Cherry Money Baby (18 page)

“I should get going,” Cherry said at last. “I got a lot of stuff to do.”

“Oh. Okay, sure.” Vi looked as if she wanted to say something more. Instead she smiled brightly and went, “Let’s go!”

“You don’t mind? I’ll drive you home.”

“Course not.” Vi set the other items she’d selected on the rack.

“You’re not going to get any of those?” Cherry said. The pink top had been super-cool, if a little grungy.

“Nah, none of these are good enough,” Vi said. She squinted,
thinking,
the worst fake thinker in the world. “You know, this place isn’t really my thing anymore.”

“No?”

“It’s kind of played out.”

Another
thumpa-thumpa
pause. Cherry felt as if she’d swallowed a coat hanger.

“Yeah,” she managed. Her voice crackled. “This place is kind of played out.”

“Night off, night off, night off !” Ardelia twirled Cherry through the hall outside her Parcae suite, her voice tumbling up to a trilling falsetto. “It’s my night oooooofff !”

“Wow. You go for the sixteen-ounce Red Bull today or what?”

Ardelia was freshly scrubbed, her skin bright without makeup, hair still damp from the shower. She smelled like spring.

“What do you want to do?” She squeezed Cherry’s hands. “We could do dinner in the big spinny restaurant upstairs. Or — oh! There’s this club that just opened — Maxwell was telling me about it — where they fill the room with
bubbles.
No, actually, wait.” She tapped her chin, a frantic tapping. “Let’s go to the park. It’s
such
a gorgeous night.”

Cherry laughed. She couldn’t help herself. Ardelia’s energy was better than caffeine. As they waited for the elevator, watching the floors illuminate in succession, Cherry imagined a countdown to launch. It was a Thursday night, and she was leaving earth behind.

The Boston Common seemed to stretch on forever, like a series of green lily pads strung through the great river of stone and asphalt. At this hour, Aubrey Park was empty and for good reason. The bright lights of Boston, the lamps along the walkway, everything seemed sleepless, restless, and alive. Sure, there were a few sketchy dudes here and there, the smell of weed floating from the public bathrooms, but mostly it was stumbling groups of drunken college kids, couples clinging tightly to each other despite the unseasonably warm night air, and the smell of late-night hot dog vendors and pretzel guys. White apparitions the size of cars loomed through one stand of trees, and as they walked around a bend, Cherry saw that they were gigantic wooden swans, clustered under a bridge. Sure, why not giant wooden swans? Why not anything at all? With Ardelia, anything seemed possible.

“Maybe I’ll move to Boston,” Cherry said. “It’s not
so
far from home, but it’s like a different planet.”

“Hmm,” Ardelia said. “Sure. Hey, you want to be a little crazy?”

“Sure,” Cherry said. Ardelia could have asked her to jump for the moon, and she would have.

They were turning onto a stretch of path running along an open sports field. Floodlights turned the grass pale gray and cast dagger-like shadows from the couples crossing the grass. A few outbuildings dotted the path.

“I’ve got an idea. You see that kid in the sweatshirt?”

The nerd in question was walking and reading a paperback. He might have been cute without the acne and little-boy haircut. She guessed he was her age or maybe a college freshman. His sweatshirt said
42
on it, but she doubted he was actually on a sports team.

“Go talk to him,” Ardelia said.

“Why?”

“This will be hilarious. Trust me.”

Without explaining further, she disappeared behind one of the outbuildings, like grown-up hide-and-seek. Cherry considered chasing her, but the dork was getting close, moving slowly, like a sleepwalker.

“Uh, hey,” said Cherry.

No response. She tried again in a more friendly tone. “Hi. Hey there.”

The kid looked up, perplexed that a girl was speaking to him.

“Hey.” He smiled. He had good teeth. At least that was something.

“Do you know this area?” Cherry tried. “I’m uh, a little lost.”

The kid shrugged. “Yeah. Where you trying to go?”

“I’m looking for the . . . burger . . . place.” What was Ardelia
doing
back there? Filing her nails?

The kid looked suspicious. “Which one? There are a few.”

“Oh. I guess the uh . . .”
Shit,
she didn’t know any burger places in Boston. “The big one?”

“Big Bang Burger Bar?”

“Yeah,” said Cherry. “That one.”

The kid tucked his paperback in his sweatshirt pocket and began to point out the way. Cherry pretended to listen, but some movement near the shed caught her eye. Ardelia floated around the corner like a ninja assassin. She was literally on tiptoe, biting back a grin. She swept up behind the dork and tapped his shoulder with a dainty pointed fingernail. He turned, and Ardelia pounced. She pressed her lips to his, not just a peck but a deep blockbuster kiss, turning her face and draping her arms around his shoulders. Her victim was stupefied, eyebrows backpedaling up to his hairline as he recognized the crazy famous person assaulting him in the park. Then, grinning wickedly, Ardelia made a mystical pass with her hand, waggling her fingertips before his eyes.

“And no one will
ever
believe you.”

Ardelia whirled, all swirling skirt and bouncing curls, and grabbed Cherry’s hand. They ran for the trees, leaving the stunned kid to pull himself together, alone on the walkway.

“Oh, my
God.
” Cherry’s face ached from laughing. “That was
epic.
”

“Mmm.”
Ardelia ran her tongue over her teeth. “Tasted like cinnamon gum.”

They were hidden now behind some elms and a length of wire fence. Ardelia rested against a tree, tipping her face toward the stars.

“I wish I’d taken a picture of the guy’s face,” Cherry said. “I think you gave him a stroke.”

Ardelia laughed, breathless. “Sometimes it’s even better. One guy actually fell over.”

“Wait, have you done that before?”

“Once or twice.” She shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe someone will start a website. A bunch of online conspiracy theorists.
Does Ardelia Deen
really
kiss strange boys in the night?
”

Cherry shook her head. “You’re like the tooth fairy, except for make-outs.” She looked over her shoulder to where they’d left him, imagining the kid still standing there, mouth hanging open, smeared with Ardelia’s lipstick. “Jesus. I almost feel a little sorry for him.”

“Oh, who cares?” Ardelia reached for Cherry’s hand. “Come on, I can’t sit still.”

A while later they lounged on a park bench, each with an ice-cream cone from the snack stand near the gate. It was the first truly warm night of the year. Voices carried over the park, other couples on other benches, a little kid screaming and laughing, despite the late hour, and somewhere someone playing a boom box. The park and the air and the cold ice cream on her tongue — it all felt too special to be real. They were only missing fireworks and a picnic blanket.

Ardelia sniffed. Her nose was running a lot tonight. She dabbed it with a paper napkin.

“You get allergies?” Cherry asked, catching a rogue dribble of mint chocolate chip.

Ardelia tipped her face toward the sky, blinking. “Sure.” She sniffed again.

“Vi was making fun of me earlier.” Cherry caught another dribble as it raced down her waffle cone. She was judging the perfect moment to bite off the bottom and slurp out the remaining ice cream, just like old times. She hadn’t changed
that
much. “She was ragging on me because I bought these fancy chocolates from the organic market.”

“Oh?” Ardelia seemed distracted. She looked up the walkway toward the park entrance, sniffed again. “Sounds like reverse snobbery to me.”

“What’s that?”

“What? Oh, you know, it’s like the regular variety, except in reverse. It’s when you think someone must be uptight, condescending, stuffy — what have you — simply because they have a little more money than you do.”

“Huh.” She’d never known there was a word for it. It felt weightier with a word. She felt a little stab of guilt, wondering how much of Cherry’s reverse snobbery Ardelia had sensed in the beginning.

“You know?” Ardelia said suddenly. “Fuck her, right? You’re trying new things. And what’s she doing? Making fun of you for it.”

“I guess. . . .” Cherry focused on Ardelia’s red eyes, her running nose, her twitching knee, which was frankly two twitches away from driving Cherry absolutely bonkers.

“Sorry,” Ardelia said, and laughed at herself. “Don’t know where that came from.”

An errant drip slid off her cone and planted itself in Cherry’s lap.

“Wait, are you
on
something?” Cherry asked.

Ardelia bit her lip. She smiled guiltily. “Maybe.”

Cherry was scandalized. She’d never seen anyone on drugs, other than weed, and that didn’t count. Ardelia seemed twisted on something exotic. And exhausting.

“What? What is it?”

“
No.
I’m not telling you,” Ardelia said, a little of her manic cheer returning. “Don’t do drugs.
Don’t do drugs, Cherry.
I don’t want that for you. I’m responsible for you.”

Cherry laughed. “I didn’t say I wanted any.”

“
Good.
Do as I say, not as I do. Okay? Okay?” She pressed her forehead to Cherry’s. “Okay?”

“Yeah, okay.” Cherry couldn’t stop laughing. Was this what they called a
contact high
?

“Come on.” Ardelia stood and tossed the remainder of her cone into the trash. “We can’t stop now, or it’ll just be too depressing.”

They were out a long time. Walking, talking. Cherry could barely keep up with Ardelia. And then, after ordering milk shakes at a twenty-four-hour diner not far from the harbor, Ardelia decided she had to be taken home. The Spider zipped quietly through the vacant back streets, the wheels bobbling over the cobblestone avenues. It was that too-late or too-early hour of the night when the city was most empty. Cherry could smell baking bread.

Ardelia wiped her cheeks. They were sparkly in the low light of the dash.

“Are you crying?”

“My eyes are just raw.” Her voice was hoarse, that of a much older woman. Ardelia seemed to have aged ten years since the park. She curled up her knees and rested her cheek against the seat. She put her hand on Cherry’s knee. “Thank you.”

Cherry squeezed her friend’s hand, not sure what she was being thanked for. By the next stoplight, Ardelia was asleep. She looked roughed up, her hair frizzed from the night’s humidity, her lips dry and cracked. It was the first time Cherry had seen her look frayed, frail, and she couldn’t decide if this was the kind of raw that comes after a workout — the used-up, good-for-you kind — or the beat-down look of someone who’s just had the shit kicked out of them.

Without Ardelia’s infectious energy, the late hour pulled on Cherry like a lead coat. She felt beat-up herself. She thought
they’d
been having fun, but, really, Ardelia was having fun with herself. Cherry was an accessory, an add-on. She thought of the kid in the park and the warm air and the ice cream — and it took the sweetness out of everything.

But it was also — sort of, a bit —
exciting.
And it
had
been pretty funny, pretty ridiculous, the look on the guy’s face. Jesus. She felt so
different.
Even the exhaustion, the fact she’d have to sneak in through her window so Pop wouldn’t know she’d been out all night, and the knowledge that tomorrow she’d be wrecked for school were good things. She felt stretched, sore like a muscle that didn’t get much exercise, used for the first time.

She yawned, guiding the Spider toward Ardelia’s hotel, through the orange and empty streets. The sun was rising in a city, and look how she’d been out all night, and look at the color of the sky, a color you could drive into forever.

Next morning wasn’t pretty. In homeroom Cherry clutched her thermos of coffee, taking tiny, trembling sips. First period was biology, which Cherry usually enjoyed, mostly because she liked Mrs. Polino. Mrs. Polino had a sense of humor. You could tell she used to be a dumb kid from the way she joked around with the dumb kids and didn’t take any shit from the smarties. Mrs. Polino was tough. A chalk thrower. Which was why Cherry should have known better than to fall asleep in her class.

A terrible bleat like an air-raid siren jerked Cherry awake. Her knees hit the underside of her desk, nearly toppling her. The class was in hysterics. Polino stood a few feet away, brandishing the air horn she used to snap unruly students to attention.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Mrs. Polino said. “Did I interrupt your nap?”

“I wasn’t —” Cherry started. Polino squeezed the horn again. Kids were convulsed with laughter, in
tears.

“See me after class, Kerrigan.”

Everyone went,
“Oohhhh.”

Cherry stayed seated until the last student filed out and she and Polino were alone. Polino leaned against the teacher’s desk, arms crossed, and indicated that Cherry should sit closer by kicking out the nearest chair. Cherry moved to the front row.