The Bubble Wrap Boy (9 page)

I
didn't dare open my eyes.

Not because I was scared I'd broken something.

No, the fear came from the last thing I saw before the board and I went our separate ways.

I didn't understand where she'd come from or how she'd known—all I knew was that it was definitely Mom towering over me. I could feel the anger radiating from her.

I jumped to my feet quickly, a minuscule part of me hoping that if I played down the fall, she might not see skating as four-wheeled Russian roulette.

One look at Krakatoa erupting from her face, though, told me I was out of luck.

I was about to get a massive bawling out, even by her overpowering standards.

“Charlie Han!” she roared, reducing the whole park to silence in only two words.

“What on EARTH do you think you're doing?”

“Oh, you know, just hanging out…” I ran out of lies before the end of the sentence and changed tack, trying the dutiful-son card. “I didn't hit you, did I? Before that silly little fall…”

“Dude, you didn't touch her,” interrupted Stan from over my shoulder. “You did this crazy Eskimo roll to avoid her. Ballsiest move I've ever seen. Especially without a helmet.”

Mom shot him a look of death, before upping it to one of extermination as she turned back to me.

“What are you doing here?” I asked her. “You were off to bed. You should be there now. You're probably ill. Hallucinating and everything…” I was rambling and knew it.

“Oh, I know what I'm seeing. Though, believe me, I wish I were dreaming. I couldn't sleep. Thought a walk might clear my head. Shows just how wrong you can get things, doesn't it?”

I could see she was trying to keep a lid on her anger but failing. Veins were popping on her neck. She didn't look tired anymore.

“So? Do you want to tell me what's going on?” she hissed.

I felt a crowd start to gather as the others sniffed a family drama at worst, and the sight of blood at best. I half expected to hear a chant of “Fight! Fight! Fight!” swell and engulf us. It didn't, though. They were clearly as terrified as I was.

“Nothing's going on. I'm just hanging out. Skateboarding, that's all it is.”

My best casual voice wasn't cutting it, sounding strangled enough to summon every dog in the park.

“That's all?” she yelled, each word getting sharper. “That's ALL? Are you insane? How long has this been going on, and why on earth didn't you think to tell me?”

I panicked, not sure what the right answer was. Did I lie and say this was the first time I'd tried it? Or claim ignorance and say I'd lost my memory in the fall?

Which answer wouldn't lead me to being humiliated in front of the people I was most desperate to impress?

My brain formulated an elaborate, coincidence-laden lie, but at the last second my mouth betrayed me, spitting out the truth in one lame punctuation-free apology.

“AcoupleofmonthsnowIwantedtotellyoubutIthoughtyoudstopmeandIlovedoingthisandImreallygoodatittoojustasktheotherstheylltellyouthesame.”

It sounded ridiculous, like the apologetic whine of a puppy who'd went on the rug before ripping up his master's sheepskin slippers.

All credibility, all hope, gone. I watched it disappear, so much faster than it had taken to gather.

Mom didn't care about that, though. She didn't want to hear what Dan or Stan thought and, anyway, they were too stunned, or terrified, to tell her.

“So you went behind my back instead, huh? You lied to me, for months. And where did this
thing
come from?” she asked, pointing at my board disdainfully. “Did you steal it?”

For some reason, despite it being my own lies tripping me up, I started to get all indignant.

“Of course I didn't steal it. I wouldn't do that, would I?”

“I don't know what you're capable of, Charlie. Not anymore.”

“I borrowed it from Bunion.” I saw her roll her eyes in disgust. “But I saved up to add to it, from all the delivery tips I earned.”

This wasn't what she wanted to hear: it made her feel like my lies were even deeper and premeditated.

“You've been planning this all along, haven't you? You and your father. Trying to undermine me, when all I'm trying to do is look after you, keep you safe.”

The kids were crowded even closer now, eyes flicking between us as we spoke, like they were watching a game of verbal tennis. At times I thought I heard gasps as the conversation bounced between us.

“Keep me safe? You don't let me do anything! I've never been bowling, or biking when friends have gone. You wouldn't even let me go to the movies with Sinus, because you thought I might choke on some popcorn in the dark and no one would notice.”

“That was years a—”

Someone snorted behind me, but stifled it when Mom and I both turned and stared.

“And don't even mention Dad in all this,” I ranted. “He hasn't got a clue what's going on. If he knew, he'd have come straight to you, because he knows what a NIGHTMARE you are!”

She looked ready to explode now, and I felt the crowd take a step back, fearing collateral damage.

“A nightmare, am I? I'll tell you what a nightmare is. A nightmare would be you falling off that death trap and knocking yourself into the middle of next week. A nightmare would be sitting by your bed waiting for you to wake up, because you weren't brave enough to tell us what you were doing.”

She didn't pause for breath; it was like she had gills.

“But I'll tell you what, young man, you might think I don't let you do anything—”

“Well, you don't. All you do is wrap me up in cotton!”

“Well, you ain't seen nothing yet. I'll wrap you in so much cotton that you won't be able to move!”

And with one shove, she moved me toward the crowd, which parted silently, all eyes staring at the two of us.

I dropped my head, feeling the ultimate shame when she ripped the skateboard out of my arms and carried it herself.

The silence was overpowering, broken only by the hammering of my own heart.

We walked another thirty feet before the quiet was broken.

Broken by an avalanche of laughter from the ramp, which thundered toward us, covering me in seconds.

I'd gone from hero to zero in one minute. My humiliation was complete.

P
rison life was tough.

Imagine Alcatraz with higher walls or Shawshank with louder guards.

Mom laid down the law as soon as we got home, giving poor Dad as big a shellacking as me, despite it all being news to him.

He tried to escape back to the kitchen on several occasions, only to be blocked by Mom as she prowled in front of us.

I was expecting her to turn our pockets out on the counter or delouse us before we were allowed near the kitchen.

It might sound like I'm making light of it, and I suppose I am. It felt important to find humor in the darkest moment of my already cloud-covered existence.

So we stood there for another fifteen minutes, Dad thanking his lucky stars the takeout wasn't open yet.

Taking a battering in front of your regular customers would've been an indignity too far.

Finally, as tears threatened to overtake anger, and having grounded me for what felt like the rest of my life, Mom stormed upstairs, leaving me to wait for Dad's reaction.

He still had a cleaver in his hand.

Despite how well I knew both him and his placid personality, I couldn't help but feel slightly nervous.

He wasn't livid like her, though—more surprised and disappointed, which in some way felt worse. He stood there shaking his head as I told him again where she'd found me.

It was the most animated I'd seen him in years.

“Not your finest moment, son.”

“I know, but it's not like she gave me any choice, is it?”

“She only wants the best for you—”

“Don't you dare say what you're about to say,” I interrupted.

He looked at me quizzically.

“Don't give me the line. The
she's your mom
line. Not today, Dad.”

“Then what do you want me to say?”

“Say you'll explain things to her. Tell her I'm only doing what everyone else my age does. Tell her she's being ridiculous, that she needs to let me grow up. Do my own thing without her running behind me with a cushion in case I fall over.”

It was probably the most I'd said to Dad in months, and certainly the most honest thing I'd ever said. He was the only one who could put a stop to Mom and her meddling. The only one she would possibly listen to.

I watched my words sink in, saw his face twitch as he processed what he could do to help. Maybe this was it. The moment he stepped over the line and took my side. Just this once. That's all I was asking.

“There's nothing I can do.” He sighed, running his index finger along the cleaver's blade.

“And that's it, is it? That's the full extent of your powers? Could you for once be a man and help me out, here? I'll do anything, Dad. Just do me this one favor, will you?”

“I don't think you have any right to ask favors of anyone right now. Not of me or your mom.”

“But you can see it, can't you? What she's doing to me? I'm a joke because of her. And it's getting worse. I can't go anywhere or do anything without her looming in the background. It's not right, Dad—she's not right.”

“She has her reasons, you kn—”

“Does she? Really? Then you need to tell me what they are, because I haven't got the faintest idea why it always has to be like this.”

But it was pointless asking for answers. Despite the tension, despite the reprimands being dished out. To me it was the perfect time to get to the bottom of why all this was going on, but to them? I was persona non grata.

Dad's shutters came crashing back down in ten seconds flat.

“Well, you'll have plenty of time to work it out, won't you? What with being grounded.”

And that was that. Off he slumped, back to the sanctuary of his kitchen, but not before throwing a long, concerned look up the stairs, where Mom was either seething, or weeping.

I wasn't sure which was worse.

The duration of my grounding was vague.

Indefinite.

With no parole, and no TV, Internet, or video game access until I learned my lesson or turned thirty. Whichever came first.

I had visions of being an adult, sitting at the counter of Special Fried Nice in a sweater Mom had knitted me, still taking orders, still pedaling away on the rhino, dressed in fluorescent gear that had lost all its powers of reflection.

I was going to live a long, dull, and cushioned life if Mom had anything to do with it. I might live to a hundred and fifty, but I'd never venture out of my comfort zone again.

Days lasted decades.

My head replayed the events of the past few months on repeat, but no matter how many different ways I thought of telling Mom honestly about the skating, the result would've been the same. There was no way she would have let me do it.

I suppose that should've made me feel better, that she'd
forced
me into lying, but it didn't help. I was banished to my room and my board locked up in a secret location. If she hadn't burned it already, or sealed it in concrete and dumped it in the Atlantic Ocean.

The worst thing about the fallout, though, was that Mom didn't seem satisfied with the punishment. If anything, her fussing got worse.

“There are going to be some changes going forward,” she announced late one afternoon. “Until you can be trusted, you'll be chaperoned to and from school.”

My stomach flipped. “What? You're kidding.”

“Do you see me smiling?”

I didn't. Obviously.

“But what about Sinus?” I asked, even though we hadn't walked together in weeks. “We always wait for each other.”

“Seeing as you got that death trap of a board from his family, I can only presume they were happy to deceive me too. You won't be spending time with him. Not if I can help it.”

“So Dad'll be dropping me off, then?”

She wagged her finger knowingly. “No. Your father will be too busy here to do that, and anyway, you know what a pushover he is. I'll be picking you up and dropping you off every day. I'll be waiting at three-forty p.m. in the teachers' parking lot.”

“But that's inside the gates,” I protested. “Everyone will see you. I'll be a laughingstock.”

“Then you'll understand how
I
feel, won't you? You'll understand the humiliation.” She fixed me with an icy glare. “In time I might trust you again, Charlie, but you will have to earn it.”

“So if I keep my nose clean I can go back to the ramp eventually?”

She slammed the counter sharply, and the whole house seemed to tremble.

“NO! You won't set foot in that skate park again. Not if you want to keep me happy. Do you understand me?”

I nodded, the pain of her punishment bruising me more deeply than any fall ever could.

If Mom was one thing, she was true to her word, and so the next two weeks at school were hell on earth. She insisted on the ridiculous chaperoning, parking closer to the school doors with every passing day, just in case I tried to slip past her in a bid for freedom. It didn't go unnoticed by the other kids—they laughed, pointed, and banged on the car roof as I climbed in. I feared them surrounding us, rocking the car until they turned it upside down.

All right, I was feeling paranoid.
You
go through that level of indignity and not feel the same way.

But it wasn't unwarranted, the feeling of persecution. News of the argument at the ramp had gotten around. Some kids mocked me as I passed; others hunched over their cell phones, shoulders shaking with mirth. At first I didn't realize what was going on, until one particularly huge older kid let me in on the magic.

“Dude, your mom is FIERCE!” He laughed. “Someone filmed her chewing you out at the ramp. She's a monster!” I grabbed his phone as politely as I could, not wanting to look, but knowing that I had to.

And there we were, Mom going at me with even greater ferocity than I remembered. The sound quality wasn't great, but you could still hear her ripping shreds off me above the distorted howls of the others. What scared me most, though, was the intensity in Mom's face. She had no idea that the skaters were laughing as much at her as they were at me. She was being eaten alive by her own anger, totally oblivious that dozens of phones were filming her every word.