Part 13 (1/2)
He started acting all stupid around me, like we were a couple or something. He came to McDonald's every night and dropped by the trailer unannounced, which really p.i.s.sed me off because it was hard enough living with my new-levels-of-loserdom parents without having to show them off to the neighbors.
By prom night, he'd worked himself up into a nervous wreck and his mood fluctuated between morose insecurity and babbling excitement. I began to hate him for it, so much so that, as I slipped into the dress, I half considered calling the whole night off. Before I could, he arrived at the trailer door with a boxed corsage and his hair combed and slicked down with some sort of s.h.i.+ny stuff.
I'd put on makeup, and this shocked him as much as his hair shocked me.
”Wow. You look great.” The way he said it felt insulting-as if I'd never looked great before. Before I could answer, my mother was posing us next to the front window, inching Sam to the left or right to hide the peeling paper paneling.
”Hold that!” she said. ”Saffron, smile, will you?”
I smiled.
”Sam, can you lean in toward Saffron a little? I can't fit you both in the frame.”
She was backed up against the far wall of the living area, and I let her snap a few more shots before I suggested that we go.
Sam had left his pop's truck at #20, so we walked over there, and the old folks came out on the warm May night to watch us. There was something about how they looked at us that I tried to connect with. Though I felt as stupid as a sack of rat s.h.i.+t in my beaded dress, lacy shawl, and a wrist corsage, I felt a little bit of happiness for us, too.
But then, Sam opened his mouth.
”Uh, I'm not sure I can dance tonight. I think I sprained my ankle.”
”You look fine to me,” I said. ”We don't have to dance if you don't want.”
”Oh good.”
What a pathetic lying jerk.
Sam's granny and pop took some pictures and then we got into the truck (Sam didn't open the door for me) and headed for the Jefferson Hotel. About a hundred yards from the trailer park entrance, I saw two guys walking down the road in hooded sweats.h.i.+rts. As we pa.s.sed, my eyes met with Junior's. I groaned.
”Do you know those guys?” he asked.
”No.”
”So how come you made that noise?”
”I just did,” I said.
”Did you used to date one of them?”
”No.”
”Are you sure?”
I turned my head to look at him. He was clearly doubtful, upset, and, from the sounds of things, possessive. ”Yes I'm sure. Though it's not any of your business.”
”It is is my business because you're my business because you're my my date.” date.”
And that was pretty much how the rest of the night went. When he found me having an innocent conversation with Mike from the Quiz Bowl team, he grabbed my arm so roughly it left a little red mark. When he saw me heading to the bathroom with Susan and two other girls, he asked, ”Where do you think you're going?”
”To the bathroom.”
”Just don't talk about me behind my back,” he said. Susan looked at me and made a crazy face. I smirked. Wasn't this her idea to begin with?
Sam and I had one dance together, a slow number, and he grabbed my a.s.s. Like, grabbed it so hard it hurt and I let out a little yelp. I walked off the dance floor, gathered my shawl and my purse, and waited for him to catch up.
”Why'd you do that?” he demanded.
”Let's just go home,” I said. ”I don't feel well.”
”But, I-” he stopped when he saw my face. I must have looked three hundred years' worth of p.i.s.sed off and ready to kill him. And I was.
He drove home emotionally. At first, he seemed sad and tried to get me to feel sorry for him, and then, when I didn't, he drove like an a.s.shole. When we got back to the trailer park, he stopped at the entrance, put the truck in park, and pouted at me.
”I can walk from here,” I said, reaching for the door handle.
”But I thought since we went out we could, um ...”
I was already stuffing his eye sockets with salted limes, already carving his acne off, zit by zit, and feeding it to him. What more did he want? I made a move to open the door. He slammed the truck into drive and peeled forward on the gravel, aiming for every pothole there was. By the time we arrived in front of his granny and pop's place in a cloud of gray dust, I'd hit the truck's ceiling twice.
Before I'd regained my balance and straightened myself, he leaned in to kiss me. I recoiled a little, and then figured if this was prom night etiquette, and if it would get me out of ever doing anything remotely ”normal” again, then I was willing to give him one stupid kiss. But then there was a knock on the truck's window and I saw Sam's granny standing outside, crying and gesturing toward the trailer.
”I'm so sorry,” she said. ”I didn't want to interrupt your special night, but Sam, I need your help.”
Sam was out of the truck before she finished the sentence. She started telling him what happened. I was still in the truck and couldn't hear her. But I heard Sam say, ”Who would steal a wheelchair?” and then I slowly turned the handle on the truck door and slipped out. I knew exactly who would steal a wheelchair.
”Two of them, in ski masks,” Sam's pop said as I neared the front door.
”They pointed a gun at me!” his granny cried. ”And they took all of our pills!”
I reached out and touched Sam's back, but he flinched. ”Didn't anyone call the cops?” he said, and when they shrugged at him, still obviously in shock, Sam took off for the pay phone as if I wasn't standing there.
And then I realized that if Junior had been to Sam's place, then he'd have been to ours, too, and I worried about my parents. I walked (as fast as I could in two-inch heels) to our trailer and scanned a hundred mental images-Mom and Dad shot, sliced, hung, burnt, and beaten-but when I got through the door, I found them alert and watching The Late Show The Late Show.
”Was Junior here tonight?”
My father stared at David Letterman. My mother said, ”No.”
”Are you sure?”
I looked around the room, trying to see the gaps Junior would usually leave. The toaster was there. The heater was there. The microwave.
”I've been here all night and I didn't see him,” my mother said.
”Well, he robbed #20 tonight,” I said. ”And he stole Sam's grandfather's wheelchair.”