by Amy Sparling
Both of my shirts are dirty, stretched out and gross, smelling like the stank that dwells in this house. Bluntz saw me wearing one of them last night. If there is any tiny fathom of possibility that he might still be able to find me somewhat cute or interesting, I’ll need a better shirt.
For the first time since I snuck out to pee earlier, I venture out of my room and stop in front of Ben’s closed door. Enough time has passed to get us safely out of the awkward fighting phase and into the forgetting all about it and pretending nothing happened phase. “Ben?” I ask his door.
“What’s up?” He says behind me, his voice muffled as he pokes his head out of the bathroom. His toothbrush hangs out of his mouth, and like me, he’s shirtless. “God, Lex, cover those things up!” He shields his eyes with the hand that isn’t holding his toothbrush.
“Shut up, I’m wearing a bra,” I shoot back, turning to face him. He keeps his eyes squeezed tightly shut. “What do you need?”
“Do you have any shirts I can wear?”
“Yeah, please God, go put one on.” He ducks back into the bathroom, leaving the door open. I skim through his closet, finding a million button up long sleeved shirts in every color combination imaginable, some Lawson High T-shirts and winter coats.
“Anything that’s too small for you?” I yell down the hall. I spent the majority of my eighth grade year wearing Ben’s shirts. They were boyish and baggy, but I had a thing for grunge music and all of Ben’s hot soccer friends thought it was cool. I’m bigger now, but his clothes are still huge on me, since he’s all about protein shakes and pumping iron now.
I hear the spray of his deodorant as he yells back, “Check my bottom drawer.”
Incense burns on a marble stand in Ben’s room. The smell overpowers me, making it hard to breathe but at least the stale smell is gone, or probably just masked. The bottom drawer of his dresser brings me straight back to junior high. It has all of my favorite shirts folded and squished into every free space, making the drawer hard to pull open. The hockey jersey from fifth grade, the boy scouts shirt and his old baseball jersey—they are all here.
I pull the black sleeved baseball shirt over my head. It’s tight, but it still technically fits and the V-neck makes my boobs look magnificent.
“Damn,” Ben says, walking into his room with a towel draped over his shoulders. “I remember when you slept in that jersey because it was so big.”
“And I remember when you were skinny.”
He takes my comment as an opportunity to flex his muscles and check out himself in his dirty mirror. “Life goes on I guess.” Ben ruffles his hair to the left, scrunches up his face in disapproval and then ruffles it back the other way.
“I’m sorry I yelled at you earlier,” I say. I want to make things better and not just be content on forgetting what happened.
“I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have smoked in front of you without warning you first.”
A million questions swim on the tip of my tongue. Why did he do it? When did he start doing it? I catch Ben’s reflection in the mirror. He’s staring at the floor looking so mad at himself that I can’t be mad at him anymore.
“It’s fine. At least I know now.”
He squeezes some hair goo on his hands and runs it through his hair. “Bluntz tore into me last night after you walked away.”
“Like yelled at you?” I can’t believe it. Why would he stick up for me? Ben nods, bringing his eyes up to mine. “He said I shouldn’t have blindsided you like that. With the joint, I mean. They all thought you knew about our little habit.”
I can analyze Bluntz’ actions and if they mean anything about him liking me later—but now is my chance to have Ben give me some real answers. “So about that,” I say, spinning my peace sign necklace around my finger. We look at each other, sharing an unspoken bond. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”
The hurt in his eyes almost crushes me to the core, and I want to take it all back, tell him never mind. Then I remember that he deserves to hurt for lying to me.
Ben opens his mouth to speak and the doorbell rings. He grabs his hair with both hands, trying to look frustrated about having our talk so conveniently interrupted. But I know better. “We’re talking about this later, Benjamin.” The doorbell rings again. He nods and gives himself another spray-over with Axe.
“How do I look?” I ask, darting to the mirror to check my reflection.
“Fine, why?” He stops in the doorway with his hands resting on the doorframe. A sheepish grin pulls at my lips and I try to act casual but he isn’t buying it. He crosses his arms. “Who are you trying to impress? You don’t even know my friends.”
I shrug. “I know one of them.” A flash of recognition hits his eyes. The doorbell rings repeatedly now, as the person on the other side presses the button over and over again. Ben bolts into the hallway to go answer it. As he’s bounding down the stairs he calls out, “Don’t break his heart, Lex!”
The music is loud and several voices can be heard downstairs. Since the party is in full swing, I figure it’s time to venture down and make my grand entrance. I’ve spent enough time posing in front of the mirror, picking out which faces, smiles and laughs look the best on me. I have no makeup, so that’s a devastating fail, but at least my hair and boobs are top notch sexy tonight.
I’ve only had one serious boyfriend in my life and he turned out to be total bust. Guys don’t exactly flock around Jill and me. Although Bluntz is a stoner, and probably too old for me, and also someone I don’t even know—I’m beyond excited to have someone to flirt with tonight. And if on the teensy, miniscule, microscopic chance that he actually likes me, then all I’ll have to do is get him to stop smoking and then Ben will follow. Part of me knows this is an impossible plan, but the other part of me ignores it.
I practice my I’m cute and I don’t even realize it smile in the mirror for the thousandth time. Ugh, who am I kidding? I’m not cute and I do realize it. This guy probably doesn’t want anything to do with me. After all, he was my babysitter last night.
But maybe he might be interested in me. I mean, crazier things have happened. I’m getting nowhere standing in Ben’s room like an idiot. So what if he’s a stoner? He’s just someone to flirt with and that’s all. Just an experiment in honing my flirting skills. Maybe one day I’ll be as good as Marla.
Although I had vowed to make my next boyfriend better than Daniel, maybe dating a stoner isn’t the worst thing in the world.
Marla sits on the armrest of our big fluffy couch, one foot resting on the coffee table and the other tucked under her knee. She balances a wine glass in her hand. Her silky long hair looks like something out of a shampoo commercial as it bounces along with her laughter. She looks so much older than nineteen. Old Ben would have never been in her league, but the new and improved pot-smoking Ben is the perfect accessory standing next to her with one arm on the small of her back.
They both notice me when I reach the bottom of the stairs. When Marla smiles at me, my cheeks flush which make me even more self-conscious. Note to self: next time you storm out of the house in a rush, pack your freaking makeup! My face is a tomato by the time I make it through groups of people to them.
“Hello, gorgeous,” Marla says. Her lipstick is an unearthly red against her pale skin. Gorgeous? She speaks like a diva and not someone from our backwoods hick town with a population of seven thousand.
“Hey,” I say simply, knowing I’m not close enough to the caliber of awesome that’s needed to speak like her. It doesn’t matter though because right after her acknowledgement, a chubby Goth girl runs up and hugs her, stealing the attention away from me. I look around our living room. Everyone is drinking but no one is out of control. Not yet, anyway.
There are no dark-skinned, gorgeous guys with long hair within my line of sight.
The doorbell rings and Ben detaches himself from Marla to answer it. I follow him, meandering though the living room to make it look like I’m not following him waiting w
ith bated breath for it to be Bluntz on the other side of the door. Ben opens the door just a few inches and pokes his head outside. I see two football players though the window on the side of the door. Ben ushers them inside and they stand in the foyer instead of joining the party. Ben glances up and scans the room until his eyes meet mine. I grab my hoody from the coat rack and put it on, giving a little fake shiver as if I’m really cold and then turn away like I haven’t seen Ben at all.
Ben’s attention goes back to the guys and I watch them from the corner of my eye. They hand him money which he pockets immediately. They talk for a few seconds. Ben reaches into his jeans pocket and hands them a small bag. They leave without saying goodbye.
I sink into the armchair closest to me, trying to mask the look of horror on my face. Last night I had tried to cope with the idea that my brother was a stoner and that hadn’t fared well. Now it’s a thousand times worse. The words drug dealer make me picture a grisly gang member with tear drop tattoos dripping from his eyes. No one would suspect that Ben, with his polo shirts, four-point-oh grade average and charm the size of Texas would be dealing drugs out of his Dad’s living room.
Maybe that’s why it works so well for him.
I’m in the corner of the living room in what Dad had tried to turn into a reading nook with his notice decorating skills. But no one ever reads in this house and since you can’t see the TV from here, this chair has become a dust collector. I sit sideways in the oversized chair with my knees pulled to my chest for a long time. No one bothers me.
My mission to fix Ben just got a lot more complicated. Using drugs are one thing, but selling them? Maybe that was just a one-time thing. Maybe. It could have been, right? I repeat the words to myself like a mantra but after a while they stop making sense.
I should just ask Ben and get it over with. He was honest with me earlier, so he can do it again. If I’m going to make our family okay again, I need to know all that I’m dealing with. My back is to the rest of the room, so I peer around me to see if Ben is still on the couch. Instead of Ben and Marla, I see three guys playing Xbox.
The raspy, just woke up voice appears on the other side of my chair. “Looking for Ben?” I whip around to face him, overcome with excitement and too surprised to bother checking if my hair looks good. My elbow slips off the armrest and I tumble to the floor. Bluntz catches me before I get a face full of carpet. “How much have you had to drink?”
I push hair out of my eyes and shove it behind my ears. “I haven’t been drinking.”
“Could have fooled me.” His teeth are crooked but it only makes his smile more charming.
“Do you know where Ben is?” I ask, looking around the room again but not seeing him in the crowd. There are a dozen more people here now. A guy in ripped jeans and a death metal shirt walk past us, leaving a trail of marijuana smoke behind him.
Bluntz’ lips slide to the side of the mouth as he tries to think of a way to answer me. Ben must be out selling more drugs. “You know where he is, don’t you?”
His mouth opens and then closes. I don’t know if he’s shielding me from the news like I’m a child or he’s trying to think of a lie or what. “He and Marla, uh, went up to his room.”
“Ew.” I break into an embarrassed smile. “I guess that’s better than-” I stop before I can say the words selling drugs.
Bluntz pulls a footstool away from the wall and sits in front of me with his elbows on his knees. “Better than what?”
“I don’t know.”
He leans closer to me, stopping when his eyes are just inches from mine. He smells delicious, like spearmint gum and shampoo. “What’s bothering you, chick?”
As I stare into his sexy dark eyes, I want to pour out my heart and soul. But I’m not stupid. “I don’t really know you, so I’m not telling you stuff like that.”
He brings his index fingers up to his lips. “Sometimes talking to a stranger is better than talking to a friend.”
I’m about to tell him that his reasoning is stupid, but then it hits me. “Wait, is Ben making you be my babysitter again? I’ll kill him.”
“I am no one’s babysitter.”
“Then why are you talking to me?”
He gestures to the living room behind us. “Because none of these people are worth talking to.” I cock an eyebrow, still not convinced. He continues, “Not unless I’m stoned, and even then these people aren’t what I’d call friends.”
“And why aren’t you stoned?” I ask, crossing my arms. He grins. “There is a time for everything.”
“And what time is it now?” Is it flirt with your friend’s sister and give up drugs forever time? I hope so. But I don’t say any of that out loud.
He checks his bare wrist. “It’s time to talk about Ben. Come with me.”
I follow him as he leads me into my own back yard. The porch light is burned out, but all of the light from inside filters through the sheer curtains and casts and eerie glow over the patio. Unfortunately for me, eerie glows make normal guys look cute and cute guys look mind-blowingly hot.
“Ben is great, but-” Bluntz snaps a hair tie off his wrist and pulls back his hair. “Man, it’s hot out here.”
“Thanks for the random weather update. Now why is my brother great, but?”
“I think he’s taken on more than he can handle this summer and I worry about him.”
“Worrying about him is my job, thanks.” I shouldn’t have snapped at him, but this could be my only chance to flirt with him and he’s turning it into a heartfelt talk about my brother. Reminding me that my brother has a problem only pisses me off. Plus I’m starting to get defensive and bitchy, which is my fatal flaw when it comes to talking to hot guys. It’s like my body’s way of defending me against rejection.
“I know you were upset when we smoked last night, but Ben doesn’t usually smoke. I honestly didn’t think he did it anymore.” Bluntz’ voice stays calm, in that raspy way he always talks. I can’t help but think his voice would sound that same way whether he just won a million dollars or his entire family got murdered.
“I wasn’t upset. I don’t care.” Ugh, why am I being like this? Of course I’m upset. Of course I care. Why can’t I just be nice to this guy who has been considerably decent to me since the day we met?
He smiles. “Have you heard bad things about me or something?”
I shake my head. In a mock whiney voice he says, “Then why are you so damn mean to me?” His hand clenches around his heart and he leans against the back of the house, a broken man. Well, a pretend broken man.
“Shut up, I’m not mean to you.”
“Now I’m being verbally abused.” Sarcasm looks good on him. His voice stays at an almost monotone level, which is probably something that can land him in the Guinness Book of World Records. We enjoy a moment of silence together—me standing while he leans against the wall—just smiling at each other like dorks. Stoner or not, I cannot stop smiling at this guy.
Tupac’s Greatest Hits album comes to an abrupt stop from inside the house. The silence between us is deafening now. This is the recipe for an awkward silence, but I discover in the next few moments that silences don’t feel awkward around Bluntz.
He yawns and stares up at the sky. A slow indie rock song comes on next. Bluntz’ eyes light up. “I love this song.” I listen to the opening lines. The song is about how lonely the guy was after his woman left him and how he wants to throw himself into a car just to end his misery. How can anyone like a song like that?
“Hey, Lexie,” he says in a near whisper, his eyes wide and sparkly.
“Yeah?” I say, still wondering how depressed you’d have to be to write a song like this. He motions for me to come closer. I stand no more than three feet away from him, which is already too close for comfort, so I take a teensy baby step closer. He waves his hand at me again, smiling like he has a super fantastic secret to tell me. A huge part of me wants to know that secret. I step closer. His arm swoops around my waist and th
e other grabs my hand.
“Dance with me,” he says.
“Uh—no.” I press my fingers into his chest and push away from him, harder than necessary because he lets go of me instantly, a hurt look on his face. “I don’t dance.”
His head starts to bob left right, left right, ever so slowly but enough to make me notice. “But it’s Journey! You can’t not dance to journey.”
He reaches a hand out for me again but I twirl out of his grip. “Well you know what they say. Dancing with a stoner is a gateway dance. Pretty soon I’ll be raving on ecstasy.”
Head bobbing growing more intense by the second, Bluntz rolls his eyes. He looks really cute even though he’s acting like a toy bobble head. “There’s more to me than just being a stoner.”
“Really?” I snort, counting on my fingers. “Your name is Bluntz. You work at a smoke shop.” I point to my middle finger. “You…you—work at a smoke shop.”
“That’s two. I don’t care how boring someone is, they have more than two unique things about them.” He sweeps his black hair behind his ear with one quick motion and points a finger gun at me. “I win. You lose.”
I’m about to launch into an extensive argument about how he didn’t win anything and I sure as shit didn’t lose anything because there was nothing to win or lose, but the words stick in my throat. And not because I don’t know what to say either—I’m great at arguing. Ben always says I should be a lobbyist. But there’s something in the way he’s standing here in his dark jeans with holes in the knees and a blue and black pearl snap shirt with the sleeves shoved up to his elbows and his stupid long hair that keeps falling in his face even though he pulled most of it back and his even more stupid finger gun and—shit. I forget everything I wanted to say.
I don’t know who first said the heart wants what the heart wants, or love is blind, but they weren’t just putting words together because they sounded agreeable in the same sentence. They were on to something much more than just properly formatted sentences. They were forming together a universal truth worthy of the Nobel Prize.