Hope and Other Punch Lines(15)

“Cool,” I say.

“I have an idea: If you’d like to come with me, you can just say, ‘Hey, Julia, mind if I tag along to the party?’ Would be much less awkward for both of us that way.” Julia says this without looking at me, and at first I assume it’s because I’ve annoyed her. Then I realize she’s watching Zach, who is standing close to Natasha, getting an intimate one-on-one lesson on how to hold a bow. Noah, meanwhile, is giving piggybacks to his boys, and he looks surprisingly dorky-cute with his socks pulled up and cargo shorts and a T-shirt that reads This T-shirt is dry-clean only, which means it’s dirty—Mitch Hedberg.

“Hey, Julia, would you mind if I tagged along to the party tonight?” I ask, my voice still a touch too hopeful. I wonder if I’ll die before I’m able to rid myself of all this terrible earnestness. That seems even more of a shame than the likelihood that I will die a virgin.

“Sure.”

“I can be your designated driver,” I say.

“That would be great.”

“Also, I can bring snacks.”

“Stop talking now, Abbi.”

“Done,” I say, and for once, I shut up. Just like a badass.



* * *



— “Are you driving?” my dad asks. No hello, even. He calls as I’m pulling out of the camp parking lot to head home. I’m in my 2009 Toyota Prius, the car my father bought for my mom as a divorce present eight years ago and now belongs to me. He does weird stuff like that sometimes. Once, long after my parents split up, my mom came home from work to find a new washer and dryer on our front porch. A more cynical person would say these are easy ways for my dad to assuage his guilt for leaving our family, but the truth is, as I’ve told Dr. Schwartz for years, he didn’t leave. He moved two doors down. I really think he just uses the money he works so hard to earn on the people he loves the most in the world, even if he’s no longer married to one of them.

“Bluetooth.”

“Still.”

“Dad,” I say, in the way daughters have been saying Dad for millennia: with a heavy hint of affection hidden behind a whine.

“Please just pull over,” he says, and I do as he asks even though he can’t see me. “I was calling to see if you want to watch a movie at home with your mom and me tonight. We were thinking that new Pride and Prejudice adaptation set on Mars after Earth has been destroyed in a nuclear apocalypse? We both missed it in the theater, and you know how I feel about Jane Austen remakes.”

“You and Mom are watching a movie together tonight?”

“Well, we were both hoping we were watching a movie with you tonight,” he says, and then I realize what’s happening here. My parents are so worried about my dire social situation that they are uniting to fill in the void. I have reached a new low of patheticness, which I realize isn’t a word but totally should be. In the dictionary, under its definition, all they’d have to write is Abbi Hope Goldstein, right now.

“Can’t. Going to a camp party tonight,” I say.

“Oh, great! That’s so great, honey!” my dad says with entirely too much enthusiasm and relief.

“Most parents worry about their kids going to parties, not the other way around.”

“Most parents aren’t as cool as I am. So do you need me to pick up some snacks for you to bring?” he asks, and I rest my head on the steering wheel and close my eyes. I was always going to be exactly who I am and there is nothing I can do about it. “I can get those sour cream and onion potato chips you like? Or Doritos? Do kids still eat those? I haven’t seen a Dorito in years, come to think of it. Why is that? What happened to Doritos? Also, is the singular of Doritos Dorito? Am I right about that?”

“Dad,” I say again, same whine, less affection. No doubt, he is where all my awkward excessive verbiage comes from. My dad might be super liberal, but he’s definitely not cool. “I’m not bringing snacks.”

“Okay, beer, then?”

“Seriously? You’d buy me beer?” If my dad bought me alcohol, then I’d definitely start getting invited more places. This could be the answer to all my social problems. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner.

“I was kidding. I would never buy you beer.”

“Oh.”

“But I can score you some pot.”

“I’m going now.”

“Oh, you know what? I can combine the pot and the snacks and get you edibles. How does that sound?” he asks, full-out laughing at me now.

“Goodbye,” I say.

“I love you, sweetheart,” he says.

“Yeah, yeah,” I say, but I’m smiling when I hang up.





“We’re going to a party tonight,” I tell Jack. We are in his basement, because…we are always in his basement. I wonder if one day, when I am old, I’ll regret the ridiculous number of hours I’ve clocked down here. I hope not. I hope future me will remember and understand how limited the options were in Oakdale.

“Were we invited to this party?” Jack asks. He hits a ball against the wall with a ping-pong paddle, since he does not own, nor has he ever owned, an actual ping-pong table. I still have no idea where these mysterious paddles came from.