The New Normal (10 page)

eleven

I woke up in a sweaty panic in the soft gray light of dawn. I didn't know who I was or where I was. I looked down at myself. My blue pajama top fell across my body like a piece of the sky. I put my hands over my belly, tried to slow my breathing, my heart rate. And gradually I remembered that I was Tamar, I was at home in my bed, my sisters were dead, my mom was gone, my dad was crazy, and I was bald and the whole world knew it. I closed my eyes and willed myself back to sleep, because sometimes even bad dreams are better than real life.

When I got up hours later, I called Cruisy Chicken and told Don I could work any day that week if he needed me. Figured I might as well make some money if I wasn't going to school.

“Fantastic. Why don't you come in tomorrow at eleven?” he said.

I drank a glass of orange juice and stood in the kitchen, listening to the eerie quiet of the house around me. Dad wouldn't be up for another few hours, Mom was gone, and I was still getting used to not hearing the sounds of my sisters.

There was a blanket of new snow insulating everything. I could hear creaks and groans coming from the walls and the floors and the furnace, but other than that it was silent. First period would just be starting. My biology class would be taking a test on the parasympathetic nervous system. I was glad I wasn't at school. I wrapped the silence of the morning around me like a scarf. I made a cup of tea and drank it as I gazed outside.

The snow sparkled like a hundred billion diamonds piled up in our backyard. I put on my coat and slippers, slid the back door open and crunched down to the lawn.

When I found the right spot, I fell back into the snow and moved my arms and legs into the shape of an angel. It was something my sisters and I always used to do when there was a fresh snowfall. I stopped moving and lay still for a while. Snow fell noiselessly around me. I let the sun shine down in my face as I stared up at the white sky. I could almost smell the sky, that's how close it was. The snow beneath me was like a soft fluffy blanket; it felt cool against the bare skin of my head. I watched the crystalline clouds of my breath float away, and I blinked snowflakes out of my eyes. And then
suddenly there was so much light, it was as if the world had cracked open. It got brighter and brighter, until I couldn't stand it anymore and had to close my eyes. But the light
didn't go away. It was dazzling. I stayed absolutely still and tried to focus on the insides of my eyelids. My whole body got warm and I felt like I was melting into the snow. After a minute or two, I slowly opened one eye, then the other. Then I stood up carefully so as not to ruin my angel and stepped back to look at her. She was beautiful.

You would never be able to tell from a snow angel if someone was bald or not. I thought she looked a little lonely in the middle of all that stark white snow, so I made two other angels, one on either side of her. And as I was doing it, I was smiling.

But I stopped smiling when chunks of the sky were hurled down upon me. I yelled, throwing them off as if they were on fire, and jumped to my feet. Then I realized they weren't slabs of the sky at all—they were shingles. Our roof was being torn apart.

“Oh, sorry,” said a tall man wearing a baseball cap, squinting down at me from the roof. “Didn't see you there.”

I pulled my hood up over my head and went inside, banging the glass door closed behind me.

Roy called at
3
:
47
PM
.

“Tamar, I heard what happened. Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

“I got your assignments. Do you want me to bring them over?”

“Um, sure. That would be fine.”

“I'm on my way.” He hung up.

I went upstairs and put on my purple toque. I wasn't wearing my wig anymore. I was mad at my wig. For not sticking to its adhesive. For letting Beth Dewitt rip it off me in front of thirty-six girls. My wig sucked shit. My wig was not worth $
769
if it couldn't even stay on my head during a stupid fight. I put my false eyelashes on and carefully drew on my eyebrows. I put down the pencil and stared back at my reflection. I wasn't the ugliest person alive.
“You're a whole lot prettier than Beth Dewitt,”
I heard Abby say.
“Even without boobs.”
And then Alia was singing,
“U.G.L.Y. She ain't got no alibi! She's ugly!”
I smiled into the mirror.

Roy arrived; his kaleidoscope eyes looked big and worried and beautiful. He gave me a hug, and I let myself be hugged. He smelled like fresh ginger.

“You okay?” he said in my ear.

“Yeah.”

We kept hugging. I heard Dad turn the
TV
down so he could eavesdrop. We went into the kitchen and I put the kettle on for tea.

“Here's your work.” Roy placed a small stack of papers on the table.

“Thanks.”

“Oh, and Ms. Jane said it's okay that you have to miss this week of rehearsals because there are extenuating circumstances. She said they'll get someone to stand in for you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Nice to know I'm so easily replaceable.”

“You're not and you know it.”

“Whatever.”

“I can't believe Beth did that.”

“Believe it.”

“So, what are you gonna do?”

“What can I do?” I shrugged. “Life will go on, with or without my hair.”

He nodded and bowed his head as I handed him a steaming cup of green tea.

We sat there in silence for a minute, blowing on our tea.

“She should be kicked out of the play,” Roy said.

“I don't know, maybe just a role change…she'd make a pretty mean Munchkin.”

Then Roy started laughing and so did I, and we sat there at my kitchen table laughing and laughing until tears rolled down our cheeks and fell into our tea.

The next morning I took the bus to Cruisy Chicken. I wore a black bandana, no wig. If anyone noticed, they didn't say anything. Don sat in his office on the computer all day, probably looking at greasy porn. Mike started at
3
:
45
PM
, and I was glad when he got there. I didn't know if he had heard about the fight and my wig and everything, but if he had, he didn't seem to care. We made fun of customers and made up dead-baby jokes together.

“What do you call a dead baby, a rat, a six-week-old bun and a pickle?”

“What?”

“Cruisy Combo number three, hold the fries.”

“What do you get when you put a dead baby and a cup of Tabasco in the blender?”

“What?”

“Cruisy's secret sauce.”

“Why did the dead baby cross the road?”

“Why?”

“Because it was stapled to the chicken.”

We doubled over with laughter.

“Okay, what am I? What am I?” Mike turned away from me and then spun back around hissing, two french fries stuck up his nose and his eyeballs rolled back in his head.

“An epileptic walrus!” I guessed.

“No! A dead baby that fell into the deep fryer!”

“Ohhhhh,” I groaned.

“Thanks for playing. Here's your consolation prize!” He picked a fry out of his nostril and presented it to me.

I took it from him and held it up for the fake studio audience to see. Then Don walked out of his office. I pretended like I was just throwing the fry in the garbage and gave Mike, whose back was to Don, a warning look. He got it and took the other fry out of his nose and put it back in a bag of fries.

“Order up!” Don barked.

I tried to keep a straight face while I bagged the order and took it to the window for a blond lady in a yellow Jeep. There was a fluffy white dog in the passenger seat, and I had a hunch the chicken was for him.

“Tam, step into my office.”

Mike made a face behind Don's back like he'd just eaten something disgusting.

Once I was standing in Don's office, he closed the door and pulled out the plastic lawn chair for me.

“Have a seat, Tam.”

When I was sitting, he placed his thick hands on my shoulders. He began massaging my shoulders, lightly at first, then harder.

I cleared my throat and squirmed a bit in the chair. He didn't stop.

“You like working here?”

“It's okay,” I said.

“Yeah?” He pressed his thumbs deep into my upper back.

“Yeah.”

He began to rub my neck, and then he ran his hands several times from my shoulders down the length of my arms to my wrists. “You're very tense,” he whispered, his lips close to my earlobe.

“Um, I need to use the washroom.” I stood up fast, nearly knocking the chair over.

Don sighed. “Here's your paycheck,” he said, handing me a brown envelope from a stack on his desk.

“Thanks. Did you want me to work again tomorrow?”

“No, I think we'll be okay without you tomorrow.”

When I came out of the office, Mike looked at me, searching my eyes, his face tight with concern. I shook my head and went into the staff washroom. I locked the door and sat on the toilet, feeling shaky and gross. A slimy layer of sweat had formed on my skin. I fought down the vomit that was threatening to erupt and ripped open the brown envelope. It was my first paycheck ever, and it was for seventy-two dollars and thirty-nine cents. Diddly-squat.

I hung my head in my hands. Hot tears stung my eyes. Then someone knocked on the door of the bathroom.

“Just a minute!”

“Are you okay?” It was Mike.

“Yep!” I lied.

I blew my nose and washed my face at the sink, then retied my bandana and prepared to face the disturbing world of chicken slinging once again.

When I came in the door, Dad looked up from his can cutting and turned the volume on the
TV
down.

“Hey, Dad.”

“T.”

“What's up?”

“Time's up.”

“Not bad.” I headed for the kitchen.

“Bring me a beer from the fridge?”

I unwrapped the chicken burger I had brought home for him and heated up the fries in the microwave. I made myself a peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwich and went back to the living room to eat with him.

“Thanks.” He opened the can, twisted off the tab and placed it carefully on top of a pile of tabs beside the couch. “Want one?” He looked at me.

“Can I?”

“Sure, when you turn eighteen.”

“
Dad
!”

He laughed. “Grab yourself a soda, kiddo.” I took a ginger ale from the fridge, then went back to the couch.

“So…” he said.

“So?”

“Cheers.” We clinked cans and both took a swig, and it was good. “So, I got a phone call from Mr. Ivers…”

“Oh yeah?”

“Were you going to tell me about that?”

“There's nothing to tell.”

“I see.” He nodded, tilting the can to his lips.

I took a gulp of ginger ale and a bite of sandwich and then another big guzzle. I took a potato chip from the open bag on the floor, ate it, took another one, had another drink, sighed. Then I told him the whole damn thing. But I left out the part where Beth called my sisters slutty because Dad didn't need to hear about that.

He listened quietly and nodded at certain parts. He didn't
interrupt me to ask questions like my mom would have. When I was finished, he said, “Well, I can't blame you.”

“Thanks.”

“But there are other ways you could have resolved your conflict with Beth.”

“I guess.” I shrugged.

“And I never want to hear of you doing anything like this again. Ever.”

“Okay.”

“I'm serious, Tamar.”

“
Okay
.”

“I worry about you.”

“Me too,” I said.

We sat in silence for a minute; then Dad turned the volume back up and we watched
Jeopardy!
and finished our drinks. I snuck looks at him while he was yelling out the answers to the hapless contestants who stared blankly at Alex Trebek. Dad's skin was as pale as glue, and his light brown hair was flat and dingy.

“Who is Mahatma Gandhi! Jesus, these people don't even deserve to be on
Jeopardy!”

“Dad, when's the last time you went outside?”

“I don't know,” he said.

“Do you want to go for a walk?”

“No.”

I frowned.

“In case you haven't noticed, T, I'm a bit of a gimp right now.” He gestured to his cast.

“You're getting around on your crutches all right.”

He snorted.

“I want you to walk with me down the street to the mailbox and back.”

He grumbled.

“Come on, it'll be good to get some fresh air.”

I slung his arm around my shoulders, helped him to his feet and handed him his crutches. He waved me off and pulled his coat on over his robe. Then he gingerly slid into his boot, teetering ever so slightly.

The snow was lavender under the light of the moon. There were no cars or people around, and our street was quiet except for the occasional yelp of a dog.

My dad breathed deeply. “Feels like it's getting warmer out.”

“It'll be spring pretty soon.”

He shook his head as if he didn't believe it.

There was a huge stack of bills, late-payment notices and fliers in our mailbox. No one had picked up the mail for weeks.

On our way back home, I noticed rust-colored clouds creeping over the pockmarked face of the moon. “Look at that.” I pointed.

We stood on the sidewalk and watched as the splotch of clouds spread across the moon like a bloodstain. The whole sky darkened to a reddish brown and the thin wisps of clouds turned coppery. I shivered, and my dad adjusted his crutches and put his arm around my shoulders.

And then my dad tipped his head back and howled. It was a low, mournful sound that seemed to come from somewhere deep and secret inside his body. Well, that settles it, I thought. My dad is officially insane. Then a dog across the street yowled, and another one from a backyard close by woofed and whined. Dad howled again, and more dogs joined in, then more dogs, from two, three, four streets away, and then I howled too, right up into that strange dark shadow. Again and again we howled at the blemished moon, until the entire neighborhood was a loud and crazy chorus of bawling, wailing, yelping cries and shrieks and moans.