She pretends to be looking for her sunglasses in the basement, but really she is trying to escape from me.
“Mom?” I repeat. She says nothing. “Toys? Clothes?” Now she’s literally moving the laundry detergent jug and looking behind it, like she might have worn her sunglasses into the basement to do laundry, then taken them off between loads. She’s pretending not to hear me. “Ski boots?” Please let it be ski boots. But no. Those are not the things Mom thinks take up precious shelf space that could be used for weathered wooden signs that say things like LIVE LOVE LAUGH with no punctuation. No no no. The things she thinks take up too much space are my—
“Books? Did you give her BOOKS?”
She turns to face me now. “It’s a long flight.”
“You gave her my books?”
“With a layover.”
“The child has two iPads: one for games, one for movies.”
“Mel’s been telling me that Quinlan has been so quiet lately, just moping in her room, and I said you’ve always been like that, too, I mean not moping but alone in your room—”
“I LIKE TO READ. That’s why I’m in my room. And that’s why I like my BOOKS.”
“We figured Quinlan would be more willing to read something if we said it was from you.”
“What did you give her?”
“I don’t know. Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, Superfudge, the one with the mouse family and the research lab. I didn’t know it was going to be such a big deal. They’re children’s books, Greer.” I am glaring at her. “You read them ages ago.”
“That isn’t the point. They weren’t yours to give.”
“Greer, that little girl is really struggling. She needs somebody looking out for her.”
“Why are you always looking out for other people? Why can’t you look out for me?” I ask, even though I suspect it’s because I can’t leave her five stars on the re-lo agent review page.
Mom huffs. “Are you really that upset about a couple of old books?”
Yes.
No.
I’m disappointed that Jackson didn’t find some excuse to come with his mom to our house, even if I was sleeping. I’m stressed out that I keep changing my mind about what I want so I can’t figure out if I blew it or I saved myself, but it feels more like I blew it. I’m worried that after break we’ll either start all over from the beginning—or that we won’t. And that Maggie will get back from the Cleave family Christmas in Iowa and spend the rest of the break helping Rafa write a musical. And now I’m upset that Maude, Mavis, and I will be alone without my chewed-up old Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH and a mother whose retinas are too sun damaged to drive to the library.
“They were my books,” I say, without conviction.
When I come upstairs, Tyler is taking a selfie with Mom’s sunglasses and my Stabilizer on, and he is eating my waffles.
CHAPTER 51
Dad and Tyler and I always pick a movie series to watch all the way through over break. Last year we watched all the Harry Potters. This year we were going to do a Marvel ultramarathon, but Mom interfered and said Ty was still too young for Deadpool, so we switched to Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. Dad tried to talk us into a Top Ten Classics from the Nineties list but Ty and I revolted.
We watched two Hobbits yesterday and the third tonight. It’s too late to start LOTR, so we’re just vegging in front of the TV, Ty perched in the giant Lovesac beanbag we got for Christmas, me and Dad on opposite ends of the couch.
Ty flips the channel to a late-night talk show. The guest is an actress from a new action movie. They show a clip, just a minute of action, in which she is wearing what looks like a shiny black wetsuit, but with the front zipped down to show several inches of bulging cleavage. Her breasts don’t move a bit when she’s knocking out bad guys with roundhouse kicks, which is biologically impossible. The clip ends when she smothers the last villain in her chest while she breaks his neck in her arms.
The audience goes wild. I think they think this is empowering. They think this is what it looks like to be a badass woman.
“Congratulations on the movie! I heard it was a big opening weekend,” chimes the host.
There’s an older comic, who must have been the first guest, on the opposite side of the actress and he pipes in, “Real big. I bet it was huge.”
The actress fans eyelashes that are like tarantulas and laughs along, like she’s flattered by the attention, even if the attention is for her boobs. Is she shrinking inside, wishing she’d worn a big sweatshirt to this interview so they’d have to talk about the movie or the hundreds of hours of training she must have done instead of her body?
“We can, ah, watch something else,” says my dad.
The comic butts in. “Lemme ask you something. Did you shoot that scene in a lot of takes? Was that guy you killed, like, ‘Ah, can we try that again?’”
“Put on Food Network, Ty,” says Dad. Ty’s nestled in the beanbag, scrolling through his phone, oblivious.
I look for a sign that the actress has had enough. But no, it’s different for her. She read the script. She knew what she was there for. She might have even paid a doctor to make sure her body would always be the center of attention. Judging by how perky and happy her breasts look peering over the top of her dress, they are not made of the same stuff as mine.
They put up some pictures of her from other films and award shows. There’s not a single one where she’s not wearing something low cut or tight. There’s even a promo picture from a film where she’s wearing a fur hat and a tank top. Where is a movie supposed to take place if it’s cold enough for a fur hat but warm enough for a tank top? I can tell from the live show that her biceps are cut like a boxer’s, but they don’t even feature in the promo shot.
“And here you are last year with your fiancé at the MTV Awards,” says the host. There’s a picture of her in a dress that looks like her breasts got caught in a sparkly fishing net. Her fiancé is wearing a plain black suit.
“Are you sure that wasn’t at the Golden Globes?” pipes in the comic. The host indulges him with an eye roll, as if to say “Whaddya gonna do? These old guys don’t know any better.”
Maybe she figured it was the only way she was going to get into movies. But this can’t really be what she wants, can it? Maybe it’s close enough to what she wanted? To sit there and smile while some ape makes obvious boob jokes? And what if it is? What if this is everything she’s ever dreamed of? What if she was considering majoring in physics and then decided, “You know what? I could split an atom, but that seems like a lot of work”? What does that do to the rest of us? But really, why should that be her responsibility? I look over at my little brother absently letting the commentary on the TV wash into him.