The Truth of Right Now

by Kara Lee Corthron

  Mom tilts her head and frowns at me.

  “I think I do. But, um, do you think I don’t let you have things just for you?”

  I repress the urge to sigh; that would only worsen matters.

  “I don’t think that, Mom. I don’t know. This might sound crazy, but sometimes the line where you end and I begin gets a little fuzzy.”

  She goes stone silent. Oh, no. I may have just mortally wounded her feelings.

  “Never mind, never mind, never mind. I’m exhausted. I’m just gonna go to sleep. I didn’t mean anything weird.”

  She plays with her hair, looking at the floor, the neurons churning in her brain.

  “Seriously, don’t worry. Thanks for the cocoa,” I say and kiss her on the cheek.

  “No. This is good. I want you to always be honest with me. You’re probably right. I need to let you have your experiences without feeling the need to . . . monitor you all the time. I’m proud of you for speaking up.” I smile and mouth the words love you. And then she relaxes. She whispers the words back to me before leaving. As she closes the door behind her, I notice that her face seems softer today. No deep worry lines interfering with her beauty. She’s my beautiful mom as I remember her before I became a living PSA.

  * * *

  “Lily? Lily!”

  “Huh?”

  I look up to see the mess I’ve made of our experiment. Tara sighs and grabs a handful of paper towels. Epsom salt and honey all over the place. No crystals for us.

  “You never pay attention. I don’t know why you come to class at all.”

  “Me either,” I agree.

  Tara scribbles something down in her notebook angrily and continues working. I finish cleaning the mess. I should apologize. She is doing all the work and I’m just in the way. But then again, come on! She hasn’t exactly been the most fun lab partner imaginable. When I ask questions, she answers me, but not before sucking her teeth, rolling her eyes, and/or asking if I ever do any of my assignments. She treats me like I’m a complete idiot, and I am far from being an idiot. The truth is I do sometimes do my assignments. But mostly I don’t. Because mostly I don’t care. And I certainly don’t plan on becoming a chemist when I grow up.

  “You used to be a goody-goody,” Tara mumbles.

  “I haven’t heard anybody say ‘goody-goody’ since about third grade.”

  “I want a new lab partner,” she announces, and before I can say anything she marches to the front of the room and starts talking animatedly to Mr. Crenshaw. My heart starts pounding, and I wonder what fresh humiliation is waiting for me thanks to Tara’s complaints. I hate her.

  Mr. Crenshaw listens, but looks really tired and annoyed, which is generally how he looks all the time, so it’s hard to tell if she’s having any impact. He glances at me a couple of times, but doesn’t quite make eye contact. Then he heaves this big, gigantic bear sigh.

  “Class? Apparently there is some disharmony. Is anyone willing to exchange lab partners so Tara will be happy?”

  The room is shocked into silence. There are some weird, muffled giggles, but nobody says anything. Nobody raises a hand, and nobody walks forward. Tara’s face is redder than I’ve ever seen a face get. I wonder if she should go to the hospital.

  “Fine. Thank you, class. Get back to work.” He then talks to Tara for a few more minutes before she slowly walks back to our table.

  “What did he—”

  “Just leave me alone,” she hisses. Her hands shake as she returns to her work, and though her jaw is locked in rage, tears pool at the corners of her eyes. I look at the clock. God, this period always feels endless. It’s awful. She has every right to want a new lab partner.

  “Sorry,” I whisper. “I’ll try to be better.”

  She shakes her head, a sad yet still angry smirk on her lips. She knows I’m lying. I’m not going to be any better. I think she even knows I’m not sorry. I just said it because I know I should be.

  * * *

  I sit in the cafeteria with Dari, and he draws while I eat. We discuss possible menus for our dinner tonight at my house. I warn him that it will most likely be served in takeout containers, but this seems to delight him.

  If I’m careful—and super quiet—I can smell him and he doesn’t know I’m doing it. He smells amazing. I don’t know how to describe it. It’s spicy and sweet and there’s a roughness to it too. Maybe he wears Old Spice? Not sure. My granddad used to wear that and I remember liking it, but then again maybe that’s something only old people wear. Whatever it is, it’s nice.

  “Do you know everyone here?” he asks me.

  I stop smelling him and focus.

  “In this school?”

  “No. Just in the lunchroom.”

  I look around. Yeah. I know most of these losers. A few since I was five or six. Sad.

  “Pretty much.”

  He looks around the cafeteria and points to a random guy. Jason Chung.

  “That guy. He seems like a dick. Is he?”

  “Completely. He’s on the rowing team and supposedly he was really drunk at this party last year and he peed in every glass in the house.”

  “Oh my God!”

  “Yeah. He’s disgusting.”

  “What about her?” Dari points out Megan Parsons.

  “I don’t know her that well. She’s in band.”

  He nods, but seems disappointed by this answer. So I add to it.

  “I did hear once that she’s a serious sleepwalker. In the middle of the night, she left her apartment, got on the subway, and ended up out on the beach at Coney Island before she woke up.”

  “Holy shit.”

  “I know. Creepy, right?”

  Did I hear that Megan was a sleepwalker? Yes. But the story I heard was that she got out of bed, left her apartment, and woke up at the twenty-four-hour Gristedes across the street. I like my version better.

  He looks around again and his eyes stop.

  “What about her?” I follow his gaze and see Tara McKenzie standing in line for lunch and looking lost. Why did he pick her?

  “That’s my lab partner. Tara. I’d rather not talk about her.”

  “Why?”

  “Not worth it,” I say, choosing not to go into any more detail. Tara may get on my last nerve, but I don’t want to be the one to start that god-awful rumor rolling around again.

  When the bell rings, I gather my things, and only then do I realize that we’ve made no concrete plans for later.

  “Uh? Should I meet you after school somewhere or . . .?”

  He blinks then nods his head. I try not to feel crushed, but I do. If I hadn’t just mentioned it, would he have forgotten about it entirely?

  “Yeah. Do you walk home or take the train?”

  “Why?” I sound far more defensive than I meant to. I didn’t mean to sound defensive at all.

  “No reason. I’ll just meet you at the front entrance.”

  “Cool,” I say and then leave before I can say anything else weird.

  As I walk down the hall to class, someone grabs my sleeve and I jump.

  “Is everything all right?” Jackie asks with severe emphasis, suggesting that she’s sure it isn’t.

  “Oh. Yeah. I’m fine, Jackie.”

  “Are you sure? You haven’t joined us for lunch in a while.”

  I thought it was pretty clear that I’d never be joining them for lunch again, but I guess it wasn’t to Jackie.

  “No, nothing’s wrong. I, um, I met a guy.”

  “I can see that.” Uh-oh. Jackie is using her grown-up, parental voice. “I certainly won’t tell you who you can or can’t socialize with, but I can warn you as a friend that you might not know as much about him as you think you do.”

  My head swims a little. She obviously thinks she knows something about Dari. I’m not in the mood for this. We’re about to be late for class. I have to remember to meet him at the front entrance, text Mom about dinner. What is she talking about?

  “Jackie, he�
��s a nice guy. What’s the problem?”

  Jackie frowns. “I’ve heard some things, Lily. He was kicked out of his old school. I’ve even heard he has a record. Like”—and for this, she whispers—“a criminal record. Haven’t you been through enough?”

  Two things happen to me simultaneously.

  1) I am instantly terrified that Dari might be a serial killer.

  2) I am furious that Jackie thinks she has the right to talk to me this way.

  “Jackie. I’m fine.”

  “That’s what you said last year, Lily. You weren’t fine. At no point is intimacy with your teacher fine. It’s abnormal. I don’t mean to hurt your feelings, but how many disastrous choices are you gonna make?”

  My fists clench, my jaw tightens, I hear blood pumping in my ears. If I do not get away from her, I am going to do her harm.

  “Good-bye, Jackie.”

  “Lily, I’m worried about you.”

  “Then where were you this summer?” Jackie’s mouth falls open, like she really wants to say something, but can’t. “Exactly.”

  I leave her gaping at me in the hall. I never planned to confront Jackie about abandoning me, but what difference does it make now? I feel my hands shaking and tiny beads of sweat on my forehead, but at least I don’t feel angry anymore. Honesty isn’t easy. Or comfortable.

  * * *

  The final bell of the day rings, and I head to my locker, drop off everything, and then go downstairs to wait by the entrance. For a few brief seconds, the halls are so crowded, I can’t imagine ever finding anyone here. But it only lasts for those few seconds, and then it’s fairly dead.

  There are a few seniors goofing off out front. Two guys and a girl. One of the guys throws the girl over his shoulder and she punches him to let her down, but she’s laughing the whole time. I don’t know them. They look like burnouts.

  While I wait, I strain to remember the song I’ve been trying to create. I finally wrote a little bit down, but I know there’s more, and it’s a tricky one. It might be my perfect song. That’s quite a high bar to reach, but then again no one knows I’m making it but me, so nobody can tell me if I’ve failed or not. I’m the only judge. My anxiousness is too distracting, and I can’t think of more than another two measures. Lame.

  I glance at my watch. I’ve been waiting for almost ten minutes. I decide to think about what I’ll do if he doesn’t show. Will I play it off and pretend it meant nothing to me at all? Will I act like I forgot about it too? I don’t know. But I won’t cry. It never solves anything. In any case, if he doesn’t show up soon, I will be getting on the ferry today. I will ride out to Staten Island. I will only get off the boat long enough to reboard the one returning to Manhattan. And I might do it once or twice more before going home. HE can’t control me. HE can live out the whole rest of his life in his beautiful home on Staten Island with his beautiful sons and his beautiful wife and his beautiful Irish setter, Annabel Leigh (what a stupid name for a dog). But I still exist. I matter, motherfucker! I—

  “Hey! Sorry it took me so long,” Dari runs up to me, out of breath.

  I shake myself out of my momentary psychosis.

  “I had to run back up to the art room to return a book to Ms. Spangler, and she ended up showing me some other ones. I kept saying, ‘I have to meet somebody.’ Sorry about that.”

  I smile. He’s here. It’s going to be okay now.

  * * *

  “What does your mom do?”

  “She’s a writer. Self-help. She wrote a book years ago that sold like five million copies or something. Her author name is ‘Price,’ though, if you look her up. She’s been trying to write a follow-up book forever, but, well, she can’t seem to finish it.” He nods. I guess this is interesting. We’re still walking on Broadway, but we’re not too far from my block.

  “She also does a lot of lectures and workshops. Some call her a guru, but she hates that word.”

  “What does she teach?” he asks.

  I think. My mind’s gone blank. It’s been a part of my life so long that I can’t distinguish her self-helping from her mothering.

  “Well, I’ve never gone to a workshop, so I don’t know how she does it exactly, but she has these things called the five Cs. Consciousness, compassion, consistency, control, and creation. I don’t really know what you’re supposed to do with them, but that’s like the core of what she teaches.” I feel bad. I’d be a terrible agent for my mother. I’m making her sound like a total flake.

  “Is her book any good?”

  He asks this just as we arrive at my building, and I stop.

  “I’ve never read it,” I tell him honestly. He’s astonished, but tries to conceal it. I walk us past Marcus, who still makes sure to look down whenever I go by. We’re silent in the elevator, and I feel like the crappiest daughter. Why haven’t I read her book? It doesn’t make any sense. She’s never mentioned it either. The only logical reason I can think of is that I was too little to understand it when it first came out, and by the time I could . . . well, I guess I just never thought about it.

  We enter and Mom is nowhere to be found, but sounds come from the kitchen and the Buena Vista Social Club is blasting. Her housework music.

  “Mom?” It’s sort of a half yell.

  She pops in from the kitchen, looking a little frazzled. Her curls are roughly tied in a knot at the back of her head, but some of them have escaped.

  “I know what you’re thinking, but don’t panic: I’m not cooking. I’m baking. More or less. Hello! I’m Savannah.” She offers her hand to Dari. He shyly shakes it, averting his eyes, which I find strange until I notice something.

  “Uh, Mom?”

  “What sweetie?”

  I shake my head and turn to Dari. “Have a seat. Do you want a drink or anything?”

  “No, I’m good,” he says and sits as I try to gently yet aggressively pull my mother into the kitchen.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I think you forgot something,” I say, eyeing her chest.

  “What?” she looks down. Her tight cotton tank top is clinging to her by the sheerest layer of perspiration, and then she, too, notices that she somehow neglected to wear a bra. This is quite normal for her, but having a guest is not.

  “Oops! Well, I didn’t know you guys would be coming straight from school. I thought I had some time to prepare.” She checks the oven and turns the music down.

  “Be back,” she says and then scurries off to her room. Not the best start to the evening.

  In the living room, Dari studies the photos on the bookshelf. There aren’t a lot.

  “Is that your dad?” he asks about the one photo we have of a man on display.

  “No. That’s my uncle Raymond. That’s an old picture. I think he’s in Uganda now. He’s a Doctor Without Borders, so we don’t get to see him much.”

  “Wow. I bet he’s seen some shit,” Dari says. He sounds low-key, but I can tell he’s seriously impressed.

  “Yeah.” I hope he doesn’t ask any follow-up questions because I know very little about what Uncle Raymond does. He sends e-blasts and a quarterly e-newsletter to the family about his work, and I usually just skim them, if I open them at all. Uncle Ray is a really cool, righteous guy and I’ve always liked him, but you can only read about children with HIV and malaria and filthy drinking water for so long before you start to lose hope for all of humanity.

  We sit for a bit in an awkward silence. Typically our silences aren’t that awkward, but this one is and I don’t understand why.

  “Are you sure it’s okay for me to be here?” he asks.

  “Of course!” I say it a little too fast and perhaps a little too earnestly, but it’s true. If I’m completely honest with him, which I will not be, I think Mom might be more excited about his visit than I am. Finally, she gets some tangible proof that her daughter is capable of socializing like a normal human being.

  “Okay,” he says, “You get along well with your mom, huh?”
r />   “I don’t know.”

  “You do,” he insists. He picks up a photo of my mom and me that was taken when I was twelve. She looks radiant in it, her long chestnut curls all wisped away from her face neatly, but not too neatly. Her turquoise eyes shining. I remember that she cried in the parking lot that day before our photo appointment. She used to cry a lot more back then, when she was dating Adam. She was either ecstatically happy with him or horribly depressed. It was good when he finally moved to Seattle.

  That day, we went out to Elizabeth to sit for this photographer. I can’t remember why we would’ve done something as random as that unless Grandma put her up to it. We pulled into the lot and she cried really hard for two or three minutes, clutching the steering wheel. The engine was still running and “The Hook” by Blues Traveler played on the radio. A corny song, but I kind of like it. I just sat there and watched her knuckles tighten on the wheel, wishing I knew what to do. Then she wiped her eyes, laughed, and said, “Let’s go make a goddamn memory.” The next day, she put our car on Craigslist, and a week later, it was gone.

  I look terrible in the photo. Bad skin, braces, and dark circles under my eyes because I was going through a long bout of insomnia. I hate that picture so much. I wish I could cut myself out of it, but Mom won’t let me.

  Dari studies the photo for a while. A long while. It’s agony. What is he looking at? Is he trying to decide if I’m still that gross? I keep thinking he’ll either put it back or say something. When neither of those things happens, after the longest minute of my life, I try to pull the photo from his hands. He actually holds on to it tighter, so I snatch it away from him and shove it back on the shelf where he found it. Except I turn it toward the book spines so I’m safely hidden. Like it matters now.

  “What’s wrong?” he asks. Jesus, he has pretty eyes.

  I shrug and prepare to change the subject, but I don’t have to because Mom comes back. She’s now wearing a bra accompanied by a tight black blouse with a modest neckline and one of her famous, flowing gypsy skirts. It’s adorned with a colorful Mexican print, and I’m pretty certain she got it as a gringo tourist in Tijuana. I rarely think about what I wear, but Mom takes ensembles very seriously. A few times she’s attempted to dress me up like a little doll, but I’ve never been into it. Before she finally gave up, she said by the time I’m ready to attract attention, it’ll be too late. I have no idea what that means; guys are attracted to you or they aren’t. But I think the “too late” part scares the crap out of Mom.