Never Have I Ever(11)

Tuesday. May 28. 1991. The moon peaked full at 1:36. . . .

But the words stayed in my mouth. I lay in his arms in the darkness, and I let that moon sink. I did not even trace its descent. I didn’t need for him to love the girl I’d been, and I wouldn’t ask him to forgive her. I hadn’t. Why should he? I only needed him to love me now. I stayed silent, listening to his breath grow deep and even until he was asleep.

But now Roux had gone dredging, reaching down so deep inside me. That old moon rose, and there was no way not to see by its pale light. No way not to remember.

At fifteen I’d jet-dyed my sandy-colored hair into submission, so that it hung down my back in lifeless hanks. I had thick-cut Betty Page bangs, too severe for the soft moon of my face. They got in my eyes as I leaned out the window to wave to Tig Simms, drenched in moonlight, asking for a pork chop.

I’d been waiting, my big body filling up my papasan chair like I was a scoop of ice cream in a wide, round cone. I was already dressed for school tomorrow in a plaid skirt and a navy uniform top. Beside me I had a tote bag with a can of Lysol in it, though I’d half hoped Tig wouldn’t show. It was the first night that the moon looked full, and tomorrow or the next day would be so much better—assuming that he showed at all. He didn’t come every month, and more than once he’d woken me up, unprepared, on random, near-moonless weekdays.

I whisper-called down, “Gimme a minute.”

He grinned up at me, pushing his wild hair off his forehead. In sunlight it had a metallic cast, like he’d gilded it in bronze, but now it looked almost black. Brighton’s dress code required short-haired boys and long-skirted girls, but Tig’s tight curls saved him from paying for a lot of haircuts; if I grabbed one and pulled it straight, it would likely reach past his shoulder.

He motioned for me to come down again, urgent. I gave him a thumbs-up, flushing at my own staring dorkitude. I drew the window shut. I’d have to sneak through the house and out the back door. My unwieldy body would not let me shimmy out, creep along the roof, then leap to the oak and climb to the ground, the way my older brother often did from his room next door.

I stuffed my feet into my stretched-out flats, grabbed my tote and my guitar, and snuck downstairs, barely breathing, careful not to bang the instrument against the banister. Creeping put me inside my body, though. All at once I was hyperaware of the way it sloshed around me. That xylophone sound effect that played on cartoons when people tiptoed started plinking in my head, and I knew with bitter knowing that not much was funnier than a fat thing sneaking.

Once down I hurried silently through the living room, more at ease with every step that took me farther from my parents’ bedroom, into the kitchen. Usually on these nights, after we’d gotten baked and played for a couple of hours, I’d ask Tig to take me to Waffle House. Chez Waffle we called it. Your gas, my treat, I’d tell him, because he rarely had money. We’d walk through Lysol clouds to kill the pot smell and go eat with the truckers, Patsy Kline on the juke, all of us grainy-eyed from being up all night. We’d drink tons of coffee, mine khaki colored with half-and-half. Then we’d go straight to school. Since my dad left for work before dawn and my mother slept in until eight, no one knew except my brother. Connor couldn’t rat on me; he snuck out more than I did.

I wished Tig and I could Waffle House tonight. God, bacon sounded good. Hash browns scattered, smothered, and covered with a waxy slice of American cheese. Pancakes, and I could almost feel the thin spread of maple-flavored syrup on my tongue. But I was broke; just this week, after her “big announcement,” Mom’d told me she was going to start putting my allowance directly into my savings account. She’d also emptied out my pig, depositing my saved-up babysitting money. For college, she’d said, though thanks to Nana’s trust my college was covered. More than. We both knew she really did it to stop me buying food.

I grabbed four pears from the ceramic bowl on the counter and threw them into the tote with the Lysol. I checked the pantry. Canned soups, jars of oil and olives, five kinds of cereal that all looked and tasted like the cedar chips in the bottom of my hamster’s cage.

I opened the fridge and found packages of skinless chicken breasts stacked up like a wall of bland, waiting to be baked dry. I fished a plastic envelope of ham, 98 percent fat-free, out of the deli drawer. I divided the slices in half and made two sandwiches on the extra-thin-cut diet bread. There was no cheese or mayo in the house. No ketchup either, because of the sugar. I squirted on some mustard and bagged them up.

These were the best things I had to offer Tig, moon crazy and wanting meat. Tomorrow I’d have better. Our neighbors down the street, the Shipleys, had a new baby that wouldn’t sleep at night. Pretty Mrs. Shipley had asked me to come by right after school and babysit, so she could get a nap. I could tell Mom I’d been at the library and keep the money.

Plus, three-year-old Lolly and I would have snack, screwing the tops off Oreos, eating the filling, then dipping the sides in Mrs. Shipley’s whole milk. We’d get milk mustaches and color pictures of Ariel or Muppets while baby Paul cooed and drooled in the bouncer. Mrs. Shipley never noticed that I snuck extra cookies or her Pringles home in my backpack. She wore peasant blouses that slipped off one delicate shoulder and narrow-cut capri pants; no way she ate junk food. I couldn’t imagine Mrs. Shipley eating anything but leaves.

But Tig was here now. So it was pears and diet bread stuffed with rubbery, fatless ham. In desperation I checked the lower cabinets. Tupperware and pans and kitchen gadgets, nothing good or even edible. Until I looked under the sink.