The Secret to Lying (16 page)

The salesgirl grinned. “You are the coolest mom.”

Ken doll rang us up. Everything was expensive, but Moms didn’t bat an eye. She liked to pretend we were rich.

“Why don’t you wear your new clothes out,” she said.

The salesgirl slipped around behind me and clipped the tags. “There. You’re a new man.”

Moms thanked her and told her to throw my old sport coat and jeans away.

“Don’t,” I said, reaching for my clothes.

“Honey,
Goodwill
wouldn’t even take those things.”

“That’s because I bought them at
Goodwill.
”

“You’re such a joker.”

“I’m not joking,” I snapped.

The salespeople looked at each other, then the girl handed me my clothes.

Once we were out of the store, Moms stopped and faced me. “What’s gotten into you?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, angry that she blamed me for messing things up.

“You used to love shopping.”

I scoffed, wondering what bizarro-world past she was remembering. “No, I didn’t. I never liked shopping.”

Her face crumpled. For a moment, I feared she might cry, then her eyes focused on something behind me. “I’m trying, James. I really am,” she said. “Can’t we be happy? For once, for just a few hours, can’t we pretend to have fun and be happy?” There was a note of desperation in her voice, as if her life depended on whether I said yes or no.

“Sure,” I replied, swallowing myself. “I’m sorry. I really like the sweater.”

I CALLED JESS’S DORM ROOM
the next day. It was the last day of finals, and all the students were supposed to pack and go home for winter break after they finished exams. I worried that she might have left already, and I didn’t have her cell number.

She picked up after the third ring. “Hey, Jess.”

“Oh,” she answered. “It’s you.”

“I think it’s me,” I said. “I mean, you can never be certain, can you? I don’t always feel like myself.”

Jess didn’t say anything. In the background, I heard Rachel talking with someone else. I realized how strange I must have sounded. Ghost44 would have understood, but I had to be careful with Jess.

“Why’d you call?” she asked.

“I miss you,” I said, surprised by how cold she sounded. “I haven’t talked with anyone in days. I’m going crazy here.”

“Crazy how? Crazy like you’re wearing lipstick and talking to your hand, or crazy like you dissed your incredibly awesome girlfriend to go skinny-dipping in a frozen pond?”

“Sorry about the pond thing.”

“Save it. I knew there was someone else.”

“You mean Ellie?” I wanted to kick myself for not thinking of what Jess might have heard. This explained why she hadn’t returned my calls. “You think I snuck out to see the Ice Queen?”

“Why I’m even talking to you is beyond me.”

“Hold on. There’s nothing going on between me and Ellie.”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s true,” I said. “It was a coincidence that she was there.”

“Then why’d you go swimming?”

“I was bored. Honestly, Ellie wasn’t even around when I jumped in the pond.” Technically, it was true, but I didn’t know if Jess would buy it.

“I’m not stupid,” she replied. “I know Ellie was there. She called security.”

“She must have seen me jump.” I racked my brain for some way to convince her. “Look, if there was something going on between Ellie and me, why would she just leave me there? Why wouldn’t she walk me inside so I could warm up? It’s because of her that I got suspended.”

Jess didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “You could have frozen to death.”

“I was fine.”

“Yeah, right.” She still sounded pissed.

I tried to change the subject. “You ever think about running away?”

No answer.

“I wish we could run away together,” I said.

“Where would you want to go?” she finally replied.

“Someplace interesting. California, maybe. Or Seattle. Someplace where no one knows us — so we could start over.”

“Why do you want to start over?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I just need to get away from here.”

“Why? What happened?” she asked, concern breaking through her anger.

“Nothing happened. Nothing ever happens here.” Even though it was the truth, it sounded like a diversion. Let her think I’d survived fistfights and abuse, because no one makes a movie about a bored middle-class teenager living in a cornfield with nice parents.

I heard a door shut in the background and the other voices grew distant. Jess must have stepped into the bathroom to talk. “You okay, James?”

“Yeah. I’m great,” I said. “I just think running away would be fun. We could steal a car and drive out west and rob convenience stores like Bonnie and Clyde, or that other movie —
True Romance.
”

“Never saw it.”

“It’s classic. Anyhow, are you going home for break?”

“Where else would I go?”

“Some people go to Florida for Christmas. Or Paris.”

“Nope. Not my family. Going to IHOP is the closest my dad gets to traveling.”

“I’ve got an idea. How about I catch a bus to Chicago and stay with you?”

“At my dad’s place?” she replied. “No way, J.T. How about I borrow the car and rescue you?”

I pictured Jess with her tattooed chest, piercings, and combat boots meeting my parents. They’d probably call the cops when she arrived. “That won’t work,” I said.

“Why not?”

“It’s too far.”

“I don’t care. I’ll pick you up and we’ll go on a dinner date. We can be normal teenagers.”

“That’s the last thing in the world I want to be,” I said. “Besides, isn’t the guy supposed to pick the girl up?”

“You don’t have a license.”

“I have a learner’s permit.”

“How’s Tuesday sound?”

“Not good.”

Jess sighed. “I thought you missed me.”

“I do.”

“So what’s the problem?”

“There’s no place to eat here,” I said, scrambling for a way to keep her from coming.

“Then we’ll have dinner at your house.”

“With my parents?”

“I’m good with parents. I can be very sweet when I want to.”

“So you’re inviting yourself over for dinner?”

“Yup. Then I’m whisking you away and ravishing you.”

I tried to come up with some other alternative. “What about running away?”

Jess chuckled. “Maybe after dinner.”

ON SATURDAY, AFTER ALL
the students had gone home, the administration allowed me to return to ASMA to take my exams. Dad dropped me off. I actually got a little excited about taking exams since it meant I’d get to be back on campus, if only for a few hours. But as soon as I entered the main building, things felt different. Other than some teachers grading papers and a custodian vacuuming the orange carpet, no one was there. The emptiness drove me up the wall. I couldn’t stop listening to the tick of the clock or the scratch of my pencil on the page as I wrote out answers.

Most of the teachers gave me the exam and went back to grading, but Mr. Funt wanted to talk. I didn’t even have to take an exam with him since the final project was a short story and I’d turned mine in before I’d left. It was a good story, too, about a boy who lived in two worlds. Mr. Funt had said that the only thing a writer needed to be was honest, and this story was the most honest thing I’d ever written. I’d even pulled a few scenes from my dreams.

I figured the story would blow Mr. Funt away. It had more symbolism in it than most of the stories we’d talked about in class and the plot was full of action, so I wasn’t all that surprised when I dropped by his office to pick it up and he asked if I could stay a minute.

“I heard about what happened at the pond,” Mr. Funt said.

I shrugged, expecting him to cut to the chase and tell me how he realized now, after reading my story, that he’d misjudged me. I wasn’t some messed-up kid who needed to see a shrink — I was a literary genius. He’d probably encourage me to publish.

“Do you want to talk about that, James?” he asked.

“Talk about what?”

“Why you keep engaging in these self-destructive behaviors.”

I glanced at my arm, but I was wearing my usual sport coat so all my scars were covered. “I’m not trying to destroy myself,” I said. “I really like myself.”

Mr. Funt rubbed his jaw. His stubble made a sound like sandpaper on rough wood. “The Greeks called it
katabasis,
” he said, “from
kata,
meaning down, and
baimen,
meaning to go. Hence the term refers to a descent to the darkest depths whereby a person may discover who he truly is.”

He inhaled loudly through his nose, like he did when he gave a lecture in class. “A few Native American tribes called it ashes time,” he continued, “because the young men of the tribe were covered in ashes to remind them of the death of their child selves. Then they were sent into the wilderness with only a blanket, and if they came back before they found their name, the people of their tribe would treat them as ghosts. No one would talk to them. No one would acknowledge them. No one would see them. Some wandered for years looking for their true name. Are you with me?”

I nodded, even though I had no idea what he was getting at.

“Ancient cultures had their rites of passage — their ways of challenging youth to discover an adult self. But what do we do now?” Mr. Funt rubbed his jaw again, seeming to consider his own question. “Standardized tests? Sports? Keg parties?” He shook his head. “In the absence of real challenges, teens must devise ways to transform themselves.”

“Sounds better than wandering for years with a blanket,” I said.

Mr. Funt gave me a concerned look. “I know you’re exploring, James. Testing your limits. Plumbing the depths, trying to discover who you are. But be careful. Descend too far into that darkness and you might not return.” He paused, as if this advice should instantly change my life. “You might lose yourself entirely.”

“Okay.” I fiddled with a button on my coat, wishing he’d just give me my story and let me go.

“Sometimes,” he continued, “when things are the worst for us, we don’t see that they’re bad. It’s when we need it the most that we forget how to ask for help.”

“Okay,” I repeated, getting annoyed.

Mr. Funt raised his arms slightly, as if he wanted to hug. “If you need to talk, I’m here.”

I backed away, catching a whiff of stale coffee and cigarettes. I wasn’t the one with problems here. It wasn’t like I smoked a pack a day and clung to a ponytail even though I was going bald. It wasn’t like I was getting a divorce.

“Hey, what are you doing for the holidays?” I asked.

“Not much,” Mr. Funt said, returning to his desk. “Grading papers, mostly.”

I nodded. “So you’re spending it alone?”

“Yes.”

“That’s too bad,” I said. “You know, if
you
need to talk with anyone . . .”

He frowned and shuffled through a stack of papers. “Here you go, James,” he said, handing me my story. “I think this is what you came for.”

“Thanks, Mr. Funt. You take care of yourself, okay?”

He waved me off, not responding.

I hurried down the hall, feeling a little guilty for how I’d acted, but his insistence that I needed help pissed me off. He hadn’t even said anything about my story.

I sat on the front steps to the school and flipped through the pages to read his comments. There weren’t any marks on most of the pages. No stars, or exclamation points, or spelling corrections. Just a grade, B–, scrawled in red ink on the last page, and one line that read:
Come back to earth, James.

I crumpled the story and threw it away. That’s what you get for trying to write something honest.