Nature of Jade (3 page)

"Jade?" Mom calls from upstairs. She's in her bathroom, I'm guessing, judging by the muffled sound of her voice.

"Yeah, it's me."

"How was school?"

"Fine."

"The day went all right?"

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"Uh-huh."

"I got my dress for homecoming," she says. Yeah, you read that right.

My mom has gone to more homecomings than I have--four for four. I went once, with one of my best friends, Michael Jacobs, during a time we thought we liked each other more than friends but didn't really. As vice president of the PTSA, my mother chaperones the dances, which means she goes when I don't. I swear, she's got more pictures taken in front of phony sunsets and palm trees and fake porches than I do (with Mr. Robinson, my math teacher; Mitch Green baum, Booster Club president; Mr. Swenson, P.E., etc.), more corsages pressed between pages of our Webster's dictionary, more shoes dyed to odd colors. She's involved in every other committee and program my school has, too, from fund-raising to tree planting to graduation ceremonies to teacher appreciation days. Most irritating is The Walkabout Program, where "concerned parents" walk the school hallways in between classes to promote safety and good behavior, i.e., to spy. They even wear badges around their necks that read SAS--Safety for All Students. One time, some kid got into the badge drawer with a Magic Marker and swapped all the first and second letters, giving you an idea of how appreciated the program is.

Don't get me wrong. I love my mother, and I feel bad having these mean thoughts. Because Mom, she's one of the few people I can really talk to, who understands me. Sometimes she knows what I'm feeling before I even realize it. And we have a great time together. We make fun of the really bad clothes in the discount stores, and put ugly and embarrassing things into each other's carts when the other person's not looking. We tell

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each other about good books and talk each other into ordering a milk shake with our cheeseburger. But sometimes it just feels like she's this barnacle we learned about in biology. It discards its own body to live inside of a crab (read: me), growing and spreading until it finally takes over the crab's body, stealing its life, reaching its tentacles everywhere, even around its eyes. Well, you get the idea.

"Wanna see?" Mom calls.

"In a sec," I say.

I want to get to my computer. I want to be there if the red-jacket boy happens to come back. I knock on my doorframe three times, which is just this thing I like to do for good luck, then I go in. I log on, and sit down. Then there's a knock at my door.

"What do you think of the color?" Mom asks. Rose-colored taffeta, no sleeves, sash around the middle. The dress actually swishes as she walks. "With the right bra ..."

"It's real nice, Mom." It screams homecoming. Or bridesmaid.

"You don't like it."

"Not for myself, but it's great on you."

She checks herself out in the mirror on the back of my door. She lifts her blond hair up in the back, even though there's not much to lift. She tilts her chin, sucks in her stomach. Something about this makes me sad, the way women with eighties-style permed hair make me sad. The way old ladies in short-shorts make me sad.

"I think it makes me look slimmer," she says. She's always worrying about this--pretty needlessly, because she's average weight. Still, we've got low-fat and "lite" everything, and tons 21

of those magazines with articles like "Swimsuits That Flatter Every Figure" and "Five Minutes a Day to a Tight Tummy." It makes you realize how basically everything we do comes down to a) mating or b) competing for resources. It's just like Animal Planet, only we've got Cover Girl and Victoria's Secret instead of colored feathers and fancy markings, and the violence occurs at the Nordstrom's Half-Yearly Sale.

"You don't have to look slimmer. You're fine."

"God, I'm just glad for fabric with spandex. Just shove in the jiggly parts and zip. Are these considered unhealthy weight issues that'll make your daughter turn anorexic?"

"Nah," I said. "I think they're completely normally abnormal. Besides, you know how I hate throwing up."

"Okay, whew. I can chalk that off my list of concerns."

"Yeah, stick to worrying about me robbing banks."

"Or your drug dealing. I've been thinking that it's something you should quit. I know you like the money, honey, but it's just not right."

I laugh. "You're not going to make me give that up," I faux-groan. This is my favorite version of Mom. The relaxed, watch-romantic-movies-together Mom. The let's-stay-in-our-pj's-all-day Mom.

But suddenly she takes a sharp left turn into the version I'm not so thrilled with. The I-want-more-for-you Mom. I hear it in her voice, which goes up a few octaves. "So? How was school today?" she asks.

"Fine. I told you." I'm trying to keep the edge off of my words, but it's creeping in anyway. "And, no, no one asked me to homecoming."

"Jade. Jeez. I didn't say anything."

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But I know it's what she's really asking. It's in the way she says "So?" As if it can unlock a secret.

"Are you getting your period?" She narrows her eyes.

"No! God. I hate that. I hate when every negative act is blamed on your period." Sometimes bitchiness is just bitchiness, happily unattached to anything hormonal. It should get full credit.

"I'm sorry. I hate that too. It's just . . . You. I want you to have a great year," Mom says.

"I don't even want to go to homecoming. And no, it's not because of anxiety." We'd been mother and daughter long enough that I hear that in her voice too. When you've got a situation like mine, people are always looking at you sideways, trying to figure out what's you and what's the illness, as if there's some distinct line down the center of my body they should see but don't. "It's because of people dancing like they're having sex while you're trying not to feel weird about it and everyone all made up and phoniness and because somewhere inside you're always wishing you were home, eating popcorn and watching TV." In my opinion, dances like that are one of those painful things we all pretend are fun but really aren't.

Mom sighs. Her dress rustles. "I hear you. I do. Wait, what am I saying ? I never even went to a dance when I was your age. But your senior year. It should be fun. It should be one of the happiest in your life."

"You always tell me how much you hated your senior year," I say.

"I hated all of high school," she admits. "I was so glad to get to college, I cannot tell you. Let's just say, I was a late

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bloomer. College, now, that was a good time. College, I was good at. I had friends, went to parties, got good grades--the whole thing. But high school. Oh, my God."

"Ha-ha. You ate lunch in the library."

"Don't remind me. Not that there's anything wrong with the library."

"I don't eat lunch in the library. I'm happy," I say. "Look." I put on a huge, toothy smile. Wiggle my index fingers in the air. "See? Yay, happiness is flowing throughout me."

Mom smiles. "You goof."

"Happy happy, joy joy. Three cheers for late bloomers."

"What do you keep looking at? It feels like you, me, and your computer are having this conversation."

"Nothing." I focus on her. "Just elephants."

"All right. Okay. I'm going to go change." She says this reluctantly, as if getting back into her jeans will change everything back, coach to pumpkin, glass slippers to the big yellow Donald Duck ones we gave her for her birthday and I think she actually hated.

I'm glad when Mom leaves, because I don't want to miss that red jacket. I was so sure he'd be back that I'm bummed when I finally realize I must be wrong. No boy. No anyone, except for the Indian man in charge of the elephants.

I try to do homework--Advanced Placement American Government, Advanced Placement English, Calculus, Spanish, and Biology, which shows why I barely have a life. It's hard to concentrate, though. I keep peeking up, still holding out impossible hope for the nonexistent red jacket.

Another knock--Oliver, this time. You wouldn't believe how many years it took to train that kid to knock. He's ten

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years old, so minus one before he could walk--nine years. See, I'm not in Calculus for nothing.

"What?" I say, and he comes in. I bust up when he comes through the door. I could never quite get over the sight of Oliver in a football uniform. Oliver's kind of small for his age, and he has this narrow face and thoughtful, pointy chin. His hair is a soft blond like Mom's, where mine is black like Dad's. He looks too sweet for football. He is too sweet for football. That's why he's coming to see me.

"Don't laugh," he says. "I hate it. Help me." He holds his helmet under one beefed-up arm, just like you see the real football guys do. He waddles over, sits on my bed.

"Talk to him. Tell him how much you can't stand it." Him, meaning Dad. My father, Bruce DeLuna, is a financial officer for Eddie Bauer, and a bit sports obsessed. To him, there's nothing that can't be cured by a brisk jog or vigorous game of touch football, even anxiety. He had this whole "cure" mapped out for me once, which actually included calisthenics. Dad's the kind of person who thinks he knows "what is what" and how exactly things should be, which means he misses the point about most everything. I've gotten him off my back, though, mainly by using his narrow-minded female stereotyping to my benefit. Shameless, but it's a survival tactic. See, I'm a girl (the "just" hovers somewhere nearby in his mind, you can tell), and even though he constantly reminds me that I should be doing my "cardio," he lets me off the hook on the team-sports thing. He tried me in softball for a while, but I'm one of those wusses that flinch when a baseball flies at my face. A ball hit me in the leg once, and after that, all I could do was crouch and hover and wonder when it was going to happen again. I'm sorry, it's not my idea of a good time to stand alone

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while someone pelts a hard object my way, with basically only a stick and my bad hand-eye coordination for protection.

I know I'm making Dad sound like a dad stereotype, but it's how he is. He loves sports and understands sports, and I see him as viewing the world in this sports-themed way--win/lose, right/wrong, yes/no. The garage needs cleaning: yes. I should buy you your own car: no. You can slack off on your grades every now and then: wrong. Sports are a good idea for girls and mandatory for boys: right.

So I can get off the athletic hook, but Oliver, who is a guy, can't. Even if he hates sports and just wants to play his viola and read his Narnia books, he's constantly signed up for soccer, basketball, Little League, and even the Lil' Dragons karate course in town. I swear, the kid has so many uniforms, I don't remember the last time I saw him in regular clothes.

"You know talking to him doesn't do any good."

"'Being accountable to a team builds character.'" One of Dad's expressions.

"I hate it."

"'There's no 'I' in team.'" "These other guys--they're machines." "'Sports are good practice for life.

You've got to be able to hang tough.'"

"Please, Jade." He's almost crying. I can see fat tears gathering in the corners of his eyes. "He's going to be home any minute to take me to practice. It's so stupid. Guys smashing into each other, shoving each other down. What's the point} The coach calls us men. 'Okay men, in formation.'

We know we're not men. And why? Why are we doing it? I've got homework."

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'"A good athlete makes time for work and sport.'"

"Please. I can't do this. I can't." A tear releases itself, slides down his nose. "What can I do?"

My brother was born when I was seven. I was old enough that I can still remember him as a baby, with his tiny toes like corn kernels and chubby wrists with lines around them, as if a rubber band had been placed there too tightly. Ever since he first grasped my finger and held on (a reflex, I was told, but who cares), I felt a responsibility toward him. He was my brother, which meant I both loved him and wanted to kill him often, but that there was no way I'd ever let anyone else lay a finger on him. "Okay, Oliver. Let me think."

"Hurry."

"Okay, okay." Broken arm, broken leg--too drastic. Run away? Nah, he'd have to come home sometime. "Help me, Jade."

Sick. Yeah. Really sick. Undeniably sick. "Meet me in the bathroom."

"He's gonna be here in five minutes." "Just meet me there."

I hop off my bed, tromp downstairs to the kitchen. Root around in the fridge. Even if we don't have any, I can whip up a batch with some catsup and mayo. But, no, the phony-illness gods are with me. There, behind the milk and the jam and the single dill pickle floating in a huge jar of green juice, is the Thousand Island dressing.

I head up the stairs, and halfway up, I hear the garage door rising. Dad is never late when it comes to taking Oliver to sports practice. Once, I had to drive Oliver to soccer, was ten minutes late, and learned that there had apparently been a misprint

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in the Bible on the Ten Commandments thing: Thou shalt not murder, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not be late to soccer. My father was so pissed, I practically had to get the lightning bolt surgically removed from my back.

I shut the bathroom door behind us. Oliver rises from where he was perched on the edge of the tub, the shower curtain a plastic ocean behind him. "You're going to have to do some groaning, look bad," I say as I unscrew the cap.

"Okay."

I squirt a blob of the dressing down the front of the football uniform. Smear it around. Perfect.

"Oh, gross, it looks like I threw up."

"That's the idea, Tiger."

"It looks so real," Oliver says.

"Smush your bangs up with some hot water. But get a move on. He's coming. Call out for Mom.

You're so sick, remember? Bleh." I hurry. Screw the cap back on. Hide the dressing bottle in a towel.

"You're a genius, Jade," he says.

I smile. Feel a rush of sisterly competence and good will. It makes me happy to help him. He's my brother, after all, and I love the little guy. It's important I stick by him. Your sibling, after all, is the only other person in the world who understands how fucked up your parents made you.