Anatomy of a Misfit (12 page)

Henry is acting pretty weird, honestly. What else is new? Quiet. Check. Brooding. Check. Staring. Check. Now if Robby were acting this way we'd call an ambulance but this is Henry's natural state, so we're all clear.

And what about the ogre, you ask? Well, his way of dealing with this excruciating dinner is to pile his plate as high as possible and stuff his face as fast as possible and not make any eye contact. If he looks up at all, he looks up at my mom, rolls his eyes, and quickly eats another bite of mashed potatoes.

Poor Mom.

“Now, Tiffany, I want to know if they are treating you girls okay at the Bunza Hut. I try to ask Anika but I can't seem to get a straight answer out of her.”

“Mom, what do you think they're doing? It's the Bunza Hut.”

Tiffany obliges: “Oh, it's not so bad. They let us drink the shakes.”

“Oh, they do, do they?”

“The leftover shakes.”

Silence. Confusion.

I chime in to ease everyone's befuddlement: “You have to make the shake in this silver cup thingy, and there's always some leftover. So, we get that.”

Now Henry: “But then couldn't you just make the shake bigger?”

“Well, we do. Basically we make the shake twice as big so every time anyone orders a shake we get a free shake.” I'm so proud of myself.

“So, you're stealing.” That's the ogre. Of course.

Tiffany kind of blushes. Stealing's not her racket. It's mine.

“Well, I just hope you're not abusing that privilege.” Mom feels the need to turn this into some kind of life lesson.

“Oh, Mom, the guy's a total jerkface. And he's like superrich. Have you seen their house on Sheridan?! Not to mention he told Shelli she's fat.”

Again, Henry: “Their house on Sheridan is worth one million two hundred and seventy-six thousand dollars.”

Silence.

Now Robby: “But who's counting.”

“Mom, the guy totally sucks. You should see how he talks to Shelli, he just abuses her. It's horrible.”

Now the ogre: “Does she work there?”

Now Mom: “Wade—”

“I said, does she
work
there?”

God I hate the ogre. “Yes. She works there.”

“So, he's the boss. He can do whatever he wants.”

Me: “Nice. That's a nice philosophy. What if he wanted to chop her head off or eat her ankles or something . . . could he do that, too?”

Wade shrugs. Everybody else looks at their plate.

Now the doorbell rings. This is a surprise to everyone but Tiffany.

Mom goes to the door and answers in her best Doris Day.

“Good evening, how may I help you?”

But the person on the other side of the door is not in the mood for Doris Day.

“Tiffany! Get out here right now!”

Of course, now the whole table, our whole table of sibling rivalries, little snickers, and the ogre, turns to look.

Tiffany's mom is not in a good mood. She also looks like maybe this is the first time she's got out of bed today. Just looking at her, my heart breaks for Tiffany. As meticulous and sweet and orderly as Tiffany is . . . now I see it's maybe a reaction to whatever her mom has going on at home.

“Get out here right now. C'mon now!”

Tiffany is red with shame. God, I wish I could take this from her. And all of us are instantly on Tiffany's side. I can feel it. The whole family, who were so annoyed we had to have this stupid
Leave It to Beaver
dinner . . . well, now we are ready to take Tiffany in as our own.

Come live with us, Tiffany. What's one more? Even the ogre is less ogre-fied. His spine is up. He wants to help. But like all of us, he is helpless.

Mom tries to make it better.

“Would you like to come in for dinner, there's plenty of—”

“Lady, I can take care of my own.”

Mom nods. I can tell she's calculating. What can she do? Can she do anything?

“You think I can't take care of my own?”

“No. No. I don't think that. I just thought maybe you might—”

“Well, you thought wrong, lady. C'MON now, Tiffany, I ain't sayin' it again!”

Tiffany ducks out of the dining room and down the stairs and to her mother. Her mother, who moves her, not gently, behind her. We all stare.

“Please, we would love to—”

“Good night.” And with that, Tiffany, in her white ankle socks and cute navy skirt, is gone. Back to that cruddy little stucco apartment complex with that just-out-of-bed mom, and the rest of us are just sitting there, struck dumb.

There is a long silence.

Mom comes to the table and starts collecting the plates. Lizzie and Neener look at me. Lizzie does the talking.

“Hey, Anika. That sucks. We didn't know.”

“Neither did I, really.”

Beat.

Now Neener: “Poor Tiffany.”

Now Henry: “I thought she was beautiful.”

Silence. Okay, if you were looking for the quietest, weirdest silence in the USA . . . you found it. Right here in this dining room between the oak dining cupboard and the cedar breakfast nook.

Now Robby just starts chuckling. “Well, okay, there you have it.”

Now Lizzie and Neener start making funny noises, not a catcall exactly, more like “Ooooo, Henry's in looooooove . . .”

And now it's too much for the ogre.

“DON'T. Don't even think about it, Henry!” He's pointing his finger.

Of course, this makes Lizzie and Neener lose it completely, they are giggling and teasing and snickering it up. Robby's clearing his plate with a smile on his face and Henry is turning the color of a lobster.

“You guys are idiots.” Henry clears his plate, shaking his head. “I swear, if I don't get into Harvard I'm going to jump off a bridge.” He walks back to his room, annoyed.

“Yeah, a loooooove bridge.” Brilliant comment, courtesy of Neener.

The ogre rolls his eyes, gets up, and lumbers back to his room, where he will lie down on his water bed and blast
Wheel of Fortune
, then
The
Tonight Show
, then the late-night news.

I say it. “What in the world is a love bridge?”

 

Mom is just putting away the leftovers. She looks at me, over the Tupperware. She doesn't have to say anything. She just gives me the universal look for “We tried.”

We tried what? To have dinner with a black person? To pretend we weren't just a household of generally crappy people? We tried to be less self-involved. We tried to look up from our dumb obsessions and notice other people. We tried to be open, for once. We tried not to be just another vaguely racist family. We tried to be enlightened. We tried to be good.

We tried to be all of the things . . . we are not.

twenty-seven

T
oday at the Bunza Hut I'm in charge of putting up the Halloween decorations. There're two skeletons, one for each door, and a bunch of pumpkins that I'm assuming will be doing double duty for Thanksgiving. Right now they have faces on them.

Shelli is behind the counter doing her lip liner.

Monday nights are pretty slow because pretty much everybody in Nebraska is addicted to football, thanks to the Cornhuskers, but that translates, of course, to the NFL, so tonight is, basically, a holiday. Sure, people call in big orders to take home and eat in their family rooms, rec rooms, and man caves while they watch the game with the guys but, pretty much, once the game starts, it might as well be the end of days.

Tonight's the Bears vs. Packers. Big matchup. Also, this is a game that shall cleave the heart of the city in twain, as basically Lincoln, Nebraska, is chock-full of both Packers fans AND Bears fans. Yeah, Chicago is closer but that's full of a bunch of city slickers and half the people here are related to people from up north in Wisconsin. Why do you think everyone in this state is blond? They might as well call it
Scandinavia 2: Electric Boogaloo
. Or maybe
Germany 2 . . . This Time, Without Nazis!
There are about five last names at my school: Krauss, Hesse, Schnittgrund, Schroeder, and Berger. It is not unusual to have an uncle named Ingmar.

If you care what I think, I'm a Packers fan. Sorry, everyone else in the world. But really that is just me feeling sorry for you for not being a Packers fan.

These skeletons are not easy to get up. First of all, they're too heavy for this Scotch tape and second of all, these freezing cold glass doors don't seem to want to have anything taped to them. Shelli is not helping.

“I think you should dump that Logan guy.”

Shelli always has a way with words.

“How can I dump him? I'm not even going out with him.”

“Seriously. What if Becky finds out?”

“Whatever. Wait. How's she gonna find out?”

“I dunno.”

“Did you tell her?”

“What? No.”

“Shelli, seriously . . . did you tell her?”

“No . . . I didn't.”

“Well, don't. Even if she asks or anything.”

“I know, I know.”

“Can you help me with these stupid skeletons? They won't stay up.”

Shelli sighs and comes over, pocketing her lip liner.

So there we are hanging these spooky but not too spooky skeletons on the ice-cold door when it happens.

“Oh my God.”

“What?”

“Anika. Oh. My. God.”

“Jesus. What?”

“Turn around.”

“Seriously. You're scaring me.”

“Turn. A. Round.”

And so I do. And that's when I see it.

Jared Kline is getting out of his Jeep and walking straight into the Bunza Hut, straight for the door, straight toward us.

“Jesus. Mary. And Joseph. Whaddawedo whaddawedo?!”

“Act cool. Act cool.”

Shelli is quivering behind me and I'm not so sure-footed myself.

Jared sees us looking and gives a little wave. Barely a wave. More like a nod from his hand.

The door opens.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

Shelli watches in silence as Jared keeps his eyes on me. Her fingernails are bearing into my arms like mini-knives made of the letter
C
.

“Busy night?”

“Yeah, um . . . I guess everyone's watching the game, so . . .”

“I guess that makes me lucky a little.”

Shelli is basically stabbing my arm now with her fingernails.

“So . . . you don't like football . . . ?”

“It's okay.” Shrug.

This makes Jared the only guy in Nebraska who doesn't worship at the altar of the pigskin.

“What about you?”

“I dunno. It's fun sometimes, I guess.”

“A-ha! Lemme guess . . . you're a Packers fan.”

“What . . . how did you know?” I can't help but smile now. I'm busted but Jared is such a stone-cold fox maybe I'm just delirious.

“Because it's kinda like old-school. They're like an old-school team.”

“Okay. You got me.”

“Do I?”

He's smiling now. This guy is good. He really knows how to make a girl blush.

Shelli elbows me, not so subtle.

“Oh, this is my friend Shelli.”

“Hi Shelli.”

“Hiii . . .”

Shelli says hi in a really weird way. It's like if you tried to make a deflated balloon speak.

“So, can I order some food or . . . is this just a Halloween decorating operation?”

“Ha-ha, very funny.”

And with that we leave Shelli quivering by the door with the skeletons. Now, I'm behind the cash register, kind of wishing I came from one of those households where you didn't have to work. Like Jared.

“You look cute in your little uniform.”

Did he read my mind or something?

“Yeah? You don't think I look like an Easter egg?”

“No. I think you look like I should be asking you to marry me.”

CRASH!

That was too much for Shelli. She dropped the skeleton, the box of decorations, and the tape. She looks up, mortified. Jared nods, smiling.

“I see this is a dangerous workplace.”

“Yeah. Okay, so . . . French fries, or maybe . . . ?”

“I'd like a cheese Bunza. French fries. A Dr Pepper—”

“Oh, you're a Pepper?”

“Yeah. I'm a Pepper. Wouldn't you like to be a Pepper, too?”

I can't help but laugh at this guy. He's actually funny. Kind of a surprise. I thought maybe he'd just be some hot lug-head jerk. But this? This is unfair.

“And a shake.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. A shake. Instead of the Dr Pepper. Oh . . . and you. I'd like a date with you. Saturday night.”

Holy. Um. Shit.

“That's not really on the menu or whatever.”

“I know. That was stupid. I was trying to be clever.”

Shelli just so happens to be hanging those decorations closer and closer.

He whispers, “I think your friend is spying on us.”

“Well, obviously. You look like a criminal.”

He smiles.

“C'mon. Seriously. You're going out with me. Saturday night.”

“What? I can't. I've never even been on a date. Like, I don't even know if my parents will let me.”

“What if I talk to them? What if I ask them? What if I come over and respectfully ask your father—”

“He's not my father. He's my stepdad.”

“Respectfully ask your stepdad, and your mom, for your hand in a date.”

“Oh my God, you're crazy.”

But I'm smiling. Mostly I can't even believe this is happening. If Becky were here she would die.

“I think my friend Becky likes you actually . . .”

“Your friend Becky is a horrible person who probably drinks the blood of small children for breakfast.”

“Wow. That's fairly accurate.”

Shelli is peering out from behind a pumpkin. Her eyes are the size of the pumpkin.