Vauxhall smiles, bows. “I’m Vauxhall. It’s a weird name.”
Paige says, “It’s pretty.”
I say, “Welcome to Mantlo.” My voice cracks at every syllable.
Vauxhall, she says, “Thanks. I’ll see you around, right?”
“Right.”
On her way out she turns and looks back at me, her eyes sparkling in the cheap fluorescence. Paige puts a hand on my shoulder, squeezes. “Don’t.”
She can see my body lurching, my muscles twitching to move.
To run and gush to Vauxhall.
“You will freak her out. She’ll think you’re a stalker. A freak.”
“But not if I-” I try.
“You can’t. Won’t. You need to play it cool. We’ll talk to Jimi.”
I ignore Paige, say, “We’re going to be in love.”
Shaking her head Paige says, “You’ve been spoiling the ending for a year now.”
FOUR
After lunch, Paige and I are by my locker and I’m panicked.
“I don’t know what to do now,” I say to Paige.
She just shakes her head. “You need to calm down. I’ve never seen you this freaked out. You’ve seen it all, dude. Just chill and let the pieces fall.”
“That’s the thing. I don’t know what happens next. I need a concussion so bad.”
“What happens next is you calm the F down and strategize. Start this right, Ade.”
Like most afternoons Jimi’s in the parking lot smoking.
Like most afternoons he’s got his sunglasses on, looking like he’s waiting for applause that will never come. Paige and I, we walk slowly over to Jimi. We take our time because both of us want to get our story straight. Both of us know Jimi well enough to know how well he can manipulate a situation. Turn it on its head.
“You talk to Belle yet?”
“Of course not.”
“She’s going to be pissed. This is totally why you two broke up. I certainly hope you’re not still following her around. That was creepy.”
“I was never-”
“Yeah. Right.”
With his back against Ben Kunis’s Lexus, ashing into the car’s hood intake filter.
We walk up to Jimi and he looks over his sunglasses at us and then looks around, over one shoulder. Then the other. Slowly. Wrapping it up, this scene, he stares at us hard and screws up his face like he’s confused. Like we’ve just come from outer space and landed in a shiny ship in front of him. This is Jimi being dramatic. It’s Jimi being a dick. He knows we’re there to talk.
“So?” I finally ask.
“Who is she?” Paige prods.
“You mean Vauxhall?”
Paige rolls her eyes.
Jimi coughs out a plume of smoke. Chuckles. “She’s quite a chick, right? We met in Melton’s driver ed class at triple A. I was hitting on her hard and ’course she rejected me at first, but we became fast friends. The two of us cracking up over how giant Mrs. Melton’s ass was. Platonic flirting really, but then you know how-”
“Yeah. You’re the stud,” Paige interrupts. “We get it.”
“Anyway,” Jimi huffs. “She transferred here for film. Believe it or not, Mr. McKellar is pretty highly regarded in the avant-garde film world. Who’d of thunk, right? To me he’s just this stuck-up art teacher. Anyway, Vaux doesn’t have many female friends. She’s more the lone cowboy type. You could say she’s one of the guys. Roughhousing and crazy. You know, kind of like…” He looks at Paige.
She crosses her arms and tilts her head. “Like a dyke?”
Jimi grins. “You said it, not me. Only she isn’t gay. She’s just what every guy dreams about: a hot girl who likes wrestling, loves collecting old comic books, and watches action movies. Hot bod too. Wild. Went swimming at Celebrity with her once and wow, what can I say. Given her tomboy behavior I was worried she’d come out of the locker room looking like that chick at the end of Sleepaway Camp, but she’s totally-”
“How about her name?” I interrupt.
“Weird, huh? She says her parents are stoners and they got the name after the neighborhood in London. Hippies come up with the darndest things. By the way, how’d you like the intro? Vaux planned it.”
I ask, “Why me?”
“-”
“Why’d she sing to me?”
Jimi shrugs. “I suggested that. Fun, right? Vaux is all about shaking things up. Making people feel uncomfortable or the opposite, totally loved. She’s right there on the edge. Did she make you feel totally loved, Ade? Did she get you all bothered?”
I don’t say anything. I know Vauxhall and I will be together, happy lovers, and so I don’t say anything.
Paige asks, “So it meant-”
Jimi claps, flicks his cigarette off like it’s a biting insect. “Nothing. Doesn’t mean anything.” Then he looks to me, eyes narrowed, “You don’t know her yet, Ade. There’s a lot going on. She’s complicated.”
“How’s that?”
Jimi grins and shakes his head. “Look, players, I really gotta roll to Mr. Russo’s. If I’m late one more time, he’ll burn my ass on that trig exam.”
He turns to go but then looks back, over his shoulder male model style, and says, “Oh, and she’s left school already. So don’t go trying to track her down. They say first day’s best for ditching.”
Paige spits onto the asphalt. First time I’ve seen her do that. “What a prick.”
FIVE
Today, at home, I use what I call the side entrance.
It consists of me jumping the fence by the junipers and coming into the house via the sliding door in the study. I jimmy it open with this little tool, kind of like a flattened crowbar, that I keep hidden under the coiled snake of hose by the shed.
I do this because today there are three of them on the porch.
Three freaks.
They’re on the porch for me. Each of them wants to hear a story. A story about how their life improves dramatically. About how in the future, they will find their lost loves or lost cats or missing charms or even their faith in the Lord Jesus. These people, I tend to find them in front of my house the way some people find strays.
Thing is, with the Internet, most anyone can find my mom’s accounts, other church members’ accounts, of my abilities. They type in stuff like “I need to know what will happen with my baby when she’s a grandmother” and “Oh God, will they evict me next month?” and somehow, by some weird quirk of electronic routing, they wind up here.
Mom’s at All Souls Chapel the whole night, so I eat leftover casserole in my bedroom.
The freaks, they leave around nine. Heads hung low, kicking at the lawn.
I settle in on my bed and replay the day’s events.
So far, so brilliant.
There’s a mirror on the back of my bedroom door and I prop myself up in bed and stare hard at myself. I see my mom. Only my hair isn’t thinning out. If anything it’s gotten bushier. But the perfect triangle nose is the same. The thin arched eyebrows. The full bottom lip. With Vauxhall’s sudden appearance, I’m tripped up a little thinking about how I must look, all battered and broken.
I don’t normally fix my hair or worry over zits, but I find myself looking in the mirror more and more often these days. Looking more and more closely at the scars. At the bruises. In mom’s makeup mirror, I find myself trying to find the sunken spots from the dents. Tracing the scar tissue. The healed-over gashes and fractures. My nose, it’s been busted more times than I can remember, and yet it’s still straight. Went right a year ago but then busted left a few months later. All the damage works itself out in the end.
My face comes back together no matter how I break it.
Looking through myself, back at myself on the bed, my mind drifts to my ex-girlfriend, Belle. This is probably because I’m tired and the last time Belle and I talked, really really talked, we were sitting on my bed looking into this same mirror and saying ridiculous things to each other. She was drunk or high. With her it’s always one or the other. I fall asleep hanging on that memory but I’m only under seconds before the phone rings.