Stuck in the 70's (9 page)

“This might interest someone who cared about being popular,” Evie says.

“Like me.” I take a big bite of my bologna sandwich.

Shay clears her throat. “The list of what not to say: One, I like my classes. Two, my parents are cool. Three, I’m not into music. Four, I can’t go because I have to study. And five, personality is more important than looks. Got it?” She doesn’t wait for a response. “And don’t gobble down your food like that, Tyler. It’s disgusting.”

I swallow the sandwich remnants.

“What if you actually like your classes?” Evie asks.

“Don’t use the word
actually
. Reeks of geek.”

I open the bag of M&Ms I bought from the school vending machine. “Thanks, Shay.”

“My classes are more important to me than popularity,” Evie says. “Actually.”

Shay takes a few M&Ms. “What if I allow you to say you like one class?”

“
Allow
us? Who died and left you queen?” Evie says.

“You’re allowed to like shop class.”

“The only class I ever liked was shop class,” I say in a fake, deep voice.

“Good!” Shay exclaims.

Across the table, Evie shakes her head. “You hated shop class. You said those two enormous wrestlers kept threatening to stuff you in a wood chipper.”

Shay pours out a handful of M&Ms. “I loved shop class.”

“A girl taking shop class? What school let you do that?” Evie asks. “You mean you worked with saws and welding equipment and such?”

“Don’t say
and such
. Dweeb City,” Shay tells her.

“Hey, foxy lady.”

Ugh. The Dick has arrived. I can’t help stretching my neck up and around so I can glare at him. He’s snuck up behind us, mashing himself against Shay’s back like a sex-crazed dog while his arms dangle near her breasts.

Instead of taking mace out of her purse and dousing him with it, like any sane, self-respecting girl would do, she turns her head and grins. “Hi, handsome.”

“What are you doing at the dork table?”

“Don’t say that,” Shay says weakly before putting more of my M&Ms in her mouth.

Sensible person that I am, who knows the minuscule odds of winning a fight against someone (1) taller, (2) heavier, and (3) meaner than me, I look the other way.

“Let’s blow this Popsicle joint,” The Dick says.

“What?” Shay asks.

“Come with me.”

I assume he’s asking Shay, not me or Evie. Behind me, he’s making some kind of kissing or sucking noise. He must be doing something to Shay’s neck.

What is he doing exactly? Slurping it? I mime sticking a finger down my throat.

Evie mumbles, “Dickhead.”

“Say what?” The Dick stops the vacuum action long enough to ask.

I clear my throat. “Shay is my friend. Treat her with respect.”

The Dick claps his huge hand on my shoulder, like a jungle cat swatting a paw at its prey. I hope that after I’m gone, Shay will appreciate me sacrificing my life for her honor.

He takes his hand off my shoulder and into my bag of M&Ms. “Of course I respect your friend, man.”

“Rick, let’s take that walk.” Shay fishes out another handful of candy.

After they leave, with The Dick’s massive arm around Shay’s thin shoulders, I can’t finish my lunch. Not even my one remaining M&M.

Rick steers me toward
the popular table and introduces me around. There’s Laura, Lori, Lisa, Debby with a y, Debbie P., and Debbie M., along with John, Jeff, Jack, and Mike.

Despite their feathered hair, supersized collars, and love affair with the word “bitchin’,” the girls are a lot like my 2006 friends. They giggle, flip their hair, and suck in their stomachs. The boys have girly, b low-d ried locks and big combs which jut out of their back pockets like penis symbols. But they seem familiar too. They still stare at the girls’ chests and talk about football and parties. No one’s defending their parents’ crappy marriage, or asking me to study physics, or giving me books to read.

I play with Rick’s chest hairs. “Thanks for letting me meet your friends.”

“Thanks for sitting with me.” He puts his big hand on my knee. “John’s having a bitchin’ party Saturday night. Everyone’s going. You want to come?”

“Yes,” I tell him. “Yes, I totally want to come.”

After lunch I have over two hours to kill. I grab the best book I have,
The Great Gatsby,
and walk to the diner I saw out the school bus window. It’s a few blocks away and it looks like a dive, but I’m dying for coffee.

Krasno’s Diner is just as dirty on the inside as on the outside, and that’s saying a lot. The cheap paintings on the walls need dusting, the floors need washing, the fake plants need a trip to the Dumpster, half the booths need bussing, and the counter needs wiping down.

I walk to the back of the diner and sit on faded, cracked vinyl in a booth that smells like mildew. I wait a long time until a fat guy waddles in from the kitchen.

“Do you serve lattes here, by any chance?”

He scowls. “What? We serve anyone with a shirt, shoes, and cash.”

“Never mind. A cup of coffee, please.”

He shakes his head and disappears into the kitchen.

I sit there, like, forever, but that’s all right. I have nowhere to go, a surprisingly interesting old novel to read, and only seven dollars left from Tyler’s stash. What am I going to do for money now?

Duh. It hits me like a slap on the ass. I ’ll get a job. I never had one before, but so what? I never touched chicken gizzards before either, or wore thrift store clothes, or hung with an honors student.

When the fat guy finally brings my coffee, which tastes like crap, I ask if t hey’re hiring.

He looks me up and down. “
You
want to work
here
?”

I point to the b alled-u p napkins and dirty plates on the tables. “You could use my help.”

“Yeah, all right.”

He d oesn’t even ask for ID. I have to fill out a form. I d on’t remember my Social Security and driver’s license numbers or Tyler’s phone number, so I make all of them up.

I can start right away. Bussing tables and washing dishes. Gross.

14

When I come home
from school with Shay and Evie, pull all the magnets off the fridge, and say, “Physics experiment,” Mom’s eyebrows don’t even move a millimeter. I might not be improving in physics, but I’m getting to be a much better liar.

Once we’re in the garage, I tell Shay, “I’ll try to be gentle with the tape.”

“I’ll put the magnets on myself,” she says.

I’m one step ahead of her. “But what about those hard-to-reach spots, like your back?”

“Okay, but I’ll kick your ass if I get hurt again.”

I tape the magnets on Shay’s soft, smooth, perfect back. I close my eyes and relish the moment.

“Aren’t you done yet?” Shay asks.

“He’s done,” Evie says. “Now what?”

I haven’t a clue. Why is Evie insisting on accompanying me for this experiment?

“You want Shay to lean into the station wagon to attempt super-magnetic conduction, right?”

Oh, that’s why Evie’s here. She’s a science whiz. “Super-magnetic conduction. Right.”

Shay presses her body into Mom’s car. The super-magnetic conduction doesn’t work, of course. She scowls at me. “You’re no help at all. The only things that have traveled in your stupid experiments are your hands over my body.”

“Sorry. I thought the electromagnetic waves—”

“What the hell are those?”

“Come to my physics class and find out.”

She untapes the magnets from her arms and throws them on the garage floor. “I told you I’m too dumb for this stuff.”

“I don’t think so at all,” I say.

“I don’t get that electric magnet wave thing you and Evie were talking about.” She puts her hand under her T-shirt and removes the magnets from her stomach. “Do you mean, like, waves in people’s hair or ocean waves or what?”

“Ocean waves. Eureka! Wave simulation in a bathtub!” Tidal forces, ocean waves, could be replicated in a bathtub, generating a whirlpool faster than the speed of light. That must be how Shay got here. I could try to rig a bathroom fan to imitate tidal waves.

“What about ocean waves?” She reaches under her shirt to untape a magnet from her breast.

Wait, Tyler. Do you actually want to send Shay home?

“Tyler, are you thinking of producing a simulation of tidal forces in a bathtub?” Evie asks.

Shay takes the magnets off her long legs. “Tidal forces?” she asks.

“We should work on that idea,” Evie says.

What if the fan actually works, and Shay leaves? You’ll probably never again have such close proximity to a beautiful girl, Tyler. Plus, she promised to help you become popular. Keep Shay here, Tyler, and happy. Keep her mind off going home.

“Yeah,” Shay says. “Work on that tidal forces idea soon, before my birthday. I’ve got a party to plan.”

Suddenly it hits me. “How about we throw you a birthday party, Shay? You could invite your new, popular friends.”

“I don’t plan to be here on my birthday,” she says.

“I know, but just in case.”

“A keg party, right? Not, like, a pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey thing.”

“Of course.” I say this with no idea how I can even buy a keg or what one actually looks like. But at least it might get Shay’s mind off of returning home. For now.

15

I’m a $2.30 an hour
slave, and I look like it. The fat owner of the diner gave me an ugly white apron with a million stains, a rip, and a hole. Mrs. Gray would be shocked.

As I’m wiping a glob of syrup off a booth and hoping my nails w on’t break, Mariel shows up at the restaurant. I mean, a younger Mariel, how she looked t wenty-e ight years ago, which is now. But it’s her. Our housekeeper. Or future one, I guess. Whatever. She’s still short and chubby, and still moves slowly, with her head down. She walks into the kitchen.

What the hell? I stand nearly frozen, leaning against the table and clenching the wet, soapy cloth. Has Mariel come to take me home? Did she figure out the time travel thing? Or did she get stuck in 1978 too? She’s gotten younger here while I’m still seventeen. I c an’t understand it. Of all the people I know in 2006, why is our housekeeper here?

I leave my rag on the skeezy table and follow her into the kitchen. “Mariel?”

She turns around with a puzzled expression and asks who I am, in Spanish.

My heart sinks. I always thought that was just an expression, but it really does sink, at least an inch, enough to hurt inside my chest. “It’s me. Shay. Shay Saunders.”

She gives me a thin, polite smile.

I d on’t go into the
Back to the Future
story. She obviously w ouldn’t believe it. Instead, I tell her in Spanish that I heard there was a girl named Mariel working here.

She shakes my hand. She h asn’t tattooed her wrist yet with that tacky dragonfly.

I should warn her not to do it.

No. She w ouldn’t listen to me.

“Why a ren’t you cleaning?” the fat guy yells, so I shuffle out of the kitchen.

Just my luck. Mariel, the only person I know in 1978 and the only one who cares about me in 2006, has no clue who I am.

After dinner, Shay runs
into my room. “Your mom’s at the market with Heather. I forgot to ask if we have a curfew. I don’t want to upset your parents.”

I can’t help staring at her. I think she’s wearing one of Heather’s dresses, but it’s hardly recognizable now. It’s low-cut and a lot shorter. I point to it. “You know how to sew?”

“Are you kidding? Not me. But I’m okay with scissors and duct tape. I call this the Nasty Heidi look.”

“Wow,” I say like the dork I am.

She laughs. “You know, without the unibrow your eyes seem a lot bigger. Once you get a haircut, I bet you’ll look halfway decent.”

“Thanks, I guess. Wow.”

“You like?” She angles back her shoulders. “So what time’s your curfew?”

“Oh, right.” I turn to my desk, which has computer parts splayed across it. “The subject of a curfew hasn’t really come up. I’ve never actually stayed out that late.”

She shakes her head. “You need a social life like Michael Jackson needs therapy. Like I need a beer.” She heads toward the door. “Later.”

“Where are you going?”

She turns her head and gives me a smoldering look. “To a party, a keg party.”

“I’ll come with you, okay? You’re supposed to help make me popular.”

“Sorry. I’m going as Rick Bowden’s date.”

The Dick. My leg starts shaking. “Does Heather know you did that to her dress? That was her dress, right?”

“Don’t wait up.” She leaves without looking back.

I slam my hand on the desk.

Ow. That was stupid of me.

The phone rings, so I rush to the hallway to answer it. “Hello.”

“Hi, it’s me.”

“Evie. Hey. I was just contemplating finding a bridge to jump off. Because guess where Shay just went? To a party with Rick The Dick. She’s been here a few weeks and she’s already hanging out with the popular people, including my worst enemy. Can you believe it? You and I are in our third year at this school and we’ve never been to one of those parties.”