Stuck in the 70's (2 page)

“I d idn’t.” He blushes, b ig-t ime. “That’s not. What I. That’s not what I meant.”

Sure he d idn’t. I may not know much, but I know guys. I shove the bathroom door closed, leaving him out in the hall.

But I don’t come out of the hallucination, and Jake d oesn’t rescue me. So I put on the fugly shirt and make my way to Tyler’s room. He’s sitting on his twin bed with the light on.

“I d on’t want to rap or whatever,” I tell him. “Can I just sleep this off and find my way home when it gets light out?”

“Sure.” He pats his bed.

I stay in the doorway. “ We’re not sharing your bed.”

He sighs. “ I’ll get a blanket and sleep on the floor.”

So I lie on Tyler’s bed with my face to the wall, hoping this dude w on’t turn out to be a mass murderer or something, though I doubt murderers let their victims borrow their clothes. I want to sleep, but I can’t.
How did I get here?
In this boy’s house, in between these scratchy, cheap sheets. I bet the thread count of these sheets is barely in the triple digits. And I’m not used to wearing a T-shirt to bed. It’s nowhere near as comfortable as silk.

I close my eyes and try to figure out how this happened. I was late to school yesterday, I know that much. Blame it on my hair. After a major effort of drying, moussing, and combing, it still looked scraggly and wild. A bad hair day is always a sign that the next t wenty-f our hours will suck.

So, yesterday morning. Nothing too bizarre happened. School was its usual bore. While my teachers droned, I wrote a bunch of lists. M ust-h aves: black cashmere sweater, more thongs, a purse like in this month’s
Vogue
. To-do list: pedicure, new cell phone ringer, eyebrows, my birthday party invites.

Things got more interesting at lunchtime when I drove to Jake’s house. I ate too much pizza there. Two monster slices of sausage and olive, before Jake started kissing me at the kitchen counter.

Is that why I feel so sick? From all the meat and cheese and carbs in me? Not just from the booze?

Jake looted his parents’ champagne from the fridge. He said it was, like, three years old. Obviously, his rentalswon’t miss it.

We got a couple of glasses and took everything upstairs. Jake made a toast to fantastic sex, which I thought was kind of tacky, besides being wishful thinking. But then we got naked and got in the tub and fooled around. I never did it in a J acuzzi b ath before. Can’t say I was particularly impressed. Though the Jacuzzi itself was nice. Especially compared to the little tub I awoke in tonight.

Jake and I were still in the Jacuzzi when the doorbell rang, and kept on ringing, like, forever.

Jake went, “What the hell?” He got out, threw on the only decent-size towel in the bathroom, and headed for the front door.

Only a little hand towel remained for me. I’m thin, but not that thin. So I poured myself another glass of champagne and lounged in the tub.

Jake came back upstairs, h alf-s taggering from the champagne /sex combo, but still hot. Jake Robbins probably has the best legs of any guy in the senior class. Long, muscular, hairy but not g orilla-h airy. He stood beside the Jacuzzi, ogling my boobs as I sipped the champagne. “This lady Mariel’s downstairs, asking for you. She’s all pissed off,” he said. “I pretended like I didn’t know you, but she recognizes your Jag out front.”

I rolled my eyes. I c ouldn’t believe she drove around looking for my car. She’s always after me. None of our old housekeepers cared what I did.

I said to Jake, “It’s just our housekeeper. No biggie. Tell her I ’ll be home in an hour or so.”

But a minute later Mariel stomped upstairs and threw open the bathroom door. She d idn’t even pause when she saw me naked. “What you do? The school call look for you,” she said.

“Do you mind?” I sank my body into the bubbly water. “My mother i sn’t paying you to be a damn detective.”

She crossed her arms. An attempt to look tough, I guess. Which went nowhere, since Mariel is shrimpy and pudgy and barely speaks English. “I am not pay so much to put up with you, crazy girl.”

In her barely literate way, she’s right. I feel bad for her, with her broken English and cheap clothes, and badly drawn dragonfly tattoo on her wrist, and total lack of job options, obviously, since she has to work for my mom.

None of the other housekeepers lasted as long as Mariel, and she’s only been with us about a year and a half. There were lots of them before her. Anita, Rosa, Guttermouth Gloria, what’sherface who stole, and what’shername who I made cry. My mom should start shelling out more money, like six figures, so she can keep someone around me for a change.

Plus, even with all her stomping around, I think Mariel really likes me for some dumb reason. I could be wrong. She could be faking it for the sake of the job. My own mother d oesn’t want to hang with me, so why would Mariel?

I looked past her and said, “Get me a towel, Jake.”

He stood in the hallway, still half-n aked, peeking in on us. All guys love a girlfight.

“Big and fluffy. Please.”

He licked his lips, then walked down the hall.

Mariel was still scowling. “Hurry and put on the clothes and come to home. Is no good what you do. Your mother got to be mad.”

“You better not tell her,” I said. “ She’ll blame you for not watching me close enough, and s he’ll look for another housekeeper or whatever, and y ou’ll be out of a job.”

“Loca!”
Mariel shouted,
loca
being the first of, like, ten Spanish insults she hurled at me as I sat in the bathtub. I knew exactly what they meant, thanks especially to Guttermouth Gloria. I yelled right back at Mariel in Spanish and Spanglish, louder and dirtier. One good thing about Mom pawning me off to housekeepers all my life is that I can speak Spanish.

But soon I got a headache. Either from her yelling or mine, or maybe it was the champagne. I closed my eyes and put my hand over my forehead, grinning through Mariel’s attack. Coming from her—all, like, five feet of her, in her high voice—it almost sounded cute.

That’s the last thing I remember at Jake’s house. Next thing I knew, I was in a different tub, half as small as the Jacuzzi bath. And a boy was hanging over me, and it w asn’t Jake, and he was claiming it’s 1978.

What the hell was in that champagne?

3

A beautiful girl has
been (1) in my bed for over four hours, (2) wearing my favorite T-shirt, (3)
not
wearing any underwear.

This could be a prank. Am I on
Candid Camera
? I doubt it. Allen Funt might put a girl in someone’s house, but not a naked one.

I wish I had this on camera. Recorded evidence that a beautiful girl spent the night in my room would probably do wonders for my social standing, or lack thereof. No one would believe me otherwise. Except Evie, of course, but she doesn’t count.

The girl stays half under my sheet, propped on one elbow, obviously still braless, and stares at me. She’s gorgeous even in the morning, with her blond hair frizzy and untamed around her face, which is pale as typing paper.

“What if your mom or dad comes in?” she asks while I load my backpack for school.

“They respect my space.”

“What, you mean your parents ignore you too?” She laughs. “I need a toothbrush and a hairbrush. New ones, please. And coffee. I could so use a grande nonfat latte from Starbucks right now.”

“What’s Starbucks?”

“Good one,” she says. “Look, if we’re pretending it’s 1978, we should take your Pinto or Ford station wagon or whatever, and drive up to Seattle and see if you can invest in Starbucks coffee.” She bites her lip. “I’m still in California, aren’t I?”

“Yes, of course. The Valley. But I don’t own a car.”

“You got to be kidding.”

I don’t care how sexy she is, my hospitality is wearing thin. I glance at my digital alarm clock. Eleven minutes until I need to leave.

She sits all the way up in my bed.

Okay, I do care how sexy she is. Her breasts are fantastic. Like ripe grapefruit. Their shape, anyway. I doubt they have a bumpy peel or sour taste. I can’t think about the taste or I’ll lose all semblance of control. But, man, her breasts.

Too bad she can’t stay. I’ll tell my parents and they’ll straighten this out. She’s either a runaway or crazy or both. But she doesn’t look crazy. Certainly not like Linda Blair in
The Exorcist,
or any of the Manson girls.

“Can you peel your eyes off me for a second and get me a new toothbrush, a hairbrush, and coffee?”

I force my gaze away, to my Einstein poster on the wall behind her. What would Einstein do? For one thing, if he wanted to impress a gorgeous girl in his bedroom, he wouldn’t hang a picture of a physicist on his wall.

Think, Tyler, think.
Einstein said kindness, beauty, and truth are the most important things in life. So I should be kind to this beautiful girl, but tell my parents the truth.

I check the digital clock again. Nine more minutes. “I’ll look for a toothbrush and comb.”

“Brush,” she says. “A new brush if you can find one. And I have to drink some coffee.”

“How you doing, kids?” Mom calls from downstairs.

“Fine!” I squeal.

“Kids?” the girl asks.

“Has anyone seen my pocket dictionary?” Heather yells from her room.

“Not me!” I respond in my new, unintentional Mickey Mouse voice. “Your dictionary’s definitely not in my room.”

“You have a sister?”

“Shh. Yes. Let me find those things for you.”

I leave the room and run downstairs. I see Mom in the kitchen, but I can’t bring myself to tell her about the girl I’m hiding, not just yet. With four minutes to spare until official school departure time, I manage a new toothbrush, a used comb rinsed out in the bathroom sink, a can of soda, and a sesame seed bagel.

I race upstairs. She’s still in my bed, the sheet now lowered to the level of her hips. I try to suppress my grin while handing her the bagel. “I couldn’t find coffee.” I give her the soda. “I think this has caffeine.”

“What’s that?”

“Tab.”

She peers at the hot pink label. “That’s a diet soda? Huh.”

She takes a bite from the bagel, scattering crumbs all over my blanket. “I need some underwear at least, and a bra would be nice.”

No bra!
I plead silently. “You could try my sister’s room for, uh, a brassiere. It’s right next to my room. Heather goes to school the same time I do.” I avoid looking at the girl’s chest, which I know will never squeeze into my sister’s bras. Or my mom’s for that matter. Ugh. No boy should have to picture the girl he lusts after in his mother’s brassiere. “Just stay in my room. You can come out after ten forty-five. My mom always has a hairdresser appointment at eleven on Wednesdays, and then lunch with her girlfriends. The house should be free for two and a half hours at least.”

What am I saying? I’m going to leave her alone in my house? What if she steals everything we own? Our nineteen-inch color TV? My Commodore computer, which took me over ninety hours to construct?

“Don’t leave me alone,” she says.

I shake my head. “I have to get to school. I can try to help you afterward.”

“Please.” She stretches her legs beneath my blanket. Holy cow, they’re long.

“Maybe I can leave school early,” I tell her.

“It’s easy. I cut classes all the time.
Caveat emptor
.”

“Buyer beware?”

She shakes her head. “Seize the day.”

“That’s
carpe diem
.”

“Whatever. Just act like you have somewhere important to go. Walk fast through the halls and hold your head high.”

“I’m applying to colleges soon. I can’t afford to get in trouble.”

She bites her lip again. It’s an alluring look for her. But then again, what isn’t?

“Okay, I’ll try to get home early for you,” I say. I mean it.

4

After Tyler leaves,
I snoop around his bedroom like I’m on
Room Raiders
. A girl can learn a lot from the contents of a guy’s room. For instance, Jake has
Penthouse
magazines and baggies of weed in his closet, and condoms hidden under his bed.

Tyler has a poster of Albert Einstein’s hairy head, and another of a very young Robin Williams with a perky brunette girl, captioned
Nanu, Nanu
. The bed I slept in is covered by a
Star Wars
blanket. Under the bed is a teddy bear. Sweet. A neat desk is occupied by a humongous, antique computer. Above it are shelves crammed with books—literary crap, textbooks, and a bunch of books about Einstein:
The Man Behind the Math, Albert Speaks, The Greatest Mind Ever.

Just when I ’ve pegged him for a total dweeb, I see a
Charlie’s Angels
calendar. It’s from the old TV show, not the movie remake, and it’s definitely from 1978. There’s nothing here—no iPod, DVD player, cordless phone—to prove I’m not in 1978.

I’m getting freaked out.

I open and close dresser drawers. He wears briefs. I knew he w asn’t the boxers type.

I move to his closet and leaf through a few boxes containing a baseball card collection. All the cards are really old, nothing later than 1978.

In the back corner of the closet I find a plastic pitcher. It’s heavy. Coins clank inside it. I ’ve hit upon Tyler’s stash.

I c an’t help myself. I pull the lid off the top of the pitcher and shake out the money. I reach in with my fingers to make sure I ’ve gotten all the bills. He has mostly coins, but also a lot of ones folded neatly in half, two fives, and a twenty. T hey’re all old bills with dull faces. Maybe he inherited them from someone. I lay the paper money on the rug and count it. F orty-s ix dollars.

My purse still must be at Jake’s house. Gawd, I hope no one stole it.

I put the coins back in the bank and hold the bills. I w ouldn’t take Tyler’s money unless I absolutely needed it. He got me a towel last night, let me sleep in his bed without attempting a pass, found me that Tab drink and a toothbrush.

But it’s not like I have my own money here. Besides, how do I know Tyler d idn’t steal my purse? Maybe he kidnapped me yesterday and took me to his house. Maybe the nice-guy image is all just an act.