Learning to Swim(22)

“What are you doing?” I was certain that my eyes were deceiving me.

“Oh,” she said with a little laugh. “I saw a shell like this when I was with my friend, and so I thought I'd make one for them to remember our day. That's all.”

Translation: she was painting a shell for her married boyfriend. How Marthaesque was that? But I didn't say anything. Instead, I went into my room and changed back into my pajamas. I brushed my teeth and climbed into bed. It was Sunday morning at nine a.m. After all, I had the whole day to contemplate how I was rapidly going through the initial stages of love lunacy, and berate myself accordingly. I thought I should get an early start on it.

Barbie came into my room and sat on the edge of my bed. She looked almost worried about me. “Stef,” she said. “I just want you to know that I love you. You know that, right? You're the most important thing in my life.”

I definitely did not want to have this conversation with my mom. Not then. And so I decided to ignore the need I felt to point out that I wasn't really flattered to hear that I was the most important thing in her life. For one, she had already dumped me twice for this Ludwig guy. For two, besides her ’99 red Malibu, she really didn't have that many things to write home about. No other family. No real friends. Just the occasional married man. So what was she really saying? That she loved me more than this guy she had been dating for a couple of weeks?

“It's not easy being a mom,” she continued. “Especially a single one.”

And that's when I saw it. Considering the size, I was actually surprised that I hadn't noticed it before. “You're wearing a new ring,” I said. It was gold and sparkly, encrusted with diamonds.

“Oh,” she said, stretching out her hand and admiring it. “Yes.” She smiled and sighed. “My friend is, well, very generous.”

Normally this would've been my breaking point. I would've jumped out of bed and listed all the gifts she had received from all her men and pointed out that none of these relationships had ever amounted to anything more than a move across the state. Instead I kept my mouth shut and closed my eyes really tight as I tried to remember how it felt to float.

“I've made some mistakes. I know I have,” my mom said softly. “But you need to give me a break here. You're not my mother, Stef. You're my daughter. And you need to respect my decisions. And you need to trust me. I'm going to make a better life for us, Steffie. I promise.”

I was on top of the water, just bobbing along.

And it worked, it really worked.

Then Barbie said this: “So how was the party last night? Did you have fun?”

I pictured Keith's brilliant smile and the cute dimple on his chin and the way he said, “You just have to believe you can do it.” For some reason, it felt okay to lie.

“Yes, Mom. Everything was great.”





9


Alice (and other Tippecanoe Country Club employees) had a favorite saying: “A trip to Mr. Warthog's office is like a trip to the dentist.” Meaning it was unpleasant and you felt crappy afterward. (Most of the employees at Tippecanoe had bad teeth.)

There was only one reason why an employee was asked to Warthog's office midseason: to be fired. So even though I went to work on Monday morning in a love-lunacy-style schizoid mood (I had spent all of Sunday vacillating between these two thoughts: I love Keith McKnight and I hate myself), my mood was made even more not-so-fabulous when Mr. Warthog summoned me to his office. And it was made still worse by the fact that, when I opened the door, I saw that my mother was waiting for me too.

“Come in,” Mr. Warthog said, waving me in and motioning for me to take a seat next to Barbie.

Barbie's legs were nervously bouncing up and down. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest and she gave me one of her nasty “You're in big trouble” stares.

“Stef,” Mr. Warthog said. “I just got through explaining to your mother that a member has filed an official complaint regarding you. Apparently you were using the club pool when it was closed to the public. That is against Tippecanoe rules.”

Translation: Mora had ratted me out. Warthog had told my mother, who, unbeknownst to him, thought I had been called into work for some mysterious reason. I had been caught in flagrante delicto, so to speak.

“I could suspend you without pay, Stef,” he said solemnly.

“But you're not going to do that?” Barbie leaned forward and flashed him a toothy smile.

I could see him blush as he glanced from her pearly whites down to her giant boobs.

His pudgy face turned bright red as he swallowed. “No,” he said, with considerable difficulty. “I'm going to let it slide.”

My mother gave him a big “You're my hero” sigh.

With more considerable difficulty, Warthog turned away from Barbie and settled his beady little eyes back on me. “But no more, okay, Stef?”

All I could do was nod my head and mutter an “I'm sorry.”

“You don't mind if I talk to Steffie for a few minutes, do you?” Barbie asked.

Please mind, please mind, I willed.

“Of course not,” he said, practically beaming.

“Thank you so much, Mr. Warzog,” she said sweetly.

Then she grabbed my arm and yanked me out of his office and through the back door, to where the deliveries are made. She stopped and turned to face me. Her eyes were bulging and her neck was beginning to blotch. Even so, she still looked hot. “Are you crazy? You were in the water!” she shouted. “And you lied to me!”