After Dakota Part 31

She doesn't want to be Claire Eleanor Rollins of Albuquerque, New Mexico anymore.

All those times Bryce has been in here, battling his cowlick with the scissors before leaving for school. Claire starts laughing as she takes them from the drawer, keeps on laughing as she chops the first strand of hair. It twirls to the sink, a dead brown slug against the white porcelain.

The DJ's voice from her room says, "Got some Stones for you on this mellow morning, from Sticky Fingers."

Claire screams when she hears the first chords, then sing-yells along with Mick Jagger, about childhood living and graceless lady.

If she hadn't left school, she wouldn't have heard it. Message received. Thanks, Dakota.

More drinking. More singing. More scissors. Chop-drink-chop-drink-chop-drink. Baloo sc.r.a.pes back and forth against her s.h.i.+ns.

Later, the bottle empty, the sink coated in fur like an animal. Claire's hands got less steady as she went, resulting in strands of varying lengths around her head. She finds it a challenge to even stand steady at the moment. The person looking back at her is still recognizably Claire.

Not good enough.

She pulls her coat back on over her pajamas, makes it halfway down the driveway on her bike before losing her balance and wiping out on the gra.s.s. She picks it up and tries again, swiping the street with her feet until she gets some momentum.

A weekday afternoon means few people at Grand Central, the shoppers outnumbered by employees. She wanders around, knocking over a rack of blouses in the women's department, until she finds hair supplies. All those glamorous women on the dye boxes must have great lives. She takes a box of the blackest black, opens it and sticks the bottle in her coat pocket. A red one sounds good, too. She puts the empty boxes back on the shelf.

A creepy mustachioed man in a windbreaker stands right outside the store, staring at her when she exits. She makes a hard left turn toward the bike rack. A hand on her shoulder. She screams. Isn't that what you're supposed to do if a guy attacks you?

The hand spins Claire around and now there are three of them: mustache and two others in tight polo s.h.i.+rts. "Store security," mustache says. They're all seven feet tall, it seems; they surround her like bodyguards for the walk back inside, up some stairs she never noticed before. She loses her balance twice. "Someone's been drinking," one of them says; the others agree. Claire isn't nervous, because she knows what the routine will be; she's heard it from other people at school who got caught swiping from stores. They threaten to call the cops, then send you on your way.

They lead her to a cold office, populated only by a gunmetal gray desk and some plastic chairs. One of the walls is transparent, a magic mirror looking down over the shopping floor. "You have anything hidden on you?" mustache asks.

She shakes her head.

He sighs. "Look, you can tell us or we'll pat you down. You want that?"

These guys are sure into their parts. She pulls the bottles from her pocket, hands them over. Mustache says, "It'll take a lot more than hair dye to fix you up. You look like you broke out of a nut house."

One of the polo s.h.i.+rts pulls out a sheet of paper and asks for her name, address, phone, and date of birth. He then pushes it and a pen across to her. "Read and initial each line."

It looks like a quiz, but on this quiz each question has only one answer and you're guaranteed to be wrong.

1. I HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT.

2. I HAVE THE RIGHT TO AN ATTORNEY.

"Can I go now?" she asks after initialing.

He doesn't answer, doesn't even look at her. Just dials the phone. "Mrs. Rollins?" Claire's thoughts stop, her breathing stops. "My name is Art Barker, in charge of security at Grand Central. I've got Claire sitting here with me..." Her mom's voice comes through the receiver, some exclamation of shock. Does this guy have any idea the lecture he's set Claire up for at home? a.s.shole.

She can feel her pulse work overtime on the side of her neck; she starts a calm-down list of Saturn's moons but stops halfway. Maybe they'd let her go if she fainted.

She doesn't faint. She gets to ride home in an actual police car, in the back like a criminal.

Her parents wait on the front porch, both dressed in their office clothes. It's not even lunchtime neither of them should be home. The dark-skinned policeman unloads Claire's bike from the trunk, then opens the pa.s.senger door. "Oh, Lord, look at you" are the first words her mom says. "Go to your room and do not come out" are the next. Her dad shuts the front door after she goes through, sealing the juvenile delinquent safely inside while the adults converse.

Several minutes pa.s.s before the police car's engine starts back up. Claire's mom steps into the bedroom soon after, standing with her arms crossed. A hieroglyphic forms in the furrow between her brows.

"I stopped home from work for a minute this afternoon and found your radio playing loud enough to wake the dead. Not to mention an empty bottle of liquor and hair all over the bathroom. I thought someone had broken into our house!" Claire and the dolls in the case engage in a staring contest. "Then I got two calls one was the attendance office from your school, you know the second one."

Her mom walks out. That wasn't so bad.

She returns a minute later carrying the blue trash bin from the kitchen. "What are you doing?" Claire asks as the dresser drawers get opened and searched, one by one.

"Sit there and be quiet."

"Let me save you some trouble." Claire opens the top desk drawer, removes the Trapper Keepers to reveal the hidden contents underneath. "Here's all the makeup I wear at school every day."

Next drawer, full of unopened and half-eaten treats from the pharmacy. "Here's all my candy, so I can get really fat and make you embarra.s.sed of me."

Bottom drawer. "Here's a comic book I stole."

Her mom drops the makeup and candy into the trash, sets Tim Boo Ba atop the dresser.

"I'm sure you wanna search the closet," Claire says.

Her mom tosses aside the envelope full of all the Ricky photos without opening it. She gasps actually gasps and Claire knows. She spins around and the Tarot cards break free of their silk, helicoptering across the bed and the floor.

The Lovers, The Knight of Pentacles, The Magician.

"Careful with those. They belonged to "

"You were told," her mom says, stepping on the cards, "That these are not. Allowed. In. This. House." She finishes the sentence inches away from Claire, who flinches from the expected slap that never comes. Her mom gathers handful after handful of cards like a thresher machine, dropping them in the garbage.

"Here, don't forget this." Claire pulls the plastic baggie from under her mattress; all that's left inside are the mushroom remnants. "This had my drugs in it. I sit in here and get high because I can't stand this stupid house!"

Now it's her mom who flinches, looking like she's been slapped. Without another word, she walks out of the room. Let her go read her Dr. Spock book for advice.

Claire can hear the murmur of both parents' voices from downstairs, no doubt wondering what they did wrong, how they raised such a horrible child. She pulls the card from under her pillow, the one card she managed to save because it landed closest to her. The High Priestess: in robes and horned helmet, seated on her throne between black and white pillars, crescent moon at her feet.

She turns the High Priestess over in her fingers, wis.h.i.+ng she knew what it means.

94.

Bryce sits in the doctor's office waiting room. The only other person is a mom with a little boy, who keeps whining and squirming out of her grip. The play area in the corner is empty, its wooden blocks and toy trucks still and lonely. Highlights magazines are fanned out chaotically across the short table. The three walls that have looked the same since Bryce was younger than the squirmer one jungle, one ocean, one outer s.p.a.ce look drab today.

He'd rather be here than home, hiding down in the bas.e.m.e.nt while World War Two-and-a-Half unfolds upstairs. Claire and their mom have the tendency to fight in the kitchen for some reason, which is right above him, which insures he stays up to date on the latest. Things he knows: Claire is grounded until further notice; her bike lives in the trunk of their dad's car until further notice; they have to go see a judge; Claire has to come home directly after school every day; their mom will call every afternoon to make sure.

The skinny young nurse steps into the waiting room and calls his name. Bryce thinks he may not be able to stand up. He can't even summon the attention to check out her body.

In the exam room she asks what he's here for. He says, or whispers, "I have something on my..." She nods and walks out.

Bryce stares at the white walls. How many exam rooms still to come after this? X-rays? Stern-looking doctors, shaking their heads about tragedy striking someone so young, with so much potential? He doesn't know what he'll say if they offer him surgery to remove a ball. He s.h.i.+vers, wis.h.i.+ng for a blanket.

Dr. Pederson comes in. Once upon a time, he had black hair but now it's the same color as his doctor coat. He shakes Bryce's hand, says, "Tell your old man I need to win back some of my money on the golf course." He looks at the clipboard. "Got a little problem down south, do we?"

"It's a lump."

"Do you know which girl you got it from?"

"No, it's not... I mean, I haven't ever... I think it's..."

"Is this lump on your p.e.n.i.s?"

Bryce shakes his head.

"t.e.s.t.i.c.l.e?"

Bryce nods. Dr. Pederson snaps on a rubber glove. Bryce says, "I noticed it a couple months ago. A few months ago. Like in the fall sometime. I should have come in here then. "

"Lie back and let's have a look."

Bryce looks at the ceiling, crinkly sheet of white paper beneath him, while latex fingers fondle his b.a.l.l.s. This, then a death notice. How humiliating.

"You can sit up." Dr. Pederson rolls off the glove. "What you've got there, my friend, is a good old fas.h.i.+oned cyst." He tosses the glove in the wastebasket, writes something on the chart. "Harmless."

Bryce wants to ask for a repeat, but also doesn't want to ask better to live in the reality where harmless was indeed uttered.

Harmless.

"What are your plans for next year?" Dr. Pederson asks, oblivious to what has transpired.

"I'm going to art school." Almost shouted.

In the waiting room, he takes a yellow lollipop from the gla.s.s jar. It may be the most succulent thing he's ever eaten. Stepping out of the office and into the afternoon heat, he leans against the building to keep himself from collapsing. The sound he makes is a choked sob that comes out as a laugh.

95.

Cameron finds Rosemary's Pink Panther T-s.h.i.+rt under his bed, left over from their special week; it still smells vaguely of her. He marvels at how crisp and new the iron-on decal is, in comparison to his collection of faded, peeled ones in the bottom dresser drawer. She might need it, might be looking for it, so he'll call later and let her know. Maybe offer to bring it over.

He misses her. Misses his girlfriend.

He sits at his desk, where he should be concentrating on science homework but instead focuses on making her a tape of the Boston alb.u.m; she loves the song "More Than a Feeling" but didn't know who sang it until Cameron filled her in. He's even recording on a Maxell tape for best sound quality hopefully she's a ca.s.sette connoisseur. The s.h.i.+rt and the tape and his smiling face will be an unbeatable combo at her front door.

Bryce comes over to borrow the American Government textbook.

Cameron's glad to have someone else to unfolds his tale of woe upon. He likes definitive plans, but Rosemary has sidestepped all his efforts. He broached the subject of going to the Rush concert next weekend via a note in cla.s.s, and again on the phone last night. She talked about some Peace Club commitment, and would let him know if she could get out of it but didn't think so. Spoken as if he wasn't a club member who wouldn't have that commitment himself he didn't push the issue.

"She's probably gonna be on the rag," Bryce says, smiling like he has since he walked in. "She doesn't want to disappoint you when you try to get in her pants."

"Why are you in such a good mood?" Cameron asks.

"Just because."

"I want to reserve Sat.u.r.day night with you," Cameron says as soon as Rosemary picks up the phone later. "If you don't like Rush we can do something else."

Silence. He thinks she might've hung up until he hears a single scream from the baby. She speaks one word: "Cameron." Her voice like someone asked her to name the saddest moment of her life. He'll remember the way she said his name, long after the rest of it has settled into a toxic haze.

Other highlights, knife blades he sees even as they carve him up: "I'm not ready for what we're doing."

"I told you I'm leaving and didn't want to get attached."

"You're getting too serious."

He sits with her T-s.h.i.+rt in one hand, phone in the other. Heather Thomas smiles at him from the wall: b.u.mp me off your number one spot, eh?

They say goodbye and he stares out the window at bars of rain. A prison. "If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and dial again. If you need help, hang up and dial your operator." Which operator could help right now? He reaches to the back of his desk drawer, where he hid the finger-sized joint Geoff gave him in case Rosemary likes to get high ("That's when you find out how freaky a chick really is").

His mom is home for a change, so he runs out to the car keeping his hair covered and lights up. He savors the sweet smoke while a chorus line of rain dances across the car roof. The science homework seems so far away, so unimportant, as does the Latin he has to finish after that. Someone trying to keep academic perfection going shouldn't be smoking pot on a school night.

"f.u.c.k school," he says to the winds.h.i.+eld. He wishes he meant it. He could stay home tomorrow, sleep in hadn't a senior with three and a half years of perfect attendance earned that right?

The sky rumbles over by school. Maybe the missiles are landing. Maybe the Russians are doing him a favor, targeting that place first so he'll never have to go back and face her. Face his new friend.

Rosemary's not so great. There are plenty of things he finds annoying about her.

For example, that she makes everything European sound better, how all the customs there are so beyond barbarous America Kids drinking wine from a young age, dinner served at 9:00 For example, that she's continually putting on Chapstick.

For example, that she raises her hand before Mrs. Gordon is even done asking the question.

There surely would have been something in her counseling file to add to the list, had he ever dug further.

When the smoke hits, none of his problems seem so bad. But, of course, the downside of getting high is that, when the drugs wear off, you're right back where you started.

Down at the corner, the long-flickering streetlight finally blinks out.

Events the next morning unfold like any other morning. Perhaps he'll go to English and Rosemary will see him in person, see he's cool with everything, and realize she's made a mistake.

They sit literally two feet apart for fifty minutes, but two feet feels like two miles. Two continents. No whispered comments, no notes exchanged. He keeps his head skewed left so he doesn't even catch a glimpse of her.

At the end of the period, Mrs. Gordon pa.s.ses back their Hamlet essays, turned in back when Cameron was a virgin. Ah, this could be perfect. Gordon will compliment the two best pieces in cla.s.s, say something about how those two writers would be the perfect couple. Yes. Yes, they would. Only she never compliments anything (on this or any other day), and then Rosemary is out the door; Cameron doesn't even look at his, instead pursuing/not pursuing her.