I Am the Wallpaper (12 page)

That afternoon I ran into Calvin in the bookstore café next to Gary’s studio. By then it was raining, so I was
waiting for Ma to pick me up. If I had noticed him sitting engrossed in a book at the next table I wouldn’t have sat down. In fact, if I’d known he was there I would have stayed hidden in the studio with Gary. But I didn’t recognize him until it was too late. He saw me. We were too close to pretend we didn’t know each other.

“Hello, Floey,” he said, almost knocking over his tea.

Talk about dukkha. I almost died of embarrassment right there over my decaf caffe latte.

“Uh, hi, Calvin,” I managed, my face growing hot. “How are you?”

He fidgeted a little and gripped his cup nervously with both hands. At least he had the courtesy to be uncomfortable. He looked different in a T-shirt than he did in either his suit or his cowboy hat. Skinnier. Plus, I noticed a big pimple at the corner of his mouth.

After a moment of awkward silence he said in his slow Oklahoma way, “I … I’m sorry I couldn’t stay that night to hear you read your poems.”

“Oh, that’s all right.” For some reason, I didn’t want to tell him that I hadn’t gone through with it. “They weren’t anything, just some haikus.”

He stared at me. “You write
haikus
?”

“Well, like I said, they weren’t anything. Besides, you had to go.”

He looked even more uncomfortable, but he nodded. “Yeah, sorry about all that.”

There was another long silence. And then I don’t know what came over me—I opened my mouth and the words
just popped out before I could stop them. “Do you always let that girl push you around?”

His shoulders rose a little. “Oh, Melanie’s nicer than you probably think,” he said. “She was just having a rough day is all. She’s a little high-strung, but she’s all right. If you knew her, you might even like her.”

I had a hard time imagining it. All I could think of was how he’d let her bully him out the door.

I checked out the window for Ma’s car but didn’t see it. Today, of all days, I hoped she wouldn’t be late.

“Are you waiting for somebody?”

“Yes, my mother. She’s picking me up.” And then I felt like I had to explain further, so I said, “I work part-time at the picture place next door. I’m kind of a photographer.”

“Really?” He glanced at my fedora, black blouse and black skirt. I’d chosen a goth look today. “In that outfit you certainly
look
like an artist.”

I studied his face to see if he was making fun of me, but I decided he wasn’t. “Listen,” I said. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you that I really liked your poem.”

“You did?”

I nodded. “I don’t think I understood it completely, but I liked it—in a Zen kind of way.”

He looked surprised. And then, out of the blue, a big,
shy grin formed on his face. “Thanks,” he said, suddenly staring down at his cup. For a couple of seconds, he didn’t look at me. I could tell I’d really made him happy. It was actually kind of sweet. “Believe it or not, that’s exactly what I meant it to be—a Zen kind of poem. You’re the only one who noticed.”

“Well, I did. And I honestly liked it a lot.”

A moment later, he leaned over to see the cover of my book. “Wow,” he said. “Zen
and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
. Do you know that that’s one of my favorites?”

So we talked about it a little, and that led me to ask him about what
he
was reading. It was a worn copy of
The Collected Poems of T. S. Eliot
. Calvin said he couldn’t count how many times he’d read it. After that, we both relaxed a little and started talking about books. It turned out that he’s an even more avid reader than I am, and not just of poetry. Pretty soon, we were telling each other all about ourselves. He told me how his family moved up from Oklahoma just before he started eighth grade. It had been hard for him to adjust at first because he didn’t know anybody, so he’d spent a lot of time reading. That’s when he had discovered poetry.

“Is Melanie a poet, too?”

“Melanie?” He smiled and shook his head. “She comes to see me at open-mike nights every now and then, but she says she doesn’t really get it. It isn’t her thing.”

As we spoke, I realized that talking to him had suddenly become comfortable and easy again, like it had been at the wedding. Only this time, I told myself, I wasn’t interested
in him as anything other than a friend. And that made it almost nicer.

That’s when I noticed Ma’s car finally pulling into the parking lot.

“I have to go,” I said.

“Sure,” he said, setting his empty teacup down in its saucer. “I do too, pretty soon.”

I stood up and grabbed my things. I don’t know why, but before I left I said, “I’m sorry about what happened. At the wedding, I mean. It was really embarrassing.”

His face went pink. “It’s okay. It wasn’t that big a deal, really. I enjoyed dancing with you. You’re a good dancer.”

“I know you told Melanie about it, but don’t tell anybody else, okay?”

“I won’t.”

I smiled. “Well, bye, then. Nice to see you.”

“Bye.” But before I got as far as the door he said, “Hey, Floey. I’m really glad we ran into each other again.”

I waved and left him sitting by the window.

On the way home, I went over our conversation in my mind. What a shame it was that he liked Miss Halter Top. He seemed like he might be a nice guy. Sweet, even. But then I remembered what he’d all but said at the wedding—that I’m too young for him. He was starting tenth grade in the fall, so even if he didn’t already have a girlfriend, he probably wouldn’t want to be seen with a soon-to-be eighth grader like me.

But that was okay, I decided as we rode through the rain.
I already had Wen. Plus, I didn’t like Calvin in that way anymore. I was over him.

I was
so
over him.

The next day I biked to the drugstore to buy tampons and a new diary. Standing in line to pay, I noticed that the clerk behind the counter was Dean Eagler.

Is it humanly possible to stop yourself from blushing by sheer force of will? Why do some people go red in the face all the time while others get to experience their embarrassment in private? Can anybody tell me?

I would have put the tampons back but he saw me before I got the chance.

“Can I help you?” he said.

Dean Eagler, the secret fantasy of almost every girl I knew, looked kind of like Elvis, with the same dark, brooding
eyes, slicked-back hair and sexy lips. Behind the counter he was the moody Elvis, like the one in
King Creole
. Very cool. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know or care that I existed—there was still no way I was going to buy tampons from him. Without dropping my eyes, I casually let go of the package so it fell on the floor. Since the counter was between us, he couldn’t see anything below my waist. To cover the sound, I coughed just as the box hit the ground.

“Excuse me,” I said, hacking. “I think I’m catching a cold.”

He took my new diary and waved it over the scanner. As he waited for the receipt, I caught him sneaking a glance at me. All of a sudden and completely unexpectedly, he smiled.

“Wait a minute—you’re Floey Packer, aren’t you?”

“Uh, yes …”

His smile got even wider.

Keep in mind that a smile from Dean Eagler, one of the best-looking guys on the planet, was no small thing. His was a mysterious, rock-star kind of smile, and I have to admit it made my knees wobbly.

“I’m Dean Eagler,” he said, holding out his hand. I didn’t know why he was holding it out, but I shook it. “I like your hat,” he said.

Inside, I did a victory dance.

“Well,” he said, “it sure is nice to meet you in person.”

I wasn’t sure what he meant by “in person,” but at the time I was busy wondering why he was talking to me at all.

The New Floey was already attracting attention.

“Listen,” he said, flashing me yet another of his moody Elvis smiles. “I’m having a little shindig. Week after next. You gonna be around?”

Wait. Hold on. Did he just invite me to his party?

Was he actually
flirting
with me?

“I don’t know. Maybe. Yes.”

He put my new diary in a plastic bag and handed it back to me. “Great. Sunday, the twentieth. Around eight. My folks don’t clear out until that afternoon. You know where I live?”

I nodded.

He leaned on the counter and his voice dropped a little. “One other thing—it’s kind of hush-hush.”

I nodded again, and he winked at me. I was just about to rise off the ground and float away when a high voice interrupted. “Excuse me,” it said. I turned and there was Billy Fishman. “I think you dropped something.”

And then
It
appeared on the counter between us, big and blue and obvious.

I nearly screamed.

The box practically shouted out,
“ATTENTION! THIS WOMAN IS HAVING HER PERIOD!
” But Billy’s expression was a perfect picture of innocence. I had to think fast. I only had a second or two before my face would turn beet red again. Denial, I decided, was the cleanest way out.

“Not mine,” I said. I turned away and left as quickly as I could.

There’s a Zen story about a man hiking through the jungle who accidentally walks right up to a vicious tiger. He turns and runs as fast as he can and eventually finds himself at the edge of a cliff. Since the tiger is right behind him, he has to climb down a vine and dangle in the air over a drop that would definitely kill him if he fell. As he hangs there, a mouse starts gnawing at the top of the vine. Suddenly, the man notices a wild strawberry growing on the vine. He eats it. It’s the most delicious strawberry he’s ever tasted.

I was thinking of this story while making a crosshatch pattern in the peanut butter I was spreading to make Richard’s sandwich. It was midday on Tuesday, and Ma had told me to make lunch for my cousins while she went out for a minute. Frank Sinatra was licking himself in a disgusting way right in the middle of the kitchen floor.

On top of the crosshatches, I made a happy face.

Like the man on the vine, even in the middle of hardship I was finding something to enjoy.

Then the phone rang.

I nearly tripped over Frank Sinatra, but it hardly fazed him at all. I grabbed the phone. It was Azra.

“I can’t believe you!” she said. “You’ve been holding out on me! Why didn’t you tell me
everything
?”

“What didn’t I tell you?”

“About Lillian’s wedding—about what happened! You left out the most important part!”

“I did tell you—I got locked out in the rain.”

“Not
that
!”

I didn’t follow her. Azra and Wen were the only ones I’d told anything about what happened at the wedding. After everything that had happened to me since that horrible weekend, I was trying not to think too much about any of it. I was now trying a new strategy: complete denial.

In artistically placed blobs, I plopped the jelly onto another slice of bread. “What are you talking about, Azra?”

“You know—oh, come on. Don’t be like that.…”

“Like what? I have no idea what you mean. Isn’t it a lovely day?”

I tenderly placed the bread with the blobs, on top of the bread with the happy face. Then I reached for the knife again so I could slice the sandwich in half. Richard liked his sandwiches cut diagonally.

Over the phone I could hear Azra blowing air like she was losing her patience. “That guy … the poet? The one with the girlfriend? You never told me everything that happened.” When I still didn’t say anything, she said,
“About when you danced with him?” And then her voice suddenly got low and secretive. “You know, about how you and he were on the sofa with your hand on his rear end?”

I hacked the sandwich in one quick barbaric chop.