by Gurley, Jan
Celia turned Victoria’s Secret pink, and tried to look like she was ignoring him by chewing on her cuticles.
Bianca said, “So we wanted to talk to you guys about this weekend. There’s a big Uni party, one of those huge all-comers kind of events, and ‘Sander’s hosting it.” Bianca turned to me, as if I somehow knew what she was talking about. “You know Lysander, the skinny guy on the football team?”
I remembered him, but I still didn’t have a clue where the three of them were going with this. The whole thing sounded to me like a serious opportunity for Drew to end up in jail, for real this time, since his 18th birthday was tomorrow.
“Sander’s throwing the party for Drew’s birthday and, well, we want you all to come.”
The silence was so profound, we could hear students 1.5 acres away, the breeze shifting their blurred chatter louder and softer the way branches sway in the wind.
Into the silence, Alex and Robin exchanged a look. It was backward hat and baggy surf shorts day, but Alex alone wore lipstick.
“Even us?” said Alex.
Seeing the mingled horror and nakedly painful desire to be accepted on their faces, I realized then that all the Greenbacks were having a run-for-the-hills panic. Each one was thinking about what it would look like.
At a party like that, forget conversation, or mingling, we’d be rejected on sight. It was one thing to crash a sort-of school event like a Leadership dance. But crashing a private Uni party where “your type” clearly wasn’t welcome was a different type of social-disaster altogether. We Greenbacks were Goodwill shoppers, flea market raiders, and boys’-department purchasers — people grateful for hand-me-downs. As far as Uni was concerned, we were practically dumpster divers.
It was clear from the looks being exchanged that everyone thought this was a hideous idea, but no one wanted to be the one to say why. But no one wanted to say what needed to be said to Bianca and Drew, especially not in front of Celia. No one wanted to refuse to celebrate Drew’s birthday. I could see from the embarrassed looks on faces that everyone was even a little angry that Bianca and Drew ought to know better than this.
Silence grew longer and more uncomfortable, like dead air on a radio station. I mean, who wants to have to say that? Sorry, but your friends are evil. Sorry, but we’re freaks and dweebs.
I realized all the Greenbacks were staring across the clearing at me with pleading eyes. What else could I do, but try to help? I stood and said, my eyes glued to the base of the stump where Bianca and Drew sat, my face a stinging red, “That’s really kind, but…see…”
“Yes?” Drew interrupted. He’d swiveled around and his voice held a hint of aggressiveness, and his eyes sparked with a look of mischief I’d seen in Bianca before, and it suddenly made them look a lot alike, for the first time.
My Early Warning System went pingpingping and I narrowed my eyes. “You’ve got something up your sleeve.”
He leaned back on his arms, too casual. “Bianca and I are kind of sick of the same-old, same-old Uni party crap. So I got this idea. Remember how you told Celia my black tee-shirt didn’t fit?”
In the group-gasp, I felt like I’d been dropped into a dunk tank. I gaped, like I was underwater and couldn’t catch my breath. Was he being mean?
He continued, like none of the emotions crashing and splashing around him existed, “Well I figured that the only way to fix that was for you to take me…shopping.”
Now all the Greenbacks had eyes that danced with Bianca-level mischief. “Shopping?” I squeaked.
“For something more like, you know, what you guys wear. Besides, going to parties wearing nothing but the same boring polo shirts that my mom buys gets old.” He turned to Tio, “Am I right, or am I right?”
Tio looked like he’d been dropped in the dunk tank too. When had anyone ever consulted Tio — the perpetual boys’ department prisoner — on the miseries of having to go to endless parties in expensive clothes?
Bianca said to the stunned Greenbacks, “Remember I asked you guys about your Saturday work schedules?” There was a roaring in my ears as I realized that the two of them had been planning this for a long time. “Well, I was wondering, as a favor to me, Alex, if you and Robin would take me shopping? I know you both get off early enough to do it? I’m really sick of my mom taking me to the same two places and criticizing everything I like.” Bianca twinkled at Alex and Robin, “But now she’s so happy with Drew and all you guys that she’s unclenched the coin-purse and she’s giving us each some money to shop. But only if we take you guys with us. Will you do me a favor and take me? Please?”
Alex and Robin, from their faces, had ker-splashed, joining me and Tio in the dunk. They were barely able to make twin, bobble-headed nods.
Then I saw it, a possible reprieve, a way to climb out of this embarrassment. “Work.” I squeaked, and wondered what was wrong with my voice. “I can’t do it! I have to work.”
A huge wave of relief flooded over me. The only thing possibly worse than being sleazed by carloads of boys at Dino-Dog, was taking Drew (gulp) shopping.
Alone. Just the two of us. At my almost-dumpster-diving stores.
Drew stood, and actually stretched, his fists at the base of his back. He said, like he had all the time in the world, “Well, we already got you off work early. Your shift ends at one.”
“But, but, there’s no one to cover at this late date, not on a Saturday afternoon.”
“Sure there is,” Drew said, his voice had a weird edge to it — laughter or threat, I couldn’t tell which — as he emphasized, “Isn’t there, Celia?”
The entire Greenbacks crew gaped.
Celia said, “What? If Kate can do it, it can’t be that hard.”
I sputtered, “There’s, there’s…there’s no way!”
Celia gave me a sneer. “You don’t have to look so shocked. Slap hotdog in a bun — even an idiot could do it. At first, I thought I could use the experience for an article some day. You know, without actually having to get a job. But then I found out how boring the whole thing is, so oh well.” She looked at us like she wasn’t the least surprised that our lives were, once again, too pathetic to benefit her in any way. She gave a shrug. “Besides, the Dog swore this would be it.” She wagged a finger at him. “And I’m holding you to that, you hear? And it’s already arranged. I got the shift change approved by,” here, her bravado faltered and she swallowed hard, “Mister Gremio.”
CHAPTER NINE
Clothes By The Pound
Chapter 9
Did you ever see those laboratory electric-blue spheres in old Frankenstein movies? The ones that crackle and shiver and crawl with electricity, buzzing and threatening to explode? Well, that was me, Friday night. My nerves could have lit a small midwestern town.
For a month.
“Mom? That Mrs. Bullard? You know her?” My voice went too high, like a little kid who wants to ask for a favor.
“Yes, dear?” I could tell from the way she looked at me that I’d already flubbed it. Her guard was up.
“Do you guys…talk about…stuff?”
My mother smiled a pressed-lip smile. “We have firm opinions about mah-jongg, as you might expect. And Eileen is, well, let’s just say she’s a strong-willed woman.”
If there was an Olympic event for strong-willed women, my mother would be a gold-medalist in the heavy-weight division. No one could lift and jerk an opinion faster, or follow it through harder, than my mom. Which, when you think about it, made her calling Eileen Bullard ‘strong-willed’ kind of scary.
I scratched at the dried sauce on the edge of a pan, bending my head toward it like I needed a closer look. “So you know? About this party? Tomorrow?”
“Oh, we have better things to talk about than the details of every kid’s social life, but, yes, I heard Eileen had some idea…let’s see, what was it? Oh yes. I heard you and your friends might be there.”
I dropped the pan on the counter and there was a prolonged kah-whing as it spun t
o silence.
“Mom! How could you!”
She turned too-innocent eyes to me, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What is it you think I did?”
I had no idea, but I had a sudden need to blame her for it all. “You- you- you know I can’t go to that party!”
She frowned at me. “Is this some code? Drugs? Alcohol? Back-room sex?”
I gaped at her. “NO! Mom!”
She picked up the sponge and wiped the counter with wide, slow swipes. “My understanding — from Eileen, you understand — is that Lysander’s parents are pretty good at supervision.”
“YOU DID! You did talk about it! You KNOW I can’t be there! WHY can’t you forbid me when I want you to?”
She dried the pan and replaced it on the counter. “You’re almost grown, Katharine. If you don’t want to go, don’t go.” She walked across the room, turning to say before she slid through the door to her bedroom, “Besides, I don’t understand what the big deal is. After all, they’re just kids.”
I had to resist the urge to slam the pan against my forehead.
Repeatedly.
***
I had two hours to cover Dino-Dog before Celia was supposed to arrive.
There was a part of me that still didn’t really believe Celia had arranged to take my shift. But the last of that hope died when, fifteen minutes into my shift, Gremio clabbered out of thin air beside me. He held up a still-creased-from-the-packet Dino-Dog polyester neon-yellow sack shirt. “What do you think?” he said, his voice thin with anxiety. “Too big?”
Four of Celia could wear that shirt. Without bumping into each other.
“Um, yeah.”
He sputtered and evaporated, the way a water droplet does when it hits a hot grill.
Fifteen minutes later, in a breeze-shifted cloud of hot-dog steam, he gelatinized beside me. He held another new shirt, both arms spread to lift it. “Better?” he asked, daring me to disagree.
It seemed physically impossible, but he somehow managed to find an even bigger one. “Don’t you have anything that’s not, well, pup-tent sized?”
He blinked at me. “You’re right. She’s so dainty.”
Ew. About Celia? Did he just say dainty? And who says dainty any more? How old was he anyway?
Then he looked at me, and said, “Celia’s not at all like the rest of you employees.”
I tucked an elbow at my waist, fly-swatter raised, “Don’t you dare,” I said. “One more comment about my size and I’ll…”
He looked stricken, then said, “I’ll just…skedaddle.”
Skedaddle?
In eighteen minutes he was back. He lifted the same neon-yellow pup-tent and said, “What do you think? I can’t change the size. About the name-tag, I mean?” He had to use his head to shift the folds of cloth aside so his face could peek out to see my reaction.
Gremio had stuck a paper “Hello! My Name Is:” label to the massive chest-pocket of the pup-tent.
“I don’t have time to get it embroidered with her name,” he said, by way of explanation.
Okay, the girl was working one measly four hour shift, and Gremio, king of cheapness, wanted to embroider a uniform with her name. It was unbelievable. She definitely wasn’t that cute. Or charming. Was she? I took a deep breath and decided to ignore the issue.
Why? Well, frankly, I never thought Celia would show. Which meant that when it came to the idea of shopping with Drew, a little part of me hadn’t really, truly panicked yet, because, when Celia didn’t appear, I’d tell Drew to head off and buy clothes alone because I couldn’t leave work.
Which means Gremio was working himself into a chili-stew for no good reason, and I could just play along. He would learn the hard way that Celia was not to be trusted. I considered the paper-name-label issue in front of me.
“Uh, well, for one thing, won’t that label end up in her armpit. The way it is now, I mean?”
He dissolved into the back room again.
Seven minutes later, I knew he was behind me because the air shifted as he lifted the pup-tent again, the flapping fabric creating a breeze.
His face curdled with anxiety, “Better?” he asked.
The “Hello! My Name Is:” label now had curled edges. He’d pulled it off and stuck it on repeatedly, so that there were fainter and fainter rectangles of adhesive scattered all over the left chest area of the pup-tent. Clearly, Gremio had stood in front of his mirror, pretending to be Celia, trying to locate some imaginary target with the sticker.
The rectangles of adhesive were already darkening in the grease-steam.
As we stared, and as I tried to think of what to say, the Hello! My Name Is: tag did the only sensible thing. It let go and threw itself to a boiling, greasy death.
I picked the limp paper carcass out of the gray water with my tongs, ink bleeding off it.
Gremio swelled with horror until his face threatened to hotdog-split.
I wiped a hand down the edge of my already-greasy sack-shirt. “It’s just as well,” I said, trying to make him feel better, “this way, on the next one, you can spell her name right.”
Twelve fifty arrived. I had to ask Gremio to step back four times in a row as I served.
The fourth time, he gave this ack sound, like he’d choked on a hotdog, and I looked up.
Celia pulled into the lot, driving a sparkling-new Audi two-door convertible sports car. She parked front and center, opened the door, stretched one bare leg after the other to the pavement, tossed her bag in the backseat and walked toward us. She wore a silk camisole that, alone, cost four times more than she could make working a forty-hour week at the Dino-Dog.
I said, “Hey, you can’t park there. That’s for customers — ow OW!” Gremio was slapping me on the shoulder. I turned and glared at him. “That’s what you told me during orientation.”
He narrow-eyed me quiet.
I narrow-eyed him right back, because a thought too horrible for words had just occurred to me. “You are not going to be creepy around her, are you?” I hissed. “If you flirt with her, if you get the hots for her, that would be so…so…okay, wait a second, I feel spit-up in the back of my throat.” I flapped hands in front of my face, waiting for the sensation to pass.
Gremio looked as shocked as if I’d hit him in the face with a raw pork shoulder. Then he flushed a dark, boiled, red and lowered his head at me, spluttering his outrage. “I’ll have you know, there are quality people like her — people who should be honored and respected. Ladies — that’s what they are. And then there some people who need mandatory drug-testing.”
“Sorry I’m a couple of minutes late,” Celia interrupted, “Would you believe it, my manicure wouldn’t set. Louisa had to get the dryer. Who knew there was a different drying time for different brands?” Her smile seemed to freeze, and she gave a sniff. “What’s that smell?”
I said, “I’ll leave you to it.”
“Drew says he’ll pick you up at home in thirty minutes. Something about you needing time to…what is that smell?” Unbeknownst to Celia, as she spoke, her silk camisole broke out in grease splotches from the steam, like some lethal allergic reaction.
Gremio smoothed and patted his embroidered Manager name on his chest, waiting to get her attention. Tucked under his arm were the diseased-looking pup-tent with a new “Hello! My Name Is:” nametag attached (dead-center) and an equally super-sized paper hotdog-shaped hat.
I almost felt sorry for her.
I scrabbled under the counter, trying to drag out my bag. “I’ve got to shower,” I said, “change.” I lifted my head in time to see a carload of guys wheel into the lot, shouting and guffawing.
I shoved the fly-swatter into Celia’s manicured hands. “Whatever you do,” I said, “Don’t let go of this.”
I ran from the parking lot.
***
Drew knocked on the door and my mom swung the door wide. He stood on the steps in a pair of ratty bermudas and a frayed tee-shirt. “Afternoon, Mrs. Ba
ptista,” he said.
My mom started the interrogation. “So will you two be coming back before the party starts?”
The thought had never occurred me. Before I could shout, of course we’re coming back, he said, “Nope. We’re going straight there. So what time is Kate’s curfew?”
“Oh,” my mom said airily, “any time before one.”
Can I just say — !!!!!
I’d never before had a post-midnight curfew.
With some ninja-mom hand movement, she nudged me forward and onto the top step, Drew moving backwards like they’d rehearsed the move for weeks. My mind was doing a but but but…
Olivia Baptista, that wicked, untrustworthy woman who’s supposed to be my mother, said, “Well I did say you’re nearly grown, now didn’t I, Kate?” and locked the door on me.
I actually tried the handle and heard her laughing inside.
Drew had headed to the car, a Mercedes coupe. I half-spun back and forth twice on the steps, then threw up my hands in defeat, walked over and slammed myself into the car.
He drove to the exit of our apartment compound, stopped at the intersection and turned to me. “Where to?”
I couldn’t look at him. Not at the way his bangs touched the smooth edge of his eyebrows. Not at the curve of his upper arm. Not at the groove down the side of his calf.
“This is ridiculous,” I said, “Let’s just go to the designer mall and we’ll find something nice and you can drop me by my house after so I can change for the party. There’s plenty of time for that. Mom won’t mind taking me to Sander’s and God knows I’m not going anywhere without better shoes, make-up and all that stuff.”
His face got hard like it was roughly cut from wood. “You’re going to keep me out, aren’t you, me and my sister both. Right at the edge. We’re good enough to keep you from getting you expelled, but not good enough to be allowed into your inner circle, right?”
