That’s Punk.
Friday, as usual, I trek over to Roy’s. Time for some R and R.
“Went up to see his mom,” his dad tells me. “Chowchilla. It’s her birthday.”
“Oh. Thanks.” I stand there hoping he’ll at least offer me a beer, like usual, but when a woman pokes her head around the corner, he grins and closes the door.
Great. Here I am, all the way out at the stupid trailer park, needing to relax and no way to do it. My parents are home and Glenn’s not available. What the hell am I supposed to do now? I truck over to the liquor store and wait to see if there might be somebody who’d buy. No luck. The only customers that come in look like they’d just steal my cash. Should I go to the motel? Alone? Stupid idea. But, hey, wouldn’t be my first.
The Mexican guy waves me in. I pay, he lays out the NEB. I chop it myself, then snort, close my eyes, and sink down into the chair. What seems like seconds later, the guy calls out.
“Hey. Come rub my legs, mijo.” He pats the couch cushion next to him. “I got bad pain.”
“Your momma,” I slur, nodding off.
“I give you free, today.” I open my eyes; he’s standing directly in front of me. He leans down and ruffles my hair. “One little rub, mijo.”
I try to push myself up and out of the chair; he whirls me easily onto the couch, sits down beside me, takes my hand, and puts it on the front of his pants. I can’t raise my arms to stop him. He leans in close; I gag at the smell. He moves my hand back and forth. Reaches for my zipper.
Adrenaline kicks in and suddenly I’m up. I knock the bastard on his ass. I book it out the door, stumble through the parking lot. I moving but I’m not sure how; I can’t feel my legs or lower back. I crawl behind the dumpster to hide there until I come down enough to walk home. My head is splitting. What the hell am I doing here? I could have been raped. Not a white face in sight and I can’t run. I’m on NEB. PCP.
ANIMAL TRANQUILIZER.
Stupid doesn’t begin to describe it.
“Hey, baby,” says a black chick, leaning around the edge of the dumpster. Her eyes are glassy. “You want a date?”
“Fuck off.” I manage to stand up, but that doesn’t last. Some ugly black dude grabs my shirt and sends me flying into the gravel on the edge of the parking lot.
“Apologize to the lady,” he says, his eyes boring into me. His buddies come up behind him. I’m so scared I pee my pants.
“Sorry,” I mumble.
“Couldn’t hear ya,” he says.
“I’m very sorry,” I say.
“Yeah you are,” the guy says and they all start laughing. “You are one sorry mother—”
A cop car drives down the alley and slows, shining a light toward us. The group breaks up quick. I don’t wait around.
When I meet up with Roy a couple days later, I tell him what the Mexican tried to do. I don’t mention the other. He laughs.
“Shit, he tries that with everybody. You ain’t special.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why didn’t you ask?”
I deck him. He laughs again.
{2}
Here’s what I figure out.
If I want to play music, I got to go out and hear people playing it, see how they perform, get into the scene. Punk Rock’s taking off, moving like wildfire. It’s a revolution. I can’t sit around with Roy all the time. I can maybe drink and smoke some pot, but that NEB shit? Taking those stupid chances? No more. I won’t spend my life being unconscious. I got too much to say. Music is the way I’m gonna say it. Not hanging out with trash, being stoned.
I need to take charge of my life.
“You are so right,” Glenn says, when I talk it over with him. “Roy ain’t shit, man. He can’t even play. We got to move forward, yeah? Check this out.” He holds up a flyer for Black Flag, the one that’s like the Manson girls. “Want to go?”
We don’t tell our parents; we just go. Me and Glenn ride the bus more than an hour to get to Hollywood. We sit in the very back, him in his ripped-up shirt and jeans, me wearing my Ramones T-shirt. We put on our mean faces and like it a lot when this woman chooses to stand up rather than sit near us. We get off up by Highland and stroll down Sunset. Hollywood at night is way better than I ever imagined. The energy’s like a drug. At the Whiskey, we stand in line with all those people I’ve been wanting to meet—the ones with dog collars and spiked hair. Glenn almost chickens out.
“Just shut up and look pissed,” I whisper. We’re both over six feet tall. We do not look fifteen. When the bouncer gives us the once over and nods toward the door, I want to scream out loud.
We’re in!
Music blasts, lights strobe, people press close around us. The MC glares out at the crowd.
“Who let all you long hairs in here?” he rants into the microphone.
I know he can’t be talking to me—my hair’s like Johnny Ramone’s. That’s Punk.
“Don’t you people know short hair is All-American?” he screams.
Somebody yanks my hair from behind, hard. I whirl to see a little round Punk girl smirking. Her head’s shaved. She’s got a safety pin stuck through her eyebrow.
“Hippie,” she taunts.
“Bitch,” I say. My hair is definitely not hippie.
A second later, I smell something burning. Glenn smacks the back of my head.
“She lit your hair, man,” Glenn says and smacks me again.
I cuss the girl out and shove her backwards. She falls into her boyfriend, a big blond flattop wearing a collar with spikes. I didn’t notice him. He pops me one, dead on, center of my forehead. My head whips back like a bobble doll. The girl laughs.
This is not what I expected.
Glenn presses through bodies and drags me away from them, somehow gets us closer to the stage; I’m dizzy and stink of burnt hair, with a bump rising in the center of my face. What the hell’s different from that stupid motel? Everybody keeps trying to mess me up.
The MC rants on as the band sets up behind him. People jump on the stage; he kicks them back off. He punches one guy. Glenn slips me a flask and I gulp some whiskey. It burns going down. I’m about ready to suggest we get outta here when Black Flag kicks in.
“I ain’t got no friends to call my own!”
Lights change colors. People scream out the lyrics. Somebody starts to pogo and in an instant, the entire room’s jumping up and down, as one, including us. Everything starts to blur. The music’s going faster than my heart, but I’m catching up. The pounding in my head is now coming from the stage, and I can’t tell where I stop and everybody else begins. Long hair, short or shaved, we’re all Punk now—one mind, one single body. Nothing else exists. Dez Cadena catapults off the stage and onto the crowd. People carry him over their heads. I reach up and feel his weight as he travels across the room, never dropping the mic from his mouth:
“Depression’s gonna kill me!”
Early 1978
TWO YEARS BEFORE
SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
{1}
Sometimes on Sundays, I pretend to have a headache so I won’t have to go to church. Marianne knows I’m faking, but doesn’t say anything. We take care of each other.
Today, I lounge in the old iron chair on the front porch; it’s got a big round spring so you can rock back and forth, side to side, or even in a circle. I like how it creaks. I think about my family. I wonder about my dad, if he’s out in the garage doing a sign. I wonder if Paul’s okay. When he turned eighteen, he got out of Juvie and decided not to come back home.
“Your brother broke my heart,” Mom said when she found out. “Every time the phone rings at night, I know it will be something bad. I couldn’t live if anything happened to one of you kids.”
I wonder if that’s true.
I creak the chair around. I like how it feels. I like being where I’m not supposed to be. I start counting the cars that whiz by, trying to keep track of how many I see of each color. The street’s bus
y this morning—it adds up fast.
A bright yellow van goes by, the color of a school bus. It’s number three on yellows. A baby blue Bug is twelve, or maybe thirteen of blues. Another red car is twenty-one. One more yellow van—no, wait, it’s the same one. Should I count it twice? Why not? Four yellows. Five minutes later, it comes by again. I sit up. The guy driving pulls over to the curb and beckons me over.
“I’m afraid I’m lost,” he calls out, smiling, very friendly. I walk down the sidewalk to his car. He’s a teenager and really cute; even Marianne would think so. He’s in brown cords and a white T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up. The car behind him honks and he waves it by. He’s got nice white teeth and smells of good cologne. “I thought there was a store nearby?”
I like how he looks, brown eyes and dark hair in a short do. I’m starting to get a little tingle. I point to the right. “Yeah, 7-Eleven. Three blocks, at the corner of Wesley.”
“Well, I’m dense,” he laughs, “because I can’t find it. I’ve gone by there twenty times.”
He smiles and I blush. I tip my head down and look up at him. I shrug.
“You think maybe you’d show me?” he asks, reaching over to open the passenger door. Click.
Tingles for sure now, but I shake my head no. “I have to stay here.”
“Oh, okay. I understand,” he says, but doesn’t shut the door. “Thanks anyway.” He looks sad. “You’re very nice.”
On an impulse, I get in the car.
“Go straight,” I say, pointing. I can feel my cheeks get warm. What the hell am I doing? What if my mother comes home, or one of our nosy neighbors sees me and tells? I don’t even know this boy. Why am I not scared?
At 7-Eleven, we pull into a back space, away from other cars. He is soooo cute! Without saying a word, he helps me into the back. He’s got a twin mattress there and three huge red and black pillows, like something out of a ’60s movie. He kisses me. We fool around and when I stop him, it’s fine. He understands, leans back, smiles. It’s very romantic. His breath smells faintly of menthol and cigarettes.
He kisses me again and this time, we go further.
After, he lights a cigarette and offers me one. I take it but I don’t inhale; the smoke makes me cough.
“You’re really beautiful,” he says and I smile. “How old are you?”
“Almost fifteen.” I lie. I’ll be thirteen in August.
“Can I see you again?”
“I don’t know.”
“Just in case, here’s my phone number,” he scribbles on the back of an envelope. “If you call, I’ll pick you up. Anywhere you say.” We kiss and he cups my face in his hand, just like Jonathan did. “I love your green eyes.”
I smile as I walk home after. I wish I could tell Davy about him, or at least Marianne. “His name is Charles,” I’d say. “He just turned seventeen. Very handsome. He wants me to call him. You’d like him. He thinks I’m beautiful.”
I get home just in time to climb into my bed before Mom and them get back. I really am flushed now and don’t have to pretend at all.
I see Charles three more times. I tell Mom I’m working with a teacher after school, then meet him out back behind the field. We drive somewhere we can park without getting hassled. We don’t talk a lot, but it’s okay. He’s sweet. He makes me feel important.
Usually, when he drops me back off, I scramble out of the van, but this time, I sneak one last kiss. My luck—it’s just as Hugo Leone and Fat Ralph are coming out of soccer practice. Charles drives off, but I can tell by their faces that they saw everything.
“Sicko!” Hugo growls, him and Fat Ralph coming up close behind me as I hurry toward the street to get home. They can’t do anything—the coach and rest of the team are around—but still they surround me, keep me from moving.
“Who should we tell first?” Ralph says. “Marianne?”
“Hell, no, we got to tell Sister Mary Margaret. Or maybe Mother Superior.”
“Leave me alone,” I mutter.
“That’s a sin against God, you know,” Hugo says, and they both laugh. “You’ll be expelled.”
“Maybe even tomorrow,” Ralph says, and they high-five each other, then abruptly turn the other way.
I never call Charles again. I’m scared to. I watch Sister Mary Margaret. Nothing. Marianne doesn’t seem any different, either. Only me. Now I try get to school just as class starts and leave immediately after. Still, it feels like they’re always watching.
* * *
It’s late summer when I have my revelation. I’m finally thirteen. Mom makes me a birthday cake and fixes pot roast and potatoes for dinner, my favorite. She gives me a pullover sweater the exact same green as my eyes. And hers. I try it on. She smiles and leans in to give me a little kiss on my cheek.
“Makes up for last year, huh?” she whispers.
Last year Elvis Presley died—on my birthday. When Mom heard, she dropped my cake, then locked herself in her room and didn’t come out for three days. Nobody knew what to do, not even Dad.
All of this rambles around my head as Davy and I ride BART home from class. I’m wearing my new sweater. It’s still light out even though we have late classes in summer. I think about last year, how weird it was that no one but Marianne told me Happy Birthday. Everybody worried about Mom instead. I can’t remember what I thought, if I put it together about Elvis. We never talked about it.
We never talked about Dad or the divorce, either. Or Paul. Or Grandma, for that matter—or even Uncle Bobby. This makes my stomach hurt. Which makes me take a deep breath. Which brings me to a brand-new thought.
I know what’s wrong with our family.
I sit straight up, blink my eyes.
It’s so simple.
It’s the secrets. They weigh us down. They keep us from knowing things clearly; they cover our lives like those shrouds on the mummies in the museum. We can’t hold them all, so we pretend they aren’t there. Except that makes everything worse, like when my finger got infected and the doctor had to lance it open, so the pus could all come out. It had nowhere else to go.
Across the aisle, Davy nods his head and twitches his feet, lost in his music. What’s his secret? Is he sleeping with Isabelle? How about Marianne? She knows the most about our family. What does she not tell? What happened with Dad and Paul? I know Kaitlyn has secrets, she must, she never talks to anybody anymore. Sometimes I catch her standing in the living room, staring at the statue of Mother Mary.
Secrets can make you crazy. Look at Grandma.
I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before.
It will change everything. I don’t have to be the kid in the corner, the one who doesn’t fit in. I can be the one who makes everything better.
“What’s wrong with you?” Davy asks, as the train pulls in and we stand and wait to file off.
“Nothing.”
“Then why are you smiling?”
“You’ll find out,” I say.
He shakes his head at me. “Weirdo.”
{2}
The family meeting’s called a week from Friday; I can think of nothing else. I know Mom won’t give me another chance. She surprised me by agreeing in the first place.
“But why your father and Paul?” she said, when I asked her. We were in the living room, standing near Jesus.
“Because I have something I need to tell everyone. It’s really, really important.”
“All right then.” She gives me a look like she knows what I’m going to say, and I feel like smiling. “I’ll do what I can.”
Still, I’m kinda scared. Each day, I consider the words. They’ve got to be perfect, exactly right, so we can be a family again. So the secrets will stop. I’m thinking on this so hard after school on Tuesday, I don’t see Hugo Leone and Fat Ralph Conifer until I practically bump into them. They stand there grinning like a couple of cartoon hyenas.
“What?” I say with such force, it surprises me as much as it does them. For a second they don’t ta
lk.
“You know what,” says Fat Ralph.
“Time to put the trash in the garbage can…” they sing-song together, with those stupid expressions.
“Oh, fucking grow up, would you?”
Ralph’s mouth drops open, which makes me laugh. They step away; I take this as a sign. The family meeting is right. Things do change, standing up for myself is necessary. This is the proof I need. I smile all the way home.
Friday morning finally arrives. School goes on forever and dinner’s baked chicken, but I can’t make myself eat a thing. Mom says nothing. After, we pray as usual. Still, nothing. Did she forget? Change her mind?
Then the doorbell rings and like magic, my father’s here. Nobody knows what to say. He comes in, nods at Mom, tries to smile. He checks out the shrine. I remember that he’s never been here before; I wonder if Jesus makes him uncomfortable too. I smile. He winks back. Then Paul knocks. He doesn’t smile. He sees Dad and starts to back out. Marianne goes to him and the two talk, quietly. More silence. Paul sees Jesus and rolls his eyes.
“Shall we start?” Mom asks, and I nod.
“Start what?” Davy asks. “What’s going on?”
“Would you all please sit on the sofa?” I say.
“What are they doing here?” Davy continues.
“Be still and sit down,” Mom answers, looking at me. “We’re having a family meeting.”
“About time,” Paul mutters. His voice is deeper than I remember. His eyes shift back and forth; he stays far away from Dad.
Mom sits in the center. I stand by the shrine. My family settles. I’m conscious of Jesus to one side, Mother Mary to the other. I suddenly feel very young. What am I doing? Who do I think I am? I push the questions away. This is right. It needs to be done. A second later, I begin. I’m not even nervous.
“I have something important I want to say.”
My voice rings out clear and almost loud. Davy rolls his eyes. Mom sits straight up, motionless. I take my dramatic pause, exactly like I practiced. They lean into it, just slightly, into me, waiting. I hear the traffic, the clock ticking, Kaitlyn breathing raspily through her mouth.
Freaks and Revelations Page 6
