Beneath the Shine

by Lisa Sorbe

Adair looks at me strangely. “No,” he says slowly. “Just your nose. And your eyes. And those…” He clears his throat. “And your lips.”

  I skim my lips back from my teeth. I lined them in a soft plum color and filled them in with a lipstick shade of the same. There was nothing on them when I left the house earlier, but a girl can never be sure. “And my teeth,” I say, my voice coming out all weird because I’m trying to talk without moving my mouth.

  Adair just shakes his head and turns back to the door. “You’re a strange bird. And no,” he adds. Then he sighs, growing impatient. “So, do we ring the doorbell or just walk right in?”

  I nudge the doorbell with my elbow, raising my shoulders in a shrug. A hollow ding resounds deep in the house. “When in doubt…”

  “You do know these people, right?”

  “As much as anyone can know anyone,” I mutter.

  Before he can respond, my mother throws open the door.

  As usual, Maureen Kline looks perfect. We both resemble my grandmother and, seeing my mother now, I’m caught in a weird realization of what it will be like looking in the mirror in twenty years. If, that is, I lose the pink hair and start dressing in shades of beige and brown.

  Still, despite her lackluster wardrobe, my mother is beautiful. Her ash blonde hair is perfectly styled, the chin length cut grazing her delicate jawline and layered just right to reflect her high cheekbones. She’s paired a beige tunic and matching cardigan over brown slacks, and a chunky stone necklace hangs from her slender neck. When she reaches to pull me into a stiff hug, I notice that even her nails are splashed with a neutral shade of taupe.

  “Merry Christmas, sweetheart!” she sings, pressing her cold cheek to mine.

  “You too, Mom.” I stand just as stiffly, the gifts in my arms preventing me from returning the gesture. When she pulls back, her eyes roam over my face, and I catch a shadow of disapproval move through them before she can blink it back. It’s a look I’ve seen a million times, and I’ve learned not to expect anything else. Still, it stings, and I shift the boxes in my arms before pointing my elbow at Adair.

  “Mom, this is Adair McTaggart. And Adair,” I nod toward my mother, “this is my mom, Maureen Kline.”

  My mom turns to him, her smile polite. She’s appraising him, although thankfully it isn’t obvious. She’s subtle in her discrepancy—head cocked slightly to the right, eyes narrowed just a bit, a pause in her breath that you’d only notice if you were watching. I can almost hear the gears turning as she takes him in.

  Adair nods, the smile behind his beard stretching wide. “Mrs. Kline.” He juggles the bags around for a second and slides the bouquet from his elbow. “Pleasure to finally meet you.” He holds out the flowers, and it’s at that moment I see my mother’s façade wobble.

  I’d say it’s the accent, but the man looks just as delicious as he sounds.

  “Please,” she says with a little laugh, “call me Maureen. And it’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” She takes the bouquet and waves us in. “These are absolutely stunning. So festive!”

  As we step into the large foyer, I watch her bring the bouquet to her nose and inhale.

  So far, so good.

  “Your father is watching football in the living room, of course,” she tells us as we follow her down a hallway that spills into the home’s open floor layout. Adair studies a gallery wall of pictures as we move, and when he spots one of me in my Sharks swimsuit, a medal around my neck and smiling through a mouthful of braces, he pauses long enough to nudge my shoulder, point at it, and snicker.

  I make sure my mother’s back is still to us before flipping him off.

  Even at home, she moves with a grace and professionalism that suggests she’s entertaining corporate guests rather than family. “Adair, I don’t suppose you’re the type to spend an entire holiday hollering at a television screen rather than conversing with your loved ones, am I right?” She chuckles to show she’s joking. And to any innocent bystander, she would appear to be.

  I’m not an innocent bystander.

  “I don’t do any yelling for sports, no. Although, I have been known to get a tad riled up over House Hunters.” Adair winks at me, and I roll my eyes. I got a little emotional over one episode (it’s just carpet, for crying out loud! rip the damn stuff up!) and the jerk will never let me forget it.

  My mother reaches into a cupboard above the sink and pulls down a glass vase. “You sound like Betsy,” she says, filling the vase with water and poking the stems through the top. “She wants a house of her own so badly but refuses to take the necessary steps to obtain one. Until then, she satisfies herself by watching other people buy them. But what do you do?” Her fingers pull apart the blooms as she fluffs the arrangement and sighs. “I keep telling myself that someday she’ll grow up.” She looks up and smiles brightly, like she didn’t just thoroughly insult her only child.

  My mouth drops, if only because she brought out the big guns so fast. I wrongly assumed that, having just met Adair and wanting to keep up the image of a loving mother, she would wait awhile before taking jabs at me.

  The silence that follows is uncomfortable for everyone except my mother. Adair makes some weird noise between a laugh and a cough, and I grip the edges the packages I’m holding so tight the paper on one rips.

  See, the thing is, my mother is charming. So charming, you let you guard drop.

  Experience has taught me to always keep mine up.

  But I’m not perfect. And sometimes, it slips.

  Fourth of July – 14 Years Old

  Josh promised he’d find Taffy. That he had a pretty good idea of where she might be.

  Before leaving, he steered me to his bed, told me to wait for him—

  I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere, ‘kay?

  —and suggested I start reading the book he gave me.

  And that’s what I intended to do.

  Until I felt the bed sink beneath my weight.

  Until I slid my legs under the covers because the air conditioning was going so strong that the room was starting to feel like a meat locker.

  Until I leaned back against the pillows, which smelled so much like him, and told myself that I was just going to rest my eyes—

  that’s it, that’s all

  —for just a minute.

  I’m not tired, I told myself.

  “I’m not going to fall asleep,” I said out loud.

  Darkness took over.

  The blackness was an abyss.

  The bed tilted, and I fell.

  “I’ve driven by there. Charming little place. Not much to it though, is there?”

  My mother takes a dainty sip of her mimosa and raises her brows expectantly.

  We’re sitting in the living room, firmly planted on plush leather loveseats and pretending that we all want to be here.

  I growl. Not out loud, of course. Just a coarse rumble rising up from the pit of my stomach and reverberating in my head. My fingers pinch the stem of my champagne glass so tight I’m surprised it doesn’t break. Back handed compliments are my mother’s specialty.

  Adair smiles politely, his fingers loose around his own drink, and shrugs. “The grounds are small, but that’s how I prefer it. The real fun,” he says, and I notice the twinkle he gets in his eyes when he talks about his work, “is the brewing. That’s where the real business is. The creativity, you know?” He glances at my father, nods at the beer in his hand. “If you’d like, Arthur, I could bring you over a sampling sometime. It’d be no trouble at all.”

  My father is a tall, quiet man, but his eyes light up with the suggestion. “Well, now,” he chuckles, finally anchoring into the conversation. “I certainly wouldn’t say no to that.”

  Adair answers more questions about Rusty Bucket—all flung at him nonstop from my mother—with a nonchalance I envy. He deftly maneuvers around her inquiries into his past, refocusing the talk instead to his life here in Iowa. My father contributes a little before retreating back into h
is shell, smiling and nodding when appropriate, his eyes flicking back and forth between the television and us. The Vikings are playing today, and the fact that my mother is making the four of us sit through this little getting-to-know-you session with the volume on mute has to be killing him.

  “That’s an interesting necklace.”

  For a minute I assume she’s still talking to Adair, so I ignore her while discreetly leaning back to check the clock on the kitchen wall.

  Not even close.

  Half an hour down, how many more to go?

  I groan inwardly.

  “Betsy,” she prompts.

  I swing my head her way, guilty that she caught me watching the time and nervous she read my thoughts. Because sometimes she can do weird shit like that.

  Eyes in the back of her head? Yep, she’s got ‘em.

  “Hmm?”

  Adair smirks, and I narrow my eyes at him.

  Something my mother doesn’t miss as she looks over the two of us. She raises a brow and nods, motioning toward me. “I said, that’s an interesting necklace. I’ve never seen you wear it before. Is it new?”

  You’ve never seen me wear a lot of stuff before, I want to say. But I bite my tongue.

  Only now do I realize that I’ve pulled the necklace Clint got me out from underneath my sweater. Anxious, I’ve been worrying it between my fingers while listening to my mother give Adair the Third Degree. I immediately drop it, feel a soft thud as it lands against my chest.

  I just nod.

  But my mother seems enchanted by the piece. She leans forward and squints. “Is that a heart? I can’t tell.”

  Feeling like I need to shield it from my mother’s critical eye, I run my fingers over it, momentarily covering the charm with my hand. As usual when I’m around my mother, my defenses rise. “Yeah. It’s sort of an abstract piece so, you know, it’s not really obvious at first. But that’s why I like it.”

  Adair cranes his neck, studying the piece, too. I suddenly feel like there’s a giant spotlight on my chest.

  Just what every girl with big boobs wants, right? More reason to look…

  My mother swallows back more of her drink. “Well, it’s certainly unique.”

  I nod again, because I’m nothing but a bobblehead around my parents.

  I have a sense of where this conversation is going, and I’m not digging it. Bringing Clint into the discussion is something I have no desire to do. Even though he and my parents have never met, my mother has no qualms about expressing her disapproval of the relationship. And mentioning my unemployed boyfriend who lives at my place practically rent free would most certainly ruin the pleasant ambience we have going on here.

  I’m more than eager to move this conversation along.

  So is my mother, because we open our mouths at the same time.

  “So, Dad…” I start.

  “Where did you get it?” she asks.

  My father settles back into the couch cushions and looks at my mother, giving her the floor.

  Of course, he does.

  I love my dad, but he’s always been the passive parent. The one who lets my mother do the talking—hell, sometimes even the thinking. Stoic and unemotional, I’ve rarely ever seen him in any other mood except for calm or slightly disengaged. There have been moments, however, when the veil would lift and I’d see life shining in his eyes. Like the time I came up for air while swimming a 500 relay and saw him with his hands cupped around his mouth, cheering me on. It was just a snapshot of a moment, but it was real, and to this day the image is so vivid it’s like it happened yesterday. And there was the one time I fell and broke my arm while he was teaching me to ride my bike. I was six, and he held my hand all the way to the emergency room, diverting my attention from the pain with a funny story from his childhood. I remember laughing through my tears until, before I knew it, I’d stopped crying altogether.

  Remembering these things now gives me a warm, sentimental feeling. And perhaps it’s because of this that I don’t lie. Don’t say that it was just a random trinket I picked up for myself when I was out at the mall one day. “It was a Christmas gift.” I can hear the anticipation hanging in the air. My mother scoots forward in her seat. “From Clint.”

  Her lips curve into a smile that looks more like a leer, and she sits up straighter.

  This. This is what she was driving at the whole time.

  Call it stupid mother’s intuition or whatever, but she knew who gave me the necklace. She knew. And she just wanted to hear me say it.

  “Oh.” She lifts her chin. “Him.”

  She never says Clint’s name. Come to think of it, she’s never come right out and called any of my boyfriends by their names. She’s only met one or two as it is—and there haven’t been that many in the first place—but she’s disapproved of them all. Twisted her lips into a grimace the few times I dared to even mention their names. She really only knows about Clint because she dropped by my place one day without calling, catching me off guard. She wanted to drop off some old books that I refused to let her throw away while cleaning out my old room, and while she was politely picking apart my décor, she noticed the (obnoxious) speakers Clint set up when he moved in. Then her searching eyes took in the pair of men’s running shoes tossed haphazardly in the middle of the living room floor and the game console pulled out from the television stand. I had no choice but to spill the beans.

  I don’t say anything now, just bring my glass to my lips, tilt my head back, and down the rest of my drink. The orange juice mixed with champagne is so tart it makes the insides of my cheeks hurt. It’s early, not even noon yet, and this is a family holiday rather than a drunken bar crawl, but I hold up my empty glass, the need to dull my frustration with alcohol hard to ignore. “Anyone want another drin—”

  “Adair.” My mother juts her chin, her back ramrod straight. Her tone is pointed and clipped. It’s her no-nonsense voice, her holier-than-thou posture. “What do you think of this guy Betsy’s shacking up with?” She takes a delicate sip of her mimosa and purses her lips.

  I want to laugh. Because if she thinks Adair is going to throw me under the bus, she’s barking up the wrong tree. I mean, I know Adair doesn’t like Clint. But he also knows how I feel about my mother. About how she lives to berate me, poke at my flaws, sharpen my edges so I’ll fit into her square peg version of how she thinks I should be. Surely he won’t tell her how he really feels.

  He’ll cover for me. Because that’s what friends do.

  “Me?” He shakes his head and chuckles, stares down into his drink. When he looks up, his face is stone. “I can’t stand the guy.”

  He says it with such venom, such flat out animosity, that my mouth drops.

  My mother beams. This is just the opening she needs.

  I shoot Adair a glare. He’s joked before that he can read every one of my looks, and I hope to hell that he can read the one I’m sending him right now.

  And he does. But he just shrugs. “Sorry, Bets. But you can do better. You know you can. He’s an idiot, and he’s using you. You know my thoughts on this.”

  I don’t even have any words. My entire body is tingling; I feel like I’m going to explode. A soft buzzing whispers through my head, like my brain is a hive and bees are buzzing about, poking the soft tissue with their stingers and sending electrified shocks down my backbone that spread out to the tips of my toes, my fingers. I can barely feel the stem of the glass in my hand…

  “I just can’t believe she lets someone use her like that,” my mother says, pity slipping over her features. “It’s beyond me how anyone can be so dense.” She clicks her tongue. “I just don’t understand it.”

  I feel like I’m vibrating. Like I could spontaneously combust at any moment.

  And maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Because then I wouldn’t have to listen to this.

  “But then again, Betsy isn’t known for making the best decisions.” She nudges my father. “Remember that boy she dated her junior
year in high school? The one with that with that godawful tattoo on his arm?” She tosses her head back in laughter.

  My father at least has the decency to look uncomfortable.

  “It wasn’t godawful,” I say between clenched teeth. “It was a quote from a Robert Frost poem. Jax was actually really smart. He—”

  “He wore a trench coat,” my mother interrupts. She leans forward, wrinkling her nose in distaste as she shoots Adair a knowing look. “A trench coat and combat boots, for goodness sake! Can you believe it?” She chuckles like it’s funny, like she isn’t trying to pull unsavory moments from my past, shaking them from her memory like dice and throwing them out on the table for everyone to see. “I recall her getting into quite a bit of trouble with that one. Landed her some community service. Rightly so, of course.”

  Having heard enough, I stand up, forcing my weight onto legs I don’t feel. “I’m getting another drink.” I push past Adair, roughly bumping his into his knees as I go.

  Behind me, my mother continues her chipper tirade. Because while her words drip with disdain, her voice is filled with humor. “It’s just like that photography thing she insists on playing around with. I keep telling her she can’t make any kind of respectable living off of that. But do you think she’ll listen to me?”

  In the kitchen, my eyes are on fire as I blink back tears of anger, frustration, and every emotion in between. I don’t even bother with the orange juice as I fill the glass with champagne, swallowing half of it down before refilling it to the brim again. It’s a childish, immature gesture, I know. But I’ll own it.

  It’s not like I make the best decisions, right?

  Right.

  Fourth of July – 14 Years Old

  I woke up to pain. An intense pain in my… stomach?

  No, not my stomach.

  It was dull and throbbing, a pressure unlike anything I’d ever felt before. Waves of discomfort ripped through me, making me want to curl up into a tight ball.

  But I couldn’t move. My limbs were heavy and I couldn’t move.