The New Normal (8 page)

Mom dropped me off at Cruisy Chicken the next morning.

“Good luck, Tamar. It's a proud day.” She smoothed some of the hairs of my wig. She was getting all gushy over the fact that I had my “first real job.”

“Don't get too excited, Mom. Besides, it's not a
real
job. It's a McJob.”

“Well, you're going to do great.” She leaned over and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

“Thanks.” I hopped out, slammed the car door and hoped she wouldn't honk as she pulled out of the parking lot.

She honked.

I worked from
11:00
AM
to
7:00
PM
. I bagged fries and chicken and buns for eight hours. My skin was radiating chicken grease by noon. Only one person was nice to me. A guy named Mike, who said he was in grade ten at my school. I had never seen him before. He showed me how to close the tinfoil dishes faster by running a plastic knife along the edges. He told me we got free soft drinks during our shifts.

Don didn't work on weekends, and I was glad he wasn't there. The assistant manager's name was Karen. She had bleached-blond hair that she wore in a high ponytail. Her roots
were coming in and had formed a dark crown around her hairline. On my fifteen-minute break I walked across the plaza to get some fresh air. I felt like throwing up. All I could smell was grease. A thick film of grease sat heavily on my skin, and I tried to scrape it off my face with my fingernails.

I could see the lights from the movie theater flashing around in the sky above me like the Bat-signal, and I wished I was working there instead. At the end of my shift, Karen asked if I could work the same hours the next day.

“Sure,” I said. But I'd rather stab myself in the eye with a fork, I thought.

Mom was waiting in the car for me when I came out. “How was it?”

“Fine,” I said.

“Did you bring any chicken home for dinner?”

“No. I never want to eat chicken again.”

She laughed. “Your dad likes chicken.”

“I'll bring him some tomorrow then.”

When I got home, I threw my wig in the sink to soak the grease out of it. Then I realized I wouldn't have time to comb and dry it before Roy came to pick me up. I would have to wear a bandana. I had a shower and tried to erase the static blare of a hundred thousand orders for different Cruisy Combos rattling around in my head.

The doorbell chimed around quarter after eight. All three
of us froze. No one had rung our doorbell in a long time, and it sounded hollow, eerie.

I slid across the hardwood floor and flung open the door.

“Hi,” Roy said.

“Hi.” I grabbed my coat and purse as the parents crept toward the doorway. “Mom, Dad, this is Roy.”

“Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Robinson.”

“Pleased to meet you, Roy,” Mom said, smiling like he'd told her he'd discovered the cure for cancer.

Dad nodded, narrowing his eyes.

“What about your dinner, Tamar?” Mom said as I turned to go.

“I'll grab something at the bowling alley.”

“All right. Take good care of her, okay, Roy?” Then my mom enveloped me in a huge hug, as if I would be gone for a year or something. She never failed to embarrass me.

“Sure thing,” Roy said.

“Let's go. Bye!” We ran through the falling snow out to his cousin's car, a black Volkswagen bug. Roy and I were crammed in the back, and Roy's cousin, Lenny, and his girlfriend, Miranda, were sitting pretty up front. Lenny wore a gray toque; Miranda had black hair with bright red streaks that cascaded over her shoulders. I was exceedingly, wildly jealous of her hair. She looked like she belonged in a music video. Just looking at her hair made my innards ache with longing.

Miranda was a hairdresser at one of the upscale salons downtown, and Lenny was studying biochemistry at the University of Lethbridge.

“What are you gonna do after high school, Tamar?” Lenny asked as he merged onto the Deerfoot Trail.

“I'm not really sure. I mean, I don't…I haven't put much thought into it.”

“Oh.”

An awkward silence filled the little car.

“A paramedic, maybe.” I was surprised as shit to hear myself say that. I hadn't even thought about it before that very moment. “Helping people through their emergencies, you know.”

“That's brave work.” He studied me in the rearview mirror.

“I could never do that,” Miranda said. “Too much blood.” She squirmed in her seat. “Oh, can we go to Peter's Drive-In?
I love
the food there! Can we, Len? Please?
Please?”

“No sweat, my pet,” he said. They made me want to barf.

The three of them ordered burgers and fries. I got a chocolate shake. The smell of the fries made me want to barf too, because I had been swimming in fry grease all day.

When we got to the bowling alley, we got lane number seven—my lucky number. It was really cool under the black light. Glowing stars and planets and aliens and spaceships floated on the walls and ceiling around us. Everything white looked ultraviolet. Especially people's teeth. Miranda ordered a Mike's Hard Lemonade and Lenny ordered a Heineken. Roy got a gin and tonic.

“For yourself?” the short blond server asked me.

“Um, I'll have a lemonade too, I guess.” What the hell, I thought. You only live once, and they never ask for
ID
at bowling alleys. I excused myself and went to the pay phone to call the parents.

“Hello?”

“I'm here. Everything's fine.”

“Tamar! Thank God.” I heard her cover the mouthpiece and yell, “SHE'S OKAY!” before saying, “Your father was having a panic attack because you took so long to call. He thought—”

“We went to Peter's Drive-In first for burgers.”

“Well, you should have told us.”

“
Mom
!”

“What?”

“You gotta relax.”

She breathed into the phone.

“I have to go. It's my turn to bowl.”

“Okay, have fun, sweetheart. Have
fun
. Call before you leave. And be
safe
.”

“Bye.”

I went back to lane seven and took a big gulp of my hard lemonade. It was good.

“That's pretty awesome.” I pointed to Roy's gin and tonic. It glowed bright purple under the black light.

“I know. It makes it taste better too.” He laughed. “Want a sip?”

“Sure.”

I didn't totally suck at bowling—I even got a few strikes. I enjoyed the feeling of getting a strike, the sound of the ball hurtling down the lane and the pins smashing into each other. I liked the weight of the smooth glowing ball in my hand, and the way the machine gently placed the pins back in perfect order each time they fell. Lenny and Miranda were actually pretty funny, in a cheesy sort of way. He would pat her bum encouragingly when she got a gutter ball and say, “Next time, peaches.” And when she got a strike, which only happened once, she got so excited that she leapt into his arms and wrapped her legs around him, and they both howled with joy. Roy gave me high fives every time either of us got a strike.

I caught myself laughing a lot, even though I was trying not to smile with my mouth open because the black light made everyone's teeth look freaky and gross. It was fun. It was good to be out with people. To not think about my hair, my sisters, the parents, that awful note. To just pretend to be normal for a night.

When Lenny pulled into my driveway, Roy jumped out of the car. “I'll walk you to your door,” he said.

I saw Lenny shoot him the thumbs-up.

We stood facing each other on my doorstep; bits of snow sparkled under the beam of the porch light. “Thanks for inviting me tonight,” I said. “I had a lot of fun.”

“Me too.”

I stared down at Roy's checkered sneakers. My heart was squirming in my chest. Then he pulled me into him. We hugged for a long time, my face pressed against his collarbone. He smelled like snowflakes. Then he stepped back and moved his face in toward mine, but I turned my head quick and ducked inside. “Bye!” I said as I closed the door.

“Goodni—”

The parents were waiting up for me. Mom pretended to be watering a plant by the door, like she hadn't just been peeking out the front window. Dad was propped on the couch, drinking beer and cracking nuts open with a nutcracker.

“How was bowling?” Mom asked.

“Fine.”

“Did you have fun?” Dad asked.

“Yep. Goodnight.” Then I ran upstairs to my room.

What the hell was wrong with me? Why didn't I kiss him? I must be developmentally disabled. I stared at my reflection in the mirror and gave myself a stage slap upside the head like people do in the movies when they've done something totally idiotic. Then I got ready for bed and fell asleep thinking about what it would be like when I finally got up the nerve to make my first kiss happen.

I went to work the next day with a better attitude. I'd decided to accept my fate as a Cruisy Chicken employee. At least I would be making money and wouldn't have to rely on the parents for everything. At least I could bring Dad home some chicken, and maybe that would cheer him up a bit. At least I had gotten one call back from all those stupid job applications I had filled out.

It was busy, and I didn't even get to go to the washroom until my break. I guess no one wants to make dinner on Sundays because it's supposed to be a day of rest or something. Mike wasn't there and no one really talked to me except to yell orders at me. I noticed that all the workers had mild to severe acne. Excessively oily skin must be a workplace hazard. Well, that was something to look forward to.

I brought Dad home two drumsticks, a couple of wings and a bag of fries. I had to wash my wig again as soon as I got home because it had absorbed all the smells and oils from a thousand frying chicken parts.

That night the parents and I had dinner together at the kitchen table, which we hadn't done in a long time. Dad ate the chicken and Mom picked at the fries and I ate some spinach salad.

“David, Tamar,” Mom said, her palms together, “I want to tell you something important.”

We looked at her as we chewed our food under the harsh light of the fluorescent kitchen bulb.

“I've been accepted to go study yoga and meditation at a retreat center on an island in British Columbia.”

Dad and I stopped eating.

“Stellar's Island.”

We stared at her, unable to swallow the food still sitting in our mouths.

“I'll be leaving on Friday and I'll be away for six weeks.”

Dad crushed his napkin and threw it on top of his plate. He scraped his chair back from the table and dragged himself to the garbage can on his crutches. He dumped the chicken bones and let his plate clatter into the sink.

I stared at her, unbelieving. She sat with her hands in her lap and a look on her face that I can only describe as hopeful. I looked at my dad. He stood in front of the sink, staring out the window into the dark, cold night.
The room was silent except for the metallic tick of the clock on the wall. Then my mother cleared her throat delicately.

“Are you serious?” I said.

“I am.”

“How can you leave us now? With everything…”

She looked over her shoulder at my dad. “I know it's hard for you to understand, but I really think it's best for all of us that I take this time for myself right now, to walk my own path to healing.”

“Dad's a freaking invalid right now. You can't leave.”

“You'll be here.”

“
What?
Why are you even doing this?”

“Because I don't know what else to do.” She sighed and ran her hand through her hair. “I need a change of perspective. I just want to feel like myself again. And I think this will help me get there. I really do.”

“You know we can't afford this, Sheila,” Dad said.

“That's the great thing—it's a work-trade program. They grow all their own organic food and raise animals, too. Goats, cows, chickens, llamas, rabbits. I'll be helping in the gardens, mostly. It's community living. It's called The Yoga Farm.”

A coarse, dry laugh came from my dad.

“
Jesus
. Are you sure it's not a cult?” I said.

“Look, I realize you guys must think I'm really selfish for doing this—”

“Yep,” I said.

“But I've been trying so hard to get it together, so we can all get back to normal—”

“Mom, this
is
the new normal.”

Dad turned the kitchen tap on and stared at the water rushing down the drain.

Mom put her head in her hands, and her shoulders shook with sobs. “I just don't know what else to do. I have to try. I have to at least
try
.”

“What about—”

“I've left you a ton of lasagnas, casseroles and other goodies in the deep freeze.”

I stared at her.

She wiped the tears from her face. “It's only forty-two days!”

“What about me, Mom?”

“You're doing
fine
, honey. You're doing better than all of us. You have a new job, you have a nice boyfriend—”

“He's not—”

“You're in the school play, your grades are excellent. Look at you. You don't need me.”

“Yes. I. Do.”

“I'll be back in time to see you in your play.”

I folded my arms on the table, put my head down on them and closed my eyes. A commune? Was this a joke?

She came over to me and rubbed her hand in small circles over my back. “Don't cry, Tamar. Please don't cry.”

“Why not? Everyone else is.”

She walked to the sink and stood beside my dad. She turned off the tap and looked up at him. “I'm sorry, David, but I need to do this. I really do. I didn't tell you before because I didn't think I would be accepted into the program, and then your leg…” She reached for his hand, and he pulled it away. They stood motionless with their backs to me. Inside, I felt hollow and cold. I quietly left the table and tiptoed up to my room. I crawled into bed and squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could. The tears came anyway
.