Crush (5 page)

Stacy’s as lonely as I am. The thing is, we’re having too much fun to realize it. Her parents are divorced, her mom having taken her older sister Michelle to live in Texas. Her dad is an agent at the Farmer’s Insurance office in West Sac. Our experimentation with mind-expansion evolves into swallowing his Vicodin and drinking his beer after school. She gets pizza and ice cream out of the icebox for us to eat, and gets mad at me when I only have a few bites. She hates it when I go home, and wishes I could spend nights at her house, but her Dad says no.

Pastor Sellers insists on a sit-down with Lloyd about me. I’m not invited, but Lloyd tells me everything. He tells me that Pastor is concerned about my “burgeoning sexuality,” and Pastor says that now is the time to nip me in the bud about my pierced ears, my enjoyment of lip liners and mascara, mycolored hair, mypenchant for black rubber bracelets, leather chokers, and other gothic jewelry, my nonexistent interest in sports, having a girl as a best friend, et cetera and so on.

Lloyd is the best person on earth. He tells me, “Forget that windbag! Sitting around passing judgment on you, on everyone around him, while he ignores his own son!”

“Who’s his son?” I ask.
“His name is Timmy,” replies Lloyd. “Mysister and his Mama were friends, years ago. Big, good looking boy…on the football team, I think. He’s still in school…You’ll probably see him when you start high school…Don’t tell anyone what I told you about the pastor…Timmy’s Mama told me about all that a few years ago, and I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone ‘cause she’s embarrassed he’s married, you know. Just a bad mistake, she said. He ignores her and pretends that boy ain’t his…I don’t think a lot of folks in town know about the matter, so please don’t say nothing…I don’t want to get her upset at me.
“Anyway, forget Pastor Sellers…You are who you are. I’m never going to force you to be someone you’re not. The Lord loves you as you are. And you’re a good boy, Jamie.”
We begin to miss church more often than not. Stacyand I find our outlet for singing at keggers. Stacy has to be there. I might be able to perform for a crowd, but
never
on myown. It’s one thing to sing solo in front of older, kinder church people. It’s something else entirely to try to sing in front of my peers. With each performance, our voices refine. People actually begin telling us how well we sing.
“Ray, where’s Temmybeen lately?” asks Stacyat a partyone weekend.
“You know Temmy,” a dark haired guyreplies with a smile. “If he’s got a girl with her legs open, that’s high priority. He ‘couldn’t make it’. That’s what I’ll hear on Monday.”
“Who’s Temmy?” I ask. What a strange name!
“Who are you?” the guyasks me, raising his eyebrows at my hair and makeup.
“Ray, this is Jamie,” Stacyintroduces me.
“You’ll meet Temmy sooner or later, I guarantee that,” Ray snickers. “He’d have been here tonight. No parents. Lots of beer. Tons of chicks. Where’s there’s girls, there’s Temmy…but he had a date tonight, a guarantee, if I know mysister.”
“Temmy’s fucking
Yvette
now?!” Stacy chortles. “Oh my God, you’re kidding!”
“Yup,” Ray nods. “She finally snagged him. Won’t be long till she’s picking shittywedding songs, God help us!”

After that night, Ray and his friend, an older guy named Benny, are part of our little clique, and it’s not as fun. The girls take to whispering and giggling and acting silly when the guys are around. Besides, I think Ray and Benny are nosy and intrusive, always telling me about girls they know are single. I smoothly refuse their offers to introduce me. I just don’t feel interested. Stacy’s never been pushylike that.

Sometimes, I worry Stacy will start to like me in a romantic way. I hope not. I love her to pieces, but only as a friend. I feel so comfortable with her and I don’t want to lose that. I’ve never had a best friend, and to lose her would end me.

Some mornings, Stacy comes over to my house an hour or so before school, and I borrow her makeup stuff. I use powder to conceal the light spatter of golden freckles over my nose. I use dark pink pencil to draw a line around my mouth, and then fill my lips in with shiny gloss. I
love
what Stacy’s mascara does to my eyes. As I check myself in the bathroom mirror, Stacy hugs my shoulders from the side. “Look how prettyyou are!” she beams.

I’ve gotten better with mirrors. As long as the mascara erases all traces of Mom’s crazed, bloodshot eyes, as long as my fuchsia and neon yellow dyes have obliterated Daddy’s honey blonde hair, I can look at myself in the mirror without feeling nauseated, without feeling the red rings of memory around my ankles begin to throb...

Once, Benny asks point blank if I’m gay, why I’m always tagging along with Stacyand always surrounded byher girlfriends and why I’m right in there painting my fingers and dyeing my hair. No other guy at middle school or at church wears makeup. No other guy at school or church has mostly girls for friends either. Rayand Bennydon’t “get” me anybetter than other boys do. I don’t wear makeup to seek attention. I wear makeup because it’s always felt like the thing for me to do, and because I love makeup. Anyway, I know most of the boys ignore me, or theymake remarks like, “I guess Jamie can
also
be a
girl’s
name!” I’d be hurt if I didn’t like being “one of Stacy’s girls” so much.

Unfortunately, one of our girls, a pretty Mexican girl named Lydia Rocha, tells Stacy she likes me. Though I’ve always loved Lydia and had fun times with her, I have to avoid her for a few days, afraid she’ll think I like her back in that same way. She’s hurt of course, and stays awayfor a while. I’m relieved when later on, she tells everyone she has a crush on that guy“Temmy.”

It’s never occurred to me that I might be gay. I onlyknow that unlike most of the other boys my age, thirteen going on fourteen, I’ve never kissed a girl or held hands or anything. But I’ve never been kissed or touched bya boyeither. Instinctively, I know I keep to myself because I’m ruined. Lloyd’s goodness can’t remedy the damage done long before he came along.

Whenever Stacy gently hints or asks, I tell her I simply don’t
know
what I am, gay, straight, bi. If the truth be told, I’m one of the A-Team. I don’t feel attracted to
anyone
. I don’t seek out that kind of companionship, I avoid it. As I get used to life outside that filthy bedroom, I realize that what me and Daddy did was wrong, and the mortification inside of me swells and throbs. I don’t want to do that ever again. I hear kids at school talking about sexand how fun it is. I remember the sex I had with Daddy and it makes me nauseous. I don’t ever want to be naked and do those disgusting things ever again.

I’ve told Stacythe barest version of what mybirth parents did to me. Aside from Lloyd, Stacyis the onlyperson who knows much at all about me. Of course, in the back of my mind is the fact that the Sommerville Police know things too, that they found things when theyfound me locked in myroom. Channel 10 probablyhas some souvenirs as well.

There are others too, from long ago. I’ve always known there are others who know, people who liked the videos…I try not to think about it, how there are people on this planet who know the darkest, most wretched details about that room, those chains, that bed.

If I pick up the slightest indication that a girl is interested in me, I leave the situation immediately.
Fortunately, no guy has ever been interested, so I don’t have to face the gayquestions head on.
I have my
own
idea about when it’s fun to be admired, and that’s when I get up and sing on Thursday nights at The End, the only bar in town that let’s kids in to sing karaoke. We’ve been going almost everyweek. The whole town seems to love it. Unless he has to work, Lloyd doesn’t miss a chance to come see me sing, and he cries sometimes when we’re up there. I’d be embarrassed, but I love him too much.
The only touches I accept are the warm, secure embraces from Lloyd and Stacy’s friendly, energetic hugs.
To be frank, I’ve never kissed myfoster Dad, except maybe a peck or two over the past year. I feel bad about it…I don’t know…I guess I’m just not a kissy person. I love hugging him, and I have let him kiss me, on the cheek or forehead a few times. I hope he knows I
do
love him. I tell him every now and again, but I still wonder if he
knows
.
At about the same time Stacy and I begin frequenting The End, we begin high school, and that’s when everything suddenly changes, and I fall in love for the first and last time.

While I’m an underclassman, I learn that the seniors at Sommerville High School know how to find the best parties in Davis and Sac, and it’s easy to charm my way into getting rides from them. I bag my first piece of ass at fourteen. Her name is Karla Grey, and she’s a sophomore at UC Davis. She’s short, curvaceous, with straight honey blonde hair and a perpetually grouchyexpression. She’s not interested in getting serious with a high school freshman, and for all of a week, I carry a torch before forgetting about her and hooking up with a twenty-four year old redhead from Sac State.

As the first three years of high school unfurl, I find that the days practicing my smile in the mirror have been well spent. I hardlystudy, but I manage a lowAaverage, mybest grades being in English, Creative Writing, and Journalism. I’m no nerd, and a 3.6 GPAwill be enough to get me out of this pathetic town.

I’m a reporter for the
Panther
, Sommerville High’s school paper all four years as well. At first I’m just a staff writer, covering plays from the drama department, band and choir performances for the music department, the efforts of SADD to curb teen drinking and driving (yeah right!), club fundraisers, student body elections, and how-do-you-do-let’s-get-to-know-you interviews of the foreign exchange students.

It’s boring as fuck, but it’s valuable experience for my future sitting alongside Wolf or Tom, and it’s an outlet for myurge to write (even if it is stuff I find boring as fuck), and I get to travel to other schools all over the state (which means I get to hook up with all kinds of girls who aren’t from Sommerville).

In my junior year, I’m promoted to head sports writer for the
Panther
. Let’s face it, unless it’s something I find important or at least interesting, like a crime against a student, or maybe vandalism against a teacher’s car (heh!) I could care less. In this dull hamlet, sports is the most exciting thing I can write about.

I’m too busytrying to get into everygirl’s pants I can to bother with exhausting myself over piles of homework. Besides, I’ve gotta be sure to save my best for the game on Friday nights. I’m a fullback, number 19. It doesn’t matter that I only score a touchdown everythree or four weeks. What matters is I score with every chick I can. The combination of height, shoulder pads and mud is magnetic, and once I’ve been introduced to the pleasures of the flesh, I’m beyond hope. My groupies tell me I’m destined to be famous, and I’m already planning on moving to Los Angeles after graduation. I’m going to one of the
good
schools (no crappy community colleges for
me
!), getting my degree, and working for ABC or NBC News.

But I’m frightened of what was once inside of me. I hate that part of me that wrote stories of murder onlya couple of years ago. I don’t want to be a bad person. I want people to love me, not be afraid of me.

I don’t know whyI wrote that shit, whyI beat poor little Cotton, why I’ve been so cruel. I hate to even think about it. I still wish I could get rid of those dust-coated diaries in mybookcase.

I turn seventeen in September of my senior year. One day, one of the legion of sluts I regularlyboink invites me to church. I’d rather have a root canal than see myold man, but the girl tells me she’ll reward me afterward, so I consent. She’s one of the girls I knew as a kid, Yvette Battle, Ray’s sister. She’s tall and brunette with black, beady eyes and a big, round rear end. She’s really great in bed. The fact that she pretends to be such a good little God-fearing girl makes it hot. Every guy who’s had her agrees to that. She suggestivelywhispers to me as myDad, the Pastor, lists all the prayer needs and requests.

“We need to pray for our sister, Evelyn Beehan, who’s still battling breast cancer.And Frances Blackwell, who had her knees replaced. We should also rememberAndyWelling, who is flying to Florida this week for his brother’s funeral.” The pastor goes down a long list. Then he asks, “And are there any unspoken requests this morning?” Several hands raise. “Alright then, take the hand of the person next to you as we pray.”

Yvette’s naughty words are in my left ear as I turn to my right to see whose hand I’m holding. It’s a kid, small with wavydark red hair, blonde at the tips. His head is lowered reverently. To his right is StacyPendleton, the girl I knew years ago. There’s no mistaking that purple hair of hers. The principal’s already threatened to suspend her, and she still hasn’t dyed over it.

I start to recognize the boy as the one who’s always been with Stacy the past month, as they’ve scurried all over the high school grounds, exploring their new territory. I glance down at him again.

Once, I think I’ve seen this little kid singing with Stacy at a kegger in Solano a month ago, only then it seemed like it was a brighter raspberryfuchsia with bright yellow at the ends.

The preacher asks us to stand, hands still joined, so we can all sing together. Yvette fondles my ass and starts whispering again. I plan to turn to her and whisper myreply, but instead I look to my right, and my eyes meet those of the boy holding my right hand.

They’re blue. I’ve never seen eyes so blue.
Déjà vu. I feel like I’ve seen those eyes somewhere…
I can’t remember where I could have seen him… Enormous and set off by unplucked, yet graceful, naturally

I can’t believe this kid’s a freshman. He’s probably only two or three years or so younger than me, but he’s
tiny
. He looks way too small to be in high school. He’s even shorter and smaller than Stacy, his skinny figure encased in a Depeche Mode t-shirt and black jeans. His little face is exotic and peculiar, with surprisingly high cheekbones, a pert little nose, and red lips, the kind you see on those old dolls in glass cases. He looks away, and Pastor begins droning an extended prayer. For a second, I wonder if Stacy’s little friend is a girl, if I’ve mistaken him for a boy.