Anatomy of a Misfit (14 page)

“See, your dinosaur will protect you. Rawr!”

“It's an ankylosaurus.”

“Oh, okay. Your ankylosaurus will protect you.”

“Can I have my T. rex, too?”

“Yes, of course. You need your T. rex and your ankylosaurus. They're in cahoots.”

That's one smart three-year-old, I've gotta say. I'm not sure I could've said ankylosaurus, let alone recognized one, at that age. They're such cute little boys, Billy with his towhead and Lars in his Spider-Man footy sleeper. Their room is full of everything little boys love. Trains. Dinosaurs. Trucks. The
Millennium Falcon
and the Death Star poised for battle on the shelf.

Looking at Logan in there, tucking them in and giving them each a peck on the forehead, I can't help but think that I'm an idiot and that he may be, quite possibly, the greatest guy in the world.

thirty-one

B
y the time I get to work on Wednesday it's total drama. I walk in and Shelli nods her head in the direction of the back, giving me the universal look for The Shit Has Hit the Fan. I go through to find Tiffany in the back with the manager and two cops.

Cops? What the—?

“Anika, not now. We have a situation.”

Tiffany can barely glance up at me. She looks stricken, you can tell she's been crying.

“What's going on? What is this?”

“Well, if you must know . . . Tiffany here has been stealing.”

It hits me like a sledgehammer.

Oh, no. All this time I've been stealing their faces off and now they think it's Tiffany! Because she's black. It's that simple.

“No, she hasn't!”

Mr. Baum scoffs. “Um, Anika? I think I know when the drops are short.”

Tiffany, on the gray plastic seat in the corner, looks like she's in pain. God, this is excruciating! I'm gonna have to come clean. I'm gonna have to turn myself in. I'm gonna have to ruin my college transcripts. Christ. The Count is going to draw and quarter me. Then he is going to feed my body to the vultures. Then he is going to draw and quarter the vultures.

“No. Listen. It wasn't her, I swear—”

“Anika, shhh!”

And then he plays the tape. The ongoing video they have on the cash register. And the cops see it and Tiffany sees it and I see it.

There on the video is Tiffany, indeed, stealing out of the cash register.

No plan, no system, nothing.

Just plain stealing.

I can't believe it. I can't believe my eyes.

Tiffany looks up at me, her cheeks on fire. I can tell she's totally ashamed.

She mouths the words “I'm sorry.”

I mouth back, “It's okay.”

And I want to tell her we've been stealing their pants off for the past six weeks and that's why they even thought to look at the tapes, so it's my fault, which it is, by the way. This is all my fault.

“Sir, do you wish to press charges?”

“Damn straight.”

Ugh. What an asshole. I have to do something.

“No, wait! I made her do it!”

“Excuse me?”

“Yeah, I put her up to it. It was stupid and I was to blame.”

“Listen, Anika, that's nice of you but—”

“Mr. Baum, I told her to do it! I told her if she didn't I'd get her fired. It was stupid and immature and I don't even know what I was thinking but she didn't want to do it. I swear. She begged me.”

Mr. Baum looks at me, still unconvinced.

“That's not like you, Anika.”

“I know. I told her it was like an initiation. I was being a jerk. I don't know what I was thinking.”

“Is this true, Tiffany?”

Tiffany looks at me for permission. I nod, as slight as can be.

“Yes, sir.”

“Anika made you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why didn't you tell us?”

“I didn't want to get her in trouble.”

“Well, she sure as shit got you in trouble.”

Tiffany nods. The cops whisper something to Mr. Baum. I can see Tiffany behind them. We make eye contact.

She mouths again, “Thank you.”

I wink.

But that doesn't mean I'm not busted. I'm in trouble now and my mom is gonna kill me. I'll probably be fired. Oh, well. It's not like my dream is to be the ruler of the Bunza Hut—

“Tiffany, you're fired.”

“What?” I yelp. “But she didn't do anything!”

“Anika, stay out of this. You've done enough, don't you think?

“Please, Tiffany, get your things and call your mom. It's time to go. That's it.”

“Mr. Baum, please—”

“And you. We're gonna have a talk. Come with me.”

Ugh. Why did I come to work today? Why did I even take this stupid job? And even worse. Why did I steal? I mean, what was I thinking? Of course Mr. Baum would press charges if he knew. He's a mean little man, taking it out on the world.

Now he's dragged me into the storage room. It's just the two of us and the Bunza Hut inventory.

“Anika. I know you're lying.”

“What?”

“I know you're lying to cover for that girl.”

“No, I'm not.”

“It's okay. You're a good person.”

“You're not firing me?”

“What? No. You're our best worker.”

I gulp. God, talk about totally unfair. If only he knew . . .

“I'd like to give you a raise.”

I really should stop poisoning him with Valium. It is clearly affecting the decision-making areas of his brain.

“Mr. Baum, you don't—”

“Just stop it. Christmas is coming, maybe you could buy something—”

“Do you really have to fire her?”

“Yes, Anika. I do. These people need to know—”

“These people?”

“You know.”

“Unh. Mr. Baum, just because she's—”

“Anika. Sometimes stereotypes exist for a reason.” He pauses. “Look. You're young. You don't know anything yet. Someday you'll get it. Now get back to work. Shelli's probably crashed the register by now.”

I don't know what to say to any of this. All I know is I'm the worst person on earth. Worse than the lowest amoeba on the lowest worm to crawl around the lowest swamp on earth.

I get back to the register and Shelli sidles up to me, close enough to whisper.

“What happened?”

“They fired Tiffany.”

Shelli's saucer eyes turn to plates.

“For what?!”

“Stealing.”

Shelli looks at me. She knows we're to blame. She doesn't know what to think. I can see the gears officially grind to a stop in her head.

“They caught her on tape.”

“What? They did?”

“Yup. I saw it.”

“So it wasn't—”

“No. It wasn't.”

“Phew. I feel better.”

“Wull, I don't because they probably wouldn't have noticed if it wasn't for us.”

“Oh.”

“I think our stealing careers are over, Shelli.”

Through the Halloween decorations, out the glass doors I can see Tiffany's mom drive up fast and slam on the brakes. Not happy. Tiffany gets in and it's all I can do not to run out there and pull her out and tell her just to go to my house, go to my mom, join our family. It's not her fault. None of this is her fault. It's my fault. All of it. And I know it.

thirty-two

I
t's twenty-two degrees out and Mom's driving me home after my shift. It's dark already and outside you can see your breath.

“Mom, do you believe in Jesus?”

“What, honey?”

“Do you believe in Jesus? Like he was the son of God and he did all those magic tricks and then flew up to Heaven in the three days or whatever.”

“I dunno, honey. Jury's out.”

We drive on in sacrilege.

“But, one thing is for sure, Anika. What goes around comes around.”

Uh-oh. That is not a message I am trying to hear.

“How was work, honey?”

“Oh, you know . . .”

“Slow shift?”

“Mom, they fired Tiffany.”

“What?! Why?”

“For stealing.”

We're almost home and none too soon. I hate the cold. Even inside the car your feet are freezing, your toes like mini icicles.

“But how do they—?”

“They had it on video.”

“Oh, that's awful. Just awful.”

“I know. Mr. Baum obviously thinks it's 'cause she's black.”

“Hm.”

“Mom. It's not 'cause she's black, it's 'cause she's poor. I'd steal, too, if I was in her shoes.”

“No, you wouldn't.”

“Mom, a lot of people steal. A lot. People who aren't even poor.”

Now we're stopped in the driveway.

“Like who?”

“I dunno. Just people.”

“Well, what people?”

“Forget it.”

“Like you?”

“What? No.”

“Listen. I'm not saying you are, or you have. I'm not saying that. But if you are, or you have, you better stop, immediately, and I mean it. Hypothetically.”

“Mo-om.”

“You want someone to press charges? You wanna ruin your college transcripts? You wanna be stuck here for the rest of your life?”

“No.”

“Okay. Well, then, don't even think about it. I mean it . . . Okay, honey? That's not you. Okay? That's not how I raised you.”

But she's wrong. Even though she did everything a mom could do to make me peach pie, inside I'm still spider stew. I'll always be spider stew. I'll spend the rest of my life pretending I'm not and that I'm candy corn and candy cane and candy apple but inside, inside . . . well, you might as well just dip a tarantula in chocolate and call it a day.

thirty-three

T
he perfect thing about a Wednesday night is no one thinks you're going anywhere. It's like the March of the week, nothing doing. Logan is waiting outside on the corner and I am doing my hot acrobatic sneak-out moves to get out this window and down this tree before my sisters hear me and blow the whistle. Boy, they would love that.

You might as well draw a heart around Logan, standing there in the moonlight with his moped and vaguely surly brow. By the time he hands me his helmet I have completely forgotten about Tiffany and the money and the fact that I'm obviously going to jail.

Flying down our ticky-tacky street to Holmes Lake, there's not a soul around for miles. Nobody's supposed to be at Holmes Lake at one in the morning. This is a family town, see? These paddleboats and bike paths are strictly meant for people in sunscreen. We have to sneak into a hole in the fence about half a mile from the boathouse. This park is all about the lake, and the park is about three miles wide. This is like a big city attraction and even though it's right by our house, we never seem to get here as a family. I think because there's no TV.

Tiptoeing through in the dark, to the boathouse, it feels like we could potentially run into a serial killer, a brigade of the undead, or maybe just a run-of-the-mill ax murderer. Logan is holding my hand, the moped left behind. He's got a backpack on so I am guessing he has some sort of plan here.

You can see the stars reflecting off the lake, still as ice and probably just as cold. It's pitch-black out here and I'm betting, on occasion, more than one person has walked right into the lake. The boathouse is a one-story wooden box, basically, locked but that doesn't seem to be stopping Logan from jimmying the lock with a pin.

“Um. Are you a CIA agent?”

“Yes. This is the first thing they teach us in spy school.”

He gets the lock on the third try and next thing I know, he's in the little boathouse.

“Stay out here, just for a second.”

Okay, that's annoying because I'm starting to freeze my mittens off. The sound of the rowboats, clacking into the dock, is only about the second spookiest sound on earth. The dock goes out about fifty feet into the lake; all along it the little rowboats are tethered, like leaves on a tree.

“Okay, okay, ready?”

“Um. Yeah.”

“Okay . . . ta-dah!”

I look in and it's not exactly the Ritz or whatever but I gotta hand it to Logan. He gets an A for effort. There's about five lanterns around the room, you know, the kind you always see weather-faced lighthouse keepers holding in paintings, with oil and whatever else is involved in making a continuous fire that doesn't burn your ears off. There's a little table in the middle of the room with a lantern in the middle and some kind of picnic—grapes, cheese, beer. You may think this seems like just some low-rent scam but Logan seems pretty proud of it and, if you saw the look in his eyes, you would want to run off with him by dawn, even to Oklahoma.

“Wow. I dunno what to say . . .”

“Why say anything? You don't have to . . .”

“Okay.”

He pulls out a wooden chair for me and I sit, suddenly feeling embarrassed, or worried, or like something is gonna go wrong and he's gonna realize I'm not worth all of this after all.

“What's wrong?”

“I dunno. I guess. I just want you to like me.”

“I do like you. Why do you think I did all this?”

“I know, but it's like . . . I want you to stay liking me, you know?”

“So you're like worried about something that's not happening . . . ?”

“Yeah, kinda.”

The boats outside sway into the dock, creaking.

“You know, Anika. You could waste your whole life worrying, you know that?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, what if you look back one day and you're like, ‘FUCK . . . all I did was worry . . . for the past eighty years—'”

“I guess.”

“Look, you don't have to get an A plus right now, or be cool, or anything. You just have to be here with me.”

I sort of don't know what to say to this. Except that it is perfect.