Like a Love Story(53)

“We need your advice, little brother,” she says. “You’re the only person who knows all the players, and who isn’t predisposed to hate me. It’s time for me to tell the fam that I’m staying in New York and moving in with my man. How do we handle this delicately?”

Tara handles nothing delicately. Even if you gave her a feather, she would find a way to turn it into a weapon and stab you with it. “I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe go back to school first and . . .”

“No, that’s not an option,” Tara says curtly. “I’m staying in New York. I’m living with Massimo.” Hearing her use his real name somehow makes their relationship, and their plans, a lot more serious.

“Do you . . . do you have enough money to live . . . in case they . . . ,” I stammer, but I know they understand what I am saying. In college, Tara’s life is taken care of. If she chooses to quit school, there is no guarantee.

“I make okay money as a DJ,” Massimo says.

“But then you have to spend most of what you make on new records,” she says to him.

“I’m not quite at the level where labels give me free records,” he explains.

“But he will be,” Tara says, beaming with pride. “And I can wait tables, or bartend. We’ll be fine.”

I nod, taking this in, imagining the look on my mother’s face when she finds out my sister is going to quit school to become a bartender and live with a DJ.

“I’m trying to change, Zabber,” she says to me. “I’m trying to handle this differently than the old Tara. The old me would’ve just blurted this out, probably after a few drinks, had a huge fight with Mom, put you in the middle of it. I don’t want to be that person anymore. I just want to love who I want to love and be who I want to be.”

It’s all I want too. To love who I want to love. To be who I want to be.

“I know you understand,” she says.

I know she does, too. She asked me that first night if I thought Art was cute, and I nodded. I did not say anything else, just a nod. But it was enough. And she only said one thing to me after I nodded. She said, “I always knew and I think it’s great.” That was enough too.

“I think you should tell Mommy first,” I say, “and alone. Just you and her.”

Tara looks over at Massimo apologetically, and after kissing her twice on the hand, he says, “It’s okay. I don’t need to be there.”

“And then,” I continue, “I think you should ask Mommy how she would choose to tell Abbas. You should make her part of the plan and the decision.”

“Okay, that’s good,” Tara says pensively, like she’s taking mental notes. “Thanks.”

“Also, I think you should find a college in New York to transfer to before you—”

Tara bites her lip hard, then stops me. “I can’t transfer to college here.”

“Why?” I ask.

She bites her lip again. “I never showed up to class in Toronto,” she says casually. “I just . . . it’s not my thing.”

“But Mom was paying!” I say, a little too strongly, annoyed on behalf of my mother, who worked so hard to raise us before Abbas was in her life, who sacrificed the prime of her life for us.

“I didn’t waste the money,” she says. “I managed to get a refund . . .”

“Did you give it to Mom?” I ask.

“No, of course not—that’s my money. If she was gonna spend it on college for me, then I can spend it however I want.” She flares her nostrils at me, defiant. This is the old Tara. This is the kind of terrible decision she makes. “And it’ll tide us over until I get a job here. It’s not easy to get a job in the States without work papers.”

“That’s like stealing from her,” I say.

Then I have a flash of me rummaging through Abbas’s pants, taking money from his pockets, spending it on Madonna posters, records, magazines. I’m no better than her. I just know how to hide my wrongs better. At least she is open about who she truly is.

“We don’t have to bring that up,” Tara says dismissively. “I like your advice. I’ll have a calm one-on-one with her, I’ll make her part of the decision . . .”

“Whatever,” I say, suddenly angry with her. Maybe she thought I’d appreciate being a part of her process or something, but it only makes me feel complicit. “And you know what, please stop making me a part of all your lies.”

“Don’t judge me for my secrets because you have your own,” she says, flinging each word at me. “You’re not exactly the poster boy for truth.”

“Amore, calmati,” Massimo whispers to her as he pulls her close to him.

She doesn’t even speak Italian, but she smiles and whispers, “Si, amore.”

We sit in silence. Her words were daggers inside me, and the cuts are only now starting to truly hurt. I know she’s right. My own life is one big lie I’ve shielded people from because I’ve been too afraid to hurt them. Maybe that’s why Tara lies too. Maybe she’s just afraid of hurting us. But then I remember all the screaming matches with our mom, that time she bleached her hair and destroyed the bathroom paint in the process, that time she had to have her stomach pumped, and when our mom caught her in her bedroom with a boy, or when Tara borrowed her favorite dress and burned the bottom of it. And now, love. Love. How can she love him? She’s known him two weeks! I’ve known Art for two months now. I’m overtaken by a desire to kiss him the way my sister kisses Massimo. I want to scream at my sister and tell her that it’s my turn now, my turn to make waves. If she tells our mom all this now, then I’ll need to spend the rest of the year fixing her mess, smoothing the cracks she creates in our family, playing the role of a good boy I know I am not and that I’m sick of being. Maybe this is really why I’m angry. Because I want what she has.