It seemed to make Joanna happy to talk about "her Todd," and I was happy enough to listen to her, though if it had been me, I think I would have been depressed to think about him too much. I was depressed enough whenever thoughts of Derek crossed my mind, and it's not like I wanted to have his baby. God.
"My Todd would have loved you, sweetie," Joanna said one evening, sipping her lemonade and shredding a napkin absent-mindedly. "You remind me so much of him. You even look a bit like him, you lucky girl. He was devilishly handsome."
"Isn't cuteness, like, a job requirement for firefighters?" I asked.
Joanna nodded seriously. "There's a box for it on the application and everything."
I laughed, and she sighed. "I wish he was still here," she said.
I stopped laughing and stared uncomfortably at my dessert dish, the dregs of chocolate syrup and melted ice cream swirled together in a complicated pattern on the boat shaped dinnerware. "I'm sorry," I said quietly.
"No, I'm sorry. I don't like to get so melancholy." She rolled the shredded napkin bits in the palms of her hands. "He was so confused, at the end. Before they even found the cancer, I knew something was wrong. He couldn't think straight, he was making crazy decisions. We got a new washing machine a month before I finally got him into the doctor. You know where he installed it?"
I shook my head.
"In the driveway. He hooked the hose up to the outside faucet and decided to call it good. The tumor was pressing on his brain. Do you know, we had fifty thousand dollars in our savings account, and it vanished? Simply vanished. I have no idea what ever happened to that money."
"Did you ask him?"
"Of course I did!" Joanna said, tossing the napkin pieces on the table. "Unfortunately I didn't find out until he was in the hospital, and they kept him higher than a kite on morphine. When I asked him about the money, he started babbling about religion and God, and how your mother would find everything she needed in the Bible."
"My mother?"
"I know. For goodness sakes, the Jehovah's Witnesses won't even come to your door anymore, you ever noticed that? Me, they visit twice a week."
"Yeah, my mom sprayed them with a can of cheese a few years ago, I think that must have been the last straw."
Joanna laughed, a sad little chuckle. "Poor Todd. He was so smart. He would have hated to know how addled he was at the end."
"It's not fair," I blurted. "You really loved him, and he died. You wanted a baby, and you didn't get one, even though you would have been a great mother. My mom and dad don't love each other at all, and they still managed to have five kids together." I balled my fists up and stuffed them in my lap. "It's not fair," I said again.
Joanna sighed and placed her fork and spoon on her plate and motioned for the check. "No, sweetie, life never is."
I agreed with her then, but at the end of the week, something happened that made me rethink my opinion.
* * *
The first football game of the season was Friday night, and the cheerleaders had been in a tizzy all week long, with the varsity squad pulling long practices and us JV cheerleaders running around like short-skirted administrative assistants, doing anything and everything the varsity squad asked of us. Brenna actually wrote a history paper for one of the varsity girls, and when it received a D, Amy Yates ripped Brenna a new asshole in front of all of us.
"What do I know about the freaking Gassden Purchase?" Brenna asked me in an undertone. "I Googled it and nothing came up."
"Isn't that when they bought some of Arizona to make the border a straight line?" I asked. "It's Gads-den."
"Jeez, Wikipedia, I guess I should have asked you," Brenna teased, right as Kaia walked by. Kaia spun around, her eyes all lit up.
"No," I said holding up my hands and giggling. "Absolutely not."
"Wiki!" Kaia crowed. "I love it."
She gestured to me. "Come on, Wiki. The 'real squad,' as Amy calls it, needs their Starbucks before the big game." She rolled her eyes. "I'm on point. Those bitches better pay me back, I'm practically broke."
Lisa jumped up. "I just got my allowance, so I've got tons of money. I'll take care of it."
"Really?" Kaia said. "That would be awesome, I've got barely enough to put gas in my car as it is."
I shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. I never gave Kaia gas money. It's not like I had any money, but still, I felt bad.
"Sure, I don't mind at all," Lisa said.
"Wow, well…thanks. That's really nice of you." Kaia narrowed her eyes at Lisa. "Hey, wait a second. What do they have you doing that you're so eager to get out of?"
Lisa folded her arms across her chest. "So suspicious! Can't I just do a good deed?"
Brenna looked at her sideways. Before Kaia could answer, Brenna interjected. "Nope, I'm not sure you can." A slow smile spread across her face. "Go get the coffee. We'll take care of your project, whatever it is."
Lisa smiled back at Brenna and walked away without another word.
"Okay, what in the hell was that all about?" I asked.
Brenna looked at the ceiling, the clock, the bleachers, pretty much anywhere but at me as she replied. "Lisa's still water, running deep."
"Okay, 'Talks In Code.' Can you clarify that statement?" I said.
Brenna grinned slyly and put her hands on her hips. "Just rumors, stuff people have said. Her parents are pharmacists, you know?"
That was news to me, but I wasn't sure how it related. I didn't have a chance to follow it any further though, because Amy walked through the door just then and started screaming at Kaia, telling her to get the damn coffee and why the fuck wasn't she already there and back already and blah, blah, blah. By the time that got sorted out, Brenna was long gone, and the other girls were busy with their own work. We had a massive amount of things to do before kickoff at seven-thirty.
I wasn't really looking forward to watching the game, but our squad was required to be there, perched in the bleachers in a show of support. I hate to admit it, but I was insanely jealous of the varsity squad. I wanted it to be me shaking my pompoms and dancing on the sidelines, but of course that wasn't going to happen. Between that and my insane urge to look for the name 'Mottola' stretched across every broad-shouldered football player's back, my night was going to be full of irritation.
The stands were packed, and Kaia and I sat next to each other in our short skirts and tops. I had my cheer windbreaker on, because I was sure it was going to get cold as soon as the sun hit the horizon in about a half an hour. The varsity cheerleaders were nowhere to be seen. "Where's the varsity squad?" I asked Kaia. "Shouldn't they be out here riling everybody up by now?"
Kaia nodded and craned her neck, trying to see the doors that led from the basement locker room to the football field. I'd heard that was how the cheerleaders and the football team always entered on game days, and it certainly seemed more dramatic than just kind of trickling in off the street. But we couldn't see the doors from where we were. Finally, just a few minutes before kickoff, the varsity squad straggled onto the sidelines and lined up in a ragged formation. About half the girls had sickly smiles pasted on their faces. The other half had their mouths set in grim, determined lines. Stephanie Yates adjusted her messy ponytail before linking arms with the two girls on either side of her. Wait. Her messy ponytail?
"They don't look so good," I murmured to Kaia.
Kaia nodded in agreement, and the varsity squad began to attempt a basic kick line. The high school marching band got all fired up at the sight of them, and the horn players stood up and blared their part of the fight song extra loud. It was too much for Stephanie. Breaking ranks with the other girls, she staggered forward a couple steps, bent in half, and projectile vomited into the first row of spectators.
Horrified fans screamed and leapt out of the way as one by one the other cheerleaders sank to their knees and a couple more lost the contents of their stomachs.
"Oh my god," Kaia cried, horrified. "Get off the field! Get! Off! T
he! Field!" she screamed, waving the disoriented cheerleaders towards the basement doors. A few of them must have heard her, or maybe they just figured it out on their own. They formed a little herd and made their way toward the basement doors, most clutching their stomachs, but a couple—oh my god, I would die if it was me—clutching their butts.
It was Lisa who jumped up from our little bevy of JV cheerleaders, a bright smile on her face. "Come on girls! It's show time."
Amy Yates stood up too, her face ashen. "Sit down, you idiot. We can't go out there. We don't have any cheers."
Lisa grinned at her. "You might not. But we do."
I stood up, and my smile must have stretched all the way across my face just like Kaia's did. The rest of the squad jumped up too, except for the Hilltop girls, who sat there, looking stunned.
The nine of us started to pick our way down the half dozen rows between us and the sidelines, and I heard Amy, Ashley, and Hannah arguing furiously behind us. "We can't let them go down there without us," one of them said. I guess the others came to some sort of agreement, because when we trotted onto the sidelines, the three Hilltop girls were with us.
Lisa totally took charge. "Okay ladies. Sorry, but we're going to have to relocate a bit to the left, because as delighted as I am right now, I still don't want to look at varsity puke during the game." She turned to Amy. "Unless you'd like to make yourself useful and clean it up."
"Fuck you, Lisa," Amy replied.
"Yes, I didn't think so." She turned to the rest of us. "Okay girls, I'm going to go have a chat with the band. You know what to do."
She sprang so lightly on her toes, it almost looked like she floated up the couple of steps of bleachers to where the band leader sat, a look of shock still etched across his face. I'm pretty sure he came close to being puked on, because there was a whole row of empty space in front of him that would have been a prime viewing spot.
I lined up with Kaia on my right and a space for Lisa on my left. She chatted with the bandleader for a couple minutes. He waved his arms in the air and shouted some orders to the band, but I couldn't hear him over the roar of the crowd as the football team charged out of the basement doors and onto the field. Lisa took her spot in line next to me and turned to me with a serene smile on her face.
The band struck up a new fight song with a hip-hop flavor, one we'd been practicing to for several weeks. She linked her arm with mine, and winked at me. "Lisa, you are awesome," I said. "And I'm also really, really scared of you."
Amy Yates and her two friends had no idea what we were doing. They stood on either side of us as we launched into a complicated series of steps. Basically, they looked like idiots. I let the music take me over, and for the next two hours, nothing on earth could bring me down.
FIFTEEN
At least I had two good hours.
We ran into the locker room, sweaty, exhausted, and exhilarated after the game. I could hear the whoops from the boys' locker room down the hall. We'd won the game, so they were excited too. Frankly, I wouldn't have cared either way. I got to cheer in front of a screaming crowd, and it was the most amazing feeling ever. I savored it, because I knew it wasn't going to happen again until junior year, if I made the varsity squad. Stephanie Yates' cheerleaders wouldn't be stupid enough to send us out for snacks again.
I stripped out of my cheer uniform, pulled my hair out of its tight ponytail, and stepped into the shower area.
The rest of the cheerleaders were buzzing around, taking off their uniforms. Amy and Ashley were there too, but they didn't need to shower, since they hadn't really done anything athletic. The three Hilltop girls had been more like lopsided bookends, standing on each end of our group of nine, shaking their pompoms while the rest of us actually performed.
I wondered where Hannah was, but I didn't have to dwell on that for long. Just as Kaia and a couple other girls stepped into the shower, Hannah ran in, her cheeks flushed, a big grin on her face. She sashayed her arms over her head and strutted like a stripper on a catwalk, talking in a sing-song voice. "Party at Derek Mottola's!"
Oh man. Derek's 'first game of the year' epic blowout. I couldn't believe I had actually managed to forget about that all night long. Amy and Ashley squealed and jumped up and down. As though they had earned the right to party, I thought bitterly. I turned my head directly into the shower spray and let the warm needles of water beat against my face.
I stayed that way for a long time. I heard the squeaky sounds of the shower controls spinning as one by one the other girls finished up with their showers. Finally I dipped my head and turned off the water. I grabbed a clean, threadbare towel from the giant Rubbermaid garbage can full of them and wrapped it around my body. I walked over next to where Kaia was getting dressed. I could tell she wanted to say something to me by the tense way she held her body. I was pretty sure I knew what it was, so I answered her before she had to ask. "You know I don't mind if you go, right?"
Kaia couldn't contain her sigh of relief. "Oh my god, are you sure? I totally don't want to, like, betray you, but Derek is still my friend and I really want to go to his party and…do you swear you're really not going to be mad at me?"
I nodded. "Yeah, it's fine. Do you mind giving me a ride home first though?"
Kaia bobbed her head eagerly. "Yeah, that's no problem at all."
Kaia had an extra pair of jeans and a tank top with her that she let me borrow, so I didn't have to wear my sweaty cheer uniform home. We drove straight from the school to my trailer. Kaia threw the car in reverse and backed out of the driveway before I'd even reached the steps to the front door. She didn't even kill the car once. It was obvious she was ready to party. The truth was I would have loved to have gone and milked this night for all it was worth. But I couldn't. Why did the party have to be at Derek's house? More than 2,000 kids in our school and there wasn't anyone else who could have thrown open their doors? Figures.
As I climbed the steps to my trailer, I could hear canned laughter on the TV coming through the thin walls. I pushed open the door, not bothering to keep it quiet. I assumed it was one of my sisters watching reruns of The Cosby Show, so I was surprised to see that the only person in the room was my dad.
He turned at the sound of the door and blinked his large eyes at me, then returned his gaze to the television.
"Hi Dad."
"Hi Baby." His voice was the same polite monotone he almost always used with me.
I let the 'Baby' slide. No sense trying to get him to call me Barbie, Mary, Tawny, or Nefertiti. For all I knew he thought my real name was Frances too. His 'Vacancy' light had been on as long as I could remember.
"Um…did you have a good day?" I wasn't sure why I lingered in the doorway, trying to start a conversation with him. He wasn't interested. I guess I must've been even more bummed out about missing the party than I'd realized, standing here trying to start social hour with my dad.
He registered his surprise at my unexpected chattiness by lifting his eyebrows about a millimeter. "Sure."
"What did you do?" Jesus, why am I prolonging this agony?
"Worked."
"Oh. Uh…good." Okay, that conversation was enlightening. Time to move on. I jerked the door shut behind me and walked woodenly across the living room, cutting between him and the TV on my way to the hall that led to my bedroom, where I planned to hide for the rest of the night. Maybe even the rest of the weekend.
"Baby?" Dad's voice stopped me with one foot down the hall.
"Yeah?"
"There's shrimp in the fridge. You can have some if you want."
I swallowed past the lump in my throat. Dad never shared spoils from the casino buffet. I was pretty sure those leftovers were his one and only reason for living. "Thanks, Dad. I'll have some in a little while."
I walked down the hall and stiff-armed my bedroom door. I slipped my shoes off, flopped belly down onto my bed and shoved my face into my pillow. I hadn't realized how sore my muscles were until I gave my body a chance to rest.
God, I was weary down into my bones. I lay on my bed for at least twenty minutes, trying to clear my mind of all thoughts. I was surprisingly successful.
The next thing I knew, there was a tapping at the door. "Baby?" My dad's voice said quietly through the pressboard. "The phone's for you."
I hadn't even heard it ring. I sat up and rubbed my eyes, looking across the room at the tiny digital clock at the foot of Phoebe's bed. Eleven thirty? Holy shit. My stomach rumbled and I bit my lip. That shrimp was long gone by now. I'd fallen asleep.
Phoebe had a little makeup table crammed between her dresser and the door, and her phone sat there on top of a pile of haphazardly stacked magazines. I crossed to the table and picked up the receiver. "I've got it," I called through the door, and I could hear the click as my dad hung up the cordless he must have carried with him.
"Hello?" I said.
No one said anything, but in the background, I could hear a lot of voices, all jumbled together. I sighed. Lovely. Kaia was calling from the party.
"Hi Kaia. Thanks so much for trying to include me in your social gathering, but really, I'm fine. You don't need to rub it in."
"Kaia's why I'm calling."
My heart jumped into my throat at the sound of his voice. Derek. Oh god, it was Derek. "What's going on?" I said, my voice strangled by the sudden throbbing pulse in my neck.
"You need to come get her."
My hand tightened around the receiver. "What's happening?"
"What do you think?" Derek said tersely. "She needs somebody to get her out of here."
"Can you come get me? I don't have a car."
"If I could come get you, then I could drive her myself. I dropped out of driver's ed, remember?"
I didn't like the accusatory note in Derek's voice. "Nobody asked you to drop out," I snapped.
There was a brief pause, and I thought Derek was going to hang up on me, but he didn't. Instead he swore. "Shit."
"What?"
"I lost her. I had my eye on her, but she's gone. Goddammit. Where the fuck did she go? Get your ass out here, Baby. Find a way. Nobody else is gonna help her, and Kaia needs you now."
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