The Screwed-Up Life of Charlie the Second (3 page)

“Well, in or out, already?” With the side of his foot, Bink shoved the poodle outside and it bounded away, barking at the moon. Some bare-chested guy I didn't know tried to squeeze past Bink. He was holding a shirt stained with strawberry Kool-Aid, probably spiked with Everclear. Bink caught his arm and spun him around in one motion. The T-shirt dropped with a splat.

“Hey, sorry about that. Dana didn't mean to spill. She gets clumsy when she's drunk,” Bink said. “She's cool, though. I'm Neil, by the way. Rob?”

“Yeah, Rob Hunt,” he nodded. “I moved next door a few days ago.”

Rob saw me watching him and grinned, all dimples. I think we were checking each other out, but I couldn't be sure. He was shorter than me (who isn't?) and cute in an easy, lazy kind of way. He had dark black hair that was mussed, a few strands falling toward his eyes. His ears stuck out just a bit (not like my Dumbo monsters). The rest of him looked good, too—a mostly smooth torso with a Y-shaped shadow of hair; a tight, slightly pumped chest with penny-sized nipples the color of raspberries; and a thin treasure trail snaking from his belly button to his low-hanging Bermuda shorts. My cheeks burned.

“Where'd you move from?” I asked. I tried being casual, but my voice chipped like cheap paint.

“Manhattan.” His bluish eyes kept looking at me, which made me think I was getting a zit (I was—just popped it a minute ago). “Well, actually my parents lived in Manhattan. I went to the Phelps School in Pennsylvania.”

“Your parents sent you to boarding school?” Bink asked. “Man, that sucks.”

Rob shrugged and picked up his shirt. “It made sense at the time.”

“Boarding school?” Bink said, like he couldn't believe it. “Like shirts and ties and blazers?”

“Well, formal, yes.”

“No girls?”

“No…no girls.”

“Damn, that had to suck.”

“Well,” Rob stopped looking at me and twisted his shirt, raining Kool-Aid on the patio bricks, “we had dances with our sister schools—Purnell and Grier.”

“Still…”

“I should probably rinse this,” Rob said to no one in particular and ducked back into the house.

Once Rob was out of earshot, Bink closed the sliding door and pulled me aside. “You know what Dana heard?”

“What?”

“She heard Rob got sent away 'cuz he got some chick pregnant. Supposedly, Rob's dad was pissed Rob was out banging some chick when his mom's really sick. He wasn't gonna pay for an abortion.”

“That's retarded,” I said, sounding pissy.

“It's true.”

“Sure it's true. Just like when Dana said Joan Hawkings was a big lesbo and they caught her rubbing her crotch against a gymnastic beam.”

Bink scrunched his face and belched pure-grain alcohol.

“I'm gonna be sick.”

Bink went green, chest and throat retching, and vomited on a pile of clothes. I gagged on the smell. I should've checked to see if he was all right, but I needed to piss—bad.

Inside, I got lost looking for the bathroom. Smug family portraits of the whole damn Flannigan family covered every wall. There were Flannigans wearing the same Christmas sweaters, Flannigans at Disney World, sepia-toned Flannigans dressed up in Wild West outfits. I stumbled into a room filled with Precious Moments figurines and hand-stitched quilts. Another door led to the kitchen. There were Flannigans at somebody's wedding, Flannigans under the Eiffel Tower, Flannigans at Mount Rushmore acting out that famous Hitchcock movie. Another room, this one filled with shelves of books and coffee tables littered with issues of
The National Review, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune,
and the
Wall Street Journal
before coming to the
foy-yay
. (
Oh, Kyle, that feels sooo good…)
Finally, a bathroom. (
Can ya wait a goddamn minute, asshole?)
I went upstairs: a girl's room, all peaches and cream, filled with stuffed animals and horseback-riding trophies. The Flannigans in a lab discovering a cure for cancer. Door number two: twenty toes sticking out from a sheet (ten with nails flaking red polish, the other ten, thick and hairy hammertoes). Another door: towels, linen, cotton balls, Kotex. Door four: a guest bedroom, a cheesy paint-by-numbers of a kneeling Jesus praying at a rock; the Flannigans feeding fishes and loaves to the poor; the Flannigans walking on water.

Door five: finally an empty bathroom—hand towels crumpled on the floor, a quarter sheet of toilet paper left on the roll, yellow bubbles of piss in the toilet. This wasn't the time to be picky. My knees were shaking so badly I almost couldn't pull it out in time. The cold-jerk, piss-shiver through my shoulders, two taps, flush, and to the faucet. A dish of soaps shaped like sea horses and conch shells.

After the toilet stopped racing, I heard a piano I somehow hadn't seen.

I went downstairs into what I'm guessing Kim would've called the “salon.” The half-dozen or so people still at Dana's had migrated there: Joan Hawkings, Bink, Dana, Shannon Debold, Bob Collins, Jon Bales, Grace Peterson. Bink was on a couch, his mouth clean of vomit, with Dana on the floor, nestled between his legs. She was stroking the back of his calves while he rubbed her shoulders and laughed at Shannon, a hammered cheerleader whose skirt was hiked so far past her knees everyone could see the daddy-longlegs hairs creeping from her panties. Bob laughed, too late and too hard, snapping one of the rubber bands on his braces against the roof of his mouth. He reeled backward and collided with the grand piano, bringing its lid down with a slam.

“Idiot,” Grace said, leaning into Shannon.

The guy at the piano—Rob, still shirtless—glanced at Bob and went back to playing that classical music from the Peanuts Christmas special.

“Hey, Schroeder, quit playing that crap or eat out Peppermint Patty,” Bales said. Dana swatted his leg and whined that he was being gross.

Rob looked up just in time to duck the flip-flop Shannon'd drunkenly tossed at his head. It hit the Venetian blinds behind Bink.

“Watch it, woman,” Rob smiled. “Play nice.”

“Then you play something nice,” Shannon said. “Not the crap you've been playing.”

“Okay, but only because you asked so politely,” he said. It seemed like he was flirting with her, but I couldn't tell. It pissed me off anyway, 'cuz, let's face it, I wanted him to flirt with me.

Rob's shoulders rolled, his fingers dancing the length of the keyboard. I plopped on the couch and threw a leg over Dana's shoulder. She was too drunk to notice.

“I know this! It's the ‘Minute' Waltz,” Bink said, surprising even himself. “They did this at my sisters' ballet recital. It's by Chop-in.”

“
Show-pan
, you pig,” Kim Green corrected him, coming into the “salon” from upstairs. Kyle followed her, tugging at his shorts like he was showing off what was left of his boner. “It's pronounced
Show-pan.
”

“Pigshh. All my friendshh are pigshh,” Dana said, her face in the carpet.

“It's fag music,” Kyle said, high-fiving Bink and knocking my leg off Dana. He curled into a couch with Kim.

Rob flipped Kyle the bird and then played a bass-heavy version of “Fascinatin' Rhythm,” making it sound as if he was playing two pianos at once. He wasn't concentrating on the music. His whole body moved, hands trilling white here, spanking black there, and he had this huge, dimple-making smile on his face. When he'd finished, the girls applauded and the guys look ticked, like Rob'd deliberately tried to show them up in front of “their” women.

“Thanks,” Rob said. Blushing, he closed the piano, flipped on the stereo, and sat next to Dana.

“You know what we should do?” Jon asked. He made one of those tough-guy, silent chin thrusts at Kyle, letting him know he needed to look up Shannon's skirt. “We should totally play Truth or Dare.”

“Hell, yeah,” Kyle said. “Dana, you start.”

Bink jabbed his knee into Dana's back. She snapped up and blinked like she couldn't figure out where she was.

“Bob,” Dana said, “truth or dare?”

“Dare.”

“Fine. I dare you to get me some water and an aspirin.”

Bob's face sank. He raced out of the room, returning with a bottle of Tylenol and a Dixie cup so fast I wondered if there was another bathroom I hadn't discovered.

“My turn,” Bob said, licking his lips and eyeballing Shannon. She whispered to Grace. “Shannon, truth or dare?”

“Truth.”

Bob looked at his crotch, then back at Shannon. “Spit or swallow?”

“Swallow. Same as you.” Kyle and Jon howled. Shannon put a hand on Rob's thigh.
Slut
. I was jealous. “Joan, truth or dare?”

“I'm not playing.”

“Chickenshit. C'mon, truth or dare?”

“Okay, truth.”

“Ever have sex…with a guy?”

“Yeah.” Everyone's jaw dropped. Rob shifted his leg and Shannon's hand slipped away.
Good. Keep her whore hands off you.

“No way. Who?” Grace asked.

“What is this? An interrogation?” Joan sighed. She wasn't gonna get off that easy, not with this group. “Oh, all right. Tom Vodak. He was…” She wiggled her pinky finger. The girls laughed. When Bob swallowed hard, I smiled. I was glad I wasn't the only guy with a reason to get self-conscious. “Charlie, truth or dare?”

“Dare.”

Dares are safer than truths. Sure, I ran the risk of being dared to make out with the dog or lick a toilet bowl, but that beat Joan making me admit that when I got home, I'd jack off thinking about Bink and Rob.

“I dare you to…” She scanned the room. “Kiss Neil.”

“Hell, no,” Bink said, curling into a fetal position and shielding his face with his arms. “I'll quit.”

“Baby,” Joan said like she couldn't be bothered. She searched the room. Jon and Kyle glared at her. “Fine. Kiss Rob.”

I froze. My face burned. My throat was so dry it felt like I'd swallowed sand. Play it cool, I told myself. Just give him a peck on the cheek. But as I crossed the room, Bob—the jagoff—tripped me. I fell, landing on top of Rob. Our bodies were hip-to-hip, our faces practically colliding. The guys moaned, “Gross,” trying to outdo each other's straightness with their disgust. Eyes closed, I leaned in, expecting to get Rob's cheek, but I got his lips. My jaw went slack. I'm not sure, but I swear I felt his tongue trying to get in my mouth. My dick switch-bladed up and I jerked away. A strand of spittle linked us mouth to mouth, then broke. He dried his lips on the back of his hand. I wanted to know if he was wiping away the taste of me.

The game went on. I got Bales to admit he spanked it while sniffing a pair of his sister's dirty panties. Grace kissed Dana. Joan mimicked Tom Vodak's come face. Bales finally got to french Shannon. Kyle admitted to nicknaming his prick “The Shotgun” because it “fired from both barrels.” If my eyes could groan, they would have. Dana dared everybody to get her more water, then made Bob get her slippers, then a quilt, then a grilled cheese sandwich. Rob frenched the girls. Bob confessed to being the guy on the hockey team who ate the Wonder Bread.

“Shannon, truth or dare?” Grace asked with a wink. They were in on something.

“Dare.”

“I dare you to feel Rob's dick—under his shorts.”

Shannon slipped her hand up Rob's leg. He tried to squirm away, but Kim and Joan pinned him by the shoulders.

“I'm not wearing underwear.” His face tensed. Shannon smiled.

“What's it feel like?” Grace asked.

“It's warm…kinda heavy. His balls aren't hairy.”

“Does he have an erection?” Kim asked.
Foy-yay. Show-pan. Erection
. If she wanted people thinking she was classy, she didn't need to throw around a bunch of big words. She could start by not letting Kyle and Bob make her into a whore sandwich.

“Sorta, I guess…I don't know.” Rob looked panicked and embarrassed.

“Let's see,” Grace said.

Rob kicked, but Shannon and Grace tugged Rob's shorts an inch or two past his hips, flashing a patch of black pubes. They looked soft, not wiry. I wanted to touch 'em.

Rob leapt from the girls, red faced and sweating. He somehow lost a shoe as he hiked up his shorts.

“Look, Shannon,” Bob said, pointing at Rob's crotch. Of course, Mr. Closet Case would notice. “He's got a hard-on.”

“Do not,” Rob said. He was tenting his shorts.

Rob forced himself between Bink and me. Rob's arm touched mine. His skin felt hot. I got hard and part of me hoped Rob would notice.

“Dude, it's totally cool,” Kyle said. He grabbed his crotch. “Man, The Shotgun would totally dig three chicks going after him.”

Shannon sighed, bored with the boy-bonding, macho-posturing. I couldn't blame her. It was like all the guys were suddenly Rob's best friends just 'cuz his dick stiffed for chicks. So what? My dick doesn't need a reason to get hard and I don't see anybody throwing a party for it.

Shannon turned to me. “Charlie, truth or dare?”

“Dare,” I said, hating them and hating myself more for being there.

With the exception of Bink, it's not like I was friends with any of them. Hell, even though we'd been in the same classes for like ten years, we barely knew jack about each other. They knew I liked guys, which, depending on which one of them was talking, put me on a spectrum somewhere between one of those cute little dogs that socialites accessorized with, the Ken doll best friend that went to school dances with the fat girls, almost normal (except for all the other things about me that made me a freak—like not wearing the right clothes), a social pariah, a sitcom character's snarky best friend, and a kitten rapist. And I knew, or at least hoped, that after high school, they'd all end up fat, bald, mortgaged to the eyeteeth, and nursing a litter of ankle-biters and a six-pack-a-day drinking habit.