Doug returned with our watery hot chocolate and stale powdered donuts. “Here you go, hon.”
It seemed Miracle and I were invisible.
Buck smiled at me from across the table. “Guess what?”
“What?”
“Chicken’s my favorite.”
I laughed. “Favorite what?”
“Favorite everything.”
I looked into my mug. “Pfssh.”
He reached out, touched the tip of my pointer finger with his. “You’re cute when you splutter.”
I looked away, feigning interest in Miracle’s placemat.
“How many do you have, Miracle?”
“One,” she said. “Meat.”
I casually turned my hand palm up.
“What about cheese?” I said.
I felt Buck’s palm on mine.
Miracle grinned. “How about chicken?”
His hand was warm.
“How did we miss that one?”
She yawned and rested her head against my arm.
“Popcorn balls are a thing,” I said. “And don’t forget gum.”
“How about rum and melon and matzah?” said Buck.
She sat up and started writing again. She spelled melon like mellin and matzah like maza.
I looked at Buck. He smiled and held my hand even tighter.
“I’m supposed to be working,” I said.
He stuck out his bottom lip.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll see you tonight.”
I stood up. “Come on, Miracle.”
I put out my hand. She slapped it away.
“Miracle!”
“I have to get to ten!” she yelled.
Doug glared at me.
“Ten was just a suggestion,” I whispered. “Eight is fine.”
Miracle’s grip on the pen tightened. “I have to get to ten.”
I laid a hand on her shoulder. “And I have to get to work.”
“Then go!” she shouted. “Leave me here alone to think about balls.”
I looked to Buck, unsure what to do. He got up and crouched next to her. “How about I set a timer,” he said, fiddling with his watch. “Five minutes? When it goes off the game is over, no matter how far you’ve got. Deal?”
Miracle looked relieved. “Deal.”
I sat back down. So did Buck. For the next five minutes he drew hearts into a pile of sugar he’d poured on the table. I pretended to gag.
When the timer went off, Miracle dropped her head into her arms and cried. Buck knelt next to her. “Guess what? I thought of two more.”
She looked up. “You did?”
“Yep. But I must warn you, they’re not everyone’s cup of tea.”
She perked up.
“You ready?” said Buck.
She put pen to paper.
Buck cleared his throat. “Foot and eye.”
Miracle swung her leg up onto the table. “Eat my foot!”
Buck pretended to nibble it all over.
Miracle grinned. “You’re funny.”
Buck held out his hand. “Ready, Freddie?”
We walked hand in hand, all three of us in a row.
I’d wanted time to stand still earlier. Now I wanted it to fast-forward, to nighttime under the bridge.
* * *
When we got back to the chicken shop Mr. Chen sent me home. He said the supper rush was over so my ineffectual, inadequate, and somewhat clumsy dance moves, which were useless at the best of times, would be pointless. I saw my chicken head in a sink full of soapy water. Next to it, on the counter, was a brand-new bottle of gentle-care laundry detergent. I apologized for using whiskey. Mr. Chen said he knew that I meant well. He gave me a single chicken wing to eat on the way home.
I walked down the train tracks wondering if steam engines were still used in the forties. It was a hobby of mine, looking at today’s world and imagining it then. Tonight I’d be under the bridge with Buck. If it were the forties, we’d be down at the dance hall cutting a rug. He’d be wearing a sport shirt tucked into a pair of wide-legged, high-waisted slacks and I’d be wearing a plaid skirt with a fitted angora sweater. We’d have a real gas, jitterbugging and jiving, and Buck would tell me I was a dish. At the end of the night we’d kiss on the doorstep and when I went inside I wouldn’t watch videos of people being burned alive because the internet wouldn’t exist yet.
I ran into Eve and a couple of derby girls on the path that led to my neighborhood.
“We were just at your house,” said Ally.
“You were?” I said. “Why?”
Eve rolled her eyes. “Because friends call on other friends when they’re about to have an epic night downtown.”
She’d gotten her nose pierced. It looked cool. I wished I’d been with her at the piercing studio. She’d have squeezed my hand and said, Hey, Poppy, your hand is kind of peachy too, and I’d have laughed because having no filter is what I loved about Eve.
“How’s your brother?” said Ally.
Ally’s derby name was Bashin’ Robbins. She was in twelfth grade and had a mad crush on Cam.
“Still gay,” I said.
She snapped her fingers in disappointment. “Damn.”
“I can’t go out tonight,” I said. “I’m meeting my boyfriend.”
Eve’s eyebrows shot up. “Interesting.”
We leaned against the chain-link fence and chatted a bit. I told them about Buck’s photography and outdoorsy good looks, and Jen (a.k.a. Cinnamon Roller) told me about their big tournament in Toronto the weekend before. Eve said, “You could have been there too, Poppy, if you weren’t such a chicken.”
“I’m not a chicken,” I said, relieved I wasn’t wearing my costume.
“Yeah you are,” she said. “You’re afraid to have fun.”
I rolled my eyes. “Pfssh. If that was the case I wouldn’t be going out with my boyfriend tonight, now would I?”
She looked me up and down, then crossed the path to hug me. “Maybe we’ll see you at the rink sometime.”
She kissed my cheek. “Love ya, Peach.”
Except for the spot where her lips had been, my entire body felt numb.
As I walked up Churchill I thought, This must be what regret feels like.
Dad was channel surfing when I got home. Instead of going straight upstairs I paused in the doorway. He stopped on Arthur, my favorite cartoon from when I was a kid. He sang the theme song, word for word. I laughed.
He clicked from PBS to CNN. A suicide bomb had gone off in a market in Kabul. A five-year-old boy had lost his legs.
No light-up shoes for him.
* * *
I went upstairs and phoned Cam.
“Are you calling from your room?” he asked.
I sat on my bed. “Yeah.”
“You couldn’t walk five feet?”
I kicked off my shoes. “Nope. Say something funny.”
It took him a moment.
“Birdies for sale, going cheap.”
I frowned in confusion. “I don’t get it.”
“You will. Anyway, I gotta go. Fabian is about to call.”
“Fabian, your boss?”
“Who else?” he said. “He wants to tell me about a new product line.”
“But you’re a floor sweeper,” I said.
“For now,” he said. “I think I might get promoted to cash soon.”
I wanted him to stay on the phone forever. “Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”
“What’s the big deal, Pops? Doesn’t Mr. Chen ever call you?”
“He calls me on an imaginary phone sometimes and says, ‘Earth to Poppy, come in, Poppy’—but it’s always during shop hours.”
Cam laughed. “I gotta go. Talk to you later, Pops.”
I hung up feeling unsettled.
Then I got the joke.
Cheep. Ha ha.
* * *
I googled “fit as a butcher’s dog.” Apparently I was healthy and physically attractive. Mayb
e that’s what Buck had meant by “chunky.” Maybe I was being too sensitive.
I put on my sailor shorts and a striped crop top. It felt good. But when I looked in the mirror I thought of The Photo and remembered the ham on the train, and suddenly I didn’t feel like dressing up anymore. I wore jeans and a tee instead.
I said goodbye to Mom and Dad and went to the bridge. Buck was waiting on top with a joint in his palm.
“Want some?”
I was in the mood for obliviousness so said yes.
We sat on the grass halfway down the embankment. I smoked it like a pro. When we moved under the bridge, Thumper greeted me with a bible verse about forbidden fruits creating many jams. “Jam?” I said. “Like for toast?” Buck said his Nan made a mean marmalade. It was the funniest word in the world. Thumper said something about brain cells but all I could do was laugh.
Around nine, Lewis and Miracle showed up with dinner.
“Mama made spaghetti.”
“Bloody hell,” muttered Buck. “That kid’s a hot mess.”
I looked at her herringbone top and checkerboard leggings.
“She’s not a mess,” I said. “She’s clatching.”
Buck raised an eyebrow. “Clatching?”
“Clashing in a way that is matching,” I said.
It was one of my favorite word blends. Cam made it up when I wore a dotted blouse with a floral-print skirt.
“How can you clash and match at the same time?” asked Buck.
“The same way you can eat jumbo shrimp in deafening silence,” I said.
He rubbed his eyes. “I don’t know what’s doing my head in more—her outfit or your ramblings.”
“Probably my ramblings,” I said. “Because her outfit is awfully good.”
I thought that was seriously funny but Buck didn’t laugh.
Lewis placed the pot, paper plates, and plastic cutlery on the ground and Thumper dished out the spaghetti.
Buck grinned at me. “We can do that thing with the noodle.”
I was too hungry for that. I ate my helping quickly.
“You okay?” asked Lewis. “You look a little green.”
The words came out tasting sour. “I’m fine.”
Miracle was in Lewis’s lap, one hand clutching Gilbert, the other rubbing his head.
“I love your outfit today,” I said. “Mixing big prints with small ones is really smart. It’s what all the big fashion designers do.”
Buck lit up another joint. “Fashion designers on crack.”
“I wish you wouldn’t do that here,” said Lewis, nodding toward Miracle.
“Her mother’s a hooker,” he said. “I’m sure she’s seen worse.”
Lewis directed his look of disgust at me, as if I had been the one that had said it. I felt even sicker.
I glared at Buck. “What the hell was that?”
He shrugged like he had no idea what I was talking about.
I turned to Miracle, to apologize on Buck’s behalf, but Thumper was already distracting her with a game of Trouble. “Who wants to play?”
Buck was too high and I was too sick but everyone else said yes. The popping sound hurt my head. Buck offered me the joint. I waved it away.
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
His eyes were half closed as he waved a hand through the air. “The river’s over there, love.”
The thought of my puke running downstream made me feel sicker.
“Where do you guys go,” I asked, “when you have to go?”
Buck took a long draw. “There’s a loo in the drop-in center.”
My stomach was churning. “Where?”
He pointed toward the sky. “Up.”
Lewis left the Trouble game in a rage. “Jesus Christ, Buck.”
He helped me up and wrapped an arm around my waist. We walked slowly up the embankment.
“Won’t be long,” he said. “Hang in there…thirty more seconds.”
Pavement turned to floor turned to blurry toilet bowl. With Lewis’s arms around my waist I hurled. My whole body convulsed. I was shaking from head to toe. He held my hair out of my face and when I was done he brought me to a bench. He soaked paper towels in cool water and put them on my forehead. I was going to say sorry but said “again” instead. He whisked me to the stall and I retched up every last thing in my stomach and then I retched some more.
Back on the bench I closed my eyes. He gave me water.
“Sorry,” I said. “That was gross.”
“Don’t apologize. I care for my dad. I’ve seen worse.”
“What’s wrong with your dad?”
“He’s dying.”
“I’m sorry.”
My stomach started churning again. “I must have the flu.”
“Yeah,” he said. “The weed flu.”
“Can I put my head on your shoulder?”
“Go ahead.”
He was wearing a T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up. My cheek rested against his bare skin.
“How did you meet Thumper?” I asked.
“I met him at a walk-in clinic with my dad. They were both there for pain relief. Dad and Thumper got to talking. When Dad found out that Thumper lived under the Fifth Street bridge, he made me bring him some food and blankets. I’ve been going there ever since.”
“And Miracle?”
“She lives next door. Her mom helps out with my dad sometimes. I return the favor by watching Miracle in the evenings. We used to just hang out at my place, but then Dad got too sick. When the overnight caregiver comes, we leave. It’s a nice break, you know? From the doom and gloom.”
“Yes,” I said. “I know what you mean.”
He looked at me questioningly. I didn’t offer anything more.
“So you live on Victoria too,” I said.
He nodded. “Yep.”
“You never mentioned it that night you dropped Miracle home,” I said.
“You mean that night you gave me a history lesson on wartime houses?” he said. “I could hardly get a word in edgewise.”
I managed a laugh.
“Wait now,” I said. “If you live in my neighborhood—”
He cut me off.
“I don’t go to Pearson High because my dad prefers the student-teacher ratio at Westvale.”
I smiled. “Are you a mind reader?”
“Yes,” he said. “And yours is constantly churning.”
So was my stomach.
I closed my eyes, let my mind churn some more. “Miracle wants to be a backup dancer.”
There must have been a hint of judgment in my voice.
“So?” he said.
“She could be so much more.”
“Don’t overthink it,” he said. “She’s only six.”
We sat for another few minutes.
“She still sucks her thumb.”
“It gives her comfort,” he said.
I reached up, brushed my fingers along his shaved bits. “So does rubbing your head.”
“Her dad had a brush cut,” he said. “She figures this is what it feels like.”
“She said he died,” I said.
He nodded. “Afghanistan. She was just a baby.”
My heart sunk. “Poor thing.”
After a long silence I said, “I’m ready to go back.”
We walked like turtles. No, snails. Buck jumped up when he saw me.
“Are you okay?”
Lewis shot him a look. “She’s fine.”
Buck slid his arm between us. “Thanks, mate,” he said. “I can take over from here.”
He opened up his sleeping bag. I crawled in.
He propped himself on his elbow. “I’m sorry, Pidge.”
“For what?”
“Chasing hens around a farmyard while you, the love of my life, got put in the dog pound.”
I managed a smile.
“I am a mangy, no-good mongrel,” he said. “I knew you were sick. And I kept getting high anyway.”
I shrugged. “Nobody’s perfect.”
He leaned over, kissed my nose. “You’re pretty bloody close.”
“Pfssh. I’m the most flawed person I know.”
“How so?”
“For one thing, I’m a chicken.”
“That’s your job,” he said. “How is that a flaw?”
“I use it as a way to hide.”
“From what?”
“The world.”
“Why?”
“It’s an overwhelming place.”
He pulled me close and recited Tramp’s speech about life off the leash, about the world being a place where two dogs could have fun and adventure. He said, “Don’t fence yourself in, Pidge.”
I held his hand. “I’m not the love of your life, you know.”
“Not yet,” he said. “But you could be.”
* * *
The potential love of my life fell asleep so Lewis became my walking buddy. We brought Miracle home first. It was twelve-thirty and she cried at being woken. She whimpered in Lewis’s arms the whole way and when he delivered her to her mother, a petite blonde with striking green eyes, she said, “Mama, why can’t you work in the day?”
The crankiness over the Eat Balls List was just beginning to dawn on me.
Lewis pointed to a house next to Miracle’s. “Home sweet home.”
It was a Plan 47-11. I thought of the dying man inside. I wanted to hug my parents.
We walked from Victoria to Churchill. Lewis asked why I’d grown so silent.
“Her mother’s so young,” I said. “And so pretty.”
He bumped his shoulder into mine and smiled. “Would it be easier for you if she was old and ugly?”
He was challenging my thinking, in a gentle way.
“The whole thing,” I said, “it’s such a shame.”
“Agreed,” he said. “But young and pretty has nothing to do with it.”
We walked for a long time in silence. When my house appeared in the distance I said, “You know, I think I might be quick to judge sometimes.”
He grinned. “Ya think?”
I bumped him gently with my shoulder. “You know, you’re pretty wise for a sixteen-year-old.”
He smiled. “That’s because I went to the school of hard knocks.”
“Really?” I said. “And here I thought you went to Westvale.”
He laughed. “I’m not wise. I’ve just been through stuff, you know? Sometimes people jump to conclusions about me, so I try not to jump to conclusions about them. I try to look at things from all angles.”
Chicken Girl Page 6
