I knew it! My senses had betrayed me! This girl was still a girl; aloof, snobby, and totally weird like the rest of ‘em. My brain searched for her faults because–despite the tingling in my heart, the hallelujah chorus in my ears, and the fireworks in my head–She. Was. A. Girl. Prolly had that curly cursive that teachers adore; prolly never laughed at fart jokes; prolly scoffed at kids who wanna make movies with killer monsters and evil princes. She was probably just like Livy, stewing with girlfriends in her bedroom, finding love in the folds of a cootie-catcher, fretting about ridiculous things like bad hair and pimples and boys and S-E-X.
I have no recollection of the time between “get the boy some water” and the feeling of a moist plastic cup between my fingers. I can only imagine how awkward I appeared to Ms. Grisham, standing like a fat porcelain doll in her living room while the pretty girl retrieved my drink.
The adorable little snob stood beside me. We faced Ms. Grisham together. Thoughts of her haughtiness began to subside and my heart swayed back toward infatuation. I really did need to leave–Whit was probably furious–but I couldn’t move.
“What do you think of my niece?” asked the woman.
I forced a gulp of water. “She’s very pretty.”
“Did you hear her sing?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“And her voice?”
“Beautiful.”
“Will you think of her when you lay in bed tonight?”
“I don’t know, Ma’am.”
“If you were of the appropriate age, would you marry such a pretty girl?”
“I don’t know.”
“Mmm.” She looked to her niece. “And what do you think of our guest?”
The girl barely gave me the courtesy of a second glance. “His face is red and chubby,” she said. “He has little hands.”
Ms. Grisham leaned forward and rested her elbows on the arm of her chair. She flicked the wedding ring that dangled against the torn photograph. “Do you think he’ll dream of you tonight?”
“Probably.”
“Why?”
“Because boys are perverts.”
“Will you dream of him?”
“No.”
“Mmm.” The woman rolled the ring in her fingers. “Go to bed. I’ll be up soon.”
The girl nodded. She turned away and didn’t look back.
I was glad to see her leave, but at the same time, I wanted to grab her hand and never let go.
“I’ll ask you again, Jaaames,” said the woman. “What do you think of my niece?”
“I think she’s rotten.”
“Do you feel a sickness in your chest?”
“Yes.” I meant it.
The corners of her smile crept through a murk of liver marks. “Good. Enjoy your new camera.”
* * *
Thunk.
Thunk.
Thunk.
The locks bolted behind me. I released a bout of vapor through my nostrils and hugged my loot to my chest. It was only nine o’clock. Whit would be fine.
I looked left and searched the patch of trees for the peeping toms. I stepped from the porch, rounded the corner of the house, and saw my bike beside the lamppost, safe and sound.
A paper football fluttered from the sky. It landed with a delicate crunch in the dead grass at my feet, and somewhere above me, a window slid shut. I stooped down to read the words scrawled in blue highlighter: “FOR THE BOY.”
Part of me longed for the night to be over, to jump on my bike, process my adventure, and tell Whit all about it from the safety of his basement bedroom. The other part wanted to wait, to snatch the origami triangle and to revel in whatever words the pretty girl intended for me–
The tackle came from the right. Pain ruptured my side and the camera popped from my arms as I hit the ground. I flailed my fists at my shadowed attacker. We tussled. He wailed his fists into my shoulders. I tried to wiggle away, but he had me trapped.
When he thought I was down for good, he lunged for the note but I kicked out my foot at the perfect moment, caught his ankle, and he tripped–elbows first–onto the pouch that held my brand-new camera. CRUNCH.
My eyes stung but I held back the tears. I stood. Before my adversary could scramble away, I dropped my fat knee into his lower back and pinned him to the ground. His arm was limp but his fingers clenched my note like a steel claw. “Let it go,” I growled while working the full weight of my body into his lower spine. “Let. It. Go.”
“Uncle!” he cried and his fingers uncoiled and released the paper football. I pushed his head to the grass and crawled over his body, then I took the note, ripped the camera from under his chest, and gathered the scattered rolls of film. Just as I stepped toward my bike, the boy looked up from the dust and I saw his face for the first time.
It was A.J.
His dirt-smeared mouth dropped when he saw my face. He stood. He ran.
I dumped my soiled treasure in my bike’s basket and peddled through the moonlit subdivision until I found a safe place to breathe; a place where I could read the note; a place where that house wasn’t watching me.
Savoring the suspense, I unhinged every adorable fold of the letter. The number “31” was scrawled in the bottom left corner. I was right: curly penmanship.
“10:00. Back window.
Boys will be gone but watch the bushes.
My name is Mara.
Whats yours?”
* * *
The grass was wet but I didn’t care. I plopped on my stomach beside the foundation of the Conrad home and rapped on Whit’s tiny window.
My friend was in bed below me. He used a broom handle to hit the latch and I stuck my head inside.
“Where the H.E. double–”
“You won’t believe me when I tell you. But I can’t stay–”
“Mom came down twice! I had to say you were in the bathroom! We’re in such deep shit if–”
“Big whoop! I’ll be back in no time!”
“Where you goin’?”
“I’ll tell ya later. Just cover for me a little longer?”
Whit shook his head. “Didja at least get the camera?”
I stuck the bag through the window and dropped it on Whit’s chest, then I reached in my pocket and pulled a ten from the wad of cash. “Got it for free. Might be broke already, but I’ll check when I get back. I’ll hurry!” I pulled the window shut before he could protest, then I hopped on my bike and barreled back down the empty streets.
* * *
I hit the brakes and listened for any indication of boys in trees before dismounting my ride. My calves burned and I was sweating like a bacon-wrapped water chestnut. Panting, I leaned the bike against the bushes and–
“Holy macaroni!” I snapped my hand back and sucked my fingertip. Blood. I stooped down and peered through the needles to find what bit me. The fancy bushes were laced with barbed wire.
“Psst!”
I looked up.
It was Mara. She held her finger to her lips. “Shh.”
I nodded and mouthed, “Okay!”
She disappeared into her room and I felt a ping of sick in my throat. A white bed sheet flew from the window, fanned out, and drifted to the side of the house. The girl was holding the top corner. When I saw her, the sickness faded.
She held up her finger and mouthed, “Just a minute!” then tied the corner onto something below the sill. The sheet thinned into a homemade rope and the tip brushed the booby-trapped bush.
I shook my head, pointed to the rope and whispered loudly, “I can’t climb that!”
She rolled her eyes and hoisted a picnic basket over her shoulder. In one swift motion she grabbed the rope, hurdled the window frame, and shimmied down the siding like Mary Jane with Spiderman’s powers. I winced as she neared the bushes, but she planted her feet against the wall with deft timing, pushed off, and landed on the ground unscathed.
Whoa.
“So?” she said.
“So what?”
>
“I told you my name, silly. What’s yours?”
“Oh. James.”
Mara grinned. She had dimples. She wasn’t wearing the footie pajamas, but light-blue jeans and a purple sweatshirt. Her hair was back in a ponytail. I wanted to hug.
“Afraid of heights?” she asked and looked to the trees. Her neck was a sweet caress. Shadows from the batting moths turned her skin to lace.
“Nope,” I said. “I love climbing trees.”
She grabbed my hand. That simple touch unleashed a potent current as if our bodies were opposite ends of a battery. As we ran to the woods hand-in-hand, the kinetic charge struck a pair of contradictory chords: an barrage of self-doubt and a feeling of unconditional acceptance. I felt the earth tremble beneath my trampling girth, but the sense of inadequacy was matched by an unspoken understanding that Mara didn’t care about my weight. I watched the effortless curves of her jeans as she ran and became acutely aware of my pepperoni nipples chaffing against my tee. My pits and back and butt were drenched... her body probably didn’t know what a sweat gland was. But despite my sudden desire to fix my despicable body, I knew she liked me anyway.
Mara stopped beneath the tree with the tallest column of rungs. Basket in hand, she started to climb. “Watch for rusty nails,” she called back.
“Okie-dokie,” I replied. Okie-dokie? Uhg.
She giggled.
A wooden platform was wedged between three branches where the trunk split. It was barely large enough for the two of us, but our knees would have to touch in order to fit, so I didn’t mind the squeeze.
The basket was open when I reached the top. Mara removed a flashlight, a box of Ritz crackers, and a circle of brie, then placed them on the particleboard between us.
“Cheese and crackers,” she said. “It’s all I could find.”
“Looks good. I’m starvin’.”
“Meee too.” She un-crinkled the crackers and took out a knife.
“It’s awesome up here,” I marveled, then glanced up and noticed that our ceiling was a cluster of dead twigs. The nearby trees still created a lush ring of leaves, but the branches on our tree were bare. I followed the black curve of the sickly trunk, then grabbed Mara’s flashlight and switched it on. The beam made a circle on the tree’s rugged skin and illuminated the letters “M” and “L” cut repeatedly into the bark. I traced the beam from the base of our platform up to the highest twig... thousands of jagged initials spiraled the trunk and choked the tree in an onslaught of “M.L.M.L.M.L.M.L.”
“My middle name is Lynn...” she said, her eyes turned down as she spread cheese on a Ritz.
I turned off the flashlight, accepted the snack, and tried to ignore the eerie presence of our strangled sanctuary.
* * *
“Why did you invite me here?” I asked. “Those things you said...”
Mara gave me the first cracker. “I felt bad,” she replied. “I wanted to tell you that I didn’t mean it.”
I nibbled the snack politely. “Then why–”
“It’s what she wanted.”
“Your aunt is weird. She sounded normal on the–”
“She’s not my real aunt.”
“Grandma?”
“She just wants me to call her that.”
“Why? Who is she?”
“We sleep in the same room.” Mara nodded to the window, then popped a cheese-covered cracker in her mouth.
“She’s in there now? How did you sneak out?”
“I found a walkman on the ground a few months ago. It had a tape of me singing, so I kept it. When I play it while Aunty sleeps, she doesn’t wake up. Sometimes I leave it on her pillow and sneak downstairs to watch I Love Lucy on Nick at Nite.”
“Cool.”
“Every Sunday she pulls out her wedding album and tells me the same stories over and over.”
“Stories?”
“About her husband. He left.”
“Oh. Are all the pictures ripped like the picture in the frame?”
“You’re the first boy I’ve ever seen in the house. Aunty hates them.”
“Them?”
“Boys.”
“Oh. Do you hate boys too?”
Mara dipped her finger in the cheese. “They’re just... gross.”
Gross. I’ve heard a million girls use that word, but “gross” from Mara’s lips carried a dark undertone and stern authenticity. I thought about the boys in the trees. “Zombies...” I said.
“I call ‘em ‘ferrets.’”
“Aren’t ferrets fast? Those boys were practically saying ‘braaains’ with their arms out in front of them.”
She shrugged, then wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “Maybe a little of both.”
The wind picked up and rustled the leaves. A strand of hair loosened from Mara’s ponytail and my insides ached to brush it back behind her ear.
“Have you heard the radio commercial for Great Lakes Family Diner?” She searched my eyes for comprehension, but I couldn’t stop staring at the fallen strand of hair. “You know... the one where the Dad asks his kids where they wanna eat and the little girl says, ‘How ‘bout Great Lake Faaaaaamily Diner!’”
The catchphrase snapped me back to the conversation. “Yeah!” I exclaimed. I stuck out my jaw and squinted my eyes. “Hop in yer pick-up and bring in the kids for the best darned chicken in West Michigan! When you want good food, make it–” Mara chimed in, “Great Lake Faaaaaamly Diner!”
She grabbed her tummy and keeled with laughter. “That’s me!” she said. “The little girl!”
“No way! That’s totally rad!”
The bout of giggles unhitched another strand, giving her face a golden frame. I sat on my hands to keep them away.
“They said I did a good job–”
“I love that commercial!”
“–but Aunty says I can’t do ‘em any more.”
“What a geezer.”
The tips of Mara’s unkept hair were moist from brushing against her lips. Another gust of wind twirled the strands and they lashed her cheeks.
“Hey,” I said, “you should act in my movie! I need a girl for the lead!”
Mara shook her head. “She won’t let me.”
“Why the heck not? I wrote the screenplay and everything!”
“Do you go to school?”
“Duh,” I muttered and forced my gaze from the taunting hair to the sky. “Who doesn’t go to school?”
“I was supposed to be in sixth grade this year, but I didn’t go. Do you think I’ll still hafta take it, or will I go right into seventh?”
I looked back to Mara with wide eyes. “You skipped the sixth grade? That. Is. Awesome!”
“I got in trouble last year. It wasn’t really my fault, but Aunty wouldn’t let me go back.”
Another strand. The new ribbon of hair fell in a beautiful arc across her brown eyes. I was certain she would see it–
I leaned forward and freed my hands. I swept my fingers across Mara’s brow and tucked the strands gently behind her ear. “I– I just– You’re just– Holy cow, I’m so sorry. I just had to–”
“Thanks,” she said. She smiled.
I realized I was holding my breath. I exhaled loudly, then sucked in the cool air.
Mara didn’t seem to notice my gasps. “I keep telling you stuff about me,” she said. “Tell me somethin’ neat about you.”
“Well...” I cleared my throat. My life was full of interesting tidbits that Mara might enjoy, but that stupid camera came to mind first. I didn’t want to stutter like a moron, so I went with it. “I like to make movies. I was gonna direct one this summer but...” I paused. How much should I tell her?
“But?”
“But I lost my camera.”
“That stinks.”
“I lied. I didn’t lose it...”
“Oh?”
I would discover later that Mara’s powers did not include coaxing people to tell the truth... but the magical, mystical, otherworldly attra
ction was already working its–
Another gosh-darned strand of hair dismounted her perky ear with obnoxious timing and I blurted the truth. “I traded my camera to Danny B. for a picture of a naked girl because he’s a bully and he was gonna show his friends and I felt sick even though I didn’t know the girl and my parents asked about it so I lied!”
Mara’s eyes were bigger than the moon. She brushed the hair from her face, but it fell right back.
“Now your aunt gave me a new camera but I have to buy film for it and film is really expensive and you have to send it in to get it developed and– God, Mara,” I crooned, “you’re so pretty.”
I reached for that last strand of hair... but when the tips of my finger brushed her cheek, she leaned forward and I leaned forward and the tips of our noses touched.
That trifling moment of nuzzled faces and near-kisses unlocked within me a treasure chest of new understanding. It finally happened. The mystery was solved! Butterflies, explosions, and white-hot elation spurred my very first girl-inspired stiffy, and I squirmed in my seat to squash it.
If my body and mind had been developed enough to be naturally excited by an accidental Eskimo kiss, the feelings that followed might have been ordinary. But looking back, I was at least a year away from the awkward stage of wet bed sheets and curly tufts of hair. My arousal was premature. The thirstiness in my gut was not the usual first-love infatuation... but something unnatural, foreboding, and stronger than a life debt.
Mara pulled away and smiled. “More crackers?” she asked.
* * *
I don’t remember our conversation after the moment our noses touched. I don’t recall climbing out of the tree, and I’m not sure how Mara reached the rope over the barb-riddled bushes.
I do remember tying the basket to the blanket and the way her slender arms hoisted the contraption like an anchor on a boat. I remember the last words she whispered from her perch, “See ya later, alligator.”
I remember her smile.
Somehow, Whit had managed to keep us out of trouble. I snuck through his house, down the ramp to the basement, then regaled him with my adventures until the morning sun turned his bedroom orange.
We attended our last day of elementary school with heavy eyes and naps at recess. When the last bell rang and the kids went berserk, I felt above it. Mrs. Conrad picked us up at the flag pole and unknowingly ushered us into the craziest summer of our lives.
Back in Whit’s bedroom I remembered the item that sparked the evening’s insanity.