by Julie Murphy
It doesn’t take us long to move Saul. He has mostly clothing and a large DVD collection of B horror movies. The trickiest thing is the mattress and box spring, but with a little effort, we maneuver it in.
Afterward, we all lie spread out on Saul’s floor, because he doesn’t actually have any furniture.
Hattie corralled Tyler into helping with the promise of free food. The two of them sit with Tyler’s back against the wall and Hattie’s back against Tyler. He traces lines on her stomach absentmindedly while she closes her eyes. To be honest, I’m surprised Tyler even agreed to show up.
Ruth is lying facedown in the kitchen, pressing her body hard into the cold tile floor while Freddie is sitting beside me beneath the fan as we both beg it to spin faster. Today was another unseasonably humid day and maybe not the best day for Saul to move.
“Oh my God,” I moan. “Feed us.”
Saul pops down onto the floor like his legs are made of springs, with both his arms full of Styrofoam to-go containers. “Po’boys from Risky’s.”
Ruth crawls over and snatches a box for herself. “Mine.”
A few moments later, with my mouth full of food, I turn to Saul. “So this was sort of spur of the moment, don’t you think?” Now that I am not in need of food in a primal way, I can ask what I’ve been wondering all day. “Were you saving up for this place or something?” Every time I think I know everything there is to know about Saul, he nonchalantly strolls out a new piece of information about himself, like his life is some kind of clown car. So it’s not all that odd that he sprung this on us.
Behind Saul, Ruth raises her eyebrows and makes a face that says there’s more to this story.
“It was time,” Saul says.
“Really?” Hattie scoffs. “That’s all you’re giving us?”
“Yeah,” says Ruthie. “And don’t you wonder how he’s affording this place all by himself?”
“That’s a good point, Ruthie!” I say. “You wanna be bad cop?” I ask her.
“Y’all are so nosy.” He takes another bite of his sandwich and takes his time chewing and swallowing before setting it on the container. He pushes down on his knees and takes a deep breath. “I met someone, okay? And it’s pretty serious.”
“What!” I shout. I expected that Saul had been maybe dipping his toes into something illegal to afford this place or that his parents asked him to move out after catching him mid-hookup. But a serious relationship? That might have been the last thing I expected.
It’s silent for a moment, before Hattie asks, “So where is he?”
“On a boat.”
Ruth puts her sandwich down, and the words spill from her. “He met a roughneck over the summer and has had this huge secret relationship with him and now they’ve got their secret love bungalow or whatever and our mama is fuh-reaking out.”
Oil. Offshore drilling. It’s the fastest way to make money around here without going to college. A few weeks on the rig and then a few weeks off. It’s a sweet deal for as long as you can maintain going back and forth like that. Does a number on your social life and your body, that’s for sure. “Wait,” I say. “You’re tellin’ me this guy isn’t out or it’s some kind of secret thing y’all got going on?”
“He’s out to me?” His voice is tiny.
“Saul!” I gasp. “You’re breaking your own rules!”
“Rules?” asks Freddie. “What rules?”
The natural light in the apartment shifts as the sun begins to set, and for the first time I notice how nice this place is. It’s only a block off the coast. All the appliances are new. All the flooring is real hardwood and new tile. It’s better than any place I’ve ever called home.
I sigh. “No dating in the closet. And no long distance.”
Saul’s eyes meet mine, and there’s something in them that I recognize. He’s got this desperate yet thrilled look to him. Saul is in love. Part of me wants to hug him and tell him that some things are worth breaking the rules for. But I can’t.
I think back to Grace and how all I wanted was for someone to tell me we could make it work. Some kind of reassurance that I wasn’t setting myself up for heartbreak. I look to Saul and give the most encouraging smile I can muster. “I can’t wait to meet him.”
His face lifts. “Let me grab my phone and show y’all a picture.”
As he runs to the bedroom, Hattie turns to Ruth and says, “There’s no chance of this ending well.”
Instead of saying she’s right or wrong, I pull my knees into my chest and chew on the french fries in my to-go box. Freddie scoots close to me and touches my thigh. “You okay?” he whispers.
I nod. I want this to work for Saul. He deserves to be happy, and if he does, maybe I do too.
NINETEEN
Me, Freddie, Hattie, Dad, Saul, Agnes, and Bart are all huddled around the kitchen table and the extra card table Agnes set up to accommodate all of us in her kitchen. In true Agnes form, each table is dressed in matching tablecloths with homemade centerpieces.
Agnes clinks her knife against her wineglass. “Before Bobby”—she motions to my dad—“carves this bird, let’s go around and say what we’re each thankful for this year.”
A few weeks ago, Agnes asked me what my family did for Thanksgiving, and I told her the truth: we order pizza. Agnes, of course, was outraged and demanded we all come over for a late dinner after Dad finished up at work. So here we all are in the closest things we have to church clothes. We look like a gang of sinners at an Easter service—especially Saul in his red polyester pants and denim button-up shirt. Tonight he’s an honorary Leroux since he couldn’t get the time off work to go with Ruthie and their parents to visit the rest of their family in Florida. Or at least that’s the story he told. Really, I think his loverboy is about to have some time off the rig and he doesn’t want to miss a second of it.
It sounds bad, I know, to brush off such a major holiday with some greasy takeout. But Dad always works on Thanksgiving, and Hattie and I aren’t the type of people who are willing to cook for hours in the name of a holiday we don’t really care about. With the casino open 365 days a year, my mom’s place isn’t really an option either.
One year, though, when we were both in elementary school, and we were still making an effort to spend half our holidays and birthdays with Mom, it was her turn to have us on Thanksgiving, so she took us with her to work and left us in a corner booth at the buffet. Hattie and I ate crab legs and green Jell-O and played MASH for hours.
MASH, if you’ve never played it, is a silly game we used to play as kids. All it requires is a piece of notebook paper and a pencil. The game told us all the things we thought made an adult life. What kind of house we’d live in, how many kids we’d have, who we’d marry, and what kind of car we’d drive.
Back then it never occurred to us that those factors might be minor details when we were grown up.
But right now, all Agnes wants to know is what we are thankful for in this exact moment.
She reaches for Bart’s hand to her right. “I’ll go first. I’m thankful for this man and the adventure he’s embarked on with me. Just when I thought my journey had come to an end . . .” Her voice trails off for a moment, and her eyes are glassy and wet. “I’m just grateful for this. All of it.”
Bart’s response is as direct as his wardrobe. “My girl,” he says. “And her Freddie.”
And then it’s my turn.
I take a sip of my sparkling apple cider. I’m thankful for Hattie, even though she drives me nuts and even though her life is ballooning so quickly it’s practically edging me out of my own home. I’m thankful for my dad, even though he’s always busy and tired and working, because he’s there. Always. And I’m thankful for Freddie. His friendship has saved me bit by bit every day. It’s like I was drowning, and Freddie has slowly pulled me to the surface.
“Family, friends, and good food,” I say. It’s a generic answer that I immediately regret, but I don’t always know how to say the things
I can so clearly see in my head and feel in my heart. Freddie catches my eye from across the table, where he sits between Saul and Hattie, and gives me a wink.
My dad stands. He clasps his hands together, but then shoves them in his pockets, like he’s not sure what to do with them. “Right. I’m thankful for my girls and for this goddamn delicious deep-fried bird.”
He’s right. The turkey smells amazing.
Down South we don’t cook turkeys for hours until they’re dry and the only way to salvage them is with gallons of gravy. Most every household slathers their bird in Cajun spices and dunks it in a deep fryer in the backyard for thirty minutes. Granted, the tradition has been known to cause a house fire every now and again, but the aroma is intoxicating enough to drive you mad. I don’t even have to touch this turkey to know the meat is going to fall right off the bone.
Next is Saul. He’s thankful for many things. “Oh my word,” he says. “The list is long, but I’ll just say reality TV, discount liquor stores, spray tans, and tourists. And boys in good jeans.”
Everyone laughs except for Bart, who nervously stares down at his empty plate like he might make food magically appear there by the sheer power of his will.
Freddie licks his bottom lip and then chews on it for a moment, like he’s thinking and doesn’t mind that everyone else is drooling for this turkey. “I’ve got lots to be grateful for,” he says. “But right now, I’d have to say Ramona.”
I can feel the heat crawling up my neck, turning my skin red. I don’t know if it’s because everyone’s looking at me or because Freddie is looking at me, but I can’t bear to make eye contact with anyone or anything except the fried turkey at the center of the table. I feel like I’ve swallowed a magic seed, causing flowers to sprout up in my belly, and now they’re swelling against my rib cage.
“I guess when we moved here—and you know this, Gram—I thought my senior year would be something I just had to get through. To survive.” I glance up long enough to see him shaking his head. “But now I’m trying to hold on to each day.”
Hattie—perfect, obnoxious Hattie—breaks the silence and says, “Freddie! You sweet son of a bitch!” And plants a fat kiss on his cheek. There are few times when I think so, but why can’t I be more like Hattie? Because I would very much like to crawl under this table and squeeze Freddie’s neck.
Hattie grins, and it’s an expression I know. She rubs her belly like a crystal ball that’s full of secrets. “I should wait until Tyler gets here from his mom’s,” she says. “But, oh, hell! I’m thankful that we’re having a baby girl!”
And in that second every last bit of attention is diverted to Hattie. I sigh as quietly as I can, the weight of being the center of attention easing from my chest. I am so thankful for her never-failing ability to steal the spotlight.
Everyone erupts into coos and squeals—even Bart grunts his approval. Dad circles the table and kisses Hattie’s forehead. His eyes are full of tears that he never allows himself to shed. “My girls,” he says. But he’s not talking about Hattie and me. This time his girls are Hattie and his future granddaughter. I’m happy for my sister. I am. But for a moment, I want to freeze us all in time and stop the world from changing.
After lots of hugs and kisses and a few tears, my dad uses Agnes’s electric knife to cut the turkey, and we all pass around an endless supply of side dishes and fixings. There’s none of that awkward politeness. And I guess it’s because we’re family. This odd little group of people—my favorite people in the world—makes up my family.
After dinner, Freddie and I volunteer to do the dishes, and we hear no protest from Saul or Hattie. As I’m tying Agnes’s apron around my waist, I notice that Freddie’s khaki pants are a smidge too short, but his butt still looks great. And I tell him so.
“Hey,” I say, and smack my hand against his backside loudly. “Those pants and your ass.” I whistle, channeling Hattie.
I love asses. Everyone’s got their thing, and mine is butts. I wish I could be classy and say I love hands or eyes or lips. But it’s asses, and for as much as I love a nice lady ass, I can appreciate a good guy ass, too.
“Well, you don’t look so rough yourself,” he says.
“Thank you,” I say, and give a twirl in my thrifted sunflower baby-doll dress. It actually looks like the kind of thing my mom might have worn when we were little.
Freddie scrubs while I load the dishwasher.
“What’s that noise?” He tilts his head and pauses.
I don’t have to check to know. “Hattie. She’s started snoring.” Which has made sleeping in my own room even more difficult than it was before. Her chain-saw-like snores drown out the football game on TV.
After we finish the dishes, we sit at the kitchen table, still in our aprons, sharing a hot toddy we convinced Bart to make for us. All around us are pies and cookies and a bowl of leftover Halloween candy that Agnes put out with the desserts in the hope of getting rid of it before Christmas.
I steal a notebook from Agnes’s junk drawer and write out MASH at the top of the page.
“MASH?” asks Freddie.
“You’ve never played MASH?”
He shakes his head.
“Well, I’m about to pop your cherry.”
“What does MASH stand for?”
“Mansion, apartment, shack, house. Okay, now give me two girls’ names.”
“People I know?”
“Doesn’t matter. People you know. Celebrities. Whatever.”
“Ruth,” he says. “And you.”
“And now I add two,” I explain. “Viv.”
“Shit. Come on, Ramona. Push the knife in a little deeper.”
“Hey,” I say, “we gotta have some real-life options. I’ll throw in Beyoncé to balance it all out.”
“Okay, I guess that’s fair.”
“Dream big, right?” I grin and write down each name. “Okay, pick two cars.”
“Easy. A Jeep Wrangler like Saul’s. Makes me feel like I’m in Jurassic Park,” he explains. “And a 1948 Chevy pickup. Like Bart’s.”
I nod as I write them down. “And I choose a Winnebago and a Mary Kay pink Lincoln town car.”
“Touché.”
“And how many kids do you want?”
“Zero or two,” he says without hesitation.
I glance up as he loosens the tie around his neck—one that I can so perfectly picture Agnes buying for him. It’s navy blue with yellow-and-white stripes.
He shrugs. “What? I guess I’m kind of an all-in or not-at-all kind of guy.”
“Okay,” I say. “And I’ll go with twelve and forty-three.”
He balks at that.
“If anything, it’d prove that you’re in . . . uh, good health.”
“Okay,” he says. “Now what?”
I swivel the notebook around and hand him the pencil. “Close your eyes and draw a spiral down there at the bottom of the page.”
He does as I say, his lips splitting into a slow grin.
“Now stop.”
I count the lines in his spiral like Hattie and I would when we were kids. When we’d play MASH, I’d think of the results as this distinctly adult life that we would someday have.
But that’s not the case, because I feel like an adult now. I live at home with my dad. I’m not married. I don’t have kids, or a car even, and I won’t be eighteen until next summer, but childhood ended long ago. It seems to me that childhood ends and adult life begins the moment you stop believing your parents can rescue you. As much as I love my dad, I stopped thinking that a long time ago.
“Twenty-two,” I say.
I count to eleven starting with M for mansion and go through each category until I’ve got answers for every category. “Well,” I tell him, “you’re going to live in a mansion with zero children. You will drive a Winnebago. And you’ll be married to . . . me.” My neck does that thing again where it fills with heat.
“Let me see that.” He takes the paper from me and stud
ies it very carefully. “Well,” he finally says, “you can’t argue with science.” He takes a spider ring from the bowl of old Halloween candy, reaches across the table, and takes my hand. “Ramona Blue Leroux—wait, I don’t know your middle name.”
I pull my hand back a little, but he doesn’t let go. “I don’t have one.”
He shakes his head in disbelief. “I think that makes you soulless in some cultures. Just FYI. But whatever. Ramona Blue Leroux, will you spend the rest of your life with me in a mansion with our zero children? Till death do us part?”
“Fine, but I’m only doing it for the ring.”
He pushes the black spider ring down my finger right next to my mood ring, which is a pinky-mauve color at the moment, and finally lets go of my hand. He cradles my hand in his for one . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . five . . .
I pull back and take a sip of the hot toddy we’ve been passing back and forth. “I need some air.” I never feel awkward around Freddie, but right now I’m hyperaware of every little thing right down to my breathing.
“Yeah. Let’s go out back.”
I lead the way and plop down on the porch swing in the backyard.
Freddie sits down next to me without turning on the patio lights, and we swing together in the dark for a few minutes. I fidget with the spider ring on my finger, and even think about taking it off, but that’s dumb. Freddie was just joking, and so was I.
“You ever been flounder fishing?” I ask, searching for anything that doesn’t have to do with the future.
“No,” he says. “I’ve actually never been fishing at all.”
“What? You gotta be kidding me.”
“I guess it wasn’t really Gramps’s thing.”
“My dad used to take us before he got promoted at the hotel. Back when he had more time.” I let my toes skid along the cement as we keep swinging back and forth. “Or maybe it was that we were younger and wanted to be with him more. You know all those people you see on the beach at night in galoshes with big old flashlights and buckets? They’re fishing for flounder.”
He smiles, his teeth sparkling beneath the moonlight. “I used to think those were pixies or giant fireflies or something.”
