by Bethny Ebert
She took another hit to calm her nerves, breathing the smoke out. It looked like grey clouds, and she thought of buildings. Maybe one day she’d topple over too. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail with both hands, then let it fall to her shoulders, writing a song in her mind. Amber waves of grain, she thought to herself. Amber who? Why waving? Why grain? Everybody was so patriotic, hungry for conflict, eager to hate.
Toad the Wet Sprocket on the radio, smoke in her brain. She stared at the ground in front of her, trying to decide between two hair ties.
One of them was neon pink with thick magenta beads. She found it on the sidewalk a few weeks ago. It probably belonged to a little ghetto kid once upon a time.
The other was a light blue polka-dotted ribbon she’d snatched up while dumpster diving.
Both hair ties were equally ugly, not something you’d really want touching your hair. That was cool, though. Punks didn’t give a shit about appearances.
She sighed.
Elizabeth rolled over on her back. Like every other body part, Elizabeth’s boobs were too big for her. No matter what feminist literature Brooke forced upon her, Elizabeth’s complaints about her body were endless. It wasn’t an aesthetic thing, not really. Her boobs really were too big. They made everything difficult, even relaxing, especially in the hot September weather. The fat rolls on her back allowed for more cushioning. “Yeah, but summer especially sucks.”
Brooke examined the pink elastic band. The beads were cute, but she hated pink. It was too girly, and it clashed with her hair, the unfortunate color of a moldy old carrot. “It’s not all bad,” she said.
“Easy for you to say,” Elizabeth said. “Your house has air conditioning.”
“My house is the fucking Smithsonian,” Brooke grumbled. She hated being the product of a middle-class family. It interfered with the artistic process. Artists were born to suffer. The fact that her parents were college professors only made it more disgusting.
They were always busy with school, always taking groups of students to foreign countries, leaving her and Nick alone to house-sit. They had to dust off the old Greek stoneware, make sure the paintings didn’t get stolen in the middle of the night, tend to the upkeep of weird tatami bamboo mats. Tatami was a real bitch to clean, by the way. They couldn’t even throw house parties. Nick was too worried about breaking things.
Once a week, Grandma Roche called to check in on them. Grandma Roche was the technical long-distance landlord of the house, renting to her favorite daughter and her family, but whether it was out of family obligation or a love of money, Brooke couldn’t say. She just knew Grandma Roche always phoned them up whenever she planned to get in trouble.
Elizabeth groaned. “I need air conditioning.”
Trevor walked in just then, rolling a cigarette. He kicked affectionately at Elizabeth’s pudgy leg. “You need a gastric bypass operation.”
“Oh, shut up,” Brooke said. “At least Elizabeth’s not made of hair gel.”
Trevor touched his shellacked-back, crunchy dark-blonde locks. He was pretty good-looking, actually, but his attitude ruined it. He set his lips in a flat line, thinking. “You know, I bet if we book a few more concerts and set up a donation jar, we could afford an air conditioner.”
“Yes!” Elizabeth threw her hands in the air. Finally, she could be cool.
Brooke looked at them, then at the light blue hair ribbon. “I think Pete at Smelly’s Tavern is looking for musicians. And there’s another Battle of the Bands coming up.”
“Nice,” Trevor said.
“Will Parker be allowed in?” Elizabeth said.
“It should be fine,” Brooke said. “They don’t have age restrictions for performers, you know that. And anyway, Parker doesn’t really drink.”
“I think he and Nick are so cute together,” Elizabeth said.
Brooke was quiet. Comments like that were unnecessary. What did that word mean anyway, cute? It bugged her. Everybody thought being cute was so important, but really it was just another useless capitalist requirement. Insecure people were good for the economy.
The hair ties bugged her too. Maybe she should just wear her hair down. “Non sequitur por nada, machisima. Por quoi? No me gusta. Dak dak dak dak dak.”
Elizabeth and Trevor exchanged looks.
Keeping secrets stressed Brooke out. Acting weird and crazy was her only reprieve.
The world was a mean place. People started nasty rumors about the O’Doole siblings. Nick got beat up a few times, and then she had to fuck them up herself since he wouldn’t fight back. Only punches, nothing that bad. A bloody nose here and there to prove her point. He was such a pacifist. In retaliation, somebody wrote up a bunch of graffiti about her. Her reputation never recovered.
She put most of her anger into writing songs for Deathskull Bombshell. Lucky for them, abrasive lyrics were in these days.
Sometimes when her parents were gone she would take a ball-peen hammer to glass wine bottles in the backyard. It felt good to smash things. Nobody ever talked about it.
Elizabeth spoke first. “You know I have no idea what you just said, right?”
“You’re too smart for us,” Trevor joked. He scratched behind his ear, grinning in a weird way she didn’t recognize, jiggling his foot. He seemed really hyper all of a sudden.
“What?” Brooke asked. “I am not. It’s called linguistic blurring. People do that when they want to speak in code.”
“What’s the point in speaking in code if nobody knows what you’re saying?” Elizabeth asked.
“Because Jesus.”
Elizabeth sighed. “You and your atheism.”
“I think my atheism is quite nice, actually,” Brooke said, crossing her arms. She fluffed her hair. Yeah, no hair ties today. Punk ideology didn’t necessitate head lice.
They were silent for a while, listening to Toad the Wet Sprocket. Good chill-out music. She missed the nineties sometimes. Everything was so simple before the attacks.
“Have you ever read Kafka?” Trevor asked her.
“I don’t believe I have.”
“I have a copy of Parables and Paradoxes upstairs.”
Brooke stared at him. Was Trevor hitting on her? They were in a band together. She was his sister’s best friend, for fuck’s sake. He’d never hit on her before. Why start now?
“Oh, shit, the frying pan!” Elizabeth yelled, shooting straight up into the air like someone stuck a fork in her. She grabbed Brooke’s arm and dragged her into the kitchen, running. An omelet, left unsupervised on the stove, fried to a crisp. It smoked with heat, smelly and burnt.
“Whoops,” Brooke said. She smiled.
Elizabeth rolled her eyes, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Here,” she said, handing Brooke a paring knife and a few jalapeño peppers from the fridge. “Make yourself useful.” She grabbed the egg carton and a new frying pan, prepping for another omelet. “We gotta stay in the kitchen for this one, okay? I don’t want to start any fires today.”
Brooke rolled her eyes and got to work.
Cockblocker.
Chapter nine
January 2009
“I just feel so useless,” Corey said, half-asleep in my room. The January sun shone dark through the Saran-wrap. I had to tape Saran-wrap over every window so my mom wouldn’t complain about the cold.
I ran a hand through her hair, but it was too greasy, so I settled for petting her head. I wiped the grease on my pants, hoping she didn’t notice.
She wasn’t useless. If anything, I was useless.
Corey was tough. She knew everything. She’d lived in the ghetto since elementary school, could instantly form friendships with perfect strangers, a total chameleon. She was punk in all the right ways, educated, a fan of both seventies glam and nineties alternative, but she knew enough not to be too openly weird, a crime that got you targeted in the ghetto. Any sign of excessive luxury, especially from a white girl, led to street harassment and eventual mugging attempts. Corey kept her hea
d down, wasn’t racist or judgmental, heard enough of everybody’s business but never repeated anything, having few people to repeat it to.
More than that, she just didn’t care.
Engineering school kept her busy and out of trouble. My father often used her as an example with me, in his rants about how I should be more motivated. Look at your girlfriend, he liked to say. She’s capable.
Sometimes I thought he liked her better than me.
“You’re doing just fine,” I murmured into her shoulder, kissing her cheek.
She rolled over, clutching her belly. “I look like a whale.”
“You look beautiful,” I lied. She looked tired and angry. Her hair was stringy. She hated shampooing and showering, couldn’t stand the sight of her body in the mirror. I kept waiting for the pregnancy glow to kick in so she could feel fuzzy and maternal, but so far, nothing.
I felt like a doctor sometimes, looking for a heartbeat in a dying patient.
“A big, beautiful whale.” She closed her eyes, falling asleep. I wished I had the money for a real house, not a lease on my mom’s basement.
We weren’t even married yet. My mom kept bugging me. Her mom kept bugging her. It was a maternal conspiracy. At least we could agree not to marry each other.
She started snoring, and I felt her tense body start to relax. I smiled, knowing there’d be drool crusted on my arm when we both woke up.
Maybe I’d be an okay dad after all.
Chapter ten
October 2010
“Man, I can’t believe your sister’s coming to visit,” Parker said from his old flannel-lined sleeping bag on the floor. A few feet away, Nick lay in another sleeping bag, curled up like a fat caterpillar.
Even though they lived together, they always had the same argument about where to sleep. Neither of them wanted to be the asshole who slept in the bed while the other one had to sleep on the floor. And they both had twin mattresses. Sleeping in the same bed was impossible. It always ended with both of them on the floor. Separate sleeping bags. Like one of those old-school television sitcoms where nobody fucks.
He felt like an old maid.
They’d slept a dozen places together over the years. Couches, floors, tents, even in the back of a pick-up truck a few times back when Parker and his dad were fighting.
But they’d never fucked, not once.
At least Nick kept his bedroom floor clean. One of the perks of having a boyfriend with OCD. And it wasn’t like they’d never made out. At least there was that.
“I can’t believe you tried to win a date with her,” Nick said.
Parker snickered, hugging his pillow. “Had to get Austin to step his game up,” he said. “I never seen a guy more motivated to win at Tekken. He almost looked happy.”
“You let him win?” Nick asked.
“I don’t remember. I was drunk.”
“Dude, you had one beer,” Nick said, shaking his head.
“Meh, well, he won, I didn’t. Your sister’s safe from my dirty man-meat.”
“Oh, well, that’s comforting,” Nick said. He half-smiled, gazing up at the ceiling, then glanced over at Parker. “Seriously, man. It’s not that dirty.”
“How would you know? You’ve never seen it,” Parker said. “I could be covered in diseases for all you know.”
“Whatever,” Nick said. “You haven’t slept with anyone either, so I doubt you have diseases. At least no sexually transmitted ones.” He frowned, taking his glasses off and folding them next to his pillow. “You don’t have a crush on my sister, do you?”
Parker looked at the ceiling. He scratched the back of his head and narrowed his eyes, pretending to think. Of course he didn’t. Brooke was too female. But something had got into him tonight, and he felt like being contrary.
He yawned, stretching out his arms.
Nick crossed his arms, waiting for a response.
Parker didn’t say anything. He looked out the window, contemplating. It was kind of nice to have control of something.
A full minute passed.
“Well… she does look like you,” Parker said.
Nick threw a pillow at him. It sailed past, landing near the bookshelf instead.
“You suck. Learn to throw.” Parker threw the pillow back at him.
Nick climbed on top of Parker and hit him with the pillow a few times, soft hits. “Take that back.”
“Bastard,” Parker said from underneath him.
Nick hit him with the pillow again.
“Homo,” Parker said.
Another hit.
“Butt-head. God, you’re a jerk. Ow.” He lay there anyway. He kind of liked it.
Nick held the pillow above his head, ready to attack again. The weight of his pelvis was heavy on top of Parker’s. Parker swung his leg up, kicking Nick in the head, and Nick grabbed his foot, leaning into his face. His toothpaste-scented breath came in short, hot gasps.
A siren went on from outside, and they hushed up, holding their breaths. Nick had an irrational fear of policemen. The uniforms freaked him out, he said, you never knew how often they did laundry.
Maybe this was it. You couldn’t expect consent, you had to ask these days, but they’d been going out long enough. It was a beautiful night. The world stretched before them.
Maybe maybe maybe maybe.
They glared into each other’s eyes, daring the other to continue. Parker’s blood pumped hot through his chest. Everything buzzed through his body, while outside the sirens wailed.
A drunk man slurred together a string of obscenities as one woman sobbed and another woman yelled. The smash of breaking dishes. A baby started crying. A few more people showed up, and the fighting increased in volume. The red and blue police lights flickered on and off.
Fucking ghetto. Parker hated the neighbors and their bullshit arguments. It was fine when he was a kid and didn’t know any better. Most of his neighbors were rednecks back then, but gentrification happened over the years. Lately it seemed like everyone was armed and on drugs. If the rent wasn’t so cheap, he’d get the fuck out, faster than anything.
Nick tossed the pillow aside and flung his shirt off, pulling Parker’s body close. Their stomachs pressed together, warming each other despite the cold autumn air that blew in through the window. He could feel Nick’s erection through the soft fabric of his pajama pants, hard against his thigh.
The sirens were a few blocks away by now. The rubberneckers were probably gone, but it was hard to know, really. You were never alone in the sticks.
Sticks, ghetto. It was all the same, anyway. Too much Midwestern weirdness, well-meaning religious folk and nosy crack addicts crammed in the same small studio efficiencies and duplexes. Their house was one of the few that hadn’t been paved over to make room.
Parker waited there, breathing hard in the dark, his pulse racing like a rabbit, waiting for any sort of sign from Nick, whether he should keep going or give pause, erring on the side of conscientiousness.
No luck. All quiet.
Whatever. Fine. Parker lifted his face up, fearless, about to go in for the kiss.
Nick began to cough violently. He rolled off Parker and sat up, hacking and wheezing. Parker patted his back until he calmed down. Poor guy.
“My heart’s trying to kill me,” Nick complained. He massaged his throat, looking annoyed.
Parker leaned back in his sleeping bag, trying to calm down. Well, fuck. He should have been a woman. They were so lucky, no boners.
“I’m going to bed.” Nick got back into his own sleeping bag and rolled over on his side, away from him.
A few hours passed. He listened to Nick’s breath, ragged in his throat. Sometimes he worried Nick would die in the middle of the night. He’d read stories about guys with bad lungs. Sometimes they just died.
Well, everybody died, that was part of it.
Suppose Nick died. Then he’d be all alone.
Parker remembered reading someplace that otters slept in the water, h
olding paws. They did that so the other otter wouldn’t float away in the middle of the night. He felt like that. Nick was, like, his other otter and he had to protect him from death. Maybe it was an arrogant thought, but it wasn’t wrong. Not really.
The tree outside looked like a skeleton, black bony fingers tapping on the glass.
He shivered in the cold October. The window was open a crack, and the breeze blew in, fierce and cold. His thoughts freaked him out, trapping him with dire repetition.
All he wanted was to screw his boyfriend.
Either that or get some sleep.
He looked over at Nick. The moonlight shone on his face and hair. Even asleep, he looked worried.
“Are you awake?” Nick murmured.
Parker hesitated. “Maybe,” he said quietly.
He looked out the window again.
The glowing moon shushed him. It’s not even Halloween yet, the moon said, stop being so creepy.
True. He was probably too romantic.
Parker heard the sound of a sleeping bag, slowly unzipping. A pair of hands grabbed him in the darkness, messing up his hair, scratching up and down his back. Nick kissed him, over and over. Parker moaned into his mouth. He didn’t try to. It just happened.
Nick pulled a fistful of his hair and bit his ear. Parker dug his nails into Nick’s back. He moved his hips, arched his back. Everything moved really fast. His head kept banging into the floor.
It was a crazy sort of affection they had with each other. Not unkind. Just crazy.
After waiting for so long, it was confusing. His body felt hot. He knew Nick wouldn’t make fun of him if he fucked up, but his hands felt clumsy. Shaky. The condom felt sopping wet and slippery in his hands, like a fish, and he dropped it on the floor.
“Use another one,” Nick whispered, panting. “The box is over by the bookshelf.”
Parker raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Dude. I don’t want dust bunnies and specs of dirt contaminating my penis. Do you know how many diseases the average bedroom floor has? There could be cockroach eggs, mouse crap… I could get salmonella and die.”
