Love and Other Four-Letter Words Read online

  I folded my arms across my chest and faced Mom. We stared at each other for a few seconds, like gunslingers in an Old West showdown. That's when I noticed the purple half circles under her eyes. Without them, Mom would look about twenty-five, not fortytwo, which she actually is. Every once in a while, people ask if we're sisters. I never know if they're being sincere, because we don't look that much alike, except we're both around five feet five and have brown eyes. I wish I'd gotten Dad's eyes, which are hazel with rusty flecks that appear almost orange if he wears a certain color shirt.

  I did inherit Dad's straight brown hair, which I've kept right below my shoulders for practically my whole life. There's nothing else to do with it. For a while, in junior high, I attempted styling it with various products pawned off on me by overly optimistic hairdressers. But it never made a difference, except to make me look like I'd had a run-in with a jar of rubber cement. Eventually I gave up and resigned myself to my fate: to be absolutely, completely average.

  Mom finally broke the silence.

  “Look, I'm driving down to the A&P to get more boxes,” she said. “I just wanted to see if you'd like anything.”

  “I don't think you could get what I want at the A&P.” Mom ignored that comment. “Some Ben & Jerry's or a Frozfruit?”

  I shook my head. A lump was lodging in my esophagus.

  “The more you resist this change, the harder it's going to be,” Mom said.

  I didn't want her to see that I was struggling to catch my breath, so I turned toward my bookshelf and surveyed the stack of remaining paperbacks. I wasn't in the mood for homilies tonight.

  “Time moves like a river,’ Mom continued, quoting the John Stewart song Dad used to listen to when he was feeling melancholy, ‘you can either sink or swim.’

  And that's what got me. I pivoted around, sucking in a pathetic gasp of air. “Please tell me the next time you're giving an inspirational seminar, because I'll remember to sign up.”

  “Have it your way,” Mom snapped, starting down the hallway. But when she reached the stairs, she spun on her heel. “Just make sure you finish your room. The movers are coming at noon and anything we don't send with them gets stored in the garage.”

  I almost yelled back, What does it look like I'm doing? But instead I reached over and blasted the volume on my stereo again.

  People think it's strange when I tell them I am closer to Dad than Mom, as if the only things fathers are good for are briefing you on current events or lubing your bike chain. It's not even that Dad and I chat the way I do with Kitty, it's more that we like to do the same things. Or I guess I should say liked. Up until last month we were always planning hikes or cycling into the farmland surrounding Ithaca. And ever since Christmas, when Dad gave me his old guitar from college, he'd been teaching me chords to folk songs. Kitty always teases me that I'm a hippiechick, which I don't even think is such a bad thing after all.

  Sometimes I wonder if Mom resented our bond, if she felt like the odd person out in the Davis clan. Resentment. That's what Mom and Dad's last blowout was about, back in April, when they returned from a dinner party hosted by the dean of the Arts School. I'd gone up to bed already, so I'd only caught this sound bite:

  Mom: I can't stand the way everyone looks down their noses at me, as if I show kids how to glue Popsicle sticks into birdcages for a living.

  Dad: Don't harbor resentment against Cornell for the way your life hasn't turned out, Roz … or against me, for that matter.

  Mom: Well, if it weren't for Cornell, or you, for that matter, I wouldn't be stuck in this godforsaken town.

  I'd be the first to agree that Mom doesn't mesh with Ithaca. Take last year's holiday chorus recital. All the other parents wore jeans and coats, with the occasional red and green sweater. But Mom arrived in a purple velvet cape and glittery silver leggings that hugged her curvaceous hips. I'd gotten an earlier ride from the soprano who lives two doors down, so I almost keeled over when I spotted her. And then, during the final number, they invited the audience to join in on “Let There Be Peace on Earth.” Instead of mouthing the words like all the other parents, Mom let her voice echo through the auditorium (And let it begin with meeeeee …) so loudly I wanted to crawl under the risers.

  I guess that's the biggest difference between Mom and me. Where I'm more at ease being a chameleon, Mom thinks idiosyncrasies are what make a person interesting. At least that's what she said on the first day of eighth grade, when I wound up in her art class. Rule #1, she'd scribbled on the chalkboard: Call me Roz. Mrs. Davis is my mother-in-law. Once the initial astonishment had rippled through the classroom, she'd selected a fresh piece of phlegm-colored chalk and written, Rule #2: The only rule in art is that there are no rules.

  After the bell rang, as we were filing into the hallway, a chorus of classmates fed me that your-mom-is-so-coolI-bet-you-can-get-away-with-murder line. I just shrugged and shifted my notebooks onto my hip. I didn't tell them about the day before, when I'd returned from Buttermilk Falls only to hear the Doors reverberating through the cul-de-sac, originating from our house. Nor did I say how uneasy it had made me to discover Mom grooving around the family room to “Light My Fire,” shaking her boobs as if she were some Vegas showgirl. Nor did I say that since I wasn't forecasting homicide in my future, all I wanted was a gardenvariety mom like Kitty's. Mrs. Lundquist lived in freshly pressed blouses and slacks, muted tones only, and was constantly dashing out to town board meetings.

  As I dragged a box of books over to the doorway, I switched on my fan. It was warm and muggy out, a typical central New York early-summer night. Even though my windows were open, there wasn't the slightest hint of a breeze. The elastic from my bra felt sticky against my skin. I reached under my T-shirt, unhooked the back, slipped an arm through the strap and pulled my bra out the other sleeve.

  There's something I did inherit from Mom: big breasts. Not gigantic, but enough so they sag without an underwire bra. Enough so some jerk in gym class last year called me Grand Tetons, after those mountains in Wyoming. Enough so they make me appear heavier than I actually am. And I'm not even heavy, though next to Kitty, who is four inches taller and fourteen pounds lighter than me, I must look like a whale.

  Curvy is what I'd call myself on a good day. On a bad day, I try not to look in the mirror. I'm probably about as insecure as the next girl, which is to say that I wish my thighs didn't splay out when I sit down or my stomach didn't look pregnant after a second helping. Or I could lose those awful, pinkish stretch marks that recently appeared on my hips. My pediatrician suggested vitamin E oil, which I rubbed on them religiously for two weeks. But then I missed a day, a week, and eventually I gave up altogether.

  I should know better than to compare myself to Kitty. Besides the tall thing and the skinny thing and the blond thing, there's the guy thing. Even though she's been going out with Jack for five months, she's still a natural-born flirt. Like she knows exactly how to shake her hips or twitter at guys' jokes, even if she's already heard them. I could never pull the giggling number off. I'd probably wind up sounding like a hyena with rabies. Besides, I'm well aware that guys didn't frequent our table in the snack bar because of me. It sounds awful, but if you saw a Jaguar and a Ford Taurus parked next to each other, which one would you want to drive?

  The other thing about Kitty is that she's really smart. Like she and her parents are planning a road trip to Harvard and Yale this fall. Like we can cram for a test together and she'll ace it, bonus question included, and I'll walk away with a B-plus. Exemplary is how teachers always describe her. Just like they say I'm a team player, which I hate. Because I suck at organized sports, and anyway, it's just a euphemism for absolutely, completely average. Which is why I've always felt lucky someone like Kitty wants me for a best friend.

  We met on the first day of third grade, when some boys on the playground were meowing at her, making fun of her name. She began to cry, not out loud, just little tears slipping down her pale cheeks. To this day it beats me ho
w I mustered the courage to march over and say, She's not crying … it's just allergies. And then I led her to a shady spot under the poplar trees and offered her a crumpled tissue that had been in my pocket, making sure to tell her it was still clean.

  That's when she told me that her real name is Katarina Lundquist. And that her father is Swedish, so she's bilingual, which sounded like the pasta dish I'd ordered at dinner the night before. And that her American mother met her father in Stockholm on her junior year abroad. It all sounded so exotic, especially since my parents got married at City Hall and don't even have photographs to show for it.

  And we've been Best Friends Forever since then. At least that's what we carved into a poplar tree on the last day of third grade, after deciding that the blood sister thing was passé, what with the AIDS epidemic. Kitty's father is a physician, so she was the one to point that out. Because up until that moment, AIDS had never crossed my mind, except as this thing school nurses warned us about, for when we got older. But by junior high, I'd written more than one paper on the HIV virus. And by high school, the PTA and school board were having scathing debates about handing out condoms in school, whether it was a means to prevent STDs or a green light for kids to have sex.

  It was also by high school that Kitty started acting sophisticated on me. Suddenly she was hyperconscious about how she appeared, clucking her tongue if I so much as cracked up in public. I think it has to do with wanting to be a Beautiful Person, which is absurd because we used to mutually disdain them as shallower than a wading pool. But when I reminded her of that, she accused me of putting up a defensive front, rejecting them before they could reject me.

  Let's just say I do that, I considered saying. Have they ever given me reason not to?

  In global studies a few weeks ago, Mr. Rizzoli drew a long horizontal line on the chalkboard, to illustrate the political spectrum. On the far left he wrote “radical” and explained that radicals are people who do things like strap themselves to redwoods to protest the lumber industry. Just left of center, he scribbled “liberal” right of center, “conservative.” And then, way off to the far right, he wrote “reactionary.” Reactionaries are people who want to return to the way things used to be, he said.

  Then he gave us an assignment to detail three reasons for why we are where we are on the spectrum. For a split second I thought about writing an essay entitled “Why I Am an Emotional Reactionary.” Because the truth is, I wouldn't mind winding the clock back a few years. Back to when I could guess what would happen on the next page of my life. Back to when things with Kitty were less complicated. Back to when Mom and Dad were a rock-solid institution. But, of course, I didn't. Instead, I declared myself a liberal, citing abortion, the death penalty and tax cuts, just like everyone else in the class.

  Iwas fast asleep when the phone rang the next morning. The sun had been glaring into my window since about five-thirty, when I'd wriggled out of my damp cotton nightgown and buried my head under a pillow to drown out the blue jays. I'd had a hard time falling asleep last night even though I was so exhausted I thought I'd conk out the second I closed my eyes. Instead I'd lain there thinking, This is it. The last night in my room. As of tomorrow it's a pullout futon in the living room of a dinky apartment, with Mom a few steps away. And it was like I'd downed a double shot of espresso.

  The phone kept ringing. Mom must have already disconnected the answering machine. Where was she, anyway? The last I'd seen of her was in the middle of the night, when I'd heard a crash from the hallway. I'd stumbled out of bed and cracked open my door. Shielding my eyes from the light, I'd glimpsed Mom, surrounded by a swirl of towels, picture frames and cardboard boxes. Even though her back was to me, I could have sworn she was sobbing.

  After the millionth ring, I wrapped myself in my sheet and dashed down the hall. Clearing my throat, I lifted the cordless to my ear.

  “Hello?” I asked as I sank onto the bed. Mom had already stripped off her bedding, so the mattress scratched against my bare skin. I rearranged the sheet so it was under my thighs.

  “Sammie? Are you up yet?”

  I groaned and rubbed my eyes. That's another thing about Kitty. She tends to forget that the only other humans who rise as early as she does are bakers and dairy farmers.

  “Now I am,” I said, eyeing the book sprawled on the floor next to Mom's bed. The purple cover of You Can Heal Your Life was adorned with a brigade of boldly sketched hearts, three of which were pregnant with one-line affirmations. Something about the scrawled messages—I am at Peace, I Love Myself, All is Well— made me feel queasy.

  “I just got back from running,” Kitty said. “I didn't want to miss you before you left.”

  “What time is it?”

  “A little before eight. Do you want to meet at Lincoln Street Diner around eight-thirty for a quick breakfast?”

  I suddenly had to pee really badly. I wedged the phone between my ear and shoulder and headed into the bathroom off the master bedroom.

  “If you bike down, I'll drive you home.”

  “Eight-forty-five?” I lifted the toilet seat lid and sat down.

  “Okay. That'll give me time to take a shower.” She paused. “And, Sammie?”

  “Yeah?” “Hope you had a nice pee.”

  I waited until we'd hung up before I flushed.

  I finally found Mom in the garage, duct-taping cardboard boxes and labeling them with a black marker. She was wearing the same overalls as yesterday, which made me wonder if she'd even gone to bed. Her hair was pinned on top of her head in a tortoiseshell clip, but judging from the sweaty strands that clung to the back of her neck, it didn't look like she'd taken a shower.

  Our chocolate Lab, Moxie, was sprawled on the ground, gnawing a ratty hunk of rawhide. Moxie wagged her tail as I dragged the stepladder over to where the bikes were hanging from a high hook. Mom frowned.

  “I'm just going to meet Kitty for breakfast.” I attempted to release my bike as quickly as possible. “I'll be back in an hour.”

  “One hour,” Mom repeated, glancing at her watch. A few minutes later, I was pedaling through Cayuga Heights on my burnt-orange Trek Hybrid, aka Mariposa. That means “butterfly” in Spanish, the language I started taking freshman year. It's halfway between a mountain bike and a touring bike, and one of my most treasured possessions, along with my guitar. I'm going to miss Mariposa in New York City, but Mom was firm that she remain in Ithaca: no room, not safe, will not budge.

  It's not like I'm this star athlete or anything. I mean, I wouldn't know what to do with a ball if it landed in my hands, so I steer clear of things like softball and soccer. But cycling is a whole other story. I'm not sure whether it's the gliding motion or the wind splashing against my face, but cycling relaxes me. Cycling is what I do to get away from the world.

  But as I turned into the cemetery, with the dew still glistening on the grass and the sunlight barely peeking through the leafy trees, my shoulders were tensed up to my ears. I scuffed my Birkenstocks against the pavement to bring Mariposa to a stop while I unbuckled my helmet and looped it around my arm. As I began coasting down the steep incline that leads to Fall Creek, my hair whipped into my mouth and in front of my eyes, obstructing my vision. But I didn't care. Because for one split second, as I pedaled so fast I thought I'd lift off the earth, I'd been able to forget that this whole mess was happening.

  Kitty was already in front of Lincoln Street Diner by the time I arrived. She was leaning against the hood of her mom's station wagon, which is unofficially becoming her car. Clutching a handful of wilted dandelions, she was flicking their golden heads into the street with her thumb. Her long blond hair, still damp, hung loosely around her shoulders.

  “Hey …” I stopped pedaling and let Mariposa roll the rest of the way to the curb.

  “What happened to you?” Kitty asked as she tossed the flowers onto the sidewalk.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You look like you've come through a typhoon. Are you going for t
he wild child look?”

  My hand wandered self-consciously to my hair, tucking wayward strands behind my ears.

  “Here.” Kitty reached into her pocket and produced a rubber band. “A ponytail cures all.”

  I hooked my helmet around my handlebars and gathered my hair back. As Kitty popped open the rear of the station wagon, I hoisted Mariposa into the folded-down seat.

  “Much better.” Kitty nodded approvingly. “Now you're presentable.”

  The diner was bustling with its morning crowd: a mix of townies, high-school kids and Cornell students. As the waitress gestured us to a booth near the back, some guys hunched over their coffee gaped at Kitty. She didn't seem to notice, or if she did, she's so accustomed to the attention that it didn't faze her.

  Once the waitress had taken our order, Kitty rested her chin on her fists and sighed. “Is it just me or do the guys in our grade have yet to hit puberty?”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, swirling the mound of whipped cream into my hot chocolate.

  Kitty took a sip of coffee, which she started drinking this past winter. I personally find coffee repulsive, even when doctored up with milk and sugar. But Kitty explained that you have to grow accustomed to the taste, like with beer and chili peppers.

  “When I was at that party last night, I noticed that half the sophomore boys don't even shave … or maybe just their mustaches.” Kitty paused. “The seniors, on the other hand, they're already real men.”

  I almost said, Easy for you to say when you've got one. But instead I asked, “How was the party?”

  “It was okay. Jack and I slipped out early and drove to his lake house, where we …”

  Kitty paused, relishing the suspense. I lifted my hot chocolate to my lips.

  “… Did it in his parents' bed.”

  I coughed into my mug, spraying whipped cream onto the table. I quickly smudged it away with a napkin, which I then stuffed in my pocket. I don't know why Kitty and Jack's sexual escapades still throw me off balance. It's not like it's anything new; they've been official lovers for two months now.