Other Words for Love Read online

  She gasped and covered her mouth. “I didn’t mean it that way, Ari. That came out wrong. I always say things wrong. You know I meant when. When you get a boyfriend.”

  Whatever. I watched her zip her boots while my mind shifted back to her tattoo. It made me think of dirty needles and AIDS and people in hospital isolation units, wasting away with sores that blistered every inch of their bodies. I was about to ask if the tattoo parlor had taken the necessary precautions when she changed the subject.

  “That Rachel Ellis is an even bigger bitch than her daughter. ‘Stage left, stage right …,’ ” she said, imitating Rachel by pointing her finger. “But my mother is all gushy about her because she got us a new account. A law firm or something.”

  “You mean Ellis and Hummel?”

  She nodded. “We’ll be handling their business meetings and stuff starting later this spring. I think it’s in the Empire State Building.”

  Ninety-eighth floor, I thought. Then I got nervous because Summer might meet Blake, who probably wanted another bleached blonde to replace the one in Georgia, and I didn’t stand a chance against Summer Simon. I wished she had never given me that Tell Your Friends card, because it had led to nothing but disaster.

  I was glad when Summer went home, passing Mom on the front steps. Mom was carrying a grocery bag filled with marshmallow ducks, jelly beans, and eggs, which we dyed in the kitchen later on.

  I dropped a yellow PAAS tablet into a cup filled with a combination of water and vinegar and watched it fizz. I’d already colored a dozen eggs and I was planning to do a dozen more. Mom and I always gave Kieran a huge Easter basket, and now we had to give one to Shane, too, even though he was less than a year old and mostly toothless.

  “Is Shane better?” I asked, drawing a rabbit face on a fuchsia egg.

  “Oh,” Mom said. “He’s fine.”

  I was drawing whiskers. I stopped because her voice sounded funny. It sounded like she was trying to keep something from me. “Well,” I said, certain that my exile would be suspended on holidays. “I guess I’ll find out next week.”

  “Ariadne,” she said. “Here’s the thing.”

  That was when I found out I wasn’t going to Easter dinner in Queens. Mom acted like this was no big deal, it was a one-time occurrence. Evelyn had lost eleven pounds since my birthday, her psychiatrist was fantastic, and we wanted what was best for her, didn’t we?

  Mom was being a ringmaster again. I nodded and went back to drawing because I didn’t want to talk about Evelyn anymore. What was the point, anyway? I’d just come off as spoiled and weak and a wimpy delicate flower if I complained that nobody ever put me first, not even Mom. I wasn’t in the mood now for jelly beans or colored eggs, but I forced myself to organize them in Kieran’s and Shane’s Easter baskets. It wasn’t their fault they had a very selfish mother.

  On Monday I complained to Leigh about Easter. There was no other choice. I couldn’t talk to Mom and I never talked to Dad, and Summer was too involved with herself to care. She rarely ate lunch at Hollister nowadays, Casey always picked her up from school, and she was constantly meeting with guidance counselors. She wanted to convince them to let her take extra classes next fall so she could graduate in January instead of in June, which just figured. Leigh would be gone soon and Summer probably would too, although it seemed as if she was far away already. What do you care if I don’t eat lunch in the cafeteria? Summer had said last week. You’ve got Leigh.

  “Well,” Leigh said as we sat together in homeroom. I was surprised that she’d actually shown up, and I hadn’t seen a SUNY Oswego shirt for weeks. Now she wore a dab of lipstick, a white eyelet blouse, and her chain with the arrowhead charm. It was a sunny morning, and she looked a lot more cheerful than I felt. “You’ll just have to come to my place for Easter.”

  “I don’t want to impose,” I said.

  She picked up her charm and pulled it back and forth across the chain. “Now you’re being ridiculous. It’s no imposition at all. We’ll have plenty of food … my whole family will be there. I really want you to come—I’ll even send a car to pick you up. Please come.”

  Her voice was tinged with desperation. Her face was close to mine, and there was a mix of hope and sadness in her eyes that made me nod, just so she wouldn’t say please again. I also did it because I knew what it was like to be unpopular, because I knew how important it was to have at least one friend, and because I remembered that Leigh’s whole family included Blake.

  “Don’t let this bother you, Ariadne,” Mom said the next Sunday afternoon. We were standing on our front steps while Dad loaded the Easter baskets into his car.

  “It doesn’t bother me,” I said, because I had to. My parents didn’t think that missing one lousy Easter dinner was a big deal—they went through much worse when they were my age. Kids are so spoiled these days. Mom once said that her father had usually passed out drunk before the ham was served, and it was no secret that Dad’s mother had spent every holiday emptying bedpans. So I pretended I didn’t care.

  Then a sedan arrived. It took me to the apartment on East Seventy-eighth, where I settled down at a cramped dining room table. Mr. Ellis sat at the head; Rachel was at the opposite end. Leigh sat next to me, and Blake and Del were across from us. I was surprised that I felt so comfortable eating Easter dinner with a family that wasn’t mine.

  “Pass that over here, sugar pie,” Rachel said, gesturing to a disposable aluminum tray beside Blake’s elbow. Her accent was very Southern today, and so was the food. There were no maids or leeks or desserts set on fire. We had potato salad and pork chops and collard greens, and I ate the collard greens even though I’d never heard of them before. Rachel had cooked everything herself, and it wasn’t exactly a penthouse party. It was the same kind of simple family gathering that was going on in Queens. There was another similarity too—I had to hide my Blake stares just like I hid my Patrick stares.

  Blake ate more than he had at the penthouse. He dug into the potato salad and left four bare pork-chop bones on his plate. As we ate, he talked to me across the table. We talked about school and about grades, and at one point Mr. Ellis chimed in.

  “A-plus on the Intro to Business Law midterm,” he said proudly, patting Blake’s shoulder in a way that was supposed to be affectionate, but he did it so forcefully that it probably hurt.

  Rachel clapped her hands. “Congratulations, nephew. Now you get an extra piece of hummingbird cake.” She turned to me. “You’re not allergic to hummingbirds, are you, honey?”

  Hummingbirds. Those were the little things with the thin beaks and the speedy wings. Hummingbirds are of the Trochilidae family, I remembered one of my science teachers saying. They’re the only birds that can fly backward. I didn’t remember her mentioning that hummingbirds were edible, but maybe it was a Southern thing. A delicacy or whatever.

  “Aunt Rachel,” Blake said. “Don’t do that to her.”

  It was only a joke, thank God. Rachel went to the kitchen and came back carrying a four-layer cake covered with cream-cheese frosting and chopped pecans. It tasted heavenly. Blake was cutting his second piece when Mr. Ellis rose from his chair.

  “I have to get going,” he said. “There’s a trial next week and work on my desk.”

  Rachel twisted her mouth. “You push yourself too hard, Stan. You should get some of your associates to help you.”

  He smacked Blake’s shoulder again. “This boy right here will be working for me over the summer. That’ll be all the help I need.”

  Rachel offered to walk him to his car, adding that it was a beautiful day and we should all take a spin around the block to burn off dinner. Blake and Del shook their heads but Leigh sprang out of her chair and grabbed my hand.

  “Come with us, Ari,” she said.

  I didn’t want to. I wanted to stay here with her cousins, so I unlatched my hand from hers. “You go ahead, Leigh. Have a nice walk.”

  She stood there looking disappointed, like she had at Rockefeller
Center. Her clinginess annoyed me a little, but I didn’t want her to know, so I got up and went into the bathroom. When I came out, she and Rachel and Mr. Ellis were gone.

  I went back to the dining room, where I sat at the table with Del and Blake. They made the room smell musky and masculine, from the things they drank or smoked or slapped on their skin, and I liked it, whatever it was.

  “That was rude,” Del said. He struck a match and lit a cigarette. “Daddy leaving early, I mean. Who works on Easter?”

  Blake ran a hand through his hair and it stood up straight. “You know he’s busy.”

  “Yeah. Too busy to see my club. It’s been open for three months and he hasn’t shown up once. And neither have you.” A long stream of smoke came out of Del’s mouth. He pushed his chair back and it scraped the wall and that annoyed him. “This apartment is so fucking small. Why doesn’t he get them a better one?”

  “Del,” Blake said. “There’s a lady in the room. Watch your language.”

  That’s okay, I thought. Nobody in my family watches their language, but thanks anyway, Blake. I’m flattered that you care. Del muttered an apology and Blake told him that Mr. Ellis paid Rachel and Leigh’s rent and their bills, and wasn’t that enough?

  Del didn’t seem to think it was, because he screwed up his face and started clearing the table. I watched him and tried to find the green in his eyes, but I only saw gray.

  “You’d defend Daddy if he slit their throats,” he said before disappearing into the kitchen. I heard water running and trays being crunched into the trash. Blake let out a heavy sigh.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Another family drama.”

  That’s okay, I thought again. I’m familiar with family drama. Then I remembered the way Del had talked about Cielo and I felt sorry for him. “Your brother’s club is nice … I was there for the opening-night party.”

  “I skipped that,” he said, sliding his hand beneath the neck of his shirt to rub his shoulder. I wondered if it was sore from when Mr. Ellis had pounded on it. I caught a glimpse of bare skin, and I also saw a silver chain. Then Blake turned slightly in his seat and I noticed something dark on the top of his back, near his shoulder. “So how old are you, Ari? Leigh’s age, right?” He stopped rubbing and his shirt fell back into place before I could figure out what the mark was.

  “Right,” I said.

  He smiled. “Then you’re old enough to get into R-rated movies.”

  “Yeah,” I said, wondering where he was going with this. “I’m old enough.”

  “You want to see one with me?” he asked. I couldn’t believe it—Blake had just asked me on a date. Suddenly this was a very good Easter.

  He called on Wednesday night. The phone rang when I was curled up on the couch with my calculus homework, and Mom answered it in the kitchen. Then she came into the living room with a puzzled expression on her face.

  “It’s for you,” she said. “It’s some boy.”

  She looked so surprised that a boy would deliberately dial my number, and that really irked me. Then she lingered in the kitchen while I talked to Blake. She opened and closed cabinets, pretending to search for cinnamon. She also rummaged through the refrigerator, checking the expiration dates on the milk and the sour cream and the butter, even though she knew good and well that they were all perfectly fresh.

  She was even worse on Saturday night. I heard a car’s engine at the curb and I flew down the stairs from my bedroom, calling “I won’t be home too late,” and I thought Mom would have the sense to stay inside, where a mother belongs, but she didn’t. I was at the curb when I heard her husky voice behind me.

  “Don’t I get to meet your friend?” she said.

  Go away go away go away, I thought. Blake is twenty years old and he drives this beautiful black Corvette convertible and you have no idea how much you’re embarrassing me. Then Blake was on the sidewalk and he shook Mom’s hand. Next he answered her probing questions with “Yes, ma’am” and “No, ma’am” and “I go to NYU, ma’am.” She loved that ma’am business. She waved goodbye when I was in the car, and I watched her reflection in the rearview mirror as Blake drove away.

  “I apologize,” I said. “For her, I mean.”

  The Corvette had the scent of leather and plastic and other unknown substances that make a car smell new. It was a stick shift, and I marveled at how expertly Blake changed gears.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I don’t blame her. When I have a daughter, I plan to interrogate every guy who comes within a hundred yards. I’ll probably get a polygraph machine and stick bamboo shoots underneath their fingernails.”

  I laughed. I wasn’t embarrassed anymore. And I decided that Blake was different. He was better than the guys Evelyn had dated before Patrick, the ones who honked their car horns impatiently and rolled their eyes behind Mom’s back and gave Dad weak handshakes. None of them ever said ma’am. I wondered if Blake’s good manners were a sweet Southern thing, like Rachel’s hummingbird cake.

  He drove us to a movie theater in Manhattan, where he held every door for me, and the next thing I knew, we were eating dinner in a Little Italy restaurant with red-and-white-checkered tablecloths and a waiter who called me Signorina.

  Blake seemed comfortable. So was I. The food was good and the atmosphere wasn’t formal or fancy, which was fine with me. Our table was near the front door and I felt the cool April air, heard it rustling a tree outside, and saw Blake’s Corvette parked across the street.

  “You have a nice car,” I said.

  He shrugged. The waiter had just brought two bowls of chocolate gelato and Blake lifted his spoon. “My father gave it to me for Christmas. Total waste of money.”

  I wasn’t sure how to answer, so I didn’t. I lifted my own spoon and swirled it around the gelato, and Blake asked if I was seeing anybody else.

  “No,” I said. “I was dating someone for a while. It’s over now.”

  It was a massive lie but I had to say it. I couldn’t let Blake know the humiliating truth that this was my first real date. For some strange reason he didn’t doubt me.

  “Same here,” he said.

  I nodded and conjured up a vision of his bleached-blond girlfriend. I imagined her in a mobile home in Georgia, trying to make the place presentable by hanging up a wind chime and growing flowers in plastic containers out front. I saw Blake inside, having sex with her on a foldout couch while rain beat down on a metal roof, and I thought she was lucky even if she did live in a trailer.

  “Who were you dating before?” I asked, as if I didn’t know.

  “A girl in Georgia,” he said.

  I acted all surprised. “Georgia,” I echoed. “Do you go to Georgia much?”

  “I used to. My grandmother lives down there. She has a little house far away from everything, underneath these big oak trees that were planted before the Civil War.” He leaned his chair back and smiled at the ceiling. “I want a place like that someday.”

  I laughed. “But you live in a penthouse.”

  The check came. He tossed some cash on the table. “That’s my father’s taste,” he said, popping a Life Saver into his mouth. “And Del’s. I’d rather live in your neighborhood.”

  We were back in my neighborhood an hour later. It was dark now, and Blake parked the Corvette in front of my house as butterflies fluttered in my stomach. I remembered when Evelyn was a teenager and she would sit in parked cars on our street with her boyfriend of the month, while Mom paced the living room saying things like She’ll end up with trench mouth and I hope the neighbors don’t see.

  I was looking out the window, checking for neighbors and hoping to give them something to see, when I felt Blake’s hand on my chin. I looked at him, at his straight nose and his perfectly carved lips, feeling his finger move slowly back and forth on my skin. Don’t ask me, I thought. Just do it.

  He lifted my mouth to his and it was so much better than that stupid Catskills kiss. It was nice and gentle and he squeezed my shoulder an
d smoothed my hair, and he didn’t get grabby with my off-limits-on-a-first-date areas or turn all critical when it was over.

  “You want to sit over here?” he asked.

  The only place to sit over there was on his lap. The invitation was so enticing and his voice was so soft that it made goose bumps pop all over me. I nodded and Blake smiled, hooking his arm around my waist, pulling me over the stick shift. Then I was on his thighs, and I loved it there, where I smelled aftershave and stayed wrapped up in his arms. He kissed me again, harder and deeper this time. I felt his tongue exploring my mouth and tasted a trace of his Wint-O-Green Life Saver. I wondered if he knew that they made tiny blue sparks if you crunched them in the dark.

  “You’re too pretty,” he said when we were done.

  I was? Those three words sent me floating over my lawn. The grass was growing in thick and green, and Saint Anne didn’t seem lonely and old and chipped. Her dress was bright blue, her shawl was sparkly gold. She and little Mary looked like they were having a good day.

  fourteen

  Mom was waiting on the couch. She made sandwiches and she heated milk, but I didn’t want to tell her anything. The memory of tonight was as unblemished as new-fallen snow that I had to protect from careless footsteps. I just talked about the movie and the restaurant as Mom stared at me with her heavy-lidded eyes, waiting for something that never came.

  “Don’t you even want a sandwich?” she asked.

  I shook my head. I heard her in the kitchen while I was brushing my teeth upstairs; she was tearing a sheet of aluminum foil to cover the sandwiches. I might have felt a lot guiltier if I wasn’t so happy.

  My happiness hindered my sleep. I stared at my bedroom ceiling later on, thinking about Blake, remembering the way he had touched me. He was careful and gentle, as if I was something fragile and important, like I was that soft spot on a baby’s head.

  He called on Sunday night. I wished there was a phone in my room. Evelyn used to have one, a powder-pink princess model that Mom and Dad bought after she whined and cried and nagged for weeks. Its cord had been woefully tangled and the dial had nearly fallen off from constant use, but she had still lugged it to Queens along with her Pet Rocks and Peter Frampton poster.