What's Important Is Feeling: Stories (2 page)

“It’s shit all right,” Kendra said. She blew into her instrument. Out came something that sounded like music.

“Fo shiz,” Alex said.

“I told you,” Sam said.

Roland nodded in approval.

“She’s Hungarian,” I said.

There was one song we could do, an old sixties sing-along, four chords and a chorus. I was singer by default, the only one who knew the words. It wasn’t singing exactly. More like a mix of talk and scream with but the merest hint of melody. We turned the mic down low and let the music drown me out. I was okay with that. When we got to the bridge Kendra came in for a solo. The other instruments went quiet. Her clarinet was tense and trebly, flouncing up and down the scale. Dusk was coming on. The wind picked up, poured into the garage, carrying smells of cut grass and distant grilling. Kendra kept going, another eight bars. Her eyes were closed. Her body hardly moved. Just long thin fingers fingering, pinkies lifted, index tapping out the meter, thumb continuously curling. She was a virtuoso, or had maybe just taken lessons.

“Earth to Daddy,” Wyatt called, hands cupped around his mouth. I’d been spacing out, writing lyrics on a napkin. The song was about Kendra, but I’d veiled her as a meerkat. I’d been watching lots of nature shows while stoned. In the song, we were lovers in captivity, trying to fuck our way to freedom. I’d managed to rhyme zookeeper with Grim Reaper. I couldn’t wait to show the band.

“Work is calling, Big Daddy. No more poetry—time to wipe some tables. Dinner rush is almost here.”

We were getting to the end of June. School was over. The heat brought out hibernators, folks emerging from cave-homes for oversized sundaes. I was constantly mopping the sticky floors, wiping tables, washing bucket loads of glassware. My fingers were wrinkly, suds-softened. I smelled like milk and Windex.

“Yes, boss,” I said, and crumbled the paper. Wyatt wasn’t gonna let me off that easy.

“Hand it over, Big Daddy, let lil’ ole Madonna get a look.”

He grabbed at the napkin, managed to rip off a corner.

“Never,” I said, and stuffed the rest in my mouth and chewed. Claire sidled up to us, placed an arm on Wyatt’s shoulder. I spit the chewed napkin in the garbage.

“What tastes so bad, Benny?” Claire asked. “That fruit plate in the kitchen? Because I think Ernesto left it out overnight. I wouldn’t touch that if I were you.”

“My, my, it’s the bitter taste of young love,” Wyatt explained. He puckered up and made smooch sounds. “Bless his beating little heart.”

Kendra was waiting by my car when I got out. She looked different under streetlight, less affable, as if posing for an album cover. She stomped a cigarette, leaned up against the car.

“Here to break my kneecaps?” I asked.

“Something like that,” Kendra said.

We drove through the residential areas, past Sam’s and the cul-de-sacs, past Roland’s apartment complex, through the north side and around the lake, out to the quiet byway that connected us with the next town over. The area was mostly woods, the undeveloped limits of our municipality. Soon Uncle Marion would kill these trees too, build mansions, make more money from the ugly.

Kendra flipped through my CDs, found something acceptable.

“Are you tired?” she asked.

“No,” I said. I wasn’t. Work had worn me out, but I was eager. The long run of it—life—looked mostly unhopeful. I would go to the JC, stay on at the restaurant, siphon from my parents until they cut me off for good. But tonight was open-ended; it would be hours until sunrise.

“I’m tired,” she said.

“Long day?”

“Just tired,” she said. I knew enough to let it slide. Kendra turned up the music. She opened her compact but didn’t apply any makeup. She studied herself.

“The thing about cars,” Kendra said. “Is that you’re going somewhere, but you also are already somewhere.”

“Totally,” I said, and took a left.

“But that place you are isn’t a real place. I mean, it’s moving. You haven’t arrived yet.”

“Right.”

“I don’t want to arrive,” Kendra said. “I don’t ever want to arrive.”

“I’ll need to get gas eventually,” I said, an attempt at a joke. Kendra didn’t laugh.

“Park somewhere,” she said.

I doubled back to the women’s fitness center, found a spot in the sequestered lot. It was late but the lights were on in the center, the tennis bubble lit white. Kendra and I stared at each other across the car’s console.

“Hi,” she said, and gave a thin smile.

I leaned in for a kiss, but Kendra pulled away.

“Not that,” she said.

She opened her door, stood outside, lifted her dress over her head, and dropped her panties to the ground. Clothed only in Doc Martens and a couple of bracelets, Kendra stood with arms at her sides. My headlights were off. Kendra’s black hair blended into the dark. Her body looked like a child’s; the skeleton seemed uneven, south-sloping. One breast was bigger, about the size of a golf ball. The other was almost completely flat. Her bush was dark and wispy and trailed up to her belly button. Her legs and belly were bruised in places. For a moment I thought she might disappear, fade into nighttime, vanish in a slow roll of gray smoke.

She got back in the car, fit herself between my body and the steering wheel. Objects dug into us: seat belts, soda straws, empty cigarette packs. I tried to kiss her again, and this time she sort of let me. Her lips were dry. Her cheeks were wet with tears.

“We don’t have to,” I said. “Are you sure?”

“Shut up,” Kendra said. She raised her body, lowered herself onto me. I didn’t last long. My penis went flaccid. Kendra bounced up and down with increasing vigor.

“I’m soft,” I whispered.

“Just shut up,” she said, and kept on going.

The band was getting better. I’d written a song, not the meerkat one. It was a minor-key ballad called “Car”—the refrain:
“I don’t want to arrive
.
”

Kendra liked it. The others were indifferent, but her vote counted more than theirs. We’d secured a gig for the following weekend, playing Wyatt’s July Fourth bash. The band needed a name.

“It sounds like a fart,” Sam said, and tried to twirl a stick. The stick slipped from his grip and fell. “A womanly fart.”

“It doesn’t,” I said. The name was my idea.

“Well, not like an actual fart,” Sam said. “But a description of one. Like if someone asked, ‘What did that fart sound like?’ one might reply, ‘Oh, soft thunder.’ ”

Roland shrugged, plucked an E string. His amp produced a low and reverbed note. I took this as a vote on my behalf.

“I like it,” Kendra said. “It’s retro, kind of seventies. Kind of Fleetwood Mac.”

“Exactly,” Sam said. “A shitty decade and a shitty band—just what we want to be!”

“I like it,” Kendra said, which settled the matter.

“No dizzout,” Alex said.

“Fine,” Sam said. “Whatever.” He picked up his drumstick, played a snare fill, silently fumed.

After practice I drove Kendra to the Bickford’s out on Route 1. To get there, you had to pass this big oak where some kids were killed a few years back. They’d been speeding and lost control of the car. For a while the tree was decorated, surrounded by framed photos, drawings, flowers, notes tacked to the trunk. Now there was no memorial. Weeds grew back in around it. It was hard to remember which tree was the right one.

“Some kids died there,” I said. Kendra paused a moment before responding. She inhaled deeply. I thought she was being dramatic. It’s not like she knew them.

“I’m gonna die,” she said.

“We all are,” I said. “Everyone in the world. Everyone we’ve ever loved.” It was something I’d heard someone say in a movie. What I wanted to say was that I’d never loved anyone, not yet, but maybe if she’d let me I would fall in love with her. I could lie on top, blanket her body.

Bickford’s had that unbearably cold air-conditioning that comes from the ground and freezes your flip-flopped feet. Everyone in there was old—waitresses and patrons—life’s cooling leftovers. There was a nursing home across the street, the Star of David, an unkempt drop box for Jewish seniles. Trish was always threatening to put our parents there.

Kendra and I ate in almost silence. Well, I did. She ordered chocolate-chip pancakes but didn’t take a single bite.

“Not hungry?” I said, sneaking my fork into her food.

“Go ahead,” she said. “I don’t eat.” She said it like it was supposed to be funny.

“Oh,” I said. “Okay.”

“It does sound like a fart,” she said.

Later, entwined on my futon, after many minutes of unexplained crying, Kendra told me that as a girl growing up in Hungary, she would sneak into the living room at three in the morning to watch a show that played American music videos. She said that her whole life all she’d ever wanted was to be in a rock band, to have sex and get high and wear outrageous outfits, and that she was glad she was getting to do that now. She said she was happy. I wasn’t sure what to do—what the appropriate response was—so I reached for her hand and held it. I said, “That’s good.”

“Drinky-pinky time!” said Wyatt, brandishing a waiter’s profuse armful of plastic cups. His T-shirt said “Put a Little South in Your Mouth.” The cups were filled with a fruity concoction, heavy on vodka, garnished with floating gummy bears. I was on my third. The party was in full swing. A sign said “Welcome Homos and Hookers!!!” The crowd consisted of the former costumed as the latter. According to Wyatt, it was the summer of leather short shorts.

Wyatt lived in a ranch-style condo with a couple other gay guys. The décor was Hawaiian, apropos of nothing. Leis and grass skirts were handed out at the entrance, and the yard was lit with tiki lamps. We were on the porch, a perfect little outdoor stage. Ernesto wore three leis around his thick neck. He slugged his drink, crushed the empty punch cup in his fingers.

“These fruitcakes sure know how to party!” Ernesto said. He had an arm around Wyatt.

“Oh, you’re bad,” Wyatt said, and flicked Ernesto’s puffy cheek. My friends watched in awe, unsure whether to be embarrassed or amused. We were setting up our amps, waiting for Kendra to arrive.

“The thing about these fruitcakes,” Ernesto explained, “is they know a lot of sexy ladies.”

“True dat,” Alex said.

“Depends on your definition of sexy,” Sam said.

Claire was in a group of women with perms and press-on nails. They smoked long cigarettes, and their laughter led to coughing. The gays were teaching them dance moves. The girls giggled as they tried to two-step in stilettos. I’d never seen Claire out of work, gussied up. Maybe it was the booze and mood light, but she looked younger for once, face softened, less severe.

Even my sister was at the party. I’d invited her by e-mail but didn’t think she’d bother. Trish had hardly been out of the house since her return. She’d arrived alone, looking tentative, too pale for summer. But the gays had welcomed her into their fold, fed her tequila shots, commiserated about her ex.

“Oh, that sorry little man-child,” said Wyatt, and waved a finger. “He gon get what he got coming.”

Trish was nearly too drunk to stand. “I’m a fag hag!” she screamed in my ear. “Benny, I’m a fag hag!”

“Awesome,” I said. Soft Thunder were the only ones not having fun. We scanned the crowd for Kendra. I hadn’t heard from her in days.

“I saw her Wednesday,” Sam said. “We went and saw
Titanic
.”

“Really?” I said. “
Titanic
?”

“Just the two of you?” Alex said.

“Yeah,” Sam said, “Just us two.”

“I took her bowling,” Alex said. “I think that was Thursday.”

“Bowling?” I said.

“Bowling’s dope, yo. Don’t fuck with bowling.”

“I saw her yesterday,” said Roland.

“Okay, boys,” Wyatt interrupted. “Let’s get rolling before this crowd gets any rowdier.”

The conversation would wait. There were bigger things at hand. Sam sat behind his drum kit. Alex strapped on an American flag bandana he’d bought for the occasion. He took off his T-shirt, waved it over his head, tossed it into the audience, played the lion’s roar on his keyboard. A few people clapped. Wyatt killed the stereo. I tapped my finger on the mic.

We opened with the sixties sing-along, vamping on the chorus for a good ten minutes before seguing into “Car.” Our third and final song was a surprise for Wyatt. We’d been practicing an awkward cover of “Like a Virgin.” The crowd gasped, applauded. Wyatt appeared onstage wearing nothing but jockey shorts. I moved away from the mic to let Madonna do his thing.

It would have been triumphant if Kendra hadn’t then appeared. She’d snuck onto the stage and was suddenly standing next to me. Her head was completely hairless.

There’s something unsettling about a shaven head. Maybe it’s that you can really see the skull, the shape of it, all its lumps and juttings, skin stretched tautly over bone. So little separates our brains from the world.

Kendra blew out the melody on her un-amped clarinet. No one could hear it, but she played on. The rest of us—Roland, Alex, and myself—circled in on her, a pathetic pack of teen wolves. Even Sam’s drum kit seemed to gravitate toward her.

When the song ended we were pulling at her arms and saying “Baby” and “Kendra” and “K.” She broke out of our huddle and escaped into the party. We tried to chase after her but were plugged into our amps.

“I’ve been,” I said. “I mean, she and I have been—you know?”

“You?” Sam said.

He swung at me. I ducked and he missed, tripping over some cables. Alex charged us both, windmilling with a look of pure insanity, knocking everyone over. Except Roland—he shook his head. Wyatt helped me up.

“Where’d she go?” I said.

“Big Daddy,” Wyatt said. There was wisdom in his tone. “Oh, Big Daddy.”

Someone turned the stereo back on. ABBA blew in and the dance lawn exploded. It looked as though the dancers were jumping, trying desperately to launch. Fireworks went off over the lake. They were the cheap kind of bottle rockets that flare low with white sparks and then fall into the water.

When I found Kendra, she was in the neighbor’s yard, openmouthed, Trish’s tongue stuck down her throat. They groped like babies at each other’s breasts. Trish had her shirt off. She was swimming in sweat.