Goblin Fruit

by S. E. Burr

  “Really? What’s the story?”

  Audrey smiled. “Okay, but don’t tell Maria I told you.”

  I sat crossed legged on the floor, looking up at her, and she started the story. “Jerry came from a wealthy family. His parents moved here from back east somewhere. They moved here, built a big house, joined the Country Club. They had two girls that were already in college. Then Jerry came along. He was an accident, but the way they acted you’d think he was the second coming. He had anything he ever wanted, and he was kind of a brat.

  My father, Roberto Ortiz, came here with his parents from Mexico. He was their only child, and his parents couldn’t have any more kids. They were field workers, and they’d take my dad with them a lot. He was tall and athletic and one of the farmers his parents worked for sponsored him in t-ball and then in Little League. That’s where he met Jerry.

  Jerry’s parents always gave a lot of money to the sports leagues, but it’s not like they were buying him a place on the teams or anything. He didn’t need it. He was small, but he was fast and athletic. Dad became a great pitcher, and Jerry was his catcher a lot of the time.

  By 8th grade, the two boys were best friends. Jerry was ‘short, stocky, and cocky.’ That’s how my mother describes him. She says that his ego was always bigger than he was. He could talk just about anyone into anything, including talking a lot of girls out of their underwear.”

  I laughed.

  “My dad,” Audrey continued, “was a ‘good boy.’ He was very quiet and respectful of girls. He found Jerry hilarious, though, even though at times he ‘despaired about his character.’” She smiled and rolled her eyes. “Those are my mom’s words.”

  “Anyway, while the two boys were growing up so was my mother, who was from here. They all ended up at the same high school when they were Freshman, my mom took one look at quiet, tall, polite Roberto, and got a massive crush. My dad noticed her too, but she didn’t know it. Todd’s father didn’t notice any one girl because he was too busy playing them all, and trying to get what he could. Then, in their Junior year, there was a new girl in school.”

  “Maria,” I said.

  She nodded. “Maria. Imagine her as a teenager. She was tall, thin, had beautiful brown eyes and long, flowing black hair. She totally ignored him.”

  Of course, she did. I could totally picture that.

  Audrey went on. “Jerry thought of Maria as a challenge. He was determined to add her as a notch on his belt or bedpost or whatever. But he misjudged her. She was quiet, but she wasn’t naive. She knew exactly what he was after. At first, she ignored him. Then he got their chemistry teacher to make him her lab partner, so she treated him like a slightly stupid, younger brother. It drove him crazy, and he fell in love with her, and then she fell in love with him back.”

  “Wow.” I thought about that. My chemistry partner wore striped socks and smelled like soup. I probably wasn’t in any danger of falling in love with him, not unless he shaved his unibrow.

  “During the summer after junior year, my dad, Roberto, got a job as a cook at Sonic, which was easy compared to working in the fields. When he got there for his first shift, he saw my mom skating around the parking lot as a carhop. When she saw him, she started to do some fancy moves and fell on her butt. That really helped him get over being shy around her. He helped her up and was finally able to talk to her. As an excuse to spend more time with her, he asked her to teach him how to skate. After work, they would go downtown and skate together. That summer, they fell in love, too.

  Okay, so think about how mismatched those two couples would look. There was short, blonde Jerry with tall, willowy, olive-skinned Maria. Behind them came tall, handsome Roberto with Natalie, who he towered over by like a foot and a half.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, I didn’t notice that in the picture, but yeah.”

  “Things got complicated,” said Audrey. “Jerry’s and Dad’s parents were the problems. They were really old fashioned and traditional. Neither set of parents would approve of their son being in a biracial relationship. So the two couples ‘cooked up a switch’.” She laughed. “Those are my mother’s words again.”

  “Todd’s dad told his parents he was dating my mom, and my dad pretended to be dating Maria.

  On Friday nights, the two boys would dutifully arrive at the door and pick up the other’s girlfriend. They’d go on a double date, or get in separate cars and cruise around downtown. Then, the four of them would meet again and switch to take the girls home before curfew.

  This went on for all of senior year, and then, after graduation, both couples eloped. They came home and told their parents they had married someone that their parents hadn’t even known they were dating. It didn’t go well. The guys’ parents were the most upset, but Maria’s and Mom’s parents were unhappy too. At my mom’s house, there was a huge family fight with a lot of yelling, breaking dishes, and slamming doors. Afterward, Mom drove back to the hotel where the two couples were sharing a room until they could find someplace to live. The next day when they left for breakfast, they realized that her father had had her car (which he actually owned) towed away.

  It was really ugly for a while, but then Maria and my mother both got pregnant within months of each other, and things started to change. Maria’s mother started coming around, but she kept it from her father. She was very excited about the baby, and once Todd was born, his grandfather relented too. Todd Francisco is still his only grandchild, and he really loves him. That’s why I got so mad about how Todd was treating him yesterday.”

  Audrey shook her head. “All four sets of parents got involved again once Todd and I were born, but things with my dad’s parents were always kind of tense. I don’t think they ever completely forgave him. And it was even worse with Jerry’s parents. They died in a car accident when we were two and Jerry found out that they’d cut him out of the will when he’d eloped and never changed it back. All their money went to his sisters and fancy charities and art foundations. My mom said he was pretty bitter about that.”

  She sighed. “When Todd and I were little, our families were poor, but we had a lot of fun together. We’d have picnics in the park and go camping at Elephant Butte. Todd was like a brother to me. When we moved away, I cried for like a month.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It sucks, the way he acts now.”

  She shrugged. “Yeah. I think he took his parents’ divorce really hard. Jerry left Maria for some rich blonde, the daughter of a board member at Brinkley Labs.”

  “And Jerry works there now,” I said, “with Nick.”

  Audrey nodded. “Right. Todd lived with his mom for the first couple of years. We kept in touch for a while, but then Todd quit responding to my emails, and he didn’t want to talk on the phone anymore. He seemed angry all the time. I was hoping that maybe with us moving back here Todd and I might be friends again. I thought it might be a silver lining, to a really, really black cloud.”

  Ah, crap. I hugged her. “I’m so sorry,” I said.

  Audrey nodded. “You’ve been a silver lining, though. You’ve been great.” I didn’t feel great. I felt bad for her. There was nothing I could do about Andrew, her real brother. I understood better now why Todd, who’d been like a brother to her, was such a drugged out jerk, but I didn’t think it was a good enough excuse, and it didn’t change what he was. I didn’t want her to make up with him.

  12

  Two days later, Clarity woke up in the morning and walked down the stairs. Like always, Kevin was in the living room, lurching through his morning exercises, and she could hear Maria in the kitchen, making breakfast. She went into her mother’s room to get her up. It was bright with a fresh, flowery scent in the air. Marcos’s bouquet of flowers sat in a vase on the nightstand. They were lasting pretty well, and she wondered where he’d bought them.

  “Good morning, Mom,” she said, approaching the bed. “Ready for breakfast?” She leaned over and put an arm under her mother’s neck to help her sit up, but she c
ouldn’t lift her. Sara was lying there like dead weight. “Come on, Mom,” Clarity said. “Help me out here.” It was then that she looked down and realized that her mother’s eyes were still closed.

  That was a change in the routine, and it frightened her. She pried open her mother’s eyelids with her fingers, and they stayed half open. “Mom!” she said, then shook her and checked her pulse. It was racing. She lifted her arm, and when she let it go, it fell limply back onto the bed. She screamed and backed toward the door.

  “What’s wrong?” Maria said, rushing in.

  “She won’t move,” Clarity told her. “I can’t get her up.”

  “Dios,” Maria said and shook the catatonic woman. She quickly examined her and then took out her cell phone and dialed.

  #

  Anna peered into the mirror above the bureau in her bedroom and raised her hands to her face, gently stretching her skin, smoothing out the wrinkles on her forehead and beside her eyes. She sighed as she dropped her hands and her wrinkles reappeared. She turned away and put on a set of scrubs, pulled her hair into a simple ponytail, and then sat on the end of the bed to tie her shoes. Oscar, her short haired, white cat jumped onto the bed beside her, and Anna smiled, scratching him under the chin. Her cell phone rang, and she glanced at it, seeing Maria’s name as the caller. “Hello,” she said, answering. After a short pause, she sprang up from the bed, startling Oscar, who streaked out of the room. Anna grabbed her coat and ran out the door.

  #

  Clarity wasn’t at school that day. Audrey sat in Mrs. Nelson’s English class, curious, a little disappointed, and slightly worried. She wondered if her friend was sick or if she had stayed home to help with the patients. She didn’t look forward to lunch detention alone with Todd, but it would be better than lunch in the cafeteria with all Todd’s mean friends. She’d been popular at her old school. She’d been Andrew’s sister. Here she was just herself, and no one liked that…except Clarity.

  She and Todd stayed after class, but Mrs. Nelson dismissed them. She said there was no point working on the project on their own. The whole point was to show that they could all three work together. “But don’t be getting ideas about ditching,” she said as she shooed them out the door. “Clarity better have a good excuse for her absence.”

  Audrey hesitated outside the door, thinking about what she should do. She was hungry, but she didn't want to be hassled.

  Todd stopped beside her. “You don't want to go to the cafeteria, do you?”

  She looked at him. “Not really.”

  He sighed dramatically. “My car's finally fixed. You want to go to my house?”

  She was suspicious. “Who's going to be there?” she asked.

  “No one,” he answered. “Me and you.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why would you invite me to have lunch at your house?” she asked. “You've been nothing but mean to me.”

  He grunted. “Look, if you don't want to come, don't come.”

  She glared at him. “Okay,” she said. “I guess I won't.”

  “Fine.”

  She turned and started to walk away.

  He called after her. “Look, I feel bad about the way I acted, okay? I want to make it up to you. Just come on.”

  She turned back, with a tentative smile. “Okay.”

  Todd's house was big, not a mansion, like the crazy palaces Audrey saw on TV sometimes, but large in a realistic, but unnecessary way. It was two stories with great, tall pillars out front. It had a multi-car garage, hardwood floors, and a TV in the living room practically big enough for a movie theater. They sat in the kitchen at a granite-topped counter and ate leftover take out—Thai noodles, pizza, and fried chicken.

  The food was good, but the couple was awkward together. The first five minutes of their lunch consisted of chewing noises interspersed with silence.

  “So where’s your dad?” said Audrey, finally. “Is he working?”

  “No. He and Bridget left for the weekend.”

  “Oh. Do you like your step mom?”

  He half-laughed. “Not really, but my dad does.”

  “Oh.” She chewed some more. “So…what’s your uncle Manuel up to? Where’s he living now?”

  He looked at her, his gaze cold and suspicious. “Why?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Because I’m trying to make conversation. Because he’s nice and a lot of fun and your grandma said he wasn’t living there anymore.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him.”

  “Oh.” Audrey took a bite of her pizza. “This is good.”

  He nodded. “It’s from Uno’s.”

  “I haven’t been there.”

  “You should try it. It’s pretty good.”

  After a while, Audrey looked at the clock, an oversized brass one with roman numerals in the place of numbers. “Lunch is almost over. I guess we better be getting back.”

  “Kay,” said Todd, scooping up his keys from the counter. “I’ll give you a ride.”

  “Give me a ride?”

  He raised his eyebrows and nodded. “Yeah, unless you’d rather walk.”

  “You’re not going back to school?” she asked.

  “Nah, I figured I’d take the afternoon off.”

  “And do what?”

  “Play video games, watch TV, sleep, whatever. You wanna stay?”

  “We’re already in trouble at school.”

  He shrugged. “We’ll tell them we had car trouble. What’ll they know?”

  Audrey hesitated. She didn’t want to get in any more trouble. Her mom had enough to worry about without being called to the school again, but it was Todd, and she missed him. She’d missed him for a long time. He was a jerk now, but still… “Okay.”

  The afternoon was a lot less awkward. They played video games and made fun of each other. They watched old movies with the sound off and made up what the characters were saying. They ate popcorn and had a contest throwing it into each others’ mouths. It was like they were kids again. It was awesome. Audrey thought she was getting her friend back.

  A little after three o’clock they heard giggling outside. There was a knock at the door, and then it opened before Todd had a chance to answer it. It was Jamie. “Hey Todd,” she said walking in. A couple more girls followed in behind her. “We brought jello shots and brownies for the party tonight.” She spotted Audrey on the couch, and her eyes widened. She looked at her friends, and they started giggling again.

  Todd blushed and glowered.

  “Well,” said Jamie. “I guess we’ll just put this in the fridge.”

  They walked through and into the kitchen. A moment later they were back. “Ugh. I guess we’ll just leave you two alone,” Jamie said, and her friends cackled.

  “We don’t need to be alone,” said Todd.

  “Right,” said Jamie. “Well, that’s okay. See you tonight.”

  They left.

  Todd watched the door close behind them and then turned and looked at Audrey.

  “You’re having a party?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. He sounded angry. “You probably shouldn’t come.”

  She glared at him. “Believe me, I don’t want to.”

  “Good,” he said. “School’s getting out now. I should probably take you back.”

  Audrey stood up and followed him out the door. “Take me to the catatonia center,” she said. “I want to visit my brother.”

  They got in the car and started to drive in stony silence. “Is there going to be fruit at this party?” she asked.

  He grunted, dismissively and glowered at her. “Of course not.”

  She glowered back. “Well, I don’t know. You’ve got jello shots and pot brownies.”

  “She didn’t say they were pot brownies,” said Todd.

  “Are they?” asked Audrey.

  “I don’t know.” He made an angry growling sound under his breath. “
Probably.”

  She scoffed and turned away from him.

  “I wouldn’t let fruit in my house,” he said. “I know better.”

  “Yeah, well Andrew knew better too, and now he’s a zombie.”

  “Yeah, well I’m not Andrew, okay!” He was yelling, now. “And I know better! You’re not the only one who had someone they cared about become catatonic!”

  That stopped her. “Who do you know who’s catatonic?” she asked, very quietly.

  He hesitated. “No one,” he said. “A friend of mine.”

  She watched him. He was red and sweating. He seemed to be holding back tears. “Manuel?” she asked.

  Seconds ticked by. She thought he wasn’t going to answer but then he nodded. “You can’t tell anyone, okay?”

  “Okay.” She was nearly whispering. “Where is he?” she asked. “I thought Dr. Harman had the only center around here.”

  “He does,” said Todd. His voice was quiet but cold, and his face was hard. “He’s not in a center. They’re taking care of him at home, Mom and Abuela, all of them, hiding him there.” As he spoke, his words came faster and faster, and his voice got louder. “They don’t care that it’s illegal and they could go to jail if anyone found out. They don’t care that he’s contaminating their house. You couldn’t pay me to go in there. They don’t care about anything. They just say that he’s family, and they’ll take care of him at home. It’s so stupid!”

  Audrey took a deep breath, taking that in. “How long has he been catatonic?”

  “Like a year and a half.”

  She nodded. “Is that when you went to live with your dad?”

  “Yeah,” he answered. “I wasn’t going to live in that house with that…zombie.”

  They pulled up outside the catatonia center and sat there, looking at each other.

  “I’m sorry about Manuel,” said Audrey.

  “Me too,” said Todd. “I’m sorry about Andrew.”

  “Thanks,” she said, “Well, I guess…” She pulled the door handle, opening it slowly.

  “Seriously,” said Todd. “Please don’t tell anyone about Manuel.”