The grandparents kept their entire financial realities at the same bank where James's mother worked, and because James's mother wasn't their daughterâfamily isn't a technicality: you're either family or you're notâthey took ready advantage of her willingness to clean up their messes:
“Now tell me dear, why would they call it overdraft âprotection' if we're not really protected?” She could be so sweet when she felt like it, but this was rarely the case. James's grandmother scowled and stood, her knobby fingers plunged into her hips.
“And what⦔
James's grandfather also stood, although he was always slightly stooped from years of bad posture.
“â¦are you
implying?”
the grandmother snapped. “That we need
your
credit?”
Her scowl lunged deeply into the grandmother's cheekbones. James's grandfather shot a glance towards the thick oak door, but just as quickly, he corrected himself and returned his glossed eyes back onto James's mother. She was sweating.
“I'm only ever going to say this once.” His eyes narrowed in perfect tense with his voice. “You are a whore.”
The grandmother knocked the knuckle of her index finger on top of her daughter-in-law's desk before straightening, then wagging, the full, fleshy digit at James's mother. “A
fucking
whore.”
That night, James's grandparents tried anal sex for the first time in decades. The grandfather's skin fell loose around his waist and abdomen. The grandmother grabbed until she felt moisture under her nails. That was the kind of woman she was. Then, she bent him over the lime green dresser that he'd painted for her a lifetime ago and pushed a Vaselined 7UP bottle up his ass.
As she worked him over the glass bottle, she thought about the first time they did this. She'd begged to use an unopened bottle, which he thought was a bad idea from the start, but she insisted it would increase the sensation. She said she'd done it a million times.
Of course, it was a tight fit going in, but it was well lubricated and chilled, which he liked.
Afterwards, he painted the dresser lime fucking green, even though he couldn't sit, so they would always remember how much he hated her.
James's grandmother, every time she sees it, can't help but laugh.
The truth of it was that James's grandfather didn't think that Frey was his grandson. Sure, they came out of the same pussy, but that doesn't prove anything. James, however, he proudly claimed as his own. James's grandfather always said that Frey belonged to the old hag, meaning James's grandmother.
There was no real reason why he chose one boy over the other. They looked exactly the same. They had the same voice and opinion. There was just something plain dumb about Frey that James's grandfather couldn't quite place. He'd say, “Must be that you're part whore,” which Frey came to believe, although he didn't know what part of the world whores came from.
James's mother didn't like the boys to go over to the grandparents' house, but James's father wanted them to have a “relationship” with their ailing grandparents.
“Ailing?”
“Honey, they're old.”
“Fuck you. Don't call me âhoney.' You know I hate it.”
“You know what I mean.”
“If they're old, it means they'll die soon, right?”
“I don't understand this resentment you have towards them. I mean, what did they do to you?”
James's mother had pretty but vacant eyes. Whenever his father tried to look her in the eyesâto try to guess what she was thinkingâhe'd become even more confused.
“My parents have been nothing but generous with you.”
James's father was neither a fool nor ignorant, and the only thing he'd inherited from his parents was their need for sexual adventure.
James's grandparents' house was a dump. It's always been a dump, not because of the house itself or the neighborhood but because they didn't care to maintain it.
Whenever James's grandmother cooked, the house reeked for weeks.
James's grandparents left stains where they'd fucked.
James's grandfather refused to throw away his used tissues and q-tips.
When James and Frey came over, they wouldn't want to sit down or touch anything.
And their grandfather would say, “Frey, you little fucker, you look just like your fucking grandmother when she's fucking another man.” It was like he just could not help thinking about his wrinkly wife in bed with another man when he looked at the boy, and this always made him a little excited.
James's grandfather would call James over. He'd say, “Boy, do you know what a hard-on is?”
James would nod his head, since he's had this conversation with his grandfather a million times.
James's grandfather would say, “Boy, do you know where you put a hard-on?”
James would nod his head, since he's had this conversation with his grandfather a million times. James would show his crooked teeth in something resembling a smile. Frey, however, had learnedâa million minus one times agoâto start running.
I am remembering this day for all days.
Remembering. All days. Always.
This is the day you threw the TV out the upstairs window.
I'm remembering.
Always.
This is the day that started with you shaking the toaster over me so all the crumbs fell out.
This is the day that followed the day where you broke the egg in the silverware drawer.
This is the day that followed that day.
I'm remembering.
This is the day that you told me to stand still so I stood still and kept standing there.
But that's not unlike all the other days. Still.
This is the day you dumped salt all over the table.
This is the day you fed the goldfish.
Kept feeding them.
Kept feeding them.
Kept feeding them.
This is that day. I'm remembering.
This is the day you bruised my mouth with bubble gum toothpaste.
I'm remembering that, too. This is that day.
This is the day after the day the grocery store lady gave you Fred Bear stickers to give to me.
But you never gave them to me. I remember.
This is the day that followed the day where you promised the Fred Bear stickers.
Remember? This is that day.
This is the day that it rained and rained and rained and rained and rained.
This is the day that you went outside and said how hard it had rained.
This is the day that came to you like all the other days. One at a time.
I'm remembering.
This is the day they came to cut off the cable.
This is the day they repossessed the car.
This is the day they turned off the electricity.
This is the day they disconnected the internet.
Just like all the other days. One at a time.
This is the day the refrigerator defrosted.
This is the day the toilets backed up.
I'm remembering. Everything.
This is that same day. Just like all the other days.
One at a time.
This is the day where morning broke wide open, and everything was still.
The day where nothing moved. And then everything. In one huge motion.
This is the day after the day they all said it would be okay.
They promised. With their big eyes, too. I remember. They promised.
That was the day they said whatever they could say to make you put me down.
Walk away.
Slowly.
Turn around.
Hands on the hood.
One at a time.
The day where, well, you know.
You know.
Apologize. For everything. You may not have time for haunt, but you do have time for this. Start with the one that ends This Isn't Really Goodbye.
In the event of Ex's death, you are, unfortunately, 110% on your own. But in consolation, know that the current page you are currently holding is redeemable for one free draft at The 1853 Club in the sleepy but painfully fair township of LaRue, Ohio. Please don't mind that the page wasn't pre-perforated for you to make this last conscious act of yours on the planet just a little bit easier. Rest assured none of it was done on purpose. You're feeling better already. Or you will. Or you should. Especially if you're packing.
Wendy Peterson is pulling me into her bus line, the one for the #43, the pencil-barrel yellow monstrosity that slides past Candy Cane Park and the Kiwanis tennis courts before it deposits her exactly five houses down from where she lives on El Monte St, 70-some footsteps to her parents' front door. In less than 45 seconds my bus will depart, the #19, the one that scurries down 2
nd
Ave and only turns right one time before spitting its passengers out at Lincoln (“Stink-in.”) Elementary and shoos them away.
The thing/dilemma is this: the #43 is nowhere to be seen, which is typical and expected, but something that is not typical and expected is how Wendy Peterson is knotting all of her fingers into all of mine (“I forgot my gloves.”) and has no pretense of letting go anytime soon (“Keep my hands warm.”).
Tammy Tanaka is standing behind Wendy Peterson, which means that Tammy Tanaka is staring at me from over Wendy Peterson's shoulder. Tammy Tanaka is silent for right now, but at the end of 7
th
period she began begging her best-best friend Not To and/or At Least Think More About It, but as usual, Tammy Tanaka is just in the way.
Wendy Peterson is wrenching my wrists, pulling our maze of fingers and thumbs up into the gap between my chin and the forward nape of my Columbia ski jacket. I don't drop the backpack usually slung over just the one shoulder because I don't have it because Wendy Peterson gripped it off my shoulder between 6
th
â7
th
period and locked it inside Wendy Peterson's own locker using Wendy Peterson's own combination which is only one of many sequences of numbers Wendy Peterson knows I can never remember (“You
don't have
any homework tonight, silly.”). Tammy Tanaka is shifting her weight and sighing; she disappears behind Wendy Peterson's torso entirely but I can see her breath on the cold air, rising out of the back of Wendy Peterson's hair.
Wendy Peterson is sliding our hands up my face, rotating them and pressing them forward. I am feeling the bones of her hands against my nostrils and lips (
“Blow.”
). Our hands are not cold and they haven't been but that is besides the point because I do as I'm told. Wendy Peterson knows this about me intuitively; this is, after all, why I'm here, doing my best to force the air inside my lungs against her skin, but she is pressing too hard and I'm spitting more than anything even resembling blowing, and the vibration causes a small farting sound that only we can hear at the back of the line for #43.
Wendy Peterson is wriggling her knees into my legs, her torso leaning forward to counterbalance, her own forehead pitching into my own forehead. She is raising like an elevator, straight up, our eyes in parallel after pushing her toes deep into her Keds, lifting her heels at least a good inch off the rock-salted sidewalk, her eyebrows levitating into commas as her mouth disappears behind our nest of fingers and thumbs, and I feel her lips between my knuckles and I hear the same farting sound from behind the curtain of digits, and her eyebrows flatten a bit so I know she is smiling.
Tammy Tanaka and Tammy Tanaka's breath are nowhere to be found in the periphery. It's just Wendy Peterson and I, farting in stereo, as the #19 pulls away (“Oooooops! Now you
have
to.”).
We are losing track of every second it takes the #43 to take the #19's place. Steam and spittle are boiling in the air between us.
The column of beanie caps and backpacks is marching slowly up the #43's steep stairs. Tammy Tanaka is already sitting in the first seat, first left, staring straight ahead into the bus' monstrous glass windshield and is trying really really hard not to blink the eyes behind her tortoise-shell frames.
She is leading me to the very back of the bus, but all of the seats are taken on either side in the last row.
She is following the bus driver's rules by letting me hold my own hands as we are shuffling our way down the aisle.
She is sliding her hips into the last empty bench, four rows up from the back, right-hand side, scooching all the way down to the window.
She is unlashing the glass from the windowpane.
She is sitting down with her back set a perfect 90 degrees to the wall of the bus, framing the space.
She is extending her hands to me (“Come
here.”
), both of them at the exact same length at the exact same time.
She is singing to me when I land on the big bouncy block of naugahyde (
“Oooooh baby do you know what that's worth?”
) and attempt a resting place perpendicular to her.
She is wedging her leg down into the gap where the back and seat meet, arms in perfect parallel with the line she's drawn from her waist down to the toe tips of her Keds, hands spidering past the puffy shoulders of my jacket (“No, silly.
Come here.”
).
She is breathing big breaths, deep into my vertebrae.
And she is crossing her arms in front of me, cinching me in by clutching her own elbows.
And she is singing to me again.
And she is here.
And I am here.
And this is home.
As he approaches the end of the notebook he's spent months upon months smearing with waterproof ink, she is perfectly content to sit on the balcony and watch the pigeons take aim on all the poor bastards below them, all those people they've finally succeeded keeping at bay through their cleverness, lawyers and patience.