Hard Love (15 page)

I needed your

affection. I didn’t think

it would affect me. You

are asking me to change

without a word.

We have in common trusting

no one. I rely on you

to want the wrong things.

You long for the pain

I can give you.

Won’t be long before I leave

you now we’ve solved

the initial mystery.

Couldn’t we just be

patron saints?

I am invisible if I don’t

tell you. You’ll write my

lines however it suits you.

I haven’t lied; it’s time you

started listening.

Marisol pulled up right at six, parked her mother’s Nissan at the curb, and got out. I’d been ready for forty-five minutes, hiding upstairs so I wouldn’t have to talk to Mom, and reapplying deodorant more than once. I’d finally decided not to mention the poem at all; whatever message I was supposed to get from it (I’m sick of you?) I could reflect on later, or she could bring it up herself. I wasn’t going to beg for trouble tonight. Besides, I didn’t even feel like myself in this stupid penguin costume; I felt like I’d put on some hyperactive guy’s personality too. The minute I saw the car, I headed for the stairs. “Bye, Mom!” I yelled. “See you in the morning.”

“Wait a minute!” She was getting ready to go out to dinner with Al, just tunneling the final earring through her lobe. “I want to at least meet this girl.”

What could I say? She followed me down the stairs. I
was prepared to open the door to the Spider Woman, or even Morticia Addams, but I was not prepared for the woman who was standing on the doorstep.

“I’m here,” Marisol announced without a trace of humor. Except for her voice I might have thought this little apparition was a twin, or merely a hallucination. She was draped in black, or maybe wrapped would be closer to the truth, from the high collar that stopped just under her chin, down both arms to points over her middle finger, around her slim hips and down to her ankles with only a little escape hatch in the back over her heels so she could walk without tripping.

“Wow.”

“It’s from the Forties, they told me.”

“You look like Audrey Hepburn,” I said.

She sniffed. “In what?
Breakfast at Wal-Mart
?” She caught sight of Mom hovering in the background. “Hi.”

“Hello there. Come in for a minute,” Mom said, backing up and making way. She kept pulling on the sides of her hairdo as if she was trying to cover her ears.

“Mom, this is Marisol; Marisol, my mother.” I did the intro as fast as possible, figuring to dash out right away, but then I remembered the corsage chilling in the fridge like a head of lettuce. “I’ll be right back,” I said, abandoning them to each other.

“What an elegant dress,” Mom said. “It does look like something Audrey Hepburn would have worn.”

“You think so?” Marisol said. “Audrey probably wouldn’t have worn these boots with it, though.” When I
got back with the orchid, she was sticking her foot backward out of the hem slit to show Mom her old reliable boots, as scuffed up as ever.

I guess Ms. Van Esterhausen wasn’t too sure what to make of the whole outfit. “Well, you don’t really see the shoes anyway under a long skirt,” she said diplomatically.

“Except when I walk,” Marisol pointed out.

I struggled to get the corsage out of its box. “Is this okay? I mean, you don’t mind wearing it, do you?” I held up the orchid.

“Of course she doesn’t mind, you silly!” By now Mom was looking back and forth between the two of us, trying to figure out what was going on. I guess we didn’t seem like your usual junior class twosome.

“It’s nice,” Marisol said, forcing a grin to her lips.

“Now, where are you from, Marisol?” The inquisition had begun.

“Cambridge,” she said.

“Puerto Rico,” I said, weaving the straight pin around the flower stem and biting my tongue with the effort.

“He means originally,” Marisol explained, flinching as the pin grazed her skin. The orchid’s head flopped to one side.

“Isn’t that interesting?” Mom said. I guess she was too confused by that answer to ask anything else.

“Shit!” I plunged the pin into my own fat thumb.

“Oh here, let me pin Marisol’s corsage on—you go look in the mirror and get your boutonniere in place,” Mom said. It wasn’t until I’d handed her the corsage and dutifully
marched into the bathroom that it hit me; Mom could pin the flower on Marisol, but she couldn’t do it for me. I’m not sure how long I stood there staring at myself in the mirror, trying to see if it was visible, the thing that was so repulsive about me my own mother couldn’t bear to come in contact with it.

“We’d better go,” Marisol called out.

I got the dark red rose pinned on in one try, then walked right past them both toward the front door. “I’m ready.”

“It’s too bad I don’t have any film in the camera to take a picture,” Mom said.

“Oh, that would be too much to expect,” I said, grabbing Marisol’s black elbow and propelling us down the path toward the car. The material was slippery under my hand. Right. Another person I just couldn’t grasp.

By the time we crawled into the car, Mom had already closed the front door. No nostalgic waving from the porch for her. She was on to more important things.

Marisol started the car. “What’s the matter? You mad your mother didn’t take a picture of us?”

I had to laugh. “A picture? She hasn’t taken a picture of me since I was a little kid.”

“Really?”

“That’s nothing.” I shook my head. “She hasn’t even …” My voice got clotted all of a sudden. I’d never said it out loud, never told anybody, and it seemed like I couldn’t. I shook my head again.

“She hasn’t even what? What were you going to say?”

I cleared my throat. “Hasn’t touched me. Not since I was ten.”

“Hasn’t touched you? What do you mean? She doesn’t hug you?”

“Doesn’t let any part of her body come in contact with any part of mine. Like with the boutonniere. She’d never be able to pin it on me. But she could touch you without a problem. She touches her new boyfriend. It’s just me. She’s crazy.”

“That’s awful, Gio!” Marisol took her eyes off the road to find mine, but I looked out the window. “I’ve never heard of anything like that.”

“You haven’t?”

“Of course not. She’s your
mother
!”

“I know. I wrote her a letter.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. I won’t give it to her though. It’s too mean.”

“It’s good you wrote it, though. It helps, don’t you think?”

I shrugged. “I guess. I wrote one to my dad, too. Possibly even meaner.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this stuff before?”

“I don’t think about it that much.”

“Well, it certainly explains a lot, doesn’t it?”

I snickered. “You mean it explains why I’m so crazy?”

“You’re not crazy. Don’t let her
make
you crazy! You can’t let her!” Marisol demanded. I couldn’t promise. I couldn’t really talk about it anymore either. Not if I wanted to arrive at this prom in one psychological piece.

We didn’t say anything else until we got to Emily’s house. I wondered if Marisol was thinking about the poem she’d sent me. Whether it was too mean too. (It was.)

Brian and Emily were already outside the house posing for pictures when we drove up. Brian’s mother was there with both of Emily’s parents, recording every moment of our glorious departure.

Before we got out of the car, Marisol said, “They do know about me, don’t they?”

Here it goes. “I meant to tell them, but—”

“They think I’m your girlfriend?” Her voice rose in surprise.

“You don’t have to act like my girlfriend. I don’t expect you to.”

“I thought the idea of this was to be funny, to sort of goof on the whole thing …”

“I didn’t say that.” What
was
the idea anyway?

“Well, give me a clue here. Who am I supposed to
be
, anyway?”

“Yourself! Look, I’ll tell them right now if you want. ‘Marisol is a lesbian. She has no interest in me whatsoever. This whole thing is a farce.’ Okay?” I could feel anger heating up my face, but who was I mad at?

“Calm down, for God’s sake. You’re a mess tonight.” We both stared out the window at the yellow ranch house across the street, a kid on a tricycle. Lucky kid: He had years before he’d have to deal with this prom crap. “You don’t have to say anything
now
. Let’s see how it goes. I won’t lie, though—you know that.”

Before I could respond, the passenger-side door was ripped open by Mrs. Cookson, Brian’s mother.

“Here you are! Come on out! Don’t be shy! We want to see you!” She was mercilessly enthusiastic. We had no choice.

No sooner had we closed the car doors than Emily’s father turned the camcorder on us. “Hey, you two. Walk over here.” The group was assembled in front of a big salmon-colored rhododendron bush. “Smile! Wave!” Mr. Prine directed as he backed across the lawn. I felt ridiculous. Who gets out of a car smiling and waving?

“Hey, John!” Brian yelled, though his eyes were quite busy taking in Marisol.

John. How could I have forgotten about
that
little problem?

While Mrs. Prine arranged us in front of the shrubbery, I introduced everybody. Emily was dressed to look as entirely opposite of Marisol as possible: short, strapless, and all in white except for Brian’s pig-pink roses, which were fastened to her wrist like a decorative growth.

“I
love
your dress,” Emily said unconvincingly, eyeing the booted hemline. Marisol smiled, but did not return the compliment.

After a beat or two she said, “It takes a good complexion to be able to wear white.”

“Thanks!” Emily said, convinced she had the good complexion it took.

“So, here’s the mystery woman,” Brian said, winking at Marisol. You had to wonder how this could be the same
guy who, a few short months ago, would have swallowed his tongue standing next to somebody who looked like Marisol.

“Gio hasn’t told me much about you either.”

“Gio?” Brian looked at me quizzically. “You call John Gio?”

She looked at me.

“The thing is, when we met—” I started.

“I call him that—” she interrupted.

“It’s kind of a —” I tried again.

“Nickname,” Marisol said quietly. And I knew I’d have to pay for the lies sometime, mine and hers, small and white though they were.

“The four of you look over here now,” Mrs. Prine ordered. We spent the next ten minutes taking posing directions from both mothers: boys in back, girls in front; everybody in a line; each couple separately; the boys alone; the girls together. (That one was a hoot: tiny Marisol stood on the steps in back of robust Emily like an evil spirit perched on her shoulder or a bad conscience getting ready to whisper.)

I was almost relieved to see the limousine pull up. Emily was ecstatic; the whole family seemed to think this was her wedding. She kissed both of her parents and Mrs. Cookson, too, before ducking into the car. I had a feeling she’d be kissing me, too, before the evening was over if I didn’t stay out of her way. The girl was wound up and ready for takeoff.

Marisol had climbed in the car first, always ready to
escape, although in this case I was afraid it might be from the frying pan into the fire.

“Your mother’s crying!” Marisol informed Emily. As the limo pulled away we were treated to the sight of Mrs. Prine leaning on Mrs. Cookson’s shoulder, dissolved, while Mr. Prine captured it all on tape.

“I know. She always cries at stuff like this.”

“Stuff like what?” I asked. “Proms?”

Emily batted at me with her rose-encumbered hand.

“Don’t be such a cynic, John,” Brian said. “For some of us, tonight’s a big deal.” He reached for Emily’s paw and fondled it in his lap.

“Yeah, John, come on,” Marisol said. “You’re always such a cynic.” I could hardly believe she was willing, at this point, to joke. When she was sure the other two weren’t looking, she let her eyeballs roll back in their sockets. Maybe she would forgive me after all.

Chapter Twelve

Marisol only picked at the dinner, chicken stuffed with something green, and “wild rice,” which didn’t look any wilder than any other rice I’d ever seen. She refused the ice cream and asked for a second cup of coffee, which she drank with her back toward me, pretending to watch the dance floor.

The Darlington Yacht Club was supposed to have been transformed by the prom committee into
The Love Boat
, of all the asinine ideas. Fortunately their funding was limited, so the decorations consisted mostly of Mylar waves cut out and taped along the walls. Life preservers had been hung every few yards with the markered title “H.M.S. Darlington” curving around the top. Green and blue helium balloons were anchored to the middle of each table by a brick wrapped in blue tissue paper, and crepe paper “bon voyage” streamers hung from the rafters, as though we’d just taken off on our ocean crossing.

There were six people at our table, the four of us and some couple I’d never seen before who must have been such losers they had
no
friends to sit with. Or maybe it was just that they were so tight with each other they never bothered to get to know anybody else. I never imagined sixteen-year-olds could act so married. He opened her napkin for her and reminded her she was allergic to cream. She sampled his salad dressing, then asked the waiter to bring him a clean fork. They were so interested in each other’s eating habits, I expected one of them to cut up the other’s meat.