License to Spill Page 14

  Gotta go. Mom and I are going jogging. Catch me if you can!

  SPOILER ALERT:

  You can’t.

  To Be Continued…

  END SCENE.

  Nov. 11.

  Garron is our family photographer.

  He speaks with an Italian accent, but I know for a fact he was born on Long Island. He thinks we should change things up this year.

  I say, how about we don’t do this.

  My brothers laugh.

  Father says, Matthew! Benjamin! Don’t encourage him.

  Then Mother says she’d like to hear Garron’s thoughts.

  His big revelation? Mother and Father should stand behind their sons this year, not beside them. Everything else—our matching navy suits and green-checked shirts, Mother’s green-checked dress, and Noodle’s green-checked bow—is bellissimo!

  The way I see it, nothing will be bellissimo unless Garron Photoshops prison bars over our faces.

  Since that’s not going to happen, I have to make it so I can’t be ID’d.

  Garron fires off a few test shots to check the composition and lighting.

  He’s says he’s ready.

  He asks if we’re ready.

  We say yes.

  He says, smile.

  I lower my head.

  –Daniel, face toward the camera.

  –Daniel, eyes open.

  –Head up, Daniel.

  –Lower your hands, Daniel.

  Mother pinches a warning into my shoulder. It feels like a hawk’s talon.

  –Lower the dog, Daniel.

  –The dog.

  –Face away from the dog!

  Mom’s talon lands again. Daniel, please! It’s freezing out here.

  LIE #57: Sorry.

  –Daniel, look at the lens.

  –My lens… the camera’s lens!

  –Son!

  LIE #58: I’m trying!

  Garron says we’re losing light.

  LIE #59 a): I have to go to the bathroom.

  LIE #59 b): No, I can’t hold it.

  LIE #59 c): Yes, I’ll hurry.

  I don’t come back for twenty minutes.

  Garron makes us rotate. Something about chasing the sun. We have five minutes left before it sets.

  He asks if we’re ready.

  We say yes.

  I unclamp Noodle’s leash.

  Noodle bolts.

  LIE #60: How did that happen?

  Father says, forget the dog.

  Mother says that dog is part of this family.

  I offer to chase after him.

  Garron says it will be dark by the time I get back.

  Matthew has a meeting to prep for.

  Benjamin has a date.

  Garron says he has enough to work with.

  He’s lying.

  Mother sends me to my room for being so difficult.

  I say, how old am I, six?

  She says I’m acting like it.

  I decide to go because resisting arrest is not in my best interest. And I want to journal my lies before I forget.

  They let me out for dinner.

  Matthew and Benjamin are still there.

  So is my shrink.

  Mother says Dr. Lloyd is here to lead an intervention.

  –Whose? I ask.

  –Yours.

  –Mine?

  –Yes, says Father.

  –Why?

  Dr. Lloyd says my family believes I’m taking drugs. Are you taking drugs, Daniel?

  LIE #61: Yes, Dr. Lloyd. I am.

  Monday

  Sheridan goes the entire day without talking to me.

  Feeling = I really want to know why she left my house Saturday night.

  So while we’re closing up our lockers I update Hud and Coops and ask them what they think I should do.

  HUD: If you start kissing up to Sheridan this early on, by Thanksgiving you’ll be whipped like my granny’s potatoes.

  COOPS: He’s right.

  ME: Who made you guys the experts?

  COOPS: Music, dude. It’s all right there in the lyrics.

  ME: You gotta love One Direction.

  COOPS: I’m serious. Who gets more girls than rock stars? No one. They know the deal.

  ME: What deal?

  HUD: That girls mess with your head.

  COOPS: Take Springsteen.

  Feeling = It’s always about Springsteen with Coops.

  ME: The guy’s like eighty.

  COOPS: He didn’t used to be. And all his lyrics are about guys who settled down too early.

  ME: What’s your point?

  COOPS: Don’t make the same mistakes Bruce made. Don’t settle for one Screamer when you can have them all.

  HUD: It’s what any self-respecting guy would do.

  Feeling = Mandy was right.

  It was time for practice so I decided not to think about it anymore.

  Two minutes later I see Sheridan outside the theater so I’m thinking about it again.

  Feeling = Why did they put the gym and the theater right across from each other? It’s not like I’d ever be in a hurry to get from practice to the stage.

  ME: Hey, Sheridan, why did you take off on Saturday?

  Feeling = It’s exactly what I wasn’t supposed to do. I couldn’t help it. I had to know.

  SHERIDAN: It’s not like anyone even knew I was coming so I figured no one would mind if I left.

  ME: Huh?

  SHERIDAN: Forget it. Oh, I got the part.

  ME: That’s awesome! I knew you would.

  SHERIDAN: Yeah, so between that and Wicked, I probably won’t see you for a while.

  Then she turned and walked into the theater, all happy and stuff.

  Feeling = Did she just end things with me?

  I sucked in practice.

  Feeling = My insides were so heavy I could barely shoot.

  The guys asked what was wrong.

  I said I just ended things with Sheridan. She cried. I hate when girls cry.

  Coops told me to download The River.

  I listened to Gotye instead.

  Tuesday, November 13, 2012

  Horace Power went live last night. I feel like a complete Homie snob saying this, but Mandy did much better than I expected and today everyone was tweeting their favorite passages.

  Seize the day, not the A! #HoracePower

  Too much time preparing for life, not enough time living it. #HoracePower

  Can’t afford to make any mistakes? I say, you can’t afford not to. That’s how we learn. #HoracePower

  Why memorize when you can think? #HoracePower

  When someone says “Use your brain,” respond with “No time. Too much homework.” #HoracePower

  Granted, I did several rewrites and was responsible for spinning a Gap idea into a Gucci gown (Mandy’s words, not mine), but she calls me partner and that’s more than I ever expected. She’s even naming her dogs Gap and Gucci after us.

  I shared this during lunch. Blake thinks I have a girl crush. Vanessa said a girl crush is better than being a stalker. We all agreed.

  Wait, it gets better.

  Bubbie Libby was sitting on the porch swing when I get home from school.

  “Shalom, Lily,” she says.

  “Shalom,” I say with a trace of suspicion. I mean, the woman fired me a few weeks ago and now she’s all Shalom, Lily? But, the definition of the word is three-pronged. It means hello, goodbye, and peace. And maybe, just maybe, she’s going for peace. “Aren’t you cold?”

  “Keeps me from aging,” she says. “Messes with my Raynaud’s, though.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” I say.

  “So, what do you say? You want your dog-walking job back? It would really help me out.”

  I told her I had too much homework and politely declined. I didn’t want Duffy to think I was stalking.

  “But we’re Jews, Lily, we can never forget that.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Then say yes,�
� Bubbie Libby said. “If not for me or the dogs, then do it for our people.” She put her hands together in prayer.

  I wasn’t sure when dog walking became a symbol of Judaic faith, but I said okay.

  Ten minutes later Duffy and I collided on his front porch. The dog leashes got wrapped around our legs and next thing I know I’m twirling and justifying all at once.

  “It’s cool,” he said. “I believe you.”

  I quickly righted the dogs and stepped onto the lawn. “Test me. Leave your backpack on the porch, then check it after I leave. Everything will be there. I promise.” Then I hurried down the sidewalk dragging Gap and Gucci behind me.

  “Let’s go,” I said, tugging. “You can pee in a minute.”

  Duffy jogged up beside me. “Is it okay if I go with you?”

  I let the dogs pee. “Why?”

  He looked up at the bloated gray clouds. “It’s about to snow.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Everything feels kind of still and buzzy at the same time. I like it.”

  I agreed. Not because I’m a stalker, but because I was thinking that too.

  I offered Duffy a leash. “Want one?”

  He took Gap.

  “How did you find out?” he asked. “You know, that I knew you were…”

  “Stalking you?”

  He smiled shyly. “Yeah.”

  “Mandy told me.”

  “Figures.”

  “She didn’t tell me how you knew. I figured that out on my own.” Suddenly, the story I couldn’t bear to write became a story I couldn’t wait to tell. I wanted to Heimlich it out of my body, spit it on the side of the road, and let the snow cover it up forever. “I happened to be wearing your shoelace as a bracelet when Mandy told me. I was so ashamed I cut it off and threw it in the trash—”

  “You could have given it back,” Duffy said, smiling.

  “Impossible. I never wanted to bother you again.” We stopped to let Gucci sniff a hedge. “Also, I ended up feeling sad for the lace so I pulled it out of the trash.”

  “Sad?”

  “I thought it would be happier with the rest of your stuff.”

  “Ahhh,” he said, knowing where this was going.

  “So I reach into the very back of my closet and what do I find? Two hard dog poops. Now I know where that smell had been coming from, but I have no idea what they were doing there in the first place, so I asked my mom if any dogs have been in my room lately. And she tells me about the night Gap and Gucci ran into the house and how you found them in my closet.”

  “They picked up the scent of my stuff,” he said, bending down to thank them.

  “Yep. And the rest, as they say, is pathetic.”

  The streetlights popped on.

  “Can I ask you something?” Duffy said.

  “Sure.”

  “Why me?”

  The first flakes of snow began to fall.

  “You seemed so… normal.”

  “Normal?” He sounded insulted. “That’s it?”

  “You weren’t homeschooled. You didn’t ride a skateboard to school in the rain. You didn’t have a head full of useless facts and a sack full of kosher luncheon meat. You didn’t use typewriters or encyclopedias. No one would describe your looks as ‘interesting’ or your hobbies as ‘odd.’ You have a popular sister, you play a popular sport, you have popular facial features, friends with cool nicknames, and you don’t accessorize with highlighter. So yes, normal.”

  “I don’t get it,” he said.

  “I thought if I could be close to your things I’d get closer to you. And if I was closer to you I’d be closer to being kissed by you. And if my first kiss came from you I’d be magically transformed into normal and—Whoa!” Duffy’s face fell toward my cheek. “Are you okay?”

  He blinked his eyes open. He looked confused, disoriented. “Do you need a doctor?”

  “No,” he snapped. Then he stepped closer, and in a gentler tone said, “I’m trying to kiss you.”

  “Oh.” I took a step back. “You don’t have to do that. I’m over it. I swear. It’s like the spell was broken and—poof!—my obsession is gone. Anyway, aren’t you and Sheridan a thing?”

  “I broke up with her today,” he said.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  “No, it’s good.”

  We walked the rest of the way in silence. When we got back to his house he snapped his fingers and said, “Gone? Just like that your obsession is gone?”

  “Gone.” I smiled reassuringly. “I promise, you have nothing to fear. The whole thing was immature. Illusory. I do think your friend Owen is cute, though.”

  “Coops?”

  “He’s been saying hi to me lately. Maybe you could put in a good word, you know, now that you know I’m not dangerous.” We stepped onto his porch and I pointed to his backpack. “See, it’s still there.”

  I thought he would laugh at that, but all he said was, “Good deal.”

  “Thanks for the pity kiss,” I said, handing him Gucci’s leash. “That was very sweet.”

  “That’s what friends are for.”

  “So we’re friends now?”

  “As long as none of my things go missing.”

  “The only thing missing from your porch will be me,” I said.

  And—poof!—I was gone.

  Tuesday

  Dad says things like: Tread lightly around women, Andrew. Simple conversations will become minefields if you’re not careful. One wrong move and you’ll trigger an explosion.

  Feeling = Dad’s clueless. Maybe girls were like that when he was a kid, but not these days.

  These days they run out of houses without saying goodbye and say things like, I don’t have time to hang or it was all illusory.

  Feeling = Whatever that means.

  They stalk you for months and then toss you like a broken shoelace. They say they want you to kiss them and when you do they think you fainted on them. You try again even though that makes you look like a Derp and they say, I like Coops.

  Feeling = No Sheridan. No Stalker. I only have one S left—the Screamers.

  November 14th

  A.J. and I left the house after dinner.99 We had to get out of there. I was scratching my arms like winning lotto tickets and A.J. was one Nirvana song away from blowing out his eardrums.

  “Haven’t you sold any cars lately?” I asked as he accelerated through a yellow light.

  “Three this month. Mr. Spencer is gonna give me a raise if I keep it going through December.”

  I punched A.J. on the arm. “Are you kidding? That’s a shedload. Why didn’t you tell Mom and Dad? We could have—”

  “Nessa, stop.”

  “Stop what?”

  “This whole Beni’s thing.” He glanced at me, then sighed. “It’s pointless.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “Because it is. Same as putting a Band-Aid on a headache, you know?”

  “But—”

  “But nothing,” he said. “I’m selling these cars for me, not them.”

  I clenched my teeth, denying the tears. “Why can’t it be for both?”

  “Because I don’t like to think about Mom and Dad fighting when I’m at work, okay? It bums me out.” His turquoise eyes darkened to navy. “Anyway, it’s going to take a lot more than a few nights at Beni’s to fix what they’ve got.” He gripped the wheel like he wanted to pull it off its base. “They were fighting about hand soap tonight. Hand soap!”

  My tears began to fall, hot and unstoppable. “I know, but we can’t give up.”

  “It’s not our fight.”

  “So you’re just going to quit?”

  “Not quit, accept.”

  “Accept what? That Mom and Dad are going to get divorced?”

  “Accept that we don’t have any control over whether they do or not. It’s their deal. I’m done wasting energy on it.”

  “Who are you right now?” I sniffled. “You don’t even sound like you.”<
br />
  “I’ve been reading Mom’s Deepak Chopra books.” He grinned. “Good stuff. You should check him out.”100

  My left eye twitched. “So it’s all up to me?”

  A.J. pulled into Lily’s driveway and put the car in park. “Guess so.”

  I slammed the door and rolled my wheelie suitcase filled with books and clothes up her walk. I didn’t even look back. Looking back slows a racer’s time and I didn’t have a second to waste.

  Wednesday, November 14, 2012

  When Vanessa called to ask if she could sleep over, I snapped a selfie of me in my lilac hoodie-footie pj’s and sent it to Blake.

  B, do you think Vanessa will get the irony?

  Maybe if they were ironic, but they’re not.

  I hate you.

  You too. xoxo

  I stuffed the hoodie-footies in the back of my closet and changed into sweats. I couldn’t wait to dish, in HD detail, about my Duffy encounter, and more importantly, my speedy love-recovery. I wanted to hear how she was handling the news about Blake. Like, really handling it. I wanted one of us to accidentally fart and then giggle about it for hours.

  I knew none of that would happen when she walked into my house with a suitcase full of books and eyes full of tears.

  “It’s the surströmming, isn’t it?” I said, ruing the day Mom created International Cuisine Night. Tonight’s delicacy was fermented herring from Sweden. Top notes include rotten eggs, vinegar, and rancid butter. It tastes worse than it smells.

  “No. I mean, it is stinky in here but…” Vanessa lowered her head and her shoulders began to shake.

  “Oh crap, are you okay?”

  Mom hurried into the foyer the instant her sonar picked up the sound waves of Vanessa’s sobs. She was still wearing her blond Swedish wig. I was about to chide her when I realized I was still wearing mine.

  “Vanessa, right? I’m Nora.” She put her arm around Vanessa’s shoulder and led her into the den. I hoped the tears blurred Vanessa’s vision to the point where she couldn’t see the beanstalks of old periodicals that my parents mistook for necessary.

  “I am a trained child psychologist,” Mom said. “So if you ever want to talk—”

  “Really?” Vanessa sniffled.

  “Any time,” Mom said.

  “How about now?”

  Nora knew exactly when to “fix” Vanessa’s problems and when to “listen.” She helped her understand why parents fight and how, at times, it can even be healthy. Convincing Vanessa that her parents’ marriage had zero correlation to her grade point average was a much harder sell. Vanessa insisted that if she aced her AP midterms on Friday, life at home would improve. Then she suggested we hit the books.