The Downside of Being Charlie (20 page)

“So, be honest, okay?” I say.

“Always am, my man. What's up?”

“You think Charlotte's a poser?”

He rubs his chin and considers this a moment, which makes my stomach sink.

“That chickie's hard to figure out,” he says finally. “Honestly, man, and I know this might hurt, but you said be honest.” He looks over at me. I nod.

“Basically, I think she's genuine enough, but I also think she digs both you and Mark, and she's just gonna keep hanging with both of you until one of you gets tired of it and calls her out on it.”

“You think I should call her out on it?”

“I don't know.” He turns real serious for a minute. “I mean, if you feel about her the way I felt about, you know, that one who did me wrong and shall remain nameless, then I get it.”

“This sucks,” I say.

“I know it, cat, I know.” I don't say anymore since this conversation is pointless. I don't think Charlotte and I will be hanging out much more. We ride in silence for a little while. Then I remember I can't pay for my movie ticket.

“Dude . . . you're gonna have to spot me. Some modern-day gangstas mugged me last night.”

“What?” Ahmed looks like he just got hit with a taser.

I sigh and just start explaining. At first I wasn't going to say anything, but I figure I might as well. I'm too tired to come up with anything but the truth. So I tell him about Dad's affair, how Mom went crazy, and how I had to pick her up at the hospital with Killinger. And then I tell him how I headed into no-man's-land and got a pretty little mugging after running into Charlotte and Mark. Ahmed just keeps looking at me like I'm out of my mind. The really strange part is that even after I explain all this craziness, it doesn't even seem
that
strange or wild to me anymore, which is probably crazy in and of itself, but whatever.

“Holy shit, Charlie . . . I mean, HO-LY SHIT! Are you seriously carrying all this crap around with you? And you're asking me about my freakin' date? Why are you just telling me this now?” he yells. I shrug.

He looks at me with his eyes as big as Tanya Bate's, which almost makes me laugh. “You should've come to my house,” he says.

“In my defense, I didn't know I was heading into a fucking rumble with Ponyboy and company, and yes, I should've, but I wasn't thinking straight after the whole thing with my mom.”

“Yeah, I know,” he says and nods like he gets it. “But still, you better freakin' unload immediately from now on. I'm serious. We're best friends, Charlie. Solid, you dig?” He looks over at me.

“Got it,” I say, and for a moment I contemplate
whether I should tell him about throwing up, too. But I can't. When I think about me bent over the toilet, with my face in the crapper like that, it makes me feel pathetic. I don't think I can say it out loud.

We get to the theater, park the Roller Skate, and get our tickets before heading to the concession stand where Ahmed buys a large tub of popcorn, and I hint that maybe he should get a couple of the king-sized chocolate bars too. He does, as well as the drinks I suggest we'll need to wash it all down with. My mouth starts watering as we carry the food to our seats. As the theater darkens for the previews, I open the pack of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and shove one in my mouth.

The movie starts. I cram popcorn in my mouth and slurp away on my soda. I'm glad Ahmed is too engrossed in the movie to notice how much I'm eating. The movie is pretty good, and even though there's a lot of shooting and gore, it's not bad—not like the crappy movie I saw with Charlotte. A feeling of dread washes over me when I think of her again. I eat more junk until all I can focus on is how the food is making me feel stuffed. I can't stand the feeling of it sitting in my stomach. Then I'm consumed with the thought of all the calories I just ate. I don't want to care, but I do. I know I have to get rid of it. I can't pay attention to the movie anymore until I do.

Halfway through, I get up and go to the bathroom. It's empty. I lock the stall, retch it all up fast, and start to feel better.

I stay at Ahmed's house that night, the next night, and through the weekend. Dad calls a bunch of times, and even though Mrs. Bata pleads with me to talk to him, she tells him I won't come to the phone. I overhear her counseling him to give me some time—that she'll take care of me. I seriously consider asking her if I can move in, but actually, seeing the perfectness in Ahmed's house starts to depress me. So I finally decide to go back home. Even though I don't want to deal with Dad yet, part of me just wants to get it over with already.

I start making the walk back home. I turn my corner and from here I can see the garage door is open.

The rental car, which I know Mom got while her car was in the shop, is gone now, but her car isn't there yet. And I know it means she's gone, again. I stand still on the sidewalk for a while and stare at the empty garage.

I don't think I can do this anymore. I still can't decide if I should thank God that she's gone and I don't have to deal with her craziness, or if I should want her back, despite having to deal with her craziness. I don't want to go any closer to that mess. I look at the sky, and wonder if there really is a heaven. I don't think there is, but if there is, I wish I could go there now. Or maybe the earth could open up and swallow me, and I could become part of this concrete sidewalk. Maybe I would turn into a weed that sprouts up between the cracks. I wish I were a weed.

I look back in the direction of Ahmed's house. But I've already been over there too much. I wonder if I should go see Charlotte, but I shoot down the idea as soon as it enters my head.
Just go home
, I tell myself.
The truth is, no matter where I go for a distraction, I'll still have to go home eventually. I take a deep breath and head toward the insane asylum.

When I open the door, Dad immediately comes to the foyer.

“Okay,” he starts before I have a chance to say anything, “so I know you're pissed and you have every right to be. But we gotta talk.”

“I already know she's gone again,” I say.

He sighs and drops his head. “I'm sorry, Sport. Can we sit down?” he asks looking at me still standing in the front doorway. I close the door but don't move.

“Please.”

It's not that I'm being spiteful, really. I mean, sure I want to make this hard for him. But I don't move because I can't. I actually would rather sit, sink, and disappear into the couch, but my feet don't move—just in case I need to make a run for it again.

“Fine.” Dad sits on one of the bottom steps and rests his arms on his knees. “I know things are messed up, Sport. And, yes, Mom's gone, and I don't know where she went. Again.” Are we really talking about this? He looks up at me and waits for me to say something. My throat is closing up.

Maybe if you weren't cheating on her, she would stay
.

“Charlie,” he starts again, “I made a huge mistake. I . . .” He can't bring himself to actually say it, and I can't bring myself to let him off the hook. I wait silently.

“I knew from the start what I was doing was wrong, there's no excuse for it. And it did contribute to Mom
leaving, this time. But Charlie, she's left so many times before, you know that. She just goes. It's always been that way, ever since I met her.” I know it's true, but I wonder if it was always
this
bad. I try to remember exactly how often she left when I was younger, but I can't. Was she really always this way? How much worse had it gotten? How did he—we—miss it?

I look at Dad who looks like he's wondering the same thing. He sighs. “I don't know, maybe I thought I could save her somehow. Maybe I thought it would change, if I loved her enough.” His voice cracks. “Sometimes, it didn't seem so bad, but . . . ,” his voice trails off. He waits for me to say something, but I don't.

“Sport . . . ,” he starts. And it's so stupid, but that's what sets me off. That's what makes me not able to listen to him anymore. Hearing him call me Sport over and over again.

“Just leave me alone, all right? And stop it with the Sport crap, okay? Why do you call me Sport, anyway? I hate it! I hate that nobody ever calls me Charlie!” I head up the stairs, past him, and up to my room. He looks crushed as hell, but I don't care. I just want to stay mad.

I try to sleep, but I can't. I lie down in my dark room and stare at the ceiling, trying to make sense of everything. I don't know what to feel. I don't know what's right or wrong.

I start wondering if maybe I'm an orphan and imagine that my real parents are out there in the world somewhere, still miserable because they lost me. Maybe we were on some camping trip when I was really young,
and I woke up early one morning and went wandering in the woods by myself. And maybe I stumbled upon Doug and Carmen and they told me I was miles from the campgrounds and they would take me back. But they didn't because they simply could not part with me. And since Carmen bribed me with chocolate frosted doughnuts, I never asked about my real parents again. Maybe my real dad invented . . . I don't know . . . the Internet because he took all his pain and desperation and channeled it into tracking down his long lost son. And maybe my real mom . . . God, what would she be like? I can't picture her. I don't know why, but I can't. All I see is Mom. . . .

T
he day before Thanksgiving break, Mr. Killinger reminds us that we should already be working on the final touches of our collection. This sucks. I only had those shots of Charlotte that I hadn't done anything with because they hadn't turned out how I thought they would. And now I didn't have the nerve to ask her to go scouting anymore because even though both of us pretend like the other night on the street never happened, I know things aren't totally right with us.

“Hey, Charlie,” Mr. Killinger calls over to me after class as everyone files out of the room. I stay behind. “How are you? How are things at home?” he asks casually as he puts stuff away around the room.

“Cool.” My standard answer.

“Really?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah. Mom's gonna get some help, and I'm pretty sure she's taking some kind of medication. I think she'll be okay,” I lie. Even if I wanted to, how the hell could I even begin to tell him the truth? “She's already cooking for Thanksgiving, making a bunch of pies.” I roll my eyes and half smile, surprised at the lies escaping my mouth, lies I wish were true. “Even bread pudding. Bread pudding is my favorite.”
Shut up, shut up, shut
up
. “She feels bad after everything, so she's making all our favorites. She's usually not like that, you know?”
SHUT UP!

Mr. Killinger presses his lips together and twists his mouth the way people do when they don't really believe what you're telling them. It looks like he's pondering whether he should press me more on the subject.

“Yeah, I understand.” He studies me. I meet his look, putting on my most honest face. “Well, I'm glad things are getting better,” he says. “So, have you talked more with the counselor here at school?” As soon as I saw Killinger at school after the whole incident with Mom, he told me he'd had to refer me. I had talked to the counselor guy but just told him some lies that I guess he didn't bother to look into, and I pretended everything was getting better.

I nod. “Yeah, I did and it's really helping. Everything's fine. Thanks,” I tell him.

“Well, I'm here, too, you know. You can talk to me whenever.” I nod. “So, how's your project going?”

Damn. I used up all my creativity for the Thanksgiving lies.

“Have you finished it yet?”

“Sort of, but . . .”

“Having trouble?”

I shrug and decide to be honest about this because it's easier than coming up with more crap. “I really don't know what it is. Taking pictures usually isn't difficult for me. What I was working on didn't really turn out the way I wanted it to.”

The pictures I'd taken of Charlotte sucked. I had
uploaded them, but they didn't look right. When I look at Charlotte, in those rare moments she's not talking a million miles an hour, in the time when she's done saying something and just stares at me before looking away, I see something different. And I was sure I could capture that in the photos, or at the very least, in just one of them. But I hadn't. And I don't know if it's because I imagined it, or if I suck, or because now the pictures of her are hard to look at, but they weren't working.

“Well,” Mr. Killinger says while leaning on his desk and crossing his arms, “the idea doesn't have to be earth shattering, you know. It's the execution of it,” he says and tells me how every picture says or conveys something. “It's not about conventional beauty,” he says. “It's about the meaning or message behind the picture, and that might be pretty or ugly or disturbing or raw, but it's that honesty that makes a picture . . . memorable, striking and even shocking. Pictures should make you think, Charlie, reflect, ponder, in the same way that a good song or book or painting does.” Mr. Killinger sometimes gets too passionate talking about photography, but I listen to him, even as he goes on and on because there's something in his riddles and rambling that makes sense. It makes me think, and by the time I'm headed to lunch to meet Ahmed, all I can think of is the project because Killinger's words have triggered some images and ideas. But none of them are of Charlotte.