that’ll make you just like everybody else in this waste of a town. But that’s just my opinion, which isn’t worth anything to you.”

  Pussy?

  Did she just call me a pussy?

  “Don’t sic your parents on me again,” she says, then spins around and stalks away, slamming her shoulder into Marvin as she heads around the corner.

  “Don’t make me have to,” I call after her as Marvin catches himself on the wall and manages not to fall all over the hallway.

  He straightens himself up, glances in the direction Cherie just went, and mutters, “We’ve got a shot at making it to class before we get detention.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  “She didn’t punch you out.”

  “No. Not yet.”

  We walk, side by side, and there’s maybe three other people in the hallway, and it feels like there’s hardly anybody else in the world.

  “She called me a pussy,” I admit, still kind of impressed by that, and grossed out, too.

  For a few seconds, Marvin doesn’t say anything, but the corners of his mouth twitch a lot. He finally comes out with, “Well. Are you?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  He shrugs.

  I was sort of hoping he’d reassure me about the pussy thing, but …

  Oh, well.

  If God Trips Over Angels, Does It Piss Them Off?

  (“Angel’s Doorway”—Suzanne Vega)

  Parrots change the way you say “Hello.”

  Once you hear a parrot say “Hello!” in that tight, perfect little bird voice, you’ll say it that way forever.

  Parrots also change the way you dance. I should probably never dance in public again. My head would bob, and my feet would jerk up and down like somebody crammed a twelve-hundred-volt plug in the bottom of my spine. If you don’t believe me, go to YouTube and look up videos of Snowball, the dancing cockatoo. Fred’s not a cockatoo, so she doesn’t dance exactly the same way Snowball does, but you’ll definitely be able to imagine it.

  What you probably won’t be able to imagine is Marvin in a cemetery in his red jeans, his red cookie-shaped apron, with his red hat with the big rubber chocolate-chip cookie on top, bouncing up and down next to the grave I’m digging, flapping his arms like a stoned chicken, and trying to teach Fred to say, “I’m a jerk.”

  It’s enough to keep my mind off Livia, at least a few seconds at a time, even though I’m not playing my music.

  “I’m a jerk,” Marvin crows.

  Fred stares at him.

  “Jerk. Come on, bird. Jerk. Just say it once.”

  I won’t let Marvin teach Fred swear words, just in case she ever has to live anywhere but with me (parrots who drop endless F-bombs get in lots of trouble in terms of keeping good adoption situations), so Marvin goes for the tamer stuff. “I’m a jerk,” he shouts again, dancing his rubber-cookie-head dance while fluffy-feathered Fred keeps right on staring at him like he’s a few chocolate chips shy of a full recipe. Gertrude’s sitting beside Fred’s cage, drooling and looking fat, and also staring at Marvin, but I think she might be waiting for the rubber cookie hat to fall off so she can bite it to see if it’s edible.

  We’re in the very back section of the cemetery, close to Harper’s house, about five slots from the main road. Two big pines shade us from the late-day sun, but I’ve got Fred’s cage on the ground next to my dirt pile because the branches seem too far away. I smile at her every time I pop my head up to make sure I’m not dumping rocks and mud on Marvin’s feet.

  “Is Harper already drunk?” he asks, taking a breather from trying to brainwash my parrot into calling herself names. Whenever he moves, I catch a hint of cookie smell, kind of stale, but still enough to make my stomach growl.

  “Probably. I haven’t seen him this afternoon.”

  Hope I don’t, because I’ve got a sort-of date. The thought makes my insides clench and I plop another shovelful near Marvin’s shoes.

  Should I tell him about the date?

  Probably.

  He might think it’s great. Or he might have a big-deal freak-out, and I just can’t go there, because I’m so nervous about eating dinner with Livia that I’d freak, too.

  Marvin rubs his hands together because it’s a little cool, and Marvin’s hands stay cold, anyway. “Harper’s gonna end bad, Del. You should say something to him.”

  I stop digging, thinking about it, but a few seconds later, I shake my head. “I don’t feel like it’s any of my business. He doesn’t give me any crap about my life.”

  “You’re not pickling your organs.”

  “No, just letting my brain and my big glorious future stagnate, according to Branson and Dr. Mote.” I cram my shovel in the dirt hard enough to rattle my own teeth.

  Marvin’s grin droops at the edges, and his eyes dart toward Fred and Gertrude. We don’t talk about this much, the fact he’s on track for early acceptance at his dream school, Notre Dame, where we were both going to go. I know he’s noticed I haven’t even been bothering with stuff like taking the ACT or doing senior pictures, or even paying for my ring or cap and gown, because I’m not planning to walk in the graduation ceremony, and I’d rather not have jewelry with these dates engraved in gold forever.

  “You’re right,” Marvin says. “Talking to Harper probably wouldn’t help, anyway. Why ask for trouble?” He glances down at his watch.

  My fingers curl tight around the shovel’s handle. “Exactly. That’s why it’s not happening.”

  “Good. Well, gotta fly.” He sounds relieved, and I don’t know if it’s about me not talking to Harper about his booze or the fact he’s getting to leave.

  “Cookies don’t fly. Especially cookies with rubber chocolate-chip heads.”

  Marvin ignores this and tosses me a small can of tuna. “Give Gertrude her special dinner, okay?”

  “Su kitty es mi kitty.” I give him a salute with the can. “Mi big fat huge drooling kitty.”

  “Carapedo,” he calls back as he jogs toward his car, which is parked on Rock Hill’s main road.

  Carapedo. That’s like, what? Oh. Fart face.

  I got an A in Spanish and Marvin barely got a B, but he remembers every phrase, name, and swear word we ever heard.

  “Cerote,” I fire back as loud as I can, resting the tuna can on the edge of the grave. That’s one of the words for turd, and the best I can do on short notice. Marvin wins. Again.

  I need to buy a Spanish-English dictionary and look up how to say Giant Cookie-Headed Bastard-Nose. Then I’d have a shot at scoring a few points.

  “Cerote,” Fred says brightly, keeping herself fluffed against the cool fall air. “Jerk.”

  Gertrude’s not saying anything, but she’s staring at the tuna can like her head might start spinning right before she levitates and spits pea soup vomit everywhere and screeches OPEN NOW! in Satan’s voice.

  I risk cat possession and finish the grave I’m working on first, then climb out next to Fred’s cage and dust my hands on my jeans. It takes a few seconds to fight the pop-top lid off Gertrude’s tuna, and I dump the juice on my dirty shirt trying—stinky crap. The tuna I pile carefully on the tarp in front of Gertrude, but I don’t give her the can, because she’d probably cut her tongue on it trying to get every last drop of tuna water. I cram the lid into the can before I stuff the whole mess in my pocket.

  “Fred,” Fred says in a mocking tone, and I feel sad that in a month or so, it’ll be too cold to bring her with me, and she’ll probably sulk and pluck feathers off her belly every afternoon I have to work.

  Gas and propane heaters emit exhaust fumes that could hurt her, so I can’t use them. I’ve been wondering, though, if I could find a battery-operated plant
grow light that would give off enough heat that I would only have to abandon her during the worst part of winter. The part where Harper and I have to use pickaxes to chop up frozen dirt to get the graves started. Nothing needs to be near us when the pickaxes start flying, anyway.

  Somebody’s walking through the main gate, and I recognize Livia immediately. She waves at me. I wave back.

  Guilt washes through me as I let my hand fall to my side.

  What the hell am I feeling guilty about?

  Cheating on Cory.

  Stupid. Cory’s been gone for three years. That’s over. No contact. Your choice.

  Not telling Marvin about my sort-of date.

  Marvin doesn’t have to know every detail of my life.

  Not telling Livia she shouldn’t be having dinner with a sex offender.

  Now, there’s a reason for guilt.

  This afternoon she’s wearing jeans and a black sweater, and she looks more like a fashion model than a Fairy Girl, and I’m sweaty and covered with dirt, and I smell like Gertrude’s tuna juice.

  Great.

  I knew I had a sort-of date, and I’m filthy and I stink. No doubt Marvin does much, much better with his rubber cookie head. At least cookies smell good.

  Livia has her bag plus a second bag, and she comes up to the dirt pile separating Fred’s cage from Gertrude and me and the fast-disappearing tuna pile, and sits down on the drier part of the dirt next to Fred.

  “Poor thing. She looks cold.” Livia smiles at the bird, then at me, and I like that a lot.

  “She probably is cold, a little.” I settle myself about an arm’s length away, on another dry patch of clods and rocks, and Livia pulls a small blanket out of one bag and spreads it on the ground between us. “Parrots can stand low temperatures for short periods of time, but she doesn’t have all her feathers, so I try to be careful.”

  “Cerote,” Fred says.

  Livia’s eyebrows pull together. “What was that?”

  “Nothing.” I jam my palm into the dirt and glare at Fred. “Sometimes she mumbles.”

  “Jerk,” Fred says, dancing from foot to foot, obviously happy with herself. “One, two, four, jerk!”