Under the Dusty Moon (12 page)

“
Ha-ha
, nothing like that,” I said, which didn't actually feel like a lie. “She works for a record label,” I added, which was almost true. I mean, she was
on
a label. “She just kind of knows a lot of people.”

“Wow,” Shaun said, “cool.”

Fortunately nobody bugged us after that, and we spent close to an hour wandering the aisles and picking up goofy record covers to show each other — breaking one of Mom's cardinal rules, I knew, but I figured that it was okay when there was a boy involved. Neither of us bought anything, and I was relieved to see that the girl at the counter was on her break by the time we left.

We started walking back toward Dufferin, talking about nothing in particular. Shaun suggested we play a game where we each take turns naming a band that starts with the last letter of the band that came before. It took me a couple of turns to get the hang of it, even though we started off pretty easy.

“All right,” Shaun said, “let's start basic: The Ramones. So now you've gottta name one that starts with
S
.”

My mind drew an unfortunate blank as I stuttered out words that started with
S
, trying to think of a band name. “Snakes, Shoot, Something, Simple, Sleigh. Oh, uh, Sleigh Bells?”

“Heh, yeah, you've got it,” he said. “Hmm,
S
? Okay, The Smiths.”

We went back and forth like that for a while, until I thought I'd finally stumped him with The Beta Band, an old favourite of Mom's.

“Huh,” he said, “don't think I know them. You're not making bands up to try to win, are you? That's a dirty move. You're playing dirty on me, V!”

“I'm not,” I said, my hands up in the air in a
cease-fire
gesture, “I swear!”

“Oh sure, you play all innocent now,” Shaun said. “You want another obscure name to follow that up? How about … hmmm,
D
? Uh, lemme think.”

An obvious name jumped into my head, but I kept my lips zipped.

“All right,” Shaun said finally, “you've probably never heard of them, but I'm using them anyway: Dusty Moon.”

I felt a small laugh fighting for life in my throat, but I choked it down. “Oh yeah,” I said, “‘Stranded in Daylight' and all that? I know those guys.”

Shaun's eyes grew hugely wide in surprise and then, before I had a chance to come up with some amazing lie about how exactly I was so
well-versed
in
mid-nineties
Canadian
alt-rock
, he leaned in and kissed me.

Our lips met in a perfect combination of mushy and firm. They tingled. No, it wasn't just our lips. Everything tingled. It was like my whole body was alive with electricity — like a game of Operation gone totally haywire — and I couldn't tell where my mouth stopped and his began.

He was kissing me.

Shaun.

Shaun
.

And I was kissing him back.

Holy shit!

“Sorry,” he said, pulling his mouth away, “I had to.”

“You're easily impressed,” I said, grinning like an idiot.

“My cousin got me into Dusty Moon when I was a kid,” he said. “I totally love them. I can't believe you know them! You're, like, the coolest.”

It wasn't as unlikely as Shaun seemed to think. “Stranded in Daylight” was a pretty huge hit, and it still got decent radio play whenever unimaginative DJs got nostalgic about the nineties. But I wasn't about to let him know that.

“Yeah,” I said. “I know them pretty well. They were great.” Again, not a total lie. “I should, uh, go, though. I mean my gran's going to want me home soon.” I pulled out my phone to check the time and saw that Gran had already called three times. Dammit. Fortunately we'd already walked to Dufferin, and I could see the northbound bus heading up the street toward us.

“Oh, huh,” Shaun said, “yeah, sure. I don't want to get you in trouble or anything. But can we, you know, not wait another month until we see each other again?”

“Yeah,” I said. “That sounds good.” Shaun leaned in for another long kiss. He tasted like sweat and SPF30 which was kind of disgusting but somehow totally perfect. Finally, I pulled away. “That sounds great.”

He texted me a minute later as I snagged a seat on the Dufferin rocket:

You're the coolest.

It wasn't even remotely true, but maybe I could fake it for just a little longer.

I
t
was weird waking up without Mom around on her birthday, though it wasn't all bad. I was spared the steamroller for one thing, which was a definite plus. Ever since I was little, Mom has started every birthday morning — hers, mind you, not mine — by creeping into my room while I'm still asleep and waking me up by flopping down on my bed and rolling herself over and over me while yelling something like “Birthday steamroller!” or “Mama was a rolling stone!” or even something more elaborate like “How did you know I wanted pancakes for breakfast? Mmmm, freshly steamed!” which doesn't even really make sense. Not that sense has ever been Mom's strong suit.

I've tried to beat her at her own game a few times, but I could never seem to wake myself up early enough to catch her. When I was eleven I'm pretty sure she woke herself up at four in the morning just to get me, crouched in the shadows by my bed, waiting for the deepest part of my sleep cycle to hit. I came pretty damn close to being the world's youngest heart attack survivor that year. Ladies and gentlemen, my mother.

But this year August seventh arrived just like the day before. I woke up in a bed that still felt strange, in the spare room at Gran's house. It was almost eleven, but the house was silent except for the
tick-tick
-ticking of the clock on the wall next to the bed. It was plain and utilitarian, not a cheesy bird in sight.

I reached under the bed to grab the laptop and turned it on. It started up about as slowly as I did, and I lay back down for a couple of minutes while we each gradually woke up. There was a little lump of guilt in my stomach, about the size of a peach pit from the feel of it, that I hadn't planned anything special for Mom's birthday, even though she was thousands of miles away. We'd hardly talked since she left. I mean, yeah, we'd emailed, but since the time in Japan was fourteen hours ahead of the time here — and she'd been so busy with shows — it'd been hard to find the time to
video-chat
.

I checked through my overstuffed inbox. I couldn't even remember when she'd suggested we try to talk on her birthday. Scrolling through messages — mostly just spam, exactly how much discount Viagra did the Internet think I needed? — I found Mom's last message. She said we could talk when she got back to her hotel after her
birthday-night
show. Could I wake myself up early enough to talk at ten in the morning
my-time
? She said she thought that she could make it back to the hotel by midnight
her-time
, but that she probably couldn't stay there too long because Mel and the others were going to take her out. The guilty peach pit wobbled and throbbed in my stomach, and I logged on to chat.

She wasn't online, but she'd sent me a series of messages.

Hey, sweets. Sorry I missed you. Great show in Matsumoto tonight. I couldn't believe everyone knew the words to all my silly little songs. Happy 38th (gasp!!) birthday to meee!

The band's about to drag me off to some bar, and then we're going to a karaoke box or something. I don't really know what the deal is, but you know I'm going to be belting some Prince loud enough that you'll be hearing it back in Toronto.

“Litttttle red corvettttttte …”

The tour's going great, though, it's just amazing. And it's great having Ken here. I think he's gotten some good stuff for the book too. I mean, what do I know? But he seems happy with the interviews we've done. He and I are hanging out tomorrow and we're going to do some exploring. We've got the whole day off, which is great, so maybe we can talk then? Miss you (but not toooo much).

xo,

Mommy Dearest

Sent: 10:45AM

Of course she couldn't have just waited another ten minutes for me to log on. Like she didn't know how much I usually slept in. Like she didn't know that it had just been a mistake, but that I'd be online soon enough.

It was like she'd done it on purpose. She'd left this tiny little window of her day open for me to slip into, wish her a happy birthday, and then send her off to party with her real friends. Like it was so easy to forget that birthdays were a thing we always did together, only now she didn't have time for me.

And why was she getting so friendly with the leech? This Ken guy was totally suspicious and here she was going off exploring with him, which meant they were probably hooking up by now. Mom always picked the worst guys, and this guy was clearly another premium,
grade-A
idiot. Couldn't she see that he was just using her to get a better story for his book? He was just another slobbering fanboy and she was eating up his flattery, or whatever it was, with a spoon. A shovel. A forklift.

I wrote her back slowly, hitting one key at a time with the index finger of my good hand.

Happy birthday. Guess I just missed you. Have fun.

We can talk tomorrow if you can find the time.

And then I closed the computer.

I had to get out of the house, had to get out of the whole neighbourhood. Without my bike I felt trapped. I couldn't move fast enough to put the distance I needed between me and Mom — even if it was just her words on the computer — and Gran's suffocating house. I put my phone and my wallet into my bag and started walking. I made it to the closest subway station, scrounged for some change, and got on the first train headed east.

Without realizing where I was taking myself, I got off at Dufferin, our home stop, and took the bus south to Queen. The bus home.

I checked my phone and realized that Gran had texted me.

Ill be out for most of the day dinner is at 7 gran

She really didn't understand how to use her phone. I texted her back to say okay and then started walking. But I didn't know where I wanted to go. I didn't want to go anywhere, really.

I passed Lucy's family's shop and decided to stop in to see if her parents were back in town. Lucy hadn't responded to my texts, but it was possible she'd just left her phone charger at her aunt's house or something. It wouldn't be the first time. I pushed through the door and set off the automatic chime, but the man behind the counter was someone I didn't recognize.

“Hey,” I said, “are, uh, Lynn or Walter here?”

“Sorry, no,” he said. “Family business. They're out of town.”

“Oh, okay,” I said. “Thanks anyway.”

I was disappointed that things were stalled with Lucy's and my game. As long as she was stuck babysitting in deepest suburbia, we couldn't exactly work on it together. I was excited at the idea of finishing it and showing off to the She Shoots crew, but with Shaun on my mind, the game wasn't really my first priority.

As if on cue, my phone vibrated with a new message. From Shaun.

Hey
, he texted.
Just thinking about you.

I knew it was just a matter of time until he figured out who I really was, or, more specifically, who my parents were (had he really not made the connection with my last name?). And it probably wouldn't end well. God, why did he have to be a fan? Still, he was like a
super-charged
magnet to my heart and I was totally helpless against his pull. I was a little freaked that he'd realize how much I liked him. I knew that the conventional
Cosmo
wisdom was that I had to keep him guessing. To try to cultivate some mystery. So far the only mystery I had going for me was that Shaun didn't know I was the daughter of Dusty Moon, which I was pretty sure was about a million miles from what these manipulative magazine editors had in mind.

I sent Lucy a text to distract myself from more obsession thoughts of Shaun.

Hey
, I texted,
when you coming home? It's almost my birthday, y'know.

Then I kept on walking. I'd missed the sights and sounds of Parkdale, since I'd barely been able to breathe on my last date with Shaun, and the noise of neighbourhood personalities clashing in the street. My stomach gurgled as I walked past a row of roti shops, helpfully reminding me that I hadn't actually eaten anything yet that day. I pulled out my wallet and counted my change. When I counted all my loonies and quarters together, along with a couple of nickels, I had just enough.

I ducked into the grungiest of the shops, Roti Lady, where five bucks would buy me enough chicken curry to stretch my stomach to its limit. The sweet woman behind the counter, who probably thought she'd seen my face a bit too often around her shop, wrapped up an
extra-large
roti for me, and I ate it, tearing off small bits at a time, as I kept walking down Queen, toward the lake.

After crossing over the pedestrian bridge that led down to the water, I climbed up on one of the unattended lifeguard stands on the beach. A couple of dogs were running in and out of the water in an endless game of fetch with their owner, but otherwise the waterfront was pretty quiet. The sun was just starting to set, and the sky was a corally kind of pink. I stuffed the rest of my chicken roti into my mouth, ignoring the pain in my stomach that told me I' d eaten too much, and watched the small waves rising on the sand. The beach was so littered with garbage, cigarette butts, plastic bags, and abandoned
flip-flops
, that it was hard to forget you were in the middle of the city, but it was still peaceful.

Mom and I used to bring picnics out to the lake and eat them huddled up on the lifeguard stands after the sun went down. We' d done it fairly often the last few summers, but hadn't been down here yet this year. I'd missed it, and I only realized how much as I sat there looking out across the water all by myself.

I thought about Shaun and the way he'd looked right before he leaned in to kiss me, this soft, vulnerable face I'd never seen before. It was beautiful.

And I thought about the game Lucy and I were making, at least in theory.

Things were happening, kind of. Things that Mom wasn't a part of at all. And I felt torn: it was weirdly satisfying knowing that, for the first time, there were parts of my life that Mom knew nothing about, and yet, despite that strange satisfaction, I missed her. Desperately.

My phone vibrated with a text from Lucy.

So so so sorry
, she texted,
my parents had to extend their trip. I'm stuck in Richmond Hill til Sunday
.
I'll make it up to you when I get back I promise!! :( :( :(

I tried to bury my conflicted feelings along with my sinking disappointment as I looked back out onto the water and the swans floating near the shore. At least I still had Shaun around to make my birthday special. I hoped. I balled up the empty roti wrapper and checked my phone.

Damn. Even if I left now I'd still be late for Gran's seven o'clock dinner. Since I was already stuffed and knew that I'd be chewed out anyway, I texted Shaun back.

Hey you.

I probably should have waited longer, at least until I had something real to say, but I couldn't hold it in anymore. Why did I have to play dumb just to keep him interested?

I waited a few minutes for another message, but when none came I climbed down from the lifeguard post and started walking back toward Queen. I caught the streetcar up to Dundas West station with the last of my change and texted Gran to let her know that I'd be a bit late.

She texted back,
Dont expect it to be warm when you get her.

Jesus. At least I had Shaun. And Lucy. And the game.

Maybe.