Under the Dusty Moon

by Suzanne Sutherland

  Quite literally. Well, almost. Someone rang our doorbell at the bottom of the stairs.

  Mom went down and opened it as I started reluctantly soaping up the pile of dishes in the sink. She appeared at our door a minute later, with Ken the Leech in tow.

  “Hey, Vic,” Ken said, taking off his shoes. “Nice to see you again.”

  “Again?” Mom said. “What do you mean?”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” I said to Mom, ignoring Ken’s existence altogether. “I told you I didn’t want him coming over tonight.”

  “Whoa,” Ken said, “I should go.” He bent down and started clumsily trying to stick his feet back into the still-tied sneakers he’d just pulled off.

  “Hold it,” Mom said, and then turned to me. “You don’t talk to me that way. You don’t talk to anyone that way, you know that.”

  “Yeah, and you know that I told you I wanted it to be just us tonight. I don’t want him here.”

  “You told me that you wanted it to be just us for dinner, so I told Ken to come over afterwards,” Mom said, turning to put a hand on his arm, “It’s fine, Ken, you can stay. Vic’s just upset because she’s going through a bad breakup.”

  “You don’t even know!” I said, my voice was so loud that it filled the room. It could have filled every room. I’d had enough.“You don’t know my life anymore! And instead of trying to figure out who the hell I am without you, I have to worry about you running around with some obsessive fanboy who’s just using you to write some fucking book about my dead dad!” I slammed down the glass I was holding and it smashed into a million little pieces in the sink, then I went to my room to grab my stuff.

  Mom followed me and barricaded my bedroom door with her body, straining to keep her voice low and even. I figured that Ken had already bailed. Maybe a big scene was all I needed to make sure that he’d leave us alone for good.

  “Where are you going?” she asked slowly, giving each word weight.

  “I’m not staying here tonight. I’m going over to Lucy’s. It’s disgusting what you’re doing. You’re falling for someone who wants to squeeze you dry for your story.”

  Mom pinched the bridge of her nose, breathed in deeply and then back out. “I can’t talk to you about this right now, you’re being completely irrational. Do you know what kind of stress I’m under? You had to pull this with me tonight of all nights? I have a show tomorrow. A really important show. You know that.”

  “So this is all about you?” I said, stuffing my phone into my bag. “Then I’m going. Have a great show tomorrow. I’ll be sure to tell all my friends what a beautiful fucking star my mother is.”

  “Just go to Lucy’s,” she said. “And text me when you get there so I know that you’re okay.”

  “God, you’re really going for Mother of the Year, huh?”

  “We’ll talk about this later,” she said. “After tomorrow. Just give me that much.”

  “Fine, whatever.”

  I pushed past her and out the door. Mercifully, Ken had already split.

  I started running as soon as I hit the street. People meandering on the sidewalks gave me weird looks as I rushed past them, heading west. With tears burning down my cheeks and my bag thump-thumping against my side, I looked like a mess, but I couldn’t stop moving. When my legs finally ached so badly that I knew I had to stop, I straightened up to see where my feet had taken me.

  Shaun’s house.

  Seventeen

  I went around the side of the house, where I hoped Shaun’s parents or any snooping neighbours couldn’t see me, and texted him.

  Outside. Let me in?

  Outside where? Shaun replied.

  Your place, I texted. Are you home?

  Yeah, just got in. Come around the back, okay? I’ll let you in. Just be quiet.

  A motion-sensing light went off as I came around the back of the house, but fortunately no one seemed to notice. Shaun’s parents had a beautiful backyard, with flowers and plants sprouting in just about every direction, but somehow the peacefulness of it all was jarring after my big fight with Mom and it jumpstarted my tears again.

  A minute later Shaun’s face appeared at the back door.

  “Hey,” he whispered through the screen, “what’s going on?”

  Then he saw my pathetic face, and opened the door as quickly as he could without making it squeak and pulled me into a deep hug. He wrapped around me so perfectly, and with two good arms I folded myself into him completely. Eventually I stopped crying.

  “It’s my mom,” I whispered. “I can’t go home tonight.”

  “Okay,” he said, “just be quiet. My parents are upstairs watching a movie, and they’re probably asleep by now anyway. Just come up to my room, okay?”

  I sniffed hard and nodded, following him upstairs as quietly as I figured was humanly possible. We paused at the top of the stairs when Shaun thought he heard a noise from his parents’ room, but it turned out to just be a Jurassic snore. Shaun led me into his bedroom and closed the door behind him.

  “Come here,” he said, “lay down with me. What happened?”

  “Just a sec,” I said, pulling out my phone. As furious as I was at her, I knew Mom would ask fewer questions if I just sent her a stupid text saying I was okay. I hoped that she’d be too busy in the morning to call Lucy’s parents to check in on me, but at that point I hardly cared. What was one lie on top of everything else? I just didn’t want her to think that I was lying belly-up in a ditch somewhere with a needle in my arm. Not that there were any ditches downtown anyway.

  Mom texted back a single word.

  Good.

  I shuddered at how quickly she’d responded, then tossed my phone to the other side of the bed where I wouldn’t have to look at it.

  “Can we just watch a movie?” I asked. “Something stupid? Please?”

  “Yeah,” he said, “of course.”

  “And I’m not having sex with you tonight, okay?”

  “You think that’s what I want when you show up at my back door, with friggin’ geyser eyes?” he asked. “Come on, give me some credit.”

  I laughed and sniffed hard. “You’re right. You’re such a sensitive guy.”

  “Obviously,” he said. “Just don’t go spreading that around, all right?”

  “Our secret.”

  He pulled out his laptop and I made it through about fifteen minutes of Step Brothers before passing out cold, splayed out over most of Shaun’s bed.

  Shaun nudged me awake at an absurdly early hour the next morning. “Come on,” he whispered, “get up.”

  “It’s okay,” I whispered, my mouth still slow with sleep, “I’ll get out.”

  “No,” he said, “I meant, I’m coming with you. Let’s go get breakfast.”

  “Yeah?” I said.

  “Yeah. But we’ve gotta leave now, before my folks wake up.”

  I’d passed out wearing all of my clothes, so I was ready to go in a minute. Shaun wasn’t shy at all about changing in front of me, and I found myself staring at him as he took off his boxers and put on fresh clothes. He had a mole on the small of his back and it was the most perfect little spot I’d ever seen on another person. I instinctively memorized its coordinates and its size.

  Once he’d swabbed his pits with deodorant, he was ready to go. And when he turned around to face me, I saw that he was wearing his Dusty Moon shirt again.

  “What?” he said, when he saw the look on my face, “too much? I know you’re not supposed to wear the shirt of the band you’re going to see, but isn’t this a little different?”

  There was no way I could tell him not to wear the shirt without ruining everything, so I just shrugged. “No, it’s fine. It’s a nice shirt.”

  “Thanks,” he said. “Now we better get out of here.”

  We were halfway down the stairs when all of our good luck ran out. We’d been perfectly silent all the way down the hall, and I was just starting to think that we should write a manual on how to be totall
y stealth, when the door at the end of the hallway opened and a woman with cropped grey hair in a faded T-shirt and plaid flannel shorts stepped out.

  “Hello,” she said, “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  I was paralyzed. My body’s impulse was to run, but I knew that wasn’t an option. At least not outside of a cheesy sitcom.

  “Hi,” I said, holding up my hand in a static wave.

  “V, just go downstairs, okay?” Shaun said. “Give me a second. Don’t leave.”

  I could feel Shaun’s mom’s laser vision burning a hole through the back of my head as I walked the rest of the way downstairs and took an uneasy seat on the couch. Upstairs, a door creaked and then shut and I couldn’t hear their voices anymore. I sat perfectly still with my feet flat on the floor like the whole world might crack in half if I moved.

  A few anxious minutes later, when Shaun still hadn’t come back downstairs, I heard a door open and then fast plodding footsteps heading toward me on the stairs. I finally turned my head just as Miles hopped up to his usual spot on the couch. He turned on the TV, picked his controller up off the coffee table, and resumed his game of Dragonfury Infinite without saying a word. I sat there watching him play for a few more minutes before he finally opened his mouth.

  “What do you play?” he asked.

  “Huh?” I said, startled by the sound of his voice.

  “You play, right?” he said, not taking his eyes off the screen.

  “Um, yeah,” I said, “a bit. I like Lore of Ages.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “The new one’s gonna be sweet.”

  “Totally,” I said, exhaling the last bit of breath I had left in my lungs before we returned to our mutual silence.

  A few minutes later, I heard a door open upstairs and then three sets of footsteps made their way down the stairs. Shaun reached the bottom step first, flanked by two women: one who I’d already met, though she was now wearing jeans, and the other who had her hair in a ponytail and her mouth in a tight smile.

  “Mom, Alice,” Shaun said, “this is Victoria.”

  I stood up from the couch at the introduction. I wasn’t sure if I should shake their hands or not, but figured the fact that they’d caught me sneaking out of Shaun’s room first thing in the morning meant that we were probably past the pleasantries stage.

  “Hi,” I said. “It’s, uh, nice to meet you.”

  “I told them why you came over last night,” Shaun said, by way of explanation as to why his parents hadn’t run me out of their home yet. “That you had nowhere else to go. Right?”

  “Yeah,” I said, trying to look as harmless and pathetic as possible. “Right.”

  “While we disagree with the way you and Shaun went about this,” the first woman, Shaun’s mom, said.

  “We have always said that our home would be a safe place for anyone who needed it,” said the second woman, Alice. “So, welcome.”

  “They want you to stay for breakfast,” said Shaun. “Okay?”

  “Oh, yeah, sure,” I said. “Okay.”

  Shaun’s mom got to work cracking eggs into a large cast-iron skillet, while Alice tried unsuccessfully to get Miles to set the table. Shaun took a brick of cheese from the fridge and started grating it into a painted ceramic bowl, and I stood around uselessly, unsure of how to help.

  “Um, can I … is there anything I can do?” I asked.

  “It’s fine,” said Alice, who had given in and started setting the table herself. “Just have a seat. Would you like some juice?”

  “Thanks,” I said, “but I’m fine.”

  I watched Shaun’s family’s choreographed chaos from my seat at the table. Shaun’s mom started throwing vegetables and cheese into the skillet, and soon she was setting neatly folded omelettes onto the plates Alice had arranged on the table. Shaun took a seat next to me with a giant glass of juice in his hand.

  “All right?” he whispered to me, a deep crease cutting through his forehead.

  “Yeah,” I said, as his parents took their seats. “Fine.”

  “Miles,” Shaun’s mom called, “put the game down. It’s breakfast time.”

  But he didn’t seem to be listening. The rest of us smiled uncomfortably at each other around the small table.

  “Miles,” Shaun’s mom called again, “your eggs are getting cold.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he said, waving her off with one hand.

  Shaun’s mom got up from the table and stood between Miles and the TV. “Breakfast,” she said. “Now.”

  Miles sighed loudly and put down his controller, then came over and joined us at the table. We all picked up our forks and started eating, and I was grateful for the excused silence. Miles was the first to clear his plate, which took him all of six giant bites, and soon he was back on the couch, controller in hand.

  As Alice reached the middle of her omelette, she said, “So, Victoria, you and Shaun go to school together?”

  “Mmhmm,” I said. “I’ve actually been over here once before. We were rehearsing a play.”

  “I remember that play,” Alice said. “It was … interesting. How’s your summer been?”

  “It’s been fine, mostly,” I said. “I, uh, broke my wrist back in July. So that wasn’t good. But otherwise it’s been okay.”

  “And what’s going on right now with you and your mom?” she asked.

  “Alice,” Shaun’s mom said, “it’s not the time.”

  “Yeah,” Shaun said, “just leave it, okay?”

  “No,” I said, “it’s fine. I can talk about it. You guys are, like, really nice for not kicking me out.”

  “You hear that?” Alice said to Shaun’s mom, “We’re nice.”

  “She’s clearly been misinformed.”

  I smiled. “Yeah, my mom … she’s, well, we’re just not getting along right now. Which isn’t like us. We’re, like, usually really close.”

  Alice nodded but didn’t interrupt me, and I wondered how much I could confide in Shaun and his parents without giving my secret away.

  “She’s dating this guy who, like, I just don’t think is good for her. And she can’t see what’s right in front of her face, that he’s using her.”

  It was Shaun’s mom’s turn to nod.

  “How do you mean?” Shaun asked.

  That was a question I couldn’t answer.

  “He’s just bad,” I said, “I don’t trust him. I can’t go home right now. I mean, I will soon, just not today.”

  “That’s fine,” Alice said.

  “But we’ll ask that if you need to spend the night again that you sleep on the couch,” Shaun’s mom added.

  “Oh yeah,” I said, “of course. I’m really sorry about last night. I just, well, I was desperate.”

  “That’s enough of the third degree for one morning,” Shaun’s mom said, as she finished her breakfast.

  “Are you still hungry?” asked Alice. “Would you like us to make you something else?”

  “No, no,” I said, “I’m stuffed. That was really good. Thank you.”

  “She’s quite a cook, isn’t she?” said Alice.

  “Oh, stop it,” Shaun’s mom said. “Now we’ll go back upstairs and leave you two to clean all of this up, all right?”

  “Oh yeah,” I said, “sure.”

  “We’re on it,” said Shaun.

  Soon Shaun was up to his elbows in sudsy water, and I was wielding a rag to dry off the wet dishes.

  “Your parents are, like, so cool,” I whispered. “That was so decent of them.”

  “Yeah,” he said, “they’re pretty all right most of the time.”

  “So, Alice …?”

  “She’s my step-mom,” Shaun said, handing me a glass.

  “Oh,” I said, toweling it off, “gotcha.”

  “I hope it’s not weird that I didn’t tell you,” he said.

  “You didn’t have to, Miles did. But, I mean, you could have, you know.”

  “Yeah,” he said, handing me a cheese grater, “I know
. I just get annoyed with feeling like I have to explain my family to people all the time. We’re just us, you know?”

  “Yeah,” I said. And having spent only one meal with his family, that much was already perfectly clear. They were just themselves. And it was kind of amazing.

  “So are we still on for the show today?” Shaun asked, pulling the plug up from the bottom of the sink and draining out the water.

  “You sure you’re not grounded?” I asked.

  “Oh, no, I absolutely am. But my folks said we could take the day before they lock me up for the rest of my life.”

  “I guess we better enjoy it then.”

  “I think it’s our duty,” Shaun said. “So do you want to head down to the Island a bit early? To hang out on the beach and stuff before the show starts?”

  “Yeah,” I said, trying to figure out how I was going to swing meeting up with Lucy, too, “that’s fine.”

  “Aw, come on,” he said, “it’s going to be great. Micky Wayne!”

  I pictured it: Mom in her element with Ken watching her from backstage, scribbling in some tiny little notebook, trying to capture the impossible magic she radiated when she performed and probably getting off in the process. But I didn’t want to disappoint Shaun, he’d been basically perfect to me. The faded letters of his T-shirt seemed like a flashing neon sign. DUSTY MOON. DUSTY MOON. Was he ever going to see me the same way again once he knew the truth? There was just no way.

  Shaun went upstairs to tell his parents we were going, and I sent out a pair of texts.

  To Lucy I texted, Hey! Going to the beach with Shaun before the show tonight, but text me when you’re heading over and we’ll meet you there.

  I knew Lucy wouldn’t be thrilled at this, but at least I wasn’t ditching her completely.

  And then I texted Mom. Two words were all I needed: I’m alive.

  Shaun and I caught the Queen streetcar headed toward the Island ferry docks, and I shivered as we passed the spot where I’d been doored all those weeks before. It felt like forever ago. Shaun held my arm and traced the tan line where my cast had been with his index finger.