by Rachel Vail
“I’ll show you the surprise I have planned,” he whispered.
“Danny doesn’t usually like surprises,” I said, on our way up.
“I think he’ll like this one,” Dad said. “But I want to get your opinion on how to spring it, when the kids get here. You know Danny better than anybody else. So, tell me what you think.”
When we got to the field up the hill from our yard, Dad pointed at the firepit.
“S’mores?” I guessed, already trying to figure out how to remind Dad that Danny hates them.
“No, doesn’t Danny hate those?” Dad asked.
“Yeah,” I said.
“No, it’s: I’ll make a fire in the firepit. Then I’ll let Danny and the other kids hold the hose, maybe working together or taking turns, and put out the fire while they wear their fire helmets. What do you think? Fun, right?”
“Sure,” I said. “Or, even if not all of them wear the helmets.”
“Right,” Dad said. He looked so unsure and hopeful, it was like a flashback to what he must’ve looked like as a little kid.
“That’ll be a really fun activity,” I told him. “You could get a siren effect on your phone, if you want.”
“Oh, good idea,” Dad said. “Thanks, Niki!”
My father is very strong. Once, he was changing the tire of his car in our driveway and it came off the jack, and he just stood there holding the car up and cursing, yelling at me to get away, get to the grass. He looked like a superhero. But sometimes when it comes to Danny, he looks a bit like he might cry. Which makes me feel very sad and unsturdy.
The thing is, Danny really doesn’t enjoy surprises much at all. I was thinking it might be a better plan to have a practice round of fire and putting out the fire, but it was too late because the party was supposed to be starting.
“Will you buy that siren thing for me?” Dad asked, holding out his phone.
“I can get it on my phone if you want,” I said. “It’s free.”
“Perfect.” He pocketed his phone as we went back down to see what was happening.
Nothing.
Just the four of us in our family still standing around our own backyard.
I set up my alarm to sound like a fire-truck siren but didn’t choose a time, and made a wish toward the unlit candles on Danny’s fire-truck cake that his friends would please start arriving. At least Danny’s best friend, Boone. The guests were all already five minutes late and my mother’s face was starting to look like a jack-o’-lantern on November fifth. Another thing that makes me feel unsturdy.
How can I be on Danny’s side when he hurts my parents?
Danny was the only one of us who didn’t look stressed. He was lining his new toy fire trucks up with the old ones. That’s what he cares about. Not that his birthday party was supposed to have started and nobody was here yet.
Sometimes he seems like the only one of us who is okay.
But not usually.
After another few excruciating minutes, I put on a fire helmet. “Dude,” I said to Danny. He didn’t look up.
“Danny! Should we make sure there’s enough candy in the piñata?”
“There is,” Danny mumbled.
I didn’t want to look at my parents, so I checked my phone again: 3:15. Nobody had shown up. I thought of texting Madeleine. Her sister Margot was supposed to be coming. I could find out if they’re on their way, at least, make a joke about last year. What, though? Also, yeah, that’s super normal for me to do, to text one of the most popular girls in my grade to find out why her little sister is blowing off my brother. Um, hard pass.
Ava. She said we could text each other in an emergency.
me: So, this sucks: It’s Danny’s bday party and nobody has shown up. 15 minutes past start time. My mom is literally twitching. Advice?
“Hey, Danny,” Dad said. “Let’s make a fire in the firepit!”
“Uh-uh,” Danny said.
I couldn’t look at any of them. No response from Ava. Oh no. She probably had another sleepover I wasn’t invited to; they were probably all at Ava’s in their pajamas looking at that sad, pathetic thing I had just texted her like an idiot, talking about my whole defective family. Why can’t I erase a text? I rubbed my thumb against my pink eraser in my pocket. Why can’t I erase everything???
I highlighted that dumb text to Ava. Nope, won’t delete. Instead I copied it and sent it to Holly. Which I also immediately regretted. Was I looking for attention? Sympathy? Rejection? Just company? Why do I put myself at the center of the drama? No wonder Ava doesn’t want to—
Buzz. I checked.
Holly.
“Niki,” Mom was saying. “Maybe you and Danny could—maybe you don’t need to be . . .”
“One sec,” I said, and opened the text.
Holly: That’s awful! Is there anything I can do?
me: I wish—thanks, Holly. I just felt like complaining haha
Holly: Hang on, trash collectors, right?
me: ???
Holly: You said Danny loves?
me: Yahhh but???
Holly: They just came by—I had to run out with the recycling for my mom. Lemme see if I can catch them
me: Holly, I don’t think . . . what will you do?
No response. I looked up at Mom. She was sucking in on her lips, her trying-not-to-cry expression, and, yeah, the whites of her eyes had turned pink.
“Let’s go,” I said to Danny. “Let’s make a huge bonfire with Daddy.”
“Uh-uh,” Danny said.
“It’ll be fun!” I said. “We can throw anything you want to burn in there. Draw a picture of anyone you hate and we’ll throw that in.”
He glanced up at me. His sunglasses blocked his eyes and his mouth wasn’t giving anything away. “Come on,” I said. “I’ll do it too. You don’t have to tell me who it is, and I won’t tell you.”
“I don’t hate anybody,” Danny said.
“Really?” I asked. How is that even possible? I hate most of my grade and, currently, all of your grade. Are you completely unaware what is happening right now, Danny?
“That sounds fun, right, buddy?” Mom asked him. “Should I go get a pad and some markers? If you would rather write names, you don’t have to draw faces. . . .”
“No,” Danny said. “That’s not nice.”
“Or should we check the loot bags?” Mom asked, her voice a high soprano, an emergency.
“We did,” Danny said.
“You know, I’m thinking, did I put four o’clock on the invitations? I know I was trying to decide which would be better, three or four, and now it occurs to me that maybe—”
“You put three,” Danny said.
“I’ll get kindling!” Dad yelled.
We all turned to him.
“For the fire!” he yelled. “Surprise! Fire! Put it out!”
“What?” Danny asked.
My phone buzzed.
Holly: Bring Danny! Come to your front yard!
Now? I texted back, but then I heard it. Clank, clank, clank. Danny’s head swiveled around. Mom and Dad were oblivious.
“They already came,” Danny said.
“I’m sure they’ll come soon, sweetheart.”
“Why are they here again?” Danny asked.
“Who?” Dad asked.
“Surprise!” I yelled. “Come to the front yard!”
Please let this work. Please, please.
Danny got up and ran, actually ran, around the side of the house. I followed him, not answering my parents’ questions about what the heck was going on.
The garbage truck was parked right in front of our house. One guy, the biggest, was standing with his legs wide set on our front walk, while the driver waved over the top of the truck’s cab. The short super-frie
ndly guy with the beard was hanging off the back of the truck, yelling, “Big Dan the Man!”
Danny stopped on the walk.
I could see he was smiling even from the back of his head.
“We heard it was your birthday, Big Dan!” the bearded guy yelled.
“How old are you, Big Man?” the deep-voiced huge guy on our walk asked him.
“Nine,” Danny told him.
“What? Nine! No wonder you look so strong. Show me a muscle, Big Man!”
“Which muscle?” Danny asked.
The huge guy made a bicep curl, his huge cantaloupe of an arm muscle bulging. Danny imitated him, and the huge guy reached out to feel Danny’s skinny arm. “Whoa!” he exclaimed. “Check this bruiser out! Don’t punch me, bro!” He held up his massive arms, pretending to be scared of Danny.
“I wouldn’t,” Danny said. “I never would.”
“Good man!” the driver yelled. “So, you gonna help us grind this load?”
Danny turned to Mom and Dad, hopeful.
“Sure,” Dad said.
“If you want,” Mom said.
I wasn’t looking at them. I was smiling at Holly, who was on her bike across the street. I did the thank-you sign. She made her hands in a heart shape over her heart and then rode away.
Danny spent the next half hour being shown everything on the truck, sitting in the driver’s seat, working the tilt device and the scraper. I took pictures and videoed some of it so Danny could enjoy it again later. The workers refused to take the cash my dad offered them, after, but were happy to sing happy birthday to Danny and cheer when he blew out the candles, and to take loot bags along with their cake slices.
Danny’s scrawny friend Boone got dropped off by his grandma at four, just as the garbage truck was pulling away. They both waved, and Danny recounted to Boone in excruciating detail what had happened with the garbage truck as they wandered to the backyard.
They decided not to smash the piñata, but to eat the candy out of the fire truck’s middle as if it were a serving bowl, up in the field while Dad built them a fire.
Mom put her arm around me as we followed them up there. “How did you . . .”
“Shhhh,” I said. “They just came because they’re his friends.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“It was Holly,” I whispered back.
“Holly?” Mom asked. “Holly Jones?”
“Yeah.” I went to help Dad find kindling. I didn’t want Mom’s opinion on Holly right then. I know Mom has been proud that she thought I was in with the popular crowd. She likes Holly (she likes everybody), but she always smiled in a we are the popular kids way whenever I got invited to things with Ava and then the bigger crowd of popular kids, and was disappointed when I couldn’t get myself to be interested in sports, couldn’t hang with the Squad as much last year. She knew more about me being dumped by Ava and the Squad than I’d told her. I really didn’t need to see the worry and pity in my mother’s face over me being possibly dumped down to being friends with Holly. Not right then, thanks.
We ate cake while Dad made and then put out the fire, wearing one of the fire helmets. I videoed that, too. What a goon. At least Mom didn’t have a headache this year.
After Boone finally went home, I stopped by Danny’s room.
“Happy birthday,” I said.
“Thanks,” he said without lifting his eyes from his game.
“Did you have fun?”
“Best birthday ever,” he said.
“You weren’t—it didn’t bother you that the other kids didn’t show up?”
“I’m not friends with them anyway,” Danny said. “They don’t like me.”
The reason people talk about heartbreak, I realized, is because you can literally feel your heart breaking apart. Right inside your chest, the cracking apart of it.
“Danny,” I managed. “I’m sure they like you; they’re just a bunch of pissant buttfaces.”
He smiled a little, then said, “You don’t get it.”
“I do get it,” I said. “Seriously. I think they suck.”
“You don’t get it because you’re popular,” he said.
“I’m not.”
“Yes, you are,” he said. “You’re the most popular girl in your grade.”
“I’m hundred percent not, Danny.”
“You are,” he said, matter-of-fact, calm. “So that’s why you don’t get it. The kids in my grade aren’t pissant buttfaces. They just don’t like me. I want to have more friends, but I don’t. I’m sad sometimes about that. But even when I tell jokes or tell them interesting facts, I don’t get more friends.”
“Danny,” I said. “That’s awful.”
“It’s okay. I’m used to it. Boone sort of likes me, and I’m the only one who likes him. That’s why he’s my best friend in school. You’re my best friend in the world.”
“I am?”
“Yes!”
“Well, I’m kind of a buttface friend too.”
He looked up at me, with his goofy sunglasses still on. “No, you’re not, Niki. You’re the finest kind, like Mom says. You made the garbage men come, you make up the best games, you’re the most popular eighth grader, and you like me. Most of the time.”
“Yeah, Danny,” I said. “I do.”
“Boone’s my best friend in school, though.”
“Okay.”
“He smells a little like old clams.”
“Oh no.”
“Yes,” Danny says. “He does.”
“It was Holly who made the garbage men come. Holly Jones. Not me.”
“That’s what I meant. One of your friends. You’re popular.”
“I’m really not, Danny,” I said. Other kids confide in their sibs. . . . “I actually am having trouble with friends lately, like Ava, the other day—”
“Yes, you are! YOU. ARE.”
I could see the storm brewing. Not worth it. “Okay,” I said. “Anyway, I’m glad you had a good birthday.”
“My muscles are really strong,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“That guy was scared of me. But I would never beat him up.”
“That’s good, Danny. Use your power for good.”
“I do,” he said. “I will.”
Dead serious.
I went back to my room and spent the rest of the night editing the videos and pictures I’d shot of his party for him. Not a great present but something, at least.
20
MONDAY AT SCHOOL I tried to avoid eye contact with Ava, or the Squad. In art class I asked Ms. Hirsch if I could move my seat to near the window. She asked if I needed more natural light. Okay, sure. I was happy she didn’t realize I was just trying to get away from my ex–best friend.
Those three clunky syllables (Ex. Best. Friend.) in my head almost made me cry, right there in front of my clay.
Nadine and Beth were talking about the clay representing the patriarchy and they were all happily punching and pounding it, and then Holly was like, Yeah, the clay is everything that’s keeping us down.
“Fight the clay,” I said, and immediately wished I could suck it back in because maybe that’s a stupid thing to say and who asked me and maybe they had a thing going, they weren’t asking for my judgmental or weird or whatever input.
“Yeah,” Holly said. “Fight the patriarchal clay into submission, and then we’ll fill these bowls with something good.”
“Yeah, clay, you stupid idiot,” Beth said. And I don’t know why that completely cracked me up but it did. We were all giggling so much we were snorting, which was about the most hilarious thing and made us giggle that much more. Luckily, Ms. Hirsch is happy if kids are chatting or laughing as long as we’re creating art. Which I guess we were, or at least we were sure pounding the heck out of our clay.
I glanced over at the Squad. They were frowning at us, whispering, rolling their eyes. I know Ava was thinking, what a bunch of losers. I ducked my head and smoothed my clay on the table for the rest of the period.
I was surprised when Holly showed up in the library at lunch. “You don’t have to babysit me,” I told her. “You can go hang out with Nadine and Beth. They’re great.”
“I know, aren’t they?” Holly said. “I just like sorting books. It’s therapy to me.”
She took a stack of them off the cart next to where I was sitting.
“Danny looked happy,” she whispered after a few minutes.
“He was,” I said. “He was so happy, and I am such a jerk—I meant to thank you. I really did. I—that was amazing, what you—I should have invited you in, and I should have texted you after to thank you, and . . .”
“It’s okay,” Holly said.
“I’m the worst.”
“You sure think about yourself a lot.”
“What?” I asked.
“You were in the middle of thanking me for doing a nice thing, but then you got distracted by yourself and suddenly you’re the worst, which, obviously you’re not the worst, so it turns into me having to tell you you’re fine, or great, even. Why do you do that?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I didn’t realize I did that. Sorry.”
“I’m glad it worked out. Danny looked really happy to see those guys. I didn’t mean to criticize you. I was just—you apologize a lot.”
“I do?”
“You can just say thank you, instead of sorry. I was happy I could help out.” She turned and fit a book into its place on the shelf.
“Okay,” I said. “Thank you, Holly.”
I pretended to go back to reading but I wasn’t, really.
* * *
• • •
After school, I shrugged into my backpack and was about to start scooting home when Dad pulled up and beeped. He lowered his window and called out, “Niki! Hey, Niki! Time to go get your glasses!”
I rushed to the car, threw my scooter into the back, and ducked into the front seat, low. “Hiya, sweetheart!” Dad bellowed.
