Not the Girls You're Looking For

by Aminah Mae Safi

  “You don’t mince words, do you?”

  “When most of your friends are assholes, you kind of learn you can’t. You’ll be trampled otherwise.” Lulu divided another hunk of the beignet. They settled into a rhythm of this. Ripping, tearing, sharing, and eating.

  “Still not a very nice thing to say about your friends.”

  “They’re loyal assholes. And that’s what matters to me. I’d rather have assholes on my side than anyone else.” She offered him her coffee granita.

  He took a sip, winced, and went back to his mocha. “I think,” he said, with his all-knowing voice, “you put on a tough act. And you’d die before you’d admit it. How right am I?”

  Lulu slurped her granita. “And why would I admit that?”

  Matt took the first step back outside, the bell jingling again at their exit. Lulu followed, shivering in the cold air. She took another sip of her granita, regardless.

  “I parked by the flower shop. Closer to Sealy.” Lulu flashed a winning smile. Down the block, Lulu spotted the fence she had parked her car behind that morning. “Thanks, by the way.”

  Matt angled the paper bag over his mouth, trying for one desperate bid to eat the last of the crumbs. His T-shirt collar was dusted with powdered sugar. His drink was empty. He tossed his containers into the trash. “For what?”

  “Hanging out. School’s driving me crazy today. My friends are driving me crazy.”

  “The assholes?”

  “Sometimes when I’m around them for too long I forget why we even like each other.”

  “Yeah?” he asked.

  “You really wanna hear about my bullshit?”

  “Why not?” Matt shrugged.

  And it was all that Lulu needed. “It’s Lo. And Emma. And Audrey. All of them. Like, Audrey’s the best when she lets her guard down. There’s a version of herself she practices real hard to be, and then the parts of her that slip through when she’s finally relaxed. I think she was raised to be a lady too much.”

  “Wait, you weren’t raised to be a lady?”

  “Not like Audrey was.”

  Matt tilted his head, clearly not understanding.

  “She’s so wacky. She’s got the zaniest sense of humor. It was her idea for these super-rad tattoos on Halloween. Old sailor-type mom-in-the-heart tattoos, but for each other. Because we love each other so much. But she’s been trained her whole life to be this prim and proper lady. And when she swears, it still sounds awkward, from years of castigation, you know? But there’s a wild woman inside her. A real one.” Lulu left off the problems that popped up when Audrey drank. That didn’t seem like a fair mark against Audrey, before she’d even met Matt. Audrey had her faults. They weren’t all for everyone’s ears.

  “Did you say castration?”

  “God, you would pick that out from my entire rant.”

  “What else?” Matt bumped his hip against Lulu’s. “Or, who else?”

  “Lo, you’ve already met.”

  “She seems—”

  Lulu arched her eyebrows. Nobody could talk bad about Lo except for Lulu.

  Matt sensed this immediately. “—tough to get along with. Even if she’s loyal.”

  “There’s something about her, though. You want to follow Lo. To the ends of the earth. She’s fearless. But not a fiery fearless. More, a tornado isn’t scared of a house, you know? Lo’s the tornado. We’re all in her path. She’s an Amazon. I know, that sounds insane, but she is.”

  “Jesus.” Matt shuddered. “Would she chop off her boob?”

  “If she thought it would improve her aim, she would. And she’d make everyone want to have only one boob, like bodies were meant to be that way.” Lulu laughed. She would make up with Lo. One day. Maybe Lo would cool off in a decade. “Someone tried to call her Lolita once.”

  “Only once?” Matt asked.

  Lulu nodded. “Lo has the meanest right hook I have ever seen.” Nobody then had thought it from looking at her. They’d been wrong to underestimate her. Lulu had been wrong to underestimate her.

  Matt’s eyes went wide.

  “Afterward she leaned in and whispered something to the guy.”

  “What was it?”

  “No idea. But nobody ever snitched.” Lulu grinned. “And no one ever called Lo anything else ever again.”

  “Christ,” said Matt.

  “And then there’s Emma. She’s the kind of person who doesn’t look rebellious, but she is. This one time she shoved her ice cream in Nina Holmes’s face because Nina started a horrible rumor about Lo. She made Nina go around and apologize to everyone and say that she’d lied and take it back.”

  “What does Emma look like?” Matt asked.

  “A Powerpuff Girl.”

  “Sugar and spice and everything nice?”

  “Exactly! Except, no one sees the drop of Chemical X. They only see the sweetness and light. She’ll knock you off your socks, if you’re not paying attention.” And Lulu hadn’t been paying attention. Emma had gone rogue and Lulu had no idea why. Lulu squinted in the distance. The florist was just up ahead.

  “Question,” said Matt. “Why’d you call on me and not James? You’re not playing hard to get, are you?”

  “I’ve never been hard to get, to be honest.” Lulu chewed her straw absentmindedly. “Just last time I saw him I was vomiting into my own lawn.”

  Matt whistled, like an old man in a Western. “That’s too bad. Why never been hard to get, though?”

  “I like the chase too much. How could anyone give that up? Seems so unfair for the boys to have all the fun.”

  “You chase boys…” Matt’s voice trailed off, more unfinished thought than question.

  “Hah. Maybe. Or maybe I don’t run away when they catch up to me. I haven’t quite figured it out yet. All I know is, once I pounce, or let them pounce, the fun’s all gone. Usually.”

  “Usually?”

  “Okay, so, like, every day last spring, I’d run for training. I’d run by the boys’ lacrosse team, you know, to keep it interesting.”

  “And?”

  “And a friend of mine. Let’s call him Brian, he accuses me of running by the team on purpose,” said Lulu.

  “What did you do?”

  “I denied it, of course.”

  “You lied.”

  “I didn’t lie. See, Brian accused me of running by the boys on purpose, so they would check me out.”

  “Weren’t you?”

  “No. I was running by the boys to check them out. But Brian assumed the reverse. Boys are the subject; I’m the direct object.”

  “That’s a technicality.”

  “It might seem like a technicality to you, but I like being the subject of my own sentences.” Lulu kicked the curb with her shoe. The rubber of her sole made a satisfying squeak.

  “Who cares what some idiot thinks of you?”

  Lulu slurped the last of her granita. “If everything you did in life was constantly about that same misunderstanding, you’d be pissed off, too.”

  Lulu dug into her bag, pulling out her keys. She looked up, then froze. Across the street, the flower shop had closed early and locked the fence around their property. Her car was snugly, safely padlocked in for the night. Of course it was. Lulu pointed to behind the fence. “That’s my car.”

  “Impressive,” said Matt. “How’d you manage that?”

  “Obviously the gate wasn’t locked when I parked it,” Lulu said, a shrill edge to her voice. Then, “Dammit, Matt. How are we going to get home?”

  “I have an idea. You might not like it, though.”

  20

  Hard to Get

  A burnt orange Datsun parked in front of the curb of the plant shop, where Lulu and Matt sat. Under her breath, Lulu swore in all the languages she knew.

  “Thanks, man,” said Matt.

  “No problem,” said James, his elbow leaned out his opened window.

  “Isn’t it a little cold to roll your window down like that?” said Lulu.
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  James looked at her then. He smiled. “Are you going to accept the ride, Lulu Saad, or are you going to stand in the cold with your pride intact? It’s totally your call. I do need to know. So I can plan.”

  “I plan on getting in the car with my pride intact. Thank you very much.” Lulu pulled her shoulders down and kept her chin up.

  Matt opened the passenger door. Lulu slid into the middle and swung her leg over the gearbox. Matt climbed in beside her.

  As Lulu looked out the front windshield, she watched a purple cabriolet pass by on the street. Audrey had driven by with nary a honk or a wave. Not that Lulu wanted her to honk or wave. Lulu grabbed the parking brake. “I think I’ll do this, if you don’t mind.”

  “Thank God. It was weird enough when you weren’t wearing a skirt,” said James.

  “Man, you know how to make a girl feel flattered,” said Lulu.

  “Could you start the car? Much as I’d love to watch you two flirt, I wouldn’t. James, your heater is absolute shit.”

  James blushed. He rolled up his window and put the car into gear. Lulu dropped the e-brake and stared firmly ahead, out the front windshield. They rode in silence as James drove. James wouldn’t say anything. Lulu couldn’t. And Matt didn’t seem to care one way or another. He leaned across Lulu and messed with the old dial radio until he found a station that wasn’t playing a commercial. Lulu let the guitar chords and the rhythm of the road wash over her.

  When the car stopped, Matt unbuckled, hopped out with not much more than a “thanks, man,” and disappeared into his house. Lulu slid over into Matt’s vacated seat. James put the car into gear and drove. Lulu drew shapes in the condensation on the inside of the window. James should have dropped her off first, not Matt.

  James rolled down his window again. “Sorry, I know it’s cold. But it’s the only way to really defrost the windows in here.”

  Lulu shrugged into her sweater. “’S’okay.”

  “I’ll close it in a minute,” he said.

  The resulting silence threatened to devour Lulu whole. She had to fight it, to fill it. “You know, Reza’s a Persian name. And Ben always seems so Old Testament, so everyone thinks it’s Jewish. And then I got the world’s most generic Arabic name.” Lulu watched the shapes she drew slowly fade out with the blast of cold air entering the car. “But Rez shouldn’t have been named Reza at all. He should have been named for my grandfather. First son of a first son and all that.”

  “But he wasn’t,” said James. “He wasn’t named for your father.”

  Lulu looked over. He had a firm grip on the wheel. His knuckles were going white from the cold. She could see his breath coming out of his mouth in little puffs. “No, he wasn’t. He was named after my dad’s best friend.”

  “Why?”

  “He was killed the year my brother was born. Or at least, my father heard he died the year my brother was born. And without any children. So my dad gave him a legacy. He was Iraqi, but his family had been Persian, way back when. Nobody over there forgets these things. So they kept a lot of Persian names in the family.”

  “Lulu,” said James. Like he was going to start something important.

  Lulu breathed across the window, fogging it briefly one last time. She hummed, ignoring the urgency in his tone.

  James pulled the car over. Lulu looked back at him.

  “Lulu,” said James again.

  She couldn’t ignore it now. “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, still looking her dead in the eye.

  “What?” Lulu shook out her head, like there was water trapped in her ears. “No.”

  “I’m sorry. I jumped to conclusions that Saturday. I know that wasn’t fair. I just saw you through the window, and it was like the floor came out from under me,” said James. “And that’s not an excuse.”

  “’S’okay. You get a freebie for holding back my hair while I puked and standing up to my mother.”

  “I’m serious,” he said. “Don’t play this off with a joke.”

  “Not a joke. I just believe in restitution more than I believe in apologies.”

  “I don’t believe in excuses. Just in reasons. I’ve had enough excuses for one lifetime. I don’t need to give anyone else more of them.”

  “Simple as that?” She realized the condensed white puffs were coming out of his mouth in shorter, smaller bursts. His lips looked soft. She leaned in, following the trail of his breath.

  “Simple doesn’t mean easy. It means uncomplicated,” he said.

  “I’m afraid of uncomplicated,” she said.

  “Lulu,” said James.

  Lulu hummed in response. The gap between them was closing, slowly, inevitably.

  “I want to kiss you. But I won’t unless you say that I can.”

  Lulu took a deep intake of breath. Her whole body came alive at the question. How many times had she been kissed? She’d lost count. How many times had someone laid their desires so clear before her? Never. She could say no, she knew. But she didn’t want to. She wanted to hold on to this moment for a second longer—where anything was possible, where her imagination could only heighten her anticipation. Their lips were millimeters apart. Lulu couldn’t see his breath anymore, but she could feel his eyelashes on her cheek. Both their eyelids were lowered, but they were still looking at each other, still hesitating. James, man of his word, would not move.

  Lulu put them both out of their misery. She closed her eyes, took a leap of faith, and leaned in. Their lips met, softly. His hands tested out their position on her hips, and she made no indication for him to remove them. Her hands tangled through his hair. It was so soft her fingers slipped through faster than she had anticipated. One of his hands traveled upward to her waist. As his thumb moved against her shirt at her stomach, Lulu temporarily forgot she needed air. And then the kiss was over. He’d pulled away. Lulu was confused, a little disoriented. She had anticipated more, much more.

  “We’re right outside your house, by the way. That’s why I pulled over. I thought you should know that,” he said.

  Lulu looked out the window to see her house, set exactly into her block as it always had been. That was a sobering, steadying sight. She closed her eyes for a moment. When she reopened them, she faced James. “Good call.”

  “I do have my moments,” he said.

  “I’m learning that,” Lulu said, a sly grin pulling across her mouth.

  James’s expression mirrored hers. “Get out of here. I’ll call you.”

  “I might pick up.” Lulu opened her door and slid across the seat as she grabbed her book bag.

  “Come on. Have a heart, Lulu.”

  Lulu grinned, blew a kiss, and slammed the car door. She practically skipped to her front door. She unlocked the dead bolt and turned around. He was still waiting, his car idling, to watch her cross the threshold of her own home safely. She entered, waving, as he drove off.

  It was only later, when she was in her room and reliving the moment, that Lulu reached for her phone and realized she had no one to tell.

  21

  The Price of Freedom

  Lulu was upstairs, working her way through those chapters of La Princesse de Clèves when the front door slammed shut and the sound of trudging could be heard up the stairs.

  The door to her bedroom swung open. Aimee Saad startled. “Leila Margot Saad, what are you doing home so early? Why don’t I see your car? How did you get home?” Her mother took a deep breath. “Don’t you dare roll your eyes at me. Answer the question.”

  Lulu sighed. “I didn’t roll my eyes.”

  “You were thinking about it.”

  “Am I going to be in trouble for having thoughts now?” Lulu crossed her arms.

  “Answer the question.”

  “Which question?”

  “Why are you home early?”

  “Early dismissal.” Lulu shrugged.

  “Says who?” Aimee narrowed her eyes.

  “Says me.”

  “Don’t y
ou dare get cute with me, Leila Saad. And where the hell is your damn car?”

  “Locked up in the plant shop parking lot,” said Lulu.

  Aimee pinched the bridge of her nose. “What is it doing locked up in a plant shop? Actually, never mind. Don’t answer that.”

  “There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation,” said Lulu. “I parked my car at a plant shop. They closed up for the day. The fence is now locked.”

  “You skipped class and got your car locked into a plant shop?” Aimee put her hand to her hip and took a deep breath. Lulu believed it was meant to be calming. She could tell it hadn’t worked out as her mother had planned. “Do you realized how ludicrous you sound? Don’t you already know how in trouble you are?”

  “Go ahead and ground me some more. It’s not like I have any friends left. Hell, at least I can blame being grounded on my lack of a social life. You’d be doing me a favor,” said Lulu, all bluster.

  Aimee gave Lulu a hard appraisal. Lulu stared back, unflinching.

  “Fine,” said Aimee. “You’re ungrounded.”

  “What?” yelped Lulu.

  “You’re ungrounded. If I’m doing you a favor grounding you. You’re not grounded,” said her mother.

  Lulu narrowed her eyes. “What’s the catch?”

  “The catch is Tamra’s older sister, Tanya, is getting married, and you’re going to help make centerpieces.”

  “I can’t apologize.” Lulu knew no one could apologize for what had happened. It had been too feral of an attack, the wound inflicted too deep.

  “You don’t have to apologize, darlin’. It’s too late to apologize and have that make everything right. You just have to do penance.”

  Lulu groaned. “Come on, Mom. They don’t want my help.”

  “Mrs. Salwa is being remarkably Shiite about the whole thing. Your baba got her great-uncle to issue a minor fatwa on your behalf. So you better thank Sheikh Fadi when you see him. And your father. Thank both of them. Profusely. This is also part of your penance.”

  “You are so Catholic,” said Lulu.

  Her mother glared. And eventually, under the weight of such a stare, Lulu flinched. “Fine. I’ll make the dumb centerpieces.”