“Right,” Linda said. “Pep squad girl. Father owns a paper company in New Jersey. Painfully dumb, but really good looking. She’s got the hair and the scrawny body and the nose-job button nose—everything. And she’s dating Frank? Four out of five experts would never have seen that one coming.”
“Well,” May said, “Frank’s kind of smart….”
“He has five snakes and he just dyed his hair purple,” Linda said firmly. “He laminated his Mensa card. Dumb blond paper heiress—insane, snake-loving engineer. There’s no logic behind it. Don’t try to find any. And don’t try to figure it out with Pete and Nell.”
“Okay,” May said, reaching up to pick at some flaking paint by the mirror. She looked at her reflection as she did so. She was scowling. She looked a lot like Palmer when she scowled—all chipmunk cheeks and round, maniac eyes. Very attractive.
“Second thing,” Linda continued. “Don’t get involved in the details of other people’s love lives, because the details are always creepy.”
“Trust me, I’m not getting involved.”
“I’m not saying you would want to. I’m saying it might happen, and you have to avoid it.”
“Huh?”
“Here’s an example. Just last night Dash comes over to dinner. So I have to listen to her rambling on at the table for half an hour about how she’s so excited to be eating actual Chinese home-cooked cuisine. We were having little crab cakes, which she obviously thought were dim sum fish balls or something. But I can let that go. She’s from Jersey. It’s a handicap.”
Linda reached into her bag and popped another candy into her mouth.
“Anyway,” Linda went on, waving her hand in front of her mouth again, “after dinner she tries to bond with me. She comes up to my room, sits on my bed, and tells me that she’s been shopping. She pulls this pink silk gown out of her bag and asks me how I like it. This gown is about five inches long and covered in lace—it’s disgusting. I don’t want to see this. So I tell her it’s nice, thinking she’ll go away. But she just agrees with me and starts explaining to me how sexy it looks on her.”
“We should get her together with Nell,” May said. “They could start an I’m-comfortable-with-my-own-body club.”
“It gets worse. Then she starts asking me if I think Frank will like it, as if I study my cousin’s turn-ons. She was going to try it on and show it to me, but someone called her from downstairs and she left.”
May wrinkled her nose in sympathy.
“But you see what I mean,” Linda said. “People will try to open that window sometimes and give you a little look. Don’t let them. Unless, of course, you have some personal interest in the relationship.”
It was said innocently enough, but May understood what the pause meant.
“What am I going to do?” May asked, sagging against the sink.
“I don’t know,” Linda said. “Can you talk to Pete about it?”
“No.” May shook her head. “It would be too weird.”
“Then try not to watch,” Linda said. “That’s really all you can do.”
That night May could barely be coaxed out of her room to take the obligatory photos of Brooks stabbing Dave Vatiman in the heart with a small boutonniere pin.
“Palmer!” her mom was yelling up the stairs. “Come down here and look at Brooks.”
May sniggered as she laid the photos out on the coffee table. Yeah, Palmer, she said to herself, come see the leaning tower of Brooks. Brooks had mastered walking in her heels on the driveway, but the living room carpet was presenting a whole new challenge, and she was listing precariously to the left.
Palmer came halfway down the stairs and stared at Brooks, as directed.
“Doesn’t your sister look great?” her mom prompted.
“Uh-huh.” Palmer was chewing on something very loudly.
“Instamatic,” Dave said, reaching for May’s camera. “Cool. Can we take this? Do you have more film?”
“No,” May said, automatically retrieving the camera and tucking it under her arm. She didn’t know Dave that well, but her every instinct told her that she didn’t want him getting his hands on her precious Polaroid.
“Isn’t Brooks’s dress great?” Her mom was still needling Palmer. “Doesn’t she look nice?”
“Yeah.”
May gathered up the photos and went into the kitchen. Brooks pigeon-toed behind her and cornered her by the refrigerator.
“We need a camera,” Brooks said pointedly.
“Buy a disposable. You have the cash.”
“I’m out.”
“Well,” May said, dropping the still-developing photos into Brooks’s purse, “at least you have that nice tattoo.”
Brooks hadn’t actually mentioned the tattoo to May—May had heard her describe it over the phone. This silenced Brooks, and she did her funny little walk back into the living room, this time with an angry little hustle.
May smiled in a rare moment of complete satisfaction.
The feeling lingered up until the time May arrived at Presto Espresso, but it fled at the first whiff of elevator jazz she heard as she walked in. It didn’t help that it was a gorgeous, warm Friday night in early June. And this was where she would spend it. The only good thing about it was that for the first time, she would work alone. There had been no one available to share the shift. At least she could get something done.
May spent an hour attempting to read Pride and Prejudice for her English class, but her attention kept drifting. She kept looking out the window or just staring into space. As she tried to turn her focus back to her book one more time, she noticed Pete’s car pulling into the far entrance of the lot. Without any time to wonder what Pete and Nell were doing there, she dropped into a casual pose and tried to look as engrossed in her book as possible.
Nell flounced—and that really was the only word for it—out of the car and into the store, striking the skinny heels of her shoes hard against the red tile so that her every step could be clearly heard by all.
“Like it?” Nell said, twirling for May.
“It’s great.” May nodded. It was great. It was black and very long and clingy, run throughout with a gold threading. Nell had piled her hair on top of her head and tied it into a shaggy lump with a leopard print scarf. It was the kind of thing May could never, ever pull off.
“It’s Betsy Johnson,” Nell said proudly, coming closer so that May could feel the velvety material. “I got it online for forty bucks. Vintage.”
“Wow.”
“This,” she said, holding forth her hand and revealing a silver bracelet that was linked to a silver ring on her middle finger with a small chain, “is my new slave bracelet. Like?”
“It’s beautiful.”
Pete came in quietly. He wore a slate gray suit, which May recognized from her father’s funeral. It was probably the only one he had.
“You going to be okay by yourself here tonight?” Nell said, taking a sudden concern in the running of Presto Espresso. On any other day the roof could have caved in and she would hardly have noticed.
“I’ll be fine,” May said. “Nothing’s happening here.”
Pete saw Nell and May conferring.
“I’m going to”—he looked around—“go to the bathroom.”
He sped off toward the back. Nell nose-whistled.
“I already traced a star on the side of his neck,” she said.
“You what?”
“The freckles,” Nell explained. “They make a star pattern on his neck. On the right side. I already told him that he should get the outline tattooed.”
“Oh.”
The rather eerie image of one of Nell’s slender fingers playing along the side of Pete’s neck leapt into May’s mind. She could see it quite clearly. Nell leaning across the front seat of Pete’s gray tank, her short, ruby-colored nail stroking the coppery freckles. Linda was right. Nell was already opening the window and letting the creepiness come pouring in. She really didn’t want to
know these things.
While May was musing, Nell jammed her hand down the front of her dress and busily adjusted her bustier.
“I have this wire that’s making me crazy…,” she mumbled. “And the front keeps getting stuck on my…Ow. Ow. My rings are…Oh, I think I may be bleeding.”
May struggled for something to say.
“I don’t know if he really likes them,” Nell managed as she rummaged around in her bustier.
“Likes what?” May asked as the horrifying image of Pete examining the knocker knockers leapt into her brain.
“Tattoos.”
“Oh.” May sighed. “Right. Tattoos.”
“I’m totally caught here,” Nell said as she pulled a napkin from one of the dispensers and plunged it down into the depths. “I’m seriously stuck.”
Do not expect me to help you, May thought. You are on your own.
“This always happens.” Nell groaned, rummaging and pulling like crazy now. “But with studs it would even be worse, you know? I…oh. Got it. Thank God.”
She tugged the bustier up and arranged herself. Pete emerged from the bathroom just as Nell’s performance was complete.
“You look nice,” May said in her clearest this-is-a-sincere-yet-obligatory-remark voice. But he did actually look nice, even though the sleeves of the jacket were a bit too short. The gravity of the suit really made him seem adult, something she’d never thought possible with Pete.
Pete stared down at the suit, unbuttoned the bottom button, then quickly rebuttoned it. He must have seen the extra space at the ends of his sleeves in the process, because he jammed his hands deep in the jacket pockets.
“I guess we should go,” Nell said. “You’re sure you’re going to be all right?”
“I think I’ll manage.”
“Here are my keys,” Nell said, pulling a Hello Kitty key chain out of her bag. “And don’t worry about doing the bank deposits. Someone will do them tomorrow.”
“I never do them anyway….”
“And if you have any problems, you can call Ann on her cell. Mine’s going to be off.”
With that, Nell skittered off in the direction of the door. Pete turned to follow, smiling a good-bye at May.
“Have fun,” May said.
“We will,” Nell said, grabbing Pete’s arm and pulling him along.
May walked over to the window when they were far enough away and watched Pete’s Cutlass disappear through the line of shrubs that separated the shopping center from the road. The parking lot was nearly deserted. A big white moon was just coming into view in a lavender evening sky.
It was only seven thirty. She would be here until eleven, engulfed in the odor of overroasted coffee and the chill breeze of the air conditioner, guarding her empty tables and doing homework. May pressed her hand against the window and left a soft print that quickly faded away. She rubbed at the spot with the edge of her apron and stared across at SuperDrug. She remembered that whenever she’d go in there with her dad to pick up soap or bleach, he’d always have to buy something by the front counter, like a pack of mini–Snickers bars or some barbecue potato chips. Or they’d stop and get a double-dip cone from the ice cream stand (“they’re only open three months a year”). There was always a reason, some little celebration, some splurge. He seemed to see every day as a special event.
May turned away from the window. This night was bad enough without dragging up any of that. She went back behind the counter. At the very least, she could use the time to try to search for the label maker and fix her name tag. At least that would be constructive.
The ladies’ room in the catering hall was divided into two parts—the stall-and-sink room and the bizarre “ladies’ parlor” area. This was overstuffed with silk flowers, plush pink carpeting, beaded glass light fixtures, and prints of shy ballerinas waiting to go onstage. There were two marble-topped mirrored makeup tables, a full-length mirror, and several chairs in this antechamber, inviting all users of the rest room to recline and breathe in the overwhelming fragrance of woodland rose potpourri and listen to the cascade of flushing toilets. Brooks and Jamie had taken them up on this generous offer several times this evening.
“Okay,” Jamie said, shuffling through her red silk drawstring bag. “Anyone coming?”
Brooks cracked open the door and peered into the hall. Nothing but the lingering smell of sterno and a staff member pushing an empty coatrack into the lobby.
“No. We’re good.”
“We got Jack. We got Jim. Who do you want?”
“Jack,” Brooks said.
“Jack.” Jamie nodded, pulling a tiny bottle of Jack Daniel’s from her purse. “Here you go. I’ll take Mr. Jim.”
“How did you get all of these?” Brooks asked.
“My dad is a frequent flyer,” Jamie said, breaking the seal on her little bottle. “Ready?”
Brooks unscrewed the cap and nodded. On Jamie’s nod they tipped the small bottles back and sucked down the contents. Jamie quickly passed her empty over to Brooks, who had a disposable hand towel ready and waiting. She wrapped up the evidence and shoved it deep into a small pink trash can next to her chair, taking a moment to carefully rearrange some of the other discarded towels and tissues over it.
“Okay,” Jamie said, taking another look in her bag. “So, Jim Beam I can do without a chaser, but I am not drinking straight gin. That’s disgusting. Ooo…teeny, tiny Absolut vodka.”
She held up a small bottle, grinned, then plunked it back into the bag.
“I swear to God I had a little Grey Goose in here, but I think Dave swiped it. Oh, well.” Jamie rose unsteadily on her open-backed heels and turned to the mirror to rearrange her tight, Chinese-style red cocktail dress. Brooks watched her for a moment, then reached for her own evening bag and emptied the contents onto the dressing table.
“Look,” she said.
Jamie looked down at the small pile of makeup, keys, and wallet. Brooks pushed the objects around until she revealed a small square of green plastic. Jamie laughed and picked it up.
“Did you just buy these?” she asked. She held on to one edge and dangled the three condoms from her fingertips.
“Yesterday.”
“Are they for tonight?”
“I don’t know,” Brooks said, staring at them. “I was thinking tomorrow night, at the party, when we stay over at Dave’s. Here.”
She opened up her bag, and Jamie dropped in the condoms.
“Look at you.” Jamie grinned. “All prepared.”
“I don’t know if I can get up,” Brooks said.
Jamie reached over and presented her carefully manicured hand. Brooks accepted the help out of the chair.
Back in the main room, about half the people were on the dance floor. The others were huddled in conference around tables. The inseparable couples were in each other’s laps. Brooks looked at one of the tables near the door. Pete was there, deep in the throes of telling some story, obviously. He had taken off his suit jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. He was waving his arms wildly at some girl in a tight black dress who was laughing hysterically.
For some reason, Brooks found the sight very amusing.
“Oh my God,” Brooks said, pulling Jamie to a stop. “That’s Camper.”
“Who?”
“Camper. Peter Camp. Don’t you know him?”
Jamie shook her head.
“He’s a friend of ours.”
“Who’s he with?” Jamie said, leaning in close to Brooks. “Is that Ani DiFranco? All she needs are the dreds and maybe a little more body hair.”
“I have no idea. I thought he was stalking May. I have to say something. Come with me.”
Arm in arm, they approached the couple. Pete stopped his gesticulating.
“Pete!” Brooks screamed. “What’s going on?”
Jamie laughed politely into her fist, as if coughing.
“We’re sitting,” he said. “What’s going on with you, Brooks?”
&nb
sp; “Who’s this?” Brooks asked.
Nell narrowed her eyes a bit.
“This is Nell,” Pete said.
“Nell. Oh, Nell.” This was much too loud. Brooks had lost her sense of volume. “You work with May, right?”
“Yes.” Nell nodded. “You know her?”
“She’s my sister.”
“May’s your sister?” Nell said. She carefully looked over the very tall, very blond, very drunk thing in front of her.
“Pete,” Brooks said, throwing herself down in the empty chair on his other side, “have you seen Dave? We’re looking for Dave.”
Brooks dropped her head onto Pete’s shoulder and began to laugh a loud, snorting laugh, grabbing the front of his shirt for support. Her head began to slide down, and she left a long smudge of black mascara across his chest.
“Who’s Dave?” he asked.
Brooks picked her head up and smiled.
“You want a tiny Absolut?” she said. “Show him, Jamie. Show him.”
“You’re kind of falling out there, honey,” Nell said sweetly, pinching the front of Brooks’s dress and tugging it up an inch. “You might want to get off your hem.”
Brooks looked down. Her dress was pinned under the leg of the chair, and it was pulling down the entire front.
“Come on,” Jamie said. “Let’s go find them.”
“We have to go,” Brooks explained as she stood up and steadied herself. Then, somewhat mysteriously, she added, “Good luck with everything.”
“That’s why I don’t drink,” Nell said as Brooks and Jamie stumbled off across the floor. “Nothing. No alcohol, no drugs. Not even taurine. Is that really May’s sister?”
Pete nodded, watching as Brooks tried to regain a steady gait.
“That’s really her sister,” he confirmed.
8
The next day Dave’s parents left town for a Jimmy Buffet Parrothead convention in Key West to drink tequila and sing “Margaritaville” for four days.
Brooks had spent the day in bed, recovering from the prom and resting up for the evening. She’d worked out a cover story about staying at Jamie’s, so everything was ready. In the late afternoon she showered and dressed, then tore through her closet looking for the most feminine outfit she owned. This was tricky, since she mostly wore jeans and T-shirts. Of these, she chose the most flattering. She finally chose a blue baby tee that just hit her waistline and her darkest jeans, which made her legs look even longer than they already were. It wasn’t that much of a switch from what she normally wore, but it was a nice combination.
The Key to the Golden Firebird Page 10