The Starter Boyfriend

by Tina Ferraro

  He blew out a laugh. “I’d challenge him to a twenty-footer any day. While I was shooting the curl, he’d sink like a log.”

  I was thisclose to correcting him, to telling him that Tux was one of the expensive models made of fiberglass, and that fiberglass floated. Even I knew that was a step past crazy.

  “Yeah, well,” I said, pausing in the shop’s doorway. “If you decide you want a tux for Homecoming, I’m your girl.”

  “My girl?” He reached out toward me, and for the longest, most electric moment, I thought he was going grab my face and pull it to his. Instead, he patted the top of my head, looked me long in the eye, then strolled off, his loose blond curls swaying, his hips slow and sexy again.

  I swallowed hard and turned toward the door, sneaking a look up at Tux. His face and line of vision was tilted away from mine, which was just as well. He was the perfect boyfriend who never judged or complained, and he could never hurt me. Still, it was just plain rude to check out some other guy’s walk in his presence.

  Even a guy of the confusing sort. Who’d been among the reasons I took up with my starter boyfriend in the first place.

  Chapter 6

  Flea was babysitting her sister’s five-month old that night, and sent out an SOS for me to keep her company. Which I was more than happy to do since a) I was all about keeping things real with Flea, and b) the definite downside to “dating” a mannequin was no nights out. Of the store window, even.

  Plus, her family had a backyard Jacuzzi. So there I was, my capris rolled above my knees, dangling my tired, achy feet in the frothy water, while she cuddled her niece in a lounge chair, trying to get her to take a bottle. I was fairly certain I was getting the good end of the deal.

  “So you disappeared on us last night,” Flea said, then made some cutesy, kissy baby noises.

  “Yeah, I was cruising around, trying to find Adam.” I intended to finish with the truth, to give him back his beer, but a little voice in inside my head—which sounded a lot like Adam’s—put the brakes on that.

  She scrunched her face. “I was afraid it was something like that. I mean, you’re doing a kick-ass job of making people think you’re okay with Adam and Saffron...”

  My hand shot up to my ear for a quick hair tuck. She had me there, and seeing as she was my best friend (at least, I was still hers), I felt an obligation to give her kudos. “Yeah, who likes seeing an ex—or even ex-crush—with someone else? Especially a friend. But nothing I can do about it, or want to.” I summoned my all my sincerity. “I really am over him.”

  “I’m glad.”

  Swishing my feet in big circles in the hot water, I considered taking the BFF moment to the next level and confiding how Adam secretly truly felt about Saffron. But strengthening our friendship was one thing; ratting him out was another. Better to return to the topic of why I’d disappeared. “I went looking for him to make sure he had a ride home. Since he rode with me, from a family dinner.”

  Her brow furrowed. “Why’d you leave, then? Something to do with Randy?”

  Randy. Huh. That worked, as long as I didn’t have to out-and-out lie. I shrugged. “That whole thing is weird, don’t you think, with his mom asking me to be his date? And then there’s his girlfriend.”

  “Ex.”

  “Ex. I kept thinking she’d show up and maybe give me crap.”

  “She was there. Keeping her distance from Randy, but definitely there. Didn’t you notice?” She stroked her niece’s cheek. “Anyway, I get it. Trauma drama. Just next time, let us know before you take off. We were worried. You know better than to drink and drive.”

  “Sure,” I blurted, letting go of any pretenses. “And just so you know, I didn’t drink very much.” (Like, none.)

  “All the more reason you should have let us know your plans, Courtney. We totally needed a designated driver. Poor Madison had to go all night on Diet Coke.”

  Wow—serious tragedy.

  “Oh, yeah, sorry,” I said. “Next time.” Still, I couldn’t help wondering what the girls wanted from me.

  Drinking. DD. Couldn’t do both.

  At times like this, it wasn’t only guys who confused me.

  * * *

  Snoozing away the next morning, I sensed my dad in my doorway. I lifted my head from my flannel pillow case to focus on a gray and white striped shirt and gray plaid pants, telling me he was gearing up for his usual Sunday morning tee-off.

  “Sorry to wake you, but does this match?”

  “No,” I replied, trying to sound even and patient, and not like a sleepwalker. “Remember, prints, plaids and stripes go best with solids.”

  “But there’s gray in both of them,” he said, and did a point-by-point comparison.

  “Still, too busy.”

  He bit on the inside of his cheek. “If you’re sure...”

  I nodded and watched him sigh and wander off, glad at least he thought to ask.

  I figured I’d just rest my head back on the pillow while I awaited his next fashion attempt, but next I knew, I was waking again, and to a brighter and quieter house. I hoped he hadn’t gone off looking like a circus clown.

  Wandering downstairs, through a sparkling clean kitchen (way to go, Jennifer!), I tossed a load of bleach-needy whites into the washer, then grabbed a bowl of grapes and settled down in front of the big screen.

  Sunday mornings were my “me time,” when I could catch up on housework, schoolwork, DVR’d programs—whatever. Today I was about catching up on Jennifer.

  I was about halfway through “17 Again” when she waltzed in. The DVD had been her gift for my birthday after she’d learned I had a bit of a thing for Zac Efron. She saw something sexy in Matthew Perry (which I didn’t analyze, considering her taste in men included my dad), and had declared it “our” movie.

  I thought it dragged in parts, but with the wedding so close, most important was keeping her happy so that no matter what my dad did or didn’t do right now, she’d keep marching a straight line to the altar. And I could keep my sights on college in Oregon.

  “Hello, sweetie!” exploded from her mouth as she set my dad’s dry cleaning on the back of a chair.

  Zac said something witty on the tv screen. Jennifer did a head jerk, and her gaze fled to the free end of the sectional L sofa. Next thing I knew, she was in full-throttle, catching big air (Adam would have been proud), rotating, and landing butt-down, her sandaled feet wiggling above her joyously. The end table lamp trembled like we’d had a magnitude 7.0 quake, and I reached out to steady it. You’d think the building would be used to Jennifer by now.

  “I love this part!” she squealed, somehow managing to grab my free hand and squeeze it.

  We watched the house party scene—which had as much drama as Saffron’s, only a lot more laughs—and then Jennifer reached for the remote and stabbed the pause button. “I could watch this all day, but it’s thirteen days and counting until I’m a blushing bride, and I’ve got a To Do list as long as my arm.”

  I sat up. “What do we tackle first?” I was the designated Walsh family organizer, after all.

  Her voice retained its volume, but weakened in oomph. “Um, didn’t your dad tell you about the phone call?”

  A strange pressure built in my chest. Rather than let myself analyze it or the anxious feelings Jennifer’s question had evoked, I bought myself some time from whatever it was she had to tell me by answering at length. “I’ve barely seen him this weekend,” I said and did a comparison of our schedules.

  She pressed her lips together patiently while I spoke, but dive-bombed me with her next two words. “Your mom,” she said, “called the other night. She’d tried your cell, apparently, but you didn’t pick up.”

  The call with the weird area code at Saffron’s circled in my brain. Maybe I’d even, subconsciously, realized its possibility at the time. For my mother did phone every now and then, usually on my cell and from different numbers, and always with completely bogus claims of missing me.

  “Yo
ur dad thought she sounded good. By that, I mean sober.” She paused, as if that word needed the chance to penetrate my (thick) skin. “He thought this might be a good time for you to touch base, and told her she could likely find you at home this morning. He was supposed to leave you a note.”

  I rolled my eyes because there was just nothing else to do or say. Except maybe scream “Hallelujah!” that I’d managed to miss my mother’s call. Because drunk, sober, or anywhere in between, she was a deserter. She was AWOL. Declared by me—her judge and jury—for leaving me at fourteen years old to be a cook and maid. I’d sentenced her to time eternal in solitary, with no time off for good behavior.

  “Well, whatever,” I finally said, realizing Jennifer’s face was pretty much in mine, awaiting some kind of response. “Myra Walsh only calls when she wants something, and I’ve got a big fat nothing to give her.” I rose to my bare feet. “No way I’m sitting around waiting for her to call. I’m going with you.”

  “Sorry, sweetie,” she said, standing, and pulling both height and age rank on me. “Your father promised you’d be here, and I can’t go against him. Besides, I’m perfectly capable of deciding between doves or angels on our napkin holders.”

  She let out a laugh, but instead of it filling every crevice of the room, the sound merely hovered between us, then took a swan dive. “I’ll be back for dinner.” She grabbed her bag and hiked it on her shoulder. “I’m planning a wonderful chicken tikka masala—that’s chicken in yogurt and some yummy Indian spices. And a cumin-scented Jeera rice on the side.” Her hands took off in air circles with her thoughts. “Oooh, maybe I’ll pick up some colorful cloths and we’ll drape them around the dining room. It’ll be just like we’re in Bombay!”

  The specifics of her dinner gave me a brain cramp. I was too hung up on what was happening. Jennifer listened to me, helped me, cared about me. She was here for me. Choose my mother over Jennifer? Had the world gone mad?

  She crossed the room, lifting her hand in a fluttery wave. “I’ll be back before you know it,” she said and opened the door.

  Which was good. Fine.

  Except for the emotion throbbing in my throat as my legs took off with a mind of their own behind her. And my arm, which was suddenly jutting out toward her back, as if to grab her sleeve. To tug her and hold her back. To make her stay.

  When—thank God—a beach breeze and a slap of sanity smacked me upside the head.

  Because of course, I was completely overreacting.

  I sighed and closed the door, blowing some loose hairs off my face, relieved at least that Jennifer hadn’t caught sight of my ridiculous “Mommy, don’t leave me” kindergarten act.

  No worries. I’d finish watching Zac, fold some laundry, maybe do a little daydreaming about Tux, while supposedly waiting for a phone to ring. But unless it was Flea or one of the girls calling, I had no intentions of answering.

  Chapter 7

  My iPod and ear buds were particularly helpful in blocking out unwanted noises as I went about my day. When the house phone rang after dinner, though, my dad made a long-handed reach, answered it, then shoved it my way.

  Busted.

  “I must have called your cell ten times today,” spoke the woman who had given birth to me. “Didn’t you get my messages?”

  Watching my dad leave the room, I made a noncommittal noise, then asked what was up.

  “I wanted you to know I got my ninety day chip.” A.A. talk. I’d heard it before. “Ninety meetings in ninety days. It’s the first time I actually made it. I knew you’d be proud of me.” Then she went quiet. Giving me a turn to talk. About her. We always talked about her.

  “Great,” I said. Because, okay, in the big picture, the world was a better place with a martini glass out of her hand. But let’s not go crazy with trust, hope and confidence.

  “Maybe it’s a good time to see each other, Courtney. It’s been a while.”

  My hand fisting around the cordless receiver, I felt a low hum of fury course through my body. A while. Uh-huh. Like, since the day she took off on us? Over three years ago?

  As I gathered the wind to respond, an oddly calm voice resonated in my brain. Offering up choice words: not now. Not before the wedding. Because while I had zero reason to believe my dad still had feelings for my long-lost mother, she was the one who left him. I’d learned enough about relationships to know sometimes the dumpee longs for the satisfaction of an “I’m sorry and I still love you” from the dumper, even if it’s just an ego thing. I was betting my dad wouldn’t know how uncoordinatedly uncool taking my mom back would be. I mean, what if?

  The last—the last—thing I wanted was Myra Walsh returning to L.A. and somehow ruining what I planned to be the first day of the rest of my dad’s life. And mine.

  “How about Christmas,” I choked out, doing a variation of the compromise thing that Adam had talked about. Meeting halfway, even it was a little bit of a lie.

  “I was hoping for sooner.”

  “Thanksgiving, then. I—I could come see you. In Detroit.”

  She went quiet. For so long I felt like another three years had passed. “I was thinking of making the trip out there.”

  My throat thickened. “Oh, no reason for that. Besides, I’m dying to travel.”

  She paused, then let out a little laugh. “Why, of course. I keep thinking of you as a little girl, but you’re seventeen now. Practically grown up.”

  Practically? I had been for quite some time. Her absence had assured that.

  “Why don’t we talk again in a few weeks?” I said instead. After the wedding. “We can make plans then.”

  “Okay,” she said, brightening up. “You have my number, right?”

  I’d kept myself completely in check so far, if for no other reason than to make her go away. But that last question? Them’s was fightin’ words. “Oh, yeah, I’ve got your number, all right.” I skipped a beat then let out a laugh, as if this was all fun and games, as if there were no hard feelings, as if this mother-daughter reunion stood a chance of happening.

  She laughed, too, and did a quick goodbye thing and hung up. Then I walked away. Calmly. Until I hit the stairs, which I took at a thunderous two at a time, my body on the verge of a total implode.

  A million miles away, in a low, tinny voice, I heard my dad ask Jennifer if I was okay.

  “Let her go for now,” Jennifer’s voice floated toward me. “She needs to be alone.”

  I wanted to scream to my dad that no, I was not okay, then scream at Jennifer for thinking she—or anyone—could understand what I was going through. Mostly, I just wanted to scream.

  That’s what pillows were for.

  * * *

  I slept like a baby that night. No, not waking up every hour, crying, but a long, hard, solid sleep. I woke before my usual alarm clock explosion, feeling oddly okay, like the phone call had never happened. I decided to take extra time to work my hair, my outfit, my mood. Why not have a good day?

  In the car, when KROQ assaulted my sensibilities with an oldie about it being a Manic Monday, and I had to resort to street parking because I couldn’t find a spot in the student lot, and a glance at the ensuing crowd told me it was a School Spirit Day (should have worn a softball shirt), I kept my cool. I was simply getting the crap out of the way early.

  That philosophy held all the way into the building and up the stairs to my locker. Where in addition to the people doing their usual grab-and-slams, I spotted Flea, Saffron and Madison. Standing in a half-circle—like a broken Krispy Kreme—in front of my locker. Except there was nothing sweet in their eyes.

  “O.M.G., Courtney,” Saffron burst out.

  “Have you seen it?” Madison asked.

  My voice and any semblance of reason were pretty much flattened by a tsunami of adrenaline. “Huh?” I managed.

  Flea flicked her head toward a flyer on a nearby wall. A neon pink page screamed out: “LOST DOG!” above a black-and-white photo. A head shot of Randy. I stepped closer to read t
he small print.

  Answers to Randy.

  Last seen holding his mommy’s paw

  while wagging his short, stubby tail.

  Someone had crossed out “tail,” changing it to “thing” before photocopying.

  Whoa. A guttural choke sounded from my throat. I turned back to my friends. “Cold, much?”

  “Of course,” Flea spoke immediately, “Jacy’s denying it.”

  “Of course she’s denying it!” Saffron snorted with a loud inhale. “Wouldn’t you? It’s probably not only tacky, it’s illegal.”

  “Or at the very least, littering,” added Madison. “And I hear Randy’s furious, ripping down every flyer he finds.”

  “Well, duh,” echoed the others.

  Saffron let out a short laugh. “You’re so in, Courtney.”

  I must have looked as baffled as I felt because Madison cleared things up for me. “Randy. You should totally go to Homecoming with him.”

  “It’s not like he’s asking me!”

  “Puh-lease.” Saffron smiled and two dimples formed in her cheeks—Catherine Middleton perfect. If I hadn’t gone to school with her since seventh grade, I might have wondered if they’d come from her dad’s wallet, rather than his gene pool. “Everyone saw you at my party. You were all over each other.”

  “We talked for like two minutes.”

  She plucked a piece of imaginary lint from her sleeve. “Longer than that. A lot longer. But you know what they say about time flying when you’re having fun.”

  Give me a break. Randy Schiff and me. Right.

  Besides, in my heart-of-hearts, when I imagined myself bathed in the glow of the dance ball at Homecoming? The guy in my arms was wearing a certain thirty-eight long, thirty-two inch inseam style 02116 tuxedo, and had bluer-than-blue eyes and an expression that could be considered rather, well, wooden.

  “We’re all going to the dance,” Madison spoke up. Which I had pretty much figured since both she and Flea had boyfriends, and Saffron now had—or at least, was going with—Adam. “And it’s not like Randy’s gonna say no if you ask him.”