Before My Eyes (22 page)

“The best summer ever.”

My mother looks from Trish and Peter to my father to me. “You'll be okay, Max?”

“Fine.”

“I'll check on King before we go.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

My father's hand finds my shoulder. “Where's the rest of your friends?”

I shrug. I don't want him touching me.

“They'll be here,” he says softly to me, but it's already too late. He drugged my dog.

“Yup,” I say, which really means, “I don't think so.” I face him. “Don't worry. Go to the diner. Have a piece of apple pie à la mode for me.” I'm thinking that I'm going to take one of Barkley's pills, maybe both of them, as soon as he leaves. I'm going to obliterate myself. I'm going to rip away all the hurt and feel nothing and lie down next to King.

“Pie à la mode, that sounds good,” he says, giving my shoulder one last shake. I clench my fist, or, I swear, I'd punch him.

“I like my pie with ice cream. Vanilla,” says Peter to no one in particular.

“If I never ate another soft swirl in my life I'd be happy,” announces Trish.

My mother tugs my father's arm. “Let's let the kids have some fun, Glenn. It's still a birthday party, after all. And you know the diner is packed at this time of night.”

“I can shake more potential voters' hands is what she means,” he says to Trish and Peter and me. My mother hurries my father back into the house, and after a minute or so, I hear the front door open and close behind them.

“I just have to go in the house and get something,” I say to Trish.

“You won't find it.”

“Find what?”

“The pills you bought from Barkley. I took them from your backpack, didn't you notice? I saw you with Barkley and knew you were making a mistake.”

“Who the hell are you to take them?”

“I'm your friend.”

“You're an idiot.” I pace around her. “Those were mine. Who the hell do you think you are?”

“Lie down.”

I slump against the deck railing, listening to my parents drive off. “No.”

“Why not? I'm fat? A fat what? Even if you haven't said it, and you've been nice, Max, you haven't, but I've seen your look. I see everyone look at me like I'm a freak, like I'm a sideshow, like they think I don't know they're staring at me, saying to themselves: she is a fat pig. Either they're looking or they're pretending that I'm invisible. I don't exist. I'm not a real person with genuine feelings. Well, I am. So, listen to me, sweetie. Lie down.”

She doesn't wait for me to say no again. She stands behind me, locks her hands on my wrists, and pulls upward.

“Hey.”

“I should have offered to do this earlier this summer.”

She guides me to a lounger on the deck. I lie down on my back. I feel like I have no choice, so I do. I can't believe this is my birthday party. Up in the sky, a thousand stars up and a full moon, a hint that maybe the heat will break soon, that fall and the promise of winter will come. I want to imagine what the sky looked like three or four hundred years ago when places like Long Island were barren of decks like these, of houses like these, when there were plains out here. In fifth grade, I wrote about the Hempstead plains, high grasses that stretched all the way to the ocean. I almost want to flip off the floodlights on the deck and see the stars for what they are. I've never been out in the night with only the stars.

“Turn over. Head down.” I do as she says. Soon enough, her hands on my back, and then under my shirt, and surprisingly cool and dry on my skin.

“Didn't your mother ever tell you to stand up straight?”

“She thinks I'm perfect,” I mumble.

“Good thing someone does.”

Peter circles the deck, something he always did at the Snack Shack when he didn't know what else to do. “This is a very nice party, Max. Thank you for inviting me.”

Trish loosens my shoulders. “Does this hurt?”

“What if I said yes?”

She stretches each arm separately, pinpoints different muscles in my back. “You've done this before?”

“On my mother. She's an English teacher. A lot of stress between the semicolons and the persuasive essays.”

“What should I do?” asks Peter.

“Can you sit down?” answers Trish.

“Yup.”

“You sound like Max,” says Trish. Peter reacts as if he's received a major compliment.

He doesn't sit, though. “What's back there?” he asks, pointing to the high evergreens like sentries at the edge of the yard.

“Nothing. Woods. A town hiking trail.” My voice is muffled into the lounger.

“Does anything come out of there?” Peter looks worried. “I think something could.”

“Peter, that's your problem, you think too much,” says Trish. “Let me finish here.” For some reason, I think she's going to leave. So the party will be Peter and me until everyone else comes, or just me and Peter. I flinch.

“Relax. Concentrate on nothing at all.”

Nothing doesn't work for me, not without pills, only makes me think more. Instead, I focus on her hands. And they are strong. Trish kneads her hands up and down, deeply, then lightly, as if by alternating between extremes she will bring me naturally to a middle ground, a safe place. I couldn't run if I wanted to, and I don't. She works every muscle, bending into me. If I concentrate I can smell the trees dry and desperate for rain, pine trees, their needles ready to fade from green to brown, ready for the ground, as ready as I am for summer to end.

She massages my back for fifteen or twenty minutes, long enough for me to feel stretched and loose and good. When her hands leave my grateful back, she orders me to stand up slowly and I obey. She instructs me to walk briskly, and I jog around the confines of the deck, freer than I've been all summer.

“If you want to go take one of those pills now, go take it.”

“You said you threw them away.”

“I thought about it, but I didn't. I think drugs are stupid, but it's your stupid, not mine.”

I stop in front of her. She's wearing a lot more makeup than she usually does at the Snack Shack, eyeliner and bright silvery blue eye shadow, a sure sign of a South Lakeshore girl. She's sprawled out on one of the deck chairs, looking out toward the trees. Her legs are in a V-formation in front of her. I make direct eye contact. “Thank you.”

“For what?” says Trish, blushing. “You haven't even offered me anything to drink or eat yet, sweetie. And, whoa. Look at this.” Trish holds up her phone. “I think we may be the first and last at your party.”

Glowing radioactively on the phone is a text from Jackson, which has been forwarded and forwarded and found its way to Trish: “Meet at dunes. No go Cooper's.”

“Here's another. This is from Samantha. Essentially says the same thing, Cooper. Do you want to hear it?”

“I don't need to hear it.”

“I'll hear it,” says Peter.

“You don't need to hear it, either,” says Trish. “But Max, you're what everyone is talking about tonight. You're trending.”

“Nobody is showing up.”

“Okay, so nobody shows up. More chips for us.”

“More chips for us,” repeats Peter.

I bring out the chips and dip and place them next to Trish.

“Go ahead, take one,” says Trish, pushing the bowl toward Peter.

“No, thank you,” he says, even though it's clear that he wants one.

“Eat,” I say, sounding a little bit like my mother.

“I'm not supposed to eat or drink anything. You don't know what kids could put into the food or drinks. My mother said that.”

I take a chip and dip it into the onion soup and sour cream mix. “Delicious.”

“Really?” says Peter, looking at Trish.

“Go ahead. Have fun. Life is too short.”

Peter scoops up a handful. I stretch and feel okay, and that's a lot—to feel okay.

“Magic hands,” she says, fluttering her fingers. “So, I'll have a beer, if you have any. If you don't, I have a cooler with some in my car. That was going to be my contribution to the party, but it doesn't look like you need any contributions.”

“Are you sure nothing is in those woods, Max?” asks Peter, munching on chips.

“Nothing,” I say. “How about I find us some beers?”

“May I have a soda, please?” asks Peter.

“Sure thing, Petey,” I say, to make him smile. “And don't worry about the woods.”

I step back into the house without turning any lights on. The temperature drop is artificial, choking, wrong. I peer into the dark. I feel lost and alone and want to go check on King. But first, I have to go downstairs and rescue my father's beers from the backup refrigerator, where they've been hidden—or so he thinks—since our Memorial Day barbecue.

Then, all of a sudden, lights flash into the living room, a lot of them. Cars honk, a dozen or more, suddenly gathered, like a swarm of mosquitoes drawn to light, except I'm in the dark. Someone is standing with his head through the sunroof, whooping my name. Jackson. On closer look, I see that Samantha is leaning over and driving his car.

“Having fun, Cooper?” shouts Jackson. “We're off to the dunes. To party.”

On “party,” everyone shouts or honks their horns or flashes their lights, and I am caught in the barrage.

“Having fun?” he shouts again, because that's about how clever Jackson is. “Part-ay. Part-ay.” He's stolen all the helium balloons. Laughter rips into the night.

By the middle of my birthday party somebody, usually Jackson, would have sucked the helium out of the balloons, and talked like an idiot with a high-pitched voice. I wonder if my mother knew that was why I always insisted on balloons.

Out on the street, Jackson raises his hands above his head like a goal has been scored—a goal against me. Like he dribbled at me, sidestepped me, and slammed it right into the net. He ducks his head back into the car and commandeers the wheel from a screeching Samantha. He speeds up, all the cars in a line behind him, all my so-called friends, the entire party. They are gone as quickly as they descended on me. After the buzzing roar of a dozen cars veers from the neighborhood, after what seems like a very long time, I stumble down the stairs to our lower den, where it's even cooler. Waves of heat and sweat and total embarrassment pound in my ears. I pop open a beer and gulp down searing cold swallows. I'm thinking that I could take my mother's car and go down to the dunes, too. I could bring all the beer and make like it was all a joke when I see Jackson. I could go there, too.

“Hey,” comes the voice down the stairs.

Inside my head, I scream. I want to be left alone. I thought they had all gone.

“Hey, anybody here? Anybody down here?”

I don't know that voice and I do. Husky and quiet.

“Max?”

I don't say anything until she is downstairs. I busy myself with finishing my beer as fast as I can.

Even in the shadows, I can see that she is in a white button-down shirt, her sleeves folded up, the tails of the shirt tied at her waist, and jeans, nothing fancy, but somehow she looks dressed up for a party. She takes a deep breath. Lets it out slowly. Her big, brown eyes adjust to the dark. She wears no makeup. I open the refrigerator and go rummaging through it searching for Peter's favorite soda.

“Max? Is this the party?” she asks, concerned, or maybe annoyed.

“Nobody is showing up.”

“I got a text from Brent. He said he was planning to come.”

I pull out two beers and, yes, two orange sodas. “I don't know any Brent.”

“He said you'd say that. He's a couple of years older than you. But he's a friend of a friend. He knew all about your party. How about that?”

“How about it? Then, I don't think he's going to show, either.”

“Maybe I should just go? I'll just go.”

She's brilliant. She asks and answers her own questions—I think sarcastically. Claire heads for the stairs. Juggling bottles of beer along with Peter's orange soda, I slam closed the fridge and follow her. She races to the top. I hesitate. She swings her hair off her face, and I stare: this is hair I want to bury my face in, my whole self in.

“Claire,” I finally say. “Please, don't go.”

“Why not?”

“I'm glad you came.”

“How about that?” she says softly.

Claire

Sunday, 9:20
P.M.

I'm not staying because of Max. I'm out of here. I don't know why I even came to this party, which isn't a party at all. I just had to get out of my own house, and this has nothing to do with Max inviting me—it has to do with Brent. When I mentioned it to him in a quick phone call, he said that he was thinking of making an appearance—that when he was a senior, he was on the varsity soccer team with Max and had heard that he was having his annual party this weekend. But I don't think I can trust Max. I don't know what he wants from me, and all I want in my life is clarity right now. It's all clear with Brent. And with Max, it's all cloudy, all far away, with those sea blue eyes.

At the top of the stairs, a desperate scratching and whining stops me from walking out the front door. I glance down the long hallway.

“That's King. He's locked in my bedroom.” Max lays down the bottles and cans on the pristine wooden floor and jostles past me. He opens his bedroom door, and out bounds his black Labrador, sniffing my feet and leaping up to lick my face. His paws easily reach my shoulder.

“King!” says Max behind me. “Down.”

“You keep your dog locked in your bedroom?”

“My parents don't like him banging around the house. You see, he's blind.”

King's eyes are misted and sightless. “I'm sorry. Last night—I didn't realize.”

“That's okay. I don't think he knows, either.”