We stand under the faint glow of the motion light on my front porch, both of us looking at our feet.
“Do…. do you want to come up to my room?”
My body is hobbled with fear right after I say it. I know what this means. I know exactly what he’s going to think by me proposing this.
What the hell am I trying to do here?
“The sacred bedroom? Am I worthy?”
I’m ok with this.
“I think maybe you’ve earned it.”
Who the hell am I? Who says something like that?
We tiptoe up the stairs with our shoes in our hands, even though I know for sure we are completely alone. Mom and Dad were supposed to go to dinner tonight for a ‘meeting,’ which is just code for a congregation with their divorce lawyer. I nudge the door open to my room and hold my breath as Owen steps in and analyzes everything. He seems so out of place, like a feral cat sniffing around his new owner’s house. Fascinated by everything in this exotic, new world.
I try to remain silent, letting him acquaint himself without doing anything to spook him. It takes all of my energy to stifle my screams of embarrassment. Why did I think this was a good idea? He fluffs a pillow, picks up a framed picture of me and my dad for a closer look, kicks a deflated football, and shakes my anxiety-reducing pinball game around in his hand. He runs his fingers over the dresser and picks up my Cognitive Psychology book.
“Pleasure reading?”
“Kind of. Mr. Berry recommended the author to me. He said this particular book would be a good thing to read to help prepare me for next year’s introductory courses.”
He sets the heavy textbook back down on my desk and moves towards the corner. I hold my breath.
“What’s all of this?”
Shit. A drunken lapse of judgment on my part, that’s what. This is something I never intended for him to see. It’s all mine. Only mine.
“It’s…it’s a dollhouse.”
I wince as he bends down and peeks in. How can I explain this to him? Maybe I have a half sister from one of my father’s illicit affairs, and I keep this in my room for her to play with when she comes to visit?
“I’m sure you think I’m insane for still having a dollhouse,” I say, ready to gush on about my imaginary little sister and her affinity for dolls.
He picks up the kitchen table and turns it over in his fingers. The tiny wooden structure makes him look like a giant—one squeeze and he could shatter it into a million jagged toothpicks. He grabs Samantha in the other and it takes everything in me to hold in my panicky scream.
“Did I say that Maura?”
He sits down Indian-style and starts to examine more furniture. The couch I upholstered myself. The pink and blue polka-dot bed frame. The high-chair for the new baby. The mom and dad, dressed in their respective stereotypical wholesome family attire. Then he does the craziest thing. He smiles.
“This is amazing. Did you do all of this yourself?”
I sit down on the edge of my bed and allow my legs to relax a bit. He scoots himself across the carpet and lets his head fall against my knees. His gelled spikes poke into my bare thigh but I don’t give a damn.
“Yeah, most of it. My dad originally started all of this with me a long time ago but…well…I sort of took it over as my own project. It’s pretty much done, I just have a few more little things to do.”
“Why did your dad stop helping you?” Owen asks, bringing himself up to my bed and sitting next to me. Our knees are touching and he lets his hand rest on mine. “Because he stopped playing football?”
I moisten my lips and try to stop all of the memories of my dad from infiltrating my brain. It hurts too much.
“Yeah, when he got the knee injury he was forced into retirement, and he kind of retired from a lot of other things as well,” I say, my eyes getting misty with beer tears.
Owen reaches up and pulls the rubber bands out of my braids, ever so delicately unraveling my tangles of dark brown that I have grown to loathe my entire life. But the way he strokes each strand as he sticks them behind my ears makes the tips of my fingers tingle with anticipation.
“What’s the status of the whole situation with your parents?” he asks, as if this is really what I want to talk about right now. His fingers push the remainder of my hair away from my neck and his lips are on my bare skin before I can find a moment to speak. They brush against me like hummingbird wings, quick and light. I force my voice to get unstuck from my throat.
“Um…. nothing’s certain yet. I don’t want to talk about anything until I know for certain.”
He cups my face in his palms and kisses me hard. Our noses push into each other and I can’t catch my breath. He grips my forearms and pushes me on my back. Our kisses get more frantic and our teeth bang into each other. A car horn shrieks outside, making both of us jump. He sits up and I grab the chance to collect myself as he pulls off the top half of his gladiator costume. His wild fingers paw at my beer maid skirt, untying the apron and un-tucking the blouse. I grip the comforter underneath of me as I try to keep focus.
Oh Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
He lays his body on top of mine. I can feel his groin area press into my thigh and I hold on to the comforter for dear life. Even though we’ve gotten to this point several times before, my breath still catches in my throat and I panic as a wave of fear sweeps through my veins.
I close my eyes and let him unbutton my blouse and run his fingers over the lacey edges of my bra. His fingertips are rough and cold as the poke around underneath of the wire, pleading for its removal.
“What you said before, did you mean it?” I say as he starts running his lips over my bare stomach. My breathing gets too fast. He must be able to notice my stomach rupturing up and down.
“What?”
The pads of his fingers start to trace the inside of my thigh, making small, deliberate circles that make my knees quake. I bring my eyes over to the dollhouse and catch a glimpse of Samantha sitting on the edge of her bed, watching. It’s moments like this when I wish she truly were an actual, flesh-and-blood person with whom I could converse. Deciding whether or not to sleep with your sexually starved boyfriend is precisely the kind of conversation that is meant to be shared between close girlfriends.
“You know…the…. that WORD,” I mumble, bringing my focus back to him. His eyes are glittery with anticipation, darting all around like an ADHD kid who’s consumed a ten-pound bag of overly sugared candy. He takes a moment to wipe the sweat from his forehead before he starts devouring me again.
I wrap my fingers around his and pull them up to my chest. He’s not having any of it. Instead, he uses his left arm to bring both my hands above my head, placing them on the bed frame and securing them with his own. The right arm goes back down to the thigh. But this time he’s tugging on the edge of my underwear.
“I’ve said many words tonight, dear,” he breathes into my mouth as he kisses me again, finally taking the time to respond to me. He’s vigorous and rough, and I have a hard time not gagging on his pulsating tongue.
Not yet.
I can’t until I hear those words again.
“Starts with an L…” I whisper, hoping to jog his exceptionally short memory. He pulls away and leans on his elbow next to me. I guess he needs to take in some oxygen to remember.
“You mean when I said I loved you?”
A smile spreads across my face as he tickles the back of my neck—a smile so big that my cheeks ache.
“That’s the one,” I whisper.
He wraps his fingers around the top of my skirt and swiftly pulls it off, leaving me lying on the bed in my high-waisted, bleach-stained pink panties. Shit. I did not think I was going to be allowing myself to be seduced tonight—I might have made a run to the mall and attempted to pick out something a little more appealing if I had any sort of inkling.
“So did you mean it?” I ask as his fingers poke around underneath of my panties.
“Of course I meant
it. You’re amazing.”
My entire body fills with light. Owen LOVES me. This boy, for some unknown reason, actually LOVES me.
“I…I love you too,” I say, pulling his body tightly against mine. I sense that I’m about to lose all control, pushing my hips into his and pulling at the waist of his pants. I’m giving him the illusion that I might actually have some clue as to what I’m doing.
I was never brave enough to tell him the truth.
“I have protection…” he purrs into my ear.
I let go of his belt loops and look into his eyes. They’re filled with hope and eagerness, like a kid on Christmas morning. I can’t deny him his presents now. He’s waited so patiently all year.
“You want to?” he says. My mind is screaming for me to say ‘no, I’m fucking terrified out of my mind,’ but I smoother those ideas. I’ve been waiting all of my life to hear those staggering words Owen sighed into my ears tonight. I have everything I’ve ever wanted now. And besides, there’s no way I can bring him to this point and let my own personal fears hold everything back.
He LOVES me.
“Oh…ok, yeah…” I say, not recognizing my own voice or the words coming out of my mouth.
He jumps off and grabs the top half of his costume off the ground. After a moment or two of digging, he pulls out a shiny blue square. Before I get the chance to contemplate why and how he managed to stash a condom in his skimpy gladiator getup, the front door of the house slams, shaking my wall.
“Fuck, my mom’s home!” I screech. Owen simply stares at me, waiting for direction.
And then I hear his voice float up the stairwell.
“WITH my dad. Fuck my life.”
Owen snaps up and scrambles to collect all of the pieces to his costume. “Um, how the hell do I get out of here?” he breathes, his lips twitching with the fear of my dad throwing the door open and catching him in the act of defiling his daughter. I’ve told enough stories about my dad to strike this very necessary fear into every fiber of his being.
“There’s a fire escape ladder—use that,” I say, pointing to my window. “I’ll call you tomorrow?”
I lean in for a kiss as he lowers himself onto the first rung, but he’s too focused on watching his bare feet and keeping his balance.
“Yeah, ok.”
I wait until I hear Owen’s feet hit the dusty driveway below before I jump over to the dollhouse and pull the notebook out of its hiding spot—underneath Samantha’s bed. My fingers are so jittery that the first few words are pretty much illegible.
Dear Samantha,
Ok, so I realize you saw everything. What do you think? Should
I sleep with him? We’ve messed around before, but he’s never come out and actually asked me like he did tonight. I think I want to. Scratch that. I know I want to.
I’m so sick and tired of sitting back and letting things happen around me. I’ve never been the instigator for any of my own life events. But I want to. With Owen. No one has ever loved me before. My parents, of course, but they’re obligated to. He’s not. He loves me on his own volition. When he touches me, my body tingles and feels like it’s waking up from the dead. I think my body truly was dead until he came along.
I can’t wait to bring it back to life with him.
“Maura?”
Shit. Of course he’s going to want to interrogate me about my summer plans and scan his judging eyes over me a few times while he listens to me struggle for an appropriate response. I pull a pair of sweatpants over my nearly naked bottom half and grab my hoodie as I throw the door open. I lean back and take a mental picture of my smiling face as I glance in the mirror before I go. I’m confident. I can handle him right now. I can handle anything.
“You’ve failed to return any of my phone calls.”
He’s standing in the stairwell, studying me and my haphazard outfit as I push my way past him. And I’m pretty sure he notices my I-almost-had-sex hair as well.
Whatever.
“Sorry Dad, I was busy with finals and all.”
I start to make my way to the kitchen, but he grabs my elbow before I can even get off the bottom stair.
“Can you come and sit down with us? We would like to have a family meeting.”
I stroll towards the front door and pull back the curtain to the window. I scan the street to make sure Owen is far, far away from this place. He has yet to meet my parents since we started officially dating, and he’s not about to now.
“Maura, I’m sorry about everything that’s happened between us.”
I feel his arm on my shoulder. I shudder.
“And I brought you a graduation present.”
He turns me around and hands me an envelope and stares at me. I tear it across the top and pull out a check—a check addressed to me for $1,000.
“I just want you to understand that I’m proud of you. Graduating with a 3.8 GPA…that’s just marvelous. I knew you could do it.”
You mean you knew you could give me no other choice BUT to do it.
“We all need to move on. You’re going to college soon. You’ll get a chance to be out on your own and experience the world a little. It’ll be good for you.”
He lets his arms fall to his side and steps in closer to me.
“Thanks for the money Dad,” I say as I cross mine around my body. I stuff the check in my pocket and look down at my feet. Mom comes in carrying a tray of steamy mugs. She sets one down on the table in front of me but I pretend not to notice.
“Maura, why are you so angry with me?” he asks, locking his eyes onto mine like a straight jacket. He moves his body into me so Mom can’t see his worried face. The words burn in my heart, and I want nothing more than to let them out, but I can’t. Not tonight.
“Nothing,” I say, trying to keep my voice as flat as if I were reading off a list of ingredients for a cake recipe. Dad’s eyes start to blink rapidly and he turns away from me.
“Can we get on with this family meeting please?” I say as I sit on the old apricot-colored sofa Mom picked up form a consignment shop last month. The rancid fabric still smells like wet towels, no matter how many hours she spends scrubbing it with disinfectant. They sit on the family couch across from me, but on opposite ends. The space between us feels a million times longer than it actually is.
“Ok,” Dad says sitting down and taking a sip of his tea. “Maura…we’re getting a divorce.”
He says it so matter-of-factly. Almost like he was practicing it out in the car right before he came in here. I look at Mom, but she just keeps her eyes on her hands, folded in her lap.
“Jesus, you couldn’t find a way to segue in a little bit?”
“It was your mother’s idea to just be blunt.”
“Whatever,” I snap. “It’s not like this is a surprise. I’m not stupid enough to think that you were meeting with a lawyer just for the hell of it.”
She finally sits up, clears her throat, and smoothes out her blouse.
“Your father’s going to be moving out for good this time, but I would like to stay here so that you can still have a home.”
I feel completely numb, like all of the blood in my body is being replaced with ice. It burns.
“We can’t afford to have one of us stay here Alexis, you know that. Why would you get her hopes up like that?”
Each of my fingers turns into little individual icicles now.
“Your mother will probably go stay with her sister. The house has to get put up for sale as soon as possible.”
Any moment now I’ll be able to break them, let them fall to the ground, and watch them melt away.
“No, I can’t stay with her.”
I snap my eyes shut. I need a break for just a moment.
My parents decided to renew their wedding vows when I was five. I still remember everything about that day.
“Ok, your mother then?”
We went back to the same church where they were married, and they even found the same minister to per
form the service. I got to be the flower girl.
“No, I’m not doing that Vadim. I’ll figure something out on my own.”
I realize that I haven’t taken a breath for I don’t know how long. I gasp. A terrifying cry escapes my throat when I do. Mom rushes over and pulls my head into her lap. I knew this was coming. It was painfully obvious. So why am I crying now? Why am I wasting my tears on a relationship that’s been on life support for years?
“Nobody here’s to blame for any of this, honey. Everything is going to work out fine.”
“Whose fault is it then, Mom?” I demand, pushing myself up from her arms and pulling my body to the floor.
“Your father was taken advantage of by a woman at work.”
I pull my hoodie far enough over my head so that my face is covered as well.
“She blackmailed him and did everything in her power to tear him down. The competition to make homicide detective in this city is intense.”
I dig my top teeth into my lip. Blood fills my mouth. All I can taste is metal.
“Mom, just STOP. I get it. There’s no reason to carry this on anymore,” I cry, trying to keep the desperate pleading out of my voice. I keep my eyes closed and count my breaths, 1,2,3,4…1,2,3,4 as everyone else remains quiet. After a few minutes Mom eventually gets up and starts to straighten things out in the living room.
And just like that, it’s over. It only took 1.5 minutes of conversation to tell me that everything I have known up until this moment—my family, my home, and my world—is gone. I’ve spent more time brushing my damn teeth than they did incinerating all of our lives.
“So I must say that I’m comforted to know that you picked State. It will be good for your mom to have you so close to home.”
Dad’s sitting on the apricot couch now. I can smell his trashy, pervert cologne wafting into my nose and it makes me want to smack him in the face.
“Have you given any more interest as to what you’re going to get involved with while you’re there? I’ve heard they have an excellent debate team.”
That’s it.
“Mom, Dad. I have my own announcement.”
I spring up and pull my hood down. I don’t care if they see my teary eyes or my chewed up lip. I just don’t care anymore.
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