by April Lurie
As I turned to leave, Dominick called, “April, wait! Let me explain!” I heard him racing down the stairs, but I hopped on my bike and took off.
I pedaled hard and fast. Behind me I heard Moe yelling, “You never learn, do you, Dom? Think you can go around doing whatever you please? Well, it doesn't work that way!”
Tears streamed down my cheeks as I pedaled home, and what the wind didn't dry, I quickly wiped away. In the garage, I leaned my bike against the wall and braced myself for what awaited me inside.
In the kitchen, my mom and dad sat quietly at the table drinking cups of Postum. “So,” I said, looking back and forth between the two of them. “What happened? What did Matt say?”
“He's not going to see the girl—Bettina—anymore,” my mom said.
“You mean … he's agreed?”
My dad nodded. “Yes.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. “That's good news.”
“And,” my dad said, “considering who we're dealing with, we're not going to call the police. Matt seems to be all right—Mom gave him something for the pain—and he's sleeping now. We'll have to keep an eye on him for a while, but hopefully things will blow over.”
Suddenly, the events of the day started caving in on me, and I began to feel very tired. “Mom, Dad, I'm going to lie down for a while. I didn't sleep very well last night.”
“Okay, honey,” my mom said. She stood up, walked over, and wrapped her arms around me. It felt good to be held. “Listen, April, I understand how you wanted to be loyal to your brother, but he was in danger, and you should have told us right away.”
“I know, Mom. I'm sorry.”
She ran her fingers through my hair. “I'm not saying it was your fault, honey. It's just, well, Dad and I want you to know that you can always come to us. We love you, and we're here to help.”
I guess it was pretty selfish of me considering Matt was lying in the next room, beat up and brokenhearted, but as I curled into a ball on my bed, all I could think about was Roxanne and Dominick at the top of the stairs—her arms circling his waist, her chin resting against his shoulder. I wondered if he'd played her the Eric Clapton album too—if they'd danced to the slow, pretty love song, and if he'd kissed her the same way he'd kissed me. I felt like such a fool, but worse than that, I felt raw, like someone had scraped out my insides with a paring knife. I closed my eyes, and after a while I must have drifted off to sleep because the next thing I knew, it was 2 p.m. and someone was knocking on my door. “April, can I come in?”
It was Brandi. I'd never been happier to hear her voice. She snuggled up next to me on the bed, and I told her everything—first about Matt and then about Dominick. When I was finished, I expected a lecture, which would have been okay considering how stupid I'd been, but instead she opened a fresh box of tissues, and said, “Don't worry, April, everything's gonna be all right, you'll see. And no matter what, we always have each other.”
For the rest of the afternoon Brandi and I played gin rummy, and when we got sick of that we flipped through my old Tiger Beat magazines, laughing at pictures of Donny Osmond and David Cassidy. Matt slept most of the day, and occasionally my mom went in to check on him. She brought him stuff like soup, yogurt, and Jell-O, since his jaw was too sore for chewing. But when she carried the trays out I noticed he'd barely touched his food.
Finally, Brandi went home for dinner, and when my parents and Sammy retreated downstairs to watch TV, I picked up Bettina's letter, tiptoed into the hall, and knocked on Matt's door.
“Matt? Are you awake? Can I come in?” No answer. I tried again. “Matt, can I talk to you, please?” Nothing. Finally I turned the knob and pushed the door open.
Matt wasn't asleep; he was sitting in the dark, on the edge of his bed, bent over and staring at the floor. “Matt, what's going on? Why didn't you answer me?”
He didn't move.
“Matt?”
And then I realized he was beyond angry. He was pretending that I didn't exist.
“Matt,” I pleaded, “I had to tell them, what else could I do?” I held out the letter. “Please, take this. Bettina said it would explain everything.”
He raised his head slightly and stared at the envelope. Finally he took it from me, and in one swift motion tore it in half and then in half again. He flung the pieces across the room.
“Fine!” I screamed. “Go ahead! Let them kill you, what do I care?” I gathered the torn pieces, stormed out of the room, and threw them back into my drawer.
Later that evening Little Joe came over. I waited in the hallway while he spent about an hour with Matt in his room. They talked in hushed voices, and even with my mother's stethoscope pressed to the door, I couldn't hear what they were saying. “Any luck?” I asked when he finally came out.
He sighed. “It's hard to say. Matt knows he can't see her, but …” He trailed off. “Well, anyway”—he patted the back pocket of his jeans—”he gave me a note for her—I'm going to give it to Marcella, and she'll pass it on to Bettina. He swears it's a breakup letter, saying it's too dangerous for them to be together.”
By midnight I was exhausted, so when I saw that Matt had turned out his lights, I did the same. Again I slept fitfully, dreaming that we were back in the theater watching the final scene of Romeo and Juliet. Only this time Dominick was sitting next to me, and Matt wasn't dead yet. As Bettina leaned over to kiss him, Bobby the Bull stood up, holding a gun. Just as I was about to scream, “Matt, watch out!” Dominick clapped his hand over my mouth, and as the shot fired, I woke up with a start.
Breathless, I looked at the clock on the wall. It was 5 a.m. The house was dark and quiet. I got up, tiptoed into the hallway, and opened Matt's door. He was gone.
The streets outside were cold and eerie, dimly lit by an occasional lamppost, and the wind blew in great gusts. As I walked steadily toward the performing arts center, I fingered the jagged edges of Bettina's letter in my coat pocket. It was only a hunch that Matt would be waiting for her in their secret hideaway, but I figured it was worth a try. I couldn't imagine my mother's face when she woke up in the morning and found him gone.
When I arrived, the building looked dark and haunted, nothing like the previous night. The wind howled against my ears. I grabbed the handrail and padded slowly down the steps into the marble courtyard. It was like entering a cave.
“Bettina? Bettina, is that you?” I followed the voice, and in the moonlight saw Matt sitting on the edge of the wooden bench wrapped in Sammy's Kermit the Frog comforter.
“No, Matt,” I said. “It's me, April.”
“April? What are you doing here? How did you know … ?” His voice trailed off, and now we were face to face.
I sat next to him, thankful that he was at least speaking to me—that he'd said my name. At this point I wouldn't have cared if he'd called me Magilla Gorilla. “It was a guess,” I said. “I woke up and saw that you'd left. I thought you might be here.”
He stared at me in disbelief. I could tell he was wondering how I'd known about their secret place, but maybe part of him didn't want to ask. There was a suitcase beside the bench; I motioned toward it. “Are you and Bettina planning to go somewhere?”
He turned away. “That's none of your business. You should leave now.”
“No, Matt,” I said. “I'm not going to leave.”
The wind blew fiercely, and he wrapped the comforter tightly around himself. “You're not dressed warm enough,” he said. “You're going to freeze.”
“I don't care. I'm staying right here. With you.”
We passed about an hour in silence, and by then my teeth were clattering inside my head. It was the kind of cold that seeped right through you, into your bones. The hard bench didn't help matters either—my butt was numb, my feet and hands like blocks of ice, and my ears were throbbing. I pulled my coat up over my head and leaned back, and I must have drifted off into some kind of frostbitten unconsciousness because when I came to, the early-morning sun was peeking through the
bare trees. Matt was crying softly. “I thought she'd come,” he said over and over, like I wasn't even there.
“Matt?”
He turned to me, and it was not a pretty sight. Besides his face being all busted up, his lips were blue, his eyes red, and the bandage on his face stained with tears. I must have looked pretty bad too, because when he saw me, he moaned sympathetically and lifted a corner of his blanket. “Here, Ape. Slide over.”
I scooted next to him, grateful for his body heat, and he wrapped the blanket tightly around the two of us. It was strange being so close to my brother; in fact, I couldn't even remember the last time we'd hugged. It might have been years. The sun was rising higher every minute, and I figured it must have been getting toward seven o'clock. There wouldn't be much time before people nearby would be starting their day, traveling to school and work.
“Matt, I'm really sorry I told Mom and Dad. I didn't know what else to do.”
He stared straight ahead and said nothing.
I fingered the pieces of the torn envelope in my pocket. “That day Bettina was at our house,” I said, “she told me how much she loved you.” It felt weird saying this to my brother. I wanted to tell him that I loved him too, but I couldn't seem to find the right words. Instead, I took his hand. “Please, Matt, take this. She wanted you to have it.”
Matt sighed deeply and hung his head. Finally, he grasped the torn letter. After placing the pieces safely in his coat pocket, he reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out the wad of bills I'd given him the day before. “I don't know where you got this money, Ape, but I don't want it.”
As he handed me the money, a strong gust of wind blew. I could have grabbed at the bills if I'd really wanted to, but instead I let them go. They fluttered away, rising and swirling, and for a split second they looked beautiful, like a flock of birds taking off. As they blew around the courtyard, up the steps, and onto the sidewalk above, a sparrow swooped down from a tree. It snatched one bill in its beak and flew off with its prize. Matt and I watched in awe.
“Thanks for coming to get me, Ape,” he said.
“Yeah, sure.” I snuggled closer to Matt, and as we watched the rest of the bills scatter, I imagined all the people smiling as they picked them up, thinking Wow, this is my lucky day. I wanted to shout out, let them know they were not fugazis but the real thing. Legit.
As Matt and I walked home together, taking turns carrying his suitcase, I lifted my face to the sun. It had been a long time since I'd felt so free.
* * *
Things weren't perfect after that. Matt was moody and miserable—moping around the house, sleeping a lot—and when his friends came to call, he sent them away, even Little Joe. My parents hovered over him nervously, watching his every move, which irritated him no end.
He didn't talk much to me, either, and the only one he allowed in his room was Sammy. In fact, Matt became quite the babysitter, teaching Sammy to play chess and poker, and showing him how to bet on the football games in the newspaper (which, of course, they didn't mention to my mom). But one morning, when I got out of the shower, I heard Jethro Tull's Aqualung blasting from Matt's room. “Hey, Chimp!” he yelled above the music. “Stop hogging the bathroom! You're not the only person in this house!” I knew then that things were definitely looking up.
During this time I had my own demons to face. In school, I avoided Dominick as much as possible, but on a Friday, after my piano lesson with Mr. Ruffalo (happily paid for in full by my parents), he came to the band room to pick up his guitar. We hadn't spoken since the afternoon I'd seen him with Roxanne. Rumor had it they'd gotten together briefly, but split up after Chris Capelli, the guy with the beach cabana on the Jersey Shore, lured her back with a diamond-studded ankle bracelet.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” he said.
“Um, yeah, sure.” I said goodbye to Mr. Ruffalo, told him I'd be back next Friday with the second half of “Peace Train” committed to memory, and walked into the hallway with Dominick.
“Listen,” he said. “I'm really sorry, and I need to explain what happened. You see, the night of your brother's play, Roxanne stopped by my place. She had two tickets to this sold-out Rolling Stones concert at Radio City, and, well—”
“I understand,” I said. “Totally. I mean the Rolling Stones? Who wouldn't go?” What irony, I thought. Bianca scoring tickets to a Stones concert.
“I did call you,” he said. “I swear. But by that time I guess you'd already left.”
There was a moment of awkward silence. “So,” I said, “I heard the two of you got back together.”
“Oh … yeah.” He looked a little embarrassed. “That night, after the concert, Roxanne and I started talking, and it's just … we'd been together for a while last year, and I guess we hadn't gotten over each other. I was pretty mixed up. Anyway, it didn't work out. She's with Chris Capelli again.”
I wanted to say, What goes around comes around, but instead I just nodded.
He looked at me with pleading eyes, and for a moment I actually felt sorry for him. “Our, uh, Halloween gig is tomorrow night. I was wondering if you'd come.”
I felt my throat closing up. “No. I promised Sammy I'd take him trick-or-treating. And after that we're going to the St. Bernadette's festival.”
“Oh, okay, maybe you can stop by afterward?”
I shook my head. “I'll be busy—you know, carving pumpkins, bobbing for apples, riding my broomstick, stuff like that.”
He smiled a little. “Okay, I understand.”
“But if you do see me there,” I said, looking him square in the eye, “it'll be for Larry. I'd like to see Larry play his drums that night.”
Another demon I needed to face was Mr. Luciano. Since the night he'd brought Matt home and I'd given him a piece of my mind, he'd made himself scarce when Brandi and I picked up Larry for school in the mornings. But on Saturday I spotted his car parked in the driveway. I walked up the steps and rang the bell.
“Why, hello, sweetheart.”
“Hi, Mr. Luciano. Do you have a minute?”
“For you? Of course. Come in.”
We sat together in the living room—me on the plastic-covered sofa and him on his papal throne. “So what can I do for you?” he asked, striking a match and lighting a cigar.
“Well, first,” I said, “I want to thank you for helping Matt. I understand now what happened that night, and I'm sorry I spoke to you that way.”
He blew a ring of smoke. “No problem, sweetheart. No harm done.”
“I want you to know he's not going to see Bettina anymore.”
He nodded. “I figured as much.”
“And now,” I said, “I have another favor to ask you.”
“Another favor, is that so?” He seemed vaguely amused.
“Yes. It's about the money. If you happen to know who's been placing those rather large bills in my books— Brandi's, too—I'd like it if you would please ask them to stop.”
“Stop?” He tapped the ashes from his cigar into the ashtray. “And why would you want this person to stop?”
“Because,” I said, giving him a measured look, “there are things more important than money. Like friendship, for example—caring for someone who might need a little extra help, wanting to do something without expecting anything in return.”
He pondered this a moment. “Friendship, huh? But what if this person doesn't want to cooperate?”
I shrugged. “Well, I suppose you could twist his arm a little.”
He smiled. “Hmmm, interesting thought. I'll see what I can do.”
Since I had promised there'd be no more secrets in my family, and because the deadline for the short story competition was drawing near, I decided to give my parents the pleasure of reading “Babysitting Games.” The three of us sat at the kitchen table, and I watched as my mother read first. She didn't smile, she didn't laugh. Mostly she frowned, and when she was finished, she stared at the floor and passed it to my dad. As my da
d read, he scratched his head, winced, and cleared his throat a few times.
Afterward he handed me the paper. “Well, April, that was … interesting. Your, uh, teacher, Mr. Cornelius, gave you an A-plus. Must mean he liked it?”
“Yes. He says it has a really good chance of winning.” I looked at the two of them. “Mom, Dad, it's a comedy. A dark comedy. Fiction.”
“Well, that's good to know,” my mother said. She managed a small smile.
“Yes,” my dad agreed. After another minute of awkward silence, he picked up a pen and scribbled his signature on the application. “We may not always understand you, April, but we want you to know we're very proud of you.”
“Yes,” my mom said, signing her name next to my dad's even though she didn't need to. Enthusiastically, she dotted the “i” in “Lundquist.” “We are. Very proud.”
On Sunday afternoon, Bert called to tell me he'd made Xavierian's tennis team, and we decided to celebrate by playing a few games of mixed doubles with Walt and Brandi. But before leaving for the park, I dug out Frank Stapleton's card from my sock drawer and dialed his number.
“Hello, Mr. Stapleton?”
“Yes.”
“I'm not sure if you remember, but last month you saw me playing tennis at Poly Prep with some of my friends. You gave me your card and asked me to call. Anyway, I was wondering if you were still having tryouts for the Lady Firebirds.”
There was silence on the other end, and just when I'd decided that it was a stupid idea to have called and I should just hang up, he cleared his throat and said, “You're a little late. We finished tryouts two weeks ago.”
“Oh, okay, I was just wondering, sorry to bother—”
“But,” he said, “there is one more spot on the team. I think I remember you—the tall blond girl with the killer backhand?” He seemed to be smiling on the other end.
“Well, I am tall and blond, but—”
“Tuesday,” he said firmly. “Four-thirty at the indoor bubble courts. Do you know where they are?”
