by Maggie Bloom
“I was hoping this would be a watershed moment for you,” Harvey says outright. “A challenge you could use as a springboard to bigger and better things. A pivot-point for charting your future.”
I try not to think about the future, mine or anyone else’s. But it’s comforting to know that Harvey does. “I’m not quitting,” I assure him, my hands going to my hips in protest. “I just have other things happening right now. With Marie having the baby, and…”
“Well, if you change your mind, let me know.”
“Will do,” I say, and leave it at that.
chapter 9
I MIGHT be falling in love with Tom Cantwell. Not because he’s the hottest guy on earth (honestly, I’ve been screwed by boys who are, objectively speaking, much more physically attractive), but because he’s agreed to spend an entire Sunday afternoon searching for Buttercup.
We kick our bikes away from the periphery of Gramp’s rain-soaked lawn, after a rough few days of storms that have finally begun clearing. This time Tom lets me lead, cruises leisurely along parallel to me at a quarter of a pace back. “We should start at the baseball field,” I say into the wind, which is still whipping mist at my face, despite the storm having ended. “He loves the woods back there.” While Evan Richter was screwing me by the dugout, crazy old Buttercup came strolling out of the trees and sniffed at my foot. Stupid cat.
“I thought I saw him the other day by The Plough Horse,” Tom says, “when we were picking Wilma up from work.”
It’s been four years since his dad married Wilma, and Tom hasn’t taken to calling her mom? Somehow this makes me like him more.
“What was he doing?” I ask.
“I don’t know? What do cats do?” He chuckles faintly. “Hunting, I guess.”
We bang a right onto Marigold and follow it all the way past the shuttered knitting mill, the toothpick factory where Orv works (he really could walk instead of mooching rides off Miss Esther every day), and an outpost of the Industry Fire Department (why on earth did they hide the thing down here?). Just before Marigold dead-ends, we zip into a parking lot and stop fifty feet to the west of first base.
I dig my toes into the gravel, scan the tree line for a fuzzy orange form. “See anything?” I ask.
Tom doesn’t answer right away. Instead, he spends a solid minute or two peering squinty-eyed in the same direction I am. “Nah,” he eventually replies. “Nothin’ out here. We should probably check the trails, though.”
“Trails?”
He shoots me a frown that makes me feel a tiny bit pitiful. “You’ve never been on the trails?” he asks.
Maybe if Marie and Duncan had stuck around and been real parents… “Oh…the trails,” I say, as if my memory has chugged back into gear. “No, I’m afraid not.”
We share an easy grin, the kind we’ve had ready for each other since second grade. “Good thing we came out here, then,” he says. “So we can fix the situation before people start to talk.” He wheels the BMX over to a rusty chain-link fence, and I follow.
“What about the bikes?” I say, noticing he doesn’t have a lock and there are three punky-looking middle school boys loitering in the field on the other side of the baseball diamond.
“Don’t worry about it,” he says. He jerks the BMX a few inches off the ground and suspends it by a handlebar through the chain links. Then he takes the Schwinn—without asking—and does the same. “They’ll be fine.”
I’m not sure how having our bikes precariously dangling in the air will stop anyone from stealing them, unless potential thieves assume we’re insane and, therefore, steer clear of messing with us. “If you say so,” I agree. I give the punks another glance and jog a few steps to catch up with Tom, who has made an abrupt beeline for the woods.
We get forty feet into the trees before I realize we have, in fact, hit one of the trails, which is rather awesomely marked with ruby-red crosses on every fifth tree. What is not so awesome is the carpet of debris—rocks and leaves, logs and branches, curious mountains of mud—that threatens to trip me with every step. “Hey, slow down,” I beg. I hate to let my size get in the way of, well, anything…but sometimes it’s inevitable.
Tom backtracks a few steps. “Sorry,” he says sheepishly. He offers me his hand, which I accept with gratitude. It’s a nice hand, warm and smooth and substantial, even with the string-bean fingers. The kind of hand a boyfriend should have. Or a husband.
“BUUUTT-er-cup!” I call, hoping my little buddy is somewhere in this patch of woods and will recognize my voice—and his name—and come trotting. “BUUUTT-er-cup!”
I yowl until my throat goes hoarse, Tom squeezing my fingers periodically in encouragement and reassurance. He takes over and calls for a while too, but eventually we’ve exhausted our lung power and the available trees. “He might not be here,” Tom says, seconding my thoughts in the matter.
We drift out of the woods into a clearing behind a housing development that resembles a diorama I constructed in first grade out of shoe boxes and macaroni. “Maybe he lives over there,” I say, an odd thought having just occurred to me: Maybe Buttercup has a real family and isn’t a stray at all.
An aching pain gnaws at my chest, a feeling I recognize from the night Marie and Duncan deposited me on Gramp’s front stoop. And the night after that. And the night after that.
“I doubt it,” Tom says. He nods at the cookie-cutter complex. “This place doesn’t allow pets. They’re considered a health hazard or something.”
I let out the breath I’ve been holding. “Oh.” It’s not like I begrudge Buttercup a family, it’s just that, if he has to choose to belong to someone, I wish it would be me.
At a snail’s pace, Tom and I survey the perimeter of the hulking masses of red-shingled timber (six buildings, to be exact) that, although they purport to be “Senior Living Condominiums,” could just as easily pass for optometrists’ offices or the headquarters of the IRS.
“You hungry?” Tom asks as we dodge an enormous puddle that, unlike the rest of the dampness on the pavement, has failed to evaporate with the intensifying afternoon sun.
Am I ever not hungry? “Kind of,” I admit.
He eases his hand away from mine and goes into his jeans, pulling out two Milky Ways. “Here,” he says, offering one to me with a satisfied smile.
I shake my head. “I…uh…” I mutter, not wanting to offend him when he looks so proud. I’ve been ticking off the Milky Way-less days on a calendar at home: thirty-two and counting. He gives me the saddest puppy-dog eyes, his lips dissolving into a disappointed frown (and leaving me no choice). “Thanks,” I say, accepting the thing after all. As soon as the candy hits my fingers, they begin to hum.
Tom unwraps his bar halfway and takes a messy bite. “They’re sorta melted,” he tells me, a coating of chocolate clinging to his mouth.
Since I’ve already accepted the damn thing, I might as well eat it. Plus, it looks good. And smells good. I tear it open and risk a nibble and…
Oh. My. God.
It’s the best Milky Way I’ve ever had, times a million. “Mmm…” I can’t help saying. “Yum.” I run my tongue over my teeth, rescuing every last drop of chocolate-caramel-nougat deliciousness.
The next thing I know (did I lose time to a sugar coma?), we’re heading for a rock-infested swamp beyond the condominium parking lot. “I’ve seen cats down here,” Tom explains, traipsing along ahead of me. “Not Buttercup, though.”
As much as I love that mangy mongrel of a cat, I’m beginning to tire of searching for him. But I follow Tom over the bed of muck-slicked rocks anyway, my ankles twisting and mashing as I struggle to keep upright. When I glance left, I notice a giant aluminum culvert (for the city folk among us, a big tube or pipe) burrowed into the earth and spitting gulps of water onto the rocks, that strikes me as a perfect spot to stop and regroup, hash out our game plan. “Hey!” I shout. “Tom!”
When he turns around, I point at the culvert. He gets my meaning, nods and begins
traversing the cobbled slip-and-slide under our feet. A little ways in front of the culvert, we meet up. Tom locks his arm around mine and guides me to the mouth of the pipe, where, at the risk of soaking our pants, we climb inside. Of course, what looked like a massive space before shrinks to nothing as we cram it full of a two-hundred pound tubbo and a gangly band geek.
“I’ve never been in here,” Tom says, our backs curved against the culvert walls, our legs opposite and interlocked, like dueling crabs.
“It’s neat,” I say. “Very intimate.” I’m not sure if I want this comment to mean anything, but I say it anyway. Once you start letting boys screw you, it’s hard to stop. I wish I could begin again with Tom and without the baggage. Go nice and sweet and slow.
Tom seems happy that I’ve mentioned the culvert’s suitability as a love nest. He leans toward me and I mirror him, our lips brushing softly, our tongues dancing a silent tango. I could take his virginity right here in this drainage pipe, a cool rush of water washing over our nakedness, warmth in our flesh and our hearts. It would be quick and easy, and maybe he’d love me when it was over. Isn’t that what boyfriends are supposed to do?
I let him get started, at least. Work his fingers under my t-shirt and around the waistband of my jeans. If I wasn’t so fat, it would be easier. Should I unbutton my pants? Or his? That’s the usual first step. As for the second step, I’m afraid I’ll be as lost as Tom, since every other screw I’ve been part of has been one-sided.
We kiss harder and faster, to the point of lightheadedness. “I want to,” he tells me during a brief pause. “Do you?”
There’s no use lying. He’ll be able to tell. “Uh-huh,” I murmur, my mind foggy and my thighs stinging. “But first I have to tell you something.”
Obviously, he can’t anticipate the gravity of what’s coming next. “Okay,” he agrees easily. “What is it?”
“I think I might be pregnant.”
* * *
Nothing snuffs out the flame of sexual chemistry, or a fledgling romance, for that matter, like the knowledge that your girlfriend might be carrying another boy’s baby.
Since we abruptly parted ways in that culvert, Tom has gone to extreme lengths to avoid me, which may explain why I’ve willingly subjected myself to an entire weekend in the company of Duncan, Marie, and little Roy.
I jump my wheelie bag over the threshold of my parents’ barn, agitated and headachy from the nonstop screeching Roy has performed the whole way from Industry to Hollyhock, like some operatic diva.
Please, God, don’t let me be pregnant.
Please.
Please.
Please.
I’ll do anything.
“How do you get stuff upstairs?” I ask no one in particular. I’m afraid of lugging my hefty frame up that ladder—although it does look rather sturdy—let alone wrangling my bulging suitcase along with me. (Maybe I could strap it to my back?)
“Piece of cake,” my father says proudly. He saunters over to a mission-style sofa (an ironic furniture choice given my parents’ previous occupations) and ducks behind it, coming out with an enormous rectangular basket with four metal hooks sprouting out of its back. “Give it to me.” He gestures at the bag, and I oblige. “Now go upstairs and wait.”
I shoot a questioning glance at Marie, who’s got Roy calmed down with a binky (did they pacify me with one of those things?). “It’s fine,” she says, rolling her eyes just a tad.
“Okay,” I say with a shrug. “But my blood’ll be on your hands. Remember that.”
Duncan chuckles, and I award myself mental points for wit. Then, with a flutter in my stomach (was that a baby turning over?), I clamp my hands around the side-rails of the ladder and begin ascending.
“All right!” I yell down from the top, my voice echoing throughout the barn. I crouch behind a bamboo half-wall that’s supposed to keep me from tipping over the edge of the loft and becoming an ugly splatter on the living room floor. “Let ‘er rip!”
Duncan loads my suitcase into the basket (yes, it’s that big) and hooks the entire contraption to some sort of pulley system he’s rigged. Like magic, my luggage floats up the ladder (well, maybe not magic exactly, since Duncan has to undertake quite a bit of cranking to set the illusion in motion) and sputters to a stop right before me. I heft the suitcase out and say, “Wow…impressive.”
“Amazing what a little old-fashioned ingenuity can do, huh?” Duncan says as he cranks the basket back down to the first floor.
Marie just beams from Roy to Duncan to me and back again, an unsettling look of fulfillment overtaking her expression. The last thing I want to do is give her the idea that I’m going to simply click into place, the missing piece of her wholesome family puzzle. I belong to Orv and Denise (and Gramp, even though he’s gone), the way I want Buttercup to belong to me.
I check out the loft for the first time and discover that it’s not so terrible. Like Marie said, it’s divided pretty equally into two distinct spaces, separated by a series of oriental-looking screens (souvenirs my parents have collected during their travels, I suspect). The side with the crib and overgrown safari-themed mobile also features a simple futon I’d bet a million bucks was trucked in here from IKEA (another catalog retailer for which Denise harbors an affinity).
I clunk my bag against the couch/bed (probably I’ll leave the thing in its upright position when I sleep anyway) and then slowly creep back down the ladder.
“So tell us about this Yo-Yo race,” Marie prods coyly, my baby brother now clamped to her chest and suckling away.
“Huh?” I say. It’s hard to concentrate when your mother’s boob is flopped out for everyone to see, even when everyone amounts to you, your father, and the offending bambino.
“The race,” she repeats. “Don’t you volunteer over there at the bike shop?” She waves her hand through the air as if The Pit is just beyond the barn door instead of miles away in Industry.
I meander to the kitchen island, where I’m happy to try my luck with another of my parents’ delicate stools if it means I don’t have to scrunch next to Marie and Duncan on the sofa. “I sorta work there,” I say, wondering exactly what my parents know about Harvey, The Pit, and my sextra-curricular activities. “Why?”
“Your father’ll be competing,” my mother says, stopping to pat Duncan lovingly on the knee.
It seems like just yesterday that I punched his name into the database. “I know.”
My father reclines on the sofa (as much as one can recline on something with a solid wood frame, that is) crosses his legs and studies me pensively. “What about this Lex Arlington character?” he says. “Anything I should know about him?”
Shuffling through a pile of old newspapers and new bills, I say, “Nothing you can’t find out in the National Enquirer. You do know who he is, right?”
Marie shifts Roy to her shoulder but doesn’t bother covering up, her comfort with primitive exposure unnerving. I hope she doesn’t plan on acting like this in public. “He’s famous,” Marie says. “They call him the modern-day Marlon Brando. Quite the compliment, if you’re familiar with the original.”
I’m not. “He’s on TV,” I add with a shrug. “He plays a lawyer called Kurt Holmes on Penal Code 911.”
Duncan’s eyes brighten. “We really should get a television set,” he tells Marie. “Think of all the educational programming Roy’s missing out on.”
My parents engage in a brief squabble over the prospect of a TV invading their peaceful barn, most of their spat whizzing by me as I inspect a stack of drawings I’ve unearthed from their mountain of junk. On ragged slices of parchment that look as if they’ve been torn from an ancient sketchbook are illustrations of what I assume is Duncan’s pulley system at various stages of conceptualization, notes and equations chaotically scratched in the margins.
I am intrigued enough to dig further, where I discover something entirely different: a cluster of sketches that seem to represent some sort of hybrid bicycle/hang glide
r that is not unlike the Ornithopter Leonardo da Vinci imagined more than four-hundred years ago.
“What’s this?” I ask, the pages clutched in my hand.
Duncan shoots off the sofa, wrenches the drawings from my grasp. “Honestly, Roberta!” he spouts, clearly aggrieved. “Mind your own beeswax!”
Mind my own beeswax? If my father hadn’t gotten so irrationally ticked all of a sudden, I might find the saying quaint (a new turn of phrase I could try out on the profanity-phobic Denise?). “Fine,” I agree, handing over the drawings before he can demand them. “Pardon me.”
Duncan strides across the room to a wall of bookcases and tucks the sketches between two giant tomes, no further mention being made of their existence. Inspired, Marie tucks her boob back into her peasant top and beckons me to the sofa.
If Tom and I hadn’t had a falling out, I wouldn’t be here right now, I think as I take my place beside Marie and Roy.
My mother gets a wistful look in her eyes. “You haven’t even held him,” she says in a tender tone, the emotion in her voice threatening to pry my heart open. “Don’t you want to?”
I love my brother. Or at least I want to. I cradle my arms in front of my chest and say, “Go ahead.”
chapter 10
I HAVEN’T seen Evan Richter’s Dart since way back in October, but today it rises from the dead.
I’m at the same crossroad—Marigold—and, once again, perched on the Schwinn, when the Dart tools up beside me. “Yo, Cotton!” a familiar voice cackles out one of the rolled-down windows. “Wanna fuck?”
Malcolm Gates. Douchebag. “No, thank you,” I say as pleasantly as any well-mannered debutante.
Justin White’s cleft chin juts out the passenger window, followed by his pouty lips, which blow me a lewd, tongue-laced kiss. “Oh, come on,” the quarterback whines. “You know you want it.”
