The Lighter Side of Life and Death

by C. K. Kelly Martin

  “Beautiful,” I say, smiling back. “I’d kill for a license. Shit, I’d kill you for a license.”

  “Yeah, I bet you would.” His tone is oddly reflective so maybe he knows that he’s been a pain lately.

  I take a couple of seconds to digest that and then I’m ready to confess more Colette details. “I’m dropping by her place again tomorrow night,” I tell him. “I left my cell phone there.”

  “Sounds to me like you guys are still a happening thing.” Jamie casts a sideways glance in my direction as he sinks his teeth into his samosa. Hearing that from someone else is a hundred times better than telling myself. I push another fry between my lips and chew on my growing grin.

  The next day Jamie throws me another curve when he catches up with me on my way out of the cafeteria and tells me to have a good night. I say thanks and mutter something about feeling like an idiot having to ride my bike over to her place, and that’s when he really gets me. He scrunches up his eyes, like he just remembered why he’s pissed with me, and says, “I’m not going to get roped into being Mason’s Booty Call Taxi Service for however long this thing with you two lasts but if you don’t have any other way to get there I guess I can drop you off.”

  “Seriously? You can get the car tonight?”

  “I think I can swing it,” Jamie says. It’s obvious that he doesn’t want me making a huge deal out of the offer so I don’t. I’m not entirely done being pissed with him for being mad at me either but it’d be tremendous to show up on Colette’s doorstep without my bike. The fewer things around to remind her of my age, the better. Getting home’s a separate issue. I can figure that out later.

  So I tell Jamie to come by around seven-thirty and he shows up at my house later as planned. Dad answers the front door, observes Jamie’s car keys dangling from his fingers and offers his congratulations. I hear him from halfway down the stairs where I’m sticking one of those sadistic mint breath-freshener strips in my mouth. My eyes water and my tongue burns but Jesus, I’m fresh.

  “What’re you guys up to tonight?” Dad asks with a smile as I show up at the front door. This isn’t Dad keeping tabs (he doesn’t do that); he’s just making conversation. Dad and Jamie get along really well, just like I do with Jamie’s parents, and if Dad wasn’t so busy adjusting to our new roommates I’m sure he’d have noticed that Jamie hasn’t been around much lately.

  “Just cruising,” Jamie says after a split-second delay. Neither of us is used to sneaking around or lying to our parents. I guess that makes us lucky.

  “Newfound freedom,” Dad notes.

  Newfound something. We tell him goodbye and climb into the same Honda Civic I rode in a thousand times as a kid. Jamie’s mom has had this car for years and it’s strange to sit in the passenger seat with Jamie driving but mainly I’m thinking about Colette and what she’ll be like this time.

  “So can you ask her if she has any friends who’re interested in younger guys?” Jamie jokes. “What’s her name, anyway? You never said.”

  “It’s Colette. Colette Fournier.” I only know her last name from spying it on the mailing label on the United Way leaflet.

  “French?” he says. “Is she from Quebec?”

  “I don’t think so.” I shrug and look out my window. “Her parents live here.” Truth be told, I don’t know much about her when it comes to factoids like that. We’ve kept ourselves busy talking about more important things.

  Jamie doesn’t have much to say after that. His presence next to me in the Honda feels like a bitter blend of admiration, loyalty and disapproval and I wish one single thing in my life could be simple, but then again, I’m just happy for the ride. My last conversation with Colette was on the rocky side. Anything that helps tonight go smoothly is a bonus.

  Soon we’re turning into her subdivision and I give Jamie directions to her door. He pulls into her driveway and we sit in the car staring at two little boys in soccer shorts darting across the front yard after a Nerf football. Their father sits on the front stoop, alternately watching them and casting a suspicious eye on us.

  “This sucks,” Jamie says with a groan. “What’re you gonna do?”

  “What choice do I have?” I unbuckle my seat belt and open the passenger door. The father stares openly as I approach the house.

  “Hello,” he calls. “What can I do for you?”

  “I just came by to see Colette.” I say that as calmly as I can. No big thing, right? There are a thousand reasons someone like me could want to speak to Colette Fournier. Sure. My spine is shivering. If he has a follow-up question my voice will crack.

  “Around the side,” he says, pointing to his left.

  I nod thanks and walk around to the side door, questioning for the first time if I’m crazy to get involved with someone like Colette, who has a career, an apartment and some other guy to bonk, while I have a whole other year of high school, a seven-speed bike and the promise of my own TV. We barely even live in the same dimension.

  Five seconds later she answers the door and hurriedly motions for me to come in. I stand in the laundry room as she slips her bare feet into blue flip-flops and says, “My appointment got moved up. You can wait here while I’m gone if you want—or come along and keep me company. Your choice.”

  “What appointment?” I don’t sound happy.

  “Mason, what’s the matter?” Colette searches my face. She’s wearing light capri pants and a sleeveless yellow top that reveals an inch of skin around her midriff when she reaches up to skim her fingers through her hair. She looks great but the circumstances suck. I just got here and now we have to leave again?

  “Your landlord is outside with his kids,” I say.

  “That doesn’t matter,” Colette says confidently. “He’s just the landlord, Mason. I could be your math tutor for all he knows.” Go figure. Now that I’m rattled she’s all smiles.

  “Monday I had to park a mile from my house but this guy’s sitting in your front yard and it’s all good?”

  “I know. But the landlords don’t involve themselves in my life. It’s purely a business arrangement.” Colette leans her weight pensively against the washing machine. “I can drive you home if you want. Just let me get your phone, okay?” She stares into my eyes, waiting for an answer.

  “Your jumpiness is rubbing off on me,” I tell her. “I don’t want to go yet—I just got here.” I take a step towards the washing machine. “I just had the feeling this was all supposed to be a big secret.”

  “It is.” She takes a long breath and rubs the back of her neck. “I’m not very good at this.”

  “Me neither.” I rest my palms flat against my jeans. “Every time I think we’re getting somewhere you change on me.”

  “Where is it you think we’re getting?” Colette asks. She moves hastily away from the washing machine and adds, “Honestly, we don’t have time for this now, Mason. If you want me to drive you home I can take you on the way but I have to go now.”

  “On the way where?” She warned me that she had plans tonight but I’m angry anyway. I want her to invite me downstairs and lie on the couch with me. This is bullshit.

  But I’m not ready to go home, so I get in the car with her and we drive out to the country to check out a litter of Malti-Poo puppies that she saw an ad for in the paper. Two of the puppies are already spoken for and Colette wants the remaining girl. This farmhouse with spotted cows roaming around in the background is the place she had to be in a big hurry. A bearded middle-aged guy in a Blue Jays T-shirt and his blond wife let Colette and me play with the pups and ask questions. They don’t have any questions themselves and they don’t seem suspicious of our relationship. Maybe they think she’s my sister. Maybe they don’t care who we are to each other as long as they sell their puppies.

  The important thing is that they get us acting all gooey, these insanely adorable scruffs of white and brown that lick at our faces and scamper around like this is the best moment in the history of the world. Colette’s eyes light
up in a way I’ve never seen and I’m glad I came along, even if she’s wasting my time and giving me the runaround, never really intending for us to get to know each other any better than we do now.

  Colette gives the farmer couple a down payment because the puppies aren’t quite old enough to leave their mother yet. She says she’ll be back in a few weeks to pick up her puppy, and when we get back into the car we’re both sublimely happy. We talk about the puppies and their mother, Elsa, who has the sweetest temperament you’ve ever encountered, and I complain about Billy the bastard cat going terrorist on me and why couldn’t Nina have had some kind of terrier instead?

  Colette glances at my hand like she hadn’t noticed the bandage before. “That cat gives me the creeps,” she says. “Listen, Mason.” Her voice drops. “What did you mean before when you were talking about us getting somewhere? Did you mean physically or something else?”

  Her bluntness out of nowhere like that startles me. What’s the right answer?

  “Because you know about Ari and I don’t want you to get the wrong idea that this is going to turn into something serious and exclusive. We’re just enjoying each other and having a good time, right?”

  “I know.” I didn’t think she was going to be my girlfriend or anything, but at the same time I don’t appreciate her throwing Ari in my face. “That’s not what I meant. It’s just that so far it doesn’t feel like you’ve relaxed into the idea of us being together at all, in any way. Monday was great, but when we talked on the phone the next day you were oozing guilty vibes, like you didn’t think we should see each other anymore.” I scratch my bandage as I continue. “And to be honest I don’t want to hear any more about Ari. Maybe you’re cool with me talking to you about other girls, but as far as I’m concerned we can skip those kinds of details, okay?”

  “Okay,” Colette agrees. “Does this mean I shouldn’t ask about Kat anymore?”

  “You can ask about her if you want. I just don’t want to hear any more about Ari.”

  “You know we never talk about Ari.” Colette presses her lips together. “I only wanted to make sure that we’re clear what we’re about.”

  Sex and good times, I get it. So shouldn’t we at least be having sex? Incidentally, I have another condom in my back pocket. I’m ready to go when she is.

  As soon as we get downstairs I back her up against the wall and kiss her. For the first few seconds she seems surprised and then her body leans generously into mine, like this is the moment she’s been waiting for. This time I don’t have to worry about breathing breaks. We ram our mouths together like wild things. I suck on her neck and shove my hands up under her bra. Ari can wonder where the hickey came from—or maybe he already knows about me.

  Colette slips her hands under my T-shirt and onto my back. “Let me look at you,” she says, pulling off my T-shirt.

  I smile at her but I feel ferocious.

  I tug her top off and stare at her pink nipples, my mind throbbing with sensory overload. She’s wearing this lacy beige bra thing but now it’s hanging around under her collarbone, not covering anything. Colette reaches around her back, unsnaps it and lets it fall to the floor. “Come on,” she whispers, taking my hand.

  I follow her into the bedroom. She has one of those beds with a hundred pillows on it and she sits on the edge and unbuttons my jeans. I watch her do it, feeling my skin blaze while simultaneously wishing I had a build like Hugo’s. Maybe then I wouldn’t feel like such a kid with her.

  “Did you bring another one?” she asks, reaching into my back pocket. She tears open the condom, slides it on like an expert and sucks me off.

  My face is drenched in sweat and I come so fast that it shocks me senseless. I peel off the condom and clean myself up in the bathroom, breathing so hard that the entire neighborhood can probably hear it. When I go back to Colette’s room she’s lying on the bed, naked, with half the pillows pushed onto the floor. She’s so skinny that her pelvic bones jut out. Her pubic hair’s trimmed short and she has a tiny bruise on one of her knees that you’d hardly notice only she’s so white. I’m in absolute awe and I start to sweat again as I look at her.

  “You look like a sculpture,” I say, my voice low.

  Colette smiles that smile that turns me golden. “You know you’re beautiful, don’t you? That day in your father’s kitchen I couldn’t take my eyes off you. I felt so evil.” She laughs this deep sexy laugh that I’ve never heard before, and I stretch out on the bed next to her and touch her skin. The sight and feel of my fingertips on her bare skin seems like fantasy.

  We kiss, our bodies jammed up tight together and our hands greedy. She’s two hundred degrees of blistering hot and it’s so much better, and different, than I was expecting. I lick her everywhere, like a cat lapping milk—a feverish, deliriously ecstatic cat that only scratches if you want him to and Colette knows exactly how she wants it. I want to give it to her too but it takes so long that we have to break and talk because I’m worn out. “Sorry,” she says with a hint of self-consciousness. “It always takes a long time when I’m getting to know someone new.”

  “So it seems like we’re just the opposite,” I say, smiling as she tucks her hand into my armpit.

  She laughs that voracious, sexy laugh again and I can’t believe how incredibly, colossally lucky I am. I smooth my hands over parts of her anatomy I’d only been able to imagine up until now and I guess I should feel nervous, given the gap in our experience level, but I’m too deep in the moment for that.

  We talk about our favorite movies and songs and the first guitarist she ever had a crush on when she was thirteen. I tell her about mastering the perfect smile when I was ten and how I thought I wanted to be a drummer for a while but that I just never clicked with music the same way I did with acting.

  “I wish I was like you,” she says. “I’m really interested in law and I think I have the right kind of mind for it, but it’s not like with you and acting. It’s not a passion.”

  By now I’ve built up some energy reserves and I dedicate myself to working on her again. Colette breathes heavy and plays with my hair. She coughs as she comes and we drift slowly off to sleep, my arm draped across her ribs. I stay most of the night and we keep waking up and rediscovering each other, sometimes frenzied and sometimes half-asleep. It’s not like anything else that’s ever happened to me. It feels like another life in a parallel universe where my sole purpose is to touch and taste Colette in between snatches of sleep. In some ways I honestly can’t believe I’ll eventually have to leave this room.

  The funny thing is that during all that we never straight-out fuck and I don’t even notice until I’m alone in my bedroom later, changing my clothes.

  What can I say? It didn’t feel like there was anything missing.

  fifteen

  Lynn calls as I’m stretched on my bed, watching Relic Hunter after school the next day. Dad and I picked the TV up two days ago and I’m so tired that Relic Hunter’s as much complexity as my mind can deal with. Actually, it turns out the show’s more complex than I can handle. Tia Carrere’s kicking some army guy’s ass and I’ve already lost track of who he is and what he’s done to piss her off. Exhaustion’s fast becoming a recurring theme in my life.

  Lynn wants to know about my summer plans. Honing my craft? More theater? Shakespeare perhaps?

  “I need to land a job that pays more than minimum wage,” I say with a yawn. “Increase my cash flow.” I don’t expect my dad to sponsor this thing with Colette. Truthfully, I’m not sure what he’d make of our involvement. He doesn’t interfere with my life much but this feels different.

  “Well, you know you could still pick up some modeling jobs for extra money,” Lynn suggests. “Only, I know you don’t want to do that anymore.” If she knows, then why bring it up? But that’s Lynn for you, always pushing. “It’s a big crossover area, though, isn’t it? It could bolster your acting career. Do you still take care of your skin?”

  “Don’t worry about my skin,”
I tell her. “I’m not doing any modeling. That dream is over.” Her dream. And I remind her that it’s finished with pretty well whenever she brings up modeling, which isn’t often these days.

  “I know,” she sings. “I’m all for the acting, Mason. You’re a rising star.”

  This is the short version of what my childhood sounded like. No great sob story, I know. It’s not the worst thing in the world to have someone fawning over you and trying to turn you into something perfect but it’s not the best thing either. Lynn’s faults are just a bit more transparent than lots of other people’s.

  She can be really cool at times, though. Like, she’ll try anything once. The last time I was in Vancouver we went snowboarding together and she never complained, even though she kept wiping out. Plus, she’s turning into quite a good writer. Sometimes I check out her opinion column online to chart her evolution.

  I get more of a kick out of her from a distance than I ever would if she lived around the corner. Some people are better in small doses. That’s just life.

  Anyway, I say goodbye to Lynn and lie there listening to my stomach rumble over Tia Carrere’s dialogue. I close my eyes and silently debate whether I’m more hungry or tired and I guess my stomach wins because I get to my feet and stumble down to the kitchen.

  Brianna’s microwaving something garlicky, and two girls with long hair, one redhead and the other a blonde, are sitting at the kitchen table leafing through a glossy magazine. “Hey,” I say sleepily, scratching at my neck.

  The blonde looks up at me with a smile. “You’re Mason, right?”

  “Yep, what’s your name?”

  “Merilee.” She motions to her friend. “And this is Jane.” Merilee cranes her neck over the table to look at Brianna. “You never said anything about how cute he is.” Jane blushes the way only redheads can and I go over to the microwave to sneak a peek inside.

  “Is that garlic bread or pizza?” I ask Brianna.