The Cranberry Hush: A Novel (11 page)

“All these heroes and villains, and the kid picks
Peter Parker
,” Zane whispered to me as
they were leaving the store. He stretched his arms across the counter. “In his
street clothes. I don’t get it. He doesn’t even come with
weapons
.”

“Characters can be cool even when they’re not wearing
tights, you know.”

“Whatever you say.” He rolled his eyes. “Actually, speaking
of—” He straightened up suddenly and I turned to look out the window.
“Jesus,” he said, “the old guy almost just fell.”

“Did he?”

“So much for my sand sprinkling.”

“It looked fine to me. Um. Man the counter, I’ll go put some
more down.”

I got a container of salt from the back and brought it
outside, sowing it across the slick sidewalk down to the Copy Cop, then I ran
back inside shivering. Zane was checking out a customer.

When the customer left we stood at the counter looking out.

“Cold out there huh?” he said.

“Really.”

He was quiet a minute and then he said, “At least you’ve got
someone to keep you warm at night.” Then he sighed.

“Zane, I don’t need you picking at this. Griff and I aren’t
together. Come on.”

“Tell me about him.”

“No.”

“Tell me and I’ll stop harassing you.”

“He’s just a friend.”

“Where’d you find him? Probably online, right?”

“Not online,” I said, ruminating on Zane’s use of the word
find
as opposed to
meet
, and how in this case it was actually kind of appropriate. “I
don’t even own a computer. In college. I met him in college. Freshman year. We
roomed together our sophomore year.”

“So he’s rooming with you again?”

“For a week.”

“You just being casual?”

“I keep telling you. He is straight.”

“That’s what they all say.” He sighed. “That guy Jeremy from
last night? He’s straight, too.” He placed air quotes around
straight
.

I felt a flare of anger at his insinuation that Griff was a
closet case. There were days when I wondered about that myself (extreme
tolerance, like extreme intolerance, always made a person seem a little
suspect), but I didn’t like anyone else thinking it. It was like how I could
make fun of Superman for wearing his underwear on the outside, but when someone
else who didn’t love him like I loved him said the same thing, watch out. They
had no right. Zane had no right.

“I don’t know about Jeremy,” I said, “but Griff really is
straight.”

“Straight and he sleeps in your bed with you?”

“I don’t have a couch,” I countered. “You’ve been to my
house. What would be your suggestion? Should he have slept on the floor?”

He shrugged. “I’ve just never heard of a straightboy sharing
a bed with a bi dude.”

“If Griff was gay he’d be out. He’s just that way. Sometimes
I think he wishes he was.”

It made me remember Griff sitting on his bed one night in
our dorm room, telling me he’d seen an attractive guy in the dining hall while
he was eating lunch.

“How attractive?” I said, trying to keep in check a rising
thrill.

“I don’t know,” Griff said. “Attractive. Nice to look at. Do
you think that means I might be bi?” He seemed almost excited, as though he
were on the verge of discovering a new part of himself, one that would allow
him to tap into unlimited potential for romance.

“Did you want to kiss him? Touch him and stuff?”

His smile faded a little. “Kiss him? Not really, no. But his
skin was really clear and he had a cool haircut.”

“Did he make you nervous?”

“Nervous how?”

“Like did he make you feel like you wanted to go talk to him
but were afraid?”

“No...”

“Did you get a boner?”

“... No, no boner.” Now he looked disappointed and I felt
the same way.

Zane was eyeballing me. “Do
you
wish he was?”

“Gay?”

“Gay, bi, biologically available.”

“He’s my friend. I don’t care what he is.”

“Sure.”

The bell jingled. Two high school girls came in and browsed
the Indie section, giggling over
Cavalcade
of Boys
, the homo version of
Archie
.
One of them said to the other, “I told you.” They left without buying anything.

“So who was that Jeremy guy last night?” I said. “Quid pro
quo.”

“OK. He’s on my brother’s basketball team.”

“He’s in high school??”

“Relax,” he said, scrunching his eyebrows. “He’s a senior.”

It hit me that I was judging the appropriateness of the
hook-up based on my own age. Zane was only twenty.

“Oh, yeah, I guess that’s not a big deal,” I said. “Couple
years.” I felt old. Zane seemed young.

“I came across his profile on
XY
. He didn’t have a very descriptive pic, but there was a
basketball jersey like my brother’s hanging on the chair behind him. Number nine.
So I went to one of Ralph’s games and was like,
Yo
.”

“Did his number match his inches?”

“Not even close,” he said with a frown.

I laughed. “Well is he cool?”

“I guess—for a jock. I don’t know. He was skittish.
Too eager. Bad kisser. Told me just before he went down on me that I was
quote-unquote
beautiful
. —Funny
how it’s always
beautiful
, isn’t it?
Never
cute
or
hot
.”

“For newbies
beautiful
is the only word intense enough to express their feelings,” I said. “They need
patience. You know how hard it can be to deal with.”

“Well, judging by the look on his face when you arrived last
night, I don’t expect to get another shot.”

“Too bad,” I said. “He was cute.” I put my hands up over my
head, shaped my lips into a surprised
O
.
“
You won’t tell anyone, will you?
”

“So are we laughing about this now?”

“I don’t know.”

He looked at the clock. “OK, Vince,” he said, “I’m gonna go.”

He left the counter and pulled off his Golden Age t-shirt.
His white undershirt rode up and revealed his stomach and a trail of dark hair
that disappeared beneath a red Gap waistband. I looked then looked away. He
went into the back room, came out wearing his coat and the blue hat.

“Have a good weekend,” he said.

“You too. Thanks for the company.”

“Sure.”

The bell jingled. Through the window I watched him go down
the front walk, and when he was out of sight I felt like crying.

At 8:20 I noticed Griff standing outside the store,
bent over with his eyes aligned with the hours on the glass door—the
double zeros of
8:00
looked like
white spectacles.

“Can’t you see the sign?” I mouthed from the other side. “We’re
closed.”

He cupped his hand around his ear. I tapped the numbers on
the alarm pad and went outside. Once again there was that urge to kiss him,
this time a hi-honey-how-was-your-day kiss.

“Good day?” he said.

“Kind of slow.” I put the keys in my pocket. “Wow, it’s
chilly out, huh?”

“Slow boring or slow relaxing?”

“Zane stayed a while after his shift and kept me company.”

“Dreamy.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I shushed. “I think he just wanted to inquire
about you, actually—make sure we’re not fucking or anything.” I felt
dizzy from saying that about Griff and me, even if it was meant to sound
ridiculous.

“Ha, he
was
jealous,” Griff said. “I knew he liked you. So why haven’t you asked him out or
whatever?”

“Why haven’t I asked him out? How about I’m his boss? How
about he’s like five years younger than me?”

“How about he’s into you and even I can tell he’s cute?
Here’s your keys.”

“Thanks.” They were warm from his pocket. “I don’t know. I’m
not that into him. So what did you end up doing all day?”

“...” He arched an eyebrow. I wasn’t sure he was going to
let me off the hook about Zane. But he relented. “Had myself a little shopping
trip,” he said at last. We got into the car. It was warm and when I started it
up the radio was playing Guster.

“Cool, you mean you spent some of your hard-inherited cash?
What’d you buy?”

“A mattress, box-spring, frame.” He ticked the items off on
his fingers. “Sheets. Pillows. One of those foam egg-crate things?” He paused.
“What’s wrong?”

“Dude, you didn’t really have to get me all that stuff. I
was only joking about furnishing the room.”

He waved dismissively. “Oh and don’t worry, I got a twin-size
bed so as not to cramp your comic museum.”

I didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed that he
wouldn’t need to share my bed anymore. “How’d you fit all that stuff in the Jeep?”

“I didn’t, they’re delivering the big stuff tomorrow.”

“On Sunday?”

“Tomorrow’s Sunday? Monday, I mean.” He paused. “You don’t
mind me hogging your space for two more nights?”

“I slept OK last night. It’ll be fine.”

I knew now that I would’ve been disappointed. With some
things it was hard to know how I felt until it was out of my hands, when pros
and cons were irrelevant and all I could do was react.

On the way home we stopped at the supermarket. In the glossy,
fluorescent entrance—which always felt to me like the seventh circle of
hell—I grabbed a basket.

“Grab a wagon, dude,” Griff said. “You’re here, you might as
well do it up so you don’t have to come back for a while. In fact, I’ll buy a
wagon’s worth.”

“Come on. You’ve spent enough on me. It’s going to start
getting uncomfortable.”

“We’re sharing a bed, Vince. I’d say we’re a skooch past
uncomfortable already, knowi’msayin?”

“...”

“Consider it my room and board.”

He took the basket from me and flung it clanking back into
the stack. I begrudgingly pulled a cart from the accordioned line. Griff walked
a couple steps ahead and tossed items in with seemingly no more rhyme or reason
than a whimsical appreciation for the labels. Pickles, donuts, macaroni and
cheese. No wonder his stomach was a wreck.

In the breakfast aisle he was saying something about pancake
mix—we need more pancake mix, what kind of pancake mix—but I was barely
paying attention. My focus was squarely on the woman at the other end of the
aisle. Her back was to us; she was kneeling, reaching for peanut butter on the
bottom shelf, but when she stood up and turned around—

“Oh god. It’s her.”

“Her who?”

“Melanie.”

“Oh.” His eyes scanned her from her knit hat to her green pleather
boots. “Ooh. Not
bad
.” He dropped a
box of pancake mix on the powdered donuts. “Not-bad-at-all.”

She was walking toward us now, looking for something on the
shelves. I hadn’t been seen yet but it was inevitable. She stopped and grabbed
a thing of Grape-Nuts, dropped it in the basket bumping against her corduroy
thigh. I was usually good at avoiding exes, had avoided her since the October
night she dumped my ass in the drive-thru.

“She’s coming. Fuck.
Fuck.
”
It was too late to turn around. I clenched the cart’s plastic handlebar. She
raised her eyes from her basket and met mine—a fluid, magnetic motion
followed by a twitch of recognition.

“Vince!” Her lips parted into a smile. “Hi! How
are
you? I thought you’d fallen off the
face of the earth or something!” She glanced at Griff, who was standing beside
the cart with his fingers entwined in the plastic grid of its side.

She set her basket down on the glossy-tiled floor and opened
her arms. I obliged. Her smell was familiar, like lilac—her hair
whispered against the backs of my hands. Immediately I felt horny.

“I’m good,” I said. I had seen this woman naked, had had my
tongue on parts of her body she’d never even
seen
. I was a medieval conquistador returning to an exotic land
whose soil still held my flying flag—or something. “How are you—doing?”

“I feel like I’m here all the time. Bernie is such a big
eater,” she said. “High metabolism.” Then she lifted her finger as if to
connect the plot-points of her life, and added, “He and I moved in together right
after Christmas.”

Without missing a beat I said, “That’s great!” but I felt as
though she’d pulled out my waving flag and was driving the pole through my gut.
“I’m happy for you.” I realized I was frowning and forced a smile. “How’s he
doing?”

“Oh, he’s getting there, thanks,” she said. “Still has a
chunk of shrapnel in his thigh, but he’s better. The nightmares are tapering
off too, finally.”

“Wow, that’s, um— Oh—sorry.” Her eyes were
darting to Griff again. “Melanie, this is Griffin. Griff, this is Melanie, my
old...”

“Ball and chain,” she said, weirdly. They shook. When I saw
Griff’s eyes drop toward her boobs I wanted to shove him into the Froot Loops.

“You boys doing a little shopping?” Melanie said.

“Yeah. Uh.” Was that a hint of coyness in her voice? Did she
think we were together? I was about to say we were just friends when Griff put
his arm around me.

“Vince is a big eater too,” he said.

He flashed Melanie a toothy smile and rubbed the back of my
hair. Melanie looked at me with you-devil-you
eyes.

“I’m glad you’re doing well, Vince,” she said, and she
seemed to mean it—I wasn’t sure whether that made it easier or harder to
see her go. “Stop by the gallery sometime.” She put her open hand against her
cheek, blocking her lips from Griff’s view, and whispered to me, “I want to
hear
all
about him.” She smiled at
Griff and in her normal voice she continued, “We’re having a pop art show in
June. There’ll probably be some comic book–type pieces.”

“That sounds interesting. Maybe I’ll do that. Um. Say hi to
Bernie?”

She nodded. “Nice meeting you,” she said to Griff.

When she turned the corner and disappeared into the next
aisle, I asked Griff why he’d done that.