11
Normally Nina’s driver was the one waiting on me. But today, he was running late. I stood on the corner, shivering. The music from Citygirls suddenly thumped louder, and I turned to see one of the girls slipping out the door and lighting a cigarette. She stepped to the curb and peered down the street, then stepped back to wait with me beneath the glowing pink awning.
“Hey,” she said. “You live upstairs, right?”
“Yeah.” I spoke cautiously.
“I’ve seen you going in and out. That must be so noisy, living up there. Do you guys get any sleep?”
“Sure.” I shrugged. “It’s pretty quiet once you close the door and everything.”
“I’m Shawna, by the way.” She extended her hand, and I shook it. Her nails were impossibly long, bright pink, acrylic.
“Maria.”
“You waiting on your boyfriend or something?”
“No, just a friend.”
“My boyfriend’s probably forgot about me.” Shawna snorted and took a drag on her cigarette. “I’m supposed to be off, but I was filling in for the girl that takes the money. You’d think you wouldn’t get tired, just sitting on your butt, making change. But it’s so boring.” She shook her head. “I’d rather dance.”
“Do you, um, do you make good money?” I cleared my throat. “Dancing?”
“Hell, yeah,” she said, jumping from one foot to the other to warm up. “I make more money than my boyfriend some weeks, and he’s in construction. And at this place, you get medical and dental. It’s a lady who runs it.”
“Oh.” I nodded, not knowing what to say. “That sounds like a good deal.”
“You thinking about trying out?”
“Me? No way.” I laughed, then I stopped, not wanting to insult her. “I mean, I can’t dance.”
“Honey, you don’t gotta be a Rockette. You just shake what you got.” She waggled her butt to demonstrate. We both laughed. Just then, Nina’s driver pulled up in the limo, honking his horn.
“Gotta run.” I waved good-bye. “Nice to meet you.”
“Damn, girl! Ride in style!”
There were crowds swarming, lights in the shape of snowflakes fastened to lampposts, and the taste of peppermint and sugar melting between my teeth. Nina and I walked side by side down Fifth Avenue after a day at the Guggenheim and an early dinner at an expensive bistro. She’d let me borrow a silk dress and a fancy wool overcoat. I felt like someone else. When I caught my reflection floating between the mannequins in the storefront windows, in Nina’s coat and Lee’s haircut, I hardly recognized myself.
“Have you got any more of those mints?” Nina asked. I reached into my pocket and handed her one of the foil-wrapped mints I’d swiped back at the restaurant.
“Thanks again for dinner,” I said. “You didn’t have to go all out.”
“My pleasure,” Nina replied. “You seemed right at home. I didn’t even have to tell you which fork to use.”
“And did you notice how I kept from spitting on the floor the whole time?”
“Your grandmother would be so proud.”
I tucked my hands farther into the coat pockets. A light snow had fallen that afternoon, and Nina laughed when I got so excited over the flurries. We didn’t get much snow in Millville. I wondered if we’d have a white Christmas.
“Have you given any thought to your mother’s Christmas present yet?”
“A little.” I was having a hard time coming up with any good ideas. And I wanted it to be special.
“If you see anything here you think she’d like, let me know,” Nina said. “I’ll help you pay for it.”
“Thanks, but …” I looked back at the shops we’d passed. Gucci. Prada. Versace. “I don’t think this is exactly—”
“I know.” Nina laughed. “Victoria’s not exactly one for a Chanel suit.”
“I just wish I had more—” I stopped.
“More what?”
“I wish I had more money. I mean, my own money.”
“It does go quickly up here, doesn’t it?” Nina mused. “Maria, I realize that your mother—” She sighed. “Listen, just come to me. Anytime you need money. Don’t even bother your mother. I’ll give you whatever you need, no questions asked. Agreed?”
I nodded, trying to keep up with her quickened pace. I agreed, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t want another Grandmother, offering to hand me money anytime I wanted, for whatever I needed, claiming there were no strings attached. When money was involved, strings were always attached. With money came expectations. I had been here before. Once money was invested, some kind of payback seemed inevitable: good grades, or good behavior, or just some indefinable poise—better clothes, unbitten nails—some outward signifier that I was worth the investment. I didn’t want to be indebted to Nina. I wanted something else. Like those tiny countries we studied in European history, I wanted autonomy. An uprising. I wanted out from under the expectations. I wanted to prove myself to nobody but me.
I was thinking about how to tell this to Nina when I barely knew how to say it to myself when, in the sea of people coming toward us, I saw a familiar blond bob. It was my grandmother’s friend Mrs. Donningham. I almost did a double take.
“Maria? Maria Costello, is that you?” She grabbed my arm and we stopped, clogging the sidewalk artery and forcing the crowd to move around us. Mr. Donningham was a step behind her, his arms full of shopping bags.
“Hello, Mrs. Donningham.”
“Well, if this isn’t the biggest small town in the world!” Mrs. Donningham caught me in a hasty embrace. “This morning we ran into Mitchell’s old business partner having breakfast at the Waldorf. And now here you are! This must be your mother—”
“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” Nina deftly shook Mrs. Donningham’s hand before I could correct the mistake.
“We’re the Donninghams. Mitchell and Doreen. We’re friends of Maria’s grandmother, down in Atlanta.”
“Ah, yes. Mrs. Costello. Do say hello to her for us,” Nina said, cool as a cucumber.
“Certainly! We’ll—”
“I’m sorry, but we’re terribly late.” Nina hooked her arm through mine.
“Bye—” I waved as Nina whisked me away, back down the street into the cold specks of freshly falling snow.
“What are we late for?” I asked.
“We’re late for not entertaining the Donninghams,” Nina said. I laughed as we rushed into the parting crowd.
It was late, but I wanted to go by the record store and see Gram. We’d been talking on the phone, but we hadn’t seen each other since the party. Actually, I’d been talking to his answering machine more than I’d been talking to him. He had finals and recitals, and I didn’t want to push it. I was afraid I was calling him too much, being a pest. But I wanted to see him again.
“Wow, look at you.”
“I know.” I was still wearing Nina’s coat and the silk dress. “I had to go to a thing.”
“What, the opera? Nice hairdo, by the way.”
“You like it?”
“Yeah. You don’t?”
“I kinda think it makes me look like I’ve got a … giraffe neck or something.” I touched my hair self-consciously. “I can’t wait till it grows back out.”
“Naw, naw, leave it cut. What this ugly old world needs is more of your lovely neck.”
A customer stepped up to the counter and handed Gram his stack of CDs. Blushing, I drifted down the aisle to browse the records.
“Looking for something in particular?” Gram called out as the customer walked out the door. Gram and I were alone in the shop.
“Just doing a little Christmas shopping,” I said. He came down from behind the counter and walked to the bin where I stood.
“So, uh, you going back to South Carolina for Christmas?”
“Not if I can help it.”
He laughed. “Maybe we can get together sometime before you go,” he said. “I had a really good time with
you at the SSKs.”
“Me too.” I bit my lip. “How’s your tattoo?”
“Totally healed. Check it out.” He rolled up his sleeve. The swelling had gone down, and now the letters snaked beneath his skin, fuzzy-edged, inky black. I thought about Travis’s tattoo, the one above his heart. I wondered how much it had hurt. I touched the letters on Gram’s arm, feeling the faint hairs on his smooth, pale skin.
“Hey, Gram?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m—actually, I am looking for something in particular.”
“Shoot.” He pushed his sleeve back down.
“Do you know anything about Joni Mitchell?”
Mom knelt next to me at the stereo as I unwrapped the blank tape.
“It’s the easiest thing,” she said. “Just flip this lever to the left for records, all the way to the right for CDs. Press play and record at the same time, and there you go.”
“Thanks.” I chucked the tape into the deck and switched the turntable on. “Thanks for letting me use your records, too.”
“Use anything you like! I think it’s so sweet that you and your friends make mixtapes for each other. This is the girl who gave you the videos, right?”
“Dory, yeah.” Mom and I had watched both movies back-to-back one night when Travis was at rehearsal. We ordered a pizza and then made French toast for dessert and nearly made ourselves sick dancing around to X and the Germs after we ate.
“If you’re set”—Mom pounced up off the floor like a cat—“then I’m gonna meet Travis. I told him I’d help put up flyers for the show.” She grabbed a stack of Xeroxed flyers sitting on the kitchen counter and a roll of tape and shoved them all into her oversized purse. “Are you sure you don’t wanna come?”
“I’m sure.” I wanted to help them out, but I wanted to make this tape for Dory, too, for Christmas. “I’ll meet up with you guys later.”
“Definitely.” She kissed the top of my head. “Sushi. Or the Moroccan place. We’ll call you.”
She left, locking the door behind her, and I was there with the stacks of records and CDs. The afternoon sun slanted across the floor; Saturday, and nothing to do but wade through these songs, build this mixtape. I wanted to make the perfect tape for Dory. I wanted it to rise and fall, to put the perfect songs in the perfect order, the way she did. But mostly I wanted to paint this picture for her. This picture of New York, of everything I’d heard since I moved here. Mom’s music, Travis’s and Gram’s, and mine, now. The songs I’d taken as my own, that looped in my head as I walked the streets and rode the subways. The songs that saturated the apartment like another coat of paint, black and white and red and black again and blue, the running motor of guitars, the voices we knew as well as our own. I wanted to paint this picture for Dory to let her know I was okay, that I was over it now, that I had gotten better and I wasn’t alone anymore.
I slid the first album out of its sleeve and put it on the turntable. Pressed play and record at the same time, let the needle drop. Patti singing Jesus died for somebody’s sins …
12
My mom was actually jumping up and down on the corner of Bleecker and Bowery, waiting for the light to change. And it wasn’t just because it was freezing out and the only warm thing she had on was her Patti Smith jacket.
“Oh my gosh! Okay, can I tell you how totally psyched and proud I am right now?” She put her hands on my shoulders and kept jumping. “It’s your first show at CBGBs! Do you have any idea how much this place changed my life? Why are you not jumping?!”
So I jumped!
“I know!” I couldn’t help but get excited, too. From the second Travis announced that the band had landed a gig at CBGBs, it was like Mom revved into hyperdrive. She circled the date on the calendar and did a countdown, crossing off the days with different-colored markers.
“It’s not that big a deal,” Travis had insisted after Mom’s initial freak-out. “It’s a total hole now. And it’s just us and a bunch of other crappy bands. It’s not like we’re opening for the Ramones or anything.”
“I know, but …” Mom held out her hands like she was describing an elephant. “It’s history, honey. It’s CBGBs. It’s the first place I ever saw the Ramones. And Patti, and Richard Hell, and Sonic Youth …”
The light changed and she grabbed my hand, both of us now jumping and running across the street.
“Vic!” The door guy in a black satin jacket put his arms around my mom, yelling over the music. “Where you been?”
“I’ve been exiled to Brooklyn! Jimmy, this is my kid, Maria.”
“No kidding. Looks more like your kid sister.”
“You know I love you forever now, right?” Mom kissed his cheek. “Can we go on back?”
“Of course. Lemme get your hands.” Jimmy pressed the backs of our fists with a rubber stamp in the shape of a star. Inside, the room was long and narrow, not nearly as big as I thought it would be. As we passed the bar, a woman with heavy black mascara and magenta hair recognized my mom and jumped off her bar stool.
“Vic!”
“Hi, Paula!” Mom hugged her. “This is my—”
“Oh my God, Vic,” Paula cut her off, her eyes wide. “Did I tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“I had a beer with Lenny Kaye!”
“Get out.”
“For real! Tom took me to see this band, some friend of his, and he was just hanging out at the bar—Lenny Kaye! And he’s so fucking cool! He’s, like, the coolest guy ever!”
“Hang on, I gotta go meet my boyfriend, okay? But I wanna hear all about it.” Mom grabbed my hand. Once we were past the bar, she explained, “Paula’s even more of a die-hard Patti fan than I am. I used to see her at the shows back in the seventies. But she’s a little, you know, overboard sometimes.”
“Who’s Lenny Kaye?”
Mom gave me a look. “Uh, Maria? Patti Smith’s guitar player?” Mom held her hand to my forehead like she was checking for a fever. “Not to mention the editor of all those Rock Scene magazines we were looking at the other night. Remember ‘Ask Doc Rock’? I thought you were paying attention.”
“I guess I forgot—”
I didn’t have time to be embarrassed about forgetting the name of Patti Smith’s guitar player. Mom was pulling my hand again, weaving us through people all standing around in clumps, kids with dyed-black hair and messenger bags slung over their shoulders, a collage of punk badges dotting each one, too cool to dance or even jump in place. We pushed past the stage, down a narrow hallway, to a small, graffitied room without a door. The room was packed with guitar cases, amps, drum parts. Slade and Gary sat on a duct-taped bench, and Penny stood with her eyes closed, strumming her guitar, running through the songs.
“Hey, guys,” Mom called out. “Where’s Travis?”
“Hey!” Penny’s eyes snapped open, like she was coming out of a trance. She hugged Mom and then me, her guitar jabbing into my hip. “I’m so glad you guys are here!” Slade got up to shake our hands.
“I think Travis is in the john,” Gary said. He nodded at me. “What’s up?”
I shrugged. Mom was grabbing at my hands again.
“You have to see the bathroom here,” she said. “The toilets are notorious.”
“Notoriously foul.” Penny scrunched up her nose.
“I’m not sure how I feel about a notorious toilet,” I confessed.
“Then why don’t you go get us some drinks?” Mom suggested.
“Me?” I didn’t think I was allowed to do that.
“A vodka tonic for me, and whatever you’re having. Guys?” She turned to the band.
“I’ll take a Heineken,” Gary said.
“Me too,” Slade seconded.
“Would you get me a bottle of water?” Penny reached into the pocket of her leather pants. “Here, I have a drink ticket.”
“No, don’t worry about it—just ask for Theo and say you’re with me,” Mom said.
“So that’s two Heinekens,
a vodka tonic, and a water?” I said sarcastically, waiting for somebody to realize that no bartender in the world was going to serve me a bunch of drinks, no matter whose kid I was. I was sixteen, and I looked sixteen.
“And whatever you’re drinking,” Mom added.
Unbelievable. I slunk out of the room, feeling demoted. The designated waitress. Fine, they’d see how well their little plan worked when the bartender refused to serve me. I waited patiently for the girl filling glasses behind the bar to notice me, then asked for Theo.
“I’m Theo,” she said. “What can I do for you?”
“Two Heinekens, a vodka tonic, and a bottle of water,” I said. “And a ginger ale.”
“Can I see your ID?” she asked.
“My mom told me to ask for you. My mom’s Vic—Victoria Costello.”
“Vicki! Oh my gosh, is she here?” Theo leaned over the bar. “She totally saved my life. Your mom is the absolute coolest. Hang on, I’ll get you your drinks.”
The next thing I knew, I was weaving through the crowd again, hands slipping on cold glasses, beer bottles tucked into the crooks of my elbows, bottled water tucked under my chin. When I got back to the dressing room Mom was gone, but the band was happy to relieve me of my beverages.
“Where’d my mom go?”
“Uh, I think she went to look for Travis.” Penny thumbed the way to the bathrooms. “Thataway.”
I took my ginger ale and Mom’s vodka tonic and pushed past loitering punks in the hallway. Even over the racket of the opening band, I heard Mom and Travis before I saw them.
“Fuck that shit, Travis! Fuck you!”
I gasped and drew back. That was my mom, but it was like somebody else’s voice coming out of her. Screaming. I watched her shove Travis into the wall, really hard. He kept his arms folded tight across his chest. He was looking straight down at his shoes. I could see his mouth moving, but I couldn’t tell what he was saying.
“I ask you for the littlest, for the tiniest fucking thing, and this is what I get. What am I supposed to do now, huh?” Mom yelled.
Travis dropped his chin to his chest and mumbled something I couldn’t hear.
Supergirl Mixtapes Page 14