Nothing to Lose (8 page)

“Okay,” he said. “I get it. At least now I know where I stand with you.”

“Yeah. Yeah, you do.”

“Fine.” He stood and started to leave. But just then, three cheerleaders showed up. Vanessa—my luck—with two friends, Katie Gonzalez and Kiffani Stringer. They carried green-dyed carnations they were delivering for the cheerleaders’ carnation sale.

I’d forgotten about the carnation sale. They were two dollars each, and I’d always sent them to potential girlfriends and just friends. This was the first time I hadn’t bothered. It would suck if someone sent me some and I hadn’t sent any to them.

“Special delivery for Tristan Kaboleusky.” Kiffani held out an armful of green carnations and pushed out her chest, showing off her new cheerleader uniform.

“What’s this?” Tris laughed. Tris had never gotten many carnations. He griped that girls told him he was “nice” or “a great friend” (“which means too ugly to consider,” he said).

“We take care of our guys,” Kiffani said.

“We’re working on a cheer for you,” Katie added. “Except we can’t think of anything to rhyme with Tristan or Kaboleusky.”

“Try
Grab a brewski,”
he said.

“Time for class!” Karpe picked up his tray and my trash and took them to the conveyor belt.

I left in the opposite direction. When I looked back, Tris was still talking to Kiffani. She had her hand on his shoulder.

I was glad, I told myself. Tristan was a good guy. I’d just grown past our friendship, while he hadn’t.

Except part of me wanted to run back to the cafeteria and stand on the table and yell and yell until someone caught me and held me and took me away.

“Karpe?”

I make sure I call right after school, even though it means getting someone to cover for me and calling from a pay phone by the livestock tent. I want to get Karpe alone.

“Is that you, Michael?”

“Yeah. Listen … about Angela.”

I stop. I want to ask if he’s sure I can trust her. After visiting her office, I started thinking about what that meant, putting myself out there. She tried to persuade me to turn myself in, go into a foster home, for God’s sake. And, even with attorney-client privilege, you hear about lawyers selling their stories all the time. I wasn’t sure how that happened, but I knew it did.

“Yeah. You going to call her ever?”

“I wanted to know…” I stop. “She didn’t tell you I came to see her?”

“No. You did?”

“Yesterday.”

“She didn’t say a word.”

Something moos in the background, and I think about what Karpe said.

“You mean you just didn’t see her last night or something?” I ask after a minute.

“Actually we all had dinner together. Since Angela and Dad got married, we do that a couple days a week, take turns cooking, that type of thing.”

“No more baked bean cans?”

“Well, sometimes. Not as much. I actually sort of
like
baked beans.”

“So you all sat down and had dinner, and she didn’t mention she saw me?”

“Not a word. I guess she thought you wouldn’t want her talking about your case. What did you want to ask me about?”

“Um, I … You know what? Nothing. I mean, you answered it.”

I went to the fair with Karpe for one reason. It beat going home. Why I went back, that’s a different story.

It sounds crazy to say that—that I went to avoid going home. After all, I’d done everything in my power, quitting football, ditching all my friends, all to
stay
home. But that day, a Thursday, was my sixteenth birthday. I could not spend it with Walker.

I was standing by my locker, feeling sorry for myself, when Karpe showed up.

“Hey, Michael Michael Unicycle! Want to go to the fair?”

I considered letting Karpe know people would like him better if he didn’t call them stupid nicknames. But first off, I wasn’t sure people would. And second, who was I to judge?

So I said, “Don’t think so.”

“Why not? It’s opening night.”

“No flow.”

“I’ve got passes.” Karpe flashed two blue tickets. “I’ll pay.”

“It’s not just admission. Once you get there, it’s like a giant vacuum, sucking out money—food, games, rides....” I stopped. I sounded like Walker.

“I said I’d pay. I’ll drive, too.” Karpe looked suddenly desperate. “Come on, Mike, I’ve got no one else to go with.”

It wasn’t because I felt sorry for him. I didn’t. But I started thinking about how it was my birthday. How pathetic was it, to go home and watch television like it was just a normal day. I slammed my locker door. “How do we get there?”

“I’ve got a brand-new Miata, just looking for passengers.”

He expected me to react, an
ooh
, or maybe an
ah.
I said, “Got any change?”

“I told you, I’ll pay.”

“For the phone.”

Karpe flipped me a cell with a Spiderman cover and headed for the door. I shoved the lock onto my locker, then dialed. I sort of stared at the keypad before hitting Send.

One ring. Two. No answer. We reached the parking lot. Dutton and Tristan were there with some girls. They leaned against Tristan’s pickup. When Tris saw me, he raised an eyebrow.

I hung up and waited a moment. We passed them. The girl Dutton was with was Vanessa. She’d told everyone in school I was an asshole. I hadn’t defended myself.

“Looky there—Daye’s got a new friend.” Dutton made Loser
L
s on his forehead.

“Aw. leave him alone,” Tristan said.

I dialed again.

Mom answered on the first ring after my redial. “Michael, is that you?”

She knew it was. Walker didn’t let her answer the phone when he wasn’t home unless it was his number on caller ID. Sometimes, he tested her. So we had a code. Two rings, hang up, then ring back.

“Yeah, it’s me,” I said.

“Sorry. I was outside. I couldn’t get to the phone.”

Like I didn’t know the truth. “Yeah, I know. Look…” I moved Karpe’s phone to the other ear, away from him. “Look, I’ll be late tonight. Tell him I have something for school.”

“Oh, please, Michael. No. You know how he gets. I can’t lie to him anymore.”

No mention of my birthday, of course. Just Walker. And then, in the background, a door slamming. Walker was home early. “Lisa, who you talking to?”

“No one, honey.” And the sound of the telephone being replaced, soft but quickly, in its cradle.

We reached the famous convertible, and I tossed the Spidey phone at Karpe. “Thanks.”

He was looking at Dutton and those guys, but he turned to me. “Say, Mikey Boy, why are you always so broke? Thought your mom married some rich guy.”

And I said, “None of your damn business.”

But I still went with Karpe. It was better than the alternatives.

When I was a kid, the fair was like magic. Sometimes I’d go with Mom and whatever guy was trying to impress us. Other times it was just us. Those were the best, even though we couldn’t afford wristbands that let you on all the rides, and we had to smuggle in our own sandwiches and soda. But with Mom. I could watch the shows and hear the music and not have to worry about owing someone.

Owing someone was a big part of the problem, going with Karpe.

“It says here there’s a circus at three thirty.” Karpe pointed at our complimentary program. “And every hour on the half hour after that.”

“Negative.” I kicked a half-empty cup of cherry slush in my way. “It’s not a real circus. Just poodles, walking on hind legs and stuff.” Though, even as I said it, I remembered how I’d loved it when I was younger.

“Oh.” Karpe looked at the program again. “How about rides? The Doppel Looping goes upside-down twice.”

“Rides are for kids.”

“We are kids. What’s up your butt?”

I ignored him, watching a guy with an American flag and the words,
My Country
~
Love It or Leave It
, tattooed on his arm. He held a beer bottle, circling the Whack-a-Mole game.

“Easy,” the guy said to his girlfriend. “They gotta give a prize each game.”

“But there’s no one playing,” she said.

“That’s what makes it so easy.”

His girlfriend gave the tattoo a squeeze, and the guy handed a dollar to the girl running the game. She stuck it into her money belt and pulled out an orange balloon. I watched as she fitted it over the nipple of the game and handed the guy a mallet.

“What do you want to do?” Karpe’s voice, always on the verge of it, reached full whine.

“So, start,” the guy commanded the Whack-a-Mole girl.

“I need four players.” The girl held up four fingers. She wore leather bracelets on each wrist. She yelled to the nearly empty midway, “Three more players. Put the mole in the hole! Prize every time.”

“Want to play?” Karpe asked.

“To win a stuffed Clifford the Dog? Not likely.” I started to walk away.

“Well, I’m playing.” Karpe went over to the Whack-a-Mole, waving a dollar, so I had to stay.

The girl took the money, barely glancing up. “Two more players! We’re looking for terminators,” she purred. “Whack-a-Mole exterminators!”

“Ain’t no one here.” The tattooed guy took a swig of beer.

“Sorry, sir. I’m not allowed to start with less than four players.” She pointed to a sign that said that.

Something about her voice—or maybe the
sir
—caught my attention. I looked at her.

Because, you know, I hadn’t before. Not really. I thought I knew what to expect. I’d been to enough fairs to know what a Whack-a-Mole girl looked like.

I was wrong.

First, she had no visible tattoos, scars, or body piercings. No scabs either. Nothing, in short, to ID her body if it was found in a canal. And she was young, nineteen or twenty. And pretty. Not the carnival kind of pretty that gets in your eyes like too much sun—just regular pretty. I felt like I’d seen her before. She repeated the balloon process. This time it was a green balloon. As she concentrated, a half inch of pink tongue slid out between her teeth. Her dark hair fell over her eyes so I couldn’t see them. What I could see, at least if I walked closer, was the view down her green T-shirt.

I walked closer.

She finished the green balloon and stepped back. She pushed the hair from her eyes. They met mine. They were brown. She held my gaze a moment, then looked away.

“Two more players!” she called. “Two more!”

“Start the game!” the tattooed man snarled. “There’s no one else going to play.”

“Maybe the lady wants to play?”

“I ain’t paying twice for a shot at one prize.”

“Pretty good shot, I’d say.” The girl glanced at Karpe, who held his mallet like it might bend over and take a bite of his arm.

The guy grumbled but tossed her another dollar. He yanked his girlfriend toward him. “Now, start!”

The Whack-a-Mole girl turned and yelled into her microphone, “One more player for a chance at the prize. Second win gets you a big prize.”

This time the balloon was yellow. But her eyes were still brown, the T-shirt still green. Unbelievable how everything in the world, everything in your
head
, can evaporate in a second over a hot girl in a green T-shirt.

I stepped closer.

The guy slammed the bottle on the counter. Beer splashed up onto his girlfriend.

“She needs another player, Les,” his girlfriend said.

“Who asked you?” The guy raised his hand. The girlfriend flinched. Then, fast as it had happened, he turned back to the Whack-a-Mole girl. “Start the game
now.”