Headlights flashed across the picture window before turning into the driveway. I took a breath. Relief. Fear. They felt the same.
Mom pulled back the curtains and looked out. “Tell me he’s not driving a motorcycle.”
“Stop, Mom, he’ll see you. It’s just his car.”
“I don’t care if he sees me. Are you sure that’s a car?”
“It’s old.”
“Where’s he taking you?”
“I don’t know. Please get away from the window.”
“You don’t know?”
The car honked. I jumped from the couch. “I have to go.”
“No way.” She stepped in front of me. “He’s coming inside after making you wait like that.”
“Mom, that’s stupid.”
“You’re not a dog that comes when he calls.”
My jaw ached. Everything about her exhausted me. If I ignored her, she’d chase me outside like a lunatic. “Fine,” I said. “I’ll go get him.” I managed not to slam the door behind me.
Joey’s red Camaro sat idling in the driveway, seeping light and smoke like some kind of alien ship. I shielded my eyes against the glare of headlights. Cold air needled my skin.
The passenger door swung open. Warmth and music flooded out. Joey leaned across the seat, his hand on the door. “You ready to go?”
“Uh.” I felt like a little kid to have to say it. “My mom wants to meet you.”
“Yeah, okay.” No sigh. No flicker of annoyance. I tried not to stare as he glided out of the car. Jeans and a t-shirt never looked so good.
“I feel like I should warn you,” I said.
“About what?”
“My mom can be a little . . .” Tense didn’t begin to describe it, so I went for the truth. “Crazy.”
He laughed. “You forget. I have one of those, too.”
Something in common. We both had screwed-up moms.
Our shoes crunched on the gravel. I watched my stretched shadow, jealous of how it bobbed along without a care in the world. When we reached the door, I stopped to take a breath.
“Don’t worry,” Joey said. “I’ve done this before.”
Of course he had. I turned the knob, squinting in the glut of yellow light. Mom sat on the couch with her legs tucked up, a gardening magazine in her lap. She must have snatched it from the pile next to the couch. She looked up like we’d surprised her.
“Mom,” I said. “This is Joey.”
“Hey,” Joey said.
“I’m Connie.” Then she corrected herself. “Mrs. Waters.”
“Nice to meet you.” Joey offered his hand. Mom shook it.
This was going too well. I had to get him out before things blew up. “So,” I began. “I’ll see you later, Mom.”
“Just a minute.” She aimed her smile at Joey, sweet, like rotten fruit. “Where are you taking her?”
Oh crap. Here it came.
“I thought we’d go to a movie,” Joey said.
“Really?” Mom looked down at her magazine, still smiling that overripe smile. “Which movie?”
Joey hesitated, glanced at me.
My mind whirled, got nothing. “We’re still deciding.”
“I see.” Her smile dissolved. The magazine slapped shut as she speared Joey with her stare. “And did you plan on feeding her first?”
Jesus, Mom!
Joey tried to laugh. “Yeah, of course. My uncle owns a restaurant.”
“And which restaurant is that?”
“It’s called Johnny’s.”
“Sounds like a male strip club.”
This was getting bad. “Mom, we have to go.”
She coiled her magazine into a cylinder, gripped it like a stick. “Maybe you wouldn’t be in such a hurry if your boyfriend could get here on time.”
“Uh.” Joey rubbed the back of his neck. “I had car trouble.”
“Mom, we’re going.” I grabbed the doorknob, shoulders hunched as if to make myself a smaller target for Mom’s abuse. Joey was right behind me.
“Enjoy your night,” Joey said, and I caught a glimpse of her face as I closed the door. Scared. She looked scared.
Don’t think about her. Don’t let her ruin this.
Cool night air washed over us. I filled my chest with it.
Joey laughed. “What the fuck?”
“Sorry,” I said. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
He led me to his car, opened my door. I climbed inside, my body rigid in the empty silence. When he slid in beside me, his smell filled the car. Soap and tobacco, his hair wet from a shower.
He dug his keys from the pocket of his jeans. “You look great.”
“Thanks.” I studied my hands, made sure they weren’t shaking. He thought I looked great. Was that something guys said out of habit? He couldn’t know how I’d tried on all the clothes in my closet before settling on my one pair of A&F jeans and a purple sweater.
“So you want to go to my uncle’s place?” He started the car and twisted in his seat to face me. “It’s kind of a drive.”
“Maroa, right?”
“Did I mention that?”
“I forgot to tell you. I have ESP.”
“Awesome.” His fingers traced paths over my temples. I wanted to draw those fingers, stick them in my mouth and taste them. “So what am I thinking now?” he asked.
I closed my eyes, trying to dial the right words. Something clever, flirting. Anything but silence.
“Come on, girl.” His voice teasing.
“Um.” I opened my eyes. Sometimes the words came easy. Most of the time they didn’t. “You’re thinking you’re hungry?” I asked.
“Hmm.” He cocked a smile, his voice like a rumble. “Close enough.”
• • •
We sped toward Maroa, his stereo blasting. He told me about all the different bands on his mix CD: Sleigh Bells, Cage the Elephant, Death Cab for Cutie. The music made things easier. No awkward silence, no struggling for the right words. I leaned my head against the seat and watched how his head weaved to the music, how his lips murmured the words.
The soaring beat of Jack White’s “Love Is Blindness” hit me hard. The rawness of the guy’s voice. The melody. Joey must have felt it, too. His hands gripped the steering wheel. His head swayed with the chords. Near the end of the song, he reached across the seat and grabbed my hand. Intense. I felt the beauty of the song. The pain.
And he shared it with me.
As the last chords faded, Joey loosened his grip. “I love the orgasm of that song.”
I smiled. “Since when do songs have orgasms?”
“Since always. You never noticed? The orgasm is the part where everything explodes. The part you have to crank up.”
The part where Joey had grabbed my hand. Once he took it away, my hand felt cold. “I get it,” I said. “I think that’s my new favorite song.”
“Awesome.” His tone was edged with pride. “So what used to be your favorite song?”
“I don’t know.” Did I have one? “Maybe the U2 version?”
A slow smile. “Most people wouldn’t know that.”
I didn’t tell him how I grew up listening to U2 because my mom had all their songs. There were a lot of things he didn’t know about me. Like how important art was to me. I needed to tell him about the contest. I needed to ask him to sit for me as my live model so I could paint him. But now didn’t seem like the right time. I’d only come off sounding awkward.
He popped the CD out of the player, handed it to me. “Here. Take it home.”
“Really?”
“I’ll burn another one.”
I slipped the disc into my purse, hoping I wouldn’t scratch it. Should I ask if he had a case? Better not push my luck.
“So do you play something?” I asked. “An instrument?”
“Bass.” Again, that tinge of pride. “I’m in a band.”
“I knew it! I do have ESP.”
“I gue
ss you do.” He rummaged through a pile of CDs on his dashboard and fed one into the player. “This is my band. We’re called The Wake.”
A mesh of guitar and drums pumped from the speakers. Screaming vocals. I tried to pick out the bass line but couldn’t find it.
“Only problem is . . .” He turned the volume down. “We lost our drummer. It’s hard to get gigs without a drummer.”
“What happened?”
“Rehab. They won’t let him out.”
“Was he in an accident? I mean . . .” I realized too late he was talking about drug rehab.
Joey gave me a sidewise glance. “He OD’d. That means overdosed. I keep forgetting how innocent you are.”
And then his hand reached over and stroked my thigh, a warm caress that jolted my insides, made me gasp. He looked over with a little smile.
I didn’t need ESP to know what he was thinking: Innocent, yes, but not for long.
Or maybe that’s what I was thinking.
• • •
Maroa, population 1,601. We passed two churches, a trailer park, and a grain elevator. Just behind the convenience store sat a low-roofed building made of white concrete bricks. Johnny’s in big black letters was painted on the side.
Joey led me across the gravel parking lot. A woman came out the door, tottering on her high heels, trying to balance her cigarette and wine glass while she talked on her phone. I felt her eyes on me as we went inside.
Joey said it was a restaurant, but it looked more like a bar—the room dark, the few scattered tables made for standing around, not eating. Eighties music pumped from a jukebox. My parents’ favorite.
Joey put his mouth close to my ear so I could hear him. “Let’s say hi to my uncle.”
I followed him to the bar. I could have sworn the guys were checking me out, and by guys I meant men my dad’s age. No one seemed to be younger than forty. Joey hooked a stool, and I sat at the bar. He put his hand on my back. Then he draped himself over the bar like a lazy cat and waved his arm at the bartender. “Hey! Uncle Johnny!”
Joey’s uncle was big—muscular big, like a wrestler. A tattoo of a snake curled up his neck and over his shaved scalp. He plunked a drink in front of a laughing woman across the bar, then grabbed an empty mug and started filling it from the beer tap. He nodded at Joey. “About time you showed up. Your dad’s been looking for you.”
I felt invisible while they continued their conversation.
“I told him I was going out,” Joey said.
“Well, he don’t remember much of what you tell him.” His uncle set the full mug in front of Joey before flicking his eyes to me. “Who’s this?”
Should I introduce myself? I sat on my hands and pretended to study the colorful bottles behind the bar.
“She works at Papa Geppetto’s,” Joey said. “She’s new.”
“And you let him take you out?”
It took me a second to realize he was talking to me now. I tried to come up with a witty response, but all I could do was shrug.
“Can you get her a drink?” Joey asked.
“What do you like?”
I opened my mouth to order a pop, but Joey beat me to it.
“She’ll have wine. You like wine, right?”
“Uh, sure.”
His uncle plucked a wine glass from the rack above his head. “White, pink, or red?” he asked me.
“Pink’s fine.”
“Pink it is.” He opened a fridge beneath the bar and pulled out a bottle. The wine glass was small, but he poured it full and set it down in front of me. No ID required.
“Thanks.” I lifted the glass to my mouth. Both of them watched me like I was performing some kind of dare. The first sip went down smooth.
“You like it?” Joey asked.
“It’s good.” I took another sip.
“You hungry? You want fish and chips?”
“That’s fine.”
“Get her the special,” he told his uncle. “And I’ll have another beer.”
While his uncle got the beer, Joey leaned in close so he could talk in my ear. “If my dad shows up and starts bothering you, just ignore him.”
I nodded like it wasn’t weird at all that his dad might show up and bother me.
His uncle set a full mug in front of Joey and another glass of wine in front of me, even though I’d only drunk half of what I had. “So you don’t fall behind,” he said.
Was he joking? I smiled and took another sip.
Joey looked around the bar. “So where is he?” he asked his uncle.
“Downstairs.”
“Loaded?”
“Sleeping it off.”
I felt like I was eavesdropping on a private conversation, like I wasn’t needed there at all.
“Any chance we’ll see him in the next hour?” Joey asked.
“He’s about due to come wandering around.” His uncle squirted something from a hose into a fancy glass and stuck a straw into it. Then he added a shot of brown liquor. He set the glass in front of a man across the bar. The man looked up and met my eyes. He winked. I looked at my glass.
My glass was empty, the first one at least. I pushed the empty glass to the side and started in on the second. A new song started playing. Kajagoogoo’s “Too Shy.” Joey kept looking around the bar, and I kept looking at Joey, waiting for him to make conversation. At least the wine was helping. Slowly, some of the tension evaporated from my shoulders. Joey’s uncle smiled at me and poured me another glass.
I was halfway through my second drink when my food arrived. By then, I felt amazing. Relaxed like I’d never been. Smiling. Uncle Johnny set the platter of fish and chips in front of me, but I was having too much fun to eat. My whole body swayed to the music. Joey eyed me with a little smile. Wow.
He said something, but I couldn’t hear him over the music. I shook my head, slow and luxurious, like I was moving underwater. He leaned in to yell in my ear. “You look pretty sexy!”
Even my smile felt relaxed. Was this real? Then he kissed my neck, and a flush like a warm bath shivered up my body.
His breath warmed my neck. I pushed closer, felt my stool start to topple. Joey’s hand on my arm kept me from falling.
“Careful,” he said.
I laughed, not embarrassed at all.
He pointed at my plate of fish. “Your food’s getting cold.”
“I guess I’m not hungry.”
Another glass of wine appeared in front of me.
“Hey, look,” Joey tapped my arm. “My dad.”
I followed his eyes to where a tall skinny guy with a beard was clutching the backs of chairs as he shuffled toward the bar. His chestnut hair was the same color as Joey’s, but messy, like he’d just woken up. His messy hair reminded me of my dad’s mug shot. I tried to swallow my uneasiness.
“Dad!” Joey waved him over.
I put down my drink as he stumbled his way over. Now I knew how Joey had felt when I’d made him meet my mom.
“Don’t worry,” Joey said in my ear. “He won’t remember anything.”
Up close, I saw how much Joey looked like him. Besides the chestnut hair, they had the same hazel eyes, the same lips. But his dad’s face was puffy and sweaty, his eyes glassy. His mouth hung open. I’d seen old guys stare at me like that before. Greedy.
“Dad, this is Tera,” Joey said.
His eyes shot from my chest to my face. “What’d you say?”
“I’m Tera,” I yelled.
“Oh.” His smile was missing teeth. “I’m Tom. Call me Tommy.” He stuck out his hand, and I shook it. His sweaty hand swallowed mine.
“You finished eating?” Joey asked me.
I nodded. Joey’s dad kept staring.
“Want to go downstairs?” Joey asked.
“Uh.” I wasn’t sure what was downstairs, but it had to be better than getting ogled by a guy who looked like he’d crawled out of the gutter. “Sure.”
As soon as I stood up, my head started spinning. When I tr
ied to walk, my legs wobbled. Joey seemed to know I was having trouble. He didn’t let go of my hand as we weaved between tables toward a little alcove at the other side of the bar. A cigarette machine stood between two doors labeled Dudes and Chicks. Across from the restrooms was a third door that said Employees Only. Joey pulled it open. A narrow staircase led down.
“Go ahead.” Joey held the door for me.
I felt my way down like a blind person. “I think I’m drunk,” I announced, and Joey laughed. Then I almost rammed my face into a closed door at the bottom of the stairs.
Joey reached around me and pushed open the door. Dark inside. Music from the bar vibrated the walls. It smelled like a basement. It was a basement. He groped the wall for a light switch, and suddenly I could see. Boxes were stacked ceiling-high on metal utility shelves that ran the length of the room. Shoved against the far wall was a futon, and on the arm of the futon was an ashtray overflowing with cigarette butts. A mini-fridge squatted beside the futon. Was his dad sleeping down here? Did he live here?
“What is this place?” My voice sounded way too loud.
“My dad’s flophouse.” Joey rubbed the back of his neck. It was the first time I’d seen him look embarrassed. “Sorry,” he said. “We can leave. I didn’t realize how this must look.”
“That’s okay.” This was awful, but it wasn’t Joey’s fault. “So you don’t live with your dad?”
“Not really.”
What did that mean? Was Joey homeless?
“It’s temporary,” Joey explained. “Until we can find a place.”
He was homeless. Oh my God. I longed for the right words, something to let him know I didn’t judge him.
“My dad’s in jail,” I blurted.
That surprised him. He blinked at me like maybe he hadn’t heard me right.
“He hasn’t been convicted or anything, but . . .” My voice trailed off. I waited for him to ask what my dad had done—what he had been accused of doing.
“No shit.” A slow grin spread across his face. “I knew there was something about you.”
“I was going to tell you earlier, but . . .” I shrugged.
“Don’t let it bother you. My dad’s a total fuckup, but it’s him fucking up, not me.”
He was right. I didn’t have to feel embarrassed by my dad. But I still did.
Joey moved the ashtray from the arm of the futon onto the floor. “Sorry I don’t have a better place to take you. You want to go back?”
Work of Art Page 9