Surface Tension (7 page)

They love it here. I wish I could spend the whole summer here.

Mom says, “Good-bye, lake,” and Dad and I say it too.

The lake is part glass and part gold where the sun catches a ripple from the wake of a boat that went past a long time ago. I wish it were raining.

We turn and walk back to the car.

The peppermint stick ice cream is melting in the backseat, and Mom is driving because Dad got tired and almost drove us into the back of a tractor-trailer somewhere in Pennsylvania.

Dad is like a little kid. As soon as we got close to Ithaca, he tuned the radio to the Ithaca College station because he knows the guy who runs it. Now we're on the back roads, and the farther we get from Ithaca, the worse the station comes in. He keeps trying to tune it in better by rolling the knob back and forth between his fingers. I ask why we can't get a new radio, one that has like push buttons and some real speakers, but he said we can't spend any money on a radio right now. Apparently, we have to spend all our money on Dad's new toy, his brand-new kayak strapped to our roof.

I swear, I think he loves that thing more than he loves us, because when he's not listening to the radio station that doesn't come in, he's staring at the kayak in the pas senger mirror. He's tilted the mirror so that it's pointing straight up in the air, just so he can look at his kayak the whole time.

Ever since Grandpa died last winter, Dad has gotten into this whole kayaking thing. I think it's because Grandpa was into all kinds of outdoorsy things, like canoeing and hiking and stuff, and now because Grandpa is dead, Dad feels like he wants to do all those things too.

Which is fine, because at least it's better than how he was right after Grandpa died, all depressed and snapping at everyone all the time. Even on his birthday, he didn't want to have presents or a cake.

Then he got a little better when he put this picture of Grandpa next to his bed. It's not the kind of picture you normally see of a dead person, where they look all saintly and kind. This one is of Grandpa on the beach with the sun setting behind him, carrying this giant wooden canoe on his head. Dad says that it was taken only about a year ago.

And then Dad got all focused on kayaking. It was the only thing he ever wanted to do or talk about. So now we're bringing a kayak up to the lake with us, and I guarantee that's the only thing he's going to talk about.

I can't wait to get out of the car and put my feet in the water, but we're still a couple of miles away. We turn right on the country road, and I'm tapping my toes under Dad's seat.

The power station pumping pollution up into the atmosphere. The Wirth mansion rotting into the earth. The roadside strawberry stand, where the fruit is covered in pesticides.

The dairy farm—where that girl offered me a kitten—got sold, and Mom and Dad say they're turning the whole place into a winery. Do people really want wine that grows in a place where cows have been shitting for a hundred years?

At least some things are the same. At least the Go
Children Slow sign is still here. And all the mailboxes are still here.

We pull in and park in our old parking spot underneath the pine tree. Dad is just staring at his kayak in the passenger mirror, making sure none of the branches scrape against the kayak. I wonder if the Richardsons are here.

Mom unlocks the cottage and starts unloading stuff out of the car. Normally, Dad would be yelling at me to help her, but now he just wants me to help him untie his kayak so he can get it into the water.

Mom is getting mad. She's the only one who is moving anything into the house, and she keeps trying to slam the screen door behind her when she goes into the house, but it's got one of those stopper things that makes it close slowly. So when you try and close it hard, it just flutters there for a second and then it closes. It's probably pretty irritating for her.

There's some guy standing out in front of the Bells' cottage. I've never seen him before. He's a big, fat white guy dressed all in black, with long white hair and a white beard, and he's talking on a phone with a really long cord, like the one we have in our kitchen, pacing back and forth and talking really loudly. Who pulls the cord outside? Who is this guy?

Dad grabs the handle at one end of the kayak and I get the other and we lift it off the car and carry it down to the lake across the lawn. We don't wave or anything as we walk by, and the guy on the phone doesn't even look at us.

He has a really thick Southern accent, and I can't understand anything he's saying, even though he's talking so loudly it's making my ears hurt.

Dad says, “That's obnoxious,” loud enough for the guy to
hear. I'm surprised, because normally Dad would wait to get inside to say something like that.

We get the kayak down to our little beach, but there's kind of a problem. Every year, we bring our lawn chairs down and leave them on the beach. But in the spot where we normally set up our white plastic chairs, there is a whole new set of red-cushioned lounge chairs. You've got to be kidding me.

Dad puts down the kayak on the rocks, turns around, and looks back at the dude on the phone. Dad isn't really an aggressive kind of guy, but he's got the same look on his face like he had the time that I called Mom a bitch, like he's ready to tear the guy's head off.

We just stand and stare at the guy. I'm trying to figure out what's going on here. Apparently, this guy is living in the Bells' cottage, because there are all sorts of bags and boxes of stuff everywhere. There are a bunch of kids' toys out on the lawn, but I don't see any kids anywhere.

He does have two dogs, though—Labrador retrievers, one chocolate, one yellow—that are chasing each other in and out of the house through the sliding glass door. They're running through our yard and the Richardsons' yard. They're pissing everywhere. The chocolate one just squatted and took a dump right in the middle of the Richardsons' lawn. Wow, that is not going to go over well with Mr. Richardson, considering that he spends almost all of his free time working on his lawn.

Mom walks down to the lake, past the guy, and we all stand together, just like we always do, on the shore of the lake. But I can't concentrate because all I can hear is the guy talking on the phone.

I try to skip a stone, but it doesn't skip, and the guy on
the phone starts laughing. I can't help but feel like he's laughing at me. This is really going to suck, especially if he's going to be tying up the party line all the time. I turn around and look at Mom and Dad. They don't look happy. Dad has his arms around Mom from behind, but they look about as pissed off as I've ever seen them.

The Richardsons just arrived. Mom's getting dinner ready, so Dad and I go over to talk to Mr. Richardson about the new neighbor. I used to think that Mr. Richardson hated us, because he almost never said hi or anything. He just mowed his lawn and did his own thing, but now Mr. Richardson seems really happy to see us.

Dad shakes his hand and says, “How are you, Mr. Richardson?” I've never heard my dad call another man “Mr.” before.

“You joining up with the minister over there?”

Dad says, “What's that?”

“Our new neighbor says he's a minister of some church. Got the Bells to sign over their deed to him for tax reasons. Some kind of scam, that is, I tell you what.”

“Is that right?”

“That guy is a con man. I told him to keep those dogs on a leash.”

We all look at the dogs, still running around our yards, chasing and biting at each other.

I say, “One of them went to the bathroom on your lawn earlier.”

Mr. Richardson looks at me like he's about to strangle someone. He's mad at the minister. He goes into his garage and gets a shovel. He says, “Where?”

I point and say, “Right there.”

Mr. Richardson goes over and scoops up the dog shit with the shovel, brings it over to the minister's property, and drops it right in the middle of his lawn while he's still talking on the phone.

The minister stops talking and stares at Mr. Richardson as he turns and walks back toward us. That'll teach him.

It's raining, so Mom and Dad and I get out the old Monopoly board and set it up on the kitchen table. It's totally weird how dark it gets around here when it's raining. It's even darker than it is at night, except for not really. It's just dark.

I get the race car, Dad takes the top hat, and Mom takes the dog. She says, “It looks like Panda, my dog I had when I was a little girl.”

Dad is so funny. He shoots her a look over his reading glasses and says, “Panda is a great name for a dog, dear.” But he's being sarcastic, so it's funny.

I say, “Yeah, why did you name it Panda? Did it have trouble mating?”

Dad says, “What did you feed it—bamboo?”

We laugh at Mom, but it's okay, because she doesn't mind when we pick on her. She likes it better than when we pick on each other anyway. She just smiles and deals out the five-hundreds, the hundreds, and all the rest into three neat little stacks in front of her.

Dad does the real estate and Mom is the banker. I don't do anything except straighten up the Community Chest and Chance cards and put a five-hundred-dollar bill in the middle of the board. Mom eyes it but doesn't say anything. She's a stickler for the real rules, so she doesn't like that we put the
money in the middle, but it makes it more fun. It's like winning the lottery if you land on Free Parking.

Before we roll to see who goes first, Mom makes the same speech she always does: “Now, I want you to promise me something, and I'm very serious about this.”

“What?” We both know what she's going to say, but we also know that she's going to say it no matter what we do.

“I want you to promise me that when I beat you, you're not going to cry. Can you promise me that?”

“Yeah, whatever, Mom.” She always makes that speech, and she always has, ever since I can remember. It used to make me mad when I was little. But now I just want to beat her.

We roll the dice to see who goes first. I get a two. I go last. I always have the worst luck. Dad lands on Reading Railroad. Mom lands on Oriental. I land on the stupid Chance space, and the card says to go back three spaces, so that puts me on the Income Tax space, so I already have to pay a hundred and fifty dollars before I even get to do anything.

Dad rolls an eight and buys States Avenue. He's smiling. His teeth are so crooked and yellow. I've never really noticed that before. It's gross.

Mom rolls a four and is just visiting Jail. I don't like the way she moves her dog. She taps it on every square like it's a kangaroo. A dog named Panda that hops like a kangaroo. Why doesn't she just jump ahead four spaces? It's so easy to do. I mean, there are ten squares on each side.

I roll an eight and land on stupid Electric Company, which is the biggest waste of time in the whole game, because no one ever lands on it, and then even if they do, I don't get
very much money for it. I've got a feeling this game isn't going to go very well.

Mom has both Boardwalk and Park Place. Dad has all four railroads and most of the red and yellow properties, and all I have are a few random properties and not much else. It sucks. It's just like the worst feeling in the world, losing at Monopoly. Seriously, it's just like being a bum or something. Being totally broke with no money and no chance of ever getting any money. And plus, whoever is winning is just so happy with themselves. It's sickening. Totally sickening. It's like some rich asshole telling a homeless guy to get a job.

I just don't have the feeling that anything good is going to happen.

It might be possible if I were playing with my friends, but my parents are so competitive that doesn't seem very likely.

Mom has hotels on both Boardwalk and Park Place, and Dad has taken all the green properties right next to them, and he's trying desperately to build up some houses on them before Mom totally cleans his clock. I have thirty-six dollars, most of it in ones, which I got when Mom landed on my stupid Electric Company space and had to pay me four times the amount on the dice. Dad's got a monopoly on the orange properties. I've been sitting in Jail for the last two turns, partially because I don't have the money to get out, but mostly because it's too depressing to do anything other than sit in Jail.

It's not even the losing that bothers me that much. It's just how everybody turns into such an asshole when they're playing Monopoly. Especially Mom. She's so competitive. It's
not even what she says—she's just acting so cocky and full of herself. She's been humming the same tune for twenty-five minutes. I don't know what it is, but it's so annoying.

“Can you stop humming?”

“Why, you don't like my singing?”

“No.”

“Sorry.”

My turn. I know I'm going to roll either a six, an eight, or a nine. And then I'm going to be out of this game.

Eight. Finally, some mercy. I hand all my money and properties to Dad and stand up and go out the screen door and walk out across the grass toward the lake. It's stupid, but now I feel really bad about myself, like really bad.

I just about want to go and drown myself in the lake. I walk barefoot through the wet grass, and all the little clippings get caught between my toes.

The rain here smells like metal. It smells like iron or something. I wonder if it's pollution or acid rain or what, but it smells like metal.

It's like it's raining copper pennies. I should get some of those pH strips we use on our hot tub and test the water around here. I bet it's filled with lead and acid and oil and poison. I bet this whole place is just filled with terrible stuff.

I'm either going to skip stones or go for a swim, but I don't really want to do either. I don't want to do anything, so I sit down on the beach and look over at the Richardsons weeding. They're amazing. They get like one day off a week, and they spend it on their hands and knees, digging weeds out of the rocks. If I got only one day off a week, that's not what I'd be doing with my time.

Mrs. Richardson looks up at me from her weeding and smiles. Wow, that's cool. I smile and wave back, and she motions for me to come over.