Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can't Have

by Allen Zadoff

  Towards the girls.

  There are a lot of girls here. Not Nancy Yee, acne-and-glasses girls who chew the ends of their hair when they get nervous. These are real girls. Pretty girls who know how to wear makeup to make them look even prettier. They know other things, too. At least according to the guys.

  I’m wearing an untucked black T-shirt under a button down. I’ve got on my largest jeans, which are actually a little baggy since I’ve been working out so much. Jessica pulled out Mom’s cuffs and rolled the pants up on the bottom. I feel like a sloppy freak, but when I look around, I fit in perfectly. Big points for Jessica.

  “What are you thinking about?” April says.

  She’s like a friggin’ stealth fighter. When I want her, I can’t find her, and when I’m not looking, she’s sneaking up on my six.

  “Just stuff,” I say.

  “Good stuff or bad stuff?”

  “Not sure.”

  “You smell like beer. Are you shitfaced?”

  “No,” I say, but truthfully I feel a little tipsy. I didn’t drink more than half a beer, but it must have been a strong half.

  “You want a beer?” I say. That’s what I hear the guys asking the girls.

  “Are you kidding? If my dad smells beer on me, my life is over. Seriously. He’ll lock me up until I’m twenty-five.”

  “That’s pretty strict.”

  “Korean dads, you know? He has to protect the family honor.”

  “If you drink, it will destroy his honor?”

  “Kind of.”

  “What if you talk to a Jewish boy?”

  “Executed,” she says. Then she smiles.

  Now I’m smiling, too.

  “But seriously,” she says. “A Korean family is different. We’re all connected, like a spiderweb or something. One person makes a wrong step, and it vibrates across the web.”

  April is standing really close to me, talking loudly so we can hear each other over the music. I know I’ve looked at her about a thousand times, but it feels like I’ve never really seen her up close. It’s easy to look at girls from a distance, but the closer you get, the scarier it becomes.

  “You have blue eyes,” I say.

  “You just noticed?”

  “I guess I never saw them before. I didn’t know Asians could have blue eyes.”

  “We can’t, usually,” she says. She lowers her voice. “They’re contacts.”

  “Why do you need contacts?”

  “I don’t need them. I want them. They make me look … I don’t know … different.”

  I look at April’s whitened teeth and her blue eyes. All artificial. All beautiful.

  I glance down. I can’t help myself. The beer is in control of my eyes.

  She adjusts her bra. “Those are real,” she says. “In case you were wondering.”

  “I wasn’t looking—”

  “It’s okay,” she says. She pinches my arm and smiles. “You’re a good guy, you know?”

  “I know.”

  “And modest, too.”

  The stereo is booming some hip-hop song I don’t recognize. The guys on the football team scream the chorus, bopping their heads with the beat. They’re scattered everywhere. Bison is on the sofa making out with some girl. O. is in an armchair with Lisa Jacobs sitting on his lap. A bunch of people are dancing. I bop my head like the guys do.

  Suddenly I feel good. I’m at a party on a Friday night with April next to me. I’m a guy and I’ve got a girl, and I’m surrounded by other guys with their girls.

  It’s like I’m normal.

  Even more amazing, I don’t feel fat right now. Maybe it’s because of the beer. Maybe I’m still fat, only the beer makes me numb so I can’t really feel it. When the beer wears off, I’ll be enormous again. Or maybe it’s something else. With April next to me, at a party with the team, the rules are different. I’m not really fat. I’m big, like Jessica said.

  “Do you have a boyfriend?” I say. As soon as I say it, I want to take it back.

  “Not anymore,” April says. “I mean, I used to. At my old school. Kind of. It’s a long story.”

  “I like stories.”

  “Another time,” she says. She runs her fingers through her hair like a comb. A delicious scent of fruit washes over me. “Do you have a girlfriend?” she says.

  “Not anymore,” I say, even though I’ve never had a girlfriend. “It’s a long story, too.”

  “I guess we’re both single,” April says.

  “Are you two about to kiss?” O. says. He comes up and puts his arm around my shoulder.

  “Shut up,” April says. She sounds like a little girl when she says it.

  “Hey, there’s nothing wrong with a little lip-on-lip action,” O. says. “Provided nobody is sporting a cold sore.”

  “You are sooo gross,” April says.

  O.’s eyes are glassy. “I’m just messing around,” he says to April. “But I noticed your hands were empty.”

  He offers her a beer.

  “No, thanks,” April says.

  “Hey, it’s a party,” O. says.

  “April doesn’t drink,” I say.

  “I drink,” April says defensively.

  “Well, which is it?” O. says. “Drinky or no drinky? Not that I give a crap either way.”

  “Drinky,” she says, and she grabs the beer from O. and takes a sip.

  I can’t believe it. We just had a whole conversation about this, but the O-Effect has completely neutralized it.

  “What about your dad?” I say.

  “Don’t have a hemorrhage. That’s why they make breath mints,” she says.

  “Or better yet …,” O says. He takes out a pack of those Listerine strips that burn when you put them on your tongue. “Lista-rents. Two on the tongue and the ’rents don’t know what you’ve been up to.” He passes the pack to April. “With my compliments,” he says.

  We stand there, nobody saying anything.

  April looks at me, then shifts her eyes towards O. When I don’t do anything, she gives me an elbow. Suddenly I get that she wants to be introduced.

  “Do you know April?” I say.

  “We’ve met a few times,” O. says. “But I can’t say I really know her.”

  “Let’s do something about that,” April says, and she holds out her hand. “April Park, cheerleader extraordinaire.”

  O. takes her hand. “Cheerleader. Well, that explains the short skirts,” O. says.

  April giggles.

  O. pushes her hand down by her side. “You’d better take this back,” he says. “I don’t trust myself with it.”

  “You’re a pervert,” April says. She laughs way too loud. “Hey, I’m going to run to the ladies’ room. You guys stay here, okay?”

  “Sorry,” O. says. “We’re required to make the rounds every fifteen minutes. Spread the love. You know.”

  O. turns his back, hooks his arm around my neck, and pulls me away from her.

  “What are you doing?” I say. “I was talking to her.”

  “Just walk away, baby boy.”

  “But she asked us to wait.”

  “We don’t wait. We move, and she follows.”

  “But it was going well,” I say. I’m so pissed right now I want to punch O.

  “She’ll go to the john, fix up her makeup, then come back in five minutes. But only if you don’t look for her.”

  “That’s like playing some kind of game.”

  “Exactly,” O. says. “It’s all a game. Your only choice is which one you play. Do you want to play the friend game? Or the hot-guy-I-have-to-chase game?”

  “When you put it like that …,” I say, and I follow O. to the bar.

  “Change of subject,” O. says. He grabs himself another beer. “Get this: I nailed the Huckleberry Finn quiz.”

  “Seriously?”

  “No kidding. B-plus. Burch practically crapped his Depends.”

  “That’s great,” I say.

  O. looks upstairs
towards the bathrooms.

  “Here’s the deal,” O. says. “You’ve been working hard. Practicing a lot, helping me out. So I’m going to help you out.”

  “Help me how?”

  O. takes a long slug on the beer. “I’m your genie,” he says. “Just make a wish.”

  “What can I wish for?”

  “What do you want?” he says.

  “You know.”

  “Say it.”

  “April.”

  O. waves his hand in the air like a crazy magician and hops on one foot. It’s so ridiculous it makes me laugh.

  “Done,” he says.

  “Bullshit.”

  “Seriously. I’m going to take care of you.”

  I suddenly feel excited. It’s like a dream I used to have where I become president. That’s what it feels like to be with O. Like I’ve been elevated.

  O. looks over my shoulder.

  “Speaking of which … hot Asian at six o’clock.”

  I start to turn around, but he stops me.

  “I’m going to walk away, and you keep looking towards the kitchen like you’re thinking about something important. Preferably another girl, hotter than April.”

  He takes the empty beer bottle away from me and replaces it with his own half-full one. I feel strange drinking the beer that was just in O.’s mouth, but I take a long swallow. It’s like we’re brothers or something.

  I see Lisa Jacobs beckoning to O. from the other room. He pats the center of my chest.

  “Lisa needs my lips,” he says. “You’ll be fine.”

  He walks away backwards, making the magician motions with his hands again.

  I stand there for a second, not knowing what to do. I look towards the kitchen. I try to think of another girl. “Bring the hotness,” as Eytan used to say. But instead of the hotness, an image of my mother pops into my head. Probably not what O. had in mind.

  “Andy,” April says from behind me.

  O. was right. She came to me. I turn around slowly, trying not to smile.

  “How’s it going?” I say.

  “We’re friends, right?” April says.

  “Friends? Um, yeah,” I say. I drink the beer and try to channel O. “We are good, good friends. Or we could be. If you play your cards right.”

  “Why are you acting funny?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe I’m happy.”

  “Okay, listen,” April says. “I want to tell you something. But you have to promise you won’t say anything.”

  “Don’t have a hemorrhage,” I say. “I don’t kiss and tell.”

  She grabs my arms and pulls me towards her, all the way in so our faces are practically touching.

  “I mean it. You can’t say a word to anyone.”

  “Okay,” I say. I’m smiling now, wondering what’s about to happen.

  April stares at me intensely. Her eyes are huge, her cheeks flushed with excitement.

  “What’s the big secret?” I say.

  “Oh my God,” she says. “I have such a crush on O.”

  the nice/mean/nice theory.

  I’m lying in bed looking up at the stars swirling around my ceiling. Dad and I put glow-in-the-dark cutouts up when I was Jessica’s age. For some reason I never took them down. Maybe I’m still a little drunk, because when I look up, it feels like I’m flying.

  There’s a tap at my door and Jessica cracks it open.

  “How did it go?” she says.

  “You should be asleep.”

  “How can I sleep when you’re at a football party?”

  It sounds like something Mom would say.

  “How did the clothes work?” Jessica says.

  “Fine.”

  “Just fine?”

  “I looked good. You did a good job.”

  Jessica beams. She comes into the room uninvited and sits on the edge of my bed.

  “Did you meet anyone famous?” she says.

  “There’s no one famous at Newton.”

  “O. Douglas,” Jessica says.

  “How do you know about O. Douglas?”

  “What do you mean? Everyone knows.”

  I lie back and groan. I wish my ceiling was really the sky, and I could take off and never come back.

  Jessica says, “You smell like beer and Listerine.”

  “How do you know what beer smells like?”

  “From the weddings, stupid.”

  Jessica lies down next to me. I don’t think she’s been in my bed since she was five. She used to try and get me to play dolls with her. Sometimes she’d want to sleep with me when she had a bad dream.

  “What am I going to do?” I say.

  “About what?”

  “I have problems,” I say. “You wouldn’t understand.” But as the words leave my mouth, I realize she might actually understand. She’s popular. She’s got boys chasing her. Even if she’s only twelve, she probably knows more about this than I do.

  “Jessica, what would you do if you liked a boy, but he didn’t like you back?”

  “That would never happen,” she says.

  “Hypothetically.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Okay, pretend your friend likes a guy, but he likes another girl instead. What advice would you give her?”

  “I’d tell her to be mean to him.”

  “Be mean?”

  “Sometimes when you’re a jerk, guys notice you more. Or wait, it’s even better if you’re nice, then mean, then nice again. That confuses them.”

  I can’t believe I’m taking advice from a twelve-year-old. But I think about O. telling me to walk away from April. It was kind of the same advice. Maybe Jessica is on to something.

  “So what’s O. Douglas like?” Jessica says.

  “I’ll introduce you some time.”

  “No way!” Jessica says. She gets so excited, she kicks her feet and makes the bed shake.

  O. seems to have that effect on people.

  Especially girls.

  thighs dancing in fluorescent light.

  I get to AP History before everyone else. I look around the class. It’s hard to know where to sit these days. My old desk next to Eytan is out of the question. The left side in the back is the April zone. The front is Nancy Yee brainiac territory.

  I decide to pick the most neutral area. Center of the class, one-third of the way back. Switzerland.

  When April comes in, I hold my breath and put a nasty look on my face. I figure I did nice the other night, so it’s time for mean. Just like Jessica suggested.

  April glances at her regular desk in the back left, but she doesn’t sit there. She walks up to me instead.

  “Hi, Andy.”

  “What do you want?” I say. I try to say it like Jessica would, like I’m annoyed by everything in the world, especially if it has a pulse.

  April totally misses the point. She touches the chair next to me. “Anyone here?” she says.

  “It’s free,” I say, like I could care less.

  I’m thinking she’s going to sit down quickly and ask me a question, but she sits and settles, putting her books underneath, wiping off the desk, arranging various thinks like she’s decorating a house. For a second I imagine we’re married, and she’s puttering around our living room moving furniture and watering plants.

  Eytan walks in and heads straight for his old desk. He doesn’t even look at me or April.

  “You and O. seem like friends,” April says.

  My breakfast does a backflip in my stomach.

  “Friends?”

  “You’re always hanging out together and talking, laughing about things.”

  “We’re helping each other out,” I say.

  “I don’t think he likes me,” April says.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “The party was the first time he’s ever talked to me. He usually ignores me. It’s like he’s got a problem with me, but he won’t say it. Or maybe someone else has a problem with me.”

 
; She waits for me to say something. I think she’s talking about Lisa Jacobs, but I can’t be sure.

  “Does O. hate me?”

  “I don’t think so.” I try to swallow, but my mouth is completely dry. “Why do you care?” I say.

  “He’s the captain,” she says.

  “So?”

  “It’s important.”

  “What’s important?”

  “It’s a reputation thing,” she says. “If he likes you, your stock goes up.”

  The door opens and Nancy Yee walks into class. She’s wearing a short dress over jeans, and she’s got a jacket over the dress, and something like a sweater over the jacket. It looks like she’s wearing three different people’s clothes at the same time. Jessica would have a coronary.

  Nancy doesn’t sit at her usual desk. She crosses past April and me and walks to the back of the room. To Eytan.

  “What’s up, little lady?” I hear him say.

  Nancy smiles wide and flips her bangs. Is it my imagination, or has her acne cleared up a little?

  “Anyone here?” she says.

  “There happens to be an opening,” Eytan says, and he brushes off the chair like a maître d’.

  Nancy giggles and sits in my old chair.

  “Andy!” April sighs, frustrated because I’m not paying attention.

  “You said you didn’t care about stuff like that,” I say.

  “Like what?”

  “Reputation. Remember that day in the hall? You said you didn’t care whether I was a jock or not. That isn’t what you’re about. That’s what you told me.”

  “I don’t care, but it’s still important. Not to me, but to the other girls.” She looks at me for a long second. “Don’t play dumb,” she says. “You know your stock has gone way up.”

  “Has it?”

  “Sure. People talk about you now. People who didn’t know you existed before.”

  “You mean because I’m on the team.”

  “Um … yeah,” she says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

  I’m not really playing dumb. I am dumb. What do I know about all this? There are popular kids and unpopular kids, losers and winners, geeks and players. That much I know. But the variations on the theme, whose stock is up and whose is down, the nuances of it all—I’ve got no idea.

  People are coming into the room now, and April is leaning all the way over with her forearm crossed over mine. I can feel our thighs touching under the desk like they’re dancing.