Know Not Why: A Novel (39 page)

She gives me a sad smile. “I’m not a cure.”

“Yeah. But you’re nice, and you’re smart, and
you’re fun, and you’re sweet. And if I was going to find any girl
who would, I dunno, be the right one for me, the one who was going
to stop me from feeling like shit all the time or whatever, you
would have been just like …
it
. You know?”

She doesn’t say anything, but she’s staring
really intently at me. Make it count, Jenkins.

“And so, yeah, I got this job to get laid.
Because I’m a guy, and I guess that’s how we stupid bastards think
stuff’s gonna get fixed. But my problem wasn’t really just like …
oh, I’m horny, better find me a hot mama. Or, well, it was. Kinda.
But it’s not like it was just about sex. It was like – an
all-consuming horniness. A horniness of the soul.”

That part gets a laugh out of her. “That’s
gross.”

“It is somewhat gross,” I acknowledge. “It was
supposed to be poetic. In a modern, hard-edged kinda way.”

She eyes me thoughtfully. “Are you still
soul-horny?”

“No,” I report. “My soul’s getting some on a
pretty regular basis.”

She giggles. A Kristy giggle! All in the world
is right.

“But, you know,” I continue, heartened, “that’s
not just Arthur. I mean, obviously there are – er – certain aspects
of said horniness that he gets to take care of. But it’s you, too.
And Cora. Knowing you guys, all three of you, it’s made my life a
lot better. It’s made me a hell of a lot better. And – and if you
can’t tell right now, which, I really can’t blame you, well …
you’ll be able to soon. I’m getting better. Just in a general,
human beingly way.”

She’s starting to smile.

“Oh, Howie,” she says. I feel so very, very much
like I am on my way to better.

Chapter Twenty-Four

“I think,” Amber says, “I’m gonna go on a
date.”

“Whoa huh what now?”

We’re sitting on the bleachers at the ice rink,
because while exercise is well and good, bleacher-sitting has
always been Amber’s and my area of expertise. Meanwhile, Dennis,
Emily, and Mitch are out skating it up, along with a handful of
small children. While our zany companions are out physically
exerting themselves, we split a bag of barbeque potato chips and a
thermos of apple cider.

And Amber drops unexpected bombshells.

“With Kristy’s boyfriend’s friend,” Amber
elaborates. “That John guy.”

“Uh, okay. Why?”

“I don’t know.” She grabs the thermos from me
and takes a sip. She seems a little embarrassed. “For one thing, I
was terrible to Kristy and I feel really bad about it. Maybe this
would help to make it up to her, or something.”

“I can see that,” I admit. “But isn’t it a
little … I dunno …”

Amber watches me expectantly.

“…
loose
?”

“Wow. Thank you.”

“Not by normal human standards!” I throw in
quickly. “Just by you standards. The Amber May—”

“Ugh, no middle name.”

“—Clark Standards of Being Hella Proper, they
don’t exactly involve going on dates with random scalawags, now do
they?”

“Maybe he’s not a scalawag. Points for word
choice, by the way.”

“Why, thank you. And oh, you know he’s a
scalawag. He hangs out with
Cliff
. That guy did not hesitate
to go all fisticuffs on my ass.”

“Scalawag, fisticuffs – you are
on
today.”

“It’s the apple cider. It makes me
articulater.”

“Way more articulater. Also – he did hesitate,
right? Wasn’t that the whole thing?”

“Well, okay, yeah. Maybe he hesitated. But then
he full-on
beat me up
.”

“Please. You can’t even tell anybody hit you.
And he gave you hot chocolate afterwards!”

“Still,” I mumble.

“Quit pouting,” she orders, and waves the bag of
chips at me. I grab a few. “And – I don’t know, I just think maybe
it would be good for me to try something new. This is my year off
before I throw myself back into the sweet mad academic hell that is
grad school. And I’ve never really done the living thing. I should
do that, right?”

“Um,” I say. I know I should be supportive now
that she’s suddenly empowered, but I can’t help it. It’s weird. If
Amber starts going on dates, who knows where that will end up? One
night stands! Jello shots! Prostitution!

“I don’t mean like go all crazy.” She gives me
this knowing, you-are-ridiculous look. “I mean … Do you know how
many books I read in college?”

“Uh. No?”

“Five hundred and twenty-four. You know how I
know? Because I kept a list.” She sighs. “But it’s not like I was
totally Miss Weirdo Pariah Girl.”

“Pariah Carrey.”

“Thank you, Oscar Wilde.” I tip my imaginary hat
at her. “I did make friends and everything. I went out sometimes.
But – I dunno, I never met anybody that I liked as much as you.” In
spite of myself, I like the sound of that. It was hard to get left
by Amber, to imagine that she was off having this great new life
while I was stuck here. It’s nice to know I left a hole.

“And,” she continues, looking out at the ice, “I
never met anybody that I even thought about liking as much as
Dennis.”

The Dennis in question is, at the moment,
adjusting Emily’s amorphous lump of a hat for her. They’re both
smiling.

“There was this one guy who was in a bunch of my
classes, and he asked me out to coffee a few times,” Amber says.
“And I would never go. It seemed pointless. And sort of
offensive.”

“That bastard.”

“That bastard,” she echoes wanly. Dennis and
Emily get back to skating, hand-in-hand. “There’s this story by
Edith Wharton.”

“Who?”

“Don’t make me hit you.”

“Oh, right, Edith Wharton. Or as I like to call
her – EdieWhoa. Yeah. We’re tight.”

Amber rolls her eyes. “
Anyway
. It’s about
this woman who’s in love with this man her whole life, but it
doesn’t really matter, because he never looks at her like that. And
after he’s dead, this other man falls in love with her. Of course,
it doesn’t go so well. And in the end, she writes the new guy this
letter. To explain why they can’t be together, and all that. And
there’s this line – ‘It is because Vincent Rendle didn't love me
that there is no hope for you. I never had what I wanted, and
never, never, never will I stoop to wanting anything else.’ I love
that. I am so profoundly that. Never, never, never will I
stoop.”

She’s looking at Dennis and Emily. It feels like
she’s not even talking to me.

“But maybe I should, like – I don’t know. Stoop.
Being like this; it’s like I can actually feel it making me into a
sucky human being. I was evil to Kristy, who’s never been anything
besides nice to me. I’ve been like this bitchy hell-hag of doom to
you. I totally wrote Emily off right from the get-go even though,
the more I hear, the more she seems like exactly my type of person.
I’m twenty-two. I’m not Miss Havisham. I should stoop.”

“You should try,” I correct. “I’m not saying ho
it up all over the place. I’m not even saying let the scalawag come
within a foot of you. But maybe you should, like, try just enough
to see if it’s worth it.”

“Yeah.” She smiles. “Check you out. You’re so
wise.”

“I am that.”

“Making out with boys agrees with you.”

“Hey,” I say, because Mitch is making his way
over to us. “Shhh, shhh, shhh.”

“Why don’t you tell him?”

“Because. It’s one thing if I’m telling ladies,
but
he
is a fellow male. It’ll be freaky and awkward.”

“Oh, it’s Mitch. He won’t care. He cried at I
Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry.”

“There’s a distinct difference between bromance
and romance, lady friend.”

“He won’t ca-are—”

“Shut u-up—”

“I can’t believe you guys aren’t skating!” Mitch
exclaims, coming to a stop in front of us. “This is
awesome
.”

“We’re kind of having a conversation here,
Mitchell,” Amber informs him.

Apparently he takes this as an invitation,
because he hoists himself up onto the bleachers. “Oh yeah? What’re
we talkin’ about?”

“Amber’s date.”

His eyes get really big. He looks at Amber.
“You’re going on a date?”

“Maybe,” she replies. “Don’t start.”

“Who with?” he continues, sounding more
interested than your average bear.

“A friend of Kristy’s boyfriend. I haven’t
actually met him. I guess it would be like a blind date type of
deal.”

“Oh,” Mitch says. “Cool.”

She laughs shortly. “We’ll see.”

It gets quiet. Mitch keeps on staring at
Amber.

“What?” she asks at last. “Do I have something
on my face?”

“Uhhhh,” he says. “Yeah! Some of that orange
barbeque chip stuff.” As she starts to lift her hand to her face,
he lunges forward. “Oh, hey, no, don’t worry about it, I got it.”
He pulls off his mitten, not seeming to care so much as it falls
under the bleachers, and brushes his thumb over the left corner of
her mouth.

I try to ignore the part where I’m like 99% sure
she didn’t have anything on her face. It makes things weird. I am
retiring from weird.

Mitch, meanwhile, is being really thorough about
the whole touching-the-side-of-her-mouth thing.

“Okay, man,” I can’t help but say. “I think you
got it.”

“You dropped your mitten,” Amber tells him.

“Oh.” He actually, honest-to-God shakes his
head, like he’s shaking his brain right out of the moment. “No big!
I will just – go grab that—”

This involves having to take his skates off so
he can go glove-hunting under the bleachers. Hopefully this will
teach him a lesson or two about random compulsions to touch Amber.
He stands up, sock-clad, and prepares to set off.

“It’s freezing, Mitch, don’t wander around
without any shoes on,” Amber says.

“No! I got this. It’s gonna be fine. It’ll be
great. It’ll take like two seconds.”

“Fine,” Amber sighs.

“Unless,” he adds, “you want me to wear shoes.
Then I will. If you want me to.”

“Um, okay,” she says. “Yes. Wear shoes.”

“’kay!” He puts on his shoes, gives us one last
jaunty grin, salutes, and then embarks on his mission.

“He’s been acting sort of weird lately, don’t
you think?” Amber says.

I, in the interest of abstaining from weirdness,
say nothing.

+

“This,” Arthur observes, “is a Halloween
gingerbread house kit.”

It is here, exactly here, that I feel like maybe
I shouldn’t have gone along with our newest dissatisfied customer’s
“Let me talk to your manager” request.

“Yeah,” grunts said customer: a middle-aged,
somewhat portly gentleman.

“It’s the end of December.”

“Yeah.”

“And you only realized that you were
dissatisfied with this product now?”

“So?”

“You appear to have used it,” Arthur continues,
inspecting the empty box.

“Yeah, it’s at home,” the customer says. “In the
trash
. But this is the box.”

“I’m afraid we can’t refund you a box.”

“But I bought the box.”

“Be that as it may,” Arthur says, his tone
becoming strained, “the box isn’t exactly as important as the item
that was inside of it—”

“Oh my God, man, can I just get my money back,
please?”

Underneath the stoicism, I notice about fifteen
complicated emotions flashing across Arthur’s face. Then he
suddenly gets steely. He stands up taller and says, very clearly,
“No.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Fine,” Customer says, scowling. “Screw this.
You know what, I came here to be good, support local business,
whatever, but forget that. Next time I’m just going to
Holly’s.”

Arthur watches him walk out with a look of
bitter resignation.

“Oh, Arthur,” Kristy says.

“Why the hell did that guy want a Halloween
gingerbread house kit?” I ask, trying to lighten the mood.

“This is thankless,” Arthur says to no one in
particular. “Thankless.”

Kristy and I exchange looks.

The bells on the door jingle.

“Hey, losers!” Cora says cheerfully, striding
in. “I forgot my book in the kitchen, I— who died?”

“We lost another one to the H-word,” I
report.

“Oh yeah?” She has the decency, at least, to
look concerned. “How’d that go down?”

“Someone wanted to return one of the Halloween
gingerbread house kits,” Arthur says. “Now. In December.”

“Can’t blame them,” Cora says. “Those things
were shittacular.”

Arthur pinches the bridge of his nose. “Thank
you, Cora.”

She looks at all of us, taking in the sorry
sight.

“Okay,” she says, very brisk, very
argue-and-die. “I’m gonna go grab my book, and then we’re going on
a field trip.”

“In case you’d failed to notice, Cora,” Arthur
says, “we happen to be open—”

“So close for an hour. What’s gonna happen?
We’ll be prevented from driving away yet more customers?” She
fake-gasps. “Heavens no!”

Arthur stares at her for a long time. “Fine,” he
finally says.

“Good. I’ll be back. You be ready.”

“Field trip!” Kristy whispers to me with a
surreptitious bounce.

“Hells yeah,” I whisper back. This may or may
not lead to some discreet high-fiving.

“I can’t see,” Arthur says, sounding like the
most jaded of men, “how it can get any worse.”

Cora comes back out into the room. She’s
striding with an air of supreme badass purpose, and she’s holding …
the copy of A Little Princess that’s been sitting on the kitchen
table forever.

Unexpected.

“I thought that was Kristy’s,” I say.

“I thought that was Howie’s,” Kristy says.

“Uh, not that gay.”

“Sorry!”

“Enough, children,” Cora interrupts us. “Let’s
roll.”

+

And so we all pile into Cora’s death trap of an
automobile. We offer to award Arthur the shotgun position, but he
says he’s already stressed out enough without having to bear
firsthand witness to how Cora drives. So Kristy gets upgraded to
front-seat-hood, and Artie and I take the back. As soon as the car
gets turned on, the stereo starts blasting what sounds like a
ritual sacrifice having hideously violent sex with a cello. Kristy
screams.