Read Love and Leftovers Online
Authors: Sarah Tregay
Love and Leftovers (11 page)
and Hershey’s Special Dark,
J.D. follows my directions,
turning
right at the stoplight,
left at the Y,
and left down a gravel lane.
With the spare key,
I open the door to the summerhouse,
where we sit cross-legged on the floor
and breathe a fire to life in the potbellied stove.
Waiting for coals,
J.D. asks me about Idaho,
what it looks like and how much it snows.
I ask him what J.D. stands for
and if he prefers the nickname
to the full-blown one like I do.
He asks me about my friends
and what we do for fun.
I ask him about Conner
and how long they’ve known each other.
He asks about Katie
and if I like manga, too.
We toast marshmallows on barbecue skewers,
sandwich the molten sugar
between two crackers and a square of chocolate,
and eat them in slow motion
to savor the sweetness.
It may have been me
reaching to wipe chocolate
from the corner of his mouth.
It may have been him
kissing marshmallow goo
from my sticky sweet fingers.
It might have been me
wondering if his lips were sweeter
than marshmallows and chocolate.
It might have been him
wondering what it’d feel like
to touch the skin under my shirt.
All I know is
chocolate and marshmallows
weren’t the only things melting
in the heat of the coals.
I’m writing Linus an email
to make us
just friends.
But it’s so mean
(to dump him via email).
I can’t hit Send.
share secret smiles
over Styrofoam cups of hot coffee,
in the halls between classes,
over ordinary cafeteria trays,
when Conner isn’t watching.
Friday night, J.D. and I
and some other kids
snuck into a frat party.
I thought they’d kick us out
because we weren’t college students,
but J.D. said the Greeks were open
to showing everyone a good time.
Inside the floor pulsed with bass.
The sound waves made me seasick
as they rolled through my body.
I liked the woozy feeling
because I could act tipsy
while drinking Diet Coke.
Because J.D. doesn’t dance,
I was nestled deep within his embrace,
swaying to the music
when some girl shrieked,
“YOU’RE DANCING WITH MY BOYFRIEND!”
In the Aftermath of Operation Girlfriend Defreak
J.D. brings me
two jelly doughnuts
and a large cuppa Dunkin’
on Saturday morning.
“Maybe I should have told you
I had a sorta girlfriend.”
“No biggie.
I have a boyfriend.”
“Huh?”
J.D. and I have so much to explain
to each other,
to ourselves,
that our jog takes us
all the way
to the summerhouse
before
we begin to understand
each other,
ourselves.
“She lives in the North Country,”
he tells me,
as if northern New Hampshire
is a territory yet to be accepted
into the union.
“We met over the summer,
where we worked as junior counselors
at a soccer summer camp.
It should have been a summer fling,
but because we had sex,
I couldn’t bring myself to
break it off.
No official end.
No official ‘let’s be friends.’
So, technically,
she’s still my girlfriend.”
“Linus and I,” I explain,
“have been friends since junior high
and more-than-friends since April.
I’ve been meaning to ask him
if we can go back to being just friends.
But, he’s kinda emo-sensitive,
and I know it’d really crush him.”
J.D. and I sit on the rocks
and watch the tide recede.
I admit into the silence
that I don’t really know
what to do about
my relationship with Linus,
because it isn’t all chocolate-covered strawberries dipped
in whipped cream
and there certainly weren’t any misplaced back rubs.
“Linus?” J.D. asks.
I tell J.D. about
Linus’s three older brothers
and how they picked on him
without mercy,
christening him
with the name
of the
Peanuts
character
he most resembled
when he was four.
J.D. and I share more secrets
as we warm our aching muscles
in front of the potbellied stove.
He had sex with Megan three times.
Me and Linus none at all.
“Never?” he asks.
“Nope.”
“You wanted to?”
“Yeah.”
Upon hearing this, J.D. takes his shirt off
and tells me that I can do whatever I want.
Except all I can think of
is his poor, unglued girlfriend
who had sex
three times.
But that night, alone in bed
I let my dream fingers
trace every muscle—
each rise and valley—
on J.D.’s beautiful torso.
I let my dream eyes
connect the dots between the freckles
that spill over his shoulders
as if he stood in pink lemonade rain.
I can almost taste
his hard-earned sweat
salty and masculine
on my dream tongue.
Kissing as a Recreational Sport
After J.D. and I
firmly establish
that we are otherwise engaged,
we find ourselves
sequestered in the summerhouse
every afternoon after school,
building little fires,
and kissing until our lips are chapped
and my face has rug burns
from the stubble on his chin.
Answering Machine Message from Dad
Charlene, I got your message.
Sorry my phone was off. I was at work.
Yes, we can talk about Marcie.
Mom calls Dad back
late at night.
And since we only have one phone
I can’t listen in on the other line.
Her voice is quiet.
And I can’t quite hear
what she is telling him
about me.
Ignoring my mother
isn’t helping.
Even when I’m not there,
where I can’t see
her sad tired eyes
her thin petite frame
her messy curly hair
where I can’t smell
her toast
her coffee
her unwashed blankets
where I can’t hear
her snores
her fingers tapping the keyboard
her silence
where I can’t feel
her cool hand in mine
her warm embrace
her pain
I still remember.
Thinking back,
I remember a time or two,
(maybe three)
when Mommy shut herself
into the bedroom.
Daddy would tell me to play quietly.
“Sh,” he’d say. “Mommy’s sleeping.”
But he’d let me help make her toast
and fresh-squeezed orange juice.
We’d make up a tray
(just like for breakfast in bed)
even though it was
the middle of the afternoon.
And Daddy would always put
two pills in a little bowl
next to the glass of orange juice.
We’d sit on the bed
in the darkened room,
quiet while Mommy
tried to smile.
It helps if I imagine
that depression is like the flu,
or if I pretend that she has cramps
and can’t possibly get out of bed.
I bring her orange juice,
chicken noodle soup,
One A Day vitamins.
I tell her about my day,
my grades in biology,
that Gigi had called.
I give her every opportunity
to tell me what she is telling Dad,
but she remains silent.
I bundle her up in G’pa’s bomber jacket
and take her to the deli for pitas,
to Wildcat’s for pizza,
and to the sit-down place for salad.
I wait for her to sip her coffee,
to finish her food,
to thank me and smile.
I drag Mom out for breakfast
at one in the afternoon
while our clothes spin dry.
J.D. comes in with two guys from school
and wearing a mint-green T-shirt,
looking as edible as ice cream.
They must have ordered soup
because their table is piled deep
with packages of crackers.
I steal glances his way,
watching him make a saltine and cream cheese sandwich
and put the whole thing in his mouth.
I flush pink when he smiles at me
even though he has gooey white stuff
stuck in his teeth.
Mom pulls warm, fluffy clothes from the dryer,
trailing socks and unmentionables across the tiles.
I play sweeper picking them up.
“You missed one,”
J.D. says from behind me.
Dangling from his index finger
is a pair of very tiny
black lace
panties.
I snatch them away,
but at the same time
I realize
they aren’t mine.
In fact, there is a Victoria’s Secret
price tag
dangling
from the
dark lace.
J.D. drags me out
on a run, promising me
pine trees and snowflakes.
“Underpants?
You gave me underpants?”
I curse J.D.
He laughs.
He runs faster.
“That’s, like, so not appropriate!”
I chase him down.
He stops.
Hands on his knees, he gasps between laughs,
telling me they were my Christmas present.
“Not funny. My mom was there!”