I quietly chugged the beer as he went on. “I was shocked when I discovered an organism I hadn’t introduced myself, and I . . .”
During Lance’s lengthy explanation of his project, I got my hands on something stronger: a bottle of tequila. Thirty minutes, and several shots later, I was fully drunk. My eyes roamed around the party, looking for a way out.
Oh yes! Here comes Ling to save me!
“Ling! This is my friend, Lance! Have you two met?”
She gave me a weird look. “Why are you shouting?”
“I’m just excited to seeeee you! Meet Lance!”
She cocked her head to the side and appraised him, then fully turned to me. “So this is your type?”
“What?” I said.
She leaned in and whispered in my ear. “Are you into this guy? I didn’t think he was your type.”
I jerked my head back and scowled. I leaned forward and whisper-shouted, “No way! I’m not into annnnnyone. I’m shingle.” I realized I was slurring and so did Ling.
She whipped her head around, looked at Lance, and then back at me. “Let’s go, Penny. You need to call it. You’ve had a long day.”
“Call who? Why? No I jusss fine. Ima goood.”
Ling was glaring at Lance. “Did you roofie her?”
He held his hand to his chest. “Are you kidding? No! I would never. I’m not even sure how she’s so drunk—she’s had, like, one beer and a couple shots.”
Ling glared at him even harder. “She’s a dancer, genius. She’s probably a total lightweight.”
I could see Lance blushing through my double vision. “She can come to my apartment on the third floor and sleep it off. I live in this building.”
“Um . . . noooo,” Ling said. “I’m calling her dad.”
“I’m standing riiiight here!” I yelled. “Ima big girl. I can take care of myself.”
Everything about the next hour was a blur. I remember being back in Ling’s apartment, and her trying to comfort me as I cried. She fed me a Hot Pocket and I threw it up in her bathtub. She gave me water and I threw that up, too. She threatened to call my dad and I begged her not to. She tried to lead me to the couch but her cat had pooped on it.
Finally, I felt warm arms around me. “P, I’m gonna take you to my place, okay? You’re safe.”
“No, Gavin. I can’t go with you. We’re jusss friends.” He was holding me up near Ling’s front door.
“Maybe I should take you home then. Your parents will probably be worried if you don’t come home, right?”
“Nooo, they don’t care. They only care about Kikiiii.” I pinched his arm.
“Ow!”
“No funny business!” I said.
He laughed. “No offense, but you have puke on your shirt and you’re about to pass out. That’s not really my thing.”
It was weird that his admission hurt my feelings, but it also made me like him even more. I passed out in the car. I don’t know how I got into his second-story apartment, or into his bed. All I know is that when I woke up the next morning, I was in one of his T-shirts and nothing else . . . and my hair was damp. Did he give me a bath? Did he see me naked? The sun was blasting me through the window, cooking my already injured brain with its Vita radiation.
Oh my God.
As I looked around, the only male in sight was Mike’s dog, Jackie Chan, at the foot of the bed, staring back at me.
“Hello, Jackie Chan.”
He cocked his head to the side.
“Did you strip me down and give me a shower?”
He cocked his head to the other side.
“Gavin!” I yelled.
A moment later, he was in the doorway, shirtless, wearing flannel pants. He grabbed the molding above the door and leaned into the room, showing off his ridiculous body. I could tell he had nothing on under his pajama bottoms.
“Hey, sleepyhead,” he said.
I sat up and leaned against the headboard, crossing my arms over my flat chest. “I’m completely naked under this T-shirt . . . your T-shirt.”
“I’m painfully aware of that.” He glanced down at his crotch and back up to me, smirking.
“Please wipe that smirk off your face. I said no funny business. What happened last night?”
“Well, little firecracker, here’s the whole story. I carried you into my apartment; you finally woke up and punched me in the chest about twelve times. Then you proceeded to strip off all of your clothes and throw them at me—at which point I tried to cover you with a blanket, but you tore that off, too. I did see every inch of your magnificent body, but that was all your doing—not that I minded. I begged you to take a shower, which you begrudgingly did, while I sat outside the door. Afterward, I went in with my eyes shut and toweled off your ungrateful but perky ass, and then put a T-shirt on you. You tried to kiss me about six times, so I threw you over my shoulder, gave your bare butt a little swat, and then threw you into my bed. You begged me to make love to you—your words, not mine—but I told you ‘no way.’ I covered you with a blanket and then ten seconds later you were asleep.” He smirked.
I was mortified but I knew it was all true. Foggy memories were coming back to me in fragments. “Umm . . .”
“Nothing to say? You had a lot to say last night. You told me I had a nice body and a beautiful face.” He laughed.
Oh god, I did say that.
“And that I was the smartest guy you’d ever met.”
“I never said that!”
He squinted. “Well, I thought I heard you say it.”
I tried to swat at him but missed. “What time is it? And do I smell pancakes?”
“French toast, actually. And it’s noon.”
“Oh my god, my parents are gonna kill me.”
He held out his palm. “I called your mom and gave her my address. I asked if she wanted to come and get you, or if I should let you sleep it off. She said she was heading out the door, to the spray-tan lady, or some shit like that, so I just let you keep sleeping.”
“Geez,” I scowled. “She didn’t even care?”
He walked toward me. “Penny—”
“Don’t come any closer.”
“I’m not gonna touch you. I slept on the couch, I swear. I left Jackie Chan in here to keep you company.”
“I’m just warning you, I have the breath of a very sick dragon, and it feels like there are tiny sweaters covering my teeth.”
“Yeah. I know, I can smell it from here.”
“Thanks.”
“You can use my toothbrush if you want.” He looked like he felt sorry for me.
“She takes my sister to the spray-tanner for pageants.”
“What?” Gavin came over and sat on the end of the bed. “You’re kidding?”
“No, it’s absolutely deplorable.” I looked up to the ceiling. “I still can’t believe she wasn’t worried about me sleeping at a stranger’s house with his forty-year-old tattoo-artist roommate.”
He picked up a guitar and starting strumming. “Well, she doesn’t know that part, obviously. Anyway, Mike’s out of town; otherwise, he would have gotten quite the show last night. You ready for some French toast? It’s my very own recipe.”
Who is this person?
He was strumming the song “Just Like a Woman,” trying to work out the chords. “French toast sounds good, but I need my clothes.”
“I’m washing them in the laundry room in the basement. They were in pretty bad shape, Penny.”
“Oh god.”
“My T-shirt’s not good enough for you?”
“Well, I have nothing on underneath it.”
“It fits you like a dress, and anyway, I saw everything last night. I mean everything.” He wiggled his eyebrows.
I leaned over and socked him in the arm. “Don’t do that to me. I’m embarrassed enough.”
“You have nothing to be ashamed of, except for maybe your attempt at a half-naked pirouette in the hallway at three a.m.”
I dropped
my face into my hands and groaned. “Noooo. Ugh.”
“It was actually really cute. You ran into the wall and starting cracking up.”
The moment Ling had called, Gavin was still blurry in my mind. Had he just come rushing over? Was he sitting around waiting for her call? Did he roofie me?
“What were you doing when Ling called?”
“I was working on a paper and messing around on my guitar. I had just gotten into bed when she called.”
Oh, the image of him getting into bed . . . “Working on a paper, my ass.”
“No, I swear. I have to graduate, Penny. I’m twenty-three.”
“What did Ling say when she called?”
“I believe her exact words were, ‘Tiny Dancer can’t hold her liquor and my cat pooped on my couch, so can you get your hot butt over here and help?’ ”
“And you just jumped in your car and came to get me.”
“Yes. That’s exactly right. You’re welcome. Now come on, let’s go eat.” He put down the guitar and yanked me out of bed. As we walked through his apartment toward the kitchen, I shuffled behind him while tugging at the bottom of my T-shirt. He pointed to the couch. “That’s where I slept.”
There’s no way his entire body fit on that couch.
“See, Penny? Already so many sacrifices I’ve made for our friendship. My feet hang two feet off that thing.”
We moved toward the breakfast bar. I sat on a stool while he went around to the other side to serve up his homemade French toast. He’d already sifted powdered sugar and added sliced-up strawberries to the plates, which made my heart and stomach do a little somersault. “Impressive,” I said.
“You don’t have to eat all of it but you should put something in your stomach.”
“Okay.” My hangover was starting to really kick in. “This looks delicious but I feel awful.”
“What were you drinking last night? Tequila?”
“And beer.” I ate half the French toast and pushed the plate away. Gavin immediately grabbed it and set it in the sink.
“You need a little hair of the dog and a nap while your clothes dry.” He started moving around the kitchen, whipping something up. A few minutes later, he handed me a glass full of tomato juice.
“Uhhh, what’s this?”
He looked at me like I was an alien. “A Bloody Mary. Duh.” I had never had one before. It looked disgusting but I drank it anyway while he went to the basement to put my clothes in the dryer. It worked. I started feeling more relaxed and my headache was fading. I walked around his apartment, looking at the random artwork everywhere. I finished the drink, used his toothbrush, then went into his room just as I heard him coming in the door. On his nightstand was a copy of an engineering magazine and the Kurt Vonnegut book Breakfast of Champions.
He reads.
Burying myself under the blankets on his bed, I feigned sleep. I could feel him as he entered the room. He didn’t want to wake me.
He cares about me.
He tiptoed around the bed and grabbed a guitar. He reached down and straightened the blankets so they were covering my feet. I couldn’t help but smile. He caught it.
“Faker,” he whispered.
“Play me a song.”
He grabbed the electric guitar instead and plugged it into a small practice amp on the floor. The volume was set very low. I could hear the string sound over the amplification. He started strumming softly, and I knew what he was playing: “Just Like a Woman,” but the Jeff Buckley version. And then he started singing. It wasn’t perfect but it was beautifully flawed. He held nothing back. He even changed some verses and lyrics, which made me laugh.
She dances just like a woman. Oh and she drinks tequila, not at all like a woman, but when she breaks, she breaks . . . just like a little girl.
The last line was so soft, so delicate—the way he delivered it, I thought he must believe it to be true. That I could break like a little girl.
When the song was over, he turned around and smiled sweetly.
“I liked your changes,” I told him.
“I was going to add a line about your breath, but it seems to be minty fresh now.”
Grinning, I said, “I used your toothbrush.”
“So now your gross little sweaters are on my toothbrush?”
“You offered.” I laughed, and then patted the bed next to me. “Want to spoon?” I yawned. “I need that nap.”
In a flash he unplugged the guitar, put The Cure on his CD player on low volume, tore off his T-shirt, and slid in behind me, wearing only his flannel pajama. “God, I thought you’d never ask,” he said. He wrapped his arms around me. Nothing hurt. Everything was right. We were spoons in a drawer. We fell asleep, his face tucked into the back of my neck.
I don’t know what had come over me. Maybe it was the fact that my mom had prioritized taking Kiki to the spray-tanner over picking me up. I needed to feel something, to feel wanted.
It could have been days that we lay there tangled together—moving at times, always aware of each other’s bodies. When we started to move together, I was curled in a ball with my back against Gavin’s bare chest. He started dragging his index finger up my leg, making little circles on the outside of my thigh, pushing my T-shirt up until he was caressing my bare hip. I put my hand over his to stop him.
I didn’t think what I was doing to him was fair, but I was scared we would become exploding stars if we gave in to each other. Our energy would be exhausted too soon and we’d have to float through space like lifeless rocks, bumping into each other, drifting through our own stardust.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, before kissing the back of my head. He rolled out of bed and threw his T-shirt on. When I looked back I noticed how turned on he was.
Catching me staring, he said, “It has a mind of its own.” And then he laughed half-heartedly. “I’ll go get your clothes.”
“Yeah, I should get home. Thank you.”
When he returned, we both got dressed quickly in front of each other. It wasn’t weird at all.
HE WAS QUIET on the way to my house. It was around four p.m. when he pulled into my driveway. Shutting the car off, he turned to me. “You might want to go easier on the booze next time.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” I said.
There were unanswered questions lingering silently in the air around us.
“What do you have planned for tomorrow?” he asked.
“I’m gonna go to ballet class in the morning. That’s it. Maybe study. You?”
“I have to finish that paper and study a bit, too.”
“You want to come here and study around three?”
He smiled. “In your bedroom?”
“Yes, in my bedroom.”
“Do I need to bring garlic or a wooden stake or anything like that?”
At first I thought he was flirting, but clearly he was teasing. “You’re an idiot. Do you want to or not?”
“Yes, Penny. I want to study you . . . I mean with you. I’ll be here.”
Just before I got out of the car, my mom and Kiki pulled up. Kiki jumped out of my mother’s blue Ford station wagon wearing a giant tiara. My mother was holding yet another giant trophy to add to Kiki’s collection. I gave a weak smile and waved to both of them as they waited for me by the front door.
Gavin looked at me with wide eyes. “Wow. Kiki looks like JonBenét.”
“No kidding. I better go.”
As my mom opened the door, Gavin started up the car. He had his window down as he backed out of the driveway. My mother, Kiki, and I all watched him pull out of the driveway as he waved to us. “Congratulations, Kiki. See you beautiful ladies tomorrow!” he said.
My mom turned to me and asked, “Is he your boyfriend?”
“No, just a friend,” I said, still staring at Gavin.
He looked right at me, blew me a kiss, and yelled, “See ya, Boo!”
My mom walked into the house, shaking her head.
12. Eight Months Ago
GAVIN
I could hear Penny’s ankles cracking and the jingling of a dog collar before I saw her and Buckley coming around the corner.
Sitting on my dad’s porch in the midday sun, I tried to pull myself together.
“Hey,” she said from the sidewalk.
“How was the concert?”
She was squinting against the sun as she walked toward me. “It was great. Thanks again for the tickets and for watching Milo. Do you want me to give you some money?”
“No, I don’t want your money.”
Her expression fell. “What’s wrong?” She sat down on the porch next to me.
“He’s getting worse really fast. He can’t even eat.” My eyes started welling up.
“Gavin, I’m so sorry.” She hugged me around my shoulders. “I want to go in and see him. Will you hold on to Buckley?”
“Sure.”
“Sit,” she told him before handing me the leash.
He was staring right at me. Once Penny was inside, I said to Buckley, “You were supposed to be our dog. Our dog.” He blinked. I let all the possibilities of what could have been rush through me. It made me sick. I had to push them away before she came back outside. “Your dad wanted to name you Sport. Aren’t you relieved your mom has more sense than that?” I scratched him around the ears. “You’re a pretty handsome dog, you know that? You get a lot a looks at the dog park? Those bitches be like—”
“Gavin,” Penny interrupted from behind. “Please tell me you don’t talk to Milo that way?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
She sat down next to me again.
“Your dad doesn’t look bad, but he was sleeping so it was hard to tell.”
I shook my head. “He’s bad, believe me.”
“I’m glad Milo got to hang out with him. He said they had a good time playing chess together.” When she smiled, I noticed she had more frown lines than ever. I hadn’t even asked about her life in the month since I’d been back. I was so swept up in my own drama.
“Yeah, I’m glad too.” I stared off blankly.
“The nurse seems nice.”
“Ha. Nurse Ratched? She has a curfew policy. Lights out at nine p.m.—for all of us, like I’m in prison. I’m about to fly over this fucking cuckoo’s nest.”