“Not all of them,” I said. “Definitely some.” I shook my head. I was having a how-times-have-changed moment with Meili’s uncle. Nice.
“For the record,” Meili said, twirling noodles onto her fork. “I did tell them exactly what happened, but for some reason they didn’t believe me.”
“It’s not that we don’t believe you, we’re concerned about the consequences,” Mrs. Jenkins said.
“And it’s … uh … reassuring to hear it from a local,” Mr. Jenkins said.
Locals was what preppies called us, to our faces at least. Behind our backs, we were rednecks, drunks, trash.
“Maylorgaspees. Amen.” He stood to clear his dishes. Turns out, that’s how dinner ends at the Jenkins home.
Later, as Meili walked me out, she squeezed my arm. “That was brutally funny at the table, that bit about the taxi and the motorbike, believe me, no one appreciates inappropriate humor more than I do, Bug, but you should be aware that Auntie and Uncle know fuckall about my past, and that’s how I prefer it. Reduces my exposure.” Weird word. “So if I make the horrid mistake of telling you anything about myself, which I fear I may, let’s keep it between us, shall we? Keep the morbid jokes between us, ’K? But do keep them, please, god, let there be someone who can horrify me with his jokes, ’s a dream come true. Ta.” She gave me the fastest, stealthiest peck on the cheek, so unexpected and sudden there was no way I could turn it into a real kiss. Or even experience it. By the time I understood what was happening, she was back through the screen door, walking down the hall, her blue dress hugging a body I couldn’t stop thinking about.
That night, I sat in my neat living room with my clean shirt and my flossed teeth. I replayed the night and Meili’s touches, especially that shocking kiss on the cheek. I’d gone a lot further with other girls and barely been affected. Meili squeezed my arm, and I sat dumbfounded on my couch.
My messy, thoughtless world was converging to a point. Everything moved to Meili.
That seemed wonderful, until it didn’t.
* * *
The Rubber Room became, to use a Meili word, exquisite. She used the word to amplify her dislike. “She’s an exquisite arsehole.” Or “What an exquisite waste of time.”
For six hours and thirty-four minutes every day, I sat near, but not too near, the person I couldn’t stop thinking about. I pretended to read but actually obsessed over her every action or nonaction. Meili was doing her lip-chewing thing. Meili turned toward me a little. Or did she? Meili was writing. Meili caught me staring and bared her teeth like a dog.
I measured days by the number and length of our unsupervised periods. That Monday, a great day, had five teacherless stretches, some lasting more than ten minutes. Tuesday was agonizing. A substitute, or anyway a teacher I’d never seen and never saw again, treated the job as if it mattered. Mr. Harris, tall and shiny bald, ate lunch at the desk, graded essays, and timed his bladder for the moments I went to pee, accompanying me to the bathroom and leaving Meili alone, which did me no good. There was a note in my American lit anthology when I returned: Damn Harris! in angry letters. That became our shorthand for ridiculously unfair situations.
Meili read, quickly and devotedly. She finished two books that Monday, one on Tuesday. I rarely got through a full page without staring at her out of the corner of my eye.
Wednesday, Meili dropped a card on my desk when she arrived. I remembered her first note, the not-apology that I’d wanted to open but didn’t. That feeling, so intense the first time, was a thousand times stronger now. A note from Meili. Since having dinner at her house, I had done exactly two things: thought about Meili, and been briefly distracted from thinking about her. It was out of control. I was out of control.
I didn’t open it.
During an aide pee break, she said, “Oh, please, Firebug, read it. We’ve got work to do.”
“Work?” I said, not opening the card.
“I’ve got a legitimate—we’ve got—a legitimate gig this weekend.”
“A gig?”
“DJing. Some crap metal band, and I’m the opening act,” she said. “Don’t ask me why, but a certain fabulous boy has decided I’m the savior of Unionville, sent to enlighten you.”
“What fabulous boy?”
“My boy Stephen. He’s booked me as a DJ, though, technically, I haven’t got so so much experience, but it’s not like the crowd will know, because they’ll be too busy throwing cans of tallboy at me as soon as they hear the shite I’m going to play, which I can’t possibly play till you obtain some very specific equipment for me. Thaink ewe vurr much.” She finished in her fake Southern accent. Not that we lived in the South. “Cans of tallboy” was Meili’s misunderstanding of tallboys, sixteen-ounce beers that were a slightly cheaper way to get drunk.
More favors. I opened the card. A white butterfly on a white flower, With deepest sympathy. Inside, she had crossed out You are surrounded by thoughts of love and care, today and in the days to come and written: Dynamix 2-Channel Compact DJ Controller! Right away please! Melissa xoxozzzzzzzzzzz. There were four crisp twenties folded into a triangle.
“That’s a lot of cash.”
“Yes, and the address is on the back. And the thing is, I need to have it to practice, so…” The door opened—conversation over.
The back of the card had an address in Wells, a good hour away.
You’re welcome, Meili.
xoxo
* * *
I didn’t go to Wells. I didn’t get the DJ controller.
Not that day or the next day.
I was proving something. Something hard and heavy and made of wanting Meili so badly.
I was so desperate to ride to Wells—it was all I could think about—that I had to resist. I had to disappoint her, turn away. She had to see me turn away.
Needing people was never a good idea. Letting them know you need them was worse.
I got a phone call, which was shocking. The phone had been shut off for two weeks. More shocking: it was my mom.
“Hey, J,” she said when I picked up. Her voice was slowed down like she’d been drinking some, but not blurry like she’d been drinking a lot.
“Hi, Mom. What’s going on?”
There’s a mode you go into when your mom’s a drunk or an addict or otherwise a mess. Whenever she called, my first thought was: What’s wrong? What is she gonna ask me for?
“Hey, baby, I miss you so much.”
My second thought, when the call was not an emergency, was: How much lovey mother-son talk does she need to reassure her that she’s not a total disaster as a parent? I was willing to provide the minimum to get off the phone.
“Yeah, what … um … how’s Florida?” She missed me so much at a specific point in her drunk. Two drinks later, she regretted everything, and two drinks after that, no one understood her.
“It’s good. It’s real warm, you know. I was just thinking about my boy, worrying about my boy. I don’t care what happened, you know you’re my boy, right?”
This was where I had to grit my teeth. “Of course, Mom. I always will be.”
“Yeah, you will, baby.” She took a drag off her cigarette. “Things are coming together, I want you to know that. They’re coming together.”
“Like what?” I said, stupidly hoping for good news. I always paced when I talked to her, stretching the cord from the couch to the fridge and back.
“I got the phone back on, didn’t I?” she said, as if a working phone was a triumph. A cell phone was out of the question in my world. We only ever had the discounted poor-people landline with no long distance, so we always had calling cards from Redi-Mart taped to the kitchen wall. They had pictures of the globe or maps of Central America or logos of Mexican soccer teams. And they stayed up long after they were used, so making a long-distance call meant trying three or four till you found one that had minutes. “And Al and I are getting it together down here. We just needed a little space. He’s got some terrific ideas for starting
things and, you know, making a little money.”
“Make a little money” was a classic Al-ism, used either to whine about unfairness (“I just want to live my life, make a little money, and have some fun, OK? Why can’t [bosses, landlords, banks, cops] understand that?”) or to promote his latest doomed scheme (“I’m just gonna [open a lunch cart, start a music festival for Spanish-speaking people, buy cigarettes on the Indian reservation and sell them outside bars], make a little money, and start over.”)
“Is he clean?” I said, knowing the answer but needing my mom to say it, needing her to hear herself say it. I warmed my feet in a square of sunlight by the back door.
“He’s getting there, I’ll tell you, he’s really taking steps. I wish you two could forget what happened. He’s a good man, J, and I’m so lucky to have him. And you, I’m so blessed with you, my sweet boy.” Another drag. “How are things in Oniontown?”
“You know, moving along. I still can’t go to class, so it’s pretty boring at school.” Truth was, the Rubber Room and Meili were the least boring things in my world. Maybe ever.
“Everything OK with probation?”
“Yeah, I go in once a month. He’s on me about finding a job, but he hasn’t visited or anything.”
“Al says they never visit unless there’s an issue. So I think we’re in the clear on that one.” We. She can live in Florida, and I can stay out of jail. “And I’m betting the whole…” The rest of her sentence was drowned out by loud music on her end. I heard a couple swear words and some banging, then her voice came back. “Sorry, I had to step outside. You there, babe?”
“Yeah.”
“Anyway, I just want us all to get along. That’s all I wanted to say. I love you, babe.”
This was the beginning of the wind-down, as my mom laid the groundwork for hanging up. Next was the part I hated, where I had to ask for money that wasn’t coming.
“Love you, too, Mom. Hey, did you get a chance to send that money?”
“Yeah, we definitely did. You didn’t get it?” Bullshit.
“Not yet.”
“Tell you what, let me ask Al, cause I’m sure we sent a check. And I asked your father to send something, too, but I don’t guess he did.”
My biological. Eight years since I’d seen the man, maybe five since I got a birthday call. I used to defend him to my mom. No, Mom, he was late, but he was really excited to be here. Then we switched, and she stood up for him. He does what he can, Jason, and at the end of the day, he is your father. Now we tried not to mention him.
“No, nothing. And it’s getting kinda tight, Mom.”
“Don’t worry, babe. It’s gonna work out. It’s all gonna work out.” Pause, then back to the wind-down. “And I do love you, J.”
In December, when she first went to Florida, the wind-down included promises of when she was coming back or how we’d all live together again. That had quietly disappeared, like all those promises of summer camps and dogs and vacations and even, in the crazed grip of some Al scheme two years ago, a promise to buy me a car.
“I love you, too, Mom.”
“Let’s talk soon, OK?” As if I hadn’t been returning her calls.
“Yeah, definitely. Take care of yourself, Mom.”
“You too, babe. Bye-bye.”
My drunk mom, a thousand miles away, hangs up after not speaking to me for three weeks, and what’s my feeling? Sorrow? Anger? Loneliness? No, relief. She’s not here. Her bullshit and her boyfriend’s bullshit are not in the house with me, and I’m free to do what I want for the rest of the night.
Except that Meili arrived five minutes later.
“Knock, knock!” she yelled, trying to open the door, which was, of course, double bolted. “DJ Esmerelda is here!”
I opened the door to Meili and Stephen Morse. Stephen (Stevie in grade school, Steve in middle school, and now Stephen) was a tall, big-eyed kid I sort of knew. We’d played on the same tee-ball team. I remember doing a history project with him in eighth grade and thinking: this kid is so nice to everyone. That hadn’t lasted into high school.
“Hey, Bug. Here for the gear,” Meili said, waiting for me to let her in.
“Hey, Jason,” Stephen said, fake-smiling, as he always did, though I think he liked me.
“Hi. Um, yeah, I don’t have it. Sorry.” I blocked the door. Couldn’t let them walk in and see the pathetic state of my life.
I liked living in chaos. No one could say anything about my house. It was mine. The crappiness was my crappiness. But that depended on one thing: if I cared about your opinion, you couldn’t see it.
“’K.” Meili paused, reading my face for clues. “Can you get it?”
“No, I’m busy. Sorry.” I was letting her down, proving myself. Why didn’t I feel righteous?
Stephen was looking past me into the house. He drove here; couldn’t he get the stuff?
“Busy.” A Meili statement-question.
“Is everything alright, Jason?” Stephen asked, wide-eyed at my behavior and what he could see of my living room.
I ducked inside, grabbed the envelope out of my bag, and hustled back. “Yeah. What do you mean?”
“I mean…” Stephen waved his hand at the barren and trashed living room.
I handed the envelope with the cash to Meili, but I talked to Stephen. “I’m fine. I’m … there’s stuff … there’s someone here. That’s all.” What? Where the hell did that come from?
“Ooooooh. ’K. Bit awkward.” Meili’s eyes widened, and she grabbed the envelope. “We’ll have our little DJ session somewhere else, then. Ta.”
Stephen waved halfheartedly, said, “OK,” and walked after her.
Crap. What had I done?
“Hey,” I called out. “I would love to hear your music, though. You know, soon.” Jesus.
Meili’s face as she turned around said: Don’t you dare fucking pity me. Ever.
I didn’t like it in the moment, but that was a good face. I support that face.
I fucking agree with that face.
SIX
The next day I cut school. Because screw it. Because sitting in the Rubber Room was no more educational than sitting at home. Because I should scrounge gas money and try to get to Florida. Because I didn’t want to face Meili.
But it turned out sitting at home, not going to Florida, and not facing Meili was worse. Daytime TV goes from Excitement of Playing Hooky to Depressed Confusion of Person with No Life in three shows. At 2:30, I was outside the rear door of the school, the one Meili and I used so we remained “segregated from the general student population.”
Students rushed out the front doors into buses and cars. At 2:50, our door popped open. I stood up and nearly bumped into Meili.
“You’re a bit late, aren’t you?” she said, unfazed. Always unfazed. “’Fraid the Rubber Room’s closed.”
“Yeah, I wanted to tell you…” What? “I’m sorry about yesterday.”
She shifted her book-filled bag to her other shoulder. “Christ, leave it go. You’re being awkward. It’s nothing to do with me.”
The parking lot was clogged with people trying to exit and people cruising. Honking and counter-honking. Sammy the security guard was on the move, ordering cars to “get the hell out.”
“No, I was … I was in a weird mood. There wasn’t anyone there.”
She dropped her bag. “Please. Don’t do that, OK? Don’t lie. You can be a freak and an arsehole and that’s fine, but don’t fucking lie to me. I can’t abide lying fucking liars.”
Somewhere in that sentence was a clue, a ping from the black box of Meili. In the moment, I was too flustered to hear it.
“I’m not lying. I mean, I did lie. Yesterday. No one was there, I just didn’t want you to come in and see my house and how messed up it is.”
“Really? You hadn’t tidied up? Curtains don’t match the sofa, that sort of thing?”
The gridlock eased as Sammy waved a long line of cars onto the road. Kids yelled out plan
s to meet at Stewart’s or Redi-Mart or some other boring-ass place.
“Seriously, Melissa, it’s bad. My whole situation is bad.”
“A bad situation? Wow, I can’t possibly imagine. Mine is so ideal.”
“You’re the fanciest person I know, OK? And my life right now is pretty messed up.”
“I’m fancy? The fuck are you talking about?” That wasn’t what I wanted to say. Ugh. Finally, she said, “I should go.”
“No,” I said. “Listen. I live alone. My mom’s a drunk and some other things, too. She got into trouble, and she left. Her and her sketchy boyfriend went to Florida five months ago to get clean.” After the fire, before the Rubber Room. “So I’m living alone. I don’t have money. I do eat cold macaroni and cheese. And if the court knew about all this, I’d be in jail.”
She didn’t physically step back, but her eyes did. “It’s quite lovely, you know.”
“What?”
“Florida. It’s gorgeous. I was down on the little islands when I was a kid, the Keys, absolutely magical. You might should take a trip.”
Here’s a difference between me and Meili: I need a certain reaction from people. Not everyone, not all the time. But if I say something real to you, acknowledge it. Meili never waited for reactions, never expected anything in conversation. She gave surprise and wanted surprise and figured the whole thing was so arbitrary and broken that expecting anything was ludicrous.
“Great. I’ll think about that.” Everything was a sick little joke to her. I got on my bike.
“What?”
“I tell you some deep, crazy shit, stuff that could get me arrested, and all you can say is: ‘Florida is lovely’?” I hoped I could start the bike without pushing it.
“If you’re looking for pity, you’re knocking on the wrong door. I don’t do pity. And in my defense, I was right about the macaroni and cheese.”
“Pity’s not the same as understanding.” I didn’t know where that came from. I didn’t know that I thought there was a difference. But there was.
Wilder Page 5
