The Screwed-Up Life of Charlie the Second (13 page)

I say this because, according to Mrs. Lardner, my ancient civilizations teacher, prior to the invention of hygiene, industrial pig farms, and assembly-line slaughterhouses, the entire western world functioned on the basis of superstition. If you wanted it to rain, you sacrificed a pigeon, goat, bull, nubile young virgin—whatever happened to be lying around—to the god of thunder. If you wanted to stop a torrential downpour that threatened to destroy nearly every living thing on the planet, you prayed to whatever anthropomorphized ADD-suffering autistic in the sky that was currently in vogue, built a really big boat, and promised not to look at your naked father, spill your seed upon the ground (
Do socks count?)
, worship golden idols, or have hot man-on-man sex. If you were a citizen of the whackin' big Roman Empire and you wanted to know if you should cross the Rubicon or just spend the day shooting craps (
Iacta alea est,
Cicero, and you got snake-eyes), you found a cute little chicken, gutted it and stared at its entrails for your answer.

Anyhow, Aaron's dirty boxers proved to be about as effective at predicting my day as a Magic Eight Ball. They did a really crappy job of predicting just how shitty today's been. Things started going to hell in choir today and didn't end until I got off the phone with Mom just now.

When third period ended this morning and I was leaving the choir room, Rob grabbed the back of my neck and smiled so big that his dimples were practically the size of golf divots.

“Hey, pup,” he said. “Follow me.”

I might've asked where we were going, but it wouldn't have mattered. Rob was all I've-got-the-world-by-the-short-hairs-and-I'm-gonna-pull determination. Most of the time, he's only like that when he's trying to talk me out of my Jockeys and into his bed, and even then, it's not like I'd object. If I tried, even before I got the chance to open my mouth, Rob'd have my pants around my ankles, a hand cupping my bare ass, a tongue in my ear, and then I'd pretty much be begging him to push me down on all fours and ride me like a Preakness filly. Okay, so I'm horny right now. Crucify me. I haven't gotten off since before breakfast Monday morning. If my nut sack gets put under any more pressure, my sperm'll start dying of the bends.

Anyhow, Rob kept his hand on my neck, his thumb tracing these really small, intricate circles along the skin there, and he led me to the stupid little closet of a room in the cafeteria where work-study students (AKA future early release reprobates) sold “everything bright young minds need to grow and blossom,” which apparently consists of green-and gold-folders, graph paper, protractors, used copies of
The Grapes of Wrath
, and gator-emblazoned stadium seat cushions. They also sold homecoming tickets.

Rob and I stepped up to the counter.

“Yeah?” said the cult of personality whose ass was fusing osmosis-wise to the stool she was sitting on behind the counter. She barely looked up from the copy of
People
that had her gums jawing as she sounded out the really hard words like “totally” and “cute” and “handbag.” I couldn't remember the chick's name, but I'd heard that back in junior high, the school shrink had her sent to reform school 'cuz she'd sewn her own fingers together during home ec out of boredom, and then, still feeling her eighth-grade ennui, haphazardly got the thread out with a stitch ripper.

“Two tickets for homecoming,” Rob said, sliding a twenty on the counter's faux laminate countertop.

Little Miss Self-Seamstress made this overly inconvenienced sigh that sounded like a blimp emptying its airbag. She looked at the money, at Rob, at me, back at the money.

“You're ten bucks short,” she said. “Twenty for couples, fifteen each for stag tickets.” Yves Self-Mutilation Laurent plopped her ass down on the stool, slurped her thumb, and flipped a magazine page to what was probably some hard-hitting expose on how it was all the rage among celbutante heiresses to surgically implant tapeworms for maximum weight loss.

“We're a couple,” Rob said, making sure she saw his hand slip from my neck to the small of my back.

“Rules say you aren't,” she said with a shrug.

“What do you mean ‘rules'? Like, ‘You must be this tall,'” Rob raised his hand to just above his waist, “‘to ride this ride?' Rules like ‘No use of cell phones, flash photography or videotaping during the performance'? You gotta be kidding me. Just give me the tickets, alright.”

Yves demonstrated her exceptional customer service skills by showing absolutely no concern of flexibility. “Guy and a girl. Twenty bucks. Two guys, fifteen bucks each. Two girls, fifteen bucks each. That's how it is.”

“That's bullshit,” Rob said. His face was so red it looked like someone'd tied his jockstrap in double knots while he was still in it.

Stupid me, I made the mistake of giving the chick the extra ten-spot instead of all Martin Luther Queen, Junior, on her by telling her it didn't matter if Rob and I wanted to stretch each other's sphincters, we still had the right to save a Hamilton on going to some lame school dance.

When I got handed the tickets, Rob stormed off, shaking his head.

Rob avoided me the rest of the day, and after practice tonight he brushed past me. I shouted for him to wait, but he blew me off. I ran after him as he beelined through the parking lot to his BMW. When I finally caught up with him, I grabbed his shoulder and yelled, “What the hell's wrong with you?”

“Just leave me alone, Charlie,” he said, dropping his chin to his chest as he massaged his neck.

“No. Not until you tell me why you've been treating me like shit.” I spat my words at him. “Is this about the tickets this morning? Jesus.”

“Great,” Rob said, leaning against the side of his car. He threw his head back and laughed—practically cackling at the sky. He looked unhinged, like he was one smart-ass remark from me away from completely losing it. “Just great. Now I've got to worry about your feelings, too. I'm so tired of making sure everyone in my goddamn life is perfectly comfortable.”

Rob sank, his back sliding down the side of the car until he was squatting along the wheel well, his face shielded behind his arms and knees. He started talking again, only the anger—the madness—in his voice was softer, strained. I couldn't tell if he was raging or crying. I sat beside him, trying hard not to set him off.

“Rob, what's wrong? Talk to me.” He turned to face me and his eyes were as wet and runny as raw egg, his shoulders shook. He looked small, breakable.

“My mom,” he said, smearing the back of his hand along his nose. “She's dying.” He leaned into my shoulder, and I felt hollow and tense all at once. I wanted to say something, but my lips were dumb, so I just pulled him into me and pressed my face to his hair.

“I'm sick of nothing being fair. I want to be normal for once, you know?” Rob hugged my chest, curling against me. “I'm sick of everything being a fight.”

“You don't have to fight,” I said, holding him more tightly. “I'm here.”

“But you're not going to fight,” Rob said, matter-of-factly. It hurt, mostly 'cuz it was true. After this morning, I knew I had to be a better boyfriend. Rob deserved that much.

“We'll get through this. Everything will be okay.” We both knew I was lying, but it was the only thing that sounded right.

We sat outside his car—Rob weeping against my chest, and me holding him hard and tight, wishing I could draw the hurt from his body. After a while, Rob stopped crying and said he was fine. He unlocked his car door and we kissed good-bye.

“I'm sorry for being a shit,” I said.

“I know you are.”

“Know I'm what?” I asked, smiling. “Know I'm sorry or know I'm a shit?”

“I'll never tell,” Rob said, laughing. We kissed again and I walked to the Binkmeyers, hoping the worst was over. It wasn't. Mom called after dinner.

In my family, bad news doesn't get front-stoop delivery; it gets left in the gutter, we all pretend like we don't know it's there, and then finally, someone gets tired of ignoring it and goes out to get it. That's why my conversation with Mom tonight went the way it did.

After Mrs. B chatted with Mom for a bit, Mrs. B handed me the phone and shooed the rest of the Binkmeyer brood from the kitchen, saying I needed privacy. I wanted to tell her that if I ever got privacy, I wouldn't be on the phone, I'd be attending to certain, more urgent needs, but I didn't get the chance. Through the receiver, I could hear Mom asking, “So, how are things at the Binkmeyers'?”

She sounded upbeat enough, so I decided to joke around some.

“It's like spending summer camp on a hippie commune. Mrs. B's been making everyone listen to hairy-legged female folk singers so much that Bink's talking in his sleep about how he's woman, hear him roar. It got so bad that, yesterday, after he begged Mrs. B to lay off the Joan Baez stuff, Bink got all excited when Mrs. B said she'd play some Seeger. Poor Bink, he was hoping for some ‘Night Moves' action, and Mrs. B's trying to get everyone to jam to ‘Turn! Turn! Turn!'.”

“And how's Mr. B?” Mom asked, playing it straight, but I knew she was trying not to laugh. I could tell she was having fun. So was I. She sounded like her old self, so I kept going.

“He's pretty good actually. He's really thrilled that he found the Charles Darwin
Evolution of the Species
edition of Barrel of Monkeys for Bink's sisters. The only problem is every time you walk around the house, you're stepping on a little red Australopithecus or Cro-Magnon.”

“You're terrible,” Mom said, laughing.

“I'm terrible? You don't even know the meaning of terrible until you've done a Binkmeyer family game night.”

“And why's that?” Mom asked. I imagined her at the other end of the line, snaking a Virginia Slim out of her pack on the table and trying to hide a smirk.

“Well, being socialists and all, they've decided that they can't play
Monopoly
for fun. It's got to be a teachable moment, so Mr. and Mrs. B have been trying to invent
Marxist Monopoly
. Let me tell you what a blast that is.

“The state owns all the property, you don't get any cash for passing Go, there's no Free Parking 'cuz both of them have agreed that in a utopian society there'd be universal public transportation, and you can end up in the gulag if you draw a Fellow Comrade card that says you lost your signed copy of the
Little Red Book
or you were caught by the secret police trying to buy blue jeans that were smuggled into the country by some decadent Western capitalist. At least, that's what would happen if Mr. and Mrs. B could figure out how players move ahead.”

“I'm afraid to ask,” Mom said.

“Yeah. Mrs. B thinks that the players, acting as a collective, decide how far you get to move. Mr. B thinks players should advance, ‘each according to his ability, each according to his needs.'”

“Well,” Mom said, “it's good that you're having fun. One of us should.”
Way to go, Mom. Suck all the life out of the room. Woo-hoo!
I pressed my ear harder against the phone like I expected the static on the line to tell me what Mom wasn't saying.

“Are you okay?”

There was a beat, and then Mom either blew a stream of smoke above her head or sighed, I couldn't tell.

“Your dad and I have agreed to a trial separation.”

“What do you mean you're separating? I thought you were supposed to be working things out. Separating's like training wheels for divorce.” My voice was wobbly and I saw I was frantically tapping my foot without even noticing it, I tried to make it stop in case Mrs. B walked past the kitchen, saw it, and freaked out (
Charlie, don't let a little bit of nerves get to you. Look at Marcel Proust…actually no, he's was a completely neurotic mama's boy. Not a good example…he was such a germaphobe he soaked his mail in formaldehyde, and died in a cork-lined room…but his writing always reminds me of madeleines. Oreo anyone?)
, but I couldn't stop the tapping.

“Charlie, we're trying to work things out, but it's hard. Just because two people are in love—or were in love—that doesn't make things easier. Relationships take work. The longer you're with someone, the harder it gets. Love's hard.”

Okay, even though it makes me seem like a fucking kid, I'll admit I was scared. I know it's pretty stupid, but I was thinking that if they could give up on each other over stupid stuff like bills and money and 'cuz they suddenly thought they wanted something more or different out of life, what was stopping them from giving up on me? I suppose I could joke and say, that, God knows, First's close enough to giving up on me already, but I don't feel like it.

“What about me?” I asked. And yeah, I blubbered like a baby. “Is loving me too much work?”

“Charlie,” Mom said, her voice going soft. “You can't be serious. With you, it's not work. It's a calling. When it comes to you, I might as well be a nun.” She laughed, trying to lighten the mood.

“Well, you look good in black,” I said, smiling weakly.

“Listen, we'll be okay, kiddo.”

“Yeah. We'll manage.”

One of the Binkmeyer girls—Stacy? Tracy? Amanda? they all look the same—came into the kitchen, started tugging on my jeans, and asked me to play dolls with her.

“Mom, I gotta go. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Charlie—even if it means not getting time-and-a-half for overtime. How about I swing by tomorrow and bring you home?”

I told her okay and said I loved her again, and we hung up.

What a day.

Friday, September 14

I'm home again, home again, jiggety jig. No more sharing a bedroom and imagining a totally hot Binkmeyer brother's incest porno. No more fighting with fourth-grade girls over a phone to call Rob.
Who's Rob? Is he your boyfriend? Then why don't you marry him?
No more sneaking around looking for places to jerk off. No more Mrs. B, God love her.
What about Tennessee Williams? No, he drank himself to death and those last plays of his…what was he thinking? Cannibalism? On Broadway?