Maine Squeeze (33 page)

I want to be truth every day, but let's face it. Sometimes I'm dairy.

Anyway, I was stuck wearing the vinyl black-and-white Holstein apron; she got to wear the natural hemp one. I made 4 sundaes, 6 cones, and 3 milk shakes; she made 6 fruit smoothies, a soy shake, and she scooped up a dish of rice ice cream. Then she could tell I was depressed enough, and so she switched aprons with me. I thought that would cheer me up, but it didn't. Nothing could.

“Dave wasn't going to be here this year anyway, right?” Beth said while we were at T or D and she caught me staring at my reflection in the chrome base of the blender. The smoothie I was making got pulverized into tiny atoms, so thin and runny you could see through it, and I had to start over with another Sunrise Strawberry Supreme.

“You were going to miss him anyway. So now you'll just miss him … more.”

“Beth,” I said, “I'm never going to cheer up if you keep talking about stuff like that.”

“But you should be sad,” she said. “You need to be sad. You have to go through the phases of grief. See, first there's denial, then anger, then—” Blah blah blah.

She kicked into self-help mode. When she wanted to quit smoking, she went out and read every book and watched every show on getting over just about anything. She could probably be a psychologist with like two weeks of additional college courses, or at the very least give Oprah a run for her money.

Of course she only smoked for like three months, but she was really into it. Personally I think she just liked the boxes.

And she hasn't done too much about her addiction to boys, but I guess it's more important to quit smoking. For her, anyway.

“What you have to do, Courtney, is go for some sort of closure.”

I flipped the sign on the front door of T or D before we locked up. “Like this? Closed?”

“See, that's what I'm talking about. Denial,” Beth said.

Has he called? Like he said he would? No. I half expected to see him at Truth or Dairy today. He's sort of addicted to Coconut Fantasy Dreams. We both are. It was like … our drink.

Half expected. Whole-not-surprised when he wasn't there. I was all ready to give him the cold shoulder, easy to do when working around ice cream at Truth or Dairy all day. I could give him a really bad ice-cream headache, maybe, mix in extra ice in his smoothie and freeze his brain.

Like he could be any colder.

Dave moves to Boulder today.

I hate him.

The thing about breaking up with someone (okay, the thing about being
dumped
) is that your whole life just sort of … sucks. No, actually I was going to say that it
stops
. Dead end. (Don't worry, I'm not getting morbid here. Not much, anyway.) It's just … you thought you were going one way. And then the road just sort of ends, and you're staring at one of those yellow signs with a big arrow pointing in two directions and you have no idea which way to go.

The way I drive, I'd probably flatten the arrow. Head off into some farmer's field. Crush a few rows of corn. Maim a prairie dog.

How did I ever get started on this? Oh yeah. The breaking-up thing.

Like I really want to write more about
that
.

I think
I'll
start smoking.

It's true: life
can
get weirder.

There's this woman who comes in every day at 3:40. Well, every day I work, anyway. Even on Sundays. She does a shot of wheatgrass juice while she stands by the window looking outside, like she's either running from the law and wants to take off when she sees the police cruiser coming—or waiting for a bus that's really late, like maybe the route was discontinued a few years ago and nobody told her. She has wild, long frizzy brownish white hair. She wears really long skirts. And she has this bag. It's purple velveteen with silver swirls. Like something Merlin should have.

I call her Witchy Wheatgrass Woman. Not to her face, of course—just to Beth. I also abbreviate that to “WWW,” as in “www.insane.com.” She's the one who got Gerry to start giving out punch cards for one free wheatgrass with every ten purchases. Bluck. If you can drink ten ounces of wheatgrass, you should get a free
car
.

At least making wheatgrass juice is sort of satisfying, putting it in the little grinder thing and smushing it down. Something you'd like to do to a certain person named Dave.

After she does her ounce of green juice, she crushes the cup with her left hand and comes over to the counter for a water chaser. Everyone else says “water back,” but she has her own term. Most regulars
don't
get water back, but then she's more like an “irregular,” or maybe a factory second.

Then she talks. And talks. “A blue streak,” Gerry says, although for her it should really be a green streak.

Today she felt like giving me advice on my love life. I guess I was saying something about missing Dave, and Beth was telling me the only way to get over him was to see someone new. Like how when she quit smoking she started chewing gum. Etc. Anyway, I think WWW only stands by the window so she can pretend she isn't listening to our conversations. I'm telling Beth—no more talking while she's in the store.

“To tell you the truth.” She always starts off this way. Then sometimes she kind of laughs and says, “I'll get to the dairy later,” only she never does. I don't know what the dairy would be—lies?—but. There you have it.

“To tell you the truth, I was never one for relationships.”

Oh. Really. I dropped my scoop. Not in shock, but in shock that she felt the need to state the obvious.

“But if you have to have one … Courtney …” She always peers at my name tag, as if it changes on a daily basis. “Please. Practice safe sex.
Promise
me.”

Oh my God. Why do all these people feel like they can give me advice all of a sudden? So she's health-conscious. So am I! Ice cream hasn't touched my lips in months. Well, okay, weeks. A week and a half, definitely.

But she annoyed me so much that I did a shot of hot fudge in retaliation. Don't tell me how to live my no-sex-life. Celibacy. Whatever. Free and clear of sex.

Came home and did yoga to relax. Didn't relax. Instead I stayed up late watching this
Our Mammals, Our Selves
program. Was starting to feel warm and fuzzy seeing all that video of baby animals, then made the mistake of switching to Animal Planet. That vet show was on. Surgery. Blood everywhere.

School in August? Does this make sense to anyone else? It's 90 degrees. We're sweating. My cool new sweater is wasting away on the shelf.

Made it to homeroom. Nobody seems to know about the breakup yet. Which might explain why everyone keeps asking me how Dave is. “Dead,” I wanted to say. “With any luck.” Maybe that was a bit harsh. I don't want him dead. Just temporarily maimed. Maybe by a wolf, or possibly a bear or mountain lion. If they can roam into the outskirts of Boulder, lounge in people's trees, and knock down their fridges, they can find Dave. It'll happen eventually. I just have to have faith.

I figure if I keep my head down and keep writing all day, no one will bother me. They'll think I'm psycho, but they won't bother me. Not sure which is the better way to kick off the school year. Reputation for being psycho, or fielding questions about my relationship. Or lack thereof.

I realize I may be psycho and also boyfriendless. And if so, I'm at risk of being a stereotype.

The word is out. Apparently Dave felt like telling all his friends before he left town that it was time for him to be Free 'n' Clear (maybe not a deodorant—maybe a zit cream). They must have helped him with his brilliant lines.

So I went to the caffy for lunch (why? You may ask. Well, I figured it's that old story about getting back on the bike after you crash, or was that the horse? But mentioning horses and cafeteria food in the same sentence is a little scary), because Beth and Jane talked me into it, and because I was almost sort of hungry for the first time in a few days. I was trying to decide between the veggie taco and the peanut butter sandwich when it started. This murmur behind me. Like a wave of water. I thought maybe it was because I had picked up a taco shell to smell it, and it was kind of close to my ear, so I listened to it for a while as if it were a seashell, but all I could hear was grease soaking into my hand. I put it on my tray and grabbed a sandwich. But I could still hear the rushing sound.

I turned around and saw Grant Superior, one of Dave's best friends, who I used to think was nice, in this semihuddle with a bunch of other guys. All seniors. These guys huddle a lot, like they're attached. Three of them glanced over their shoulders at me at the same time. They are so unsubtle, it's scary.

I tossed my sandwich back onto the tray, and it glommed back onto the pile. “Excuse me?” I said, walking toward them. “Was there a question?”

“Oh, uh, hi, Courtney,” Grant said nervously. “We were just talking about … uh …”

“You and Dave. Splitting up. He says you hate him. Is that true?” Tom Delaney asked. He's so sleazy we call him “the Tom,” as in “the tomcat.” Constantly on the prowl. “'Cause if you guys aren't together anymore, I would really love to take you out sometime.” He tried to put his arm around my shoulder.

“Yeah. Right,” I said. “That'll happen.”

Then I put my tray back. The idea of lunch after that was really rude.

Grant came up to me at the end of the day in Life Issues—this dumb new elective we have to take as seniors, it's supposed to teach us stuff that's not taught at school—hello, does anyone see the contradiction here? We're taking it
in school
.

Mr. Antero passed out the curriculum. It has things on it like “Coping” and “Moving On” and “Deal with It.” Totally useless.

Anyway, Grant said he was sorry about the Tom being a jerk. I said, “We're
all
sorry about the Tom.”

Grant laughed and started telling me how he'd talked to Dave and how it was too bad we split up. I cut him off. The last thing I want is sympathy from some good-looking guy about some other really good-looking guy.

After school Jane, Beth, and I went for our yearly first-day-of-school splurge. Well, okay, so it only started two years ago when Jane moved here from LA.

New lipstick, new nail polish (not tested on animals, naturally) and mega mochas. I picked out Better Red Than Dead, New Money Green, and extra nondairy whipped topping on my soy mocha.

It feels really good to keep my standards up.

“You're going to do so much better than Dave,” Jane said as she tried on her twenty-third pair of identical black platform loafers. Easy for her to say.

“We'll find you someone to go out with. Not that you need help,” Beth said as she checked out the socks.

I saw this pair of suede boarder sneakers on a display. They were the ones I helped Dave pick out a couple of weeks ago. It killed me.

Phone just rang. I ran to answer it, but first checked the Caller ID. There was Dave's parents' name, same as always. I reached for the phone. Then I stopped, wondering if I should answer it. Then it stopped ringing. I waited to see if he'd leave a message. He didn't. Then I thought since he'd probably already moved, maybe it was
his
mom calling
my
mom. Not very likely, but still. They could be commiserating. No, definitely Dave, home to get more of his stuff or a free meal, I told myself.

Plus I told myself to quit standing in the hallway by the phone having private conversations with myself about who's calling from now on.

I picked up the phone to call Dave back and tell him to quit calling and not leaving a message. But I wouldn't give him the satisfaction.

Then as soon as I put it back, the phone rang again. Mom grabbed it in the kitchen. I could hear her yelling, “What are you trying to sell?” and “How did you get this number?” and “Please take me off your call list!”

So much negative energy here, or at least phone calls. I think I'll drive up I-70 to the buffalo overlook. Gazing at the herd always makes me feel better. They're so incredibly huge, and majestic, they always make my problems seem really small. They suffered for so many years—well, not those particular ones, but their people. Their buffalo. Whatever. Slaughtered. By the thousands. And now they have this huge piece of land that's theirs and they don't have to do anything except try to have baby buffaloes. Buffets and Buffettes.

There are better places to see buffalo, like the zoo, and buffalo ranches, where you can see them up close. But at the zoo they're fenced in and look depressed, and at ranches they're waiting to become steaks and burgers.

What's so unbelievable to me now is that the first time Dave and I went out, he ordered a buffalo burger and I asked him to change his order, and he
did
. And he asked a billion questions about why I don't eat meat, and I told him why not buffalo, and how ordering cheese on top just compounds the problem, how our whole meat-eating culture is basically wrong, we use way too much water—he didn't even fall asleep or take off for the bathroom. He just listened. And he also said I should use all that stuff on my college entrance essays.