“My mom and dad call it the guest room now, but they left all his records here. I guess they sorta did it for me.” Seth walked in. I followed. I couldn’t believe my eyes. It looked like a cross between a record store and a museum. There were tall shelves full of real record albums, racks of CDs and cassettes. Faded posters covering the walls. I recognized some of the names as the old bands Midnight Pete used to play. Yo La Tengo. Teenage Fanclub. Superchunk. Liz Phair. Pavement. Guided by Voices. Guided by Voices. Guided by Voices.
“Donnie was a total music nerd,” Seth explained. “He went to school in New York just so he could intern for Matador, the record label. I still come in here and listen to 45s on his stereo. It’s kind of like hanging out with him, you know? He used to talk about how, when he got better, he was gonna take me to my first GBV show, because they were, like, the best live band ever. But we never did make it . . .” Seth trailed off.
“You could go see them now. I’m sure that’s what your brother would’ve wanted,” I said.
“Except that they broke up, like, right after he died.” Seth shrugged. “It sucks pretty hard, but I’m optimistic. Bob Pollard, you know, pretty much the mastermind of the band, he has this new group, Boston Spaceships. Their album just came out and it’s pretty awesome, so . . .” Seth shrugged again. Optimistic or no, he looked like he was trying not to cry.
“Maybe they’ll play an all-ages show at Cat’s Cradle or somewhere.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
I hesitated. “How did he die? Your brother, I mean.”
“Don’t laugh. Testicular cancer.”
“Who’s laughing? That’s terrible.”
“He never got it checked out, and it metastasized. The worst thing about it is, you don’t have to die of it. I mean, look at—” Seth stopped, catching himself. “Donnie used to get so sick of people saying, ‘Look at Lance Armstrong,’ but, seriously. Look at Lance Armstrong. That guy had it, and now he’s won, like, seven Tour de Frances. When I first made the team, junior varsity, I was telling some of the guys about him, saying, like, hey guys, you gotta check your balls and make sure there’s nothing crazy going on down there.”
“You told the guys on the football team to check their balls?”
“I know. They just about laughed my ass outta the room. But you know what?”
“What?”
“Just last winter, this guy Darryl Harris—you remember him? Played right guard? He was a senior when we were freshmen. Anyway, he called me up from college, out in Texas.” Seth had this very serious look on his face as he related this story. “Sure enough, dude found a lump on one of his balls. Cancer. They caught it in time, and now he’s totally healthy. He even started in the game last Saturday.”
“Wow,” I tried not to cringe.
“So, there you go. My brother may be gone, but he already saved one life. I try to look at it like that because otherwise. You know.” Seth exhaled, looking around the room. “I just miss him too much.”
I was afraid that Sexy Seth was indeed about to cry. I reached out to give him a friendly pat on the back. And then somehow, all of a sudden, he hugged me. My face was pressed against his Fighting Eagles sweatshirt. He smelled clean and familiar. It took me a minute to remember. My mom’s soap. Made out of organic hemp.
“I bet you think I’m so weird right now,” Seth said into my hair.
“No, this is totally normal. I’m into random hugs and stories about testicles.”
“Sorry about that.” We pulled apart. “Am I grossing you out? Some girls get grossed out.”
“No, it’s actually enlightening,” I told him. “Just for you, I’m going to go home and check my balls.” Seth laughed. “For real, though. I’m really sorry about your brother. I’m sorry for you. I really am.”
“Thanks.” He looked at me. I mean, he looked at me. For, like, a ridiculously long time.
“Maybe we should, um.” I cleared my throat. “Maybe we should get back down to the party.”
“Yeah. Lemme grab those CDs.” He flipped off the light, and we left his brother’s room, closing the door behind us. I looked at the other closed door down the hall.
“How did Rory end up living with you? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“He showed up at my dad’s church,” Seth said, crossing the hall back to his bedroom. “My dad’s the minister at the Unitarian church—you know that church in the building where the old library was?”
“Sure. I used to love that library.”
“You should come by sometime. It still smells like books,” Seth said, turning his bedroom light back on. “Anyway, they’ve got a support group down there for gay teens. Well, gay people of all ages who don’t feel welcome in more conservative churches, or fall out with their families, or whatever. So, Rory came in. He came to a couple of meetings before somebody figured out he was living in his car. My dad, like, flipped out and insisted that he come live with us. Especially since we’re on the same team and everything. And it’s been really cool. Kind of like Instant Brother.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what to say. I felt horrible. It should have been me. I should have been the one to take him in. Even if I was gone, why didn’t he come to Janet and Leo’s? I sank down on the end of Seth’s bed, feeling too bad about Rory to even appreciate the weirdness of sitting on Sexy Seth’s bed.
“But enough about Rory. We have serious business to discuss.” Seth gave me an all-business look as he took a small handful of CDs off of the shelf by his desk. “What’s your favorite Guided by Voices album?”
“Well, I don’t actually . . .” I could feel myself blushing. “Truthfully, I only really know one of their songs.”
“Just one? Lemme guess: ‘Hardcore UFOs’? That was a Midnight Pete favorite. I could see you digging that song. Rory told me you guys were into that X-Files show. He showed me those articles you wrote.”
“He—Rory did what?” I felt my stomach drop to my toes. Sexy Seth knew about the Guide.
“He showed me your, uh, Guide to The X-Files, the blog you guys did?” Seth opened one of the CD cases, closed it, then chose another. “I never watched the show, but those articles were pretty funny. I like the “point/counterpoint” one about the liver-eating mutant guy, where you and Rory were arguing and he kept making you all mad.”
“Oh yeah. The liver-eating mutant guy,” I echoed weakly. My ears were so hot, I was afraid my hair was going to catch on fire. I couldn’t believe Seth had read all that goofy stuff we wrote.
“So that’s why I guessed ‘Hardcore UFOs.’”
“Huh?”
“Your Guided by Voices song. Did I guess right?”
“Oh, the song . . . it’s, um. Actually, it’s ‘Teenage FBI.’”
“Man! That’s a great song, too! Do you have the album version, or the EP version?”
“I’M NOT SURE. IT WAS . . . on the Buffy soundtrack.” Just when I thought it was impossible to be any less cool, I went and admitted to Sexy Seth Brock that I owned the Buffy the Vampire Slayer soundtrack. I was blushing so much that I felt like Madeline Kahn in Clue. “Flames. Flames . . . on the side of my face.” Extra flamey.
“Buffy had a GBV song on the soundtrack?” Seth asked. “That’s awesome. I might have to go back and watch that show now.” He knelt down to a lower shelf and pulled out more CDs, seemingly unfazed by my uncool confession. “The EP version is like, rawer, but it’s awesome. I love ’em both. Some people say Do the Collapse is too polished, you know? Too slick. But I love that album. I love the lo-fi stuff too, though. Even when it sounds like it was recorded straight into a tape recorder—it probably was—but the songs are so good, it doesn’t matter. Under the Bushes Under the Stars is maybe my favorite album of all time. Even though Isolation Drills is the one I usually listen to before games. I know, I’m supposed to say Bee Thousand is the best, and, I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s awesome, but—” he paused, gave me one of his patented Sexy grins. “I’m not making any sense right now, am
I?”
“Yeah, I kind of need to phone a friend right now,” I admitted. Seth laughed.
“I tend to get sorta carried away when I talk about Guided by Voices. It’s just—their songs are like magic to me. Some of ’em get me so psyched up, I feel like I could leap tall buildings, be all Superman. And then the very next song, I go and get all choked up—” Seth paused, kneeling on his carpet. He shook his head. “Why do we love this stuff?”
“What, music?”
“Anything! Why do we love anything? I mean, my brother played plenty of other bands. Good bands. There was music coming out of his room all the time. But this one time on a long car trip, he let me listen to some GBV on his headphones, and that was it. I had to hear it all.”
“You woke up one morning and said, ‘I know: dolls.’”
“Do what now?”
“It’s, uh. Sorry, kind of random. It’s from this X-Files episode. Clyde Bruckman . . . he’s a psychic, and he’s wondering why this woman they’re investigating was a doll collector. Like, why do any of us become obsessed with the stuff we become obsessed with? The stuff that kind of defines who we are. Is it some kind of destiny, or more like a flash of inspiration? Like, was it a series of unavoidable events, all through this woman’s childhood, leading her to accumulate all these dolls? Or did she just wake up one morning—”
“And say, ‘I know: dolls!’” Seth laughed. “Exactly! Like, Under the Bushes—the first time I heard it, I didn’t even like it that much. I felt like it was too long and there weren’t enough songs that stood out. I kept going back to Alien Lanes and Bee Thousand instead. But then one night, the summer after Donnie died, I was lying here watching the sun go down. For whatever reason, I put on Under the Bushes Under the Stars. It was one of those nights, before school started back. Even though I was psyched about the football season, I was feeling kind of bummed out about summer being over. You know how it gets right before night in the summer, when the trees are dark, and the sky behind them is all fire colored and dark blue, and you feel this sort of . . . melancholy?”
Sexy Seth Brock, popular football star, looked out at the trees at dusk and felt melancholy? Are you kidding me? Was I being Punk’d? I would’ve assumed a guy like Seth would look out at the trees at dusk and feel like, I dunno, doing a keg stand.
“Yeah, actually, I do,” I said. “I think I know what you mean.”
“And right then, this song came on, ‘Acorns & Orioles’—you got a minute?”
“Well, I should get back to this fabulous party I’ve been invited to, but,” I shrugged, “for you, I’ve got a minute.”
Seth grinned. He stood up, opening a CD case. He slapped the disc into the little portable stereo on his bureau and skipped tracks until he found the one he was looking for. I heard plaintive, minor-key acoustic guitar, quieter than the one other GBV song I knew. The first verse sent a sort of chill fluttering through me. By the time the song got to the chorus, I can’t tell you anything you don’t already know, I knew how Seth felt.
“Like the weather changed.”
“Huh?” Seth turned the volume down a little.
“It’s like—” I hesitated. “The first time Rory and I watched X-Files. Normally we talk through whatever we’re watching. But that first episode we watched, we were dead silent. And afterward it felt like the weather had changed. Like the clouds had rolled in, even though they hadn’t. But it was like we . . . went through the wardrobe or something.” I trailed off, feeling like a weirdo, as usual. “It’s a really good song.”
“Isn’t it? Like the weather changed . . . that’s a good way to describe it. What do you reckon it is,” Seth mused, “that makes us see something all of a sudden? When we’ve passed by it a hundred times, and it suddenly jumps out? All of a sudden it’s not just music that you’re listening to, it’s a feeling that you’re . . . feeling. And next thing you know you can’t stop listening to the record without all the catchy tunes on it, or out of all five hundred channels, you can’t stop watching that one old show. Why do we love the stuff we love? Especially when it doesn’t make no regular sense.”
“Maybe love never makes sense,” I said. The song was fading to an end. Seth popped the CD player open.
“You know, back before I knew him, I thought you and Rory were going out,” Seth said, putting the CD back in its case.
“We were just friends. Best friends. But we . . . had a falling out. He didn’t tell you?”
“Rory’s kind of private about stuff. Not like me,” Seth smiled. “He said the same thing. You guys had a falling out. But he talks about you all the time. Me and Lula used to do this, Lula always says, Lula this, Lula that.”
“He does?” I felt myself blush again. “Bet that gets boring.”
“Any friend of Rory’s is a friend of mine. Anyway, whatever happened, I don’t think he hates you or anything. You guys can work it out.” Seth went back to his CD shelf. I hoped he was right. That Rory didn’t hate me. I didn’t know what to say. I still felt the melancholy of the song, that feeling like dark trees at dusk in the summertime. It reminded me of Rory, of our Friday nights.
“I guess these’ll do,” Seth broke the silence, gathering up a stack of CDs. “Sorry, didn’t mean to get off on a big GBV tangent.”
“It’s okay. I really like them. I mean, I like what I’ve heard so far. You should tell me which songs to download, and I’ll get some more,” I said, trying to break up the melancholy. I didn’t want to further my embarrassment by admitting to Seth that I’d just stopped at the one Guided by Voices song because I was more intent on making a mix CD for Rory. Who didn’t even care enough about music to realize that I’d found all these songs that seemed to be written just for us. “I looked them up online, but there were, like, a hundred albums. I didn’t know where to start.”
“Probably more like a thousand albums! I swear, Bob Pollard writes more songs than Lil Wayne. Anyway, you can’t download GBV.” Seth became very professorial all of a sudden. “I mean, you can, if it’s the only way you can hear them. But they’re one of those bands where it’s better when you can, like, hold the albums in your hands. Almost all the covers are Bob’s collages . . . they’re so awesome. Next time you come over, we’ll spend some quality time with Donnie’s collection. He’s even got an original Propeller on vinyl!”
“Well, uh—okay.” I was too busy trying to make sense of the suggestion that Seth and I were going to spend some “quality time” together to wonder what on earth a propeller on vinyl was.
“In the meantime, I’m gonna make you a mixtape!” Seth went on. “I’ve got all their albums, plus Donnie’s old EPs, Bob’s solo stuff, Tobin Sprout’s solo stuff, all of it. In fact, it’s gonna have to be mixtapes, plural. Prepare yourself, Lula Monroe, ’cause you are fixin’ to get bombarded with GBV.”
“I hate to tell you, Seth, but I think I’ve been vaccinated against that sort of thing.”
Sexy Seth laughed again. He stood up, tucking the CDs under his arm. He gave me one of those classic Sexy Seth smiles, and, I have to admit, I could see why my fellow female classmates tended to turn into complete idiots around him.
“Has anybody ever told you you’re pretty funny, Lula?”
“Many times, as a matter of fact, but I think they meant funny-strange, not funny-ha-ha.”
“Huh. Well. I think you’re pretty funny-ha-ha.” Seth looked down at the stack of CDs in his hand, raking his hand through his hair. He seemed nervous or embarrassed or something, all of a sudden. His room was quiet except for the dramatic dum-da-da-da-DUM! music coming from Millionaire on the TV downstairs.
“Maybe we should get back to the party,” I suggested.
“Yeah. These oughta keep us busy for a while, don’t you think?” He flipped the light out.
“For a little while, anyway.” I stopped in the doorway. “Hey, Seth? When you said you and Rory were on the same team, did you mean—”
“Football.” Seth said. “What’d you think I mean
t? Ice hockey?”
eleven
MY MOTHER AND I WERE WALKING around downtown Santa Fe, on our way to meet Walter for dinner. The night air was cool and the sidewalks were threaded with tourists bearing shopping bags, their wrists stacked with turquoise bracelets. We had just made a lame attempt at bonding by going to the opening-night screening of The X-Files: I Want To Believe.
“I’m just surprised, that’s all. I thought it would be a lot more suspenseful. Wasn’t this show about government conspiracies? It wasn’t even scary.”
“You weren’t scared? Not even when they had Mulder out in the barn with the axe?” I kicked a loose pebble down the narrow street. I was already writing in my head, trying to compose an entry for the Guide about the movie, but my mom’s complete lack of shrieking hysterical excitement was making it hard to concentrate.
“Come on,” she scoffed. “You know they’re not going to chop up one of their principals. I can’t believe you’re defending this movie. It was sort of homophobic, don’t you think? Not to mention trans-phobic. Evil gay mad scientists chopping up bodies for bizarre transgendered Frankenstein experiments? Predatory gay pedophilic priests? I thought your best friend was gay.”
“Yeah. He is.” What was I supposed to say? My mother was seriously raining on my X-Files parade. She didn’t even care about Mulder’s Exile Beard, or that he and Scully were living together, but they were still too wrecked to be normal and married and happy. And we even got to see Skinner come in and kick some ass. Everything else was, well . . . secondary.
“And what about you? You weren’t offended?”
“Me? Offended?” On the contrary. I got to see Mulder and Scully on the big screen—I was delighted. But I didn’t say that. My mother’s disdain was actually making me feel embarrassed to love The X-Files. Thankfully, there was Walter, standing on the corner, giving a big wave.
“Walter!” My mother seemed relieved, too.
Weird Girl and What's His Name Page 19
