by Ron Koertge
“What are you going to do after high school?”
“Probably move to San Francisco. My parents hate me.”
“You said probably. If you don’t do that, what else would you like to do?”
“Join the navy. Now can I ask you a question?”
I turn off the camera. “I guess.”
“Are you gay?”
“Are you kidding?”
“Let’s start with the way you do neat-and-clean. Add that look-but-don’t-touch act of yours to a fag hag grandma and I’m thinking you might be deeper in the closet than my polyester flares.”
“I’m not gay.”
“So Colleen wasn’t just a beard. You really liked her?”
“Yeah.”
“But she’s back with Ed.”
I nod.
“If you’re so butch, get her back.”
“Oh, sure.”
“Hey, you’re the cinephile: meet him in the middle of some dusty street at high noon.”
I go right to the parking lot where Ed tends to hang out. Is Oliver making me do it? I don’t know. But I have to do something.
Sure enough, there’s Ed by his spotless Camaro. He leans on the fender. Everybody else keeps a respectful distance from the paint job. Four or five guys and a couple of girls listen to him, then laugh on cue. When he spots me, he stops his monologue.
“What’s up, spaz?” The studs in his eyebrow ascend, registering the question.
I glance at Colleen, who’s slumped in the front seat sipping gingerly at a can of 7Up. I’m glad to see her, but she doesn’t look too good.
“I was worried about her.”
Ed points to the car. “Somebody should be. She could be in one of those movies you like so much, you know? Invasion of the Zombies or something.” Ed’s T-shirt is tight, but he inhales, anyway, so I can see the slabs of his pectoral muscles.
“How do you know what kind of movies I like?”
“Are you kidding? When she gets loaded, you’re all she talks about, and she’s loaded most of the time.”
I go over to the car, open the door. “Want to take a little walk?” I hold out my good hand.
Colleen takes it blindly and gets out one limb at a time: first a leg, then one arm, the other leg. When she finally finds her purse, she clutches it like a courier carrying news that could alter the course of the war.
Ed sidles up to me. “Just for the record: I’m giving her to you, you’re not taking her away from me.”
I watch a girl named Heather step up beside him. She slips one thumb into his belt loop. She’s got big boobs and she presses one of them into Ed’s arm. She’s been waiting for this. She’s the understudy and this is her big chance.
I take Colleen by the arm to steady her. “You okay?”
She swallows hard. “I don’t think so.”
Behind me, somebody says something, somebody else laughs at me. Or Colleen. And I want to turn around and shut him up. I want to hurl myself at him. God help me, I want a gun. Man, I have seen way too many movies.
I ask Colleen, “What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll take you home.”
“Fuck, no.”
“We can go to my house.”
“And have your grandma croak? No way.”
“You should eat.”
“Like I could keep it down. Give me your hand. I’m all, like, woozy and shit.”
We haven’t gone ten yards before Colleen stops. She puts both hands to her face. “I’m all fucked up, Ben.”
“It’ll wear off.”
“No, not just the weed. More like everything.”
I point. “Your car’s just over here. Can you drive?”
Colleen shakes her head.
“Then we’ll take the bus.”
“No, I’m sick, Ben. I’m really sick.”
COLLEEN DOESN’T WANT ME to see her in the hospital. “I look like shit” pretty much explains why. After about a week, though, she knows when she’s getting out, so I block off those days on my calendar, then cross them out one by one like some guy in prison.
She calls me every day, sometimes twice, and usually after school when I’m at Marcie’s working on High School Confidential, which is what I’ve decided to call my movie. I stop whatever I’m doing to talk to her. I roam the house, looking out the window at Marcie on her knees in the flower bed.
I want to tell Colleen I love her, but I don’t. I don’t even say I miss her, because she doesn’t say she misses me. She talks a lot about the other people in her ward — one of them’s a child actor I’ve heard of — and about the crappy food. She does say one of the first things she wants to do when she gets out is go to the Rialto, so that’s a good sign.
We agree to meet in front of the theater. Right after her meeting.
I get there first. Big surprise. I don’t pace — people with C.P. find other ways to be nervous — but I could pace. I’m worried about Colleen, so I’m glad to see her crappy little car cruise by, glad to see her wave and point to a parking spot. I do my best to amble that way.
“Hey!” She clambers out, grabs her purse out of the back, and kisses me.
“I missed you.” I can’t help myself.
“Me, too. I told my group about you. I said you were the cleanest, soberest guy in the world. Half the chicks in there want to be your girlfriend.”
I put my arm around her. If possible, she’s skinnier than before. “How was your meeting?”
“Well, I asked God to remove all character defects and shortcomings, and He said He’d have to get back to me on that because there are only so many hours in a day.”
She’s wearing pedal pushers, white sneakers, and a T-shirt without a band’s name on it.
“You look good.”
“I feel pretty good. I’m taking my vitamins.” She kisses me again, fast and hard. “How’s your movie?”
“Done, I think.” I hold up my crossed fingers. “I just need to show it to Marcie.”
“Have you got my assignments? Did my teachers, like, freak?”
“They were okay. I just said you were sick.”
When she digs in her purse, I flinch. She says, “Relax. I’m just going to smoke a cigarette.” Then she frowns at the little flip-top box in her hand. “Wait a minute. I just smoked about a hundred of these things. Let’s go in. And don’t let me have any Coke, either. With a capital C, I mean.”
I point to the marquee, which says APOCALYPSE NOW. “This is a really good movie.”
“You should know, baby.”
Baby. Stuff like that gives me such a rush. Every now and then Grandma calls me dear, but that just makes me feel like Bambi.
When we get in the short line, Colleen leans against me. Under her new clothes, I can feel every inch of her long, thin body.
“I was reading this brochure before the meeting?”
“Yeah?”
“There’s a twelve-step program for everything,” she says. “Ever hear of Debt Anon? Cross-Dressers Anon?”
“You’re kidding.”
“No way. ‘Hello, I’m Carl, and I’m wearing Donna Karan.’”
I step up to Mrs. Stenzgarden, put down a twenty-dollar bill, and say, “Two, please.” Then I just look at the tickets.
And keep looking at them as we make our way up the little incline and across the turquoise-and-black tiles.
“I never bought two tickets before. It feels weird.”
“Poor baby. You should have gone to All by Myself Anon.”
I introduce Colleen to Reginald and tell him this is kind of an anniversary: six weeks ago to the day, Colleen and I met at the Rialto.
He gallantly kisses her hand and says that in honor of the occasion the snacks are on the house.
At the concession stand, Colleen peers through the smeared glass. “We need to get a lot of disgusting stuff,” she says. So we do: licorice whips, Jujubes, Milk Duds, popcorn, and Mountain Dew.
When Apoca
lypse Now starts, we sit back and eat. But pretty soon Colleen shakes her head when I offer more Milk Duds or popcorn.
The deeper Martin Sheen gets into the jungle, the closer he gets to Colonel Kurtz, the harder she holds my hand. She falls right into the movie, and I go with her. I forget about camera angles, tracking shots, and close-ups. I let the movie have me, too. We watch everything. Eventually, we surface through the names of carpenters, gaffers, drivers, and caterers.
When the lights come up Colleen’s dabbing at her eyes with a Kleenex. “That was so fucking good.”
I’m not quite sure what to do; I’ve never seen her cry before. I put my arm around her and she leans into me.
“And you know what?” she says. “I’ll bet that’s the first movie I’ve seen all the way through since I was, like, ten. I was always loaded. I fucking slept through half my fucking life. Fuck!” She sits up straight and blows her nose. “How long is this here for?”
I shrug. “A week, probably.”
“Let’s see it again. Do you want to see it again?”
“I’ll have to ask my grandma.” I say it like a real weenie. On purpose. And then I kind of scrunch up and protect myself because I know Colleen is going to beat on me, and Colleen plays rough.
MARCIE LEANS FORWARD and puts her right arm around my shoulders. “I talked to my teacher, and he called the guy who runs the Centrist Gallery. He does this student-video thing every November, and we can send him yours as soon as you’re done.”
I point at the iMac. “Better check this out before we start talking about the Academy Awards.”
“True.” Marcie taps the keyboard and up comes High School Confidential. Nobody’s seen it but me, not even Colleen, so I’m nervous. I sit up straighter in my bright-yellow wooden chair. I wipe my good hand on my jeans.
Twenty minutes later Marcie frowns and scratches her head.
“That bad?” I try to sound like it doesn’t matter very much.
“Well, there are good parts. That line from Chana about leaking milk onto her Gap T-shirt is pure gold.”
“But . . . ?”
“They’re a little predictable.” She massages the bridge of her nose. “The gay guy is gay. The black girls are black. If I want to see stereotypes, I’ll watch television.”
“But Oliver is gay, and he makes sure everybody knows it. If Chana, Molly, and Debra aren’t together, they’re with some other black kid.”
“Talk to them.”
“Marcie, I did talk to them.”
“No, you interviewed them. Talk to them this time.”
“And then what?” I point at the screen. “Do I have to throw all this stuff away?”
“Maybe not. Maybe you can start with them defined by race and sexual preference and move deeper. You’re not going to know until you really talk to them.”
She stands up and I follow her to the front door. Marcie opens her purse, fishes around for a few seconds, and hands me a set of keys. “You know what to do.”
“Sure.” But now I don’t want to do it. “Pick up the mail, water the plants, feed the fish.” I try not to sound snotty.
“Ben, unless it comes up, don’t tell your grandma I’m out of town. I’m not completely comfortable with the idea of you and Colleen here by yourselves.”
“Why? We’re not going to do anything.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of. The movie needs work, and you haven’t got a lot of time.” Marcie’s wearing cargo pants and there’s actually stuff in every pocket. She reaches into one. “Have you got condoms?”
At first I think she says tom-toms. Either way, the answer is no.
“Take some. You’re going to be all alone with your girlfriend.”
“Colleen hasn’t got a disease.”
“I never said she did, but nobody should sleep with anybody without some kind of protection.” She acts like a pushy caterer who wants somebody to try the Special Cracker. So I choose one.
“Take two. You’re sixteen.” She grins, but it’s fake.
She puts the rest of the condoms back in her pocket, then takes my entire face in both hands. “Promise me you’ll get some work done.”
I pull away. “Jesus. All right.”
“Do you know you swear more than you used to?”
“Marcie, you’re not my mom.”
She stares down at her boots, Timberlands, actually, with red laces. “Well, somebody should be. You got short-changed in the mom department.”
She turns away and fiddles with a leather overnight bag. I try to remember the last time my real mom hugged me or got on my case or talked to me about anything. I can’t even remember the last thing she said to me before she evaporated.
“Marcie, I’ll work hard, I really will. I’ll get on the computer, go through and save just the good stuff, and then I’ll talk to everybody some more.”
She squeezes my good hand. “Fine. What’s there is not bad, Ben, it’s just . . . predictable.”
“And you would know with your B minus.”
I’m kidding, but she gets super-serious on me. “Ben, I didn’t work hard enough. I had a boyfriend, okay? Now he’s gone and I’ve got a stupid B minus. Don’t be me. Let’s get you in that gallery show. I want to get dressed up and go into Hollywood.”
Just then the doorbell rings. I open the door for Colleen, who kisses me on the cheek. I try not to be obvious, but I sneak a look at her eyes. She’s a little amped but probably it’s just caffeine.
We walk Marcie to her yellow Xterra. We watch her back out of the driveway then speed away.
“What’s going on?” Colleen asks.
“Gee, I don’t know,” says Mr. Innocent.
“Bullshit.” She holds up both hands, fingers up like lightning rods. “The air is like charged. Did you guys get into it?”
“Oh, yeah. Well, sort of, I guess. We were kind of talking about whether I had to do stuff she said. She’s not, you know, my mom or anything.”
“She’s better than most moms.”
I look at her. “Really?”
“Honey, she gives a shit about you. She’s on your side. She wants good stuff to happen to you. She like paves the way.” Colleen leads me up the walk. “I mean, she’s loaning you her house so you won’t miss one day working on the computer. My mom would never do that.”
I hold the door. “Do I ever get to meet your mother?”
“Why? I fucking hate her.”
Inside Colleen picks up the copies of Moby Dick and The Scarlet Letter that she’s dropped on the counter.
“It’s weird seeing you with books.”
She stares at them. “Is that what these are?”
“Are you going to study?”
“I guess. God knows I should. I’m like six hundred years behind.”
“Come and look at something first, okay?”
I lead her into the spare room, sit down, hit a few keys, then lean back so Colleen can see Isabel, a chubby girl with bad posture and a twenty-four-hour smirk.
“Just listen, okay? And then I want to ask you something.”
Colleen sinks into the chair beside me and I hit the Play button.
“I feel,” Isabel says, “like a one-woman Afterschool Special, you know? Because I’ve got booze everywhere: car, locker, even this little spritzer thing in my purse.”
I hear myself ask, “Why?”
“It takes the edge off. It makes me feel prettier and wittier. And when shit happens, I don’t take it so hard.”
“You know,” I say, “everybody’d tell you you’re wasting the best years of your life.”
“Are you kidding? I have to have a drink before I can get out of bed.”
I look over at Colleen. “So here’s what I want to know: does Isabel sound like a stereotype?”
“What?”
“Marcie thinks some of the kids in here are like stereotytpes.”
“Isabel’s a drunk. She’s going to sound like a drunk.”
“How do you know that?�
�
“I sell her a little weed every now and then. We talk.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“Why should she trust you?”
I look up at her, kind of stunned. “God, Colleen, she admitted on camera that she’s a drunk.”
“That doesn’t mean she trusts you. Everybody knows she’s a juicer. That’s old news.”
I hoist myself up, one hand on the desk, one on the back of the chair. “Look at this again, then, okay? And let’s see —”
All of a sudden Colleen backs away. She’s all but got the crucifix and the garlic necklace. “I can’t do this, Ben.”
“What? Can’t do what?”
She fumbles for a cigarette. “It’s your movie, not mine.”
“But you could help.”
She shakes her head. “I helped Ed; I carried dope in my underpants.”
“This is way different.”
“No, I’ve been talking to my counselor about doing the same shit over and over. And I know this looks different, but it’s not. It’s the same.”
Maybe an hour later I wander toward the kitchen. My shoes lie on their sides by the coffee table with its little pile of Chinese coins. Colleen sits cross-legged on the couch, frowning at a book.
“Do you want anything?” I stare into the refrigerator. “Marcie left a lot of stuff.”
“I’m okay. Are you mad?”
Clutching a carrot, I sit at the other end of the couch. “No. It’s okay. This is turning out to be a weird day, that’s all.” I glance at her. A tattooed devil stares back from her calf.
She lets The Scarlet Letter topple onto her thighs. “Talk about weird. It’s weird being clean and sober.”
“Yeah, I can imagine.”
“I was looking at my tats in the mirror this morning when I got out of the shower. I feel like fucking scratch paper. I’ve got, like, random shit written all over me.”
“Think of yourself as one of those old manuscripts with interesting stuff in the margins.”
Colleen tosses the book aside and crawls toward me. “Kiss me like they did in those old movies.”
“Let me put my carrot down.”
