“Have you ever been in a trance?” Pam flipped to her side, head propped up on an elbow, and stared at Jamie.
“No.”
“Roll onto your stomach and I’ll put you in a trance,” she said.
“Will it hurt?” Jamie rolled over.
“No.” Pam hopped off the bed and locked the door. “I don’t want anyone interrupting us.”
“How old are you?” Jamie asked.
“Fifteen,” Pam said, and she straddled Jamie’s butt.
“You look eighteen, or twenty or something.”
“I know.” Pam shifted Jamie’s shirt up as high as her arm-pits. “What size bra do you wear?”
“Thirty-two B.”
“I’m a D.”
“Cool,” Jamie said.
“I’m going to unhook your bra, okay? So I can put you in a trance.”
“Have you done this before?” Jamie asked.
“Yeah.” Pam began running her fingernails up and down Jamie’s spine. “My friends and I do it all the time. It feels really cool.”
“Was your name Pam when your parents adopted you?”
“I think it was Carol, after my real mother, but my adopted mother won’t admit that.”
“Have you gone into a trance before?”
“Yes. Now be quiet so it will work. You have to shut your eyes and breathe really slowly, okay?”
“Okay.”
Pam continued to tickle Jamie’s spine. Jamie shut her eyes and tried to breathe slowly but found that she was simply holding her breath.
“Now count backward from a hundred.”
“Ninety-nine,” Jamie began. The counting allowed her to forget about the difficulties she was having with the breathing.
Somewhere around thirty-seven, Jamie petered out.
“You are in a trance,” Pam said in a slow robotic voice. “Do not open your eyes until I snap my fingers.” Jamie did nothing, said nothing; she tried not to think about breathing. She thought that if this state she was currently in was a trance, then she frequently went into a trance—she was entranced when she watched TV, or ate ice cream, or read a book, or looked out the car window.
Jamie thought that this was just her being quiet. This was Jamie with her eyes shut.
“Now keep your eyes closed and roll over, veeeery slowly.”
Pam lifted her body off Jamie’s butt so Jamie could roll over, then sat back down once Jamie was in position. Jamie’s eyes remained shut and her hands remained by her sides, but she wanted to reach behind herself and hook her bra, which was sitting loose across her breasts.
“You will not remember any of this.” Pam slid her hands up Jamie’s belly and across her breasts as she pushed her bra toward her neck.
Jamie was nervous and absolutely certain that she was not in a trance. Pam swirled her hands across Jamie’s chest and belly as if she were playing with finger paints. There was a ticklish feeling inside Jamie that told her this might feel good. But her racing thoughts didn’t linger on the ticklish feeling; they lingered on how strange it was that this girl she had met only an hour ago was sitting on her crotch, rubbing her hands across Jamie’s bare chest. And who was this girl anyway? Jamie wondered. Was she insane? If this was what group therapy did for you, Jamie wanted no part of it. These people seemed crazier than she. Jamie wasn’t about to make herself throw up; she was simply eating! And Renee was angry and full of rage like Stan, but she never threatened to take a standard screwdriver and rip her heart out! She never threatened to throw her eviscerated heart into Jamie’s face! And her parents liked to smoke pot and swim naked, her mother liked to talk to her about sex and masturbation and diaphragms, but they would never have named her Tugboat! And how, Jamie wondered, could she possibly get this loony girl off her body without completely humiliating herself ? She was the therapist’s daughter! (Or the rapist’s daughter?!) That was like being daughter of the boss, or the president, or the school principal! Jamie considered opening her eyes, showing Pam that she wasn’t really in a trance, but she was afraid that then she’d be exposed as a liar and a fake. On the other hand, Jamie thought, to not do anything might bring on further deranged exploits!
The door rattled and someone knocked. Pam jumped off Jamie and snapped her fingers. Jamie popped her eyes open, sat up, hooked her bra, and pulled down her shirt.
“Just a minute,” Pam said, walking toward the door.
She unlocked and opened the door to her smiling father.
“You girls okay in here?” Dick asked.
“Yeah,” Pam said. “Jamie took a turn at the bed too. She was really raging.”
Jamie hopped off the bed and picked up the tennis racket that was sitting on the floor.
“Jamie, maybe you want to observe as Pam and I discuss her feelings,” Dick said. “Think of our interaction as a model for your relationship with your parents.”
“Okay,” Jamie said, although she wanted nothing more than to sprint out of the room, away from the rubber-faced man and his daughter, who just then seemed more the rapist than he.
“Pam,” Dick said, turning toward his daughter. “What are you feeling?”
“I’m feeling rage.”
“Why do you feel rage?”
“Because I was abandoned at birth by you-know-who.”
“Pam, we do not know who your birth parents are. We’ve told you that many times.”
“I’m feeling rage because you won’t tell me the truth about my birth parents.” Pam began to tremble. Dick paused and looked at Pam as if he were analyzing her aura.
“I feel love, Pam.” Dick leaned forward and hugged Pam.
Pam began sobbing into his shoulder.
Jamie edged toward the door. Dick looked up and smiled, his arms still around Pam.
“Come back here, Jamie! Pammy’s okay! Right now we’re sharing our love!”
“Cool.” Jamie stood three feet from the bed, and began counting the repeats in the floral pattern on the bedspread as Pam and her father finished sharing their love. When they were done, Dick instructed Jamie to sit on the bed, saying that he’d send in her family. Pam held her father’s hand and followed him out of the room without once looking back at Jamie.
Betty, Allen, and Renee shuffled into the guest room.
Allen shut the door quickly behind him, like he was playing hide and seek. They mustered together, standing at the end of the bed.
“Did you hit the bed?” Renee seemed excited by the possibility.
“No. But that girl, that daughter of that therapist guy”—Jamie couldn’t bring herself to say Pam’s name—“she told her dad that I did and that I was screaming.”
“That’s what he told us!” Allen said.
“He said you were wailing,” Betty said.
“I swear,” Jamie said, “I wasn’t wailing and I didn’t hit the bed.”
“So you’re not feeling rage?” Renee asked.
“I don’t think so,” Jamie said. “Are you?”
“No,” Renee said.
“I think I’m feeling kind of freaked out by that lying, makeup-wearing girl.”
“I was feeling rage,” Allen said. “But then I started feeling bored with listening to everyone complain, complain, complain.”
“I was feeling pissed off at you for talking me into this,” Betty said to Allen.
“Well,” Allen said, “you should feel glad you’re married to me and not to all those complainers out there.”
“I feel glad you didn’t name me Tugboat,” Jamie said, and everyone laughed.
“Was that girl screaming when she hit the bed?” Renee asked.
“She didn’t even hit the bed, she just wanted to hang out.” An image of Pam sitting on her, rubbing her chest, flickered in Jamie’s mind; she quickly blinked it away
“She looks slutty,” Renee said.
“Don’t criticize her,” Betty said. “She was adopted.”
“Yeah, her real mother is Carol Burnett.” No one seemed to hear Jamie.
“Think how hard it would be to be adopted,” Betty said. “It’s tragic.”
“It’s not tragic,” Allen said. “It would have been tragic if no one adopted her and she was an orphan.”
“At least they didn’t change her name to Tugboat,” Jamie said, making Renee scream with laughter.
Betty shushed her daughters.
“We’re supposed to be working on your rage,” she said.
“Yeah,” Allen grunted, “why don’t you fake cry or something, so your mother won’t be embarrassed that you’re not raging properly.”
“I’ll hit the bed.” Jamie picked up the tennis racket and hit the spot on the bed where she had been lying in her false trance. Surprisingly, it felt good to hit the bed, like she was hitting that moment away, banishing it with each thrash of the racket.
“Let me try,” Renee said, and she did a few whomps on the same spot. Jamie imagined her bashing the ghost of Pam.
“Maybe you girls should take tennis lessons,” Allen said.
“Tennis?” Betty scowled. “It’s such a white man’s sport.”
“We’re white,” Allen said.
“Mom, there aren’t any Native American sports for us to do,” Jamie said.
“There must some sort of Native American sport,” Betty said.
“Lacrosse was invented by the Indians,” Allen said.
“I want to do tennis.” Renee swung the racket in the air as if she were returning a ball.
“Why don’t we build a tennis court in the backyard by the eucalyptus trees?” Jamie asked.
“Let’s put in a lacrosse field,” Betty said. “Everyone has a tennis court, but no one we know has a lacrosse field.”
“I’m not competing with the neighbors,” Allen said.
“What is lacrosse?” Renee asked.
“Yeah,” Jamie said. “If we’ve never even heard of it, it can’t be that great.”
“It’s an East Coast sport,” Allen said.
“I thought it was Native American,” Jamie said.
“Who the hell knows,” Allen said, wandering toward the door.
“Do we have to come back here next week?” Renee asked.
“Not as long as Jamie stops watching TV and eating all day,” Betty said.
“So we don’t have to do this again? ’Cause Dad, I swear, these people are really crazy,” Jamie said.
“Well, I don’t know if we can call them crazy . . .” Allen paused to think.
“Dad! Do we have to go again or not?” Renee snapped.
“Not,” Betty said. “As long as Jamie promises to get out of the house, go to the beach, and find another boyfriend.”
“I promise,” Jamie said.
“Good. Then let’s go.” Renee marched to the door, opened it, and walked out with the rest of the family following behind.
16
In order to avoid family therapy, Jamie had to ride her bike to the beach daily with Renee and Lori. Renee and Lori never spoke to her while at the beach. They rarely spoke to each other as they lay like twins, their faces turned toward the sun, flipping over every thirty minutes so that they were perfectly and evenly browned—two pieces of carefully watched toast. Jamie didn’t mind being ignored at the beach; she enjoyed the time in her head; she imagined she lived a different life, a life where she was skinnier, had shiny hair as thick as a horse’s tail, spoke ten languages fluently, and lived in a spacious flat in the center of Paris (where she had been once on vacation with her family).
Renee and Lori always rode far ahead of Jamie on their trips to and from the beach. So it looked as though Jamie were completely alone one day when Brett’s truck pulled up alongside her as she was pedaling home on Garden Street. Brett, Jimmy, Tammy, and Debbie were piled in the cab. Debbie was on Jimmy’s lap. She had one hand cupped over Tammy’s ear, into which she whispered so violently that her head shook, shaking Tammy’s head in turn. Jamie stopped and stood, straddling her bike as Brett rolled to a stop. In the back of the truck were Flip, Terry, Scooter Ray, and Kim. Flip was passing a joint to Terry; he looked up at Jamie and lifted his chin real fast, as if he had just hit a Ping-Pong ball with it, as a manner of saying hello. No one else in the back, not even Scooter Ray, looked over at Jamie.
Get used to it, Jamie silently told herself, this is how it will be at school in the fall. She turned her head and tried to breathe away the tumbling stones in her gut.
“How have you been?” Jimmy asked, leaning out in front of Debbie.
“Okay. How are you?” Jamie stared at Debbie and Tammy, who were still whispering.
“OH MY GOD,” Debbie yelled, as if she had just noticed Jamie. “What are you doing?!”
“Riding my bike,” Jamie said.
“WHERE WERE YOU?” Tammy leaned out, pulling Debbie back.
“Why are you yelling?”
Tammy and Debbie fell back into hiccupping laughter.
“They’re wasted,” Jimmy said. “They were drinking mimosas at Terry’s house.”
“What’s mimosas?” Jamie asked.
“OH MY GOD!” Tammy and Debbie cracked up again.
“Orange juice and . . . shit, I don’t know what it is, I wasn’t there,” Jimmy said.
“I see.”
“Throw your bike in the back and get in,” Jimmy said. “There’s plenty of room.”
“Nah,” Jamie said. “I gotta go home.”
“She’s depressed,” Tammy said. “She doesn’t do anything anymore.”
“My parents are having a big party tonight,” Jamie said. “I gotta go help them get ready.”
“Your parents are always having a party! They’re total partiers!” Tammy said.
“Veronica Hale’s going to be there,” Jamie said, which was the truth. Jamie had been rolling images of the movie star in her head, incorporating her into her beach fantasies.
“Just get in the truck,” Jimmy said.
“She doesn’t go to the beach anymore!” Debbie said.
“Seriously. I’ve gotta go home. Veronica Hale’s going to be at our house in about two hours.” Jamie hoped Flip was listening. She knew he would be impressed by Veronica Hale. And what was the chance that Terry Watson’s parents ever had a party with a major international celebrity?
Terry Watson might be thin and beautiful, Jamie thought, but she wouldn’t be having breakfast tomorrow with Veronica Hale.
“You swear Veronica Hale is going to your house?” Tammy asked.
“Yes,” Jamie said. “She and her husband, John Krane, are staying in our guest room.”
“I’ve never seen any of her movies but my dad’s, like, pissed at her ’cause she was really mean to the soldiers in Vietnam or something,” Tammy said.
“Oh. Well, my parents are throwing a fund-raising party for her husband, who’s running for Senate. He was in my dad’s fraternity in college.”
“Can we come to the party?”
“No. You’re too wasted.”
“Just me and Tammy,” Debbie said. “Your parents never care if we’re around.”
“Yeah, but I don’t want you all drunk and goofy—you’ll embarrass me.” Jamie had a sudden urge to punish them for having rejected her.
“C’mon! We’ll be sober by then!” Debbie said.
“Please, please, please, PLEASE!” Tammy leaned toward the window, grinning at Jamie.
“Fine. Come when you’re sober.” Jamie hoped that Tammy and Debbie would give Flip and Terry Watson a report of the party with many flattering details about how intimate Jamie’s parents were with the Hale-Kranes.
“OH MY GOD!” Tammy screamed. “WE’RE GOING TO A PARTY WITH VERONICA HALE!”
Brett leaned over toward the window and said, “Veronica Hale, really, at your house?”
“Yeah,” Jamie said.
“Cool.” Brett said. “You comin’ to the beach with us or not?”
“Don’t say not,”
Jimmy said, shooting a smiling wink at Jamie.
“Not,” Jamie said, but she winked back at Jimmy.
“Later!” Brett said, and he pulled the truck away from the curb, jostling everyone and throwing Debbie and Tammy into screams that Jamie could still hear a block away.
Thirty minutes before the guests of honor were due to arrive, two hours before the party was to start, while Allen was out buying bags of ice, Renee and Jamie sat in the kitchen watching their mother give Rosa instructions on how to be in charge of the Chumash couple that was catering the party. Jesus sat on a stool beside Jamie, also observing Betty and Rosa. Each time Betty said the name Veronica Hale, Jesus smiled.
Betty was in a full-length, sleeveless batik dress that she had bought at an art show. There were large gold hoops in her ears and a gold chain around her ankle. Her leather sandals had a braided toe ring for her big toe. Jamie thought the sandals were cool; Renee said they were embarrassing.
“Mom,” Renee interrupted, “you bought a bathing suit, right?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Betty waved her hand and rolled her eyes.
“And you told Leon and Lois that they had to wear suits if they swam, right?”
“Honey, don’t worry about it. Everyone’s wearing a suit tonight.”
“I mean, Mom,” Renee continued, “he’s running for senator. You cannot go naked at a senatorial fund-raiser.”
“Sweetheart, we know! We bought suits! Relax.”
“Maybe we should go back to family therapy and work out the naked swimming thing,” Jamie said.
“Shut up,” Renee said.
“And listen.” Betty turned to her daughters. “Movie stars are very particular about the way their bodies look and they’re usually skinnier than normal people. So I don’t want you girls comparing yourselves to Veronica Hale, you hear? No matter how good her figure may be, you must remind yourself that you are you and you are perfect in the you that you are.”
The Summer of Naked Swim Parties Page 22