And Trix didn’t care in the least about her PE grade.
“So,” she said as casually as she could. “Any more word from Ryan?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, are you an item yet? He seemed pretty into you the last time we saw him.”
“Oh,” Emily said, sensing a bitterness in Trix’s manner and making up her mind right then that she wouldn’t tell her about their walk to the bus stop or their chat on Facebook. “No.”
“Really? I thought you might be going at it already.” Trix felt mean, but couldn’t stop herself.
“Why would you think that?”
Trix shrugged. “I just imagine at this point you’d take whatever came your way.” She hoped this would imply that Ryan was whatever, not someone to be coveted.
Emily said, “I can see right through you, Trix. You’re deflecting. And I hate it when you get like this.”
In front of them, three sets of long, still summer-tanned legs appeared, tapering gracefully into silver and blue Nikes. Trix looked up, already sneering.
“This too much for you girls?” Vanessa asked, her arms crossed. Her cronies, Kennedy and April, stood on either side of her.
“As a matter of fact,” Trix said. “It’s hella retarded.”
Vanessa, Kennedy, and April were favorites of Fark. Once, and Emily was pretty sure this was illegal, Fark had left the three girls in charge of the class while she ran an errand outside the school.
“It’s only retarded if you can’t do it,” April said.
“Why don’t you go back to humping the mats?” Trix said, picking at the black polish on her fingernails.
Emily laughed, which she couldn’t help, even though she knew her laughter would draw the ire of the three Farkettes.
April turned her attention to Emily and said, “It would be quite a sight to see you flipping around those uneven bars. With your hands and feet hitting the ground every time you went over. Like an ape’s.”
Trix stood. However she was feeling about Emily, she couldn’t abide that kind of abuse.
Emily said, “Trix. Whatever. Don’t worry about it.” She whispered, “They’re losers.”
“Oh, we’re the losers?” April said. “Ha! Yeah, us. While your best friend here lives in a shack on Aurora.”
“It’s a traaaaylllloorrrr,” Trix said, enunciating each letter. “Not a shack. A trailer. Get your facts straight.”
April muttered, “Same thing.”
Trix said, “Actually, April, they’re very different. While a shack connotes something that is fundamentally run down, a trailer is merely an architectural style. Trailers can be nice. Not that mine is, but still.”
Emily grinned, forgiving Trix in that moment for her recent surliness.
Kennedy had remained mute, hanging back the tiniest bit from April and Vanessa. But still, right along with her friends, she looked at Trix and Emily as if they were moldy chunks of Gorgonzola.
“Whatever,” April said.
“Go whatever yourself,” Trix said. “I’m sick of your fake baked faces.”
April scoffed and the three girls pivoted and walked away.
Trix had won the battle of words, of course. She always did. But, really, in the great, ridiculous, popularity skirmish that was high school, she’d lost.
She and Emily both had.
18. Crash
OUT OF HABIT, Trix and Emily still gravitated toward each other. God knew Trix didn’t have many options of who to spend time with and she wasn’t good at being alone.
That day, as usual, they went to Fatty’s, which was just across 65th, for grilled cheese sandwiches and fries.
The day was overcast, the clouds so low Trix felt like she could reach out and grab handfuls. An ambulance whizzed past, its siren wailing, lights bouncing off windshields and windows.
Inside the tired, little restaurant that was supposed to evoke the ‘50s, but just came across like a used up movie set, Trix and Emily placed their orders, then found a table.
Emily had finally decided to tell Trix she was thinking of trying to find her mom. She wanted to say it aloud, to make it real. And she thought it might help bridge the chasm that had begun gaping between her and Trix.
Before she could stop herself, Emily blurted it out.
Trix coiled one of her curls around her index finger and let it go, then checked her crappy phone. No calls. She set down the phone and looked right at Emily. Trix didn’t know what Emily expected. A round of applause? “Good for you,” she managed. Though she felt the ants crawling again. How nice to have a fantasy mom out there that you could just invent to match what you wanted, and then decide, Oh, I’m going to find her! And everything will be great and we’ll live happily ever after. Emily didn’t have to deal with a sketchy father who only showed his face once a month and never, ever acted like a real dad. No, Emily had two parents as it was, and now she was going to go out and get a third. La-freaking-dee-da.
“Yeah, I mean, I’ve Googled her before, but not very thoroughly. I’m going to be more methodical this time. I really think that finding her will help me … accept all this,” she said, trying to ignore Trix’s blatant hostility.
“Or she could turn out to be a big disappointment who dates a guy with a giant squid tattoo.”
When their order was called, Emily went up to get the food and saw, standing at the counter, Ryan McElvoy. Her heart giddyupped against her ribs.
“Hey, Lean Bean,” he said, seeming genuinely happy to see her.
“Hey, Ryan,” she answered, as nonchalantly as she could.
“What up?”
“Me,” she said. “And lunch.”
He broke into a full grin. “Nice,” he said, nodding. He wore loose jeans and a Lucky Charms t-shirt that had been bleached almost beyond recognition.
Emily smiled and grabbed the tray holding her food. As she did, something caught her arm. Then, as if in stop motion animation, her lunch and Trix’s went sliding sliding sliding across the tray, teetered, then dropped and crashed to the floor.
“Oh no,” she cried, waiting for the burst of laughter that inevitably followed moronic spills like hers. She wasn’t looking forward to it, but then she could at least bow, laugh at herself, and pick it all up.
Instead, there was silence.
Emily’s face turned hot and she stooped, gathered the scattered French fries and ruined sandwiches.
Ryan crouched next to her and helped her pick up.
“Thanks,” she muttered.
“No worries.”
Trix called out, “Nice drop, klutzy girl.” She clapped loudly until several others joined in. It seemed too late, though, to do the bowing shtick. So, Emily just waved weakly, shoved her tray in a bus tub and hurried out the front door.
“Hey, wait up,” Trix called. “You’re not mad are you? I was just trying to, you know, lighten the mood. God, you’d think you’d dropped a burning torch the way the place shut down.”
“I’m not mad,” Emily said, her stomach growling angrily. “Let’s just get back to school.”
“It wasn’t a big deal, you know,” Trix said.
“Right.”
“At least you got Ryan’s attention. He probably thought you did it on purpose.”
Above them, seagulls circled, hoping for handouts.
Emily said, “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“I … uh … guess not. But it does make it funnier.”
“Glad I’m so amusing.” Emily strode ahead, her long legs easily covering more ground than Trix could hope to unless she skittered next to her like a small bird.
Emily pushed straight into the nearest bathroom and locked herself in a stall. Without pulling down her pants, she sat on the toilet. She studied the graffiti she’d seen a hundred times before. Beth is a crackwhore. Andy + Daphne Forever!!! I hate Calculus.
It calmed her, somehow, to read the scribbles. To know that girls in her class were so angry, so obsessed, so distra
ught that they had to express themselves with a ballpoint pen on metal walls.
What would she write? Being six foot blows! Emily is an idiot! And she also can’t stop thinking about Ryan McElvoy. She sometimes loves her best friend and sometimes hates her guts.
That afternoon she avoided both Trix and Ryan in the hallways, taking alternate paths through the school to get to class. When the last bell rang, she filled her backpack with books as quickly as she could and dashed to her bike.
“Yo,” Trix said, appearing out of nowhere. “You made yourself scarce today.”
Emily bent low and jammed the key into her bike lock.
“I’m gonna go over to Sonic Boom and check out some tunes.” Trix couldn’t quite bring herself to ask Emily if she wanted to come. She figured Emily would tag along if she wanted to.
“Can’t,” Emily said. A cool rain started to fall, pinging her scalp. She pulled up her hood. “I have a quiz to study for.”
Trix narrowed her eyes. “What class?”
“History.”
Trix kept staring at Emily, eyes all squinty and suspicious. Then, just like that, she decided to believe her. “You go study,” Trix said into the rain. “Be off with you.”
As Emily pedaled, she glanced back once and saw Trix walking toward Market Street by herself.
19. Marjorie
TRIX WAS GLAD to be inside, out of the windy rain. She trolled through the aisles of CDs, enjoying the musty smell of the old record store. She wasn’t looking for anything in particular, but the home ec teacher had left early that day, closing the room, and Trix didn’t want to go to her depressing trailer yet.
She flipped through some hardcore metal stuff. The fact that Emily hated it made it all the more fun to look at. She was reading liner notes to a Danzig disc when Marjorie King, a senior, came toward her. “Trix Jones, yeah?”
Tearing her eyes away from the CD, she said, “That’s me.” She moved to a new bin. Marjorie was the type who was always trying to be outrageous just for the sake of it. She loved to shock people. She wasn’t authentic in her rebelliousness. Just superfluous.
Marjorie followed her. “Do you know who I am?”
“Um, Melanie Cook?”
“Marjorie. King. As if you didn’t know.”
Her presumptuousness turned Trix off. Like everyone should know her name just because she had purple hair and dressed like a goth? “Oh, then,” Trix said sarcastically. “Nice to meet you.”
Marjorie asked what music Trix was into. Without looking up, Trix rattled off some of her favorites.
“Cool,” Marjorie said approvingly. “Fugazi? Old school punk?”
“Sure,” Trix said, brightening a little.
“Hey, a bunch of us are going down to Golden Gardens. We have some good weed and a case, if you want to come.”
“It’s like forty-five degrees out.”
“We won’t feel it after a while.”
Marjorie had a bull ring in her nose and three studs through her left eyebrow. Her face was freckled and her eyes rimmed in thick jet-black liner. “Nah,” Trix said. “I’m not into braving the elements.”
“What else you have going on?” Marjorie challenged.
This stopped Trix. Marjorie was right. She had a stifling trailer, a blaring TV, and a checked out mother. The only thing at all worth going home for was David. Though he would probably be roaming around outside or sleeping.
Trix shrugged. “All right.” She dropped a CD back into place. “I’ll go.”
“Marcel’s driving,” Marjorie said. Marcel turned out to be the guy working behind the counter. They loitered around, waiting for his shift to end at four thirty, and when it did, he led them and two other guys Trix didn’t recognize out to a beat-up minivan.
The ride to Golden Gardens, a beach in north Seattle, was cold and loud. Marcel blasted music that was a little too screamy even for Trix. At the parking lot they all spilled out. Sailboats bobbed and creaked along the piers. A few brave families and vagrants sat on the damp sand, facing the steel gray water.
Trix, Marjorie, and the rest of the group took a picnic table under the trees. Beers were handed out. A joint was lit and passed around. What seemed at first to have been a time-killing outing with a bunch of people Trix didn’t care about, started to morph into something fun. Buzzed, the cold and drizzle didn’t matter much. They sat in two tight lines along the table benches. Someone brought out a bag of pretzel rods, which, of course, turned into fodder for all sorts of dirty jokes and pantomimes.
Trix seemed to have a lot in common with Marjorie, who lived only with her mother. Marjorie’s dad had died in a rodeo when she was young. Then she, her mom, and her twin little sisters had moved from Oklahoma up to Seattle.
“She dates these losers,” Marjorie said, her eyes red-rimmed.
“Oh, my mom, too!” Trix crowed, telling everyone the story of Rodney and his ridiculous tattoo. It felt good to say it to people who understood. She always got the feeling that Emily thought Trix and her blue-collar problems were beneath her.
Trix lost count of the number of times the joint was passed to her. She drank a few beers and gobbled God knew how many pretzels. For the first time in a long time, since she was a little kid maybe, she felt happy.
20. Found
EMILY SAT IN her room trying to study.
She read dates and battles and Chinese dynasties, but it was as dry as butterless toast.
Slamming her textbook shut with a satisfying thud, she went out into the hall where the family computer sat in the loft. Melissa had arranged dried flowers next to it that often shed and left crunchy bits all over the mouse pad.
Emily shook off the pad and clicked the machine out of its sleep.
She went to Facebook, which was becoming more of a habit.
There was a message waiting.
Hey Bean,
I’m sorry about what went down at lunch today. Please know I don’t think any less of you for it. Happens to the best of us.
Ryan
P.S. I still would’ve eaten the fries.
She laughed out loud.
High on his contact, she Googled Marilyn Lucas, as she’d done a million times before. A lot of women who weren’t her mother came up—a professor from Kansas, a Facebook profile that showed a girl with ginormous breasts spilling over the top and around the sides of a tank top, the owner of a pet spa in New York.
Emily typed in Marilyn Wozniak (her mother’s maiden name) and got the usual stuff. Social networking links she’d already checked out and found not to be her mom.
This time, though, she searched with a fervor she hadn’t before, until she got to page 24 and saw something. Something that made her suck in her breath and sit back in her chair.
A Marilyn Wozniak in Bisbee, Arizona. Emily clicked the link and was taken to the homepage of an art gallery. The background of the page was black and decorated with paintings of coyotes, front feet perched on logs, mouths open in long howls. Also, small owls looking out of cacti and fat gila monsters with skinny, red tongues.
There was a familiarity about the strokes, the style of the paintings, though Emily couldn’t have pinpointed what. Then she thought of a picture that had hung in their old house on Earl, a seascape with whales and seals and starfish. As a younger kid, she’d never questioned where it had come from. It’d simply always been there. Now, though, she knew. Her mother had painted it.
She wondered where it was now.
Her heart beating faster, she clicked the link to go to Artists’ profiles.
And there Marilyn was. In full color with a thin, drawn face, long, gray hair, bright eyes not quite focused on the camera, and the same high cheekbones as Emily and Kristen.
Emily jumped up, ran to her sister’s room, and pounded on the door. No answer. Then she remembered Kristen’s basketball game at Roosevelt.
“Oh my God,” she muttered to herself. “Oh my God.”
She sat back down to read Marilyn Wozniak’s blurb:
“Marilyn Wozniak was born in 1962 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She studied at The School of Visual Concepts in Seattle, Washington. Since 2002, her art has been exhibited in several local galleries, as well as at Bernardo Kling in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
When she’s not painting, she can be found in her garden, canning tomatoes, or reading in a hammock.”
Oh, Emily thought. Isn’t that nice? Canning tomatoes. Reading in a hammock. What about helping raise the two daughters you gave birth to almost twenty years ago. What about them?
“I hate you,” she said to the ceiling. “I hate you.”
She stared at her mom’s picture. “I hate you.”
Marilyn was a lanky woman. Even though the photo only showed the top half of her, you could tell.
Emily tried to imagine her dad with this Marilyn Wozniak and found she couldn’t. As much as she hated to admit it, Melissa suited him well with her petite build and lust for fitness and health food. She was slowly converting him over to eating granola, rejecting red meat, and walking a few miles most nights.
What had Emily’s father been like with her mother? More artistic? More free-spirited?
It was hard to picture her dad that way, with his perfectly creased Dockers, button-down oxfords, and bitter lines framing his thin lips.
In any case. Mother of God. Emily’d just found her mom. The woman of few snapshots and sparse memories. The woman who’d found it necessary to paint a celestial scene on the station wagon before leaving in it forever. The woman in whose uterus Emily had lived for the first nine months of her existence. The woman who’d missed her birthdays and taking Emily to get her ears pierced and teaching her how to make scrambled eggs.
After all these years of not knowing if Marilyn was alive or dead.
Mother of freaking God.
Her mom was the first thing Emily thought of when she woke up the next morning. Marilyn. An artist in Bisbee, Arizona. Alive and seemingly well.
A chilly breeze blew in through the slender exposed strip of metal screen. Emily clenched the cotton jersey sheet in her hands and curved her body inward.
Anger and hope created a terrible steaming crater in her stomach. What should she do with her new information? Should she try to get in touch? Should she share it with Kristen or would it just upset her? Should she sit on the revelation and try not to think about it too much, try to go on with her life?
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