Not the Girls You're Looking For

by Aminah Mae Safi

  “Anderson, I don’t know if you know this, but your dick doesn’t have magical, personality-endowing qualities.” Lulu cross her arms over her chest. A small knot formed in her stomach, clenching as she spoke.

  Dane’s triumphant grin returned. That feckless schoolboy one. “If it did, you’d have personality in spades, wouldn’t you?”

  Audrey’s face scrunched again in confusion. “Why’s that? It’s not like you two have hooked up.”

  The small knot in Lulu’s stomach hollowed out into a bottomless pit.

  “Didn’t she tell you?” Dane leaned in as Audrey’s eyebrows puckered. “We consummated our mutual affection over Halloween.”

  The melodrama had nearly reached its inevitable conclusion. People didn’t win against trains. Over Dane’s shoulder, Audrey glanced at Lulu. Deny, and Lulu knew she would look guilty. Admit and she would sound as though she had slept with Dane and had failed to mention that to Audrey. That wasn’t a win. There wasn’t any win.

  Lulu tried anyway. “There is no mutual affection. Or consummation.”

  Dane winked. “Just your tongue in my mouth.” If it had been a bad teen movie, Lulu would have laughed out loud.

  Audrey wrenched out from under Dane’s arm. She shot Lulu a glare. “How wouldn’t I know someone you hooked up with—that’s how you put it, right?”

  Lulu didn’t have anything to say to that.

  “And here I thought y’all were best friends,” Dane said, the side of his mouth upturned.

  “Same as a middle school crush, isn’t it?” Audrey didn’t wait for a reply. Instead she used her long stride to flee from Lulu without breaking into a run.

  Lulu moved to follow her, but Dane snatched Lulu’s wrist before she could move away. Lulu turned to face Dane. Whatever small joy Lulu had before, it vanished into the crisp, stifled air. She’d lost the battle, but she was going to win the war. She was ready to hit soft targets. “You are a beautiful piece of shit, did you know that?”

  Dane’s grin held. “Why, thank you.”

  “No. You don’t get it. You are—and please do not take this lightly—absolute garbage. You’re going to go through life getting everything you’ve ever wanted without any effort. It doesn’t matter if you’re as smart as you think you are. It doesn’t matter that you’re gorgeous. Every gift you’ve been given is wasted. You’re a waste of human space. And you’ll never amount to more than what you’ve already been handed. Ever.” Lulu wrenched her wrist out from Dane’s grip. “Stay away from me. Stay away from my friends.”

  Lulu was through the door of the Harrison house before Dane could respond.

  14

  Queens of the Wild

  The air around Lulu was hazy and smoky; her chair was nestled in a small circle of chairs, most of which were empty.

  Beside her sat Brian Connor. He was sitting close enough that Lulu could tell his aim was not mere sociability. But Lulu didn’t care right now. She was using him, and if he had his own aim in mind, she wasn’t in a position to try to stop him. Lulu was currently in possession of too many brain cells. Maybe a few hits would wipe the memory of her fight with Audrey from her mind. It was doubtful, true. But at this point, a temporary respite would help. It wasn’t alcohol. It was probably beyond the gray area, to be honest. Lulu took a hit off the vaporizer. She was ready to float.

  “Dude, it’s two hits and a pass. You’re not passing. Take your last hit or pass.” Brian leaned toward the vape pen in Lulu’s hand.

  She was monopolizing the weed. Audrey had finally prompted Lulu to blur the rules of Ramadan. And she wasn’t even here to enjoy it. “Brian, did you know?”

  Brian’s hand itched toward the pen.

  “Did you know, that hashish and assassin are related words?” Lulu asked, taking a hit. “They say that the hashashi’un used to smoke up and assassinate political and religious leaders who didn’t follow their ideas of Islam. Kinda like all those Christians who murdered one another over the oneness versus the three-ness of God.”

  Lulu laughed like she’d told a fantastic joke.

  “That is a historical urban legend,” said a scratchy, feminine voice.

  “Miriam,” Lulu said, a bit listlessly, as she looked up. “What are you doing here?”

  “I could ask you the same question.” Miriam plopped herself into a chair next to Lulu with all the presumption of friendship.

  Lulu was glad to see her. Miriam didn’t call out Lulu’s smoking. She wouldn’t. She understood instinctively, as many would not.

  “Brian.” Lulu held the vape pen like she had forgotten she held it. “This is Miriam. Miriam and I—we’re cycle buddies.”

  “Is that period shit?” Brian demanded.

  “It’s a natural part of life, Brian,” Lulu said, in a tone somewhere between a mother and an inebriate.

  “That is period shit. That’s disgusting.” Brian frowned.

  Sensing Lulu’s target, Miriam drawled, “We share tampons.”

  “I’m leaving.” Brian stood and stalked off.

  Lulu smiled, wide. She took another hit. “And now, it’s just us girls.”

  “How kind of him to leave his pen,” said Miriam, taking it off Lulu’s hand. She inhaled.

  Lulu laughed. “Tonight. Is such a night.”

  Miriam grinned. “Isn’t it, though?”

  “Tell me about it,” said Lulu, already experiencing a tingling sensation in her fingers. She smiled a sloppy grin.

  Miriam blew out smoke and passed the pipe back to Lulu, who took it in a rote fashion.

  Lulu looked back at the house. Lo had walked outside, through the patio doors. She was scanning the yard, squinting across its massive area.

  “Lo,” Lulu said in singsong. “Come sit. You’re here. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.”

  Lo looked around the circle of half-empty lawn chairs skeptically. She closed the gap between herself and the chairs and stood hovering over Lulu.

  “This,” Lulu continued heedless of Lo’s expression, “is my dearest, darlingest, most impressive-est family friend Miriam. She and I are halfsies. Which basically makes us best friends.”

  Miriam laughed. “It does, doesn’t it?”

  Lo huffed.

  Lulu adopted a sober expression. She turned to Miriam. “Miriam, this is Lo. Do not fuck with Lo. She never says die. That’s why she dates a superhot shitbag who already has a girlfriend.”

  “Lulu, you can’t say that!” said Miriam, coughing.

  “Don’t mind Lulu. She grew up with too many boys. She’s got no idea what is and isn’t appropriate.” Lo smirked and sat. She set the drink in her hand on the grass at her feet. “It’s basically how she says ‘I love you.’ Besides. If I were Luke’s girlfriend, he’d take me out on dates and then I’d never get an orgasm. He feels juuuuust guilty enough to go down.”

  Miriam took a long hit from the pipe. “This took a really personal turn.”

  Lo shrugged. “I know what people say about me behind my back. You’d probably hear it eventually anyway.”

  “She’s right, you know.” Lulu nodded solemnly. “I do try desperately, but I have no idea how to behave. I always manage to cock it up.”

  “Cock!” said Miriam, with a wild-woman cackle.

  Lo laughed at that. “‘Never say die’! And I thought I was dramatic, Lulu-cat. The Goonies is classic, though, isn’t it?”

  “So classic.” Miriam passed the pen.

  Lo took it, one eyebrow raised.

  “Ahlan wa sahlan,” Miriam said, tipping her finger in acknowledgment of the pass.

  Lulu giggled.

  “What’s so funny?” Lo asked.

  “That’s all the Arabic she knows,” Lulu said, the giggles now laughter.

  “Lulu. I can also say thank you. You bitch.” Miriam shoved her hand in Lulu’s face. “All the Arabic I know. Pshhhhh. Besides, between the two of us combined we’ve got the vocabulary of at least a three-year-old.” Miriam huffed.

  “Between the two of u
s,” Lulu said, flourishing her hand, “we are at least one whole terrorist.”

  Lo wheezed, coughing on her hit. “You’ve gotta warn me before you say shit like that. Luke was one thing. That—that was beyond.”

  But Lulu didn’t care. Tears of laughter were streaming down her face. Miriam shook her head; Lo passed the pipe along, back to Lulu, who took it readily.

  “Everybody else is thinking it. I can see it on their faces. All the time. I’m just saying it out loud. Clearing the air,” Lulu said.

  “Too much weed in the air for it to be clear,” Miriam said, taking two short hits in quick succession. “And I’ve never thought that.”

  “If white people can say it about me, why can’t I say it about myself? Why can’t I take it from them?” Lulu took one drag, considered another, then passed before she had time to reconsider her consideration. “And I am half-white, so I can at least half say it.”

  “You show the man you’re more man than they are, Sister Comrade,” said Miriam.

  “Whoa there,” said Lo. “There is no need to start the revolution. At least, not until we’ve sobered up. And I don’t think your white half should say it any more than your Arab half. Save the racism for all the boys I half date.”

  There was a pause, then all three girls started laughing, hysterically. Sides were splitting, breath was catching, laughter fell straight into tears.

  “What are y’all laughing about?” It was Nina Holmes. The laughter quieted down immediately. Nina scrunched her face and crossed her arms.

  Lulu found her most sober expression. Nobody else could fully stifle their laughter. It was a suspicious circle of giggling. Nina’s posture did not adjust.

  “Here, join the crowd.” Lulu offered up her seat, despite the plethora of empty ones. At the offer, Nina sunk into the chair. Lulu leaned over to Miriam and gave her three kisses on her cheeks. They both chuckled at that.

  Nina squinted, still unsure. Lulu felt blamed.

  “I bid you all adieu!” Lulu said, with a flourishingly little bow.

  “I’ll come with,” said Lo, getting up out of her seat and grabbing her drink in one move. She must have sensed Lulu’s tension. She linked her free arm through Lulu’s, and they pranced through the grassy field of a backyard to the house.

  Lo leaned in close, ready to tell Lulu a great secret. “One day, Lulu, we will be old.”

  “Oh, will we?” Lulu asked, laughing.

  “Shut up. I’m not finished.” Lo stopped moving.

  Understanding Lo’s protest, Lulu offered up her hands in supplication. She then took the invisible zipper at the right corner of her mouth and pulled it across to the left. She locked it and threw away the key.

  Appeased, Lo cleared her throat to begin again. “One day, Lulu, we will be old. And we will say, remember when we were young and wild? Remember when we were queens?”

  “Queens?” Lulu laughed again.

  “Queens, Lulu-cat. We’ve crowned ourselves. We run ragged as we please. The only people who tell us what to do are each other.”

  “Won’t we get to stay queens?”

  “I don’t know,” said Lo. “We can’t know. That’s why we have to be them so thoroughly now. We have to take our crowns while they let us. While they’re not watching.”

  “They?” asked Lulu.

  “Exactly. They. You know—them.”

  Lulu giggled. She did.

  “They will tell us we can be better than queens of the wild great something. They already told us we couldn’t be fairy princesses or white knights or dragon slayers. They will tell us to grow up, be serious. They will tell us to get a job. To find our place. They will tell us to do our duty. They will tell us to fight for a spot at the table. But now, we don’t. We desecrate their tables. We dance on tables. We take really big swords, and we hack those tables into tiny little pieces. Or whatever weapon you want.”

  Here Lo waved the drink in her hand so as to create a spectacular arc of fluid across the backyard that managed to hit absolutely no one. She’d fed the soil with her own debauchery.

  “You,” Lulu said. “Are high as a kite. I can’t tell if you’re being real smart or super dumb. If you hallucinate, tell me. I want to know what’s coming.”

  “I can be high and tell the truth, Lulu-cat. Remember that.”

  “I’ll never forget it. We’re queens.”

  “Queens!” Lo said, her voice sailing high across her shriek. She lobbed her drinking cup across the lawn. She had no further use of it.

  * * *

  Lulu followed Lo to a patch of darkness in the back corner of the large lawn that was shielded by a stately portico. A group of boys surrounded the two kegs that had been placed there for apparent convenience and ease of access. But nobody could access the beer without crossing the border created by their bodies—clad in khakis and polos, with their unkempt hair held back by worn, white baseball hats. And here was Scumbag Luke, King of the Scumbags and ruler over all that the beer touched. He stood at the apex of their circle, the head of the worst kind of hydra.

  Luke said nothing as they approached, though every boy knew to let Lo and Lulu pass to the kegs without incident. Lo smiled at him as she tilted her cup to a perfect forty-five-degree angle. It was not Lo’s usual smile. Everything that was normally sharp with her had softened. Lulu hated to see her so. Lo passed the first drink back to Lulu, then began filling her own cup. Lulu took it, knowing she didn’t have to drink it, knowing she could hold onto it like a crutch or an evil eye. Lo finished serving her own beer, but she didn’t move out from the circle.

  Scumbag Luke said nothing.

  This ought to have been a mercy to Lulu, but the fact that he wouldn’t speak first nettled her. Everybody knew what was between him and Lo. The boys had grown preternaturally quiet, speaking in half glances and stolen whispers and predatory smirks that Lulu wanted to wipe off their faces with a dousing of chilled, cheap beer.

  Lulu could have used Emma at such a moment. Emma would have prevented Lo from coming this way at all. Emma would have distracted Lulu with a story about how Molly Ringwald convinced the director of Pretty in Pink to make sure Andie didn’t end up with Duckie. Emma knew these things, knew they soothed, knew they were an antidote to the anger Lulu nursed. But Emma wasn’t here and Emma needed space. Lulu tried to take deep breaths, but they caught in the back of her throat. They seemed to grow weighty at the top of her chest, expanding and refusing to be pulled farther into her lungs. She turned her gaze onto Scumbag Luke and stared with all her might.

  Eventually, he looked up from his leering whisper to the ruddy-faced boy on his right. He stared back. But Scumbag Luke held no power over Lulu. She could not have explained why. There was, to her outward observation, little difference between him and Dane Anderson—minus the fact that they went to different schools from each other, they had the same kind of good looks and the same kind of easygoing charm. But perhaps the difference was the knowledge that Anderson had once gotten the better of Lulu. Scumbag Luke never had.

  “It’s Lyla, right?” Scumbag Luke grinned a Clint Eastwood grin—the kind where a person said a thing but knew another. He hadn’t forgotten her name at all.

  Lulu returned the smile, but hers was like Indiana Jones after he’d gotten punched in the jaw. Painful, but worth it. She’d made him talk first. “Yeah. I bet it’s all the same to you.”

  Lulu could sense Lo glaring at her, a wind of hostility blowing from that specific direction. But Lulu refused to break eye contact with Scumbag Luke. I know what you are.

  “I guess we’ve got another predator posing as a house pet here, don’t we?”

  Lulu fisted her free hand until she could feel her nail biting into the skin of her palm. The putrid tang in her throat receded a little. “Something like that.”

  “Where I come from, people say thank you when they’ve been offered hospitality.” Luke gestured to Lulu’s full container of beer. His challenge was evident.

  “You’re so r
ight.” The one side of Lulu’s mouth twitched upward, but she bit the inside of her cheek to keep the expression from fully forming. She turned to Lo and, using the thickest version of her twang, Lulu said, “Thank you, darlin’, for the beer. So kind of you.”

  The circle hadn’t been particularly loud before. Now, it was still and nearly silent. Nobody knew the rules for this. These were uncharted waters.

  Lo, however, turned and said, “Lulu, I know you’re tired. Go find a ride home. Call you tomorrow.”

  Lulu wanted to scream. She wanted to wail. She wanted to throw a fit until at least three of those burly and soft-bodied boys had to haul her off the premises. But Scumbag Luke hadn’t had the better of her before, and he never would. Lulu smiled half a smile. “All right.”

  Lulu pivoted as Scumbag Luke slung his arm around Lo—claiming his prize and offering his protection all at once—and the boys let Lulu out again with little fuss. Lulu released a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.

  15

  The Airspeed Velocity of an Unladen Swallow

  Lulu wandered. It was not an aimless, pleasant wander. It was only directionless insomuch as she did not have a good lay of the architectural land beneath her feet. She wandered because she did not know where she needed to go to find who she wanted. She wandered because her thoughts were absorbed with predicting Audrey’s movements as much as with not getting lost in the Harrisons’ cavernous, beautifully appointed home. So Lulu wandered—purposeful and without direction.

  Lulu didn’t remember greeting people as she moved through the house. She knew she did. She was raised too precisely to have ignored people she knew at such a juncture. But she didn’t remember whom she waved to or hugged. Her actions were rote, if charmingly so. She smiled where required, she laughed when she felt the conversation swelling to a point. And then she wandered off again, searching.

  When at last Lulu found Audrey, there was no exhale of relief in the discovery.

  Audrey had one hand on the neck of a plastic handle of vodka. She poured what was clearly her fourth shot into a cheap disposable cup. Her eyes were glassy. Three-shot Audrey was wide-eyed and full of possibilities. Four-shot Audrey was aggressive and not at all alert. Four-shot Audrey was a bar brawl waiting to happen. Thank God they’d never been let into a real bar.