The Grown Ups (9 page)

“Are you sure that's a good idea, Mindy?” Mindy had made Bella and Ruthie swear that they would rescue her from herself where Peter Chang was concerned. But maybe, Bella thought, maybe Peter Chang wasn't such a bad idea for Mindy. Maybe she just didn't know it yet. Bella reached out and grabbed Mindy by the sleeve. “Hey, if you want Peter Chang, who am I to stop you?”

Mindy gave her a wide, sloppy smile and then shrugged off her arm and drifted toward the house. Bella turned and continued walking, although she had no real plan until she saw Sam. His back was to her, and though he was surrounded by people on all sides, it was obvious to her he was alone, staring into the fire.

She walked up behind him and slipped her arms around his waist and pressed her cheek to the dip between his shoulder blades. Bella closed her eyes for a second, grateful for Sam's quiet, steady presence. After a few minutes she let go and Sam twisted around to face her. “Hey there,” he said. He pressed his lips to hers and she felt, as she had the first time, that they were meant to do this very thing forever. “Where've you been? I was just going to start looking for you.”

“I just had some stuff to do at home,” Bella whispered as she found his mouth again. Sam tasted like beer and smelled like woodsmoke. He tightened his arms around her and squeezed, lifting her slightly off the ground before putting her back down. Bella felt fused to him, the length of his thighs against hers, the hard angles of chest and arms. She felt soft, molding her body into his. They leaned their foreheads together and swayed back and forth.

“My dad is up at the lake,” Sam said in a low voice.

“So?” Bella teased.

“Later on? Can you spend the night?”

“Will you make me pancakes for breakfast if I do?” Bella grinned, enjoying the moment. Of course she wanted to spend an entire night with Sam.

Sam laughed. “Bella, you're killing me.”

Bella smiled and kissed his cheek; there was a little bit of stubble and her lips stung from the tiny cluster of hairs.

“DUDE! Turner! There you are!”

Bella and Sam swung around as Peter Chang and Frankie Cole came toward them. Frankie held aloft a bottle of vodka. “SHOTS! Now!”

Bella shook her head. She looked behind Peter for Mindy, but she wasn't there. Peter thrust a cup at Sam and Frankie began pouring. Bella disentangled from Sam. “I think I'm going to find Mindy and Ruthie.”

Sam hooked a finger through her belt loop and tugged. “No.”

“Yes,” Bella said. “Enjoy your shots.” She smiled and looked over at Frankie. “Where are your parents, anyway? This is getting kind of crazy.” In the short amount of time she'd been at the party the woods seemed to have grown even more crowded.

“Everyone needs to leave by midnight. They're in the city for a play and dinner.” Frankie poured vodka into the cup. He seemed sober, but even Bella knew that was impossible. “I figure that gives me until one to clean up.”

“Are you kidding?” Bella looked over at Sam, who shook his head and shrugged. She leaned over and glanced at Peter Chang's wristwatch. “It's after eleven. Have you seen how many people are here?”

“It's a little nuts,” Peter Chang admitted as he squinted toward the fire.

“Really?” Frankie looked up. “Can you do me a favor, Bella, and start telling people they need to get going?” He grinned at her and then passed the vodka bottle to Peter Chang. “Pretty please?”

Bella rolled her eyes. She twisted Sam's T-shirt into a knot and brushed her fingers against his stomach before she pulled away. When she looked back at him he was staring at her from over the cup he'd raised to his lips.

It was after
two when Bella and Sam staggered into his darkened kitchen through the back door. They had managed to get rid of everyone before the Coles arrived home, but Frankie would have to craft a convincing story when the sun rose of why there was a confetti spill of beer cans and cups in the backyard, not to mention the enormous circle of blackened grass where the flames had overshot the fire pit.

Bella had her arm around Sam's waist and his arm was slung across her shoulders as they tripped over the threshold. He'd had way too many shots, so it was Bella who led the way through the shadows to Sam's bedroom. When they got there Sam pulled Bella down onto the bed and rolled over on top of her. “Finally,” he said softly against her hair. “Finally.”

Bella laughed and pushed Sam slightly off of her so she could breathe. Their legs were still entwined but their heads were side by side on Sam's pillow. If she turned her head she could press her lips against his without moving. Sam reached down and grabbed her hand and brought it up to his mouth, kissed her fingers, and then held it against his chest. “Bella,” he whispered.

“Sam,” Bella whispered back.

“You're here. In my bed.”

“And you're very drunk.”

Sam moaned. “Give me a minute.”

Bella laughed quietly. “How many of me can you see right now?”

“I don't know. I'm scared to turn my head too quickly.”

Bella closed her eyes. She could smell the boy-ness of Sam on his sheets: shampoo mixed with sweat and detergent and foul sneakers and another layer of whatever he'd had to drink that night. “Hey—do you feel like you're going to be sick?”

Sam didn't answer. His limbs were like lead weights on top of
hers. Bella nudged him gently, afraid to make it worse. “Do you need a bucket?”

Very carefully, his words measured, Sam said, “I don't think so.”

Bella attempted to disentangle so she could get up and get the wastebasket just in case. But Sam roused himself enough to stop her. “No, no. Don't.”

“I'm coming right back.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” Bella tried again to move but Sam wasn't cooperating.

“I ruined everything.”

“It takes more than some vodka to ruin everything.” Bella kissed Sam's neck below his ear.

“That's so nice.”

Bella kissed his neck again.

“Really nice.”

Bella rolled onto her side and curled up against Sam, bringing her knees toward her chest, careful not to place them anywhere near his stomach. “Mindy is worried that we're never going to see each other again. She said we're flinging out to the far corners of the world.”

“Like pinballs?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Pinballs roll back and bounce off each other again before they find a landing place. Over and over and over.”

“Is that what you think we're going to do? Bounce off each other until we find that landing place?”

Sam bucked against the bed and the mattress moved beneath them. “You know I like to bounce off you.” He laughed.

Bella laughed with him. “Hold on, cowboy, you're going to puke.”

“Not going to puke,” Sam said quietly. “Why do you like me?” He let go of Bella's fingers and brushed the back of his hand against her bra over her shirt. With his other hand he fumbled with the button of her jeans and when his fine motor skills failed him he slid his hands up under her shirt and cupped her breasts. “Off,” was all she heard him say as he slid down beside her until his mouth was level with her bra. He bit at her nipples through the fabric. Bella put her hands on his shoulders to get his attention. He stopped what he was doing and stared at her from beneath heavy lids as she sat half up and lifted the shirt over her head and unhooked her bra. She tossed it over the side of the bed, and before she could even lie down Sam's mouth had found a nipple, while his fingers slowly drew out the other.

“You,” Bella gasped.

“What?” Sam stopped what he was doing and looked up at her, a boyish little grin on his lips, his cheeks flushed a deep red. When all of a sudden he swallowed hard, Bella saw in his eyes a rising panic. She rolled off the bed and dove for the tin wastebasket under the desk, sliding it to the bed just as Sam's head came over the side. She turned away, but from the sound of it he managed to get it all in the can.

Bella scrambled around the room and grabbed at a pile of laundry still unfolded in the basket at the end of Sam's bed. There had to be a T-shirt in there. Her clothes were somewhere on the floor by the trash can. Finding one, she slipped it on over her head and ran to the bathroom for a towel.

When she returned to the room Sam was sitting up in the middle of the bed with his head in his hands. It smelled awful. Bella opened the windows and moved the wastebasket away from
the bed with her foot. She handed Sam the towel and he dabbed at his face.

She tried to hold her breath as she moved closer to him. “Are you okay?”

He nodded, his face buried in the towel.

“You want some water?”

“I'll get it.” He swung his legs over the bed and steadied himself before he stood. He was wobbly as he made his way to the door, so Bella moved to support him around the waist. He was pale and shaking as they made their way to the bathroom. When they got to the door Sam turned to her. “I'm good, better.” He tried to touch her face with his hand but he missed. “I love you.”

Bella nodded, too stunned to respond. Sam shut the bathroom door and she sank down on the floor outside the bathroom. Had it only been tonight that she'd waited in the exact same place for her mother? She leaned her head back against the wall and closed her eyes. “Sam?” she called.

“Yeah?”

“I'm going to go home.”

He didn't respond right away. Bella stood and pressed her ear against the door. She tapped her fingers lightly. “Sam?”

“I heard you. I was trying to think of something to say to change your mind. But there's puke in my bedroom. So . . .”

Bella smiled. She heard the squeak of the faucets turning on and then off. Soon afterward Sam opened the bathroom door. His face was damp and he rubbed his hands against his jeans. She caught a whiff of toothpaste. He smelled better but he still looked terrible.

Bella laughed nervously. “I can't go back in there. I'm sorry.”

“I know.” Sam shook his head and winced. “Not a good idea.” He put a hand on her elbow. “I'll walk you home.”

Bella shook her head. “I'm okay. You're not.”

“I'll walk you to the end of my driveway.”

Bella frowned. “Watch me from the window.”

Sam laughed and then held a hand to his head. “Oh, I wish this was funny.”

“Okay, Mr. Pitiful.” Bella tugged on his hand and smiled. “Walk with me.”

When they got outside Sam took a deep breath. “That's good.”

“Remember how the air smells before you go back inside.”

At the end of the driveway Sam leaned against the mailbox. “So, let's do this again soon, okay?” he joked.

Bella smiled and leaned over and kissed Sam on the cheek. In his ear she whispered, “When you find my bra, will you give it back?”

Sam laughed. “Not on your life.”

Bella began to walk backward down the middle of the deserted street. With each breath she could still smell the bonfire from Frankie Cole's party. She waved to Sam. He looked so small as she moved farther away. It was hard not to run back down the street to him. She could feel the world that Mindy was talking about pressing in on all sides, and then the crazy crooked line that ran from her mother to Sam. They had known each other all their lives. They were in each other's DNA. This place was all she had ever known. And she wondered how she was ever really and truly going to leave.

M
rs. Spade died in the winter of their junior year of college
and they all returned home for the funeral.

Mrs. Spade had been sick as long as Sam could remember, so her death shouldn't have been that shocking, yet it hit him harder than he expected. He guessed that her illness, always unspecified, had tricked him into thinking you could be sick forever, almost as a way of life. When he considered that now, Sam realized what an idiot he was.

Bella had called from Vassar to tell Sam. He'd picked up the phone and heard his name and then nothing, just a rush of air across the wires followed by what sounded like a faraway howling. Bella and Sam had continued, despite distance and any real commitment, to find their way back to each other. She surprised him first at school, showing up at his door, and they had fallen back onto his twin mattress as if they were starving. It felt exotic, somehow, to be in a place where no one knew them as a couple. To hold hands as they shared crummy food off Sam's meal ticket at the dining hall, to drink dollar pitchers at the Rat, to wake up
next to each other and have sex without talking, as if they had the map of what they liked inked indelibly in their brains. By the time Sam's roommate returned from his girlfriend's place, the weekend ended, the buzz would wear off, and Sam would think they wouldn't do it again. Until one of them showed up on the doorstep of the other's room and it started up all over again. Sam thought this thing with Bella was casual, comfortable. They had never labeled what they were or talked about where it was going. He thought that was what they both wanted. Or maybe they were just too scared to bring it up. Sam liked things the way they were until something like this happened, and he had no idea how to act or what they meant to each other.

When she called, it had been the longest they had gone, since before Thanksgiving break. Sam hadn't been home for Thanksgiving that year; instead he and Michael had visited their mother in Vermont, where she had incongruously found her passion making goat cheese and living with a writer twenty years her junior. At Christmas, Michael went back to the goat cheese farm and Sam went with his father to Boca Raton to be with his grandfather, since his grandmother had died in September and his father couldn't convince his grandfather to come north. So Bella and Sam hadn't been in touch, and he was surprised to find himself missing her.

The night before the funeral, the Spade house had been crowded with people Sam mostly recognized: plenty of his friends' parents, pre- and post-divorce, a librarian who'd kicked him out of the stacks once for a whoopee cushion prank, Tina from the reception desk at the club, the lawn guy who hated Frankie and Sam for trying to start a rival business one summer, and their old mailman, Sy, who had carried a sack of dog treats in a bag around his belt. Running in and around all these people were the Spade
grandchildren, six or seven blond kids who seemed identical in age. According to Sam's father, there had been a steady stream of neighbors bearing bottles of liquor along with casseroles in aluminum tins, who automatically received an invitation to stay by Mr. Spade, for whom the prospect of being alone to mourn his wife appeared unappealing. The alone part he could remedy, at least, considering the odd collection of mourners in their home pre-funeral.

When Mr. Spade had offered Sam a martini he'd replied, “Oh, God, no!” and then couldn't help feeling that his reaction had made Bella's father more uncomfortable, as he had excused himself quickly and disappeared into the crowd, one small blond child attached to his pant leg.

Sam scanned the main rooms with no luck, then turned a corner after narrowly avoiding his eleventh-grade English teacher, who was leaning against the wall by the pantry whispering into the ear of his twelfth-grade trigonometry teacher. He took off down the long hallway that led to the back of the house and the bedrooms. The Spade grandchildren had left nothing untouched: most of the doors had been flung open and toys and books were scattered across the floor. A television blared from one of the bedrooms; the high-pitched singsong voices led Sam to believe it was most likely a cartoon. He peeked in as he passed and was surprised to see Bella's oldest brother reclining against the pillows of his parents' bed, drinking a beer. Their eyes met and Bella's brother raised his beer in greeting and Sam did nothing, embarrassed to be caught looking.

When he finally found Bella she was sitting on the back deck outside her room, wrapped in an enormous fur that smelled like a combination of piss and mothballs. She was curled up inside the coat, her legs pressed to her chest, her arms around her knees.
Her mouth and chin were buried in the massive collar and all that showed was the tip of her red nose and her eyes. Her eyes were rimmed pink and Sam was pretty sure there was frost on her eyelashes. It was easily the coldest day of the winter so far.

“Hey,” Sam said. “Mrs. Francussi is whispering in Mr. Holt's ear outside your pantry.”

Bella tipped her chin up out of the coat to reveal a shockingly painted mouth outlined in a heavy scarlet lipstick. “They're probably fucking.”

“Well, thanks, I could do without that visual.” Mrs. Francussi wore flesh-colored stockings that made her legs look like sausage casings while Mr. Holt favored cardigans in shades of rust. The amount of nudity they should share was nil. They should shower clothed, as far as Sam was concerned.

Bella moved over and Sam sat down next to her, grateful for her fur-cloaked body against his side, adding another layer of warmth. Even if he had to breathe out of his mouth. “What are you doing out here?”

The entire fur ball that was Bella shrugged.

“I'd be hiding too. Where did all these people come from?”

“My feelings exactly. Where the fuck were all these people when my mother was dying? She fucking died in her bed, alone. My father was in the city. At work. She was here all day. Alone. Dead. Alone and dead.”

Sam flashed on Bella's brother reclining in his parents' bed watching cartoons. Mrs. Spade had died in that bed? He didn't know what to say.

“She had a heart attack.” Bella's voice sounded weak, like she was running out of anger. “After everything she had been through, she had a lousy heart attack.”

“I am so sorry.” Sam put his arm around the coat, but he
couldn't even feel Bella inside of it. He tried to pull her closer but he just got hair in his mouth. “Do you want to go for a walk? Get out of here?”

Bella shook her head and stood up. She held out her hand and Sam took her fingers, tiny and cold, and she led him through the sliding glass doors and into her room. She pushed aside piles of clothing and books and photo albums and flung herself on her bed, facedown. Sam followed because he didn't know what else to do. He tried to find any part of her that he could touch but he just ended up patting the top of her head. “What can I do for you, Bella? Tell me.”

There was a long silence and then Bella rolled over to look at him. “Nothing, Sam. I'm going to be fine.” The lipstick had smeared across her teeth. She looked the furthest from fine Sam had ever seen. “Oh, by the way, your mom sent some cheese.”

Sam nodded. Of course she had.

“And a really nice note.” Bella nibbled at her lip, leaving tiny exclamation points of red along her top teeth. “But she was good like that. She always wrote my mom notes. I think that cheered her up, you know? That she wasn't forgotten?”

Sam had no idea his mother kept in touch with anyone from the neighborhood. He nodded again because all of a sudden there was a lump in his throat. Bella's mother was dead, while his had left them to make goat cheese and fuck a guy who looked like his RA.

“I've been going through her things. I can't even remember the last time she was well enough to wear this coat, but I love it and I am never taking it off.”

Sam held back the sigh that threatened to break loose. Parts of the coat looked like they had mange.

“So the service is tomorrow. At noon.”

“I know. My dad told me.”

“Good.” Bella looked like she was waiting for Sam to kiss her, but he couldn't imagine touching that red mouth. He felt bad. He felt fucking awful. He felt like he wished he could run as far away from this as possible. What role was he supposed to play here? Doting boyfriend? Did her father and her brothers think he was that? Shit.

“What are you thinking?” Bella asked.

Sam shook his head.

“Come on, tell me.”

“That I don't know what to do or how to act.”

“Thank you.” Bella nodded solemnly, her eyes huge in her face. “I get that.”

Sam fell back on her pillows and closed his eyes. He was suddenly so fucking tired he could have slept forever. Bella stirred next to him but he couldn't gather the strength to move. It wasn't until he felt her hand on his zipper that he realized what she was doing. He couldn't even raise his arms to pull her on top, but when she peeled back his fly and reached into his boxers he immediately sprang against her palm. He felt the fur cuff, softer than it looked, as she dug deeper and freed his balls.

Bella climbed on top. The coat fell open as she lowered herself slowly down until they were connected. She stayed still for what seemed like forever. Sam's dick throbbed inside of her until she began to rock back and forth. Sam bit the inside of his mouth to keep from coming too fast. He thought about her brother watching cartoons in his dead mother's bed. He thought about the martini. He thought about what the fuck he was doing in Bella's house fucking her while the cocktail party of death raged on all around them. He hoped one of those little kids didn't yank open
the door. Was the door even locked?
Fuck fuck fuck fuck. Bella,
Sam thought.
You feel so fucking amazing. Fuck. So fucking amazing.

When Sam woke
up the room was black and Bella was asleep on top of him, her head beneath his chin and the coat covering both of them. His dick was wedged where it had fallen out of her and as he rose to consciousness it did the same.

“Bella,” Sam whispered into her hair. “Bella?”

He could feel her hot breath against his neck. She mumbled into his collarbone something he couldn't understand.

“Wake up, Bella.”

Bella placed her palms against Sam's chest and raised herself up just enough to look at him with one eye. The lipstick was now all over her chin. “What time is it?”

“Dark.” Sam half struggled to see the clock on her bedside table but Bella moved at the same time, accidentally rubbing up against him. Sam took a chance and hooked a leg over hers and rolled her over onto her back. Bella looked up at him with a lazy half smile and stretched an arm above her head. Sam reached down between her legs. She arched her back slightly and closed her eyes.

“Please.”

He was inside her before she finished saying the word.

Sam left as
Bella was running water for a bath. They had stayed in bed for a while, talking about nothing important, and she had seemed calmer. She had even laughed a little when she caught her reflection in the mirror above the sink as the small bathroom filled with steam. She insisted to Sam that he should go, that
she was going to spend some time with her father and brothers. But even as he was leaving he couldn't shake the feeling that he should be staying no matter what Bella had said.

Sam made his way over to Peter Chang's basement. Peter was at MIT, having already developed and sold several video games that were providing him more than enough money without the degree, but Sam somehow always saw him in his mother's basement, where the best of their teenage years would live on suspended in time.

Being at Peter's was like one giant exhale. Almost everyone had come back for the funeral. Frankie Cole, Ruthie Newman, Stephen Winters, Johnny Ross, and Mindy Stevens were all there. The exceptions were Celia Newman, Ruthie's little sister, on exchange in France, and Suzie Epstein, of course, whom no one had heard from since she left. Sam took the Sucrets container that Bella had dropped into his coat pocket as he was leaving and placed it on the trunk in front of the couch. “A gift,” he said.

Everyone looked at the tin but no one did anything to open it. Finally, Stephen Winters grabbed and opened it, revealing four neatly rolled joints. “Shit.”

Ruthie and Mindy looked at each other. Ruthie said, “That's Mrs. Spade's, right?”

“What do you think?” Sam asked.

“Don't be an asshole, Sam.” Ruthie narrowed her eyes. “This is hard for all of us, not just you. Bella is like our sister.”

Sam wasn't sure what she meant. Was he giving the impression that Mrs. Spade's death was hard on him, or that tending to Bella was hard? Ever since Ruthie had declared women's studies as her major, everything had become an argument. Sam was too tired to go there tonight.

Frankie stared intently at the tin before reaching for it and
slipping out a joint. “I heard she had cancer, that the pot helped with chemo.”

“Nah,” offered Peter Chang. “MS or some shitty disease like that, I think.” He looked to Sam for confirmation.

Sam shrugged. “She had a heart attack, that's all I know.”

“It doesn't matter now, does it? Are you going to light that thing or what?” Stephen tossed a pack of matches at Frankie. Frankie, a philosophy major at Rutgers, looked at the joint and seemed to consider the possibilities. Sam thought the consensus in the room was obvious: they had smoked Mrs. Spade's weed before, and it was some really good shit.

The room was silent as Frankie struck a match and raised the joint toward the ceiling. The paper sizzled as he took that first long drag. They passed the joint around the room, not speaking. When it was done Sam stood up, pleasantly buzzed, and walked up out of the basement and into the empty street.