Outtakes Of A Walking Mistake (23 page)

“I told you. I’m not talking to that bitch,” Jenny says, waking the next morning. This is the third time her mother has called in less than an hour and I hold my hand over the receiver. “Tell her to leave me alone!”

“She wants to know if you’re taking your meds,” I state.

Agitated, Jenny lingers with a response as her mother waits patiently on the other end of the phone. Not a morning bird, Jenny looks severe with smudged black eyeliner and robin red lipstick. Her blonde hair rests on her shoulders, tangled in knots. “Tell her yes, I’m taking my meds. Yes, I can’t poop properly. And yes, I think she’s a bitch.”

I look at her in fright. “Jenny, I can’t.”

“Tell her,” she demands.

“Yes, she’s taking her meds,” I confirm.

“Splendid,” Jenny’s mother replies. And then silence.

“Dad and I like having Jenny here,” I offer.

“Well, that’s good. Please thank your father for his hospitality while we’re going through this.”

Tired of the conversation, Jenny springs out of bed and motions for me to hang up the phone. I comply. Jenny on the wrong mix of meds can be quite intimidating. “If she wants to talk, she can start with an apology,” Jenny states, taking a slug of bottled water. “Oh, what’s the point? I just want to scream! But I can’t even do that because my mouth is so dry.”

“Just keep hydrated,” I advise, while putting away my pink polka-dotted Hello Kitty sleeping bag. Last night, dad had allowed us to share my bedroom but only if we promised to return to school today. Last night, the promise didn’t seem like a big deal but this morning the weight of the agreement leaves me heavy-hearted.

The thought of seeing Billy and not being able to touch him kills me. To learn he secretly wishes to return my touch, stabs and jabs at my heart all that much more. How can I brave the torturous terrain of high school today? How can I focus in class knowing somewhere on the same campus Ashley may be holding the hand of my man?

On the drive to school, Jenny is watery-eyed, equally conflicted. Sure, dad tries to cheer her up, cracking jokes and purposely singing out of tune to WFART, but Jenny never chuckles or tells him to stop. Instead, she closes her eyes in the back seat, taking in slow, deep breaths.

Earlier in the morning, after agreeing to shower for the first time in two days, Jenny confessed to me over a glass of prune juice that she had ignored every phone call from Greg since arriving at our home. He’s called exactly thirty-seven times, she told me. What she couldn’t tell me was why she wouldn’t answer the phone. Instead, she rattled on about how Greg sent her pink carnations instead of red roses. Pink doesn’t represent love. That’s what Jenny thinks. But to me, her logic doesn’t add up. And as I travel to school with a million questions floating in my head about Billy, Jenny states she’s more worried about our remaining peers and how to provide them answers.

There was a death in the family. No, I caught that bug going around. No. I had to take time off to convince my mother that my father had forced himself on me. I beat the crap out of him. No, really
. You see, Jenny lacks a clear response regarding what to tell our peers about her absence at school, not that it matters. Once, Jenny told me people searching for answers tend to believe the worst-case scenario anyway.

Sad stories make sad people feel happy about their lives.

So I’m not sure what story Jenny will take to the public. But if I know Jenny, she’d rather be a blazing headline — the girl molested by her father — than the story on page two, the one in small print about the girl who caught the bug going around.

“Forget it. I’m not going inside,” Jenny announces, seconds after dad drops us in the school parking lot. We’re headed to the attendance office to hand in our excuses for yesterday’s absence when she begins walking in reverse.

“But we promised dad,” I state.

“I know, but I can’t do it,” she says, sizing up the nearby students. To our left, at a picnic table painted purple and gold for Rivershore Tiger pride, a gaggle of sophomore girls all dyed the perfect shade of Madonna blonde cease talking in order to stare down Jenny. Their eyes scrutinize Jenny limb to limb, searching for a clue, a bruise, or better yet, a needle hole. Was she in a padded room? Was it drugs? What’s up with her and Greg French? It’s like I can hear them without hearing a word. In high school, it’s hard not to be clairvoyant. Girls like this make it easy. Still, when one girl from the lot, the trendy one with the ‘60s bob and trash bag purse, winces and pulls the others closer, I tell Jenny to ignore it.

“They don’t know why you were absent,” I say.

“Please, they know I was in a psych unit…someone blogged about it. ”

“Who cares? Let it go.”

“They want to see me crumble,” she says. “Don’t you get it?”

I get it. Kids are cruel. So in honor of the Halloween season, I give in and mask the problem by suggesting a trip to the mall. In my mind, there’s no better way to help Jenny forget her woes and temporarily give her life a purpose. “Come on. You can pick out our costumes for the Monster Mash,” I say. “And I can buy a new outfit for the sneak screening of my film tonight.”

“Nice thought,” Jenny replies. “But how do you suggest we get there? My mother has my car, remember?”

“We can take the bus,” I suggest, pointing in the direction of the stop sign down the street. Too cool for public transit, Jenny fakes a vomit attack, saying she has no reason to ride a bus because she has no intention of attending the dance. I don’t pay her any attention. Instead, I grab her by the arm and tug her along until we reach the parking lot of a rundown army supply store just off campus. This is when I go for her throat. “Listen, you ARE going to the dance! You ARE going to find us costumes! And you ARE going to smile the whole time! I’m doing this for you. Haven’t you figured that out?”

“FINE, but I’m not smiling,” she says, folding her arms.

“No, you’re smiling. Now move it,” I command. I venture forward as Jenny stalls, entering a brief moment where she’d be more emotional if she weren’t so medicated. This is another side effect of the meds she explains, boarding the bus. “It sucks. I can’t even bask in my ups and downs. I used to look forward to having uncontrollable outbursts. Now, I just go through the day comfortably numb.”

“Good, then you won’t be a drama queen,” I reply, checking the sole of my shoe for gum. I’m in luck. Though I note fresh globs of gum coating the floor of the bus, I have succeeded in landing a seat while remaining gum-free.

“Well, there is one positive side to the meds,” she says. “They make me way too tired to consider complaining to the driver about the mothball smell. Like hello, hasn’t he heard of an air-freshener?” Within earshot, a wrinkled woman in a lime-green jumper clutches her purse and balls her lips as if to say how rude. As for me, I welcome this side of Jenny. Honestly, this is the first I’ve seen of the ‘real’ Jenny since her intake at the unit.

“Let’s go,” Jenny says, taking my hand as we exit the bus. In a change of events she takes the lead, tugging me through a cloud of black smoke as the bus pulls away. “Mom may have swiped my car, but she forgot to swipe my credit card. Let’s buy shit we don’t need.”

“First, you need to buy some bottled water,” I suggest. Jenny refuses to hear me, wrinkling her nose as if she smells something funny, possibly a clearance, possibly the semi-annual clearance at the lingerie store she loves so much. Entering the side entrance of the mall, the one closest to Victoria’s Secret, Jenny is immediately fixated.

“Forget water,” she says. Picking up her pace, she nearly collides into some newbie Stepford mom pushing a baby stroller. “I see a sign ahead. It’s big. It’s pink. It talks of a sale. Let’s see what the buzz is about.”

We’re on a mission I remind Jenny. I repeat the tasks. How I need to get an outfit for the film tonight and how she needs to find us costumes for the dance. Focused on her own priorities, Jenny doesn’t pay me any mind. “All of that can wait for later,” she says. The problem is she means two hours later, two hours of rummaging through cardboard boxes of panties and bras, and two hours of telling me how she hopes each purchase will send her mother that much closer to bankruptcy. Not once does she mention her father. “I’ll take this one and this,” she continues, picking up various items of clothing at our next stop – a snazzy department store anchoring the mall.

Me, I try to do my own thing, momentarily sneaking off to the men’s department to purchase tight black jeans for the film premiere.

Retail therapy will make me happy I tell myself, though it doesn’t seem to work. I’m too worried to be happy. Usually, shopping with Jenny is my drug of choice. However, today her actions seem mechanical. She points. She picks. She purchases, but she exhibits zero pleasure during the process. Purchase by purchase, the register rings up her every desire but a smile never registers on her face, not even when she purchases my costume for the dance. “You seriously expect me to wear those?” I ask, as she hands the cashier a pair of green tights.

“Why not? Green is in vogue now. Oh, and I found the perfect cap for you.” The perfect cap is dirt brown and shaped like an upside-down canoe. Sparkly green, heart-shaped beads line the bill, and for some reason I think she found it in the junior petites section. “The beads match the color of the tights,” she states. “Isn’t it great?”

“No. I’ll be stoned if I wear that to the dance.”

“Why? You’re going to be Peter Pan.”

“Since when does Peter Pan dress like a hideous queen?”

“Since his conception,” Jenny states.

“Whatever. Who do you plan to be?”

“Tinkerbelle.”

“Of course! You get to be the cute one.”

“I just need wings. Your father already bought me the bell.”

“Tinkerbelle doesn’t carry a bell.”

“My Tinkerbelle will carry an STD if I want,” Jenny says, finishing her sale at the register. “And right now, my Tinkerbelle wants a makeover.”

“No! We need to get back,” I inform her. But there’s no use talking to Jenny. Just when I think she’s ready to call it a day, she makes her way to the cosmetics counter where she’s immediately engulfed by a school of fish-lipped saleswomen in orange smocks.

Feeding off the attention, Jenny manages to upstage the remaining patrons seeking beauty guidance by declaring she’s prepared to drop a lot of money on crap she knows she’ll never use.

Meanwhile, sniffing the cap of a purple, clam-shaped perfume bottle, an elderly woman with a bald spot inquires about the latest fragrance by Chanel. To her left, a thin, effeminate man in a suit says he’s on the hunt for a new shade of lipstick. “Something for the wife,” he winks to a saleswoman.

This is when I hear another voice – a familiar one. On the other side of the counter, hidden behind a stack of baby-blue alligator handbags, the lady behind the voice speaks in a light, fluffy tone. “Oh, I’m just another kindred spirit blessed with the ability to read the future,” she says. “See this line on your palm. This is a lifeline. It speaks if you care to listen.”

“Is that right?” another woman replies.

“Oh yes. Your lifeline speaks of so much hurt. But so much love as well.”

Slinking around the counter, I attempt to follow the fluffy voice while remaining inconspicuous about my presence. No such luck. The banter equally intrigues and disgusts me and I find myself standing close behind the woman permitting such rubbish to fall from her mouth. I should have guessed it was mom. “Believe in love and it will believe in you,” she preaches, holding the hand of the saleswoman providing her with a mud mask treatment. Thanking mom for the reading, the saleswoman soon elicits the real reason for listening: the sale.

“Can you feel how the mask dives into your pores?” the saleswoman asks.

“Oh yes,” mom replies.

“Tingles, doesn’t it?”

“My skin feels fabulous,” mom admits. “My son will be thrilled.”

“You have a son?”

“He’s my gift,” mom boasts.

“How old is he? Is he in school?”

“No, he’s standing behind her,” I interrupt.

Startled for an instant, mom quickly calms like she knew I was there all along, like a good mother always knows where her kin roam at all times. “Tyler, I thought I felt your aura. Come. Look. You’ll be so proud,” she says. The hardening brown mask prevents her from smiling. “I’m taking the advice you gave me at the beach. I’m getting a makeover.”

“Isn’t she beautiful?” the saleswoman adds. Her question comes with an artificial nod, telling me I’d better answer yes. And I want to answer yes. I really do. I want to say how mom is the most beautiful woman in the world even with a few extra pounds. But I can’t admit it. I don’t know why. Maybe I’m embarrassed. Maybe I don’t want to give her any positive feedback. Sure, she has childish taste in clothes and her crystals need to go back to the coal mine but mom is still a looker. Who really knows? Maybe someday the ocean will whisper to me, asking me to tell her the truth. Maybe someday I’ll listen.

“She looks all right,” I say.

“Just all right?” a man responds from behind.

“Ronald,” mom announces. Tall and blond with a square jaw, Ronald passes between us, releasing the manly aroma of a pine tree. When he smiles his perfect teeth cover half of his face, and as he swoops down to give mom a kiss his lips neglect the fact that her face is covered in mud.

I don’t want to like Ronald. Mom mentioned him once before, and when she spoke of him I pretended the ocean was talking too loud to hear what she had to say. I pictured Ronald as a dirt bag, the kind of loser you associate with managing a circus, the kind of loser who considers the circus a career. The Ronald standing before me doesn’t seem like that. His collared shirt is pressed and tucked in his pants, and you know he paid extra for the tiny alligator emblem on it.

“Ronald, stop,” mom childishly giggles, smacking his shoulder after they kiss. And instantly, I ponder if this is the same method she employed to win over dad, being effortlessly playful while allowing the men in her life to feel equally young. Is this how she entices them?

“I have someone for you to meet,” mom tells her beau. “This is Tyler.”

Turning around, Ronald flashes me a camera-ready smile. “So you’re the talented young man your mom speaks about,” he says, extending his hand. “I’ve heard you’re quite the actor.”

“Don’t believe everything you hear,” I say, with a quick shake.

“I usually don’t but your mom tends to be very convincing,” he says, charming me by charming mom. “So, what brings you to the mall today?”

“You know, shopping. That’s what gay boys do best.”

“So the media tells us,” he laughs. I join in but stop the instant my guilt hits. I should not be enjoying this, I tell myself. Ronald is the enemy; he’s the true reason mom has no need for dad. How can I be so easily led to the dark side? I’m a traitor, a sucker for a cute smile. A handsome man like Ronald shakes my hand and two seconds later I’m won over and wondering about the length of his penis. This does not show promise for my future in the dating universe; I’m going to be so easy. “Are you coming to the show tonight?” Ronald asks. “It’s our last performance in town.”

Mom’s eyes go big like she thinks I’ll say yes.

“Sorry, but I have to attend the sneak preview of my film,” I say. “It’s important for me to be there. You know, for the fans.”

“Of course,” Ronald replies.

“Oh no, your father didn’t tell me,” mom frowns. “I’d like to go.”

It’s not a big deal.

It’ll just be a thousand of my followers and me.

Don’t worry. Dad won’t be there either.

This is what I should say. Then I’ll seem confident, independent, like I’m solid enough to hold myself up with zero family support. Like nothing can bring me down. But no such words ever leave my mouth. Jenny makes sure of that, causing a ruckus on the other side of the counter.

“Bub, where are you?” she calls.

I hear a loud thud, followed by the breaking of glass. Immediately, I lose sight of my own problems.