Mrs. Archer is standing in the doorway when the limo pulls up. She’s wearing a red muumuu and looks very worried.
“Thank God you’re here,” she says to me. “Billy’s downstairs. Would you like a Nanaimo bar before you go down? I know they’re your favourite.”
I smile in a tired way and tell Mrs. Archer thanks, but no thanks.
“Nadia, you don’t get to be as good looking as me by eating Nanaimo bars all day long.”
Billy is sleeping on the couch. He’s wearing his red parachute pants and looks very weak.
“Billy,” I whisper, “it’s me. I’m here.”
Billy’s eyes open and I can tell how surprised he is to see me. He thinks he’s dreaming.
“Is it really you?” he asks me.
“Yes, it’s really me, Billy,” I say. “Your mom is very concerned about you. She said you won’t take your medication and that you’re dying.”
“I have all your albums,” Billy says.
I laugh softly and say thank you. Billy asks me if I’ll sit down next to him, so I do. He asks me when my new record will be in stores and do I notice a difference between my Canadian fans and my American ones?
“I’m so glad you came,” Billy says. “I feel better already.”
Then he takes my hand and squeezes it. It’s a bold move on his part. I’m not really sure how to react.
“You mean so much to me,” Billy says. He closes his eyes. “Remember that time you were here on New Year’s Eve?”
I say, “I’m not sure.”
“Yes, you do. That was the best New Year’s Eve ever. Remember how we listened to Def Leppard and rocked it?”
“I guess so,” I say. I’m starting to get a bit nervous. I have a plane to catch in five minutes. I don’t have time to listen to Billy’s stupid stories.
“Remember how I made those Jungle Juices?”
I pull my hand away from his and check my watch. Outside, the limo driver honks. He’s getting impatient.
“Remember how after we drank them, you put your hand on me?” Billy asks. “Over my dink? You thought I didn’t know, but I did. I wasn’t sleeping.”
I stand up. “Billy, I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re hallucinating.”
“No, I’m not,” Billy says. His eyes are still closed, but somehow, he finds my hand and grabs it again. “Please sit down. I haven’t got much time left.”
“That makes two of us,” I sigh, but I sit down next to him. He is dying, after all.
“I wanted it,” Billy whispers. “I wanted your hand on my dink. It felt good. I didn’t want you to take your hand away.”
“Billy, please . . .” I must get away. The limo honks twice. I have to get back to the recording studio.
“The only way I’ll get better is if you put your hand there again,” Billy says. “You don’t want me to die, do you?”
“Well, no . . .”
“Then do it. Please. Save me.”
Then Billy takes my hand and puts it over his dink. He presses my hand against the material of his red parachute pants. “Just keep it there,” he says. “Keep it there until I start to feel better again. That’s all I ask.”
I look up at Billy. His eyes aren’t closed anymore. They’re open.
Then I fall asleep.
eight
I can’t get Billy Archer out of my head. Every morning when I wake up, I wonder if he’s waking up at that moment, too. When I come home for lunch, I wonder what he’s eating that day. When I’m doing my homework at night, I think about how Billy isn’t all that bright and how he could use a tutor — maybe me — to help him. And every time I put the showerhead on my dink to make sperm, I think about Billy and his parachute pants. The showerhead is evil and it makes me think things I don’t want to think. Back in grade 7, after I discovered how the showerhead could make me feel if I left it on my dink for a few minutes at just the right angle, I was the cleanest kid in Sarnia.
“Another shower?” my mother would ask. “You just had one this morning.”
I was in the shower two, sometimes three times a day. Now when I look back on it, I’m lucky no one found out what I was really doing in there. Since then, I’ve calmed down a little bit and gotten smarter. Instead of showers, I tell my mother I’m taking baths, which makes her less suspicious. Then I use the showerhead to fill up the tub.
Anyways, I made a New Year’s resolution not to use the showerhead in that way anymore, because it really is The Devil’s Instrument, as Mr. Mitchell might say. And I felt like it was the one thing I could do to get into the Virgin’s good books again, considering what happened between me and Billy. But I only lasted until January 3rd, which I know must’ve disappointed the Virgin. But I’ve decided I’ll quit on my fourteenth birthday, which is just around the corner.
I feel very bad about what happened with Billy because my nipples were right. I had the chance to make a real boy friend and I blew it. All this month, there’s been a dark cloud over my head. I almost lost my appetite a couple of times. It’s that bad.
“What’s wrong with you?” my mom asked me the other day. “You hardly say a word to me anymore.” Then she gasped and pressed her hand against her chest. “Are you on drugs?” she whisper/screamed.
I rolled my eyes and said no. “I’m fine.”
“Well, just remember. If anyone ever offers you drugs, you just walk away. Do you understand?”
I grabbed a Vachon Flakie out of the cupboard and went to my room.
The trouble is that I know I will never be friends with Billy Archer. Or Andrew Sinclair. Or Craig Brown. Or any other boy in my class. And then what? I’ll be the only boy in grade 9 without a locker partner.
My mother is upset at the Catholics again. Not because of the cars parked along our street on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings, but because the students of Our Lady of Perpetual Hope High School are putting on The Sound of Music.
“I mean, honestly!” she said, flipping down her Observer. “I don’t see why your sisters’ school can’t put on musicals. Sometimes I have to wonder if Catholics are Catholic just to make everyone else feel inferior.”
Then she called to order tickets.
The day of the show, Mrs. Randall, the woman my mother planned to go with, called to cancel.
“Female problems,” my mom whisper/screamed. “Now what am I going to do?”
My dad couldn’t go with her, since he had to work the night shift. Something told me he was pretty relieved about that.
“I guess I could try calling Mary or Janet,” my mom said, “but it’s kind of late notice. There’s Mrs. LaFlamme, too, but she gets so easily agitated, Henry. What if there are strobe lights?”
“Why don’t you take your son?” my dad asked.
I froze.
“Peter? He wouldn’t want to go out with his mom.” Then she turned to me. “Would you?”
I don’t like the idea of going anywhere with my mom, especially places where I might be seen. Going out in public with your parents is like screaming, “I have no friends!” And maybe I don’t, but that’s not the point. It’s better not to be seen at all than to be seen with your parents.
But then I thought back to that morning. My mom kept slapping the thermostat with a tea towel, screaming, “Who keeps playing with this? Who keeps playing with this?”
We all told my mom that none of us had touched it, which was the truth. But she called us liars and said that we were all plotting against her and Jesus Murphy, could somebody please open a window in here before she melts?
So I did the right thing — I shrugged and said, “I guess so.”
“Well, it’s a date then!” my mom said. “Me and my son. How nice is that? Maybe people will think we’re a couple!”
Then she started laughing, but I didn’t find it very funny. Actually, I thought it was gross. Moms shouldn’t joke about things like that with their sons.
“You owe me big time,” I said to my dad through a mental telep
athy message.
I wasn’t sure what to wear to the musical, since most of my clothing has been getting tighter. I think it’s the way my mom does the laundry. I ended up picking one of my favourite sweaters — a black and blue checked wool one — and my black rugby pants. I made sure I taped my nipples up good and tight and then I put on some of my dad’s Old Spice for a nice touch.
“Oh my, don’t you smell heavenly,” my mom said. She was wearing a green dress with gold earrings.
“Ready for your date?” Christine asked. She was sitting in the living room, painting her nails.
“Shut up!” I yelled. I was still angry at Christine for what she did to me at the mall before Christmas. I had barely said two words to her since then.
“Do you kids always have to fight?” my mom asked. She was re-reading her driving route for the hundredth time. “Come on, Peter. We have to hurry up. We’re running late.”
We weren’t late, since we still had a half hour to get to the school. But since my mom had to take every side street in Sarnia to get there, it was going to take a while.
“I always loved the theatre,” she said, as we turned right onto Lorne Crescent. “Especially when I was your age, Peter. I had roles in a number of school plays. Did I ever tell you that?”
I nodded.
“Never a starring role, mind you. Just scenery. Trees, mainly. But that’s the wonderful thing about theatre — every person’s role is just as important as the next. Oh sure, I’d get jealous from time to time. The bark costumes were always so uncomfortable and talk about sore arms! But then I would think, ‘Without me, the wolf would have no place to hide and then Little Miss Perfect Riding Hood would never get eaten.’ That always made me feel better.”
We turned right onto Wellington Road.
“You like the theatre, too, Peter. You’re just like me.”
My mom was only saying that because I signed up for a drama class at the college a few years back. Our teacher, Mrs. Tipperwhirl, was from England and wore a red wig. She had this thing against shoes and made everyone wear Chinese slippers to class.
“It cuts down on the clutter of your little feet,” she would say, rubbing her temples.
There were about twenty kids in the class. Some of them were nice, but most were annoying. One girl named Nikki had a thing for cats. I think she thought she was one, because no matter what role we were playing, she’d purr and pretend to clean herself.
Mrs. Tipperwhirl carried around a tambourine and would bang it to get our attention. Sometimes, she had us do the dumbest things.
“You’re a bird!” she would yell and bang her tambourine. We would flap our arms while she walked around us. “Let me see those big, beautiful wings riding on the wind! So proud, so free!” Then she’d hit the tambourine again and tell us we were rocks. We’d have to fall to the floor and curl into lumps. I made an excellent rock, because I would lie very still and pretend my skin was hard as steel.
“Excellent,” Mrs. Tipperwhirl would say. “Such, strong, silent rocks. Nikki! Rocks don’t purr.”
Anyways, towards the end of the course, I started gaining weight. And the idea of stepping on stage with everyone watching me freaked me out. So I didn’t sign up the following year. But when I’m skinny and popular in high school, I might get back into the world of theatre. You never know.
“I even dreamed of being a star one day,” my mom laughed as we turned right onto East Street. “Can you imagine? Of course, I wasn’t pretty enough. Or skinny enough. Or talented enough. And I knew that. But somehow, I just figured that didn’t matter. Until, of course, I came to the realization it did.”
I kept my eyes on the road.
“But that’s the way life is sometimes, Peter. You spend all your time up in the clouds until, one day, reality decides to pull you back down.” She sighed.
The parking lot at Our Lady of Perpetual Hope was pretty full by the time we got there, but we managed to find a spot and take our seats in the auditorium before the play started. It was weird being in a Catholic school and I thought about the time Daniela took me to St. Michael’s. I kept looking around for the hanging lantern that lets you know if God is there, but I didn’t see one.
“It smells funny in here,” my mom said as we took our seats. “I thought Catholics were supposed to be clean.”
The lights went down and the pianist came out. I wondered if he knew Mrs. Forbisher and how many breakdowns he’d had during rehearsals. I wasn’t very impressed with the scenery on stage. It looked fake and when the nuns came out and started to sing “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?” one had a voice so high that it hurt my ears. I heard someone behind me whisper, “For the love of God.” As if that wasn’t bad enough, another nun said her lines like a robot. I kept checking her back for the fuse box.
“It’s going to be a long night,” I thought to myself.
Then Maria ran onstage and changed everything.
From the minute she opened her mouth, I could tell the actress playing Maria was different from the others. She had star quality. She was very beautiful too, and reminded me of Brooke Shields. Her blue eyes sparkled under the lights and even though she was dressed in black, she looked like an angel.
“A dark angel,” I thought and sat up straighter in my chair.
When she sang “I Have Confidence in Me,” I knew I was falling in love with the woman onstage. She had the best voice I’ve ever heard and was so sweet, spinning around with her suitcase in her hand. I knew then that whoever she was, Maria was the kind of girl that I could spend my life with. She’d never get angry or tell me what to do and would always whisper “I love you” before we went to sleep at night. Everyone would want to be her friend, because she was so nice. But she’d want to be with me and me only.
“He needs me beside me. And I need him,” she’d say and smile.
Maria was the one that I’d been looking for. She was the one that could cure me of the bad things about myself. With one smile, she would heal my nipples, stop the Bedtime Movies, and help me forget all about Billy Archer. We’d run off and elope and when we got back into town, she’d show off the diamond ring to all of her friends. Maria would also get me plenty of boy friends and all of them would be jealous, because I had Maria and they didn’t. They’d see that they were wrong about me all along.
When the intermission came, I read in the programme that Maria was being played by Debbie Andover. Her biography said she was a grade 12 student at Our Lady of Perpetual Hope and her favourite subject was religion. When she graduates, Ms. Andover hopes to pursue a career in either cosmetics or missionary work. Ms. Andover is thrilled to be playing the part of Maria and thanks her family and friends for their love and support.
I kept imagining my name in her biography.
“That Maria girl is good,” my mom said to me as we stood out in the hall. “She has a nice voice. Better than that von Trapp fellow, anyway. Isn’t he supposed to be bald? Or maybe I’m thinking of Annie. Is that the one where there’s a ship?”
I was angry at my mom. Debbie wasn’t just good — she was perfect, and one day, she would be a big movie star.
When the play ended, Debbie got the loudest applause. Someone came onstage and gave her a bouquet of roses. I wondered if she has a boyfriend and if she does, I bet he’s a jerk who spends more time playing football with his friends than taking her out on dates. But Debbie would never complain. She’s too classy for that. Instead, she would cry in bed each night, wishing that someone better would come along. That someone was me.
On the car ride home, I felt relieved that I’d finally fallen in love with a girl. It was something I’d needed to do for a long time. Especially since I was going to be fourteen in a couple of weeks.
That night, while I was lying in bed, I read Debbie’s biography over and over again. I wondered what she was doing at that moment. Was she lying in her bed, too? Was she crying because her jerk boyfriend had forgotten about her opening night?
�
��What’s the big deal?” he’d say to her. “It’s just some stupid play.”
But to Debbie, it wasn’t. It was her whole life. She wanted her boyfriend to see her doing what she did best. She wanted him to see her in a way he never had before. And I knew what that felt like more than anyone else.
“I see you, Debbie,” I whispered, hoping that wherever she was, she heard my voice. “I see you.”
My birthday is next week and I get to pick where we go for dinner. It’s a tradition in my family.
“Within reason, of course,” my mom said. “We can’t afford to take you all to Walker’s, so don’t even think about it.”
Walker’s is Sarnia’s fanciest restaurant. They have linen tablecloths and the waiters wear black bow ties. Or so I’ve heard. I’ve never been inside. Daniela went there once for her cousin Angela’s wedding anniversary. She told me that they even have someone who carries around a small brush and wipes the crumbs off the tablecloth while you’re eating.
“Now that’s fuckin’ class,” Daniela said and whistled. “I bet the guy makes a hundred thousand a year just for doing that. More than my dad will ever make.”
Sometimes, I feel bad for Mr. Bertoli because his restaurant isn’t that busy. Daniela says her mom is worried about paying the bills. The other day, I walked by Papa Bertoli on my way to the Shop ’N’ Bag and I saw Mr. Bertoli sitting at the counter. There wasn’t one other person in the restaurant. He looked awfully lonely and I wondered how he’d survive. Maybe there was a way I could help him out. So when it came time to pick the place for my birthday dinner, I said what my Christian heart knew was right.
“I want to go to Papa Bertoli.”
“Oh Peter, be serious,” my mother said.
“I am being serious,” I said. “I want to go to Papa Bertoli.”
“Henry, will you please try talking some sense into your son?”
“Why? What’s wrong with going there?”
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