The Cake is a Lie

by mcdavis3

  Carol turned bright red and started laughing. My psyche choked on the image like a Herrin with an aluminum can in its gullet. Carol delicately pulling down Mike’s ghetto boxers and gently pulling out his big black dick.

  “Was he like, into your feet, Carol?” I investigated.

  “No, gross” Kristine answered for her.

  I shrugged, “They say he’s into feet.”

  I kept walking and ran into Jessica from my grade school. We weren’t friends anymore but we smiled at each other with the fondness of childhood memories when we saw each other.

  Tonight, something good popped into my head when I saw her though, “Hey Jessica, remember at Duncan’s party when you said my butt is a ten?” I asked, hoping to reaffirm my amazing butt conception.

  She laughed, “Ya…We made the whole thing up though. It was Addy’s idea.”

  “You fucking bitch,” I lamented with dripping sarcasm. “That lie had sustained me for so long. Ignorant bliss is real Jessica! It’s real.” While she laughed I dipped out on the high note.

  The night was going so well I decided to hit one of the coolest circles. I popped in next to Kace in a totem pole of popular faces, directly across from me was Janae. Simon Erickson was telling a story,

  “So this bangin’ mammacita, she’s gotta be at least twenty five, starts feeling up on me in our tent.” He was talking about a concert festival a lot of people went to last weekend. My parents didn’t let me go.

  “But I’m rollin’ balls so I’m not trying to cut.” It was common knowledge having sex on e was so good that it ruined sex forever. “So I’m touching her all over, but I’m not letting her touch me. That’s when mamma goes, ‘Which do you like better? My bootie or my naturals.’ And I’m like, ‘your naturals are killin’ it right now mama,’ and she goes ‘wrong answer, the right answer is you better start hitting this right now or I’m out.’” Everyone giggled.

  Janae interjected. “Ugh, I knew that having sex on e was a myth before I even had sex on it.”

  There are hundreds of millions of beautiful girls. Millions with the exact same jaded, dark eyes as Janae. It’s was what she did that separated her, her pure fearlessness was the true wonder.

  “So did you explore her Dora?” Janae asked.

  Simon’s bf had been waiting to jump in, “When I got back, from outside the tent, all I heard was Simon’s voice say, ‘Suck my mamma, suck my mamma.’” This got an uproar of laughter.

  “What does that even mean?” Aaron asked absurdly.

  “I dunno.” Simon shrugged.

  Everyone was laughing except Kace, he was focused on me.

  “Nice socks,” He said, half the group heard him. I looked down at my one grey sock and my one white one.

  My crises autopilot mannerisms immediately bunched my mouth to the side and brought my eyes directly into Kace’s. “I heard a crazy, nuts really, story about you. That you got pulled over drunk last weekend, driving Terra Richie’s car for her and her friends. And the whole time you were talking to the cop you had three 5ths stashed under your feet. And you talked your way out of it.”

  Kace stared back at me.

  “For real?” Simon asked, bailing me out. Kace turned to face the group.

  “Shit was crazy,” he started. Then Kace went into another one of his bemused stories, where he humbly recalled a grandiose deed as if he’d just barely forgotten all about it. Smirking to himself every time he remembered how cool he was. As if there wasn’t a pool of boiling narcissism making the whole thing run.

  “Like, usually nothing fazes me, but when I saw those flashing beams man, woo I knew I was done. It’s not even my car, and its five deep with wasted girls. I would of skirted out, but there were so many people in the car…” It was a fantastic close-call story. We all had them, there was a new one every week. And yet Kace kept setting the bar somehow.

  Halfway through the story a hush rippled through the party, heads started perking up. I turned towards the dining room to see Aaron Lo, a Shorewood alumni who graduated last year, up in a Shorecrest Senior, Blake Riley’s face. Shorecrest is Shoreline’s other high school. An interstate highway makes a natural barrier between the more affluent Shorewood side and our Shorecrest rivals.

  I couldn’t hear what Eric was saying but I could see his tense, flexing neck muscles and his unhinged, flapping jaw. Eric was a heavy hitter. By reputation there was nothing Blake could do at this point. Blake heard my telepathic warning and tackled Eric into a table. In an instant the promenade became a mob, pushing for a front row seat. I stayed back in the living room.

  Eventually E-Rock popped up. “Yo Marco, lets bounce, Kate’s having an after party at her house.”

  “Where’s Jay?”

  “He already left.” E-Rock headed out the door and I went to grab my shoes when I saw someone had tied all the laces into a huge knot. I thought about whether to try and untie them but decided I didn’t want anyone seeing me struggling to free my shoes.

  “Come on Marco let’s roll,” E-Rock called from the front porch. F-it, my socks soaked up the wet dew of the grass as I jogged across the yard.

  I should have said, “Oh real good one Kace, making fun of my socks that were made by 14 year old slaves in Bangladesh.” I could have got him in front of everyone.

  27. Robby Blue (Fall 2005)

  The floodlights above the football field illuminated the sideways rain, but my coat hood was down. The raindrops dripping from my soggy hair heightened my gloomy mood. To an outsider, it might have looked like I was standing with a few hundred teenagers on the lower bleachers of Shoreline’s stadium. In reality, it was a social podium I’d been faithfully climbing since 2nd grade. I was placed in the third row from the top, slightly to the right from center, in between Jay and Justyn.

  “What ya gonna do with all that junk, all that junk inside your trunk?” The stadium speakers blasted over the melancholy crowd, Shorewood was losing 28-0. I wasn’t watching the game, every twenty seconds I turned to sneak a glance at the top center row where Mark, Chris and the rest of the coolest seniors were standing. It was the new kid standing next them, Robby Blue, who had my spirit against the ropes.

  He’d only transferred a week ago and they’d already adopted him as their own. He was that good. It was like he just dropped out of the universe–with his shaggy dyed-blond hair and champagne sparkling blue eyes–to crap on my entire world. I wasn’t even glancing anymore, I was maniacally staring. His good looks and tall physique were as unique a combination as his black down North Face vest over his long-sleeved white polo.

  His laugh was one quick squawk, “Hah.” Like a sultan flicking a gold coin at a beggar. Or a mad man laughing over your shoulder at life itself. I could hear it from where I was standing. I was hooked the first time I heard it, hypnotized by jealousy and hate.

  He thinks he’s seen it all huh? What happened to his best friends from his old school? How come he could ditch them so easily?

  Filing out of Mark’s party, Eric, Jay, Ian and me were all wasted, but no would be able to tell. Even in a state of lowered inhibitions, we tried even harder to maintain the tedious balance between friendship and insulting laughs. It wasn’t like in the beginning anymore, when we were younger.

  As we filed down the cul-de-sac, past a few cars that were loading up with people, a distinct sound grabbed my full attention.

  “Hah.” Robby was leaning into the driver’s window of a car across the street. His existence had been an annoyance at first, but he’d seriously started fucking up my life earlier at the party. I saw the way Oakley playfully grabbed his arm at the party earlier, her loud laughter at his jokes.

  I hesitated for a moment in the night before continuing, after a few more steps I stopped again. “Yo Robby.” I shouted across the street.

  “Ya?” He stood up at the sound of an unfamiliar voice in the dark.

  “What’s up with you and Oakley?”

  “What’s it to you?”

  I reflec
ted for a second on how good his instant response was before shouting back, “Nothing,” And continued walking.

  “Hah. That’s what I thought.”

  As I caught up to our car all my friends were glaring at me from inside, but they respected it enough not say anything and let it go.

  Roby could have any of them, I agonized. Carmalita, Lena’s Veggietales, Christian perfect bf who’d recently had an epiphany “that she needed to stop judging people” and was hastily making up for years of lost time hooking up. Kate, the millionaire’s daughter, who’d done everything there is to do in life by 15 and was back on the scene again after breaking up with her 21 year old boyfriend. Terra, Isa, Mia, any girl. Why did it have to be her?

  The next weekend I urgently prodded my friends up from their hookahs, vaporizers, and bongs. Nagging them to get to the party early this weekend, on the verge of a feverish tantrum. Robby was hosting the biggest party that weekend.

  The ride there was a blur of emotional nausea. I just kept repeating my line over and over: “Oakley, I have a crush on you.” I couldn’t think about what came next, either way I was screwed. If she said “yes,” then what? I kiss Oakley Carter? Date her? It was too much pressure. But I didn’t have a choice anymore, we were there, there was no more time. I ran ahead of our group as soon as we parked, jogging through the crowd gathered around the door as if I was already too late.

  I wasn’t inside a second until I was blindsided by a hyper, jumping hug. “Marcoo!”

  It was Maddie, Oakley’s friend, I’d never seen her at a party before. She looked totally out-of-place, lost, and clearly relieved to see someone she could talk to. At the sight of her by herself without Oakley my brain began to boil.

  “Where’s Oakley, Maddie?”

  She grinned excitedly like a 3rd grader with a big secret, “She’s with Robby, in his room.” I looked down the dim hallway to my right. Which one was it? Which door? All the voices of the party blended into one terrifying inaudible noise. I plummeted to a different dimension where there was only one thought, go, get away. I pushed Maddie aside and ran down the staircase in front of me.

  The downstairs living room was empty, it was still early in the party. I stared at the ceiling. It was going on right above me, I was so close, where was it happening?

  A gust of night air hit me, the screen door was open and Ryan Orton was standing on the patio holding bong. Orton was a big friendly giant, and a staple of the senior social scene. He had the kind of face you expected to have a mean side, and he did, he did drugs as mean as you can.

  “What up, Marcizzi?” He beckoned me from outside. I stepped out into the soothing air.

  “Oakley man, she’s a straight heartbreaker,” I let out honestly. Orton’s big lungs blew out a huge plume of smoke.

  “You saw that, huh? Whatevs bro, fuck that trick.” He handed me the bong, it’s was then I saw he’d fallen for all her hugs and touches, too.

  A fury of thuds preceded the unreal appearance of Oakley herself at the bottom of the staircase, followed quickly behind by her tag-a-long, Maddie.

  “There you are. I heard you were here.” She looked ecstatic, like she was riding a wave of energy. She tried to hug me but I didn’t reciprocate, holding my hands up callously. Her waterproof, sweatproof, all day, will never fade ever, ever, blush was fading. I looked away from her to Ryan, who’d just realized he was in 3rd place.

  “I waited for you.” She said. I took the biggest bong rip I could and blew it out between us like a fire ball. My eyes attacked her, but I was frozen, hoping her own self-critiques would do their work.

  “Ok, fine, I’m already past my curfew, I gotta get home.” Oakley turned to leave. Maddie lingered behind for a second, smiling at me, before she followed. Like there was a one in a billion chance she was going to make me fall in love with her.

  “What was that?” He was so perplexed Ryan’s voice inversed halfway through the exclamation. “She just hooked up with homeboy two seconds ago, what a freak.”

  I faked laugh for him. Ryan handed me the bong and headed upstairs. The itchy burning smoke moving in and out of my lungs did nothing for my mood except focus my mind on the empty routine for a precious millisecond or two. Inhale. Exhale. Then the tears started to come, followed by more terror at someone seeing the wiped away streaks on my cheeks.

  I put down the bong and meandered through the yard until I found a side gate. I ducked away in the night to my car and crawled across the backseat. There the floodgates opened. I lied alone with the sting for hours.

  I’ve heard of people feeling such intense negative emotions while they’re maturing that they get addicted to them. That night, in that backseat, I fused with that sting. Now when I sleep with girls I imagine all the guys that truly love them. The guys that studied with them for years dreaming about them, the guy they work with. Their future husbands. I imagine how badly they wish they were me, I imagine their pain.

  Jay and Eric found me eventually and banged on the windows until I let them in, “Man we thought you left until we saw your car, you sick?”

  Instead of lying I didn’t respond.

  “Is this cause Oakley hooked up with Robby?” Eric asked intuitively.

  “Maybe.”

  “Want me to drive?” Jay asked excitedly, since Jay got his car taken away he was always looking for any opportunity to drive.

  “Ya,” I tossed him the keys and then smushed my face back into the car cushion.

  “I don’t know why you like her so much, she’s not even that bomb.” Eric stated as a matter-of-fact.

  “You can’t be more wrong.” I responded, muffled by the seat.

  “Well she’s a trick, you know she’s a trick.”

  I rolled over on my back, “I’m a slut,” I groaned fiercely.

  Eric laughed, “You’re a virgin Marco. You’re way too picky and shy.”

  “I’m a slut on the inside, if I had any game I’d be a slut. I wish I were a slut,” I chuckled deliriously. I’d lost my innocence on the computer forever ago.

  “You know how many girls throughout history have been killed and persecuted because they were girls?” I began one of my token PSAs, but Jay and Eric weren’t having it and didn’t respond.

  “Billions.” Laying down, looking up out the moving window, everything looked different. From the passing street lamps and trees I began trying to guess what streets we were on.

  I was sitting next to Oakley in Science class, it was the last twenty minutes when we were supposed to be reading and doing our homework for next class. Oakley was working diligently, turning the pages of her science book and taking notes. I hadn’t turned a page in my book since I opened it. I was failing the class.

  It had started with missing just one assignment. You didn’t say no when Loren and the seniors wanted you to come get blunted at the beach. Missing one assignment was no biggie, I’d just beg for an extension and do some upper and make it up in one night. Then I’d stayed up all night chatting online instead of doing any assignments. After that there was no way I was getting back to an A or a B in the class. And no one was blowing off E-Rock to salvage a C-. Eventually, it became best just not to think about it and stay extra blunted. I stopped letting my thoughts stray beyond a few hours into the future.

  “Did you hear that Ryan dropped out of school?” She spoke to me, still looking at her book.

  Of course I f-ing heard Ryan dropped out.

  “Why do you care?” I snapped snootily. Ryan was just a brief amusement to her, someone to hug and talk to at parties, we all were.

  “Ryan is my friend, I like him.”

  “And when you go to college?”

  “Well ya, until I go to college,” Wow she even admitted it, the balls on this one. I glared at her.

  “How many girls have you slept with, Marco?”

  I hesitated suspiciously for a minute. Had we talked about this before? What number did I tell her? I couldn’t remember.

  It was more than ju
st the grades, I could feel my brain changing, having a harder time remembering things, blanking on stuff all the time. My wit was getting less exceptional. But all my sleeping problems had gone away since I started getting high. A few brain cells were a small price to pay for true and instant happiness. What was the worst that could happen? That I got permanently more happy? That was probably why weed was illegal. Because capitalism wanted smart, quick productive worker bees, no matter how stressed and anxious they were. I was good looking now anyways, who gave a craps about wit?

  “5,” I lied, “And why do you ask, Giselle?” It annoyed her when I used her middle name.

  “You know how many girls Robby has slept with?” I frowned, I hated it when Oakley’s tongue pushed up to make that sound. She used it all the time now that they were official. I could have forgiven the 1, 2, 3, even 4 times they disappeared at parties, but not this.

  “20?” I guessed.

  “He can’t even remember. He really can’t, can you believe that? I just can’t imagine not remembering.”

  “Trouble in paradise Oakley?” I joked before adding. “Jonsen can’t remember either.” He was the only person I knew in that club. Although I could speculate on a few others. “Ya, I really don’t know if I could date someone who couldn’t remember…” I teased.

  “Isn’t he the cutest guy you’ve ever seen though?”

  The wild feeling I’d been battling to suppress rose up in me again, this time it brought with it a wicked smile. “Giselle, I need to tell you something but you have to promise that you didn’t hear it from me.”

  Her whole body immediately turned completely towards me, “Of course, I would never.”

  I held her there and started dragging the moment out. “I really don’t know if I should tell you,” I kept saying, after anguished pauses. I stared at my book, drummed my pencil against the desk’s edge, stared into her eyes, made her promise over and over.

  “Marco, you know you can trust me.”

  “Ok, here we go.” I took the plunge. “So last weekend, at Robby’s birthday party at his cabin.” Oakley’s parents didn’t let her go to Robby’s cabin for the party. Mine didn’t either, but I’d ignored them and went anyways.