Sliding On The Edge (21 page)

“
Come on, Shawna. Dig in.
It’s the Double Monster with everything!” Marta says.

It’s my chance to escape her mom the
hugger. I take it and tear off a slice, then fill my mouth with hot
cheese, pepperoni, olives, you name it. I’m taking the Double
Monster down tonight. If I can take two monsters at a time, I
should be able to take on my regular one anytime. I chew pizza
until it’s in tiny, mushy pieces. I swallow and wash it down with a
huge gulp of Coke, which I hate. But when in Rome. . . make that
Sweet River.

“
Okay, girls. I’m off to the
movies. I’ll be back about ten. Marta you charged my cell?” Jenny
asks.

Marta nods.

“
Have fun! Be happy!” Jenny
calls as she closes the front door behind her.

Have fun. Be happy. I’m chewing on
those ideas as hard as I’m chewing on the Double Monster. At the
same time I’m looking at Marta, wondering how she’d look if she
were my father’s daughter. That leads to wondering how I’d look if
I were Jenny’s daughter? Like a troll? I bite down and tear off
another piece of pizza.

Marta must have taken Martha
Stewart classes. She’s smiling, pouring more Coke when a glass is
empty, offering napkins.
How come she
isn’t as trollish tonight? How come when she looks at me, it’s with
straight-on, non-ferret eyes? And she’s definitely stopped smelling
bad.

“
So, Marta says you’re in
her AP classes,” one of the twins says. “That’s why I never see
you. I’m not AP material.” She laughs and toasts her twin with her
Coke.

“
Me, neither.” The
look-alike smirks. “So what’s it like being smart?”

“
What’s it like being dumb?”
It’s out of my mouth before I know it.

“
Hey! Shawna, you gotta be
nice tonight, all right?” Marta’s Love Bunny is hopping on her
chest and she’s turning red in the face.

. . . for a change stop
being such a grump and pushing everybody away.

I can’t shake Magic’s advice. It’s
still echoing in my head. I hold up my hands like I’m surrendering.
“Sorry. I don’t want to talk about school, okay? Let’s talk about
something else.”

“
How about Cas . . . ey?”
“Me, neither” tilts her chin and smiles, first at her sister and
then at me, splitting the syllables in Casey’s name equally between
us.

“
Deirdre, you’re a
troublemaker. I told you—” her sister throws her crust and hits
Deirdre in the chest; then she turns to me. “You know I’m seeing
Casey, right?”

“
That’s not any of my
business. I don’t even know who
you
are, so who you go with isn’t something I’d care
about.”

I grab another slice of pizza, taking
a big bite. If I keep my mouth full of food, I can’t talk—something
I’m not going to be good at tonight.

“
My name’s Deanna, spelled
with two N’s.” She holds up her left hand.

“
This is Casey’s
ring.”

Since my mouth is full, I
shrug.

“
What’s that supposed to
mean?” Deanna asks.

“
It means I don’t give a
sh—”

Marta is between Deanna and me in a
flash. “Come on. My CD player’s in my room.” She pulls me through
the kitchen door and down the hall. “You like Rap, don’t
you?”

“
I despise Rap.” I’m in no
mood to cooperate.

“
Shawna.” Marta says my name
and her voice pleads. “Please.”

. . . for a change stop
being such a grump and pushing everybody away.

“
Play whatever you want. Rap
is fine.” I’m tired of this sleepover already and I’ve been here
less than an hour.

Deirdre and Deanna travel together as
a package. They come into Marta’s bedroom together and spread their
identical sleeping bags side by side on the floor. I think I’ve got
them sorted out. Deirdre’s nose has a small bump in the center and
Deanna’s doesn’t. If I study their noses, I’ll know which one is
which.

I retrieve my bag from the kitchen,
and when I come back Chino Lite is blasting the wallpaper loose. D
and D are doing an imitation of a dance, looking like two of
Buster’s fleas on a night out.

This is too weird!
I kick off my shoes and squat on my bag.
How long does this song last?
Still, I move to the beat. Chino Lite is my number-one
favorite. Marta has good taste in music.

Marta joins the twins and hauls me to
my feet. I shake my head no, but she’s got my wrists. Short of
breaking her arm, I’m not getting free.

“
Come on,” she shouts. “I
know you have some good moves.”

Ha! She doesn’t have a clue what good
moves are. I haven’t slid around the floor since I left Vegas, but
the moves come back: slide to the right, go down and circle, punch
and kick and . . . now I forget the moves and let the dance flow
through me. I’ve got a good sweat up. It’s like I’m back where I
should be, outside the dopest joint on the old strip, lost in the
tunes.

There’re things I miss about that
town. Dancing is one. On the nights when Mom wasn’t coming home,
I’d cut out of Tuan’s and head downtown. There, lights sprinkled
over me, and music and slots clattered up and down the streets.
How’d I get stuck here in Hicksville? I hop on my toes and spin, go
around, elbow out, head out . . . .

When the music stops, I flop onto my
bag. After Chino Lite, the silence rings like an apartment house
buzzer in my ears. When I look up, the two D’s and Marta are
staring down at me. “What?”

“
Where did you learn that?”
Marta asks. Her voice sounds like she’s just seen Britney Spears in
person.

The two D’s have their arms crossed
over their chests.

“
Church.”

“
Can you teach me?” Marta
has returned to Golden Retriever mode.

“
Only if you’re a fast
learner. I’m leaving pretty soon.”

“
Why?” Marta sits next to
me, her Love Bunny brushing against my arm. She has a look I don’t
understand, but it’s something between, “I failed my math test!”
and “My mother has cancer.”

“
It’s time.” I’m not getting
into “my grandmother hates me, my mother’s broke, yadda, yadda,
yadda.”

“
Well, that sucks, you
know?” Marta says. “But could you . . .?”

“
Yeah. Yeah. I’ll show you
some steps.” I stand and Marta powers up Chino Lite again. “Go low
and turn. Try again. Okay. Okay. Nice. Now, work your shoulders.” I
stand in front of Marta and show her how to dip and sway, so her
head and the top part of her body flow to the beat.

Deirdre—I check out her nose—yes, for
sure Deirdre, tries to follow, but she’s definitely not got the
moves in her. Fish in the bottom of a boat do hip-hop way better
than Deirdre. Deanna pretends she’s not interested, but I catch her
looking up at us. She’s not kidding me. She wants to learn, and
bad.

Marta is a fast learner and she’s
good. I give her a high five before I remember who she is and where
I am.

“
I gotta stop. I’m bushed.”
I fall back on my sleeping bag.

Marta lowers the volume on the CD and
crashes next to me. “You are good, Shawna. You have to enter the
spring dance contest. You’ll win!”

I shrug.

“
I mean it. It’s a big
thing, you know? You get clothes, you get money, and . . . you
ready?” Marta sits back on her Golden Retriever haunches. “A Chino
Lite CD!”

I want to shrug, but I can’t. I can
win that contest, hands down. I’m getting ready to ask more about
it when my friend Deanna, No Bump on her Nose, asks:

“
So when do you go back to
Las Vegas?” She wants me out of good old Sweet River. Casey doth
protest too much. I know all I have to do is show some interest and
he’ll dump this little clone. Sweet little Deanna knows it
too.

“
Whenever I’m ready.” I’m
not giving her any information.

Deanna pulls out her overnight bag and
begins filing her nails. “Deirdre, what interesting little bit of
news did you hear today?”

Deirdre looks blank and fiddles with
her hair.

“
You know, the story about
how Shawna is seeing that psychologist in Sacramento?”

What does Mom always say? “Expect the
worst, then when the bad comes along you can handle it.” I should
have been ready for this one. I’m going Sweet River soft again. No.
Now I’m down to squishy.

“
That’s none of your
business, Deanna.” Marta’s voice surprises me. It sounds hard as
rock.

“
It’s none of anybody’s
business,” I say, standing up and grabbing my bag.

“
Besides, it’s not true.”
And it wasn’t. I saw a therapist, not a psychologist.

I’m so out of this place, that before
the front door closes behind me, in my head, I’m already packed and
on the bus back to Vegas. I’m going to Kay’s, call Mom, get myself
a ticket, and then it’s “Adios, Sweet River.”

I sling my bag over my shoulder and
pick my way down the hill, past the park and into town. The stores
are dark and the streets are empty, except for a couple of cars in
front of the Howling Dog Saloon.

I walk past the saloon and
look in. Nobody inside looks familiar or like someone I’d want to
ask for a lift, so I hike back to the park and sit on the bottom of
the plastic slide, my sleeping bag across my lap.
Now what?
I’m tired, so I
lay my head on my bag and close my eyes.
If I was sticking around, I’d get those stupid clones. Then
they’d know some real pain. But right now all I want is a
bed.

“
Shawna?”

I’m almost out of my skin by the time
I jump up and face Marta. “Damn, Marta, you scared me! What do you
want now?”

“
I’m sorry, Shawna. Please
come back to the house. They didn’t mean what they said. They’re
like totally jealous of you, you know.”

I point to myself,
surprised.

“
Yes, you. You’re smarter
and prettier than they are, and everybody knows Casey’s only dating
Deanna to get your attention.”

“
He’s like, wasting his
time. I’m so not interested.”

Marta sits on the grass cross-legged
and stares at me, like she’s waiting for me to say more. “I’m sorry
I asked them to come, but they swore they just wanted to get to
know you. It was stupid of me to believe them.” She plucks at the
grass and piles it on her thigh. “I’m not too swift that way, you
know? I always believe what people tell me.”

“
You wouldn’t last long in
Vegas.”

She sort of laughs and piles more
grass bits on her leg. “So why the shrink?” she asks,
finally.

“
It’s really none of your
business.”

“
I went to a therapist
once,” Marta says, “after my dad left. Me and my mom went. It
helped.” Marta looks across the park. “It’s nothing to be ashamed
of.”

“
Who says I’m ashamed? What
is wrong with every friggin’ person in this town? Do they have to
know everything about everybody?” I slam my sleeping bag with my
fist, wishing it were Deanna or Deirdre.

“
Nothing’s wrong with being
interested,” Marta says.

“
Butt out of my life and
take your charmin’ duo with you.” I heft my bag under my arm and
start toward town again.

“
Where are you going,
Shawna? You can’t walk back to your grandmother’s now!” Marta
catches up with me and grabs my arm. “Wait! I called Casey. He’s on
his way to get you.”

I want to hit her. Why does she muck
around in my life? But it’s already too late; Casey’s truck is
rolling to a stop at the curb

Chapter 40

Shawna

Casey walks up to us, takes my
sleeping bag without saying a thing, then drops it in the back of
his truck. He opens the passenger door and waits like a patient
sheepherder, for the last of his flock to straggle in.

He drops Marta at her house. And while
she’s standing out front, waving at us, the door opens and a twin’s
head pops out. Now I’m the one who’s smiling—the biggest and widest
I can manage—and I’m waving back like I’m off to Paris. Ah, life
can be good.

“
I’ll hear about this later
tonight,” Casey says, as he pulls away.

“
I didn’t ask for the
ride.”

“
No, but I’ll wager you
tricked Marta into asking.”

“
You have an ego the size of
a planet, do you know that? I don’t want anything from you, except
to leave me alone.” I scoot as far against my door as I can, and
scrunch down into the seat. I can barely see over the
dash.

It’s a fast trip down the highway, a
skidding turn onto Kay’s road, and a grinding stop a few feet from
the red house. But before I can escape, Casey’s across the seat,
pinning me against the door. I’m not breathing and my hands would
be shaking if they had the room, but he’s pressed against me so
hard, there’s no space between us for the shakes.

“
I don’t like people
touching me!” I shout.