When Everything Feels like the Movies (Governor General's Literary Award winner, Children's Literature)

by Raziel Reid

“I’m sure your dad taught you well.”

  “Fuck you. Kiss me. I just want to make sure I’m good at it.”

  “Of course you’re good at it. Amongst other things. It says so in every stall in the boys’ room.”

  “I really like Trey, I think he could be more than just, like, you know, some thing. I think he could really be something.”

  “I’m sure his girlfriend agrees completely.”

  “She’s a tramp. She has bigger boobs than me, but that’s just because she’s on the pill. Please?”

  “Okay, fine,” I shrugged. “Why not?”

  I turned to face her, and we were about to do it, but I hesitated. “I’ve never kissed a girl,” I said.

  “Oh, as if! You kiss yourself in the mirror every day.” She laughed and grabbed the back of my head. Before I knew it, lipstick and vodka were smeared on my lips, and her tongue was tied around mine.

  “So?” She asked when we pulled away.

  “You kiss like in the movies,” I said, and she seemed satisfied. But it wasn’t a compliment.

  Angela kissed like she had to.

  We left the schoolyard and walked to the party, passing the vodka bottle back and forth. When we arrived at Luke’s house, Angela stopped at the front door and started talking to a couple of guys who were smoking on the steps. I crossed my arms because I thought that if I didn’t, I’d jump out of my skin. I looked inside; there were so many people I could barely see past the welcome mat. Angela took my arm, and because she was jail-bait in a tube-top, the crowd parted like the Red Sea for Moses.

  I spotted Luke right away. He was standing with a group of people making a pyramid out of beer cans on the kitchen counter. When I turned to say something to Angela, she was gone—probably already in one of the bedrooms. Some drunk girl I had never seen before hugged me like we were best friends and gave me her beer before stumbling off. It was mostly spit, but I drank it anyway. I didn’t want Luke to see me so I went down to the basement where the stoners were sitting around the couch taking bong hoots while Labyrinth played silently on the TV. Even Hoggle was killing fairies. I finished the beer standing against the wall like a flower, trying not to think of Luke, because the last thing I needed was to be a flower with a stem. I already wanted to leave the party, but I couldn’t move, so I watched David Bowie light up the big screen like a glitter god. Although he had nothing on Jobriath.

  Alexis came out of the bathroom with a couple of girls acting more coked out than they really were. They started dirty dancing. Alexis threw her head back and forth like she was filming a music video on YouTube that would ask you to prove your age before you could view it. She gave me a dirty look and laughed with her friends, who were all wearing the same American Apparel tank tops in different colours.

  I had to get out of there, the set was haunted. The party was unbearable. I went to find Angela and tell her that I was leaving, or else needed all of her mom’s dolls so that I could at least pretend I was Jareth. It had been a mistake for me to come. This trashy teen drama wasn’t challenging enough. I was a true actor, an artist. Not just some coked-out Disney princess with an Electra complex. Vanity Fair even said so.

  While I was looking for Angela, I noticed Luke’s family portrait hanging on the wall. You could tell his dad probably looked just like Luke and Trey when he was younger. They all seemed like they could throw a ball really far, enjoyed having their asses rimmed, and know how to skin a deer. Just then, Luke walked past without seeing me and sat on the couch. Madison stumbled over and fell into his lap. He put his arm around her, and her head rolled into the curve of his armpit, her blonde hair falling over her face.

  All I wanted was for Luke to acknowledge me, because he never would. I’d only get his attention if I demanded it like a hysterical fan trying to touch him just to prove he was alive.

  Madison gave him a sloppy kiss. Luke put his hand on her back, covering the tramp-stamp of a lily sticking out from underneath her tank top. When he pulled away, Luke looked up and almost saw me, but I dodged for the stairs.

  I looked for Angela in the bathroom, but there was just a dude passed out in the bathtub with a beer tucked under his arm. Someone had turned on the shower, and water was pouring over him, washing away the puke. I looked in the master bedroom, but there were two-and-a-half people having sex on Luke’s parents’ bed. I mean, the girl didn’t look fully conscious.

  I heard moaning coming from one of the rooms, so I put my ear to the door. It was Angela. I’d recognize that sound anywhere. It was just like that time she got alcohol poisoning. I was about to leave, but right next to Trey’s room was what had to be Luke’s bedroom door. I opened it, expecting to see someone inside, but it was empty. The room was dark and smelled like laundry detergent and Adidas cologne and his hair when it’s sweaty, like right after gym class. I stepped in without thinking, and the door closed behind me. The window was open just a crack; the room was colder than the rest of the house. I could hear screaming outside. Someone had thrown a beer bottle instead of a snowball.

  I went to his bed and turned on the nightstand lamp. He had a couple Sports Illustrated magazines in his drawer, some condoms, a guitar pick, loose change, a Snickers wrapper, and a picture of him and his brother posing next to a dead moose with rifles at their feet. Right next to the picture lay a piece of paper rolled up in an elastic band. I listened for footsteps, but I could only hear the bass of the rap music pounding through the floor.

  I unrolled the paper—it was a target. There were bullet holes through the centre that were so small, I couldn’t even fit my little finger through them. As I rolled it back up, I noticed an elementary school picture in the drawer. On the back, in messy printing, he’d written, “Luke Morris, Grade 1.” I pocketed the photo, then ran my hands across his bed and pressed my face against the sheets. They were wrinkled and covered with come stains. I was tempted to lick one, but I heard laughing from the hallway and barely had time to flick off the lamp before I saw shadows at the bottom of the door.

  I jumped into the closet right as the door opened. Luke walked in carrying Madison. I could see them through the slits in the closet door. He didn’t turn on the lights but moved through the dark and dropped her on the bed. He took off his shirt and climbed on top of her. The music downstairs was blaring so loudly, I was surprised the cops hadn’t shown up. Madison began to groan like she liked the way it hurt. And I kept watching because maybe I liked it, too. The bed started to squeak. I watched Luke’s body as he went into her, but it wasn’t like in my dreams. He started breathing heavier, but I couldn’t hear it over the music; I could just see it in the way his body moved. I clasped my hands together to stop from touching myself.

  When they were done, he got up right away and put his shirt back on, then looked around for his hat. He turned on the lamp and found it sticking out from under the bed. His face was red, and his hair was stuck to his forehead. Suddenly, the music stopped; I didn’t let myself breathe. Madison curled up on the bed with her blonde hair cascading in waves over the side.

  “Turn off the light,” she moaned.

  He flicked the switch, and everything was dark again.

  “The music stopped,” she said.

  “Yeah.” He adjusted his hat and looked right at me—right at the slits in his closet door. “Are you going to pass out?” he asked, running his hand through her sea of hair.

  “Luke?” she said in her baby voice, which I imitated when I was alone in my room.

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you love me?” she asked, and it’s a good thing the music started again because I almost choked. I don’t know what he said or if he said anything at all. She got up. I was glad it was dark and that I couldn’t see. I didn’t want to see her lipstick all over him, on his lips, his neck, his eyelids.

  When they opened the door, the room filled with light, and the music got even louder. I fell back into his dirty laundry in the closet. I wanted the smell to stay on me forever. I wanted to bottle it. I want
ed it to be my signature scent. Dirty. Strong. Unforgettable. I waited a while, then came out of the closet and stood next to his bed. The blanket was bunched, and the sheets were damp. I touched them even though they made my hands feel like they were on fire.

  I didn’t care if anyone in the hallway saw me: I walked right out. I didn’t even care if Luke and Madison were standing there, their faces still shining. I didn’t care about anything. I walked down the stairs almost tripping over my laces. I was wearing the most normal shoes I owned. My grandma bought them for me for Christmas. They were purple. She wrote “Love, Santa” on the box because that’s what she always did. She wouldn’t let me thank her for them either; it was really important to her that I believed.

  I decided to go out the back door because there was a big crowd at the front, and I didn’t want to deal with it. I wasn’t in the mood to be harassed by the fans. They always expected so much from me. I could see my breath in the air, maybe because it was so cold outside or maybe because I was so cold inside. Three guys were standing in the backyard, all wearing the bro-army uniform of hoodies, baseball caps, blue jeans, and sneakers. One of them was taking a piss on the fence, and the other two were drinking beer and sharing a joint. They stopped talking when they saw me. One squinted his eyes and the other laughed.

  “What the fuck are you?” he asked.

  He said it with such awe, it was almost flattering. I didn’t stop to wonder what it was about me that they saw. I had tried to look like everyone else, but maybe it was written all over my face. I kept walking. There was dog shit on the path. I told myself not to step in it, but I did anyway. It was like I stepped in it because I told myself not to. It was fresh, not yet frozen, and I felt it squish under my foot.

  “Hey, Brian, I think this fag wants to watch you piss. You want to see his cock, faggot?”

  Maybe it was my fury over stepping in dog shit that made me lunge at him. Or maybe it was that I did indeed want to watch Brian piss. In fact, I wanted him to piss in my mouth. I wanted to drink it. Instead, I decided to drink blood and clawed at the guy’s face, but didn’t get to do any real damage before he punched my nose, and I flew backward into the snow, miraculously missing the dog shit. The other two came after me, but I quickly got on my feet. Blood dripped from my nose, giving me red geisha lips.

  I didn’t feel the pain. I just felt the silk kimono that in my head I was wearing, with its obi trailing behind me as I ran. The wind whistling in my ears was like the strings of the shamisen. I was running for my life, but in my mind I was dancing like I was available for the night.

  11

  Train Wreck

  All the lights were off in the house when I got home, but I could see the glare from the TV flashing through the front window, lighting up Ray as he sat on the couch. I stood on the sidewalk, catching my breath, tasting blood, coming in and out of focus as the snow blew off the tree branches onto my head.

  When I walked through the front door, Ray was watching TV in the living room. Keefer was asleep on the floor, curled up without a blanket and sucking his thumb like he would sometimes, even though Ray always slapped his hand out of his mouth. My mom was at work, which is why Keefer wasn’t in bed; Ray always let Keefer fall asleep in front of the TV, just like he let him watch TV sitting so close that you could see his breath on the screen. As if Keef wasn’t brain damaged enough. My mom didn’t show until she was nearly five months pregnant, so she kept dancing. All that spinning, who could blame him for being special.

  I intended to go straight down to my room because I didn’t want Ray to see my face, but I knew he’d let Keef stay there all night, so I bent down to pick him up off the floor.

  “He’s fine,” Ray said, shifting his body because I was blocking the screen. I heard him crunching Doritos under his ass. “Leave him alone.”

  I picked Keefer up anyway and took him to his room. He didn’t wake up. That kid could sleep through anything, which was definitely his saving grace. I lay him in his bed and put the covers over him. There were toys everywhere, and his sheets were on the floor because he’d been trying to make a tent. I told him that I’d help, but I never did.

  Ray was standing next to the basement door when I walked out of Keef’s room. I felt drunk just from smelling him. You could tell Ray had been really good-looking in high school—tall, dark, and bad. You could also tell that he still thought he was good looking. But his baby blues weren’t as irresistible when they couldn’t even focus.

  “I said he was fine,” Ray said, blocking the doorway. “You just don’t listen, do you? You always have to fuss with him.” He took his calloused hand and grabbed my chin, lifting my nose to the hallway light. “What the hell happened?”

  “Don’t touch me,” I said, trying to pull away.

  “Someone put you in your place?” he asked, laughing.

  “I deserved it, huh?”

  “Your words,” he said, stepping away from the door. “Not mine.”

  I went down to my room and sat on the edge of my bed, listening to the floorboards creak as Ray walked to the bathroom. If I had really strained myself, I probably could’ve heard him scratching his balls. Then, more creaking as he walked back to the living room, rocking the floor as he sat down on the couch. He turned the volume on the TV so high that I could hear all the bad jokes on SNL.

  I ignored Stoned Hairspray, who was trying to get me to pet her, grabbed Breakfast at Tiffany’s off my bookshelf, and opened it to the back page where I kept a razor blade tucked behind the dust jacket. Angela gave it to me; she carried razors in her clutch like they were cherry ChapSticks. I never went too deep—I was too vain. I just dragged the blade down my forearm, pulling the tiny blonde hairs, then across my wrist, digging for blood diamonds.

  I fell asleep on Stoned, who was used to being my pillow. I think she knew how much I needed her. She was the only one who didn’t sell stories about me, and even if it was just because she couldn’t talk, I loved her for it. She let me cry into her fur, and when I woke up, she was still wet, as if I had kept crying in my sleep.

  I picked a glob of blood out of my nose. My face was swollen, and it was kind of hard to breathe, but I didn’t miss my sense of smell because I generally had to throw bottles of perfume against the cement walls just to get rid of the basement’s musty odour, and because I liked to pretend the walls were my personal assistants.

  I tried to cover the bruising on my nose with makeup, but it was still obvious. I kept staring at my face in the mirror. There was something about black and blue that made me feel like, well, such a man. It was a whole new role for me to play.

  I didn’t want to face everyone upstairs. I could smell the French toast my mom was making. Every once in a while, she decided to be domestic, but it never worked out; she always burned something or gave someone food poisoning. The thing with my family was that we always seemed the most abnormal when we were doing the normal things.

  I put on my biggest pair of Jackie O sunglasses and escaped through the window, texting Angela to meet me at the Day-n-Nite. When I got there, I sat in the back booth waiting for her. I kept my glasses on. I was so famous I had to go incognito.

  Brooke came over, but I didn’t order anything, I didn’t have any money. She brought me a cup of coffee anyway. Brooke could be good like that sometimes. I always wondered about her name. She just didn’t look like a Brooke. You never think a Brooke is going to be some fatty whose neck folds remind you of a vagina. You don’t think of a fifty-year-old waitress who looks like she’s never been to the dentist. You think of a Brooke as some blonde bitch in L.A. with perky tits and a phony personality, someone with a white dog named Snowball and a husband who buys her jewellery every time he cheats on her. Someone living the dream life.

  Angela was late again, so I looked out of the window at the smoke billowing over the mine. I caught a trucker staring at me through the reflection. He sat at the counter, and I turned to look at him. He smiled, chewing a burger with his mouth open. He wore
a hat and a long-sleeved flannel shirt that looked like it had never been washed. Typical Day-n-Nite trucker. He stared at me, and I let him. I don’t know if he thought I was a boy or a girl or if he even cared. I slowly took off my sunglasses and stared back into his beady eyes, looking him up and down, licking my lips. His smile got so big that I could see his cavities. He was practically panting. I started thinking about some porno my mom caught me jerking off to once, one with a perverted truck driver and some dazed and confused hitchhiker. My pants got tighter, and I felt so disgusted with myself that you’d think I’d eaten my mom’s French toast. The trucker’s smile got even bigger as he poked his tongue in his cheek, and his hands disappeared beneath the counter. I picked up my glass of water and started sucking on the straw, slipping my lips down it inch by inch until my eyes started to water. His face got red and blotchy, like he was almost there. I bit my chipped nails as he rubbed his palms on his jeans and panted.

  Then I saw Angela through the window and jumped out of the booth, knocking into the table and spilling coffee over the edge of my cup. I air-kissed the trucker as I walked past, like he was a fan. I put my glasses back on and stopped Angela before she came through the door. The trucker spun around so fast to see me leave that he almost broke the seat.

  “Where are we going?” Angela asked, pulling her arm away as I dragged her down the street. “I’m hungry!”

  “I have no money,” I said. “I tried to steal some of my mom’s tips, but she was too busy playing housewife for me to get a chance.”

  “Fuck it,” she sighed, “I have booze bloat. I shouldn’t eat anything anyway.” Angela pulled her phone from her purse to check a text and asked me, “Do you know Mikey K?”

  “The dealer?”

  “Yeah, Mike Johnson. His mom’s a vet. He has the best Special K.”

  “I prefer Cheerios.”

  “He’s at the mall. We can meet him.”

  “I don’t like Mikey. He poured a can of Pepsi over my head once.”