Feral Youth Read online

  They haven’t got a clue what gets me about those women. You know what it is? I mean, aside from the hair and the outfits and the way they look when they smoke. What I really love is that people always underestimate them. It happens over and over in those movies: the lady pulls out her cute little gun and aims it at the guy, and he doesn’t think she’ll pull the trigger. “You haven’t got the guts.” That’s what he always says.

  And then the lady does.

  But anyway, like I was saying, that couple that moved in next door . . . It sort of interested me that they owned the movie theater, but apart from that, I didn’t think much about them. Until Christmas break a year and a half ago, when their son came home from college for a visit.

  I was standing in our driveway with my mom and dad and brother and sister at the time. We were about to get into the minivan to go to church. The guy pulled up in front of the Morettis’ house in a loudly chugging, beat-up compact and got out. He had one of those scraggly billy-goat beards that makes a guy look like some kind of Middle Earth wannabe hipster. He stretched as if he’d been driving all night. His arms were still up in the air when he spotted us staring at him. Even Mom had paused in her ritual Sunday morning inspection of our faces and hair and outfits to check him out, because a new person in the neighborhood’s always interesting.

  The guy checked us out, too. His eyes moved from face to face and stopped on mine. I squirmed in my scratchy polyester-blend dress shirt and plaid necktie because I knew my church clothes only made me look dumpier than usual. But he gave a nod, and even though the others probably assumed he was nodding at all of us, for some reason, I got the feeling he meant the nod just for me.

  I didn’t see him again for a couple days, although I kept an eye out. Then one night after dinner, I ducked out to the backyard. It was cold as hell outside, but the rest of the family was in the living room playing Bible-opoly, and that always sends me running for the hills. I heard a noise and glanced over. There was the Morettis’ son, standing on their back porch with a cigarette in his hand and one shoulder leaned up against the house, already watching me.

  “You won’t tell, will you?” he said, holding up his smoke. “The parents don’t know I do this.”

  He didn’t look all that worried, though. I wanted to come back with something clever, like the women in noir films always do, but I couldn’t think of a thing to say.

  He walked over to the waist-high chain-link fence separating our yards. For the first time I got a decent look at his face. He wasn’t handsome, but gazing at him made my insides sort of flutter anyway. Maybe it was just because college-aged people automatically seem cooler, even if they have piece of junk cars and billy-goat beards. But I was pretty sure there was something else about him, something that had nothing to do with age, that overcame his lack of looks and excess of chin hair. He was like Humphrey Bogart. Bogie wasn’t good-looking, but he had magnetism. This guy had magnetism too.

  “I’m Mike.”

  “Cody,” I managed.

  He nodded, the cigarette wedged between his teeth, his eyes squinting as he grinned at me, like he was sizing me up. I sucked in my belly and shifted my weight onto one foot and rested my hand on my hip, hoping the pose would make me look svelte and alluring. He snatched his cigarette from his mouth and held it out to me, which struck me as odd, since I was fifteen and looked even younger, and he didn’t even know me. Still, I wished again I had the confidence of a femme fatale. I’d grab the cigarette and take a drag and let the smoke leak slowly through my lips. Or maybe I’d blow it in a narrow stream over his shoulder or exhale it through my nostrils like a lady dragon. Those noir actresses knew a million different ways of exhaling cigarette smoke, and each one seemed to have a different meaning—like smoking was its own language.

  I’d never smoked a cigarette in my life, though, so I shook my head. An awkward silence had started to set in, and I could see in another second he’d turn away and go back into the house, but by some miracle I finally thought of something to say.

  “You’re the Morettis’ son?” Not exactly film noir–caliber dialogue, but at least I’d kept the conversation going.

  “Yup. Home for break. I’m a sophomore down at the University of Atlanta. What about you? High school?”

  “I’m a sophomore too. Hillville High.”

  He took another drag and nodded. “So what’s there to do here in Hillville?”

  I would’ve thought anyone on Earth could take one look at me and see I was the exact wrong person to ask a question like that, but I tried to play it off. “Not much,” I said with a scoffing laugh, like I’d be out partying right that minute if only I lived in a cooler location. “Actually, I prefer to call this place Hellville. Hellville, West Virginia.”

  “Well, there must be a burger place at least. You like burgers?”

  Wait a second, I thought. What’s happening right now? Is he asking me out? I just nodded, since I’d once again lost the power of speech.

  He stuck the cigarette between his teeth one more time so he could pull out his phone. “What’s your number? Maybe we can get a burger sometime.”

  I glanced over my shoulder, thinking maybe there was someone else behind me, someone thin and good-looking and probably female, because honestly, Mike seemed pretty straight to me.

  “It’s just that I don’t know anyone in this town,” he said. “And you seem cool.”

  I turned back around and looked up at him—he was a full head taller than me—and said, “Thanks. Sounds like fun.”

  Then something must’ve gotten into me, maybe the spirit of Barbara Stanwyck, because all of a sudden, without even planning to, I grabbed the cigarette right out of his mouth, put it between my lips, and took a puff.

  I just about coughed my guts clear out of my body.

  * * *

  He didn’t try anything the first time he took me to the Burger Barn. He was a gentleman. But he started texting me, and the texts got sexy way before he did in person. Maybe it was easier for him that way. I could tell he wasn’t out of the closet and wanted to keep a low profile. (I got the impression the phone he’d programmed my number into wasn’t his regular one. I noticed once during our meal he answered a call from his parents on a different phone.)

  I didn’t mind. Not only was I in the closet, I was also a total virgin who didn’t even know for certain if I’d seen another homo in the flesh, aside from those two old guys at my mom’s hair salon and this other boy at church I had strong suspicions about. And considering I was pudgy and girly and still let my mom pick out my clothes and home-cut my hair because I trusted her to know what a normal straight boy was supposed to look like way more than I trusted myself, meeting a guy who wanted to get friendly with me that way was literally the last thing I expected to happen.

  But here it was happening. Over the course of the week between Christmas and New Year’s, Mike sent a steady stream of texts. First: u have a great sense of humor.

  Then: u have a funny laugh.

  Then: u have a cute nose.

  Then: u have a hot ass.

  We only got to hang out one other time that week. That’s another reason things didn’t move faster when we were actually together. My parents were forcing me to do all these hellish Christmastime church activities (at least I’d finally outgrown the Nativity pageant), and I guess Mike’s family kept him busy too. Plus, it was tricky figuring out excuses to sneak away and hang out with him. I knew I couldn’t just tell my parents I had plans to randomly spend time with the way older son of our new neighbors. So both times we went out, I said I was going to have dinner at my friend Sarah’s house. It scared the hell out of me, because I never lied to my parents, at least not about stuff like that. Not because I had some moral objection to it or thought God was going to strike me down or something. I’d just never had a reason before.

  Mike took me to the Burger Barn again that second time, and still nothing funny happened. He never said a word about those sexy texts he’d
sent me. When he dropped me off—a block away from our houses because he knew as well as I did we couldn’t let our parents see us together—he touched my apparently cute nose with his index finger and gave me a wink, and that was the only moment that made the evening feel like sort of a date.

  Then before I knew it, New Year’s had passed, and it was just a day before he was supposed to go back to college, and I’d gone into a full-on panic. He texted, asking if I wanted to get together that night and go to his parents’ movie theater after hours. He’d arranged something special, he said.

  As I stared at my phone’s screen, my chest started to heave. I thought I might faint, actually faint, the way nobody did in real life but my noir ladies did all the time. He had something special planned. What did that mean? Would we finally kiss tonight? Or would it be just like the other nights? I honestly didn’t know which possibility scared me more.

  He asked if I could sneak out of my house late. I knew that part I could manage. I had the only bedroom on the first floor, which meant I had zero privacy, but at least it made stealthy exits easy. Theoretically, at least. Of course I’d never actually tried. He told me to meet him on a corner a block away from our houses at midnight that night.

  He drove me to the theater. It had already closed, but he pulled out a ring of keys and unlocked the back door. Inside, he went behind the snack counter and asked what I’d like. Probably blushing, I told him Milk Duds and a Cherry Coke. But I tried to say it the way a femme fatale would order a gin and tonic, with a toss of my head and a mysterious smile.

  We went into one of the screening rooms, and he sat me down in the middle of the middle row.

  “I’ll be right back,” he said with a wink.

  I sat there alone in the big, dim screening room with its scratchy seats and hard armrests and sticky floor, my heart going bang-bang-bang in my chest. I popped a handful of Milk Duds and washed them down with a swallow of Cherry Coke. The room went dark. With a low mechanical hum, the old-fashioned red curtains at the front of the room slid apart to reveal the movie screen. On it the black-and-white Paramount logo appeared, and then the words “DOUBLE INDEMNITY.”

  I sucked in a breath.

  Mike reappeared next to me. “Didn’t you say you like this kind of movie? I found it in storage and thought of you.”

  I didn’t know what to say. He grabbed my hand, and I felt shivers everywhere.

  Then he pulled my hand over the armrest and put it in his lap.

  Fade to black.

  * * *

  The next day he left. I watched from my bedroom window as he waved to his mom and dad, got in his piece of junk car, and chugged away. That night I told my family I didn’t feel well. I went to my room and cried while I clutched my phone and stared at the screen. He’d said he’d text me.

  Finally, he did. I miss u.

  I cried even harder, tears of sadness and happiness mixed together. I miss u 2!!! I texted back.

  how bout sending a pic?

  I spent the next three hours working on it. I rehearsed my smokiest, sultriest femme fatale expression in the mirror on the back of my bedroom door, half closing my eyes and holding my head just so. I figured out camera angles and adjusted the lighting. I even tried dabbing Vaseline on my phone’s little camera lens because I’d read somewhere that was what Hollywood photographers used to do to make their portraits of film stars look all blurry and beautiful. (It didn’t work.) The picture I ended up with just made me look like I was really sleepy and had a stiff neck, but I knew I probably wouldn’t do any better even if I tried for another three hours, so I sent it.

  I clutched my phone again, wondering if all my effort had been worth it, wondering if he’d just find me hideous.

  I didn’t have to wait long. A response came less than a minute later. I meant w/ no clothes on. ;)

  Outside my bedroom door, I could hear the rest of my family playing Christian charades. I knew other kids—far, far cooler kids—sexted each other, but it hadn’t even crossed my mind that Mike might want something like that.

  Another message showed up on my screen: come on.

  Then: I won’t show it to anyone.

  Then: I swear.

  Then: I think ur gorgeous.

  Before I could lose my nerve, I adjusted the lights and figured out the camera angle again. I arranged my old Noah’s ark–patterned sheets on my bed so they looked messy, to suggest . . . I don’t know, that something interesting might have actually happened there. I pulled off all my clothes, fluffed my hair to make it look carelessly tousled, arranged myself on the bed, and snapped the picture.

  In my very first shot, I had a more convincingly sultry expression than I’d had in my clothed pic after three hours of trying.

  I sent it.

  thx.

  I waited for him to send another text, or maybe even a picture of his own, but I didn’t hear from him again that night.

  The next day I texted, how’s it going?

  good! classes starting might get busy.

  yeah classes starting here too, I texted back.

  I totally understood. I didn’t expect him to keep sending me messages at the same rate he had over the break.

  I waited a week. Then two. Nothing. I didn’t allow myself to text him, though. I knew only losers let themselves seem too eager.

  But after three weeks, I couldn’t stand it anymore. hi! how r u?

  Then: u there?

  Then: u okay?

  Then: u mad at me?

  Then: Mike? plz?

  * * *

  He never did text me back. I went through the second semester of my sophomore year a zombie, barely paying attention in class, barely squeaking by with passing grades. I’d never felt so miserable. But how else had I expected things to end? I kept asking myself that. How could I reasonably expect anyone to fall in love with dumpy, pathetic me? Let alone a cool college boy? (Well, maybe not cool, but definitely magnetic.) All along, it had only been a matter of time before he came to his senses.

  The day he’d left, I’d printed out a photo of him I’d found on Facebook and taped it on my wall, hidden underneath a shot of Lauren Bacall. At night I’d unstick the top of the Lauren Bacall picture and let it hang down, revealing the picture of Mike. I kept it there all semester and uncovered it every night and laid there in bed staring at it. Just to punish myself, I guess.

  Then one Sunday morning the whole family was out by the minivan again, Mom busy with her pre-church inspection, when the Morettis stepped outside on their way somewhere else. (They didn’t go to our church.) They paused near their car to make small talk with Mom and Dad, asking if we had any summer plans. Mom gabbed for a bit about the monthlong family Bible camp we were going to in August.

  “What about you?” she asked.

  “Italy,” Mrs. Moretti gushed. “We’re spending the whole summer.”

  Mom and Dad gave vague nods, like they’d never heard of the place before.

  “I have some family there,” Mr. Moretti explained. “Mike’s coming home to run the theater while we’re gone.”

  The back of my neck prickled under my poly-blend collar at the sound of his name. My mind started to race. The Morettis said good-bye and got into their car, and before Mom had even finished spit-smoothing my cowlicky hair, I had a plan. Because in spite of everything, part of me still hoped Mike hadn’t just blown me off. He might’ve lost the phone he used to text me, and my number along with it. He might’ve gotten scared. Didn’t I owe it to him, and to myself, to give him a chance?

  The following Saturday afternoon I slipped out of the house and rang the Morettis’ doorbell.

  “I’m looking for a summer job,” I blurted, my palms sweating, “and I love movies. Any chance you need someone to help out at the theater?”

  That June I started behind the snack counter a week before Mike got home. It had taken some convincing to get Mom and Dad to agree. I’d had to promise only to work daytime shifts, when the matinees were playing, and
never to sneak in and watch any of the R-rated movies.

  So there I stood next to the popcorn popper in my paper hat and clip-on bow tie when Mike walked in. He still had the billy-goat beard, and he still had the inexplicable Humphrey Bogart magnetism. I felt it the second he walked in, even from all the way across the lobby. My heart started going faster.

  Then it lurched to a stop. He had someone with him. A girl with a huge head of frizzy hair, like a mass of blond cotton candy. As I watched, he slung his arm over her shoulder.

  Mr. and Mrs. Moretti followed them in. They’d all come so Mike’s parents could show him the ropes. They stopped on the other side of the lobby, and Mr. Moretti started explaining how to work the cash register while Mike, only half listening, let his gaze wander.

  His eyes landed on me. His face went pale. His arm sagged away from the girl.

  Mrs. Moretti noticed him staring at me. “Mike, did you ever meet Cody? The neighbors’ boy? He’ll be working the snack counter this summer.”

  Mike’s mouth opened but nothing come out. I could see him trying to figure out what he should say, what lie he should tell about us.

  I was nervous too, but at least I’d expected this moment and rehearsed it in my head. I’d run through a million scenarios—although none where a girl with cotton-candy hair was standing next to him.

  “I—I saw you a few times,” I stammered. “I don’t think we ever met, though.”

  Still he didn’t utter a word. To fill the silence, I stepped out from behind the counter and held out my hand to the girl.

  “I’m Cody.”

  “So nice to meet you!” she said, seizing my hand with both of hers and pumping it hard. “I’m Rochelle. I’ll be working the ticket counter.”

  “She’s my girlfriend,” Mike finally said. His eyes had a steely set to them, and his beard seemed to bristle as he spoke. “She’s spending the summer here.”