Love is a Four-Letter Word (5 page)

Benji has rehearsal Tuesdays and Thursdays after school, Saturday mornings, and every other Sunday afternoon. When he’s not at rehearsal it seems like he’s either catching up on his homework or practising his lines. Considering we used to spend almost every waking moment together, it’s been weird adjusting to his new schedule.

A secret part of me is relieved. I don’t think I could handle hearing about how much fun he’s having in the show I should have been in. I thought the disappointment would fade but it’s still there, niggling away like a sad song I just can’t get out of my head. Consequently, I’ve been spending more and more time with Mattie. After receiving many weepy phone calls and I’m Sorry notes written in sparkly pen, I decided to forgive her for the Don’t Tell Clarissa About Benji’s Callback fiasco. I know why she did it, and I can’t really blame her. But even though Mattie can be lots of fun, she doesn’t exactly fill the Benji-shaped hole in my life.

On Thursdays I go home with Mattie and stay for dinner, which works out perfectly because Mom trains at the gym Thursday evening. Mattie’s mom is always waiting for us when we walk in the door. She kisses Mattie on both cheeks and gives me a hug before asking, “What would you girls like for a snack?”

“Oh I’m fine, Cheryl,” I tell her. “I have my Mr. Noodles left over from lunch.”

Cheryl Cohen frowns. “Oh, Clarissa, let me cut you an apple. We don’t eat dehydrated food around here.”

“It’s bad for you,” Mattie adds.

I rip the silver packet and dump the powdery flavour and pieces of dried carrot and onion and beef onto my noodles. “Astronauts eat dehydrated food,” I point out.

“They’re in space,” Mattie says patiently, like she’s talking to an idiot instead of someone who got a higher mark on her last science test that she did. “They don’t have any choice.”

I tip the kettle and pour steaming hot water to the line etched into the cup. “Well, I
do
have a choice and if it’s good enough for an astronaut, then it’s good enough for me.”

Mattie and her mother exchange disgusted glances but have nothing more to say. How can you argue with science?

Most of the time, I drink my milk (there is no pop at the Cohen house), and listen. It’s weird watching another mom and daughter together, but I definitely don’t miss Denise’s third-wheel commentary. At first I worried that maybe I was the third wheel, but I got over that pretty quickly. Mattie and her mom just love having people over, almost as much as they love talking. Mattie tells her mom absolutely everything that happens in school, including who said what, and what so and so was wearing. Sometimes they even try to figure out the motives behind people’s behaviour.

“I’m not surprised that Amanda and Min have been spending so much time together,” Cheryl says. “Amanda has always needed someone to follow and Min is a bit of a queen bee.”

Eventually Mattie runs out of things to report and Cheryl says, “Well I’ll let you two girls get down to your
homework,” as if she’s been keeping us from the joy of long division. “But first, why don’t you pick out a CD that we can listen to while I make dinner?”

By CD she means one of her cheesy compilation albums. Cheryl Cohen has every single “Women & Songs” CD, and apparently nothing else. There must be about ten of them. Mattie takes forever to choose, scanning the song list and eventually narrowing the selection down to two and allowing me to make the final decision. I don’t see what the big deal is. “Women & Songs 1” sounds exactly like “Women & Songs 10.” Normally I would do my homework in front of the TV, but Mattie only watches one hour of TV a day on weekdays. I never thought I would miss all those corny re-runs that Benji makes us watch, but even
Full House
is better than “Women & Songs.”

When I get home, Denise is lounging in a chair, my mother wrapping thick sections of her rusty-coloured hair around a large-barrelled curling iron.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

“Denise has a big date, so I’m giving her the Cosmo blow-out.”

It’s a good thing I’m not chewing any gum, because I would have spit it right into Denise’s hard-earned curls in shock.

“A date?” I repeat. “With who?”

It must be a big date because the Cosmo blow-out — so named because it is the hairstyle they give to every single actress or model who appears on the front of
Cosmo
magazine — is a lot of work, involving hot rollers, two different curling irons, and a lot of hairspray.

Denise whacks me lightly on the arm. I admit my tone may have been a tad suspicious. “Dennis.”

It takes me a moment to respond. “Dennis?” I say carefully.

Mom frowns. “Yes, Dennis.”

“Denise is going on a date with a man named Dennis?”

Mom’s lip twitches as it dawns on her just how similar the names Dennis and Denise are. Maybe she hadn’t heard them spoken aloud together. “Yes,” she repeats evenly, in a masterful attempt to hide any amusement. “Denise is going on a date with a man named Dennis.”

I glance at Denise to see if the light bulb had gone off in her head, but she is filing away, squaring off her nails in preparation for her date. With Dennis.

“I met him in line at the grocery store, can you believe it? I guess Oprah was right. You never know when you’re going to meet that certain someone,” Denise says.

“A certain someone named Dennis. Who you, Denise, are going out on a date with.”

Mom shoots me a look but Denise doesn’t seem to pick up on it. “For Pete’s sake, Clarissa,” she asks, “what’s gotten into you? What’s so hard to believe?”

“Nothing, it’s just that —”

“You just can’t imagine someone asking me out? Is that it?”

Well, yes, but that wasn’t the point.

I sigh. When you have to explain the joke it really wasn’t all that funny. I needed an appreciative audience. I need Benji. Why does he have to be at stupid rehearsal all the time?

“Is that a man?”

Benji and I stop dead in our tracks and listen. Downstairs in the Hair Emporium, Mom is talking to someone who does, in fact, sound like a man. Mom only has three male clients: Denise’s brother-in-law Richard, a nervous man who rarely speaks if he can help it; old Mr. Lawford, who looks like he’s pushing one hundred years old; and Benji, of course. None of them sounds like the mystery man. All I can hear is rumbling interrupted by a throaty laugh. What could he possibly be laughing at? My mother is not that funny. Beautiful, yes, but not funny.

“Come on,” I tell Benji. We drop our backpacks and head down the stairs.

“Mom? I’m home.”

“Oh, Clarissa, come on in. I want you to meet Doug.”

Doug. The good egg. My mother’s trainer.

Seated in my mother’s red leather recliner, the cape tied around his neck and barely reaching his thighs, Doug looks like a giant. His legs seem to go on forever, stretched out in front of him and ending in big, yellow workboots with the laces untied. They are suspiciously clean, as if no actual work is done while wearing those boots.

Doug’s hair is damp and falls in longish waves on either
side of his part, no doubt discovered by my mother and her little red comb. He keeps slicking it back, which causes my mom to slap his wrist with her comb, which makes him laugh, and then she laughs. Is my mother flirting?

Doug stands to shake my hand and my suspicions are confirmed; he is officially the tallest man I have ever seen in real life. “Hey there, Clarissa, nice to finally meet you. And let me guess, you must be Benji? The star?”

I only bristle a little as Benji blushes and says, “I’m not the star, I’m just the Lion.”

“And what trouble did you two get up to today?” Doug asks, easing himself back onto the recliner.

“Math, English, Geography, the usual,” I say evenly.

Doug laughs. “Touché.”

“Doug is finally letting me give him a much-needed trim,” Mom says, rubbing the ends of Doug’s hair between her fingers and making her “yuck, split ends” face.

Doug shrugs. “She wore me down. Plus I’ve been meaning to check out the Hair Emporium. See what all the fuss is about.”

“The fuss!” Mom exclaims. “Well, I hope it lives up to your high standards. When is the last time you had your hair cut, anyway? Prom?”

Doug grins. “Nah, I think it was my sweet sixteen.”

Mom smiles wickedly. “Well, fifty years is long enough, don’t you think?”

Doug laughs long and hard, slapping his thigh. Mom looks very pleased with herself.

“Promise me you won’t buzz it all off,” Doug says. “My hair is my trademark. It’s the source of all my powers.”

My breath catches in my throat. How stupid can you be, making hair jokes in front of a person who just recently lost
her hair? It doesn’t seem to resonate with Mom, who is still grinning away, turning Doug’s head this way and that, visualizing the cut in the mirror.

“Yes, I’m sure if we cut it all off, the female membership at the gym would drop off significantly,” she says dryly.

Benji’s eyes almost fall right out of his skull. We exchange horrified glances. My mother is most definitely flirting. Doug laughs again but this time, if I’m not mistaken, his face turns a little pink.

“Okay, I’ve got it,” Mom says. “Do you trust me?”

“Annie, there isn’t another stylist on the entire planet I’d trust more.”

I have to work hard not to roll my eyes. Doug and Mom are grinning at each other in the mirror. Her hands are resting on his shoulders and she’s leaning forward so they are practically cheek to cheek. Suddenly the salon feels too small for four people.

“Well, it was nice to meet you, Doug. We’ve got some homework to do, so …” I gesture toward the door and start backing out.

Mom doesn’t even look over, but waves in our direction. “Bye kids, there are some donuts in the kitchen if you’re hungry.”

“Donuts?” I repeat. I can’t believe it; they were on the list of foods that Doug himself had outlawed at the beginning of my mom’s marathon training.

“Doug brought them. He knows how much I’ve been missing my Boston creams.”

“Consider it part of your tip,” Doug jokes.

Benji and I head upstairs, their laughter following us all the way into the kitchen. Sure enough, there’s a paper bag with grease stains on the bottom sitting on the counter.

I grab the bag of donuts and step back into my shoes. “Come on,” I say to Benji. “We’re going to your place.”

I should have known something was up when I started to hear Mom laughing into the phone after dinner. I knew it couldn’t be Denise, because Mom always finds things to do while she’s on the phone with her: paint her toenails, pluck her eyebrows, or flip through a magazine. But this person — whoever it was — on the other side of the line had captured her full attention. Plus she told stories that I knew Denise had already heard. Some of them were even about Denise. I listened carefully for any mention of my name, but if she did talk about me, it was in a hushed tone that couldn’t be heard on the other side of the wall that separated our bedrooms.

Now it all made perfect sense.

Once we’re out of earshot, in Benji’s den with the TV on and the donuts between us, I can say what I’m really thinking. “Well. Can you believe that — flirting? At their age?”

“Sure,” Benji says. “Your mom’s beautiful and Doug’s handsome, so yeah. I can believe it.”

“You think he’s handsome?”

Benji looks surprised. “You don’t?”

“I don’t know, his hair is kind of long.”

“Maybe for you, but not for women of a certain age,” Benji points out, adding, “I think it’s nice that your mom has a crush.”

“Ugh, stop!” I cry, covering my ears. “It sounds so wrong! Mothers do not get crushes!”

Benji grins wickedly. “Your mom totally has a crush,” he says, just to torture me.

I shudder at the thought. “There was just so much giggling. Grown women shouldn’t giggle.”

Benji laughs and takes a dainty bite out of a donut.

“What are you doing?” I ask. “Just shove the whole thing in.”

“I can’t,” Benji says, tearing the donut in half and putting part of it back in the bag. “I shouldn’t be eating donuts at all. I have to fit into my Lion costume. It’s already a little tight.”

I roll my eyes. “What is the world coming to? My mom is flirting and you’re on a diet.”

Benji’s eyes shine. “Wait till Mattie finds out. I can almost hear her squealing now.”

Benji was right, of course. Mattie can’t get enough of the idea of my mom and Doug the trainer.

“Don’t you think it’s romantic?” she insists. “A young, single mother is tragically struck with cancer. She beats it — against all odds — and decides to give back to the medical community by participating in a fundraising marathon. And that’s when she meets the man of her dreams, a hot trainer who sees both her inner and outer beauty!”

“You make it sound like a movie,” I complain. I don’t point out that my mom hasn’t exactly beat the odds, not yet.

“I’d go see that movie,” Benji says.

“Me, too!” Mattie gushes. “Except it’s better than a movie, it’s real life!”

“Sandra Bullock could play your mom,” Benji says.

Mattie frowns. “No, her colouring isn’t right.” Benji and Mattie brainstorm actresses to play the role of my mother.

“What about me?” I ask.

“You would play yourself, obviously,” Mattie declares.

Hmm. This movie idea isn’t sounding so bad after all. Can you still be nominated for an Oscar for playing yourself in a movie?

“This is so exciting, when is the last time your mother had a boyfriend?” Mattie asks.

I don’t even have to think about it. “Never.”

Mattie can’t believe it. “Never? Not even once?”

“Not even once,” I confirm.

For ten blissful seconds, Mattie is speechless, trying to fathom how my mother has remained single all these years. My whole life, it’s always been me and Mom and, regrettably, Denise. Men had never entered the picture before. This was unfamiliar territory and I wasn’t sure I liked it. Why now, after all these years?

“That is unbelievable!” Mattie says. “Your mom is so beautiful! And nice! And smart! There must be tons of men who would want to date her. I wonder what happened.”

I shrug. “Maybe she wasn’t interested in anyone.”

“Impossible. Everyone has crushes.” Mattie looks right at me before adding, “Well,
almost
everyone.”

“I used to wish she’d marry my dad,” Benji admits.

Mattie smiles kindly at him but even she knows a lost cause when she sees one. Changing the topic, she concludes, “Well, Doug must be an amazing person. After all these years, he’s teaching her how to feel again.”

I roll my eyes. “My mom
feels
things, she just isn’t gushy like some people.”

Mattie looks pointedly at me. “I guess it runs in the family.” I give her a grade-A glare. Benji looks confused.

“Did I miss something?” he asks.

Mattie sighs. “No,” she says. “Clarissa’s the one who doesn’t get it.”