Garden of Lies (11 page)

Brian crouched beside her, encircling her with his arms. “Screw them all. It doesn’t matter

what they think. All that matters is
you
.”

She lifted her face, wet and swollen with tears. “Do you think it’s true, Bri? Do you think I’m a

... a bastard like Marie’s baby?”

“No, but I wouldn’t care if you were.” He smoothed her hair as she rested her face against his

sweatshirt. It smelled of baby powder and shampoo and his own musky male scent. “Anyway,

what’s wrong with being different? You’re a thousand times smarter than any girl I know.”

“But I’m not pretty.” She realized how coy that sounded, and she quickly added, “And I’m not

fishing for compliments. It’s true.”

“Says who?”

[56] Rose felt prickly heat crawl up her neck, and was grateful he could hardly see her in the

dark. “Well, I’m just not.” She spoke more brusquely than she’d intended. “Anyway, I don’t

care.”

Brian drew back, and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Rose, you
are
pretty.”

“Oh yeah?” she scoffed. “Well, I don’t see anyone else rushing to get a closer look at me.”

“Maybe they would, if you didn’t make it so hard. You’re so sure people won’t like you you’ve

got your chin up before they say one word to you. Hell, Rose, you gotta give people a chance.”

“You mean I should flirt more, like Georgette?”

“Don’t start in on her again, Rose,” Brian warned.

“What did I say?”

“You don’t like her.”

Rose felt as if she were riding the Cyclone at Coney Island. She wanted to stop, but she

couldn’t. There was no way to get off. Deep down, she’d been mad at Brian ever since he first

started going out with Georgette. It was dumb, but she’d somehow felt she was losing him as her

best friend.

“I never said I don’t like her,” Rose countered. “Anyway, it’s not what I think that counts. The

point is that
you
like her. Maybe you even love her. She’s the type boys go after. I suppose you

do
it with Georgette.”

“It’s none of your damn business!” Brian exploded. He pulled away from her with an angry

wrench, throwing himself down onto the cushions.

In the quiet that followed, Rose became aware that her heart was beating very fast.

“I’m sorry, Bri,” Rose said softly, reaching out to touch his arm.

She wasn’t sorry really for not liking Georgette, though. Who could like someone named

Georgette, who looked like a Barbie doll, wore cashmere sweaters, and had more blond hair than

a collie?

“You really have it in for her, don’t you?”

“I only said she reminded me of Lassie.”

“Lassie is a
dog
.”

“So? I happen to like dogs.”

Brian laughed in spite of himself. “Face it, Rose. It wouldn’t [57] matter if she was Grace

Kelly. You just don’t like her because I’m dating her. You and Ma. You’re two of a kind.”

“Your mother!” Rose, furious, jumped to her feet. Smacking her head on the low roof, she was

abruptly and painfully reminded that she’d grown a fair bit since the fourth grade. She sank

down, rubbing her scalp. It didn’t hurt as much as her ego.

His mother. Jesus. That stung. Even if he was only her best friend and not her boyfriend, it hurt

to have him think of her along with his big, soft, and somehow (despite seven kids) sexless

mother.

“For your information, Mr. Smart-pants, I’ve had plenty of experience myself,” she told him.

“And not just kissing.”

“Sure you have,” Brian said matter-of-factly. She could see he was screwing his lips down to

keep from smiling.

She sighed, defeated. It was no use lying. Brian could always see right through her. She

remembered bragging one time that her father had been an admiral in the navy, and had

torpedoed a whole fleet of slant-eyes when he was in the War.

They’d been walking to school, and Brian had stooped to pick up a blackened penny off the

sidewalk. He’d studied it carefully. “Yeah,” he said. “My pop knew him. Said he was a great guy.

He didn’t even have to be an admiral to be a great guy, I’ll bet.” He tucked the penny in his back

pocket, and when he turned to her his face was solemn, the face of someone much older than

twelve. “Rose, where’d you hear that word? Slant-eyes.”

She had stopped skipping beside him, arrested by the cool light in his gray eyes. “From

Nonnie. She says the people who killed my dad were a sneaky bunch of slant-eyed yellow

bastards.”

“Well, don’t say it again, okay? It’s a bad word. Like the ones you see on subway station walls.

You like Bobby Lee, doncha?”

“Sure, I do. He’s nice.” Bobby Lee’s father owned the Mandarin Garden, on Ocean Avenue,

and the Lees lived in their building on the third floor.

“Well, if you say that word you’re calling him one, too. There’s names for people like us, too.

Wop. Guinea. Dago. Mick.”

Rose had felt dirty and ashamed. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

Brian had ruffled her hair. “Aw, Rose, doncha think I know that?”

Now Rose suddenly realized exactly why she detested Brian’s [58] girlfriend. Not because of

anything about
her
really. But because Georgette had crossed some sort of line with Brian. No,

not a line, a wall—a wall that separated kids from grown-ups, the Berlin Wall of sex.

Well, she was sick and tired of being on the other side of that wall, only
imagining
what other

people were doing.

People like Brian (probably) and Marie (definitely).

“Kiss me, Bri,” she said, saying it the way she would have said,
How about a game of Hearts?

“What?”
He sounded as shocked as if she’d suggested he spray-paint a statue of the Blessed

Virgin.

“Just a practice kiss,” she explained. “So I won’t make a complete idiot of myself when it’s the

real thing. You can tell me what I’m doing wrong. Isn’t that what best friends are for?”

“Not exactly.” He didn’t sound shocked anymore, just embarrassed. “But, well ... okay. I

suppose it wouldn’t hurt.”

“Do I sit up or lie down?” she asked, feeling suddenly nervous. Her mouth was dry as

sandpaper. Would Brian notice? Oh well, she decided, what did it matter, if this was just a

practice kiss?

Brian seemed alarmed. “Stay right where you are,” he ordered. “And if a guy ever tells you to

lie down,
don’t,
you hear?”

She closed her eyes and waited. Nothing happened. She opened them to find Brian staring at

her, frowning.

“Not like that. You’re all puckered up. Relax your lips.”

“Do I say ‘cheese’?”

“Not unless you want your picture taken.”

“That’d be nice. A snapshot for my memory album. My first kiss.”

“
Practice
kiss,” he corrected.

Brian leaned close. She could feel his breath against her face, warm and smelling vaguely of

licorice. Then Brian’s lips were moving gently against hers. Rose felt as if she were in an elevator

and it had just shot down three floors.

Something soft and velvety nuzzled her teeth. The tip of Brian’s tongue. She opened her lips

wider, feeling a gush of warmth spill through her guts as he probed the inside of her mouth with

his tongue.

When he pulled back they were both breathing hard. “Brian,” she whispered, as dizzy as that

time they’d sneaked a bottle of Gallo [59] Red Mountain up here and drunk the whole thing. “Oh,

Brian ...”

“God, oh Rose, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” He cupped her face in his hands. She noticed they

were trembling. “I didn’t mean for it to be like that.”

“Kiss me again,” she urged. “Kiss me for real this time.”

This time the kiss didn’t end. He drew her down on the mattress. She felt strangely heavy. And

wet. Down there. As if she were getting her period.
Oh, Mother of Mercy, is this how it started

with Marie and Pete?

Brian moaned, almost as if in pain. “Jesus, Rose.”

His hand moved up to cup her breast. She could feel it, hot and sweaty beneath the starched

cotton of her blouse. She knew it was a sin. A sin, the Sisters had warned, even to touch yourself

like that. But somehow it didn’t feel wrong, not with Brian. The hand on her breast was the same

one that had held hers that first day of school.

Brian was kissing her everywhere, his lips on her throat, her hair. His breath bursting against

her in hot, astonished gasps. He pushed his hand under her blouse, and struggled clumsily to

unhook her bra.

It struck Rose then:
He’s never done it before. He doesn’t know how.

Swept with new tenderness for him, she reached up and un-snapped it for him.

Brian groaned, moving his hips against her.

He stroked her bare breast, and Rose thought she would surely melt with the heat of his hand

there. But she was scared, too. It felt
too
good. Anything that felt this good had to be a sin. She

wriggled to ease her skirt down, and Brian suddenly stiffened, letting out a deep, strangled moan.

Rose felt something damp against her leg. At first she thought, stricken, that he’d somehow wet

himself. Then she realized,
His stuff. The stuff that makes babies.

She felt shame, knowing they had done something terrible, irreversible. She was just like

Marie.

But then the shame faded, and there was only Brian. Holding her tight. Her best friend, her

soul.

He was still for a long time, his face buried against her neck. She could feel his breath in her

hair, a pulse beating wildly in his neck. Rose wanted to stay this way forever.

Finally, he stirred, lifting his head. His long face gleamed in [60] the darkness. Rose saw the

look of misery in his eyes, and pressed a finger lightly to his lips.

“Don’t,” she said. “Don’t say you’re sorry.”

Rose was astonished by what she was feeling, though what exactly that was she couldn’t have

said right then. It blasted through her with the force of a jet, burning away Nonnie’s hateful

words. She felt new, shining, as if she’d been reborn.

When Sister Perpetua described getting the Call, this is how you’re supposed to feel,
she

thought. Except it wasn’t God making her feel this way. It was Brian.

Suddenly, she understood, as if a part of her had aged a dozen years and she were looking back

at herself, at the child she’d been just an hour ago, at all the things she’d felt but been unable to

put a name to.

“I love you,” she said.

“Rose.” He tugged her to him and held her tightly, his words muffled by her hair.

“Something ... happened. I’m not sure exactly what. But I ... I think I meant it. I think I must have

wanted it to happen. God help me, Rose, I think I did.”

It was those last words of his, “God help me,” that stuck in her mind like a thorn. A terrible

thought occurred to her: would God punish her for loving Brian this way? They had committed

adultery, hadn’t they? Sister Perpetua said adultery was any unclean thought or deed. Rose didn’t

feel unclean, but she knew what Sister meant by it. Sex. And that was a sin unless you were

married and did it to make a baby.
Any
kind of sex.

Fear took hold of Rose’s heart. She thought of dreadful things. She wouldn’t get pregnant, but

she could be struck down by a car while crossing the street. Or fall in front of a subway train. Or

—

She stopped; the pressure on her heart was hurting now. Then she realized what the very
worst

punishment of all would be.

Losing Brian.

“... but deliver us from evil. Amen.”

Rose completed the last Our Father. Looking up, she saw that it was dark and the church nearly

empty. Her knees ached, and her stomach was growling. It had to be past dinnertime.

[61] She rose stiffly and sidled from the pew, wincing as she genuflected. Then, dipping her

finger in the holy water in the vestibule, and crossing herself, she went outside.

Rose walked the sidewalks quickly in the fading light. Clouds had formed overhead, and it was

starting to rain. Fat tepid droplets broke against her face.

Chin tucked against her collar, she hurried down Coney Island Avenue. This time of the

evening the street reminded her of a boardwalk closed for the winter. Striped awnings folded

back, heavy metal shutters or accordion gates drawn across storefronts. Even the pretzel man had

left his corner. She glimpsed the back of his black coat flapping as he trotted across the street,

pushing his cart.

Still, the avenue teemed with life. Car horns blaring, people scurrying to get out of the rain.

Rose heard a burly trucker bellow to the driver of a Plymouth who was kissing his tail and

honking like crazy, “Aaaayyyy, mistah, I’ll ram ya fuckin’ front end up ya nose.”

She quickened her step. Loose rubbish—leaves of newspaper, bits of Styrofoam, straw

wrappers, empty cigarette packs—blew across her path. She felt lonelier than any other time she

could think of.

She hadn’t seen Brian since that night on the roof, a week ago. He was avoiding her. Why?

Was he sorry about what had happened? Too embarrassed to face her?

Guilt gnawed at her.
It’s my fault, I made him kiss me. I led him into sin, just like Eve did with

Adam.

Was this to be God’s punishment ... taking Brian away from her?

Oh please, God, please, I’ll do anything if you give him back. I’ll give up meat every day of the