Reality Boy

“I can’t figure out what that makes Mom,” I say.

“I think it makes her the mother of a psychopath,” she says. Then she laughs and I miss her laugh so much.

“I miss you,” I say.

“Me, too,” she says. “I don’t miss being there, though. Obviously.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“You mean for tonight?”

“Tonight. Tomorrow. Life,” she says.

“I don’t know,” I say. I demand to run away with the circus. “I have a girlfriend.”

“That’s great!” she says. “What’s her name?”

My phone buzzes with a text. I tell Lisi to wait a second and I see it’s from Dad. Get out of there now. I’m calling the police. That’s what the text says.

“Shit,” I say. “That’s a text from Dad. He’s calling the police. I have to get out of here.”

“Do you have somewhere to go?”

“Sure. I have a mountain of friends who will open their door to me at ten o’clock at night.” I grab my school backpack and shove in a few days’ worth of clothing.

“No. Seriously.”

“I’ll be fine,” I say. “Talk to you soon. I gotta go.”

“Love you, Gerald,” she says.

“Love you, too.”

I say that as I’m walking out my bedroom door and Tasha hears it because she happens to be standing right outside my bedroom door like some kind of stalker.

“That your girlfriend?” she asks.

I pull my door closed so it locks and run past her toward the stairs. She grabs my arm. I wiggle free and get down the stairs. In seventeen years, I’ve learned the fine art of avoiding Tasha chasing me down the stairs.

“Dude!” she says. “Just stop. There’s this girl. I want you to meet her.”

On my way toward the door, I swing through the kitchen to get some food from the fridge. I know Mom made a big bowl of chicken salad and I swim through the drunk people to get to it.

As I grab the plastic bowl and a loaf of bread, someone is shoved into my back. I turn around to face a black-haired, henna-tattooed girl who can’t be more than fifteen. Tasha’s behind her and I can tell she’s responsible.

The girl is wavering-drunk. She smiles. Tasha says, “She really likes you. She’s just too shy to tell you at school.”

I don’t recognize her from school.

The girl lurches forward and kisses me, with Tasha so close her hand is nearly up the girl’s ass like some sort of evil puppeteer, making her kiss me.

I keep my mouth shut and try to get out of her grip, but Tasha is egging her on. Do it, Stacy! Kiss him! It’s a dare, I bet. Kiss the Crapper. I manage to twist myself away and head toward the doorway to the living room.

That’s where I run into Jacko the fake Jamaican. He’s smiling at me the way he used to at the gym before I kicked his ass. His face is still a mass of bruises, lumps, and cuts. I smile back because I’m still proud I did that to him.

“That’s my little girlfriend you just kissed, ass**le,” he says.

It’s the last thing I hear before he jumps on me.

Everything goes white. I don’t feel anything. I am eating ice cream with Lisi on a trapeze. I am tap dancing with a bluebird on my shoulder. The only sound from reality that seeps through to Gersday is Tasha’s incessant laughter.

I demand to never hear that laughter again.

49

I’M NOT SURE what happened, but I find myself on top of Jacko the fake Jamaican, pounding my fist into his face. My fist is sticky. I can feel my skin stick to his skin for the split second when I pull away and make contact again.

Someone drags me off him.

He’s conscious, but startled. His black-haired girlfriend is crying.

Tasha is still laughing.

I demand that Tasha stop laughing.

I lunge at her and grab her neck, which stops her laughing. She looks at me with crazy, fear-filled eyes. Part homicidal, part wounded forest animal. I think about what Lisi told me on the phone. I think about going to court for killing a psychopath. I think about how the psychopath’s mother has spent her whole life defending her little psychopath. Then I think about all that footage of my crapping, crapping, crapping. No jury in their right minds would choose the Crapper over Tasha.

I let her go and grab my backpack, my bowl of chicken salad, and the now-crushed loaf of bread and run out the door and down the packed driveway to my car. I drive away with the bowl of chicken salad between my legs so it doesn’t tip over. I don’t look back.

The road is bubble-gum ice cream. It’s white with different-colored gum balls in it. It’s bumpy. I put in Hannah’s CD and crank the volume to louder-than-a-bomb. It makes my eardrums vibrate so much, I get buzzing in my ears, so I turn it down. I feel something like sweat running down my cheek, and I wipe it with my hand and find it’s stickier than sweat.

“It’s blood, Gerald,” Snow White says. “You should pull over and make sure you’re not hurt.”

“I don’t know where I am,” I say.

“You’re near the shopping center. You can pull into the car park,” she says. Snow White smiles a lot. She seems happy to live in a fairy tale. She seems happy to do all that housework for all those messy little dwarfs.

“How come you don’t teach those little bastards how to do stuff for themselves?” I ask her. “They should know how to do shit for themselves.”

Snow White looks confused. “Up here to the left, Gerald. Put on your indicator and get in the lane.”

I put on my turn signal and get in the left-turn lane. The lane is made of butterscotch ripple. I want to put the hand brake on and get out and lick the road.

“Light’s green. Turn now, Gerald.”

I turn and find a huge, empty parking lot. The mall is beyond closed, and the only vehicles driving around here now are security trucks. I still see ice cream and Snow White.

She turns on the interior light and I open my sun visor’s mirror. I see a small cut on my eyebrow. Snow White hands me the first-aid kit from the glove compartment and I open it.

“You’re going to need a plaster for that,” she says.

I look at her. “Say that again?”

“I said you-ah going to need a plast-ah for that, Gerald.”

I pull out a Band-Aid and stick it on the cut. It’s not bleeding that badly. I look myself over in the mirror and see that my nose has been bleeding, too, but as far as I can tell, no lumps or brokenness anywhere. I still feel kinda numb. I am so high on adrenaline, I have a spongy feeling all over my body.

o;I can’t figure out what that makes Mom,” I say.

“I think it makes her the mother of a psychopath,” she says. Then she laughs and I miss her laugh so much.

“I miss you,” I say.

“Me, too,” she says. “I don’t miss being there, though. Obviously.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“You mean for tonight?”

“Tonight. Tomorrow. Life,” she says.

“I don’t know,” I say. I demand to run away with the circus. “I have a girlfriend.”

“That’s great!” she says. “What’s her name?”

My phone buzzes with a text. I tell Lisi to wait a second and I see it’s from Dad. Get out of there now. I’m calling the police. That’s what the text says.

“Shit,” I say. “That’s a text from Dad. He’s calling the police. I have to get out of here.”

“Do you have somewhere to go?”

“Sure. I have a mountain of friends who will open their door to me at ten o’clock at night.” I grab my school backpack and shove in a few days’ worth of clothing.

“No. Seriously.”

“I’ll be fine,” I say. “Talk to you soon. I gotta go.”

“Love you, Gerald,” she says.

“Love you, too.”

I say that as I’m walking out my bedroom door and Tasha hears it because she happens to be standing right outside my bedroom door like some kind of stalker.

“That your girlfriend?” she asks.

I pull my door closed so it locks and run past her toward the stairs. She grabs my arm. I wiggle free and get down the stairs. In seventeen years, I’ve learned the fine art of avoiding Tasha chasing me down the stairs.

“Dude!” she says. “Just stop. There’s this girl. I want you to meet her.”

On my way toward the door, I swing through the kitchen to get some food from the fridge. I know Mom made a big bowl of chicken salad and I swim through the drunk people to get to it.

As I grab the plastic bowl and a loaf of bread, someone is shoved into my back. I turn around to face a black-haired, henna-tattooed girl who can’t be more than fifteen. Tasha’s behind her and I can tell she’s responsible.

The girl is wavering-drunk. She smiles. Tasha says, “She really likes you. She’s just too shy to tell you at school.”

I don’t recognize her from school.

The girl lurches forward and kisses me, with Tasha so close her hand is nearly up the girl’s ass like some sort of evil puppeteer, making her kiss me.

I keep my mouth shut and try to get out of her grip, but Tasha is egging her on. Do it, Stacy! Kiss him! It’s a dare, I bet. Kiss the Crapper. I manage to twist myself away and head toward the doorway to the living room.

That’s where I run into Jacko the fake Jamaican. He’s smiling at me the way he used to at the gym before I kicked his ass. His face is still a mass of bruises, lumps, and cuts. I smile back because I’m still proud I did that to him.

“That’s my little girlfriend you just kissed, ass**le,” he says.

It’s the last thing I hear before he jumps on me.

Everything goes white. I don’t feel anything. I am eating ice cream with Lisi on a trapeze. I am tap dancing with a bluebird on my shoulder. The only sound from reality that seeps through to Gersday is Tasha’s incessant laughter.

I demand to never hear that laughter again.

49

I’M NOT SURE what happened, but I find myself on top of Jacko the fake Jamaican, pounding my fist into his face. My fist is sticky. I can feel my skin stick to his skin for the split second when I pull away and make contact again.

Someone drags me off him.

He’s conscious, but startled. His black-haired girlfriend is crying.

Tasha is still laughing.

I demand that Tasha stop laughing.

I lunge at her and grab her neck, which stops her laughing. She looks at me with crazy, fear-filled eyes. Part homicidal, part wounded forest animal. I think about what Lisi told me on the phone. I think about going to court for killing a psychopath. I think about how the psychopath’s mother has spent her whole life defending her little psychopath. Then I think about all that footage of my crapping, crapping, crapping. No jury in their right minds would choose the Crapper over Tasha.

I let her go and grab my backpack, my bowl of chicken salad, and the now-crushed loaf of bread and run out the door and down the packed driveway to my car. I drive away with the bowl of chicken salad between my legs so it doesn’t tip over. I don’t look back.

The road is bubble-gum ice cream. It’s white with different-colored gum balls in it. It’s bumpy. I put in Hannah’s CD and crank the volume to louder-than-a-bomb. It makes my eardrums vibrate so much, I get buzzing in my ears, so I turn it down. I feel something like sweat running down my cheek, and I wipe it with my hand and find it’s stickier than sweat.

“It’s blood, Gerald,” Snow White says. “You should pull over and make sure you’re not hurt.”

“I don’t know where I am,” I say.

“You’re near the shopping center. You can pull into the car park,” she says. Snow White smiles a lot. She seems happy to live in a fairy tale. She seems happy to do all that housework for all those messy little dwarfs.

“How come you don’t teach those little bastards how to do stuff for themselves?” I ask her. “They should know how to do shit for themselves.”

Snow White looks confused. “Up here to the left, Gerald. Put on your indicator and get in the lane.”

I put on my turn signal and get in the left-turn lane. The lane is made of butterscotch ripple. I want to put the hand brake on and get out and lick the road.

“Light’s green. Turn now, Gerald.”

I turn and find a huge, empty parking lot. The mall is beyond closed, and the only vehicles driving around here now are security trucks. I still see ice cream and Snow White.

She turns on the interior light and I open my sun visor’s mirror. I see a small cut on my eyebrow. Snow White hands me the first-aid kit from the glove compartment and I open it.

“You’re going to need a plaster for that,” she says.

I look at her. “Say that again?”

“I said you-ah going to need a plast-ah for that, Gerald.”

I pull out a Band-Aid and stick it on the cut. It’s not bleeding that badly. I look myself over in the mirror and see that my nose has been bleeding, too, but as far as I can tell, no lumps or brokenness anywhere. I still feel kinda numb. I am so high on adrenaline, I have a spongy feeling all over my body.