by Jenn Cooksey
“Trist, dude, she’s leaving…” I told him after hitting him in the shoulder to get his attention and then I jerked my head in the girls’ direction.
He looked over at them with an exceedingly childlike look of disappointment and caught Camie’s eyes when she turned to make sure she’d left everything for the cats. Camie gave him a similar answer to Katy’s, but hers looked a little more apologetic with the shrug and “Sorry, I really gotta go,” expression she had though. Tristan replied by raising his eyes and brows quickly in submission and shaking his head like he was begrudgingly saying, “Uh, okay, I guess…” Then he looked over to where Pete was sitting with the cats and sighed.
“Well that really bites…I wanted to talk to her…” he said out loud but to himself.
“So go to her house and talk to her, you jackhole,” I said, pointing out the painfully obvious.
“Mmm, yeah, I’ll have to, but I’m supposed to practice with Pete,” he told me and started walking over to his children and our pitcher.
Hearing Tristan approach, the cats flew off the bench they were sitting on, startling Pete so much he dropped their leashes and ended up tripping and stumbling over one of the metal bleachers while he was scrambling to catch them as they galloped over to meet us halfway.
“Hey, why’d they take off so soon?” Tristan asked, picking up both the cats and like it was normal; he let them have their way with him as they climbed on him indelicately, sniffed him indecently, and indiscriminatingly licked his wet hair. It was kinda disturbing to watch. It was almost like he was being kitty molested or something just as equally not right.
“Camie has chores and has to help her dad make a lasagna or something… Dude, doesn’t that bug you?” Pete asked, gesturing to Phineas who was balancing herself on one of his shoulders and rubbing her entire head all over his cheek, while perched on the other shoulder, Ferb had her nose and whiskers inside Tristan’s ear.
“Nah, it’s just what they do…I’m used to it. Um, would you be terribly upset if we didn’t practice today though?”
Pete shrugged and sounding a little put out he said, “No, I guess not, why?”
“Well, Camie and I had an awesome night and I was hopin’ to talk to her about some stuff after the meet, but as you see, she bailed. I don’t know what she’s got goin’ tonight or if she’s goin’ to Kristen’s, but I kinda would rather not do this at a party anyway, and I really don’t wanna wait until tomorrow either, sooo, that kind of leaves me the time I set aside to play with you,” he explained and looked at his foot as he sorta kicked at a small puddle on the pool deck.
“You gonna tell her you’re a stupid jerk?” I asked at the same time Pete asked his question with a grin.
“You finally gonna tell her you wanna get back together?”
“Mmmmaybe,” Tristan answered and looked everywhere except at Pete and me like he was embarrassed. He’s not; he’s just being a giddy, overgrown kid.
“Amen! Jesus, it’s about time…for that I’ll totally let you off the hook,” Pete said and handed the cats’ sparkly pink suitcase to Tristan before he said goodbye to us and turned to leave, rubbing his knee as he did.
As Tristan, the cats, and I walked to the locker room to change, I looked around and dropped my voice to ask, “So um, I take it you’re not planning on telling her everything, so ah…how are you gonna do this?”
He sighed and then answered, “No, I can’t do that, so in keeping with both the lie and the truth, I’m just gonna tell her I made a mistake.”
I was nodding my head like I agreed, but, what I was really thinking was, “I was afraid that’s what you were gonna say.”
Shit. I’ve got a feeling this isn’t gonna turn out quite like he and Pete are expecting…
The best laid plans ~ Tristan
I wanted to give Camie enough time to get her stuff done at home so Mike and I took the girls down to the park and dicked around a little bit before getting something to eat. I also did that to make sure I can honestly say I’m full in case I show up before Camie’s family has eaten dinner and invites me to stay. You see, Camie and her dad not re-heating something or making a pre-packaged meal but actually cooking together won’t be good. Kevin doesn’t like to follow recipes and Camie…well, Camie can’t cook. She thinks she can but the only people in that house who can turn ingredients into food are Mandy and Jillian. Now if it was Jillian who was helping their dad make the lasagna, then yeah, I’d totally show up hungry.
I was already becoming highly impatient to see Camie when I got home though, so when I was getting the girls’ stuff set up and realized I’d ran out of the plastic cartridges for their litter box, I started to feel my blood pressure rise with the irritation of having to run back out and come all the way back home again before going to Camie’s.
“Son of a bitch!” I grumbled. “I suppose it would be completely wrong of me to ask you two to hold it for a little bit while Daddy goes and talks to Mommy to see if she’ll take me back, huh?”
They just paused in giving each other a bath and with their pink tongues poking out of their mouths, they stared at me like they were saying, “Well, Dad, we could try that, but we wouldn’t ask you to hold it or your breath for that matter, and chances are, we’ll shit on your cuddle pillow just because we can and to prove our point here, but hey, if you wanna live dangerously, by all means go ahead and run over to Mom’s for a bit.”
“I know, I know…okay, let’s go…back in the car,” I said and grabbing their harnesses again, I scooped them up and went to the damned pet store.
By the time I got back home the second time, I was in a full-fledged hurry. I debated all of three seconds on taking a shower and chose to just change my clothes instead. I already showered this morning and it’s not like I’m dirty or anything, but because I had the cats, I didn’t rinse off in the locker room after the meet and I always try to at least do that, if not actually wash my hair after swimming in a chlorinated pool. It’s just a habit I picked up when I was a towheaded kid after my mom pounded home the fact that if I was gonna swim my life away, my hair would turn green if I didn’t rinse the chlorine out and I’d be stuck sitting in a bathtub with baking soda on my head for half an hour or longer every night and I hated doing that. It was boring to say the least, but it was also kinda degrading to be a nine-year-old boy and have your mom make you sit naked in an empty tub while she slathers a baking soda paste into your hair. And now that I think about it, I don’t know why it never occurred to me to wear swim trunks all those times. Huh. I guess I just figured that if you’re gonna be in a bathtub, you’re supposed to be naked. I mean, those are the rules.
I think that’s partly why I went so over the top with using soap on my clothes and stuff when Camie and I took that shower and bath together. Interesting. I wonder if I could trace my disliking for the rules and a slew of my other issues back to that. I bet I could. I’ll bet I’m the way I am because of my mom and baking soda…
So having finished setting the girls up and getting changed, throwing clothes and crap everywhere in the whirlwind process, I discovered I’d lost my keys. “Keys, keys, keys…are you fucking kidding me? Where the hell are my keys?!” I asked the imaginary troll responsible for stealing my keys.
Oh, just to be clear, he’s not to be confused with the goblin that Jeff refers to as the Sock Monster who’s responsible for stealing one sock from each load of laundry either. They’re two entirely different species. And although they can be equally frustrating, sometimes even collaborating in their havoc wreaking, I contribute most of the reason why I now tend to forego wearing shoes that require socks to that second pain in the ass, and why I almost always hang my keys on a hook by my bedroom door to the slightly more annoying first one.
I was hunting for my keys in the mess I’d made on my bed, hoping to God I hadn’t absentmindedly dropped them in the recently used kitty litter box while I was filling it. Then the cats jumped up and thinking I was playing some great game, they start
ed diving under plastic bags, magazines, CDs, books, clothes and sheets, trying to grab those things with their paws seconds before I did. I was about to politely hurl them both off my bed after Phineas snagged three of my fingers with her claw, but I stopped in mid-reach when I heard the familiar tinkling sound of my keys as Ferb jumped on top of my baby book. Yeah, I don’t know what my baby book is doing in my bed at the moment either, and I don’t think it was there last night when I went to bed, but whatever, I picked it up and lo and behold, my keys!
“Sweet! Okay, girls, I’m outta here…wish me luck!” I said to them and was about to toss the album filled with all the embarrassing naked pictures that Camie was dying to see back into the abyss that is currently my bed, but considering it, I stopped just short.
“Hmm…” I pondered out loud. I could present it as a peace offering after I tell her I made a mistake… “Nah, not yet,” I decided and dropped the book back onto my bed where the cats were still playing and with a small chuckle, I watched it quickly disappear under a blanket as Phineas scrambled on top of the blanket trying to get Ferb who was under it.
It’s been a really long time since I even looked through that book, so I wanna make sure it doesn’t contain anything too untoward. I know, you’re wondering how a baby book might possibly contain something unseemly, but, I don’t trust my mom. I trust her mom even less… They’re both a little warped with saving every-little-fucking-thing which was more than confirmed three years ago after I found my shriveled up umbilical cord stump super glued next to a bath picture, and God only knows what my grandmother found during her last visit here that she felt just had to be included in the short biographical history of the young me. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised to find the wrapper of my first condom taped in there somewhere.
Aw fuck. I just realized I’m as warped as they are! Because, of course, I wrote the “used on date” on it and still have that little souvenir…
Considering for a brief moment rifling through the layers of crap on my bulletin board to see if the wrapper was still attached to the postcard I sent Jeff from Hawaii that read,
The surfing is great, wish you were here.
Oh fyi, sex is really awesome too, you should give it a try.
-T
I’d reclaimed the postcard from him when I got home and then taped the wrapper on the back and hid it in plain sight. Anyway, I took maybe one step in the board’s direction, stepped on a spiral notebook I hadn’t used since last semester and then reading my mom’s latest note on my whiteboard that said:
The Health Dept. called, your room is scheduled to be condemned. Also, I left something for you to look at on your bed. Good luck finding it.
I thought to myself, Christ, I really need to go through my shit and clean this pigsty up, but, it’ll just have to wait ‘cause I gotta get the hell outta here so I can see my baby and if all goes according to plan, my lips and hers will get to keep last night’s promises to each other! Yay lips!
Ten minutes later and amidst much steering wheel tapping and several choruses of “Come on, come on, come on, turn green, you bastard,” I managed to make it to Camie’s without having broken the speed limit or running any lights. Although I was tempted, I refrained every time I cared to look out the window to see the trees swaying violently from side to side, stop lights being rocked back and forth, and little dirt dervishes dancing in the streets, all letting me know in their own way that now wouldn’t be the best time to push it. I’ve got good reflexes and all, but still. My lips would be pissed at me for eternity if I was being careless and ended up dying in a car accident just because I was trying to get them and myself to Camie and her lips a little bit faster.
Sprinting up the steps and onto her porch, I was in the middle of asking myself the same question I’d asked the last time I showed up unannounced when Jillian opened the door and raised an eyebrow at me, and then letting all the air out of my sail with one sentence she said, “My dad’s lying down with my mom and Camie’s not here.”
“Where is she?”
“Out.”
“Well, uh, who’d she leave with?” I asked, becoming hugely annoyed in a hurry with Jillian’s lack of helpful answers.
“No one. She left on foot by herself.”
“What, for like a walk or something?”
“No.”
“For Christ’s sake, Jillian, your ambiguity is really starting to get on my fucking nerves,” I snapped, but trying to not growl at her at the same time. “Do you know when she’ll be back?”
“I can’t say that I know the exact minute she’ll be home, as I’m not her keeper, but I would imagine she’ll be home by twelve-thirty, that being her new curfew and all. And I’m sorry you’re not caring for my answers, which are not ambiguous at all but simply to the point, however, I am no more in charge of tracking my sister’s social activities than I am her keeper, so you’ll just have to deal.”
“Fuck, Jillian, what the hell crawled up your ass and died?” I blurted out. I didn’t mean to speak the exact question I was thinking in my head like that, but I couldn’t help it. Aside from that time in the desert, in which I felt she had just cause, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her this cantankerous.
She cocked her head to the side and chewed the inside of her bottom lip for a short second, considering whether to answer me, and then on a sigh she said, “A variety of things.”
I frowned and then asked, “Can I help?” As much as I might appear to prefer to avoid getting involved with Jillian, I like her and I try to help those people I truly like if I can.
She sighed again and shook her head. “No, people are just stupid sometimes and I find it irritating, that’s all. You could try calling her, but other than suggesting that, I really can’t help you…sorry.”
Humph. I can see where she’d find people’s stupidity irritating, especially when I’m the one being stupid as I would eventually discover has been the case more than I realized.
I got back in my car and thought about what I wanted to say and then dialed Camie. I would’ve sent her a text, but I really wanna hear her voice and I’m hoping she’ll tell me she’s just at Brenna’s studying or someplace close by and that I can come get her so we can talk in person. But, unfortunately, that didn’t happen. After her phone rang a few times I got her voicemail, which is kind of weird, but I ended up writing it off as her probably not hearing it or something non-nefarious like that, because if I allow myself to think for a moment that she’s avoiding me, I’ll end up mind-fucking myself into a foul temper and that won’t be even remotely good when I do get to talk to her…whenever that ends up being. I left her a message though and simply said I wanted to talk to her and asked her to call me or send me a text to let me know if, when, and where we can meet up.
Then, continuing my effort to not mind-fuck myself into believing last night didn’t mean what I think it did, I sent Pete a text to see if he wants to hang out before Kristen’s party and while I wait to hear back from Camie. I know I should’ve gone home and cleaned my room, but I don’t think alone time with just the girls and my thoughts will be all that beneficial in my current endeavor to exhibit patience without letting it make me its prison bitch…
Anyone have some chainmaile I can borrow? How about a shield? A helmet maybe? Come on, guys, anything? ~ Pete
“You know, I don’t really feel like goin’ to Kristen’s tonight,” I told Tristan when we were in line at the movie theater snack bar, waiting for our popcorn and drinks.
“Yeah, me neither, but, I still don’t know if Camie’s goin’ so I’m gonna just in case she shows…I can drop you off at home after the movie though.”
“I dunno, we’ll see…I might feel more like it in a little bit,” I said and rolled my eyes after taking a bite of my popcorn to find that the clerk had either not heard me when I said no butter or just flat out ignored me. I hate movie theater butter…it’s like cooking oil that’s had food coloring added to it to make it look like butter and it always m
akes my stomach hurt if I eat too much of it.
“You okay?” He asked as we handed our tickets to the ticket attendant and were told what theater our movie is being shown in.
“Yeah, my knee is all bruised from chasing after your cats and I’m just kinda tired I guess…”
“You’re not getting sick are you?”
Well, that depends on what kind of illness we’re talking about here. I am getting sick of hiding my feelings for my girlfriend who’s not supposed to exist, not that I’ll be able to keep her a secret from you for much longer anyway with the link being so close to locking, not to mention that she’s in a really piss-poor mood today and was pretty much playing least in sight all day, but other than that, I’m healthy as a horse. “Nah, I went to the Rocky Horror Picture Show last night with everyone and then a rave and Denny’s afterwards so I didn’t get home until like four-something this morning. I tried to take a nap but that fucking wind was rattling the windows…”…making me visualize said non-existent girlfriend with her hair swirling around her like ribbons of shimmering gold that are atop a gift that’s been given to me on the one condition I don’t open it and at the same time, making any kind of sleep utterly impossible.
“That sucks, man, I’m sorry,” Tristan said in a whisper as we entered the darkened, semi-full theater in the middle of a preview.
“Here or up a little more?” I whispered to him, using my chin to ask if the row of seats we’re approaching is in the middle enough or not. Tristan likes being in the middle seat of the middle row in a movie theater and I prefer an aisle seat for pretty much everything so when he and I see a movie together, we compromise. We get a middle row but choose seats on the end.
“Up one more…” he told me and captured the second seat in from the end of, according to him, the middle row.
I’d pulled my phone out to put it on vibrate when it went off in my hand. “Shit,” I whispered under my breath and frantically turned it off before I made Tristan and myself the target of evil glares or punishment from vigilante moviegoers.