Polly
Page 12
“Public transportation is hard to predict,” I said.
“That’s all right, darlin’,” he said, putting on a country accent. “Come on in and put your dawgs up. I’m awful glad to see you.”
“Thanks,” I said. I stepped past him into the apartment.
It was bright outside, so it took a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to the dimness. Joey guided me past a couple of large, heavy-looking machines to the far corner of his apartment, which was really just a big, L-shaped room. Against the wall that made up the shorter part of the L there was a metal desk. Next to that was a TV, VCR, and stereo stacked on a shelving system made out of boards and cinder blocks. It looked like it was about to fall down.
Once my eyes fully adjusted I took in the most interesting aspect of Joey’s apartment. Nearly every inch of wall space was covered with horror movie posters. There was a black-and-white still from a movie called The Hills Have Eyes, which showed a grimacing bald man in profile, brandishing a small knife. The bald man was wearing a fur vest and a dog collar. On another poster, for a movie called Deadly Blessing, a woman was stretched out on her stomach with her eyes closed and her mouth open. A menacing pair of hands encircled the woman’s head. Next to these were posters for Chamber of Horrors and Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors, among others. I hadn’t heard of any of them.
I pointed at a poster for a movie called Horror High, which featured a skeleton cheerleader in a blond wig and the words KILLER TO THE LEFT. KILLER TO THE RIGHT. STAND UP. SIT DOWN. FRIGHT! FRIGHT! FRIGHT!
“That one’s my favorite,” I said.
“You’ve seen it?”
“No. I mean the poster.”
“Yeah, I like movies about freaks,” he said. “’Cause I can relate.”
He let out a high-pitched laugh, and I gave him a polite smile. My eyes had come to rest on the oversized mattress that took up most of the floor space. His bedding was strewn around, exposing the bare, yellowish exterior of the mattress here and there. I lowered myself into the only other place to sit, a faded gray chair that looked like it might once have been blue.
Instead of stabbing me or wrapping his hands tight around my neck, Joey produced a Milwaukee’s Best from a small refrigerator that doubled as a nightstand—there was no kitchen that I could see—and I accepted it with relief. He knelt down on the floor in front of me and tugged on one of my bootlaces as I opened my beer.
“Are you nervous to be here?”
“No,” I said. I glanced over at the mattress. “I mean, should I be?”
“Of course not. I just want you to be comfortable is all.”
“Your hair seems brighter today,” I said.
He shrugged. “I did it last night. I touch it up every month or so.”
Raising my beer to my mouth, I tried to picture him bent over a bathroom sink, dabbing at his roots. When I took the can away from my face Joey kissed me, softly, like he had the first time at the T-shirt table. I inhaled his salty, leathery smell. He helped me out of the chair and onto the mattress. A few minutes later I was down to my skirt and bra.
“There’s one thing you have to know,” I said, moving his hand off my skirt. “I can’t sleep with you. You know, not yet.”
He kissed my chin. “I know, honey, I’m not expecting that. There are other things we can do.”
“Like what?” I asked. My mother called me honey.
“You know what.”
After Joey came I asked him if it was okay for me to smoke. He got an empty beer can out of the trash and put it on the floor next to the mattress. I was on my stomach, like the woman in the Deadly Blessing poster.
“I can’t believe you don’t have a boyfriend,” he said.
I thought about Mike. The thing I missed the most was the way he used to look at me when I said something funny. Like there was no one he liked better than me. And how he laughed at my jokes even when no one else did. Mom said that having the same sense of humor was one of the most important things in a relationship.
“I can’t believe you don’t have a girlfriend,” I said.
“And here we are,” Joey said.
“Yes. Here we are.”
On the way home I thought about Frank, one of Mom’s old boyfriends. Frank had a beefy upper body with comparatively skinny legs. He was a fireman, and he liked to make jokes about his name and my mother’s: “It’s Frank and Fran!” he’d shout when they came home from a date to find me and the babysitter waiting for them. On the phone he’d say, “It’s Mr. Frank, calling for Miss Fran.” At the time I thought he was funny. Frank brought me a fireman’s hat and promised to take me to the station so I could slide down the pole, but before we had a chance to go my mother broke up with him.
Mom didn’t have very many boyfriends that I remembered, just Frank and the guy I heard in the hallway and William. There might have been more. I wondered now what made Mom break up with Frank. What made Frank not even worth dating, but William worth marrying? Was it his sense of humor or something else? Mom and I didn’t talk about those kinds of things much, but I thought maybe I’d ask her.
I knew that when you were older you had to think about more things when you were dating someone, like whether they liked your kids or had a good job. Maybe in the end love wasn’t even a factor when you were choosing someone to marry, although Mom and William still held hands in public and kissed when they got home from work. I knew they loved each other, but as far as I knew, Mom might have loved Frank, too. She had seemed happy enough to see him when he came to the door.
I still wasn’t sure if I had ever been in love. I had thought that Jason was my first love, but now I preferred to think of it as infatuation since I didn’t feel like I loved him anymore. I was hanging on to the idea that real love lasted forever. With Mike it seemed like we were in love—or at least that we were about to be in love, but then he broke up with me. Maybe there was just something wrong with me. Maybe I would never find what I wanted.
Monday after third period I slipped outside to call Joey from the pay phone in front of the school. After four rings he answered, his voice scratchy from sleep.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” I said. Through the doors of the school I could see people opening and shutting their lockers, navigating their way around one another.
“That’s all right, honey,” he said. “I’m glad to hear your voice. What time is it, anyway?”
“Ten-thirty. I thought you’d be up. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it, sweetie. I’m your boyfriend, after all. Just try not to call me before noon, okay? I always get up late.”
“Okay.”
I hung up. Joey had used the word boyfriend. Joey was my boyfriend. I was late for government class, but I took my time in the hallway and swaggered to my seat a full twenty seconds after the bell rang. I imagined Joey walking me down the hall in front of the bops and surf punks and grits and bamas. People would talk about the weird older guy and the girl they’d never noticed before for days.
It turned out Joey wasn’t kidding about being my boyfriend. We saw each other as much as we could. He taught me how to make T-shirts on his machines, which smelled like burning rubber when they were turned on and issued a low, rumbling hum not unlike my family’s dishwasher. He bought me a studded belt with a small black heart on the buckle. He gave me a lot of T-shirts, too, but the belt was special. I wore it every day.
I found out that neither of the cars parked out back belonged to Joey. He didn’t drive.
“One of the reasons I live in the city is because I hate cars,” Joey told me. It hadn’t occurred to me that a person could hate cars. I liked that about him. Maybe I hated cars.
I spent less and less time at home. William nagged Mom and Mom nagged me. I told her as little as I could get away with.
Once in a while Theresa and Carrie and Lyle and I would cut last period and drive over to Joey’s. We’d listen to music and drink beer, and then Theresa and Carrie and Lyle would walk down to the recor
d store while Joey and I rolled around on his mattress. We always stopped short of intercourse.
“I’ll wait until you’re ready,” Joey said. “You just tell me when it’s time.”
I thought I’d wait for a sign. If I got an A in my tough-stuff physics class, I’d have sex. If I got into every school I applied to, I’d have sex. If Mike Franklin found a new girlfriend, I’d have sex. Maybe then.
The majority of our relationship was conducted inside Joey’s apartment, but we ventured out once in a while. We went for walks in his neighborhood, drinking beer out of Burger King cups and making out in public. When we went to see bands I sat behind the T-shirt table, helping Joey fold shirts and make change. I waited on people with the studied aloofness of a record store employee. And I handled the money even better than Joey.
“You sure can subtract fast,” he told me, kissing the top of my head.
“You should see me add,” I said. “And fractions, look out.”
“You’re the smartest person I know,” Joey said, and I believed him.
Carrie and I were sneaking a cigarette in the back parking lot near the tennis courts before lunch. The courts would be packed in fifteen minutes, but they were empty between classes.
“I feel like I haven’t talked to you in, like, years,” Carrie said.
“What do you mean?” I said. “I talk to you all the time.”
“You know what I mean,” Carrie said. “All you do is hang out with Joey.”
“That’s such bullshit,” I said. I touched the heart on my belt buckle. “I’m lucky if I see him twice a week. You don’t know what’s it’s like—you’re always with Lyle.”
“It just seems like you’re not really into hanging out with us anymore,” Carrie said. “I mean, it’s just like you pick Joey first and us second. Like if Joey’s busy, then you’ll hang out with us.”
“He’s my boyfriend! You of all people should be able to understand that. I mean, look at you and Lyle.”
Carrie scrunched up her face. “What about me and Lyle?” Her brown eyes widened and for a second I thought she might cry.
I took a drag off my cigarette. “What’s going on with you?” I asked.
“Nothing! God! You’re the one!”
I waited.
“I had an abortion two weeks ago,” Carrie said.
She dropped her cigarette and walked toward the double doors, her long dark hair swishing behind her. I followed her, too shocked to say anything. All I could think about were Carrie’s parents, with their rules against miniskirts and eyeliner and black clothing. Carrie was walking with her back straight and her shoulders back. I wanted to hug her, but something told me not to.
When she was almost at the doors I shouted, “Carrie, wait!”
She stopped. Turned around. Her large, silver-hoop earrings swayed. “You want to know why you didn’t know? Because you’re too busy with Joey!”
“I’m sorry,” I said. And I was.
We turned around and walked back in the direction we had come from. Now that I had Carrie’s attention I didn’t know what to say. I thought of the other girls I knew who had gotten abortions. There was Jenny Randall who I knew from playing soccer, who had an abortion in the tenth grade. She told me about it in French II, mouthing the words I had an abortion like she was telling me important gossip about someone else. And there were rumors about other girls. I pictured the abortion clinic as being kind of like McDonald’s, sitting like an island in the middle of a wide parking lot. I wanted to know how long it took and if it hurt. And before that, when she’d been pregnant—did she throw up and get cravings?
“Look, I know I should have told you,” Carrie said finally. “I just want to forget the whole thing ever happened, you know?”
“Yeah, I can see that,” I said. I wanted another cigarette. I waited for Carrie to say she wanted one. “So who else knows?”
“Lyle, duh. And Theresa went with me. I didn’t want Lyle to go.”
I felt a small stab of rejection. Theresa hadn’t told me.
“How are you feeling now?” I said.
“I don’t know. It’s weird. Physically I feel fine, I mean I am fine, but everything’s different now. I can’t get over being pissed at Lyle. Even though I know it’s not his fault really. I’m the one who fucked up my pills.”
I made myself put a hand on Carrie’s forearm. “It’s not your fault,” I said. Like I knew.
“Polly, it is my fault.” Now Carrie really looked like she was going to cry. “I hope you’re using birth control.” Her high, girlish voice had become stern, like a teacher’s. “I swear to God, I hope this at least makes you finally get on the pill. I hope Joey wears a condom, I hope he pulls out, and I hope you use spermicide. Apparently it’s best to use more than one method.”
“Is that what the doctor said?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact he did.”
I touched the heart on my belt again. “How’d you get the money?”
“Lyle. He sold his P.A. Now he’s using this shitty one that used to be his brother’s.”
If Carrie’s parents found out about her abortion, they’d make her break up with Lyle, and that would just be the beginning. She’d probably have to transfer to a religious school. I felt sorry for Carrie. Theresa’s parents would understand something like this, probably even make the appointment and go to the clinic with her. Mom would be mad if I got pregnant, but I knew she’d be there if I needed her help. Out of nowhere I suddenly missed Mom. I had the frantic, sad feeling I used to get when I was little, when she’d drop me off at day care in the mornings and I didn’t want her to go.
I decided to tell Carrie a secret of my own. “I don’t have sex with Joey,” I said. She didn’t answer, and I let the rest spill out: “The thing is I’m basically a virgin, except for I sort of did it with Jason but not really. I can’t seem to bring myself to do it. Sometimes I think I just never will have sex at all, ever.”
I waited for her to get angry, to say something about how I’d been lying all this time. But she just shrugged and said in a flat voice, “Well I guess you don’t have to worry about getting pregnant then.”
I hunched my shoulders, suddenly conscious of my skinny, undeveloped body, my gross lack of curves. Carrie didn’t have big boobs, but they were bigger than mine. They existed. And she had beautiful, wide hips. Hips I not only didn’t have, but probably never would. She was a year younger than I was, but we both knew that in all the important ways she was older.
Saturday Carrie came over to dye our hair. We crowded into the upstairs bathroom, the one I used.
“Wanna do something tonight?” I asked.
I was wearing the tight plastic gloves that came with the box of dye, and was shaking powder into a bottle of solution while Carrie slowly separated clumps of my hair and clipped them away from one another.
“Lyle’s brother is home,” Carrie said. “He can get beer.”
Mom showed up in the bathroom doorway. “What’s this about beer?”
“Oh, nothing,” Carrie said in a singsong tone that she wouldn’t have used with her own parents.
I kept quiet, hoping Mom would get the message and leave us alone. She stayed planted in the doorway, her hands on her hips. I replaced the cap on the bottle of solution and shook it vigorously, like the instructions dictated, ignoring Mom’s anxious surveillance of the bathroom. It was littered with dye boxes, instructions, hair clips, a timer, and a few old towels, and we were just getting started.
“I better not see one stray mark in this bathroom when you two get finished,” Mom said.
“Don’t worry,” I said. Carrie and I had never made a lasting mess before, and we did this every six weeks. I sat down on the toilet seat and Carrie began to slop bleach onto my scalp. The moment the bleach touched my head it started to burn.
“You’re getting beer and meeting Joey, is that it?” Mom asked.
“Mom, please,” I said. A light sweat began to form on the back of my neck
. I couldn’t remember if I’d told Carrie that Mom and William were under the impression that Joey was eighteen and went to another high school.
“I’ll tell you what I’m tired of,” Mom said, as if I had just asked. “I’m tired of you coming and going from this house like this is some kind of hotel we’re running.”
“I know this isn’t a hotel you’re running,” I said.
Carrie had finished my head, and I changed places with her. She was trying something new, a semipermanent dye in blackberry. I squirted the dye onto Carrie’s head and dragged the thick mixture through her hair with as much precision as I could muster.
“You better plan on making some changes around here, Polly,” Mom said. “Because there will be consequences if you keep this business up.”
She marched back down the hallway. I kicked the door shut and turned my attention back to Carrie, who had dye running down her neck.
“Sorry I said that about the beer,” Carrie said. “I didn’t see her.”
I dabbed at her neck with a piece of toilet paper. “That’s okay. Except I doubt I can go out tonight.”
“Give it a little while. Tell her we’re going to the movies.”
“I’ll have to do better than that. She’s not an idiot.”
We set the timer and carried it down the hall to my bedroom. Carrie stretched out on my bed with my Cosmopolitan. I called Joey.
“I just found out I have to go to Baltimore tonight to sell T-shirts for Dag Nasty,” Joey said. “They just called me. I’ll be gone for two days.”
“Oh, well,” I said. I had thought maybe we could drive down to Joey’s and surprise him with our own beer for once.
“You should come with me,” Joey said. “There’s room in the van.”
I thought about the conversation I’d just had with my mother. “I’ll come over the second you get back,” I said.
“I’ll be so lonely without my honey,” Joey said.