Two Roads from Here
Page 13
“It’s orange,” Brian added.
I shook my head playfully. “Maybe not right now,” I said. “But soon.” I leaned in for another idyllic kiss. “Very, very, soon.”
Brian wrapped me in the tightest embrace. He kissed me several more times, each on a different part of my body, culminating in yet another heavenly meeting of the lips. Finally, he leaned in and whispered something to me. Four words, to be specific. Four words that, to that point, he had never yet spoken: “I love you, Allie.”
And if my brothers hadn’t knocked on my door ten seconds later to come summon Brian and me to dinner, I’m sure I would have capitulated and slept with him that very instant.
“I love you too, Brian. My goodness, I love you.”
* * *
10. NIKKI FOXWORTH
* * *
I walked into first period and found two dozen red roses waiting for me on my desk. There was a card with them too.
Happy Valentine’s. Meet me after school. The spot. <3 D
I clapped my hands and did a little victory dance. Everyone around me took pictures. A bunch of people asked to smell my roses. All of my friends talked about DeSean and me going off to Fresno State together next year and how amazing it’s going to be—him scoring touchdowns on the field, me shaking my booty on the sidelines. The king and queen, living happily ever after.
Around lunchtime, though, things got weird. There was a strange vibe on campus. People were on their phones, like, way more than usual. Boys, mostly. I’d walk past, and a whole group of guys would be staring at their screens, like they were having the very same message beamed to them by aliens. Some of the boys were howling with laughter. Others were making a great show of covering their faces.
The girls I saw didn’t look quite so strange, but there was something uniting them too: None of them would look me in the eye. Normally, I’ll admit, there’s some curiosity as to which outfit I’m wearing or whose handbag I’m sporting, but not that day.
“What’s going on?” I said to my friends during nutrition break. “Did someone die?”
“Sort of,” Brooklyn said.
“We have to go,” Channing said.
I didn’t see DeSean once, all day, but I made sense of that in my head. I figured his absence was maybe because he had, I don’t know, organized some sort of V-Day scavenger hunt for me, starting with the roses and ending with a surprise at the spot. Yes, there would be sex, but probably something else too. Jewelry? A promise for the future? Ooh, and maybe the reason everyone was acting so shifty around me all day, maybe D had told them to act that way, like, for some special reason?
Golly, I used to love surprises.
• • •
When I reached the construction site after school, I felt even more like I was living in some kind of alternate universe.
Because DeSean wasn’t at the spot.
Scrotes was.
“Surprise, surprise,” he said as I approached him.
“Where’s DeSean?”
He didn’t answer that. Instead, he held his phone up and pointed the screen at me. He pouted his lips. He shook his head.
I knew what it was before he even pressed play.
“Turn that off, you little shit!” I screamed, beating the phone out of his hand.
For some reason, Scrotes just smiled.
“It’s nothing personal,” he said all calmly. “But DeSean has an athletic career to worry about, not to mention a brand. Do you really think he can afford to be associated with you now, especially during his crucial rehab period? He told me to tell you he hopes you’ll understand and that he wishes you the best as you try to recover from this, but, yeah . . . Sorry, girl. It’s over.”
• • •
When I got home, my parents weren’t there. I bet they were at school. Meeting with the principal. Meeting about me. Whatever. I went to my room. I locked myself in. I went to my speakers. I cranked up the noise, so loud it could shatter glass. So loud it could make you deaf. I skipped my usual dance mix. My tween-girl pop, my white-girl hip-hop. I went straight for the nastiest tracks I could find. Hard-core rap. Gangsta shit. The kinds of songs where violence is power, where killing is winning, where women aren’t women; they’re hoes and tricks and bitches. I let those words dominate the room. I let them violate my ears.
I raged.
I threw my head back and flung it forward, like I might break my neck. I let my arms thrash. I didn’t care what they knocked over. I stamped the floor, like some kind of animal. I let out a scream, like a made-up beast.
I shrieked in rhythm to the beat of the songs. I gritted my teeth and pumped my hips. I thrust them back and forth, faster and faster, back and forth, rougher and harder. I did it till my back ached. Till my knees shook. Till my mind went blank.
I punched the air. I slapped it. I spun around and roundhouse kicked. I spun and kept spinning past the point of exhaustion. I spun past nausea. I spun and stomped and spun and screamed. If I spun fast enough I could break free of this path, I could release myself from the past, I could make all my thoughts disappear if I killed myself to the music, if I kept spinning, spinning, spinning.
I spun so hard that I drenched my sweatshirt. I threw it off. I kept moving. I danced for so long that I soaked my tank top. I peeled it off and chucked it away. I punched and pirouetted and leaped and tumbled and roared for endless minutes, for infinite hateful songs, right until the moment when I caught sight of my reflection in the full-length mirror.
I couldn’t help but stop and stare.
There I was, in my bra and not much else. My body was dripping. My face was red. My hair was a joke. I was so out of breath. But still, I wanted more.
I know her, that person in the mirror. I know her very well. As a matter of fact, I’d seen her earlier that afternoon.
Everyone knows her. The girl from the video.
As soon as I recognized her flushed cheeks, her sweaty torso, her hungry expression, I felt this urge to squeeze my eyes shut, to turn away. To block the image out, the way I have these past several months. To do what my parents have done, what my friends did to me in Texas, what DeSean just did. I felt like I needed to wish her away, the bad girl, the animal, the slut.
But no.
I like the girl in the mirror. I think she’s kind of amazing.
I smiled at her. She smiled back.
I like sex. That shouldn’t be some crazy thing to admit. It’s a pretty conventional thing to like, actually. Practically boring. Of course, I’m the only one who’s judged for it. And of course it cuts me to the core, being reduced to that one aspect of myself. But it’s who I am, so I may as well be up front: I really, truly love sex.
Honestly, I think that’s part of why I like dancing so much, because it reminds me of sex. I get to move my body. I get to find a rhythm. My brain shuts off completely. I’m allowed to forget about the world.
The world, though, it doesn’t look at the girl in the mirror the same way I do. It wants her to put on some clothes. It tells her to stop smiling. It thinks she should stop dancing.
That’s what hurts so bad. Not that people know I have sex, or even that they saw my body in that vulnerable moment, but rather what they think of me afterward. Once they see that tape, I’m not Nikki anymore. I’m not their girlfriend, not their daughter, not their peer.
I tried smiling at my reflection, but it didn’t last long. An empty stare took its place. Something was missing. The picture wasn’t full.
I’m not saying I miss DeSean. Jesus, no. What that boy did to me is no better than what my ex did by making the tape in the first place. There’s a special place in hell for a man who turns his back on a woman just because she’s so-called damaged goods. I hate DeSean. I never want to think about him again. I don’t miss him one bit.
I’ve got to be resilient. I need to be independent. I must stop caring what DeSean, what any guy, what the entire world thinks of me. But dammit, it’s hard. When I look at the mirror and see only
myself, it’s hard to keep a smile on my face. I mean shit, I feel lonely.
The thing about dancing is, as fun as it can be on your own, it’s always so much easier, so much better, when you have a partner. Someone to share the music with. Someone to lift you up in the air.
I miss it already, having that partner to love. Not someone to grope in the dark mindlessly, nothing like that, but a person who knows how to connect in every way beyond sex. A person who, in intimate moments, can take sex and make it so much more than that, who can make it love. I’m ashamed to admit this, but I have to be real—I want a guy in my life. Even after all this, I long for Prince Charming. I still, somehow, pray he exists.
But who am I kidding? I’m not some little girl. I don’t believe in damsels in distress, in saviors on white horses, in destiny. That person who’s supposed to accept me unconditionally? That’s just someone who hasn’t seen the video yet. That person’s a myth. That person’s a fantasy.
ROAD TWO
* * *
WINTER
6. BRIAN MACK
Sometimes Mom and Dad talk in the TV room and they think I can’t hear them, but I can hear them. Like last night. They did it last night.
“He’s trying his best.”
“Right. For all the good it does.”
“He’s improving, faster than they said he would.”
“What about the shit fits he throws every morning?”
“Well, he wants to go to school.”
“Yeah, but lately it’s gotten beyond the pale.”
“He’s frustrated. He’s always had moments of frustration. That’s who he is.”
“Who he was.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Honey . . .”
“Honey what?”
“You know . . .”
“No, I don’t. What are you trying to say?”
“You know full well what I’m trying to say. . . .”
“No, I don’t. Why don’t you tell me?”
“Well, you know, maybe we should revisit special ed. . . .”
“No. God, no.”
“Honey.”
“He needs more time, that’s all. What he’s attempting, it’s been done before.”
“How many times?”
“Brian’s a fighter.”
“Brian can’t read.”
“Our son will be fine.”
“Are you so sure?”
“Aren’t you?”
“I’m being realistic.”
“He’s going to be okay.”
“He’s declining.”
“He’s improving.”
“He’s re—”
“Don’t say it.”
“But he’s re—”
“Don’t you dare say it—”
“Come on, honey. Brian’s re—”
“Don’t say it.”
• • •
Back when I was better, I exploded all the time. I heard guys talk crap about me, fools on the Bulldogs, and I went beast mode on them. I jammed them in a corner. I said, “Who you calling oaf, you bitch.” I smacked their asses hard. They cried like little pussies. You mess with the Big Mack, you get the buns.
It was like that in the hospital too. And when I first got home. Like when gas touches a cigarette. I burned crazy all the time. I yelled at my mom and screamed cuss words at my dad and punched Kyle in the belly, and when my friends stopped coming to see me, I punched the pillow on my bed. I was an angry mofo. Dad says I missed playing football. I want to tell him that’s not what I miss.
But last night was different. Hearing my parents gave me a new feeling. For the first time, I didn’t feel like blowing up. I felt the other way. I wanted to melt. Like the witch in The Wizard of Oz. I wanted someone to dump a bucket on me so I could melt. Just go away.
When Dad said that thing, that last word, I got under the covers. I put my pillow over my head. I wouldn’t let myself hear more words. I tried to go to sleep. I wanted to dream. I wanted to wake up somewhere new. Where my parents don’t fight. Where I have friends like old times. Where I know things again. I wish I could go back to that place.
If I only had a brain.
• • •
This morning, Mom and Dad took me to the hospital for a checkup. I was still so bummed from yesterday. I didn’t put new clothes on when I got up. I didn’t brush my teeth. I said hell no to breakfast.
The doctor was mean. I don’t know what he was saying, but the way he said it made Mom put her head down. It made Dad put his hand on Mom’s back.
Then the doctor told me good news—I don’t have to do another operation. And more good news—when it’s the new semester, I get to go back to school.
“Why is it good news if my parents are sad?”
The doctor was quiet. I hate doctors.
After the checkup, Mom and Dad said we could go out for ice cream. I said no. They said we could call my friends, see what Scrotes is doing over Christmas. I said I want to go home. I hate home, but the good thing about home is I can be stupid by myself there. I don’t have to be stupid in front of people.
So it was time to go.
But as we were leaving, I heard her. I heard a girl.
“Hello? Brian?”
I turned around. I wanted it to be Nikki. I miss Nikki.
It wasn’t Nikki.
The girl had hair like a jellyfish. She was short and fat. Well, she wasn’t really fat like me, but she was kind of fat. She was pretty though.
I pointed at her. “I don’t know who you are.”
“I go to your school,” she said. “I go to Dos Caminos.”
“Oh, yeah? Bulldogs?”
She smiled. “Yes, exactly. Go Bulldogs.”
I walked up to her. “My name is Brian.”
“I know,” she said. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Brian.”
“I don’t know your name.”
“Oh. My mistake. I don’t know why I didn’t lead with that. My name is Allegra.”
“What?”
“Allegra,” the girl said.
“What?”
“Ah-leg-ruh,” she said.
“All—,” I said.
“Allerg—,” I said.
“Allega—,” I said again, but I couldn’t do it, because I don’t know how to say things anymore, because I’m dumb. I’m such a dumbass—
“But you can call me Allie,” the girl said. She had the nicest smile on her face.
“Hi, Allie,” I said. I smiled too.
She held her hand out. Her hand had a #PRAYERS4BRIAN bracelet on it. I held my fist out and gave her a bump.
I turned back to Mom and Dad.
“I don’t want to go home yet,” I told them. “I’m talking to my friend Allie.”
“We know, honey,” Mom said. “Take as long as you want.”
I turned back to Allie. I looked at her with a confused face. “Why are you here?”
Her smile went away. It made me feel bad. Then it kind of came back, but different from before.
“I’m actually here for my mom,” Allie said. “My mom is sick.”
“I’m sick.”
“Oh, oh no, I wouldn’t describe you as ‘sick.’ ”
“Your mom’s retarded?”
“No,” she said. “She’s not . . . uh, my mom has . . . Do you remember what cancer is, Brian?”
I put my hand on my mouth. “Oh shit,” I said. “Your mom’s gonna die.”
Allie’s smile went away again. This time it didn’t come back to her face. I thought she was going to run away all fast and leave me all alone. But she didn’t, which felt good.
“You know, I hope my mom doesn’t pass away,” Allie said. “And I don’t think she will, not for a long time. Anyway, she’s only here for a checkup.”
“I came for a checkup,” I said. “I almost died.”
“I know,” Allie said. “I remember.”
She put her hand on her bracelet when she said it.
“I know,” she said. “And you know what? I miss having you at school too.”
I made a fart noise with my mouth. A big, loud, wet one. Allie stepped backward. Her face was grossed out, like if I made a real fart, like with my ass.
“Sorry,” she said. “But why did you just do that, Brian?”
“You’re wrong. You don’t miss me.”
“Oh, sure I do.”
“How can you miss me? You just met me. You don’t miss me. Shut up.”
Allie opened her mouth. She closed her mouth. She looked at me hard. “Well,” she said. “Yes. I suppose you’re right. I can’t miss you if I don’t know you.”
“I’m going now,” I said. “I’m not gonna miss you.”
“Because we’re not friends?” Allie said.
“Yeah,” I said. “I only miss my friends.”
“That makes sense,” she said.
“I don’t have friends,” I said.
• • •
I turned the lights off in my room. Lights make my head hurt. Also I don’t like looking at my things. My memory things. My football that my friends signed for me. Pictures of me and DeSean from the newspaper. My old feather boa from Male Ballet. My gold crown.
I think I had a nap, but the doorbell woke me up.
There was a knock outside my room. I put my head under my pillow.
“Hello,” the voice said.
“Leave me alone.”
The door opened.
“Hey, Mr. Vampire? Why is it so dark in here? Please don’t suck my blood.”
Huh?
I threw the pillow off. It was weird that someone besides a doctor or my mom would come visit me. It was hard to see who it was in the shadows.
But I recognized that nice smile. I would recognize it anywhere.
“Hi, Allie.”
She turned on the light. “You know, Brian,” she said. “I really would like to be your friend. I’d like it very much.”
She was dragging something behind her. A bag. It looked big and heavy.
“What’s in there?”
“Oh,” she said, pulling them out. There were red ones, blue ones, big ones with pictures, even a couple soft ones you would bring in the bath. “Just a few of my favorite things in the world.”