Way to Go

by Tom Ryan

  “Painting. Okay, I can help with that.”

  I must have looked confused, because she laughed and said, “You’re wondering who the hell I am, and why I’m here.”

  I nodded.

  “Fair enough. I’m in town for the summer to stay with my aunt, who is friends with Denise. Denise asked me if I was interested in waiting tables for the summer, and since I don’t know anybody around here, I figured, what the hell. I’ve waited tables in much fancier places than this, so it’s no big deal.”

  She tipped her coffee into the sink and then did the same with what was in the pot. “You make really shitty coffee,” she said as she set about brewing some more. “I was called out of town because there was a bit of an… issue…with my mom. It’s, well, it’s basically the same reason I’m here for the summer in the first place.” She shook her head, as if to dislodge a thought. “Long story. Anyway, I ended up coming back earlier than expected, and I figured I’d stop by to give Denise a hand.”

  “Where’s home?”

  “Home? Home is where the heart is, right?” She laughed, and I just smiled back, trying to figure out how to respond to her. “I live in New York.”

  “City? That’s cool.”

  “Yep, the Big Apple. Not that cool, though, unless you like bums and businessmen. Give me your cup. I won’t let you drink that swill.”

  On a map, New York wasn’t really all that far away from Deep Cove, but she might as well have told me she lived on Mars. It explained a lot. Her confidence, the way she talked, her clothes… She handed me a fresh cup of coffee with a flourish. “Now, if you don’t have any more questions, let’s go paint some trim!”

  “I have one more question…”

  “Shoot.”

  “Ummm…what’s your name?”

  She struck a pose, turning sideways and holding an imaginary pistol up to her face. “Lisa. Lisa Walsh,” she said, blowing make-believe smoke from the barrel.

  For three awesome hours, Lisa Walsh and I talked and painted and listened to music. Well, mostly I did the painting and she did the talking, but she had more than enough to say for the two of us. She had all kinds of stories, like the time in ninth grade that she and some friends had snuck out at night to try and see Nirvana at a club in Brooklyn.

  “We didn’t even make it past the security guard,” she said, “but we could hear them from the alley. It was pretty rad.” Her big cloth bag held an astonishing array of random crap. When she pulled out a pair of old cutoffs and a ratty Guns N’ Roses T-shirt for painting, I caught a glimpse of a big old camera and a deck of cards. After she’d changed in the bathroom, she unearthed a thin purple package of super-skinny black cigarettes. “I don’t usually smoke,” she said, standing in the doorway and lighting up, “but these are French, and sometimes I just want to be like that, you know?” I nodded, although I had no idea what she was talking about.

  When she was done smoking, she pulled an assortment of mix tapes out of the bag and tossed them on the floor. They all had unique handmade covers: carefully glued collages of magazine images and hand-drawn cartoons, with the names of the songs handwritten on the insides in intricate lettering.

  “My friends and I have a tape swap. Every few months each of us puts together a mix tape and makes a bunch of copies to pass around.” She dragged JP’s busted-up old double cassette player into the center of the room and shoved a tape into it, fast-forwarding to find the right song. While I painted, Lisa played DJ on what she dubbed le boom box. Every song seemed to have a story.

  “Okay, hang on,” she said, her finger paused over the Play button. “So this one is my friend Naomi’s favorite. She totally lost her virginity to this guy last year, some creepy painter dude who hung out at her mom’s gallery. He was super old, like twenty-five or something, but she totally dug him, and before they did it, she made him wait so she could put this song on. Naomi’s a total drama queen. She’ll be famous for sure.” She pressed Play and the room filled with a smoky voice singing jazz. I couldn’t tell if the singer was male or female.

  Just in time, you’ve found me. Just in time.

  Before you came, my time was running

  looooooowwwww…

  “Wow,” I said. “I’ve never heard anything like that.”

  “You like it? Nina Simone. She’s amazing. She’s like the most badass ever.” Lisa dropped to the floor and twisted her legs into a yoga pose, and then, just as quickly, she bounced back up and twirled around the room. I was getting used to the random movement; she seemed unable to sit still.

  “New York now is so clean and perfect,” she said. “It’s not edgy at all anymore. Back in the day, like in the fifties and sixties, you could get all slicked up in dresses and suits and go sit in smoky clubs and drink martinis and hear Nina or listen to Beat poets. Man, that must have been so—I don’t know—authentic, you know what I mean? Now it’s just so lame.”

  I didn’t really get half of her references, but it seemed to me that New York was just about the opposite of lame, especially compared to Deep Cove. Lisa rummaged around for another tape. “Okay, check this one out!” She pressed Play and the room was filled with shimmery hypnotic notes that were gradually joined by thumping drums and bass. She started to dance around the room, slithering over to where I was standing and grabbing me by the hands, pulling me toward her.

  “Come on, dance!”

  I was a terrible dancer, the worst. And on the rare occasions that I’d danced in the past, it had at least been to music I knew. This music was bizarre, endlessly repeating itself while somehow creating something new. I resisted, but she grabbed my arm and pulled me around the room, and eventually I found myself moving with her, with the music, letting it slide my limbs into the right places, letting the sounds do the thinking for me.

  When the music died away, we stood there exhausted and laughing.

  “Embarrassing,” I said.

  “Why? Dancing is everything!” She flopped into a cross-legged yoga pose on the floor next to her bag and looked up at me. “Don’t you dance?”

  “No. At least not like that. I don’t think I’ve ever heard music like that.”

  She laughed. “That’s Underworld. Rave music.”

  “Rave?”

  She looked at me with disbelief.

  “You’re kidding me,” she said. “You, my friend, have a lot to learn.”

  Our party was interrupted by the sound of Denise’s truck pulling up to the building. Doors slammed, and Denise came into the dining room.

  “Lisa! You made it!”

  Lisa jumped up and ran over to give Denise a big hug.

  “I hope you haven’t been corrupting little Danny with your evil big-city ways,” Denise said.

  “Mister Dan has been a perfect gentleman.”

  Denise took a look around the room. “The trim looks good, Dan. Can you go out and help JP unload the tables from the truck?”

  On my way out the door, I heard Denise, her voice low and serious, ask, “So how’s your mom doing?”

  That night, I had a hard time getting to sleep. I couldn’t stop thinking about Lisa. She wasn’t like any girl I’d ever met. I imagined the two of us traveling around the world together, lounging on oceanside patios in elegant clothes, toasting each other with well-iced cocktails. Was this what having a girlfriend could be like?

  Maybe Lisa had appeared out of nowhere for a reason. I was kind of like a frog in a fairytale who needed a kiss from a princess so he could turn into a prince. Only, instead of a frog, I was a might-be-gay kid who needed straightening out, and instead of a princess, she was a cigarette-smoking tattooed city girl with a bagful of mix tapes. I figured that was close enough.

  SEVEN

  Over the next few days, the four of us worked like crazy to get the restaurant ready for opening day. We finished painting the whole place, and we installed new light fixtures in the dining room. Flowers were planted around the outside of the building, the floors scrubbed until the original color o
f the tiles came through. Just as my mom had predicted, I loved my job.

  Best of all, Lisa and I were really connecting. She told me stories about New York and the amazing things she’d seen and done there. She’d been on family trips to San Francisco and Paris and even Tokyo. She’d done so many things that I’d only dreamed about. We were the same age, but it seemed to me she had a big head start in life.

  I couldn’t tell if she thought of me as boyfriend material though, or if she just wanted to be friends. She was always throwing her arms around me and giving me spontaneous hugs, or reaching out to mess up my hair. She spent so much time talking or laughing or dancing that it was hard to tell what she was thinking most of the time. Every once in a while, she’d get kind of moody and stop talking altogether, but it never lasted long. With Lisa, you learned to just go with the flow.

  The main thing was that she seemed to like me, which was a good start. Now I had to figure out how to get her to like me like me. As in, want to jump my bones and make a man out of me. If I could make that happen, it would prove to everyone—and to me—that I wasn’t gay.

  If only it was that simple. I couldn’t really figure out how I felt about her. I thought she was totally beautiful, not to mention the most interesting person I’d ever met. But even though I thought about her all the time, I didn’t care about what she looked like naked. I never thought about having sex with her. I just wanted to be around her all the time.

  On the night before the opening, we ended up working till well after dark putting the finishing touches on the place. It was almost midnight when Denise told Lisa and me to stand back and look at the dining room.

  “What do you guys think?” Denise asked.

  “I think it looks great,” I said, and Lisa agreed. The walls were painted a soft bluish gray, the color of the ocean in the morning, and the tables were set with crisp white linens. On top of each one was a small vase of wildflowers, and on the walls were photos Denise had taken of the local area. Fishing boats heading in from the catch, kids playing on the beach, wild rose bushes beside a dusty dirt road. It looked like a real restaurant. Denise couldn’t stop smiling.

  We joined JP in the kitchen, where he was putting the finishing touches on his workspace. The stainless steel gleamed, the shelves were neatly stocked and the big glass-fronted refrigerators were full of food.

  “Hey, JP, if you’re not too busy admiring your reflection in the counter, why don’t you whip us up something to eat?” Denise said.

  “Denise, Denise, when the clock strikes ten, I turn into a little pumpkin. You know that.”

  “What if I grab us a bottle of wine from out front?”

  “Now you’re talking. How about you kids? Are you hungry?”

  We nodded, and he motioned to us to pull up some stools around the counter.

  “If you wanna eat my food, you gotta watch me make it. Look and learn, friends. You’ll be happy you did. But first, some music, don’t you think?”

  He dug around in a stack of tapes on the shelf next to le boom box and snapped one on. The kitchen was filled with music that made me feel like dancing, and that’s exactly what JP did, shimmying around the kitchen, grabbing veggies and a knife, and chopping with lightning speed.

  Then that time I went and said goodbye,

  Now I’m back and not ashamed to cry,

  Ooooooh baby, here I am, signed, sealed, delivered,

  I’m yours.

  “This sounds familiar,” I said. “What is it?”

  JP stopped his knife in midslice as he spun to look at me. “Sounds familiar? What the hell planet have you been living on?! You really don’t know who this is?” I hesitated, then shook my head. JP made the sign of the cross and turned to Lisa.

  “It’s Stevie Wonder,” she said.

  “Thank you! Yai yai yai.” JP shook his knife at me. “You be grateful. If she hadn’t known, you’d both be eating hot dogs in the parking lot. You’ve got a lot to learn, that’s for sure.”

  He switched on the gas stovetop, tossed some oil into a pan and in a matter of what seemed like seconds, he’d chopped up some garlic and thrown it onto the heat. I was hypnotized by the unfamiliar aromas. Working smoothly, almost in time to the music, and occasionally reaching over to take a healthy swig from his wineglass, JP added vegetables to the pan, tossed in white wine, cream and some cooked pasta. Before we knew it, he was filling our plates, topping them with ground pepper and sliding them across the stainless steel counter toward us.

  I took a bite, and for a moment all I was aware of was the food. It was like nothing I’d ever tasted—rich and smooth and absolutely delicious. For a few minutes, there was complete silence as we devoured the pasta.

  Lisa let out a deep and satisfied sigh and said, “Aren’t you going to eat anything, JP?” He waved her off.

  “You’ll soon realize that JP survives on cigarettes and red wine,” said Denise. “Now why don’t you kids get out of here? Tomorrow’s a big day. You should go home and try to get some sleep.” I started to gather up the dishes and take them over to the sink to wash, but she stopped me. “Don’t worry about it, Dan. JP and I will finish cleaning up. Lisa, can you give Danny a ride home?”

  “Sure.”

  I’d been hoping something like this would happen. Until now, Denise had driven me home every night after work. Maybe some time alone with Lisa would help me figure out what she really thought of me.

  In the parking lot, as Lisa rummaged around in her bag for her keys, I could hear Denise and JP laughing on the deck. The faint aroma of sweet-smelling smoke wafted toward us on the summer breeze.

  “Is that pot?” I asked, hoping I didn’t sound like a supernerd.

  “Yeah, big surprise, eh? I bet those crazy old hippies couldn’t wait to get us out of there so they could blaze up. Aha!” She pulled the keys triumphantly out of her bag.

  I waited outside the car for a minute while she quickly threw tapes, books, makeup and clothes into the backseat.

  “Sorry! I’ve been pretty much living out of this thing. Hop in.”

  “Did you drive this car all the way up from New York?” I asked as I wedged myself in amidst the clutter.

  “You mean Old Bessie here? No way. I never would have made it all the way here in this piece of shit. It’s my aunt’s. This thing has been rusting out in her backyard for years. She’s letting me use it for the summer.”

  She turned the key, and the engine made a horrible grinding sound before finally turning over.

  “Good girl!” She patted the dashboard appreciatively.

  I gave her directions to my house, and she peeled out of the parking lot. I tried not to pay attention to the erratic clanging and rattling noises that seemed to come from all corners of the car.

  “Man,” I said as we headed out of town, “that pasta was delicious!”

  She shrugged. “Yeah, it was okay. JP is a decent chef. Definitely not the best I’ve worked with though.”

  Maybe she was right, but the meal JP had prepared was easily the best thing I’d ever eaten. I couldn’t wait to find out what else he could do in the kitchen.

  “So,” she said, “tell me about your love life. Got your eyes on anyone special?”

  My heart fluttered. Was she asking just to be polite, or did she have deeper motives?

  “Wha—me? No. I mean, I dated this girl, Michelle, for a while, but it didn’t really work out.”

  She nodded and kept driving.

  “How about you?” I asked.

  “Nope.” I waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t say anything else.

  She pulled into the driveway.

  “Here ya go, sailor,” she said. “Big day tomorrow.”

  I turned to her and smiled, and she smiled back.

  For a brief moment, I imagined reaching over and putting my hand on her face, leaning in and kissing her. Maybe all I had to do was make one little move, and everything else would fall into place. Instead, I opened the door and jumped out of the
car, and she pulled away with a short honk of her horn, her hand waving cheerfully out the window.

  I stood and watched as Old Bessie clattered away. What’s wrong with me? I thought as her headlights disappeared into the night.

  EIGHT

  The next morning, after I got out of the shower and came back to my room, Alma was sitting on my bed.

  “What’s up?” I asked her.

  “Do you think that I could get a job at the restaurant? As a waitress?” she asked me.

  “Maybe in a few years, Al,” I said, drying off my hair. “You’re kind of young. Trust me, having a job isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

  “Yeah, but I’ve been thinking about running away to Hollywood in a couple of years to become an actress,” she said. “It’d be good to have some skills, like waiting tables. I’ll probably need to make ends meet for a few weeks, until I’m discovered. God knows I don’t want to end up like Peg Entwhistle.”

  “Who’s Peg Entwhistle?”

  “Oh, just a tragic ingenue from the thirties,” she said. “She couldn’t catch a break, so she climbed up to the Hollywood sign and—ack!” She crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue, holding an imaginary noose above her neck.

  “Yoinks,” I said.

  “Yoinks indeed, but what did she expect? Who the hell is going to hire someone called Peg Entwhistle? She might as well have called herself Velma Turnipgarden. I’m going to stick with my original stage name.”

  “Oh yes,” I said, “Betsy Worthington. Well, in a couple of years, I’ll put in a good word with Denise. In the meantime, enjoy the free ride while you can, Betsy.”

  “Can you guys come down here?” Mom called from downstairs.

  “I have some news,” she said when we were sitting down. “Your dad’s going to be home at the end of the month.”

  “What?” said Alma. “That’s awesome!”

  “I don’t understand,” I said. “I thought his contract lasted till Christmas.”

  “Well, that’s the thing,” she said. “His company is laying off a bunch of people, so it’s not really good news.”