Heather stared at her new shoes and smacked the heels together. She wouldn’t make eye contact with me, and she looked like she might cry.
It was hard for me to picture Brad actually saying that out loud, but I knew people treated Heather differently than they treated me.
“It was gross,” she admitted. “I mean, I didn’t know where to go, so I shoved him into a coat closet and he sat down on this random stool. My knees hurt on the hardwood floor, and my mother’s furs were in the way. After a minute, he came all over the front of my Laura Ashley dress. I loved that dress.”
She twisted her index finger around in the fabric of her hot-pink Emmylou’s T-shirt.
I knew which dress she meant. It looked great on her. Usually, Heather wore bland clothing from Abercrombie or American Eagle—clothing that was tight. The point was to show off how sexy she looked in the same outfit everyone else wore. The Laura Ashley dress was old and faded, just a bit tight at the waist but loose and flowing everywhere else, falling just below the knee. It had belonged to one of her older sisters.
“Why did you do it?” I asked her.
Heather laughed, but it was a sad laugh. She looked at the ground. We hadn’t swept yet, and tumbleweeds of pine needles and dust were gathered on the tile.
“Because I could,” she finally said.
That was exactly what I’d said to Susan about the time I kissed Scottie at The Mooring, and it was a lie.
“Really?” I pressed. “Because that doesn’t seem true.”
“Fine,” she said. “I just wanted to make him feel better. I didn’t know how else to do it.”
When she finished telling the story, we both realized we were still mad at each other. She stood and walked across the room, reaching for the heavy wooden broom we kept in the closet. We worked in silence for a while, the broken radio cracking with every base beat. The song “As I Lay Me Down” by Sophie B. Hawkins came on—the most annoying song in the world.
“I hate this song,” said Heather, reading my mind. “It’s literally always on.”
“In the background, it sounds like she’s saying ‘I love tacos,’” I said.
“It totally does,” she said.
Heather was sweeping, and her hips were slowly moving along with the music as she swung the broom back and forth.
I grabbed the remote control to the boom box, using it as a microphone. Heather and I started singing, and we turned to face each other just in time for the part that’s like, “On a summer evening, I’ll run to meet you, barefoot, barely breathing,” and just like that we were dancing together, and everything else floated away. When it got to the taco part, we both shouted it at the top of our lungs.
By the time the radio voice interrupted, we were both out of breath, laughing. We collapsed on the floor.
But then Heather said, “My parents are getting divorced. They told me last night.”
“Heather . . .”
Her shoulders heaved, and she let out a big ugly sob. I loved that sob. I wanted to kiss that sob.
“Okay,” I said carefully. “It’s okay.”
Then she let me hold her. She gathered my hair in her fists and leaned her weight into my chest. Her body shook so hard that I thought she might break open. I wondered what happens to your organs when you don’t let anyone hug you for years. I held on tight.
“I’m sorry,” she said, clutching my arm. “I’m sorry I did that to Brad, and to Susan, and to you.”
I didn’t feel angry anymore. The sleeve of my Emmylou’s shirt got drenched in tears and snot.
The Dollhouse
When I went to Susan’s house for what would be the last time, she was sitting in front of her dollhouse. I brought a present for her baby, a blanket Sandra bought at the Ocean State Job Lot. The tiny chandelier in the dollhouse dining room lit up Susan’s face, and because she was looking down, her eyelashes made little shadows on her cheeks.
Next to her on the floor, I saw a tuna fish sandwich, half-eaten.
“Susan.”
My voice startled her. She dropped a tiny roasted chicken made of polymer clay.
“Sorry,” I said. “Hi.”
She looked at me, picked up a porcelain man, and opened her hand, her palm like a starfish, letting him drop to the floor. Something in him cracked on impact.
“He’s going away,” she said ominously.
“Which one is he?” I asked.
“He’s the grandfather,” she said, her tone serious and calm. Her hair was shiny, her skin smooth, but she looked exhausted. “Now I call him death by suicide.”
Slowly, I moved toward Susan and sat next to her, setting the blanket on the bed. I thought of Susan’s dad hitting her with his belt.
Susan flipped off the lights in the dollhouse, and it went dark.
“That story is over,” she said. “There’s a new one now.”
I picked up the man doll from the floor and cracked his head off.
Susan sighed and took a bite of the tuna fish sandwich.
“We’re getting married,” she said, chewing. “Brad asked me to marry him.”
“Congratulations,” I said, and it came out kind of like a question.
“My baby is the size of a blueberry,” she said, “and this baby’s dad isn’t going to be like mine. Things are going to be better for it.”
“Yeah,” I said, not knowing what else to say. “She’ll be okay.”
I thought I remembered hearing that you’re not supposed to eat tuna fish while you’re pregnant, but I let it go.
The New Name
It was past midnight, and I was in bed with Stinky Lewis, sweating. He wanted to cuddle, but it was hot. He seemed nervous since Brad left him with me, and I wanted him to feel better, so I cuddled with him anyway.
Suddenly, I had an overwhelming urge to find my Schwinn. I sat up in bed and switched on the light, which was jarring. My bedroom was messy, and the bottles of Clinique perfume and makeup on my vanity were embarrassing. The posters and collages on my wall were embarrassing too. I felt both too old for everything I owned, and like a child.
I wore an oversized T-shirt that belonged to one of Sandra’s boyfriends, with the KISS 108 FM logo across the front in puff letters. I grabbed a pair of dirty corduroys from a pile on the floor and yanked them on, then pulled the long half of my hair back into a messy bun.
The bike had to be somewhere in the garage, which is where we kept everything we didn’t use but couldn’t get rid of—like an ugly set of crystal that had belonged to Sandra’s parents before they died, and the boxes of Christmas decorations. We were not people who used crystal. We were people who drank out of Solo cups.