“He is not. He’ll be twenty-one in November. You were only twenty-three when you married Dad.”
“But that was 1957. It’s a different world now … women have much more opportunity today. You,” she said, pointing a finger at me, “have much more opportunity than I ever did. You don’t know how lucky you are. And Blake better not be filling your head with all this future shit. It’s just a ploy to get you in the sack.” She leaned forward, staring into my eyes like they were two crystal balls. “He hasn’t gotten you in the sack, has he?”
I wondered what she could see. Roses on a bedspread, a soft white comforter, a pool with a scorpion lurking at the bottom. “No,” I said, and I didn’t think it was a lie because in the sack meant going all the way, and Blake and I had only gone part of the way so far.
She settled into the couch and puffed on her cigarette. “Good. I’m glad to hear it. Because guys Blake’s age are flighty—they’ll tell you anything to get laid and then they move on to the next victim. There are some girls who can handle that—Evelyn, for example. She used to break up with one and find another without batting an eyelash. But you’re not like Evelyn, and if this kid does anything to hurt you, I’ll chop off his nuts and shove them down his throat.” She snuffed out her cigarette in an ashtray. “And you tell him to bring you home earlier from now on. Understand?”
I understood. I understood that I would never tell her anything about Blake again and that my head hurt for the first time in months. “I’m going to bed now, Mom. I think I’m getting a migraine.”
She wouldn’t let me go to bed. She brought me to the kitchen, where she watched while I swallowed my medicine. Then she gave me a glass of warm milk and kissed my cheek.
“Good night,” she said, and when she was gone, I wiped my cheek with a napkin and poured the milk down the sink.
Summer invited me to her house the next afternoon, which was surprising. I hadn’t seen her once since school had ended, and she hadn’t returned the four messages I’d left with Tina. But I missed her enough to forget all that and to ask Dad for a ride from Flatbush to Park Slope.
He dropped me off and waved to Tina before heading to work. I walked past her as she crouched on her little lawn, wearing a sun visor and plucking weeds.
“Hi, Ari,” she said. “Long time no see. Go ahead inside—Summer’s upstairs.”
I slipped into the foyer and peeked into Jeff’s library with its crowded bookshelves and Tiffany lamps. I heard Fleetwood Mac and I followed the sound to Summer’s bedroom, where she was sitting in a chair with one foot perched on her desk. She was polishing her toenails and didn’t see me.
I stood in the doorway and glanced around at her bedroom. It looked like it had been completely redecorated since the last time I’d been here. It was so fancy, so elegant. There was a paneled bed made of bleached wood set between two antique-looking night tables, a matching wardrobe chest, and taupe wallpaper speckled with shiny silver roses. The wallpaper matched the comforter on the bed, which had decorative pillows in the shape of circles and squares. Everything was perfect, like something from a fairy tale, and I wished I could sleep in a fairy tale instead of on Evelyn’s rickety old canopy bed from when Lyndon Johnson was president.
“Your room is fantastic,” I said, even though I had to force the words from my throat.
Summer looked up from her toes. She was wearing a short denim skirt with a pink halter top and indigo eye shadow, and she was as stunning as the room. But I remembered that I had Blake and he thought I was much prettier, which meant more to me than a fancy bedroom.
“Thanks,” she said. “Sorry I haven’t called lately. I’ve been busy.”
I guessed she’d been busy with Casey, so I accepted the excuse. Female code and all. “No problem. I’ve been busy too.”
She leaned back in her chair. “I broke up with Casey last week.”
Surprised, I took a seat on her windowsill and watched as she pointed to the tattoo on her ankle. The C had been changed to an S so that now she was wearing her own initials.
“They did a good job,” I said. “But I hope they used a clean needle.”
“Of course they did, Ari. I got it done at a very reputable place on Bleecker Street a few days ago. I went there after a meeting that my mother and I catered at Ellis and Hummel,” she said, and I tried not to react. I just nodded and crossed my legs as she flopped on her bed and hugged a pillow to her chest. “I think your boyfriend’s father is gorgeous, by the way.”
And my boyfriend’s father thinks you’re beautiful, I thought. But I didn’t say it because she had a mischievous look on her face that didn’t need encouragement.
“Forget it, Summer. He’s old.”
She rubbed one leg slowly across her comforter. “Not really. He’s forty-seven.”
“How would you know?” I asked.
“He told me. I talk to him all the time.… Stan’s a friendly person.”
She called him Stan. I didn’t even call him Stan. He must have given her special permission, and I guessed he only did that for girls he considered beautiful. “Right,” I said, and Summer flipped over onto her back and stared at her ceiling fan.
“Ari,” she began. “Are you sleeping with Blake yet?”
I looked out the window; Tina was lugging a fertilizer bag down the stairs. “Why are you asking?”
She shrugged. “I was just wondering about … what he does and … what’s normal for most guys. I mean … I dumped Casey because he was losing respect for me. He wanted a certain position all the time, not just once in a while, and I don’t think that a guy really cares about you if he doesn’t even look at your face while you’re making love.”
That image made me uncomfortable. “But you said that position was strangely exciting.”
Summer shifted onto her stomach, resting her face on her fists. “Not every single time.”
“Oh,” I said.
“I’ll bet Blake looks at your face. I’ve talked to him a few times at Stan’s parties and I think he’s a real gentleman. He always holds the door for me and he never even swears. He treats me with respect … like a man is supposed to treat a lady.”
“That’s how he is,” I said proudly, and for the first time in my life, I knew that Summer envied me, that I had something she wanted. I felt victorious, but I tried not to act that way. She’d given herself to a guy who wouldn’t even look at her face; she didn’t need to get her feelings hurt again. “But the other stuff you asked about … I don’t know. We haven’t gotten that far.”
“Jesus,” she said. “After all these months? He really is a gentleman … Casey demanded sex after just a few dates.”
I’d never known any of this—that Casey wasn’t a gentleman, that he demanded things. Now I wasn’t sure what to say, but it didn’t matter because she changed the subject. She opened a dresser drawer, took out a letter from Hollister, and told me that she’d been approved to graduate early and was going to work full-time with Tina from January until college started next September. Then Tina called Summer from downstairs, asking for help with the twisted garden hose, and I was alone.
I walked around the room, examining Summer’s pretty things: the carvings on her headboard, the old jewelry box with the spinning ballerina on her dresser. I glanced inside the drawer that she’d left open. I saw a lacy black bra, a purple velvet diary, and a silver bracelet engraved with the initials M.G.
Leigh’s bracelet. The one she’d lost at the party at the Winter Garden. I couldn’t believe it. I was furious. Leigh was desperate for that bracelet, and Summer had been holding it hostage all this time. I knew that Summer could be inconsiderate, but I’d never suspected that she was utterly heartless. I’d even defended her to Leigh. She wouldn’t do something like that. I snatched the bracelet out of the drawer, holding it in my sweaty fist. My head was pounding and I was tired all of a sudden. A minute later Summer came back, smiling, completely unaware that she’d been found out.
“What’s thi
s?” I asked, dangling the bracelet in front of her.
“Oh, yeah,” she said. “It turned up last week. I was going to tell you.”
She wasn’t going to tell me. And I was sure that she’d found it eons ago, the night of the Winter Garden party. Still, she stayed cool now, concocting a story—something about the bracelet getting tangled in a tablecloth that Tina hadn’t used for ages.
“You’re lying,” I said. “You did this because you hate Leigh.”
She slammed her drawer. “Why shouldn’t I hate her? Remember what she said when we were at that club in the city? You don’t want people to think you’re a slut. I had enough of that crap in public school. And you,” she said, pointing an acrylic nail at me. “You betrayed me, Ari. I always stuck by you, and I was always there for you when you needed me, but you weren’t on my side against that weirdo and her bitch mother. It’s unbelievable that they’re related to Blake, because they’re nothing like him.”
I supposed she had a valid point about sticking by me and all, but I ignored that. I was so annoyed by the adoring look in her eyes when she spoke Blake’s name that I couldn’t be reasonable. “Stop talking about him,” I said. “You don’t know anything about him.”
She folded her arms and let out a snarky laugh. “Neither do you.”
“He’s my boyfriend,” I said. “I love him.”
Now she really laughed. “Oh, please. You don’t love him. You barely know him. You haven’t even slept with him. It’s just a case of limerence, like that silly boy in seventh grade who kept a collection of my hair.”
Limerence. That was the word I couldn’t remember. The fact that she’d compare me to a poem-writing, hair-collecting seventh grader was just too much.
“Well,” I said. “I wonder what Blake will say when I tell him what you did to his cousin. I know you have a high opinion of him, but I’m sure he won’t think very much of you.”
She chewed on her lip, staring at me for a second. Worry spread across her face but it quickly changed into disgust. “I don’t know who you think you are,” she said. “You’ve got this idea that you’re something special because you landed a guy who’s completely out of your league. But you won’t have him forever, Ari. He’ll figure it out.”
She had hit a nerve, and it hurt. “Figure what out?” I asked as an aura crawled into my eye.
“That you’re boring. That you’re dull and boring and average in every possible way.”
I was speechless. Maybe I should have shrugged it off. But I thought that it might be true, that I might be even less than average, and I fought back tears.
“You can’t stand it that I finally have someone,” I said after a moment, choking out the words as my throat closed up. “I never had a boyfriend, and I only had one friend, but you had everything … and that made you feel like you were better than me.”
She tossed her hair. “I am better than you.”
I couldn’t talk anymore. My eyes were stinging and my face was burning. I rushed outside, past Tina, who was spraying shrubbery with her hose.
“Bye, Ari,” she said, but I didn’t say anything back.
I walked all the way home to Flatbush. I was exhausted by the time I opened my front door. I smelled potatoes roasting and Mom came out of the kitchen, drying her hands on a towel.
“You’re home early,” she said.
I thought I might faint. Mom looked distorted, like a reflection in a carnival mirror. “I’m done with Summer, Mom. And don’t call Jeff about it.”
She stared at me for a moment. “All right, Ariadne,” she said finally.
The phone rang and it was Blake. He said he couldn’t wait to see me at Evelyn and Patrick’s Labor Day barbecue next week. After I hung up the phone, I sealed Leigh’s bracelet in an envelope, wrote her Brentwood address on the front, tossed my #1 FRIEND charm and my cedar box filled with art supplies in the trash, and fell asleep on my embroidered roses.
eighteen
On the Friday afternoon before Labor Day, I got dressed for my last day at Creative Colors while Dad showered for work and Mom shopped at Pathmark. I was on my hands and knees, trying to find a pair of matching shoes in my closet, when the phone rang. There was a pile of shoes around me and I didn’t feel like answering the phone, but I ran to the kitchen anyway and picked up the receiver.
I heard a raspy voice, and it surprised me. “Hi, Ari,” Leigh said as I leaned against the dishwasher, nervously wrapping the phone cord around my finger. “I’m only calling because I got the bracelet. It was in the mail yesterday.”
That was the only reason she was calling. I supposed I shouldn’t expect anything more. And I imagined that she was going to hide the bracelet in a chest or a drawer and never look at it again until she was ready. She might wait for years and years, until she was married and had children, and one day she’d take it out to show her teenage daughter and say something like, This was from a boy I used to know. He was very special to me but that was so long ago.
“Good,” I said. The tip of my finger was turning red so I loosened the cord. “I’m glad.”
“Who found it?” she asked.
“Summer.” That was all I said. It was enough that Summer and I were done forever and that the #1 FRIEND charm had been taken away by a garbage truck. Even though I’d threatened otherwise, I had decided not to tell Blake about the bracelet. He might inform his father that Summer was a thief and a liar, and his father might fire Tina. For her sake, I didn’t want that to happen. She worked so hard to uphold her reputation.
“I also got your note,” Leigh said.
I remembered my I’m Sorry card with the dumb cat and the daisy. I expected her to say more, to say she’d forgiven me, but she didn’t. And the flat, unfriendly voice she’d been using left me feeling very awkward. “Good,” I said again. “So … do you like California?”
“It’s okay so far. Some of my neighbors are our age, and they’re much nicer than most people I knew in New York,” she said, and I guessed I was one of those not-nice New Yorkers. Then she started talking about another neighbor, a guy our age from Vermont who’d moved the same week she had. “We’re exploring Los Angeles together. He’s a friend.”
From the way she talked about him, I thought he might become more than a friend. She sounded happy all of a sudden and that made me happy, even though she was probably still mad at me and she cut our conversation short. I was glad that I’d gotten the bracelet back to her.
A few minutes later, I went outside into a sunny day. I walked to Creative Colors, past girls drawing hopscotch boards on cement. By the time I reached work, my muscles ached and I was tired even though I’d slept for nine hours the night before. I had no idea what was wrong with me. I wondered if I was seriously out of shape or if I was getting sick.
“Will you be back next year?” Adam asked.
It was the end of the day. We’d had a farewell-to-summer party—Dunkin’ Donuts, and Kool-Aid in Dixie cups that I couldn’t drink because my throat was sore. Adam was looking at me, his handsome face filled with hope, and he made me sad.
“Sure,” I said, and my voice cracked.
He smiled. “What are you doing for Labor Day, Ari? Seeing your boyfriend?”
My boyfriend. He remembered. And he spoke without a stutter. It made me think that my work with Adam had actually done him good—that maybe all the painting had repaired his neurons or whatever was wrong inside his head. Maybe he was better off because of me. Believing that made me happy again.
Blake was on time for Evelyn and Patrick’s Labor Day barbecue. He even brought an autographed Red Sox baseball for Kieran. When the sun began to set, I fell asleep on his shoulder as we cuddled together on a wicker patio sofa that Evelyn had ordered from Sears.
“Ari,” he said, shaking me.
I opened my eyes. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been asleep, and Blake looked worried. My hair stuck to the perspiration on my forehead and he pushed it away, asking why I hadn’t eaten a thing all da
y.
“I’m not hungry,” I said. “And my throat hurts.”
“Then you should see a doctor.”
“I don’t want to. Tongue depressors make me gag.”
“Baby,” he said teasingly. “And speaking of doctors … I have something to show you.”
He led me to the front of the house, where his car was parked at the curb. We climbed in and he took a piece of paper out of the glove compartment.
It was covered with words from Sex Ed—chlamydia and gonorrhea and HIV, plus a few others that my teacher had neglected to mention. They were listed on a chart and each one had a very good word next to it—negative.
“Did they stab you with a big needle?” I asked, scanning the chart, wondering which one of those filthy diseases Del had caught underneath his skylight. I despised needles and blood tests because I always ended up getting stuck at least five times. Bad veins, the nurses and phlebotomists always muttered while they turned my arm into swiss cheese.
“Needles don’t bother me. And I’m not trying to pressure you with this, Ari. I just don’t want you to worry about anything.”
I smiled, folded the paper, and put it back in the glove compartment. “I’m not worried,” I said, and he leaned over to kiss me but I covered my mouth. “Don’t, Blake. You’ll get sick.”
“I don’t care.”
Later we went back to the sofa and watched Kieran and his friends skid on the Slip ’n Slide. I kept wondering about Del and I couldn’t stop myself from whispering, “Which one of those diseases did your brother have?”
Blake’s eyes widened. “Where did you get that from?”
I shrugged. “A little bird told me.”
“Yeah … a little bird with red hair, I bet.”
He didn’t answer my question. I looked around the backyard at Patrick barbecuing hamburgers and Evelyn gossiping with her housewife friends until I couldn’t stand it anymore and I asked again.
“Ari,” Blake said. “It isn’t nice to talk about that.”
Nice, nice, nice, why did everything have to be so nice? “I won’t tell anybody. I promise.”
Other Words for Love Page 18
