“I’m the only person thinking about the big picture,” Joe says. “They didn’t say anything about anything. We got nothing.”
No one speaks for a minute. Then Gina says, “We got bento boxes.” She cracks the window and lights a cigarette. “That was cool.”
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
I tell myself it’s fine. It is fine. The next episode of Riot Grrl 16 gets tons of votes, putting us at number four overall. If we put together a killer finale, we’ll definitely make the final group. We’ll go on to do The Producers, win that quarter of a million. We just have to be patient a little while longer. We can do that. Nothing has changed. Nothing. It’s all good.
Also good, but different than any other good I’ve ever known: Lucinda.
With me, the girl thing usually starts with an accident. I mean “accident.” I “accidentally” brush her arm or bump into her. Sometimes I hold her wrist and tell her how small it is, show her how I can circle it with just my thumb and index finger. Sometimes, if I’m really pouring it on, I use the word delicate. Other times I pick up a lock of her hair and rub it between my fingers while talking about something trivial, like the weather or a TV show, and watch as her breath gets shallow.
And it works.
They like it, I like it.
Everybody’s happy.
But I don’t do any of this with Lucinda.
I don’t accidentally brush her arm. I don’t tell her how small her wrist is or show her how I can trap both of her arms with one hand. I don’t lift locks of her hair and pretend to chat about school or the weather. And I don’t pick her up to show her how light she is or how strong I am. I don’t have to do any of it, and anyway, it wouldn’t work. She’d know I was following a script. It’s like we’re dancing all the time. I’m supposed to be leading, but then, just when I least expect it, she spins in close and rests her cheek on my cheek or lets go of me to dance alone and all I can do is stand around like a dumb ass and pant.
Or maybe it’s more like tennis, where we’re in this great rally that I think might never end and all of a sudden she wrong-foots me or finds some previously unimagined, wicked angle and she’s queuing up another serve before I understand we’re on to a whole new game.
I never know what she’ll do next.
Everything is a surprise.
Not a surprise: the whole school has found us out. Not because we’re like those slags who play tongue hockey in the hallways, but because I’ve been spotted at her matches. With anyone else this would have bothered me, but now I don’t care who knows. I’m the guy with the show headed for MTV. I’m the guy with Lucinda.
One of Lucinda’s old boyfriends, Jon Sanchez, the pretty boy baseball player, passes by my locker and says, “Heard about you and Dulko.”
“Yeah,” I say.
“Good luck with that,” he says with all the sarcasm he can muster. Which is not much, he’s such a wuss.
But I don’t even say anything, not “bite me” or whatever, because he looks even more sad and pathetic and girly than usual, like he should just give it up already, put on a dress and some lipstick, and start dating guys. I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for anybody who’s been with Lucinda and had to give her up.
“I don’t want to give you up,” I say.
Dad is still out at work, and I’ve put Tippi Hedren in her cage upstairs so I have Lucinda’s attention to myself. We’re in my basement watching a movie.
Scratch that. She’s watching the movie; I’m watching her.
“Who says you have to give me up?”
“Nobody. I just don’t want to.”
She squeezes my hand, but she’s still focused on the movie. I can’t concentrate. It’s the first Lord of the Rings and I’ve seen it about sixteen times already, but that’s not the problem. The problem’s Liv Tyler, with the blue eyes and the pink lips that make you want to get a taste. Even though Lucinda doesn’t look like Liv, I get all crazy for Lucinda’s blue eyes and tasty lips and she’s sitting right here next to me. So close I can smell her baby powder deodorant and the fruity smell of her shampoo. I want to dress her up in one of those long Elvish gowns and drop a fancy, glittery crown on her head and listen to her promise her undying love in a language that sounds like music.
And then I want to peel off the gown.
“This is pretty violent,” Lucinda murmurs.
“What?” I say. I’ve shifted my weight so that I can look down her shirt. “Say something in Spanish.”
“That’s why I never saw this movie. I don’t like violence.”
“But it’s sort of fake violence, right? More like a cartoon than anything.”
“I don’t think so.”
I tear my eyes away from Lucinda’s breasts and look at the screen. Orcs are splattered everywhere.
“Feels pretty real to me,” she says. “Even though they’re just sporks.”
“Orcs,” I say. “But the fact that it feels real is what makes the movie good, right? It’s a great trilogy. Third one has a thousand different endings.”
She turns to me. “It does? Hey, pancho! Are you looking down my shirt?”
“No,” I say.
“You were.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Liar.”
“You’re beautiful.”
“You mean my boobs are beautiful.”
“That too.”
“So what’s with you guys and breasts, anyway?”
“Is that a serious question?”
“I mean it. You guys are, like, downright weird about them. I never wear low-cut shirts because none of you would ever focus on my face.”
I focus on her face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
She laughs and nudges my shoulder. “Estúpido.”
“That’s what I wanted to hear.”
“Freak.”
“Yes.” I sigh. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“I don’t know why we’re, ‘like, downright weird’ about breasts. I can’t explain it. It’s not meant to be an insult, though. When we look. We can’t help it.”
“Half the population has breasts. Your moms all have breasts.”
“I really don’t want to think about my mom’s breasts, thanks.”
“It’s pretty random,” says Lucinda. “You might as well slobber over someone’s ankles. Or elbows. Or collarbones.” She takes my hand and puts it around her neck. “Feel the collarbones.”
“Ummm,” I say.
“Sexy, huh?”
I run my fingers all around her collarbones and the little bird bones that form a V in the front, lightly, as lightly as I can without tickling her. As I’m doing this, her lips part and her breathing gets a little heavier. Her irises glow in the light flashing from the TV set. Her pupils widen.
I think she’s just surprised herself.
I press my fingers against the side of her throat to find her pulse. It speeds up when my other hand cups her shoulder and I push her back onto the couch.
About twenty minutes or twenty hours or twenty years later, I hear the sound of the garage door.
“Shit,” I say against Lucinda’s lips. “Dad’s home.”
Lucinda shoves me off the couch and sits up. Her hair is everywhere. Her clothes look like someone tried to tear them off (’cause, uh, someone did try). She fumbles with her buttons, but she keeps missing the buttonholes.
I’m on the floor where she’s shoved me. I laugh.
“Don’t make me kick your ass,” she mutters.
Her lips are so red and huge and…“You look amazing.”
She rolls her eyes. “Will you please put on your shirt?”
“I thought you liked me this way.”
“I’m going to hate your guts in another thirty seconds.”
I drag the T-shirt over my head as Lucinda closes up shop. She’s snapping an elastic around her hair when my dad’s voice echoes through the house. I hear other voices to
o. Marty and the Meatball.
Great.
“Eddy! Eddy, are you home?”
Someone opens the basement door.
“Ed,” Lucinda whispers. “Your shirt.”
“Eddy? Are you down there?”
“Yeah!” I shout.
Dad trudges down the stairs, Marty and Meat behind him. “Oh, hi,” he says. “I didn’t know you were going to have a guest.”
“Dad, this is Lucinda. Lucinda, my dad.”
“Hi.” She shakes my dad’s hand. “Nice to meet you.”
“And this is Marty, my stepdad,” I say. Marty shakes her hand as well. He pulls Meatball out from behind him, but Meat shrugs him off.
“This is Meatball, I mean Matthew. My little brother.”
Lucinda looks down at the Meat. “Hello.”
“Hello,” Meat says. “Are you the smelly girl?”
“Meat!”
“What?”
Lucinda laughs. “You can call me Lucinda.”
“Did you know that in 1954, a man grafted the head of a puppy onto a healthy Siberian husky?”
“No, actually, I didn’t,” she says.
“He was trying to make a two-headed dog, but it didn’t work very well,” says Meatball. “The transplanted head bit the other head.”
“Wow,” says Lucinda.
My dad glances around the room, looking wildly for a way to steer this conversation in a less morbid direction. “What were you guys doing?”
I wave at the TV. “Movie.”
He frowns at the screen. “Lord of the Rings? Haven’t you seen that a million times?”
“I haven’t,” Lucinda says. “But I don’t think I missed anything.”
My dad grins. “My thoughts exactly.”
Marty scans the coffee table in front of the couch. “Did Eddy offer you anything to drink?”
“No, now that you mention it,” Lucinda says. “He didn’t.”
Dad sighs. “You try to teach them some manners, but they never learn.”
Lucinda smirks at me. “That’s true.”
“Can I get you something?” Marty says. “Tea? Soda?”
“Soda would be great.”
“I’m kinda thirsty myself,” Dad says.
“I want soda,” says the Meatball.
“You can have milk,” Marty tells him.
“I don’t see how that’s fair,” Meatball says.
My dad: “We’ll be right back.”
They disappear up the stairs. As soon as they’re gone, Lucinda says, “Your shirt’s on inside out.”
“They didn’t notice. Not with Meatball’s two-headed puppy story.”
“At least put it on right,” she says.
I take the shirt off and fix it. “You just wanted to see my body again.”
“You mean you just wanted to show me again.”
My dad comes back downstairs with a six-pack of soda, a package of Oreos, and a book tucked under his arm. Marty follows balancing a hot cup of tea. Meatball holds a glass of milk out from his chest as if he doesn’t want to be associated with it. We all arrange ourselves on the furniture. Dad opens a soda and gives it to Lucinda. And then he tosses the Oreos on the coffee table. “I hope you like cookies.”
“Sure,” she says.
“I mean, I hope you like stale cookies.”
Lucinda grins. “My favorite.” She pulls a cookie from the package and unscrews the top.
“I’d enjoy a cookie,” says Meatball.
“You can have two,” Marty says.
My dad settles in the armchair. “So, what can we tell you about Eddy that will embarrass the heck out of him?”
“Let me think.” Lucinda’s eyes literally twinkle. “Do you have any baby pictures?”
“That would do it,” says Marty.
Dad gets up and goes to the bookshelves, rummages a bit, and scares up a battered album. Lucinda takes it from him and opens it on her lap.
I pop a soda for myself. “Flip to the middle-school pictures with the screwed-up hair and the braces and get it over with.”
Marty pats Lucinda’s hand. “He hides it well, but he can be very sensitive.”
“I see that.”
Meatball goes over to the shelves. “Where are my baby pictures?”
I slump in a chair while they go through the whole damned album. Oh, look at this one! He’s potty training! It’s so adorable!
At the shelves, Meatball collapses and starts to shake, milk dribbling from his mouth. I go over and revive him. ’Cause of the milk, it’s a messy job. Lucinda is staring.
Meatball sits up. “That was a seizure brought on by a brain abscess.”
“What do we do about the abscess?”
“Oh, it’s gone now,” he says. “I think I found some pictures of me.”
Marty gets up and peers over Meat’s shoulder. “Those are more pictures of your brother when he was little.”
“They look like me,” Meat insists.
“Yes, I know,” Marty says. He smiles apologetically at the rest of us. “I think it’s time I got someone home.”
“Who?” says Meatball.
Marty and Meatball take off, the Meatball protesting that he didn’t get a chance to show the smelly girl his baby pictures.
After they’ve gone, my dad says, “If you liked the pictures, I have something even better.” He gets up from the couch and pops the DVD. Then he starts digging around in the entertainment center.
“Dad, don’t even think about it.”
“Think about what? Aha!” He holds up another DVD and spins it on his finger. Then he pops it into the player.
“Home movies!” he says.
“Dad!” I say.
“I’d love to see some home movies,” Lucinda says.
“Eddy, this lovely young lady says she wants to see some home movies.”
This is so not a good idea.
“Dad, I don’t—”
Dad grabs the remote and presses Play. On the screen a redheaded baby grins. A disembodied female voice says, “Come on, Eddy. Time for the binky trick.”
“Binky twick!” the baby says.
Lucinda squeezes my hand. “Aw.”
With fat sausage fingers, the baby stuffs pacifiers into his mouth. Seven all at once.
“That’s my boy!” says the female voice. “Aren’t you the most talented boy?”
The baby on the camera attempts to grin around the pacifiers.
“Yes you are, yes you are, yes you are!” the female voice coos.
“Oh, the voice belongs to Eddy’s mom,” my dad tells Lucinda, as if she hadn’t figured that out. Dad hits fast-forward. “Let’s find another good one.” A redheaded boy drags a Radio Flyer wagon down a bumpy sidewalk. The wagon has a bird in it. The bird says, “I have to get to San Francisco!”
The boy turns to the camera and says, “Mommy, why does Tippi want to go to San Francisco?”
“She doesn’t mean it, Eddy,” the voice says. “She wants to stay with us.”
Lucinda squeezes my hand again. I pretend I have an itch on my wrist. I pull my hand away to scratch it.
Another scene: Christmas. Wrapping paper everywhere. A different voice behind the camera, a man’s. “What have you got there, Eddy?”
The redheaded boy holds up a box. “A video!”
“Which video is it?”
“The Christmas Before the Nightmare!” the boy says.
“You mean The Nightmare Before Christmas?” says the man, but the boy has already dropped the case and moved on to the next present.
The camera lingers on the boy another minute, observing as he tears open the package and frowns at the clothes he finds inside. Then the camera pans away from the boy to a woman sitting in a chair with her legs tucked underneath her like a cat. She has blond hair still mussed from sleep and she sips at a steaming mug. She turns her eyes on the camera, her face inscrutable. The camera draws in, closer and closer to the woman. She stares back, her big blue eyes flat
, giving nothing away. In the background, the sound of tearing paper.
I watch my dad watching himself watch my mother and I get so angry that I want to shove him off the couch and kick him. Lucinda clears her throat. “I’d love to see more movies, but it’s getting late. I think my parents will start to wonder where I am.”
“Oh! Right!” says my dad. “Wouldn’t want your mom to worry.”
I don’t even get to walk Lucinda out alone. My dad pretends to fix the porch light while I walk her to the car.
“Well,” Lucinda says.
“Well,” I say.
“Is your brother really sick?”
I think about this. “Define sick.”
“He doesn’t have a brain abscess, then?”
“No. He’s a little weird. Sorry if it freaked you out.”
“It didn’t. I thought it was…” She trails off.
“What?”
“Surprising.”
“Like I said, he’s weird.”
“That’s not what I mean. I thought he was adorable. I think you’re all great. Your dad and stepdad and you guys all hanging out together. I don’t know. I didn’t expect your family to be like that.”
“What did you expect?”
She shrugs. “Honestly, I guess I expected your dad might be some middle-aged bachelor bringing home his nineteen-year-old girlfriend.”
“Thanks. That’s very flattering.”
“Well. Your mom’s an actress. I just assumed…”
“That we’re all a bunch of creeps?”
“I’m sorry. I think I’ve seen too much TV or read too many bad novels or something.” She stands on tiptoe to kiss me on the cheek and while she’s doing it hooks a secret finger into my front pocket, tickling my thigh. She whispers in my ear. “I’m glad I was wrong.”
I’m going to say, “You owe me,” but I don’t. Instead I say, “Me too.” The front of my thigh burns.
We watch Lucinda back old Snuffleupagus out of the driveway and rumble down the street. My dad and I go back into the kitchen. I sit. My dad leans against the sink and stands there, grinning at me.
“Cut it out, Dad,” I say.
“She’s cute,” he says.
“I know.”
“Not your usual type, though, is she?”
“I don’t have a type,” I say.