My dad takes off his loafers and stands on the first two steps leading into the shallow end. He looks behind him toward the house then walks out and toward us. He holds his loafers in his right hand and opens the sliding door with his left.
“Come on,” he says, “it’s time to go.” So I stand and we leave.
Driving back home on the 5 we’re quiet. I watch the duck farm as we approach the 57. I think about Raging Waters and summer camp. How I used to pretend I was sick each Tuesday, field trip day, because I couldn’t count the money that my mother stuffed into my fanny pack and was too embarrassed to ask a counselor to help me buy lunch. When I did go on the weekly field trips and it was time for lunch break I knew that a ten-dollar bill would cover the counting change part. But one time the cashier stopped me. “You need thirty-five cents,” said the teenage girl beneath the imposter Hot Dog on a Stick hat. Her hair was shaggy and fell across the side of her face in a hair sprayed swoop. She wore a Swatch. Normally I would have handed her another dollar, but I didn’t have any dollar bills left. Thirty-five cents felt like such an unfathomable number to gather up from the cup of my hands. Terror swirled in my chest. Large and small and different-sized coins. “Don’t you know how to count thirty-five cents?” My eyes welled up with tears and before I could answer she huffed, blew her bangs out of her eyes and reached over the counter, scooping a quarter and dime from my hands. “Here,” she said, passing the red-and-white-striped, oil-spotted box of chicken strips and fries. “Straws are over there,” she nodded toward the napkin table and handed me a Coke.
“How are you?” he asks, seven hours into our time together.
I blink and turn away from the window. “When I was little and we lived out here, there was a mountain, or, well, I thought it was a mountain, and there was this sort of intricate pulley system, it was like Mouse Trap, this thing looked like the Zipper at the carnival, anyway, it scooped up rocks then dumped them someplace else beneath the ground. I could never see where, really.” He doesn’t say anything and I see that he’s furrowed his brow, which has sprouted the lines of annoyance. I’ve swum too far again. “Anyway, the mountain, it’s gone now.”
“The rock quarry. You didn’t live out here that long.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“What did you mean?”
“Nothing. I just, was thinking out loud.”
“You should pay attention to that. Someone could mis-construe your out-loud thoughts for passive-aggression. Your mother is passive-aggressive.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It will benefit you in this life to be direct.”
“I wasn’t trying to passive-aggressively accuse you of anything. If I wanted to say you were a crap dad for making us live out here while you were living in Hawaii I would have just said that.”
“How quickly you feel implicated.”
“Why can’t you just be normal? I only meant I thought it was a mountain and now I realize it was just a pile of rocks.”
“What do you think a mountain is?”
“How’s school?”
“Shitty!” I say, starting to cry.
He pulls across three lanes of traffic and exits beside a Denny’s. “Why can’t I be normal? You look like Elvira! Why am I getting frantic phone calls from your mother telling me she hasn’t seen you in forty-eight hours?
“Is that why you’re here?”
“What do you think?”
“I don’t know!” I scream, getting out of the car. I stop and walk back to the window, which is now rolled down. “No one tells me anything!”
“That’s bullshit. Quit being dramatic, get back in here.”
I open the door and sit back down.
“Here,” he says, offering me an old Starbucks napkin from the glove compartment.
“How come I have to be the one to figure everything out? It’s like everything with you people is a game of Clue and as soon as shit seems normal, one of you assholes changes the rules again. Why can’t you just say, ‘I heard you were missing and I’m worried about you’? Me, indirect? That’s a laugh. You’re the most confusing, indirect person I know. You’re like some angry philosopher who smoked too much bad stuff. Ya know?”
“Don’t speak to me like you’re Moon Zappa.”
“Who?!”
“Frank Zappa’s … it doesn’t matter.”
“You’re so prehistoric and you don’t even know it.”
“Nicole, I don’t know what to tell you. I try to see you girls, you say no. I don’t come, your mother puts me through hell.”
“Why do you listen to me? Why can’t you just come?”
“I try to respect your wishes.”
“I’m sixteen! You don’t want to come.”
He’s quiet and grabs a toothpick from the center console. “Are you hungry?”
“No,” I wipe at my face. “I’m always crying in cars with guys.”
“I’m not a guy, I’m your father.”
“I know.” And then I just give up. I don’t know what I’m trying to say anyway and who gives a fuck really.
×
What if I stopped here to tell you something else was coming? Something on the horizon? Sometimes I have these lucid feelings as if everything is being shown to me on some supercomputer from the future. Or the way I imagine death is, where your life flashes before your eyes. I know that’s cliché, but things line up that way. I know how I might appear on the outside, withdrawn, maybe rotten and spoiled, perhaps a little pulled back and reserved but the truth is I am alive, full of passion, and, most of all, as I age slowly on this crumbling and dissolving planet, full of sadness. I am sad. It drips like muck over my eyeballs, like the black goo on The X-Files, and the way Mulder knows the goo is coming for him. He knows because he can sense it. I can sense things all the time. I feel like Virginia Woolf’s Orlando looking out at the future, you and the future me, and I can’t shake this feeling that this sadness will be the thing I’ll have to fight the rest of my life, and that love is like this mirage, a stupid dump of water in a wrinkling, ripply distance. I know instinctually that I will spend my entire life thirsty as fuck running for something always just out of reach. This hallway is an endless eternity and my locker is all I have and my books will never fit and my lock will always jam and the spaces around the bodies of my peers are outlined in light and I can’t escape this shadow.
×
The little Scantron is sweaty underneath my fingers and I chew the eraser at the bottom of the pencil. I hold it above the word other. I look up at the nurse behind the counter, the one who handed me the clipboard and papers. Pacific Islander makes me smirk. I fill in Hispanic then quickly rub it out. I’ve hovered above the question a while now. I stand and walk toward the window, she looks up, “Finished?”
“No. Not quite. I was wondering if I could leave this section blank?” I hold out the clipboard and point at the race question.
“No, I’m afraid not,” she says looking up with an I’m sorry face. “That’s how we keep track of who’s using our facility.”
“You give this information out?”
“Not to the general public but Planned Parenthood is a government-subsidized program, so yes, we have to keep track of how many women use our facility.”
“Men don’t use the facility?” Now she smirks at me, I’ve revealed myself somehow as a rabble-rouser, some sort of smart aleck.
“Yes, of course men are allowed to use our facility, but in general, our services pertain to women. Just fill out the Caucasian option and you should be fine.”
“I’m not Caucasian.”
“Then fill out whichever option best pertains to your ethnicity, return the forms, and I’ll call you when the next available nurse is ready.”
“Okay, thank you.” I turn around and leave the clipboard on the magazine table, resting on a pile of issues of People and Scientific American, below the cheaply framed photo of a whale diving into the neon-painted ocean, alive
with brightly shining fish and coral. I push open the door, and sunshine and fast food smells of South Lake hit my nostrils. I hop the steps and make my way toward the Orean health-food shack to grab a fizzy green drink.
I walk to the pay phone on the corner, sucking the already empty Styrofoam cup, and drop in fifty cents. It rings a few times until Chelo answers.
“Hello?”
“Hey, it’s me.”
“Where are you calling from?”
“A pay phone. Look, what are you doing?”
“My parents are fighting with Adel so I’m taking Ugly to the mall. Wanna come?”
“No, I’m in Pasadena and don’t have cash. Gotta wait till my mom gets home to get more.”
“You sure? I could lend you some money if you can get here, for the ride back. I pinched forty from my dad’s bag this morning. We’re going to the Hello Kitty store and I’m taking her to Claire’s to get her ears pierced.”
“No, it’s cool, I’m not good with little kids.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t know, maybe I am, I’m just sort of, I think I’m gonna stay close to home.”
“Okay,” she says, I can see her shrug, “suit yourself. See you at school tomorrow?”
“Maybe.”
“Fool you’re gonna get kicked out.”
“Maybe.”
“All right James Dean, smell you later.”
“Smell ya.” I hang up and walk back toward home.
I open the front door and the house is cool and shady. Walk to my mother’s room and push open the door. I sit on the edge of the bed. Parsley is asleep. I pull him into my lap and stroke his head, he nuzzles into my touch.
“I tried to get birth control today. No, I’m not having sex yet, but you know, I just thought it’s better to be prepared for when I do.
“No, I wouldn’t say they were rude, they were really nice actually. She asked me a few uncomfortable questions but overall it ended up being a positive experience.
“I walked, it’s just around the corner you know. Well, you make a good point, I could have been sore after the exam but I wasn’t, it’s not so bad you know. I’ve had it done before. I took myself. It’s just around the corner. I’m not sure what’s for dinner. Whatever you feel like making is fine with me. Let’s see, I don’t think so, Facts of Life starts at two, I think it’s still noon, we have a few hours. Of course I don’t mind making you a sandwich, what kind would you like? Tuna? Of course, I might make one myself.
“I did see them, they’re beautiful, you’re such a wonderful florist. Those assholes are lucky to have you.” Parsley wrestles free and slips away.
“No, I don’t mind. I don’t have to eat either. I can just come back another time, or you just let me know when you’re free.” The pillow is soft and my head slips into its shape. I reach my hand across the bed and touch his tail, it falls away and branch shadows flutter above, the wings of birds beating on their limbs, the outside shimmering across the wall. Damp circles form their gullies around my temples and I turn my head, wipe away tears, and move my hands blindly, searching for a dry spot of land.
×
“It’s easy,” says Jessica, pulling her boobs into a dark purple tube top in front of my mirror. “I can’t believe it only took you an entire semester to invite me over. It’s nice here.” She looks around my grease stain of a room. “I like the bedspread.” She smacks her gum. “I bet tons of hot guys are gonna be there. I mean, can you imagine?” She smiles at herself, fluffs her hair, and turns and grabs my arms and squeals.
“No,” I answer and touch her boobs. But not in a sexy way, and she gets this.
“No what?”
“No, I can’t imagine. Can you, Yoko?”
Jessica laughs nervously and rolls her eyes. “You’re a weirdo sometimes?”
“Am I?” I ask, quickly lifting my eyebrows up and down like Groucho Marx.
“Yeah, a real A-plus weirdo. Stop it, you’re being creepy. Move.”
She pushes me out of the way and grabs my lipstick. I flop backward onto the bed. “You think someone there will talk to me?”
“What are you talking about, duh. You’re such a Betty.”
“I’m a regular Betty Poop!” I shout and shoot up in place like Dracula, baring my fangs and claws at her.
“No seriously, don’t act like a nerd. I will go home.”
“Fuck you, man.”
“Fuck you!”
“I’m just being me or whatever.”
“Oh boo-hoo, get dressed.”
“I am dressed, geez.” I say, sitting up regular. “I’m into this, what’s wrong with it?”
“You look like a dyke.”
“So?”
“So you’re not a dyke. Put on one of your cool vintage dresses.”
“No, man, I want to wear my Dickieeeeeeees!” and I say this like my voice is a tiny helium rocket in a parking lot, heading for the sky. “Besides my boobs look good in this.” I tug on the bottom of the wifebeater. If nothing else I have great tits. Oh yeah, I’ve got giant tits. “I did my hair and makeup. God, you’re such a Hitler.”
“I’m Jewish.”
“I know! You never shut up about it.”
“You never talk unless it’s to say something bitchy or weird.”
“Okay, fine. Tell me how to snag a hottie.”
“So it’s easy. You see some scam-worthy babe and you saddle up sort of like, cool, you know? And just be like, ‘Hey, I’m Nikki,’ you know?”
“I guess.”
“You really are a Betty, despite your total lack of sociability. You should be like, hospitalized or something, like, that book in class, Girl Interrup—”
And then she interrupts herself, sets down my lipstick. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. It’s a good book.” And now I regret telling her. It happened in a moment of stoned weakness. She asked about my sister and so I told her. I’ve never even told Chelo and it’s a real thing that I regret. Talk about not choosing wisely, Indiana.
“I know, I just, I’m sorry.”
“Look it’s cool. Do you want me to grab a knife and like, freak out on you?”
“God no.”
“Okay, so it’s cool.”
“Okay.” And she turns around again and looks at herself again and again, and again, and again, never once seeing who she is.
×
Dan is on the orange couch, Melissa Flores sitting in his lap. They’re both holding red plastic cups and talking to Ian and Sam. Sam has just returned from New York where he was visiting his father, some sort of big-deal art collector. Everyone’s been kissing his ass all week, trying to see if he got laid or something menial like that. Dan sees me and looks away. I head into the kitchen and try to find an unopened beer on the sticky overcrowded countertop.
“Nice dress,” says a deep unfamiliar voice. I turn around. It’s Joey Kandarian, from orchestra. He’s broad in the soldiers, tall, beefy around the middle, and dressed like a Rude Boy. His two-tones are worn in and sort of tattered, he keeps readjusting his Buddy Holly opticals and looking at me like he just ate something bad and now he’s not sure about it. His greasy brown hair falling from his pomp into his face.
“Thanks, I got it on Melrose.” I spot a Corona behind a half-empty bottle of lemon Tequiza and snatch for it.
“Here,” he grabs it first and pops it for me. “You’re in musical theater, right?”
“Just theater,” I say, casually.
“Yeah but you’re in musical theater, you practice in our building. I’ve heard you sing.”
“Yeah, well, it’s more like an elective.”
“No it’s not. It’s a department.”
“Okay so what?” I ask, taking a swallow and looking into the living room.
“You have a nice voice,” he says following my gaze.
“Oh. Thanks.” Go away. Go away. Go away.
“Do you read music?”
“Sure, got to, don’t you?”
“Totally.”
“I’m a better actor.”
“Yeah?”
“Totally. I’m getting an agent, you know? I mean, I’ve practically got one right now, actually.” I look away from him, like someone better is out there, waiting. Take a swig.
“Now or after graduation?”
“Now, duh! I’ve already been in some stuff. I model. Are you in a band or something?”
“I’m in orchestra,” he says simply. I shuck corn. I’m in orchestra. I sell car insurance. I’m in orchestra. I like beer and peanuts. I’m in orchestra.
“I know but … I mean, outside of school.”
“I mostly just hang out, I guess.”
“Well I’m busy, like a lot, trying to do this thing, ya know?” I take another swallow and tap my fingers against the wall.
“Well, it was nice talking to you.”
“Totes McTotes.” I turn my head and look back into the living room. He leaves and I sigh, walk toward the backyard where Mike is smoking a J and talking to some older kids I’ve never met.
“Oh, hey,” he says smiling real big and dopey. He reaches his arm out for me and lurches slightly. I quicken my step to sort of catch him, but also to be there so he can catch me. It’s seamless and only I can tell it almost went another way. I like that we have secrets. He looks up and tugs on my puffy sleeve. This stupid dress. “Pretty,” he says, sort of sloppy. “Hey, Jules, this is Nikki.”
“Hey,” says the beautiful slightly older girl in the hot-pink X-Girl jumper with patterns of houses and small ferns covering it. Her black hair has been cut into a Louise Brooks bob and her nails are the familiar lacquered red of the hot girls who hang out at the Dresden.
“Jules hangs out at Jabberjaw. That’s where we met.”
“What’s Jabberjaw? Is that like a rave? Like JuJu Beats? I’m not a raver, I told you that.” Jabberjaw is the coolest club in town and I’ve never been let in. It’s sort of dingy and like a bombed-out hole-in-the-wall. Drew Barrymore hangs out there.
“It’s a club,” says Jules shortly. She stands from where she’s been sitting on the stucco wall, stubs out her American Spirit, and blows her smoke in my face then walks away.
“What’s up her culo?”
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