Not Anything (12 page)

the next day i am surprisingly calm. i get up. i brush my
teeth. I take a shower. I play my guitar. I do homework. I am perfectly normal until my father drops me off in front of Danny Diaz’s house. It is only then, right before I reach to ring the doorbell, that I have a mini–panic attack. All I know is that I suddenly feel insecure about almost every part of my body. I feel like my clothes are too casual and my hair is out of place. And what if Danny has forgotten that I was invited to dinner? What if I’m showing up and nobody is home?

I glance at their driveway. Three cars are in it. They are definitely home.

Part of the problem is that I’ve straightened my hair and I’m wearing the outfit from the mall. I look better, but I don’t feel like me. I don’t feel like me at all.

Which, Marisol told me while she straightened my hair and dabbed cream eye shadow on my eyelids, was the point.

Not that being me is a bad thing, but feeling like me—the insecure me—definitely is a problem.

Okay, I can do this.

I push my finger forward and slide it across the doorbell’s soft center. One little move and the whole house will know that I’m here.

Okay, do it. Do it.
But I can’t. My hand falls limply back to my side. If I can’t ring the doorbell, how will I make it through dinner?

I take two small steps backward, and then, with the grace of a dancer, turn silently on my heels and run smack into Danny.

“Going somewhere?”

His smile lets me know that he’s been standing behind me for a good while.

“No,” I tell him. “I wasn’t going anywhere.”

“Then what were you doing?” he asks.

“Um.” I search high and low for an excuse. It’s not like I can say that I left my purse in my car. My dad dropped me off, and my purse is hanging across my shoulder. “Um,” I repeat.

“‘Um,’” Danny mimics.

“Well,” I stall, “the thing is”—and that’s when the best of the worst lies that I can think of comes tumbling out of my mouth—“The thing is that I have mud on my shoes and I wanted to get it off…in the grass.” I point to the grass as if it should be perfectly obvious to him that that was what I was about to do before I bumped into him.

“Your shoes look fine.” He stares down at my spotless sandals. They’re brown leather without a speck of dirt on them.

“It’s on the bottom.” I sidestep him and head for the lawn, where I avidly rub my feet on the grass.

I can tell that he’s not buying my lame excuse, but he still says, “Okay, Susie. I think that’s crazy, but okay.” And then he pulls on the side of my shirt playfully. It’s not the first time he’s touched me, but it feels as if it might as well be. My skin feels hot and tingly. “We should go inside.”

He cuts up the path, and I follow him. He rubs his finger over the doorbell and turns to wink at me. He’s teasing me, and I like it. “My mom was really excited about your coming today.” He tells me over his shoulder. “She made Dalia and me clean for like four hours.”

“No way.” I’m pretty sure that he’s teasing me again. But what if he’s not?

“It’s okay. We have to clean during the weekends anyway. My mom thinks that a family that cleans together stays together. Actually, she makes us do most of the cleaning.” Danny slides through the doorway, and I follow.

“Why do you have to do all the work?” I ask.

“Because.” Danny shakes his head at me, like the concept of family is foreign to me, which, maybe it is. “She and my dad pay all the bills. It’s fair to me. Besides, my mom says that if we think we’re too grown-up to clean the house, then we must be old enough to get a job. And with soccer practice, I don’t have time to work, so I’m absolutely happy to clean my room, vacuum the living room, do the laundry, and dust.” Danny runs his fingers through his hair and my toes tingle. He’s heart-wrenchingly cute today.

“Wow, you really do clean.” I try not to look at his lips. But my eyes are drawn to them. It’s like ever since I’ve given myself permission to like him, I can’t help but notice everything and anything about him.

“Don’t you?” We enter the kitchen, and the scent of Pine-Sol and onions permeates the air. Danny takes a seat on one of the three bar stools crowded around the kitchen counter. I stand next to him.

“No, we have a maid that comes three times a week.”

“That must be the life to live.”

“Not really; she always forgets to clean the bathroom and then I have to do it, which sucks.” I run my hand over the countertop.

I feel really, really strange.

“Susie?” Danny’s voice dips a little.

“Huh?” I smile at him without thinking.

“Why do you keep staring at my lips?”

“Huh?” My cheeks burn red.

“Do I have something in my teeth?” Danny smiles widely and twists his head to the side. He leans in really closely. His breath smells like ripe oranges.

“No,” I look down, and my hair drifts into my face. I wish the floor would open up, and I would be sucked under. I’m afraid that if I look up, my eyes will be drawn back to his lips…. “There’s nothing in your teeth.”

“Why don’t you sit here?” Danny pulls out the bar stool next to his and pushes it closer to him, leaving only a foot of space in between. When I hesitate, he taps the seat expectantly. Reluctantly, I accept his offer. And before I know it, we’re sitting knee to knee staring at each other.

“Where’s everyone else?” I ask him. The house is so silent.

“Oh, my mom forgot the Cuban bread and
tres leches,
so she and my dad ran back out to get it. Dalia is at her boyfriend’s house. They got into a fight last night at homecoming, so she’ll be over there kissing his butt for a while. And
mi abuelo
is outside talking to the ducks. So…” His voice trails off.

“So…” I repeat, watching him. He’s staring at me like he’s considering my face.

“I like your hair like that. Straight.” He leans forward and passes his fingertips over a strand of stray hair before brushing it behind my ear. “It’s really soft.”

His breath is hot on my face. His glance is unnerving. The tingling sensation returns quickly and glides down my belly over my thighs and settles behind my kneecaps. They feel weak, and I’m thankful that I have the stool to support my wobbly body. I’m mesmerized by him, by how a single touch from him can make me feel sexy. I’ve never felt sexy in my life. Before this moment, I would have never known how to describe what that word truly means. But now with Danny Diaz’s penny eyes piercing through me, I feel sexy. And it feels strange and awkward and beautiful all at the same time.

“I got something that I want to show you.” Danny pops off the stool and motions for me to follow with his hand. I don’t have to ask him where we’re going. I know we’re going to his bedroom.

“I borrowed it today from Mike Spitzer. He’s one of the guys on the team.”

I hover in his doorway, afraid to enter. My leg is brushing against his perfectly made bed with the pillow neatly tucked underneath his plaid Tommy Hilfiger comforter. I feel a lump forming in my throat, and I’m not even sure if I can speak. I want to sit on that bed with Danny. I want him to kiss me. In the corner, with his back to me, Danny is fidgeting with something. When he turns to face me, he holds out an acoustic guitar. “See,” he says simply, as if I should know what he means.

“How did you know I play?” I ask, surprised.

“Marisol told me. I talked to her last night at homecoming.” He smiles and pushes the guitar forward. “I thought maybe you would play something for me.”

Play for him. I don’t know what to say to that. Nobody had ever asked me to play for them—ever. “You and Marisol talked about me?” I ask quietly. He nods his head. “At homecoming?” I repeat. He nods his head again. “How was it? How was homecoming?” I ask. It’s something I’ve wanted to ask him since I walked through the door.

“Okay, I guess.” He presses the guitar into my hands. “If you’re into that kind of thing. Would you?” he asks, pointing at the guitar.

In my hands, the guitar is cold and foreign and comforting. I strum it casually, trying to find the courage to give him what he really wants from me. “I really want to hear you play,” he tells me, closer this time. He is just a fiber of carpet away.

“Do you like Marisol?” I say, stepping two fibers back. This question is urgently important to me. Anything to take us away from THIS.

“Marisol’s cool.” He pounds lightly on the wall with his fist.

“And?” I prompt him.

“And what?” The pounding increases. He looks over at me; his eyes burn holes through my heart. “She’s nice. We talked last night at the dance when I was standing by the restroom waiting for…Tamara.” He looks down, like he’s aware that the mention of her name might ruin THIS.

“Sit.” He drags me onto his bed, then scoots away from me as if I am on fire. He watches me expectantly. “Play,” he instructs.

I rest the guitar on my knee and clear my mind, and then I pluck a whisper of a melody from some far-off place that I haven’t quite seen. I hum it so that I can remember and let my fingers know what they are expected to play, and then, after I close my eyes and listen, I began to play with confidence. Before I know it I am singing, my voice husky, wobbly, and afraid. But still I am singing.

The words flow smoothly, like a sunny day in the back of my house, sitting between the palm trees that border my garden. In my mind, I picture Marisol there, feet propped over the edge of her bench, fingers curling in and out, eyes lost in the skies.

I play the chords. I know them well. Only a few weeks ago, I had cried while writing this song. I told myself I wasn’t crying for anyone in particular, but for the beauty of the words, their longing. Now I wasn’t so sure.

To the very end, I play with my eyes shut. When I finish, I lay the guitar in my lap and hum a little longer. My body is filled with electrical currents and bridges of uncertainty. I feel raw and exposed, like I handed Danny the keys to my diary and asked that he read it all out loud and understand.

Danny says something to quiet the silence. A heartbeat after the words leave his mouth, I have already forgotten them. I don’t care about what he says, but how he says it. My whole body aches from his tone. I have mesmerized him.

I open my eyes, and frown at their wetness.

“That song,” is all he says now.

“Yes,” I say, “that song.”

“That song,” he repeats, as if I should know.

“Yes,” I tell him. “That song.” And then, when it is inevitable, “I know.”

dinner is not what i feared. there is no fancy china
pattern to contend with, Dalia (thankfully) does not wear her tiara, and Danny’s father is not stuffy and he doesn’t bore us to death by speaking about adult subject matters such as foreign policy and the Republicans’ proposed tax cut for the upcoming year.

It’s much better than that. There are plates that don’t match and a chipped dining room table. There are his parents and Dalia. There is Danny and me. There is his cat, Max, and his grandfather who saves bread underneath the table to give to the ducks later that day. And I smile the whole way through, because dinner is nothing like what I expected and everything that I hoped it would be.

“What does your father do?” Mr. Diaz asks somewhere between the Cuban bread and the rice and beans.

“He’s a literature professor at UM,” I tell him.

“And your mother?”

“Um, she died in a car accident when I was nine.”

“Oh,” Mrs. Diaz says.

“Oh,” Mr. Diaz says.

“I’m sorry, Susie. We didn’t know,” Mrs. Diaz apologizes. And Mr. Diaz shakes his head sympathetically, while Dalia looks away. Danny reaches for my hand underneath the table and then like a dream quickly takes it away.

“I didn’t know,” he says, looking at me, like I’m new to him, like in someway it all makes sense.

“I don’t like to talk about it.” I pick at my food. Shove broccoli around. Apparently, Dalia takes this as a signal to change the subject.

“Mami,” she says, “are we or are we not going to Cuba this year?”

The conversation moves fast from there. Danny’s parents tell me about their trips to Cuba and Spain and Portugal. I have seen the world, too, I tell his mom. My dad has a set of coffee table books that explore international travel. Danny laughs, and even Dalia smiles. It’s all back to normal after that. And the best part is that I know I am a hit.