The Blonde of the Joke

by Bennett Madison

  The mall had thrown up a wall of fog; I could barely find my way from entrance to atrium. I tried to retrace old paths only to find myself back in the place where I’d started. I was worried that without Francie I wouldn’t be able to steal anymore, but when I finally I made it to Bath & Body Works, my gifts were still with me. I took some bath beads, some soap, and some body lotion. It was easy. But it wasn’t very satisfying.

  Then I was at the edge of the fountain, and Max was there, unexpectedly, waiting for me. Max was one of those people whose only reliable trait was his unreliability. He had only showed because I hadn’t been expecting him. He looked hot as ever, in a pair of mangled, loose-fitting jeans and a blue pullover hoodie, his hair messy and kind of greasy, but in a good way. He gave me that odd, winning smile.

  “Where’s your friend?” he asked.

  “She couldn’t make it,” I told him. Did anyone ever think about anything other than Francie?

  “That girl confuses me,” he said.

  “You confuse her, too,” I told him. “She mentioned it the other day.”

  “She thinks she knows everything.”

  “I know.”

  “She’s not as smart as she thinks, you realize.”

  “You’d be surprised.”

  Max had this way of talking in asides, like nothing he was saying had anything to do with what the conversation was actually about, even if it did. “Why do you like her?” he asked me.

  “Francie? What, you don’t like her?”

  “Of course I like her. I’m just curious why you do.”

  “I guess it’s like…” I considered it for a second. “I guess it’s that I’ve never met anyone like her before. Someone who just doesn’t care. It’s like she was sent here from an alien planet, or the future. A strange visitor. It’s like she’s here to teach us something.”

  “What’s she supposed to teach us?” Max asked.

  “Something important,” I said. “Something besides shoplifting. That’s all I know. With these strange visitors, it’s not supposed to be too obvious. If it was that simple, they would just tell you outright or send it in a postcard or something.”

  “I guess you’re right about that.”

  “She’s my best friend,” I said. “She really is. Actually, she’s my only friend.”

  “I’m your friend,” Max said. He dipped his hand into the fountain and splashed some water on my leg. “I’ve never seen you without her. You look beautiful without her.”

  “That’s a weird thing to say,” I said. Max was nothing if not a flatterer. I’d seen him doing it to Francie, too; the difference was that she fell for it. I stood. “Want me to show you how to shoplift?”

  “Not really,” he said. “Want me to teach you how to skateboard?”

  “No.”

  “Let’s just go for a walk, then,” Max said.

  So we went for a walk. We walked the length of the mall, and then the width, and then the entire perimeter of the wraparound balcony that was the second floor. We talked about a lot of stuff, most of it unmemorable. But even though the stuff we were talking about wasn’t important at all, I was happy to be talking to someone other than Francie. I had practically forgotten what it was like to have a conversation with someone else. Francie was all bright eyes and brass tacks, and every time you had a conversation with her, you got the feeling that she was trying a case, that every nonsensical thing she said was all a piece of a mystifying, aggregate thesis. It was kind of exhausting. Max, by contrast, barely seemed to know what was coming out of his mouth as he said it.

  “I’ve got this dog,” Max said. He was mumbling like he was embarrassed to hear his own voice, but he just had to say it anyway because it was important.

  “A dog. Cool,” I said.

  “His name’s Noodle. Stupid name, I know, but it wasn’t my idea, and he’s an awesome dog. He’s a golden retriever. The best dogs ever.”

  “I hear they’re very loyal.”

  Max considered his words. “I think it’s so shitty when people talk about how dogs are, like, bred to love people, because that makes it seem so much stupider than it is. If something’s programmed to love you, or if it just loves you because it doesn’t know any better, well, what’s the point of that? It’s meaningless.”

  “I’ve always been kind of afraid of dogs,” I said.

  “You wouldn’t be afraid of my dog,” he said. “He’s the best. But what I’m saying is, like, if dogs just loved you because that’s what dogs do, it would be so empty. It would be like having a robot. Or one of those weird life-size sex dolls that cost five thousand dollars.”

  “Gross,” I said. “Anyway, I thought dogs loved whoever fed them.”

  “I mean, true, but that’s missing the point. It’s not like dogs love you, or me, or anyone. It’s more like—like they’re the living embodiment of everything that is good. Or like they’re vessels for it,” Max said. “Like when I take Noodle to the park. He’s out running in the field, he’s chasing whatever, and all you see is this blur of yellow, and then he’ll, like, disappear for a minute or two, and then suddenly he’ll be right there at my feet, panting, and when he looks up at me, I’ll look at him, and it’s not that I can see that he loves me. I know he does love me, and I love him, too, but that’s not what I see. What I can see is, like, all the love in the entire world. Right there, those black eyes, tongue all wagging. It’s practically bursting out of him. This boundless, cosmic affection.”

  “Are you stoned?” I asked.

  “Come on,” Max said, wounded. “I’m talking about serious shit here.”

  “No, really. Are you stoned?”

  “Only a little bit.” He shrugged. “So I smoked a bowl like an hour and a half ago. That doesn’t mean I’m not being totally serious.”

  “The funny thing is that I know what you mean,” I told him. “Even though you’re stoned and I don’t like dogs.”

  We were facing each other. I looked at him, with his scruffy not-quite-beard, his blondish hair. His eyes were watery and bloodshot, which had the strange effect of making them all the bluer. He had run out of things to say.

  “You know, you kind of look like a golden retriever,” I told him. “You really do.”

  “People always say I look like Noodle,” he said.

  “That’s such a stupid name.”

  “I know,” he admitted.

  “I’m going to steal something for you,” I told him.

  He cocked his head at me like he was going to say no, and then he laughed and shrugged, and we walked into Steve & Barry’s, where I made an ugly camo hat disappear into my bag.

  “This camo shit is so finished,” he said when we were outside and I placed the hat on his head. But he looked pleased that I’d actually stolen it for him, and he flipped the brim a little, giving him a boyish aspect, like Dennis the Menace or someone who would play stickball.

  “My brother actually is dying,” I said. “I wasn’t joking the other day.”

  “I kind of figured,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay. It’s just one of those things.”

  “It’s still got to suck.”

  “It does suck,” I said. “I thought we were helping him get better, but now I’m not so sure.”

  “Here, I’ll walk you to the bus. Maybe you can meet Noodle sometime.”

  On Monday, after school, Francie and I were back at the mall together as if nothing had happened. I guess Francie didn’t know anything had happened at all. We rode the bus and made our way up the grassy hill together like always. We stood in front of the glowing map of the mall, running our fingers across the geometric, chalky-colored legends, debating our first hit of the afternoon.

  “It’s been a while since Bebe has seen these faces,” Francie said. “Shall we remind them who’s boss?”

  “I don’t care if I never see another Bebe dress as long as I live,” I said. “All those feathers and sequins. Ugh.”

  “Well, where
do you want to go?” she asked.

  I closed my eyes and pointed. When I opened them, Francie was checking my selection against the directory. “B-thirteen. Great, Val. Mrs. Bigger’s. Awesome choice.”

  “It’s a change of pace, at least. And you never know—maybe we’ll be fat someday and a fat-dress will come in handy.”

  I didn’t tell her I had seen Max without her. It’s not like I had done anything wrong. I mean, I hadn’t, had I? Just a few weeks before, she had made it clear that she wasn’t trying to get down with him herself. And neither was I, for that matter. All I had done was have a conversation. But I still felt—in some small, nagging way—like I had betrayed Francie. Maybe just because she was supposed to be all that I needed. We were supposed to have a world of our own, with no use for anyone outside the two of us. By hanging alone with Max, I was letting someone else in, and without Francie’s permission or knowledge. I was lapsing in my service to Francie’s ultimate goal:

  We’re going to do it, Val. The two of us. You start small and expand the operation. A piece at a time, a piece at a time. Start with a charm bracelet. Move on to the Great Pyramids. It will take both of us. I am asking for your undivided loyalty. But someday it’s all going to be ours. Every single thing.

  She had asked me for my allegiance. That was all that Francie had ever required of me. She had put her ass on the line for me. I wondered if I had let her down.

  I wondered if I had done it on purpose.

  Chapter Eighteen

  One day, after Physics class, I stayed behind. Ms. Tinker didn’t notice me at first; she was too busy puttering around at her desk, gathering up papers and rearranging things for the next class. But I hovered at the edge of her desk until she finally looked up and saw me. “Vincenza,” she greeted me. “What can I do ya for?”

  I ignored her mistake. There was no point, and anyway, I was pretty sure by then that it wasn’t a mistake at all. “I wanted to ask you something,” I said.

  “No such thing as a smart question,” she clucked. I was aware of her stance on questions. It was Classroom Policy #4. There Is No Such Thing as a Smart Question—Only Smart Answers.

  “I just wanted to know—when I saw you in the mall that day. In Ann Taylor Loft. How did you know about the Sign?”

  “Can’t have been me. I’ve never been to the mall,” Ms. Tinker said, averting her gaze. “I do all my shopping at craft fairs. Where do you think I got this?” She tipped her purple beret at me. “You can’t find something like this at the mall, now can you?”

  “Just the same,” I said. “I know I saw you there. And you gave me the Sign. I’m sure of it.”

  “Hmm,” she mused. “Very interesting. Do you like physics?”

  “Not really,” I admitted.

  “I knew you would. Physics is phun, and you’re one of my best students. I think this will interest you.” Her left eye twitched. She took a piece of chalk and pranced over to the blackboard, where she began to write out a long, complicated equation that I didn’t understand at all.

  She pulled her fist back and forth across the blackboard and, as if by magic, neat white rows began to appear. Numbers and symbols, but also hearts and stars and clouds, none of it in any intelligible configuration. I found myself squinting, trying to make sense of it all. I was far from Ms. Tinker’s best student, but even I knew enough to know that a heart is not an accepted symbol used in physics.

  Ms. Tinker was humming a cheerful, bouncing little tune. Finally, when there was no more space on the blackboard, she finished it all off with a giant equal sign and a smiley face, which she circled several times before she turned around and faced me victoriously.

  “I don’t get it,” I said.

  “That’s because it’s meaningless!” she exclaimed, pleased with herself. “Physics teaches us many things. But I don’t really understand physics. I used to be a special education teacher, you know. There’s not a lot of physics in special ed.”

  “If you say so,” I said.

  “I’m just an old woman,” Ms. Tinker went on. “I believe that there is no such thing as a smart question. But one thing I have learned about physics—this was in the teacher’s manual—is that the answers are always right in front of your face. Asking questions just shows that you don’t care enough about the answers to figure them out for yourself. Does that make sense?”

  “Sort of,” I said. “I mean, no, but maybe.”

  “You can’t learn a lot in school,” Ms. Tinker said. “That’s why I mostly focus on making sure everyone’s notebook holes are reinforced. What else am I supposed to grade on?”

  “Um,” I said. If she was trying to make herself seem more reasonable, she was failing.

  “No one can answer anything for you,” Ms. Tinker said. “Especially me. I’m just going by the teacher’s manual, anyway. What do I know? Well, I know a few things, but none of them have to do with physics. I know about felting. I know how to speak a little bit of Flemish. That’s not very useful; hardly anyone speaks Flemish, except maybe your friend Francie.”

  “Why would Francie speak Flemish?” I asked.

  Ms. Tinker giggled mischievously. “Let’s just say I have good reason to believe that your dear friend might be a robot. Or a hologram. Have you seen the outfits she wears?”

  “This conversation makes no sense,” I said. “Are you for real?”

  She cackled and pushed her glasses up on the end of her pointy nose. “If I wasn’t, would it make a difference? It’s all the same in the end. The teacher’s manual says that up to three-quarters of physics is belief. It’s what you believe that matters. If Newton hadn’t believed in gravity, where would we be now?”

  “Where?”

  “Floating around in outer space, that’s where!” she yelped in exasperation.

  “I guess,” I said.

  “Don’t be foolish. You know I can’t abide foolishness,” Ms. Tinker reminded me.

  She tugged on one earlobe, then another, and twitched her nose, and bared her teeth in a toothy brown grin. I didn’t make the Sign back. I left the classroom, unsure of whether Ms. Tinker had told me anything at all. I guess there’s no such thing as a smart question.

  The next day we had a substitute, and again the next. A week later, with no explanation, we heard that Ms. Tinker would not be returning to Sandra Dee.

  Francie and I met at the subway later that day. We had been collecting stuff for Jesse for a while now, and it was starting to build up. I’d brought a few things for him when I’d visited, and sent some of it with Liz when she went to visit him, but I couldn’t deliver it nearly as fast as we were stealing it. We had to make a big drop.

  Francie arrived at the station in gold stiletto sandals that laced all the way up her calves, denim cutoffs so short that they revealed the lowermost curve of her ass, and a skintight Smiths concert T-shirt that she had cropped right above her belly button. She had her hair pulled away from her face with a pronged, metallic headband.

  “You look like a total slut,” I told her. “A slutty pineapple.”

  “I look beautiful,” she said. “What’s wrong with looking like a slut, anyway? I don’t see why people always criticize. I thought everyone liked sluts! Did you bring the stuff?”

  But what I was really thinking was that she looked different these days. Still slutty, just different. While she’d always cultivated that unkempt, greasy style, today she just looked kind of dirty, like she hadn’t showered in a week. Her eyeliner was crooked and crusted over. And there was something desperate in her eyes, in her tone of voice. It was like she was trying too hard; like she knew she had to struggle at what had always come so easily to her.

  I opened the duffel bag I was carrying and showed Francie the loot. It was everything we had stolen for Jesse over the past couple of weeks. This time I’d warned him we were coming.

  “You know, you don’t have to come with me to Jesse’s just to be nice,” I told Francie. “I could do it myself if you want.”


  “Babe,” Francie said. “You think I’m coming to be nice? What planet are you on?”

  “I know. But you don’t have to. I just want you to know.”

  “I definitely want to. I know I can convert him,” Francie said.

  “I thought you didn’t have time for boys.”

  “Exactly. Boys. Jesse is clearly one hundred million percent man.”

  I hated how Francie was always talking about how hot Jesse was, and not just because he was my brother, either. There was something that seemed thoughtless about it, as if she was willfully forgetting the truth of the situation, or even making fun of it. Francie was the one who was always looking for the Most Beautiful Thing. Francie knew from beautiful. And it seemed to me that she of all people should be able to see that even if Jesse still looked okay on the outside, he could never really be beautiful again. But maybe Francie was seeing something else entirely.

  “Well, good luck with that,” I said. “You’ll look good in widow’s weeds.”

  Francie gave me a cross, regretful frown. “Don’t talk that way,” she said. “Look at everything we have for him. It may not be the Holy Grail, but for now it’s enough.”

  “I’m starting to wonder,” I said.

  “You can’t wonder,” Francie said.

  Jesse was on the couch when we got to his place. He had actually cleaned it up, if only slightly. “Hey, Hot Stuff,” Francie gushed.

  “Hey, Sexy,” Jesse responded.

  She left her glossy mark on his forehead.

  “I love your apartment,” she told him. She was taking it upon herself to inspect it, standing at the window examining the architecture, knocking on the plaster walls, looking for signs of sturdiness. “Someday I’m going to have a place just like this.”