Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can't Have

by Allen Zadoff

  I walk into homeroom the next day and the class bursts into applause. I guess when the whole school sees you at a pep rally in your football uniform, word gets around. Anyone who didn’t know me before knows me now.

  What do you do when your homeroom applauds for you? It’s weird. I nod and wave like I’ve seen O. do. I thank a couple people and accept their congratulations. Then I move to my regular seat in the back of the room.

  I notice Nancy Yee isn’t applauding. She’s buried neck deep in a copy of Infinite Jest. It looks like she’s reading a phone book.

  I ignore her and sit down.

  Almost.

  I’m halfway in my chair when I suddenly get stuck. I push a little harder, thinking maybe I hit it at the wrong angle, but I don’t slide in like I normally do. I jam.

  I know I’ve been getting bigger the last few weeks. Coach calls it bulking up.

  “You need mass to work the line,” he told me. “Eat carbs. And for God’s sake, try to enjoy it. Things change when you get older. Believe you me.”

  So I ate carbs. I enjoyed them, too.

  Now my mass is greater than the chair will allow. I’m not getting in, so I reverse direction and manage to extract myself with a loud pop.

  The Physics of Fat. Lousy timing.

  Nancy Yee is looking at me now. She’s wearing a frayed denim skirt and a T-shirt with colored threads coming out of it in every direction. Her hair is all shaggy. She looks like a big ball of yarn that was attacked by a cat.

  “You actually like sitting in the back row, don’t you? Sitting alone and reading.”

  “I don’t want to talk to you,” she says. She lifts her hands like she’s not interested in fighting with me. I look at her shirt again. I squint my eyes and the threads form into a shape.

  Sushi. She’s wearing a sushi shirt.

  Jesus Christ.

  “Have you ever heard of the Gap?” I say.

  She doesn’t say anything.

  “It’s where normal people shop. In case you didn’t know.”

  I go to the back of the room. Warner’s there, of course. He’s been standing back there all semester.

  I stand next to him. Now neither of us fit.

  I slam my books down on the counter. There’s a poster that says, ¿CÓMO ESTÁ USTED? with a lot of pictures of faces with different expressions on them. TRISTE. FELIZ. CONFUDIDO. ENOJADO.

  I’m enojado.

  “Thanks for the other day,” Warner says. “With Ugo. You know.”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “You saved me.”

  “I can’t save you,” I say. “Nobody can save anybody.”

  Warner smiles uncomfortably. “What’s going on?” he says. “You seem upset.”

  “You wouldn’t understand.”

  He just looks at me. Doesn’t say a word.

  “It’s football, Warner. I don’t expect you to know anything about it.”

  “I didn’t want to play football,” he says.

  “What do you mean you didn’t want to?”

  “Coach asked me, and I said no.”

  “Which coach?”

  “You know. Coach Bryson.”

  “He asked you to play football?”

  “The first week. He told me they needed a big guy to play center this year. He asked me, like, two or three times, but I said no way.”

  My mind is spinning. I’m thinking about the Neck, the newspaper article in my pocket. I’m remembering the time I saw Warner coming out of Coach’s office at the beginning of the semester.

  “It’s cool that you’re doing it,” Warner says. “But you’re a lot braver than me. I didn’t want to get killed. That Everest guy, you know?”

  “You’ve heard of Everest?” I say.

  “Everyone’s heard of him.”

  I’m the biggest idiot in history. This proves it.

  Ms. Weston is in the middle of taking roll when I say, “I have no place to sit.”

  She glances up, nods, and goes back to calling roll.

  “I said I have no place to sit, Ms. Weston.”

  She looks at Warner and me, maybe wondering why she’s suddenly got Easter Island in the back of her room.

  She says, “Can I ask you to take your seat, Mr. Zansky?”

  “I don’t fit in my seat,” I say really loudly. “I’m too big for that little seat.”

  The class shifts around uncomfortably.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “I didn’t know. Maybe we could find another—”

  “I don’t fit anywhere,” I say.

  Everyone’s looking at me now. Even Warner has backed away.

  “I don’t fit in this goddam school,” I say.

  “Watch your language, please,” Ms. Weston says.

  The bell rings, but nobody moves. The show is too good.

  I grab my backpack and sling it around. It knocks a bunch of books off the counter. I stomp towards the door. I don’t know why, but I kick my desk on the way out. It crashes into the wall and tips over with a loud crash.

  april (and other things I don’t want).

  History class. April is sitting where she always sits. My table.

  “Did you know?” I say.

  “Know what?”

  She smiles. It usually makes me happy when she smiles. But not today.

  “Everest,” I say.

  Her smile drops away. “He’s just some big guy,” she says. “Nothing to worry about.”

  “That’s not what I asked, April. Did you know? Before I tried out.”

  “I knew.”

  “So all that time you were being nice to me—was that just to keep me on the team?”

  “How could you say that?” she says.

  I’m putting two and two together in my head. O. saving me in the hall. April flirting with me. Everyone coming to my house. I thought I was making a choice to play football, but I can’t be sure now.

  April looks at me as if she’s really hurt, and for a second I think I’m going to crack. I’m going to apologize for yelling at her, for doubting her in the first place, and then I’m going to sit down and smile and wait for that moment when our thighs bump by mistake under the table. Then I’ll spend the rest of the day thinking about it, pretending she’s my girlfriend.

  Pitiful.

  I don’t crack.

  I don’t sit next to her.

  I walk all the way to the other side of the room and plop down next to Justin. He looks at me like I’m nuts. He’s about to say something, but I grunt, and he keeps his mouth shut.

  April stares at me, frustrated. It’s not like she can come over and make a big scene in front of Justin and the whole class. That would make her look like a fool, and April wouldn’t risk that.

  everywhere he goes.

  I scan the crowd in the cafeteria. I’m looking for O. I’ve got a lot on my mind, a lot of questions to ask him.

  I see groups moving in packs—the jock pack, the geek pack, the loser pack, the hot girls, the cool girls, the sluts, the gearheads, the rockers, the Goths, the Latin kids, the black kids. Groups. Groups.

  I try to remember what this world looked like a few weeks ago. Nobody wanted to know me. The whole room felt dangerous. There was only one place I could sit.

  Now people smile and catch my eye. They wave. Guys I’ve never met before pat me on the back. They say, “Kick ass tomorrow.” Cliché stuff like that.

  I catch sight of O. in the corner of the room. He moves between groups like a presidential candidate. He doesn’t fit anywhere; he fits everywhere. He could even go over to the Geeks if he wanted to. He’d sit down with them and the whole group would instantly change. They’d be Geeks Plus or Super Geeks or something.

  O. can walk anywhere, anytime. He doesn’t have to fit. He moves, and people fit around him.

  He turns around now, and our eyes meet. Something troubling crosses his face.

  I head right for him, but suddenly Caroline Whitney-Smith appears. She starts talking to hi
m about something, and they head out of the room. He glances over his shoulder before they disappear. He mouths something, but I can’t tell what it is. Maybe he says “later.” Maybe it’s “loser.”

  The iPhone vibrates in my pocket. When I look down, I see Dad’s picture. Dad never calls me. It’s always the other way around.

  I plug my ear with one finger.

  “Listen,” Dad says the second I pick up. As if I wouldn’t be listening to my own phone. “Good news,” he says.

  “What?”

  “I can make it tonight.”

  “Make what?”

  “The Brookline game. You invited me, remember?”

  “That’s great, Dad.”

  I must not sound too enthused, because Dad says, “You’re playing, aren’t you?”

  “Sure.”

  “So I’ll finally have a chance to applaud my son from the stands.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I’m ninety percent sure I’ll be there,” Dad says. “Maybe even ninety-five.”

  Dad never commits fully to anything. He always builds in an escape clause. Good lawyering in action.

  “I can’t wait,” I say.

  There’s a pause and then Dad says, “One other thing I need to talk to you about. It’s important.”

  The bell rings.

  “I have to go, Dad.”

  “Oh, that’s right. You’re in school, aren’t you?”

  I glance at my watch. Twelve thirty on Friday. What’s Dad thinking?

  “Can we do it later?” I say.

  “Later,” Dad says.

  He sounds relieved, like whatever it was, he didn’t really want to talk about it in the first place.

  cards and letters.

  I go to O.’s locker after school. It’s not hard to find. There’s a big banner hanging above it that says, NEWTS KICK GRASS with a painted picture of the Newton Newt kicking up a piece of turf and making the Brookline players tumble. There are cards taped all over the wall—good-luck cards, congratulations cards, even Valentine’s Day cards. It’s October. Where the hell do girls get Valentine’s Day cards to give O.? Do they buy extras in February and save them all year?

  I wait around for a few minutes, but I get this creepy feeling like I’m one of O.’s groupies. So I take off down the hall.

  I run into Bison on the stairs. There’s no practice because of the game today, so everyone’s milling around, not knowing what to do with themselves.

  “Have you seen O.?” I say.

  “Dude, he’s looking for you,” Bison says.

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “I think he’s out back. You gettin’ geared up?”

  “First gear,” I say.

  “First gear? Shit. Get into overdrive,” he says. “We’re going to need it.”

  I go out behind the school. It’s weird back here right now. The cheerleaders are off. We’re off. The field is silent and empty. A ghost field.

  Instead of going back, I head towards the equipment shed. It’s our private football domain, one of those state secrets that you don’t know exists unless you’re supposed to know. Sometimes O. and the guys hang out back there.

  As I walk, I take the article about Everest out of my pocket and look at it again. I don’t want it to be real. I want to have imagined the whole thing.

  I look at the picture.

  This same field. Holt on a stretcher. O. looking down at him.

  It’s real.

  I walk around to the back of the shed, and I see that I guessed right. O. is back here making out with Lisa Jacobs. They’re really into it, kissing like crazy, her hands moving up and down his back. It’s one of those moments when the guys on the team would say, “Get a room.”

  That’s what I say now: “Get a room.”

  Only it doesn’t sound funny when I say it. More like I’m angry.

  O. spins around, shocked.

  I see who he’s been kissing, and it’s not his girlfriend.

  It’s April.

  It all happens in slow motion:

  April’s mouth is moving with no sound coming out. O. is saying, “Um, um, um …” I’m standing there with the article in my hand.

  O. finally says, “Andy. Let me explain.”

  That snaps me out of it.

  “Nothing to explain,” I say.

  The article about Everest falls from my hand.

  I run.

  there’s this ringing in my head.

  Everything flies through my mind at a million miles per hour. O. and April. April and O.

  O. at the party with his arm around me, giving me advice about her. April and me walking in the neighborhood. O. and Lisa Jacobs bumping hips the first time I saw them. All of them in my house, begging my mom, pretending like they’re my good friends.

  Why?

  Why am I so stupid?

  Why for any of it?

  The iPhone vibrates in my pocket. I glance at it and see April’s name.

  I hold the phone while it vibrates. I imagine April holding my hand against her lips and humming. I let her hum until she stops.

  The phone buzzes again three minutes later. This time it’s O. I press IGNORE.

  The two of them call me, one after the other, for the next hour.

  I don’t turn the phone off. I just keep pressing IGNORE. I want them to know I’m getting their calls.

  I’m getting them, but I don’t care.

  the hole in the middle.

  “Are you excited, honey?” Mom says. She’s standing in the kitchen cooking mini bagels. Her fingers are spinning dough, twisting and pinching, again and again, so fast they’re a blur. She’s making enough bagels to fill an oil barrel. Literally.

  “Excited about what?” I say.

  “The game,” she says, like I might have gotten hit in the head and forgotten who I am.

  “Really excited,” I say.

  But I’m not excited. I don’t even know what I’m going to do. Not yet.

  “Who are all these bagels for?” I say.

  “I wanted people to have a healthy snack tonight,” Mom says. “Instead of that crap they usually have at games.”

  How does Mom know what they eat at football games? She’s never been to one.

  This is not about the game. Mom started cooking after I told her Dad was coming tonight. She didn’t say anything, just walked into the kitchen and took out a five-pound bag of flour.

  Bagels are Dad’s favorite.

  “Can I have one?” I say.

  “Can you eat before the big game?”

  “Carbs give you energy,” I say.

  “I guess it’s okay,” she says.

  Mom letting me have food? This is a first.

  I put one of the bagels on my finger like a ring, and I chew it off. Half makes it to my mouth, and half falls onto the floor.

  I think about Mom and Dad at the game tonight. Will they sit next to each other? Will they even speak?

  I look at the broken bagel on the floor. Mom’s distracted, so I pick it up and pop it in my mouth. Then I grab two more handfuls so I can eat them alone in my bedroom.

  dad and his echo.

  Mom drops me off in front of school, then she and Jessica go to park the car. Mom wanted to walk in with me, but I told her no. I’m not walking into the big game with my mommy holding my hand. No way.

  I’m heading for the athlete’s entrance when I hear Dad’s voice.

  “Hey, boy-o. Wait up a sec.”

  I feel this burst of excitement inside. Dad came to the game!

  I turn around to say hi, and I stop.

  There’s a woman next to Dad. She’s wearing a cute dress with a sweater around her shoulders. For a second I think it might be my sister, but it’s not.

  It’s Miriam, Dad’s old paralegal.

  “How are you?” Dad says. “Excited, huh?”

  I love how Dad asks a question and answers it at the same time. It’s like he’s having a conversation all by himself, an
d he doesn’t even need you there.

  “You remember Miriam,” Dad says.

  I grunt. I thought Miriam was long gone by now. Why would Dad bring her to my game?

  “Your father is thrilled,” Miriam says. “He’s very proud of you.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “And we really want you to visit us when we’re in New York.”

  Dad gives her a look.

  “What are you talking about?” I say.

  “Miriam is moving to New York with me,” Dad says.

  “I didn’t know.”

  “That’s what I was trying to tell you on the phone this morning.”

  “But you didn’t tell me.”

  “I tried to call you back,” Dad says. “You pressed IGNORE.”

  “Yeah, I was doing a lot of that today.”

  There’s a weird moment while the three of us stand there looking at each other. The Dad Gap again.

  “Are you getting married?” I say.

  “Whoa, whoa,” Dad says, “let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

  Miriam looks away uncomfortably.

  “I have to get inside,” I say.

  “Of course, of course,” Dad says.

  There seems to be an echo tonight. Dad’s saying everything twice.

  “Good luck,” Miriam says.

  Dad reaches over to hug me, but it feels fake, like he’s just putting on a show for Miriam.

  “By the way,” Dad says, “is your mom coming?”

  “She’s parking the car,” I say. “She and Jessica.”

  “Good, good,” Dad says.

  roar (of the crowd).

  “NEWTS, NEWTS, NEWTS!”

  I’m in the locker room all the way in the basement of the school, but I can still hear the crowd. The energy vibrates through the whole building. Friday night. Game night.

  Outside it’s excitement. Inside it’s all business.

  I’m adjusting my pads when O. slides over towards me.

  “How you doing?” he says.

  “What do you care?”

  “You didn’t answer my calls.”

  Before I can say anything, Coach walks through the door wearing a suit. The guys wolf whistle.