by Anne Dayton
I step up to the counter and pull out Ed’s old leather wallet. The teller’s eyes widen at how thick it is.
“I’d like to open an account please.”
“My goodness,” she says, patting her teased hair. “Don’t tell me you’ve had all that stashed under your mattress.” Her name tag says Brenda Bonilla, Here to Help.
“My underwear drawer.” It’s mostly tens and twenties, so it looks much more impressive than it really is, but it’s every penny I’ve managed to squirrel away from my paycheck. What hasn’t gone toward groceries or gas has gone here. I lay the final bills on the counter and push the stack toward her.
She laughs and holds up one finger, telling me to wait, then she opens a drawer and pulls out a couple pieces of paper.
“So you decided to keep it somewhere safer.” She nods as she shoves the papers across the counter toward me.
“Something like that.” The truth is, I didn’t really know I’d amassed this much, and once I counted it—it’s a little more than $700—it seemed silly to have it just sitting there. Childish. Adults save money in banks, not drawers. And if I’m ever going to be able to save enough for a car, I’ll have to do it like an adult. This way I can cash my own checks, without waiting for Dreamy. It’s time to grow up.
“If you could please fill this out, I’ll start . . . verifying the amount.” She eyes the pile of money suspiciously, but I reach for the pen on the chain and begin to fill in my information on the forms.
It takes Brenda Here to Help almost fifteen minutes to count up the stacks of bills, then she hands me a temporary ATM card.
“And are you depositing all of your money today, ma’am?” She pushes her glasses up on her nose and reaches for a deposit slip.
“Actually,” I look down at the paper where she’s listed my total. “No. I . . .” I pull my lower lip in. It feels so silly, after all those hours of work, and when there are so many things my parents could use the money for, and yet—“I’d like to keep a hundred,” I say as confidently as I can. “There’s . . . there’s something I need to buy.”
Brenda nods and writes the new total on the deposit slip, then hands me five crisp twenty-dollar bills.
“Thank you for doing business with us, Ms. Fairchild,” she says, and I smile as I slip my money into Ed’s old wallet. That Ms. Fairchild thing. That felt nice.
***
Dean is sprawled out at one of the booths when I walk into El Bueno Burrito, reading On the Road by Jack Kerouac. He jumps up and starts to walk toward me.
“He’s been here all day waiting for you,” Gus says by way of a greeting. Dean grins at me, but I pretend I don’t see him and make my way to the back. “This guy must be muy loco for you.” Gus wiggles his eyebrows and smiles from ear to ear, thrilled at his own ability to speak basic rudimentary Spanish.
“Zoe, just give me a minute,” Dean says, reaching out toward me. “I need to talk to you.”
“I have to work.” I shake my head and storm into the back.
“I’ll be here when you come back out,” Dean says, but I ignore him and grab a clean apron from the stack. I hear Gus’s voice and lean in to listen.
“That’s it, amigo.”
“If you’d let me talk to her for a moment, I promise I’ll leave and not come back.”
I tie a knot behind my back and edge closer to the wall, pressing my body to it.
“Comrade Zoe is the boss around here,” my actual boss says. It’s funny. A weird kind of friendship has developed between me and Gus. “She doesn’t want to see you, so you have to go.”
“But I—”
“You have to go now, amigo.” I hear a few steps and then the sound of Dean sighing.
I roll over, press my back to the wall, and stare up at the ceiling. Maybe I should have listened to him.
46
“What are you doing?” Ana screws up her face at Christine, who’s doing some kind of weird dance in front of a rack of sequined dresses.
“I’m making a music video for the security guards.” Christine waves up at the tiny security camera stuck to the ceiling and continues to twirl her arms around in front of her. “You can be one of my backup dancers.” She starts making beat box noises with her mouth, and Ana shakes her head.
“Zoe, what about this one?” Riley holds up a gorgeous shimmery chocolate-brown gown. It has a fitted bodice and a smooth satin skirt. It’s perfect.
“How much?”
Riley shrugs and shoves it out toward me. “Just try it on.”
I take it from her and try to ignore the silky feel of the fabric while I dig for the price tag. I’ve learned not to fall in love too easily. Prom dresses, like guys, are fickle, and all the good ones are out of my league.
“Two hundred and eighty dollars?!” I shove it back at her. “Riley, that’s not even in the right ballpark.”
“Lucky we’re not playing baseball.” She shrugs and hangs it back on the rack. “I just think you need to try a few things on so you can get a sense for what looks good.”
“And I think you should stop being ridiculous and try to help me.”
For the record, a hundred dollars is not enough to buy a dress you’d actually want to wear to the prom. You can get something cheesy, or some leftover dress in size extra-, extra-large, but after hours of perusing the shelves, I’m ready to give up. And I didn’t even factor in shoes, or accessories, or whatever kind of weird push-up bra you need to hold these things up. My bank withdrawal is looking more and more pathetic by the hour.
“How about these?” Ana comes back with a handful of plain black dresses. She holds them up, one at a time, and I examine them. They’re not particularly exciting, but they’re closer to the right price range anyway. She’s trying, which is more than I can say for Christine, who’s currently perfecting her moonwalk.
The other girls have it so easy. Ana’s mom is taking her to some boutique in San Francisco next weekend, but then for Ana, price is never a concern. Christine is threatening to go in jeans, a T-shirt, and a pair of Chucks, and Riley’s been Homecoming Princess every year, so she already has dozens of dresses in the closet. Even if I had something I’d want to wear again, I don’t fit into anything I bought before last summer.
“You guys, maybe this was a bad idea.” I take the dresses from Ana and fold them over my arm. “You should just go without me.”
“Don’t even think about it, Red. If I’m going, you’re going,” Christine calls without looking away from the camera.
“We’ll find something, Zoe,” Riley says, waving my concern away. “Don’t you dare try to back out of this. You’re going to the prom, Cinderella.”
***
The house is dark when I get home, and as soon as I step inside, I can see that the only light is coming from the kitchen. Nick doesn’t officially move out until this weekend, but he started his new job this week, so he’s hardly been around. It must be Dreamy. I kick off my shoes and walk toward the back of the house.
Dreamy has papers spread all over the table. “Hey Zo,” she calls as I walk into the room. She takes off her reading glasses and presses the tips of her finger to the bridge of her nose.
“Hey.” I plop down on one of the kitchen chairs and smile at her. “What’s all this?”
She sighs. “My application for City College.” She spreads out some of the papers. “If it’s this challenging to apply, I can’t imagine what the actual classes are going to be like.”
“Wow.” I prop my feet up on the chair next to me. “That’s so cool. You’re actually doing it.”
“I’m trying, anyway.”
“I’m glad.” My heart swells with pride. This is a huge opportunity for her.
“While you were out, some boy called for you.” She levels her eyes at me. “I think his name was Dean? He asked me if I could have you call him back.”
“Ugh.” When Nick was growing up, girls would call the house for him all the time, but that was before cell phones. It may be los
t on Dreamy, but Dean is getting pretty desperate to call our landline. I push myself up, and my chair scrapes along the ground. I walk over to the cabinet and grab a glass, then pour myself a tall glass of water from the pitcher in the refrigerator. “Did you ask him how he got this number?”
“I did not. There’s this thing called the phone book, you know.” Dreamy watches me, eyebrows raised, as I take a sip. “But it did make me realize that I haven’t heard from Marcus in a while.”
“Yeah.” I take a long, cool gulp.
“It must be a couple of months since he’s been over here.” Dreamy stares at me, and I turn away. Has it been that long since we’ve really talked? She waits. I refill my glass and sigh. It’s going to have to come out sooner or later.
“Marcus and I broke up.” I flop back onto the chair and put my glass on the table. “A while ago. I’m not really sure what happened.”
“Was it a mutual thing?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. Not really.” I slide a coaster under my glass. “I kind of made him do it, which I thought would be easier, but . . .”
“I’m sorry, honey.” Dreamy shakes her head and seems to be lost in her own thoughts for a moment. “You don’t seem that upset about it, though.”
I trace my finger along the cool fog on the glass, making a Z.
“I am. Or was.” I bite my lip, picturing his sad face on that day. “Am.”
Dreamy taps the end of her pen on the table. “Zoe, do you want to be with Marcus?”
I move onto an O, sliding my finger along the smooth surface of the glass, trying to make a perfect circle. I feel like I’m being cross-examined.
“No.” I shake my head. “I guess not.”
“I didn’t think so.”
“Huh?”
“Honey.” Dreamy laughs. “I’m your mother. I know you pretty well.” She clears her throat.
I look back down at the table. She couldn’t mean . . . I feel my cheeks flush. All those nights on the porch, when I thought everyone was asleep.
“I wait up for you, Zoe.” She shushes me before I have a chance to get indignant. “I don’t mean to. It’s not like that. But I’m a mother, and I can’t fall asleep until I know you’re safe at home. So I knew there was someone new.”
There’s really not enough room on my glass for an E, but I try to squeeze it in anyway.
“There’s nothing wrong with it. You’ve . . . changed. You’ve grown up. And Marcus.” She collects her papers into a neat stack. “Well, Marcus is young. He’s a good guy, and you got lucky to have him as your first boyfriend, but . . .”
I underline the whole name and accidentally wipe out the bottom rung of the E. “I did really like him. I’m not one of those girls who—”
“I know you did.” Dreamy’s voice is low and soothing. “But that doesn’t mean you had to stay together forever once you stopped caring about him.”
“But he’s so nice. He never, ever did anything wrong,” I say before I can stop myself. “I tried to stay with him. I didn’t want to hurt him.”
“And that probably ended up hurting him more in the end,” she says quietly. I nod. She puts her pen down and leans forward a bit.
“You guys are teenagers. Some people get it right on their first try, but most don’t, and that’s okay.”
I don’t answer.
“Zoe, look at me.”
I peer up at her, clutching my cool glass.
“I have no idea who you’ll end up with or how you’ll get there, honey. But I can tell you one thing. You’ll know. When the right person comes along, you won’t have to ask yourself whether it’s right. We were made to love, designed for it. That’s part of how God put us together. And when you find the right person, every cell in your body will know it.”
She stares into my eyes so intensely I have to look away. I wipe out my whole name with my balled-up fist.
“But relationships fall apart all the time.” I start to choke up, but I force myself to get the words out. “Even when people ‘know’ and promise to stay together forever, sometimes they end up screwing the whole thing up.”
Dreamy takes several deep breaths before she opens her mouth, but even then she stumbles over her words.
“Marriage is hard, Zoe, and it’s . . . it’s a lifelong commitment. And sometimes, it’s . . . it doesn’t work out the way you’d hope. But sometimes it does. Your father and I . . . ” She waits so long I’m almost afraid she’s not going to go on, but then quietly she does. I hold my breath. “We really, really love each other.”
My hopes soar, just a little.
“We’re going to try.” She picks up her pen again and starts drawing square, even boxes on her paper. “I don’t know what it’s going to look like, but we’re going to try to make it work again. I know you were fighting for this.”
“I—”
“I knew what you were doing, and I appreciate it.” She reaches across the table and puts her hand under my chin. She tilts my head up, forcing me to look into her eyes. “Without you trying to make us keep going, we would never be giving it one more shot.”
“What about the divorce?”
“It may still happen. But your father, your sweet, stubborn father, never signed the papers.” She shakes her head as tears spring to her eyes. “We all want it to work out, but there are no guarantees. I need you to keep fighting for us.”
I nod. The ticking of the kitchen clock is the only sound for a few minutes.
“But you and Marcus . . . that’s different. It didn’t work out, and that’s okay. You’ve got plenty more shots at love in your future.” She reaches for my hand. “Maybe it’s time you forgive yourself.”
I let her words sink in for a moment. Maybe she’s right. I need to forgive myself and I need to . . . oh my. How have I not done that yet? I think about Marcus, how heartbroken he looked that day I chose Dean in the quad, and I know there’s something else I need to do.
“So if Marcus is out of the picture, are you skipping the prom?” Dreamy stands up and puts her application papers into a manila envelope on the counter.
I put my head on the kitchen table for a moment and groan. “I don’t know if I want to go. It seems like a waste of money.”
“Maybe this other guy would want to go?”
I snort. “Trust me, you only say that because you have no idea.” Dean would never go to the prom. He’s made that abundantly clear—and I’m not going to the prom with him, for sure.
“You should go, Zo. You’re only young once.”
“Well.” I sit up. “Riley wants the Miracle Girls to go together, but I can’t find a dress that I like and now I’m kind of wondering if it’s a sign I shouldn’t go.”
“I’ll take you shopping. I might be able to help you find something.”
I don’t know how to respond. It’s not that I don’t want to go with her but, well, I don’t want her to spend money on something like this.
“Maybe I can borrow something from Riley.” I’m several inches taller than Riley, and she’s more athletic, but it’s all I can think of at the moment to get Dreamy off my trail.
Dreamy’s eyes go glassy, and she looks like she’s somewhere far away. Then it’s like she comes to, and she stands up suddenly. “I don’t know if this would interest you or not,” she says, walking into the living room. I hear the stairs start to vibrate, and I realize she’s headed up to the second floor. I don’t know what else to do, so I follow her.
I find her digging in the back of her closet. I sit down on the edge of her water bed, and she comes out with a big cardboard box.
“Maybe these are way out of fashion now, I don’t know. I think these are the kinds of things kids are wearing again.” Oh no. Her old clothes. I brace myself for some hideous seventies psychedelic monstrosities. My mother has never kept up on fashion, even in current times. There’s no way her clothes from thirty years ago are going to work. “If you wanted to try them on, you’re welcome to.” She opens the bo
x and begins pulling out dresses.
I hold up the first one and suck in my breath. It’s actually cute. It’s mod style, with a wide band of fabric around the neck and a matching swath at the bottom of the short skirt. It’s not formal enough for prom, but it’s totally cool.
“You had this in the closet all this time?”
She keeps digging, pulling out layers and layers of old clothes. I lift up a light blue dress that drapes over the shoulders and a short tennis-style skirt.
“Aha.” She reaches down to the bottom of the box and pulls out a long, soft bluish-green dress with a structured bodice and spaghetti straps. When she holds it up, it hangs beautifully, and it’s so simple it’s elegant. I take it from her and stand up, pressing it against my body.
“I know it’s not what you’d find in the stores these days, but your grandmother made it for my prom.”
“No, it’s beautiful.” I walk to the bedroom door and pull it shut, holding the dress up in front of me in the full-length mirror on the back of the door. It’s not like the sparkly, bright dresses everyone else will be wearing, but it’s beautiful fabric—it feels like silk—and it’s gorgeous in its simplicity. “I love it.” It kind of smells like mothballs, but we can fix that.
“Let’s see if it fits,” Dreamy says, ushering me into the bathroom off her bedroom. I come out a few minutes later with the dress on, my bra straps peeking out of the top, and I look in the mirror. It fits like it was made for me, which I guess makes sense because it was made for my mom when she was my age.
“You’re taller than I was, but I can let out the bottom a bit.” Dreamy crosses her arms over her chest, but I can see that she’s pleased too.
I run my fingers down the smooth silk. It feels weird to be wearing her dress, but somehow wearing it makes me feel like I understand a bit more of what made my mother into the woman she is. For some reason, that feels right.