“Is that good or bad?”
“I s’pose if you were meeting Daniel it’d be good. But since you’re not going out with him, it could bring you lotsa trouble.”
“Are you kidding? I don’t even flirt with other people.” Lexie took off her blouse and skirt and shimmied into the dress. “Also, I haven’t shaved since Daniel left.” She lifted the dress and flashed her inner thigh at Amy.
“I guarantee no one at this bar will care about that hair you’re sprouting.”
“Yeah, the townies are probably used to furry women.”
“Don’t get snobby on me just ’cause your boyfriend’s rich. You’re a townie girl yourself.”
“I know. You’re right.” Lexie opened the closet and took out the strappy silver sandals she’d bought for the canceled wedding. She stepped into them and stared at herself in the mirror. As long as her legs were closed, you couldn’t see the hair.
“You’re really gonna wear that dress tonight?” Amy clucked her tongue.
Lexie turned from side to side. She checked out her backside. “You’re in a dress.”
“Mine is to my knees.” Amy was wearing a blue shirtdress with panty hose and flesh-colored pumps. Sometimes when Lexie looked at Amy’s stockinged legs she thought of her mother. Mitzy wore thick suntan support hose every day to work. She swore by them. Whenever she walked from the shower to the bedroom (a thin, burgundy towel wrapped around her frame) she would stop for an audience, if anyone happened to be sitting in the living room. “These legs,” Mitzy would say, holding out one solid, muscled limb like she was posing for a pinup picture, “look years younger than my face thanks to Sheer Energy!” Or she’d say, “Have you ever seen legs like this before? Have you? Seriously?” Once she even did the cancan in her towel. Lexie, eight at the time, had hidden her eyes behind her splayed fingers so she wouldn’t have to see what was going on below the towel flapping open in front of her. Bert had been beside Lexie on the couch, a beer in one hand, a cigarette in the other. He’d laughed so hard that he dropped the cigarette off the back of the couch and Lexie had run to fetch it before the house burned down.
“Take off your stockings and put this on.” Lexie pulled a short black dress from the closet and tossed it to Amy.
“My hips are way too big for that.” Amy stood and held the dress in front of herself with two pinched fingers like it was a dirty handkerchief.
“It stretches.” There was a knock at the apartment door. Lexie and Amy looked out the bedroom door toward the living room.
“Oh gawd, if the students see us in these getups they’ll know what sluts we are.” Amy threw the dress on the bed and then brushed out her shirtdress.
Lexie yanked down her dress and then went to the door. Ethan Waite was there. “Can I come in?” he asked.
“Is it urgent? Miss Hagen’s here.” Lexie looked in Ethan’s eyes to assess the situation. Did she need to be the school counselor or could she tell the kid to come back at a more convenient time?
“Wild Friday night in Rilke?” Ethan grinned all big and dopey. Lexie was relieved he wasn’t in crisis.
“We’re going to get a drink off campus. So why don’t you come back tomorrow and we’ll talk.”
“You drink?” Ethan was as solid as a pillar in Lexie’s doorway.
“A little. Why would you think I wouldn’t?” Soon enough, he’d see her drink at dinner with Daniel, or when the three of them went to Rome or Paris or any of the other cities Daniel had promised they’d visit.
“I don’t know. The two weeks you spend on alcohol abuse and alcohol brain damage and all that in your class.” Ethan sauntered in like he lived there. Lexie stepped back and let it happen.
“Well, I certainly don’t abuse alcohol.”
Amy emerged from the bedroom looking like she was planning to attend a church potluck.
“How you doin’, Ethan?”
“Okay, I guess. How are you, Miss Hagen?”
“Fair to middlin’.”
“Can I sit?” Without waiting for an answer, Ethan dropped into one of the gray chairs.
“Do you want me to leave so y’all can talk alone?” Amy asked.
“I don’t think this is a crisis. Is it, Ethan?” What could he possibly need to talk about on a Friday night when Lexie had maybe one hour to hang out with Amy before she went off to be with Cal?
“It’s not a crisis, you can stay, Miss Hagen. I just wanted to talk to grown-ups, you know?”
Lexie and Amy both sat and looked at him, waiting.
“It’s my eighteenth birthday today.” Ethan sounded unenthused.
“Happy birthday! You’re an adult,” Amy said.
“Free to vote, buy cigarettes, and go to prison,” Lexie said.
“Yeah, so . . . I know I’m being ridiculous but, like, my parents are away celebrating their wedding anniversary, which was last Monday, and they, like, didn’t even call or send me a card or anything. And I dunno, I feel so . . . I don’t know, I’m embarrassed but I feel totally bad that they didn’t send anything.”
The room went silent. Lexie felt a roaring fire in her ears. She consciously composed her face: settled her eyes into their sockets, relaxed her mouth with her lips slightly parted, smoothed her forehead, straightened in her seat. She looked at Amy, who stared at Ethan with a half-concerned smile.
“Oh, no.” Lexie spoke as if her concern was entirely for Ethan and not at all for herself. “Let’s start at the beginning.”
“Yes,” Amy said. “When did your parents leave town? Was there any acknowledgment of the upcoming birthday?”
Lexie felt like she couldn’t breathe. Thank god for Amy. Amy could figure this out. Amy could be the adult in the room.
“They left almost two weeks ago; they went on a cruise around Italy and Greece. They always do something big for their anniversary.”
“So, if they always do something big, do they always miss your birthday?” Amy asked.
“No, they usually call. But I know it’s hard to get phone service from the ship. And they usually mail something, so that I get a present on the day, you know? But this year, there was no phone call and no packages came. And I feel like an idiot for even caring, you know, I mean, I’m eighteen, you’d think I’d be over this, but shit—excuse me—damn, I mean, my whole life I’ve always had this strange feeling that my parents loved each other more than they loved me and when stuff like this happens it just confirms that.” Ethan dropped his head and picked at a hole in his jeans.
“You’ve always had this feeling?” Lexie asked. The words came out too forcefully, too quickly. Better not speak again, she thought.
“I don’t think about it much. Only on my birthday. I swear, I think the whole reason they sent me to Ruxton is so they could have the house to themselves.”
There was quiet again. In her head, Lexie said the word breathe.
Amy said, “Honey, there’s not a parent on earth who loves their spouse more than their kids. It’s a whole different kind of love. And if there was no present or phone call this year, maybe it was ’cause they were way out at sea and couldn’t get a connection, you know.”
“Isn’t every corner of the world connected?” Ethan asked.
Lexie couldn’t speak. She couldn’t open her mouth. She could barely keep her face intact. Thankfully, Ethan continued to stare at the hole in his jeans.
“Well, some places are spotty. Have they contacted you at all since they’ve been on this trip?” Amy asked.
“My mom sent photos. Of the two of them. I mean, give me a freaking break! Who wants photos of their parents kissing?”
There was a whirling in Lexie’s head. She wanted to rush out of the room, go to her purse, and take a Klonopin. Instead, she forced herself to remain in the chair. “She really sent a kissing photo?” she managed, her voice hoarse and barking.
“Yeah, can you believe it!” Ethan took his phone from his pocket, pulled up a picture, and held it out for Lexie and Amy to see. Lexie st
ayed in her chair, afraid she’d collapse if she moved.
Amy leaned forward, took the phone, and examined the photo. “They look like real nice people, Ethan.” Amy handed the phone back. “And I’d bet my life they love you more than anything. I’m sure it’s a problem of Internet connection, slow mail, delivery all the way from some far off Greek island to little ol’ Ruxton.”
Ethan shrugged. He looked up at Amy. “You’re probably right. Maybe I’m more upset with myself for actually feeling this way than I am by what’s happened. Like, I can’t believe I’m eighteen and I actually care about this shit. Excuse me, this crap.”
“You know, we’re all like that,” Amy said. “I’m in my thirties and sometimes I can’t believe how much I care about things that I thought I’d outgrow by the time I was eighteen.”
“Me, too,” Lexie blurted. She wanted to run into the bathroom and retch out the mosaic of thoughts that filled her head: Daniel, Jen, Peter, the canceled wedding, the wedding dress hanging in Peter’s house, the pending weeklong visit from her mother, the idea that she owned nothing of value except a five-year-old German car with a smudge on the ceiling, and the fact that in her lowest emotional state she was sporting a pubescent boy’s beard up her thighs and into the crack of her ass.
“Ethan, I would bet my bottom dollar that there will be a package and a phone call coming your way tomorrow,” Amy said. “I think you have to give your parents a little break since they’re so far away. You need to trust that something’s coming.”
“Exactly,” Lexie said, and she breathed out as if she were blowing a gnat out of her lungs.
“You okay, Miss James?” Ethan jerked his head toward Lexie.
“I might be a little fluey.” Lexie couldn’t lift her head. She was unable to fend off the grief and humiliation that was roaring through her.
“I was about to take her temperature when you showed up.” Amy clapped her hands. Lexie wondered if she wanted to distract Ethan with the clap the way you might distract a dog lunging at a piece of cheese on a platter.
“I thought you two were going out to get a drink?”
“We were, but I was insisting on taking her temperature before she walked out this door!” Amy looked at Lexie. Lexie, dumbly, remained mute.
“Okay, well, I’m sorry I’m such a dumb-ass.” Ethan stood and stretched; his body towered over Lexie and Amy like he was a full-grown man.
“Oh honey, you have nothing to apologize for.” Amy stood, too. Lexie stayed seated. She wished she could anesthetize herself into oblivion, darkness, silence. A Michael Jackson sleep.
“I hope you feel better, Miss James.” Ethan stared at Lexie. Tiny lines of worry radiated above each of his eyebrows.
“Thanks, Ethan.” Lexie pushed her mouth into a smile and lifted her right hand. A flap instead of a wave.
Amy stood at the door and had a few final words with Ethan while Lexie pushed herself out of the chair and wobbled into the bedroom. She popped a Klonopin and then hid the pill bottle under her pillow. She wanted to hit that townie bar and hit it hard. And there was no way Amy would let Lexie drink if she knew she’d taken the Klonopin.
Amy returned to the bedroom. She sat beside Lexie on the bed. “You okay?”
“I feel sick.”
“Do you want to cry?”
“I want to get drunk.”
“Don’t get drunk. We each need to take our own car tonight.” Cal’s house was in the opposite direction from Ruxton and the bar. It would add forty minutes of driving if Amy had to take Lexie home before meeting Cal.
“Fine, no big deal.”
“Are we going to talk about this?”
“I can’t talk about it. It’s sitting in my stomach like a giant lump of clay and I . . . I can’t talk.” Lexie fell back onto the bed. She stared at the spiderweb-cracked ceiling.
“Are you sure?”
“Were they actually kissing in that picture?” Lexie hoped there was something she didn’t understand. Maybe it was an old picture. Maybe they were cheek-to-cheek and this was the send-off holiday before the divorce. The last hurrah.
“Yes. They were kissing.” Amy said it firmly, as if she knew Lexie was searching for an alternate reality.
“Let’s talk about this tomorrow.” Lexie rolled over, stuck her face into her pillow and started sobbing. She pushed her head in deeper, muffled her mouth and screamed.
“I think we better talk.” Amy rubbed Lexie’s shoulder.
Lexie came up for air, sniffed and gulped. “I don’t want to sit around and analyze anything. I want to not feel it.”
“Well, you gotta feel it at some point.”
“I’ll feel it tomorrow.” The truth was, Lexie felt the pain so intensely she could almost see it as a physical thing: a vibrating sheet of silvery magenta that clanged against her like cold aluminum. “Let’s get a drink.”
“YOU’RE DRUNK AS COOTER BROWN,” AMY SAID. THEY WERE SITTING on greasy wooden stools. Lexie’s cheek was on the bar, her face turned toward Amy. Five empty shot glasses encircled Lexie’s head. Amy held on to the neck of a light beer.
The place was as dark as a closet and smelled like a hamster cage into which beer had been spilled. There were three TVs on, a pool table with a crowd around it, and a vintage Donkey Kong game in the corner. Lexie and Amy were the only women in dresses.
“I can’t believe I did that to Peter.” The aluminum sheet of pain had been rattling forth a ruckus of emotions. Mostly shame, guilt, regret, and humiliation.
“You didn’t know.”
“You knew.” It was hard to enunciate with half her mouth smashed into the bar.
“No I didn’t.”
“You warmed me.”
“I warmed you?”
“WARMed me.”
“Warmed you?!”
“WORN.”
“Warn?”
“Shit, I’m drunk. I need another shot.” Lexie sat up.
“I’m puttin’ you in a cab.” Amy pulled out her phone.
“What time is it?”
“Nine. Cal texted, no one’s there so he’s closing shop.”
“Go meet him. He loves you. I’m a fuckup. I fucked a fucker and I fucked off a guy who wasn’t a fucker because I’m a fucker like my dad.”
“You’re nothing like your daddy.” Amy cupped her hand over the mouthpiece and turned her back to Lexie so she could hear the phone.
“I have better legs than my dad.” Lexie turned so her legs weren’t under the bar. “He was all bloated in the belly and he had these chicken legs sticking out.” She kicked up her right foot and her silver sandal flew across the room. It skimmed a guy’s shoulder before landing on the ground. The guy picked up the shoe. He turned around, trying to see where it had come from. Lexie attempted invisibility by blowing on her nails as if she’d just had a manicure. When she looked up, the guy was engaged in conversation, her shoe sitting casually on the bar next to his beer.
“Cab will be here in five minutes.” Amy consulted her phone again. “Shit.”
“What?”
“Cal wants to make a nine thirty movie.”
“Go!”
“I’m not gonna leave you like this.” Amy pointed at Lexie’s bare foot. “Where’s your shoe?”
“O’er there with that beer.” Lexie waved toward the guy. She started laughing.
“How did it get over there?”
“Hell if I know.”
“Honey, you’re so drunk, you ain’t got the good sense God gave a goose.”
“Thought I was as drunk as Hooter Brown.”
“Cooter Brown. And drunk as a goose.”
“I am a goose. A stupidy dumb-dumb goose. I deserved this.”
“You do not deserve this.”
Lexie held her wobbling pointer finger up toward Amy’s mouth. “Yes, I do. I broke Peter’s heart. I chose to be with the motherfucker. His wife! His wife, Amy! There’s a wife! I fucked someone with a wife! Not at the same time, like, that’s gross, she�
��s fifty—”
“Stop right there.” Amy held her palm up. “First of all, we’re both gonna be fifty one day if we’re lucky, so don’t start bitchin’ on older women. Secondly, you’re in no frame of mind to look at any of this clearly. So let it go for now and we’ll pick through it all over breakfast tomorrow.” Amy checked her phone. Lexie knew she’d rather be with Cal than babysitting drunk Lexie. Who could blame her?
“No breakfast. I’ve caught a bout of anorexia.”
“Oh, don’t kid about that. Let’s get your shoe; we gotta get you to the cab.” Amy tried to help Lexie off the bar stool.
“I don’t want my shoe.”
“You don’t want your shoe?” Amy gave a little tug and pulled Lexie off the stool. She steadied her on her rubbery legs.
“It’s one of my wedding shoes. They both shoulda stayed with the dress.”
“Fine, leave the shoe.” Amy put a few bills on the bar while holding Lexie with one hand. She hoisted Lexie’s purse onto her own shoulder, and helped her walk, limping, outside.
“Go to the mooovies,” Lexie slurred.
“I’ll leave when your cab shows.” Right then, the only cab in town pulled in. Amy opened the back door and almost fell in herself as she tried to keep Lexie from face-planting on the seat. She sat Lexie up and put her purse on her lap.
“Can you take her to Ruxton?” she asked the cabbie.
“Sure thing.” The cabbie tilted the rearview mirror and watched as Lexie slumped toward the door.
“I’ll wake you up with croissants and coffee tomorrow.” Amy molded Lexie into a straighter sitting position.
“No, I have anorexia now. Remember?”
“Hush! I’ll see you tomorrow.” Amy shut the door and rushed off.
Lexie looked at the cabbie who was now turned in his seat looking at her. There was no bulletproof glass partition, no credit card slot, nothing that made the cab feel like a cab from the inside. Out the front window she saw Peter and his girlfriend, Celeste, walking toward the bar.
“Oh, lookee lookee.” Lexie groaned as she watched them. Celeste was wearing a denim jacket, a white satin skirt, and cowboy boots. Lexie wished she were wearing that outfit. There was far more confidence in cowboy boots than a pair—or a single, right now—of strappy sandals.
The Trouble with Lexie Page 21