Punk Like Me (6 page)

I was stiff but nonresistant as Joey walked us, or carried me really, back to our platform. He’d put me down soon enough. Besides, I wasn’t that light.

“Yeah, right, some joke,” Kerry muttered angrily as Jack did the same to her. “My
boyfriend
’s gay.”

“We just wanted to freak you guys out. It’s just a game, dude,” Joey explained as he set me down but kept his arms wrapped tightly around me.

I was totally weirded out—I mean, what I had seen looked very, very real—and there were plenty of occasions during the day when it had all seemed so very okay, you know? Like it was supposed to be that way—Jack and Joey, Kerry and I.

Deciding to play a hunch, I reached out from under Joey for Kerry’s hand. “Day’s not over yet, boy.” And I grinned. “Right, Kerry?”

“Hell yeah,” she agreed with a sly grin of her own, reaching out for my hand in return, “so Jack, you go back to your boyfriend.”

“Uh, no, that’s okay,” he responded, tightening his hold around her. “I like my girlfriend just Þ ne, how ’bout you, Joey?” And he smiled over Kerry’s head.

“Same here,” Joey replied, and I could hear the smile in his voice as he pulled me a few feet away.

We stood, the four of us, on the platform, several feet away from each other, Joey wrapped around me, and Kerry with Jack as a barnacle

• 43 •

on her back. Silence reigned between us, the boys staring straight ahead while I occasionally looked at the girders that supported the street above us and let out little I’m-bored sighs. Kerry stared at the ground, shufß ing from one foot to another, favoring Jack every now and again with a roll of the eyes or a plainly annoyed look.

Finally, the train came roaring and hissing into the station, and as the boys shufß ed us in through two different doors, I smiled to myself as I realized something and yelled over the noise to Kerry, “Hey, Maggie, they’ve got to let go sometime!”

Kerry’s head Þ nally came up then, and she gave me a crooked little grin. “Hopey, you are so right…” she cooed, and turned to face Jack as he leaned up against the closed train door, and Joey and I settled ourselves against the opposite doors. “You wouldn’t really want to keep me prisoner, would you, honey?” she stage-whispered to him, while running her index Þ nger up and down his chest.

Jack stared down the trail that Kerry’s Þ ngers had blazed, and it was with obvious effort that he brought his gaze to Kerry’s. His cheeks blazed, and frankly, I was surprised that he had enough blood left to make his face turn that color, most of it having ß ed immediately, I was sure, to places farther south. “Well, of course not, honey,” he Þ nally managed to get out, “it’s just that, well, you had us a little worried there, ya know?” and he squirmed beneath her as she leaned into him.

Joey leaned down toward me. “That’s true, by the way,” he whispered in my ear, then softly kissed my cheek. “Wouldn’t want to lose you.”

I sighed, because there was something wrong with this whole thing, but I didn’t know what to say. I just leaned against him, resting my head on the edge of his arm. His arms lightly encircled me, and he let his hands rest loosely on my waist. We rode as pairs on opposite sides of the train the rest of the way to the ferry terminal, and we were all quiet for a bit.

Did what I think was going to happen actually almost happen back there at the abandoned station? I glanced over at Kerry and Jack, and after watching them make out for a little bit, I wasn’t so sure. Maybe the pressure from school was Þ nally getting to me and I was going nuts.

“Hey, I love you so much I’d crawl over broken glass, be sprinkled with salt and rolled in sand for you,” Jack announced into the silence, and we were off into another round of “I love you so much I’d jump from a ten-story building and get caught by the eyelid on a nail before

• 44 •

PUNK LIKE ME

falling the rest of the way down,” and “I love you so much I’d walk barefoot on slugs.”

Yeah, I know, some of the stuff we said was sorta gross (okay, maybe more than sorta), but it was sweet, too, in its own crazy, desperate way.

At some point, the boys gave up playing the I-love-you-so-much game and focused their energies on keeping Kerry and me apart, and okay, I admit that maybe it was just us girls who were still playacting at the lovesick thing. Despite, or maybe even because of, Joey and Jack’s enforced physical separation throughout this time, Kerry and I had somehow, silently, telepathically, mutually decided that whenever Jack or Joey would let one of us go, we’d attempt to unite, so we could

“pretend” to run off together, like we were crazy in love or something.

As we walked onto the gangway for the ferry that would take us home, Joey grabbed my elbow, tugging me rather sharply off to one side.

“Ow, dude! What the fuck?” I snatched my arm away and rubbed the offended part, and I also favored him with my dirtiest look. Jerk.

Joey at least had the decency to appear embarrassed. “Hey, I’m sorry,” he whispered, “it’s just that you guys gotta stop playing now. We’re going back to Staten Island,” he explained, with a pained expression.

“Dude, I know,” I answered, glaring up at him, still rubbing the sore spot. I was positive I was going to get a bruise, and really, since when was he the world sophisticate? I wasn’t the one who needed geography lessons on where was cool and where wasn’t. Double jerk.

Jack and Kerry caught up with us on the gangway to the boat.

“Keep manhandling girls like that, Joey, and it won’t matter where they are,” Kerry tossed sharply over her shoulder as she passed, shaking her head. She’d seen and heard the whole thing, and her eyes and mouth had the sharp look of anger.

Jack stopped to look Joey up and down, then shook his head. “I don’t know about you sometimes, Joey.” He continued to shake his head as he walked past us.

Joey’s face had been pink from embarrassment before, but with Jack’s words, it drained of color. He opened his mouth once, twice, as if he wanted to respond, but he shook his head to the negative, then gave up. He pressed his lips together and swallowed, and his eyes held something new in them—fear? shyness?—when he looked at me

• 45 •

again. He held out his hand for me. “C’mon, let’s Þ nd a seat,” he Þ nally croaked.

We settled in our places on the facing wooden benches on the old boat, back to our original conÞ guration: Jack and Kerry on one side, Joey and I on the other. I leaned my back against him, stretched my legs along the bench, and closed my eyes.

The rest of the time passed in a companionable, if slightly stilted, silence, and by the time we got off at our train station, it was very late. Only two places were open in the little town—the local tavern and Universe.

I looked longingly at the entrance of the store as we walked down the stairs, but not only did Kerry and I never hang out there with the guys (well, not both of them—Jack did stop in from time to time, though), I also knew it was time to go home. “Hey, guys, thanks for coming out with us today. I know I had a great time,” I said, turning to face Joey with a smile as we reached the sidewalk. “It was really cool.”

“Hey, sweetheart.” He smiled in return, lightly resting his hands on my shoulders. “It was a lot of fun. Maybe we’ll do it again sometime, just us?” He almost whispered that last part and closed the gap between us to lean in for a kiss but, and I freely admit I did this, I accidentally-on-purpose missed his intention and turned my head to rest it on his shoulder, accompanied by a big hug.

I don’t know why, but at that moment, I just couldn’t do it, just couldn’t kiss him again. I felt almost that if I did, I was giving in to him or giving over something that was absolutely mine. I know that might not make sense, but there it is. “Maybe, sometime,” I answered noncommittally, snuggling a bit into his jacket.

“Okay, guys, get a room, will ya?” Jack teased us.

“Forget the room,” Kerry corrected, “we’ve got to get home. It’s only getting later, and Nina’s the one who’s going to get grounded.” I rolled my eyes at her reminder, because she was unfortunately right about the grounded thing, and disentangled myself from Joey’s arms. “Yeah, let’s get this show on the road,” I agreed. I held Joey’s hand as we started walking past all the sleepy little houses in our sleepy little town, toward the familiar—home—Joey and I in front, hands held and swinging along, Jack and Kerry a step behind us. We passed identical manicured patches of green on the way.

“Yo, Nina,” Kerry’s voice broke through the suburban silence,

“you up for tomorrow at CB’s?”

• 46 •

PUNK LIKE ME

“Yeah, I’m cool,” I answered her over my shoulder. “Do you want to catch the afternoon show?” Not that I knew who was playing or anything—I’d never been to CBGB’s before—I was just being, well, you know, cool. Besides, I might never have been there before, but I knew where it was, who some of the most famous musicians to come out of there were, and, especially, that they had two shows just about every Sunday, and most of them were “all ages permitted.” Even more importantly, I’d been dying to go for the longest time.

“DeÞ nitely!” she answered enthusiastically, “if we catch the twelve o’clock boat—”

“Hey there, wait a second!” Joey interrupted and stopped in his tracks to protest. “You already went out to the Village today. I thought
we’d
hang out together tomorrow!” Joey looked perplexed, annoyed, and something else I couldn’t deÞ ne underneath the streetlight. His hair, always so very light colored, shone white, and his face was so very pale, except for his lips, which he held closed tightly, so tightly that they thinned and the very edges of them were almost purple.

“We hung out together today, Joey,” I explained. “No more than two dates a month, remember?” He opened his mouth to speak, but I held up a hand to forestall him. “No, really, I meant that when I Þ rst told you, and I still mean it. I like to hang out with my friends. I hung out with you today. Tomorrow, I’m hanging out with Kerry. It’s
my
time.” Jack and Kerry decided to give us a little space and dropped farther behind us, murmuring to each other, maybe even having the same conversation (I never did ask, and so I never knew). Or they could have been just making out.

As the homeward walk resumed, Joey ran a hand through his hair. “But I just miss you,” he tried again. “We don’t spend a lot of time together. You really would rather spend time with her than with me? You just spent the whole day with
her
.” His mouth twisted with incredulity and something else, and whatever
that
was, I didn’t like it.

In fact, not only was I starting to get a little annoyed, I remembered the bullshit with Robbie, and I was going from a little annoyed to a little angry. But now wasn’t the time to discuss it. I would deÞ nitely bring it up in the future though, privately.

I inhaled and exhaled slowly. “Joey, today was our date—a double date, yeah, but a
date,
” I explained patiently. “You meet me every other day, if not almost every day, outside of Universe and study with me just as much. You eat dinner at my house so often my parents are starting to

• 47 •

think you’re one of their kids. I think they’re waiting to give me your hand-me-down jeans! I don’t get to see my friends a lot, and they’re important to me, too.”

Joey watched my eyes intently as I spoke, and I touched his arm lightly to reassure him. “Besides, you want me to be a well-rounded, healthy individual, don’t you?” I smiled up at him, wanting to take some of the sting out of what I’d said.

Joey dropped his head and sighed. “Okay, you’re right, I’m sorry.

But…” and he raised his head to look into my eyes, “you’ll call me tomorrow, when you get home, I mean?”

“Sure.” I grinned up at him, all annoyance temporarily gone. “And I’ll actually have stuff to tell you about.” We stopped walking; we’d Þ nally arrived at the corner of the block I lived on, right in front of my house. I looked up at the light that shone out from the second-ß oor window, the windows of my parents’ room.

This meant they were waiting for me, probably watching the clock.

Well, another end to another day, I thought as I climbed the three steps of the front stoop, then turned to face Joey, who had stayed on the sidewalk. Ironically, this was one of the few times we were ever actually physically eye to eye. “Hey, have a good night!” I smiled and leaned in to give him a quick kiss, but Joey had slightly different plans.

The kiss he gave me almost swallowed me whole, and I could barely breathe, not out of desire, but out of sheer suffocation. How could such a small, delicate face have such a large mouth? I asked myself as I desperately tried to not smother.

“Yo, Joey, you trying to eat her face? I think your girl is turning blue!” joked Kerry from the street corner where she and Jack stood.

“Yeah, dude, it’s like watching the Holland Tunnel come to life!” Jack added.

Joey broke off his devouring kiss. “You’ll call me tomorrow?” he asked a bit anxiously, searching my face.

“As soon as I get in.”

“Okay then.” Joey smiled at me and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

He was happy, so very happy, that I was going to call. I felt a little bad about being angry with him before. He was just so, so kidlike, I guess.

In fact, I felt like I was watching a kid who’d been promised ice cream as he bounced down the walk to the sidewalk where Kerry and Jack waited.

• 48 •

PUNK LIKE ME

“G’night guys!” I called over to them and waved. “Magpie, whoever gets up Þ rst calls, ’kay?”

“Hey,
no problema
, Hopeful!” she called back, “g’night!”

“Night, Jack, Joey!” I called out again, and waved some more.

“G’night, Nina!” they both called back, and with that, I opened the door and went inside.

What happened after this point isn’t too important, except maybe this. I went up to my parents’ room where they watched television and waited for me, and a quick glance at the cable clock told me I was home with a whole half an hour to spare. Not bad, really. I wasn’t in trouble, and since I was early, there’d be a good chance I’d be able to go out the next time I asked to—like tomorrow.