Darling Rose Gold, page 2
The teenage boy pointed at my name tag. “Okay, I cheated. I’m Brandon,” he said.
I stared at Brandon, afraid anything I said would make him go away. He held eye contact—did I have something on my face? I grabbed his items off the conveyor belt: a video game with a soldier holding a gun on its cover and four bags of peanut M&M’s.
Brandon kept talking. “I go to Deadwick High.”
He was younger than me. I was already eighteen and had my GED.
“Okay,” I said. I was supposed to say something else. Why was someone as cute as Brandon talking to me in the first place?
“Did you go to DHS?”
I scratched my nose so my hand would cover my teeth. “I was homeschooled.”
“Cool.” Brandon smiled at his feet. “I was wondering if you’d go out with me.”
“Where?” I asked, bewildered.
He laughed. “Like, on a date.”
I scanned the empty store. Brandon stood there, hands in his pockets, waiting for an answer. I thought of Phil, my online boyfriend.
“I don’t know.”
“Come on,” Brandon said. “I promise I don’t bite.”
He leaned over the counter when he said this. Our faces were a foot apart. Tiny freckles dotted his nose. He smelled like boy soap. My heart started doing puppy jumps. I could finally get my first kiss. Did it count as cheating if you’d never met your online boyfriend in person?
Brandon winked, then closed his eyes. How was this so easy for him? I should close my eyes too. But what if I missed his mouth and kissed his nose? Eyes open, then. Should I use my tongue? The magazines said to sometimes use tongue. But not teeth. Never teeth.
My teeth.
I couldn’t let him that close to my teeth. Plus, Scott might see us. Our faces were now inches apart. I had been leaning over the counter without realizing it. I was going to mess up. I wasn’t ready. I jerked my head back.
“Not a great time,” I mumbled.
He opened his eyes and cocked his head. “What’d you say?”
“I said it’s not a great time.” I held my breath.
He waved me off. “I didn’t even suggest a time. Are you busy forever?”
I was never busy, but that wasn’t the right answer. I cracked my knuckles and tried to swallow. My throat was dry.
Brandon raised his eyebrows. “Are you gonna make me beg?”
I imagined spending the next forty-eight hours reliving every word of this conversation. I just had to get out before I screwed up. I tucked a strand of hair—short and stringy—behind my ear. “I’m sorry,” I said to his T-shirt.
Brandon took a step back from the counter. His cheeks turned pink. I watched his smile morph into a sneer. I must have said the wrong thing. I flinched, waiting.
“Are you busy pretending to need a wheelchair?”
My mouth fell open. My hand covered it.
“And you think you can hide those teeth? They’re fucking disgusting. You’re fucking disgusting,” Brandon hissed.
Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry.
“I only asked you out because my friend dared me,” he said. On cue, an overjoyed boy popped out from behind register two. Tears began to well in my eyes.
“Like you could reject me?” Brandon scoffed, and strolled off with his plastic Gadget World bag. His friend high-fived him. The first fat tear escaped and rolled down my cheek.
As soon as they left, I speed-walked away from my register, ignoring Arnie’s stare. I thought about Maleficent and Jafar and Cruella de Vil and Scar and Captain Hook: the bad guys always lost in the end.
The break room was empty. I closed the door and locked it.
I hadn’t sobbed that hard since I’d heard my mother’s verdict two months ago.
* * *
• • •
After work I carefully drove Mom’s beat-up van nine miles to my apartment. I’d gotten my driver’s license two months ago with the help of Mom’s former best friend, Mary Stone, who had signed me up for a driver-education course, then taken me to the DMV for my written exam and behind-the-wheel test. The DMV clerk said I was the first person to get a perfect score that month. Sometimes I got in the van and drove in circles around the block, just because I could.
I parked outside my apartment complex. Once I got the cashier job at Gadget World, Mrs. Stone had also helped me search for cheap rentals in Deadwick. Sheridan Apartments was a run-down four-story building—Mrs. Stone said it had been built when she was a kid. Sometimes I had little mouse visitors, but rent was less than four hundred dollars a month. Mrs. Stone said this was a good starter home for me. I wasn’t sure what I was starting.
I locked the car doors and headed toward the building. My phone vibrated in my pocket as I walked up the concrete path. I made sure to think of Brandon while I stepped on every crack.
Phil: Chat tonight?
Me: Yes please, rough day
Phil: What happened?
Inside, I kicked off my boots and headed straight for the bathroom scale. Since moving out of Mom’s house nine months ago, I’d gained thirty pounds. Recently my weight had plateaued. I looked down. Still one hundred and two.
I avoided the mirror as I left the room. I didn’t have the energy to go through the whole routine. (Step one: check whether the whitening strips were working. I rated every tooth on a scale of one to ten, then recorded each tooth’s score in a small notebook so I could track improvements. Step two: use a cloth measuring tape to check how much my hair had grown. I’d tried fish oil pills, biotin, and vitamins, but nothing worked; my hair still wouldn’t grow any faster. Step three: scan myself from head to toe, body part by body part, and catalogue the things I didn’t like. I kept a running inventory in my head so I knew what needed to be worked on.) I tried not to do the routine more than once a day and avoided it altogether on bad days like this one. I turned off the bathroom light. I was hungry.
In the kitchen, I threw a frozen Tex-Mex mac-and-cheese dinner in the microwave and leaned against the counter. I read the meal description on the box and wondered what “chorizo sausage” tasted like. Since moving into my own place, I had mostly lived off of cereal and frozen dinners. I’d been trying to teach myself how to cook, but I kept getting the timing wrong—burning vegetables or undercooking rice. I missed having someone around to prepare my meals, even when they were PediaSure. Sometimes I lit little votive candles to make dinnertime fancy like Mom used to do.
The microwave beeped, and I took out the mac and cheese. Still standing at the counter, I ripped the plastic wrap off the macaroni and dropped the pasta gently into my mouth, pressing the cool tines of the fork against my tongue. Curly noodles coated with Pepper Jack cheese slid smoothly down my throat, confident of their one-way travel. Bread crumbs crunched between my molars. Then the spice hit me—chorizo had a kick to it! My eyes watered. Goose bumps popped up on my arms. I would never tire of all these new flavors.
I opened the fridge and pulled out a Lunchables meal and a gallon of chocolate milk. I thought about chugging from the carton, until I pictured her lava stare. I poured the milk into a glass instead.
Me: Some high school kid came into the store and acted like an a-hole
I thrilled over my casual use of “a-hole.” Swearing hadn’t been allowed before.
Me: I’m over it
Me: How was your day?
I’d always hoped I was being hard on myself. Everyone else couldn’t think I was as ugly as I feared. But Brandon did. My scrawny body looked more like a six-year-old boy’s than a woman’s. I had no boobs. My teeth were jagged and rotten. Even after putting on thirty pounds, I was still too thin, still couldn’t fill a bus seat. No one considered me beautiful, not even Mom, who was always careful to call me a beautiful soul, but never beautiful. She chose the worst times to be honest.
Phil: Sorry about the jerk
Phil: My day was snowy ;-)
Phil had moved to Colorado a couple years ago so he could snowboard more often. He had convinced his parents to let him live at his aunt and uncle’s cabin in the foothills of the Front Range, forty-five miles southwest of Denver. This rebel streak plus his romantic interest in me had been enough to pull me in. He also helped me figure out what Mom was doing to me, so he pretty much saved my life. We met in a singles chat room when I was sixteen, soon after I convinced Mom to get the Internet to help with my schoolwork. She only let me online for thirty minutes a day, but I snuck on after she was asleep to talk to Phil. Now, two and a half years later, we were texting daily. No calls or video chats, though. I wasn’t good at conversations on the fly. With texts I had time to prepare my responses. I couldn’t risk losing him.
After tossing the empty macaroni tub in the garbage, I carried my Lunchables to the living room. I sat on one of the BarcaLoungers Mom had bought years ago at a garage sale and popped up the footrest. I stacked a square of cheddar and a piece of turkey atop a cracker, then paused. Was my stomach noodley, or was I imagining things?
Out loud I said, “Nothing is wrong with the macaroni.”
I picked up the DVDs on the side table: Alice in Wonderland and Pinocchio. As a kid I’d only been allowed to watch three movies—Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast—so I’d been making up for lost time. So far I had worked my way through half of the library’s collection of Disney movies. None of them could beat my all-time favorite, The Little Mermaid—I’d watched it thirty times. I was trying to get to thirty-three, for good luck.
But a movie wasn’t what I wanted. I studied my khakis and blue uniform shirt. Tomorrow I’d be wearing the exact same outfit, straightening the same stack of magazines, refilling the same kiosk for the next a-hole who came into Gadget World to tell me how gross I was.
What if Brandon came back to the store? What if I ran into him at the gas station or while buying groceries?
Maybe I was overreacting. I had a boyfriend and a full-time job and my own apartment. I’d been to a dentist, who said with some extractions and an implant-supported bridge, I could have beautiful white teeth. Since then, I’d started saving fifty dollars from every paycheck to put toward my new smile. I was making progress, so what was one hot guy’s opinion? Brandon was nobody to me.
“You are not disgusting,” I said, sick and fidgety. I didn’t believe me.
I wasn’t ready for a move to a new city. I’d spent most of my life in the same town house, only leaving for doctors’ appointments, visits with our neighbors, and school until Mom had pulled me out. Even though a lot of the people in Deadwick annoyed me, at least they were familiar faces. I could hold it together as long as I had our brown recliners, the corner grocery, and Mrs. Stone—known for her oatmeal cookies and eternal optimism—a five-minute drive away. A move was too big. But a short change of scenery could work.
Make a list, Mom whispered. Here were all the people I knew who didn’t live in Deadwick: Mom; Alex, who lived in Chicago; and Phil, who was all the way in Colorado. Phil and I had never suggested meeting. Face-to-face meant no more fantasies. If Phil met me, he might call me disgusting too. He might even break up with me. Still, the ants in my pants wouldn’t shut up.
I drafted the text for forty-five minutes before settling on the most straightforward approach.
Me: How would you feel about me coming to visit? :-)
Me: I need to leave home for a little while
The three dots hovered, floating on my screen. He was typing and typing and typing. I tugged at a hangnail. Don’t get balloon hopes.
Phil: Now’s not a great time. Sorry babe
Phil: Maybe in a few months?
I let out the breath I’d been holding. I didn’t dare ask why now wasn’t a great time, but instead made another list: Possible Reasons My Boyfriend Does Not Want to Meet Me. Maybe he had another girlfriend. Maybe I was the mistress. Maybe he wasn’t allowed to date. Maybe he didn’t know how to snowboard. Maybe he was uglier in real life than in his photo. Maybe he knew deep down I wasn’t the cute girl he hoped I was—although I’d given him a fake name to stop him from finding me.
The run-in with Brandon was the closest I had come to my first kiss. Eighteen was too old to still be waiting—I had learned that much from the pages of Seventeen. I decided to keep working on Phil. He was my best shot. Besides, if we were meant to be together, didn’t we have to meet at some point?
I drummed my fingers on the recliner’s arm, racking my brain for another way out. I could visit Chicago. For months my best friend and Mrs. Stone’s daughter, Alex, had offered to show me around. Gas for a three-hour drive wouldn’t cost that much.
On my phone I opened the conversation with Alex. “I think I might come visit!” I typed. I tapped the little blue arrow and chewed my lip.
I scrolled through our chat. Alex hadn’t responded to the last three texts I’d sent her. I would have been worried if she wasn’t posting on social media sites every day, detailing how much fun she was having with her city friends. Over the past few months, I had been studying some of these sites to figure out how they worked. I even mustered the nerve to create my own account on one, but I still hadn’t posted anything. I couldn’t decide on a profile picture.
I glanced at the movie rentals again, but instead inserted my copy of The Little Mermaid—the one movie I owned—into the DVD player.
Thirty minutes in, Alex still hadn’t responded. For once, Scuttle and Sebastian couldn’t distract me. I kept imagining the word “DISGUSTING” as a neon sign floating over my head, with two blinking arrows pointing at me. The word tattooed itself across my forehead and cheeks, inside my mouth. I pulled my zebra-striped fleece tie blanket—the one Mom had made for me—up to my chin. The word followed me there, pounding in my ears. I imagined it drifting along the blood in my veins and shook my head to fling the thoughts away. I should have ignored Brandon or kept flipping through that magazine.
The magazine. I grabbed my phone again and scrolled through old e-mails. I found the one from Vinny King, the writer for Chit Chat who had sent me multiple interview requests in exchange for a couple hundred bucks. I scanned it again.
All the media has done is paint you as a weak, victimized little girl—isn’t it time you set the record straight?
Back then I believed in fate. I thought everything happened for a reason.
When Vinny King had first contacted me, I’d still had the feeding tube. I’d just moved out of our town house to Mrs. Stone’s place. Social services had assigned me a therapist. Reporters were camped outside of every building where they thought I might be hiding. By the time I testified against Mom, I was barely holding it together. I wanted to publicly separate the facts from the lies, but an interview with the old Rose Gold would have been a disaster. I could see the headlines laughing that the daughter was as crazy as her mother. They were bad enough as it was: MOTHER SHOWS NO REMORSE FOR STARVING DAUGHTER.
But that was then.
Now I was stable. Nothing was perfect, of course. Like, I was maybe a little too fixated on my weight. I still couldn’t eat certain foods without feeling nauseated, although I was pretty sure the sickness was in my head. I was bad at talking to kids my own age. Jerks like Brandon still brought me to my knees.
Maybe I wasn’t ready to talk about the memories I’d done such a good job bottling up over the last year. But I could either keep taking abuse from people who knew nothing about me, or I could tell my side of the story. The media were no longer interested in Mom and me; I hadn’t heard from Vinny in months. But maybe I could convince him to hear me out. Then I could use the money from the interview for my teeth. Or to visit Phil in Colorado.
Alex still hadn’t responded to my text. On the TV, Ariel agreed to give up her voice.
I dialed Vinny King’s number before I could change my mind. The phone rang. I gazed at my shoes. The laces had come untied.
She was thinking of me.
3
Patty
I stride across the parking lot toward my daughter. Rose Gold jumps down from the driver’s seat, her five-foot frame dwarfed by the big van. A woman of twenty-three has replaced the gangly teenager I raised. Her hair is straight and limp, a dull shade somewhere between blond and brown. Her small upturned nose gives her the appearance of a mouse. She wears baggy jeans and a huge crewneck sweatshirt. She darts toward me with that same tiptoe gait she’s always had, as if the concrete is covered with hot coals. She looks healthy, normal.
Except for those teeth.
Her teeth protrude from her gums every which way, like old tombstones in a cemetery. They are a range of yellows, from eggnog to Dijon mustard. At the roots some are the color of mud; at the tops they are uneven, jagged. She is smiling—nay, grinning—at me, and I’m reminded of a jack-o’-lantern. To others, her teeth may be hideous. To me, they tell a story. They remind me of the decades of stomach acid corroding the enamel. Her teeth are a testament to her courage.
We meet in the middle of the parking lot. She reaches for me first.
“You’re free,” she says.
“You’re a mother,” I say.
We hold each other for a few moments. I count to five, not wanting to seem overeager or arouse suspicion. “Can I meet the little guy?”
Rose Gold pulls back from the embrace. She eyes me brightly but wariness slips through. “Of course,” she says. I follow her to the van. She yanks open the back door.
There he is, waiting in his car seat. Eyes darting, legs kicking: our little Adam. Just two months old.
On impulse, I reach for his stockinged foot and coo at him. He gurgles at me, then sticks his tongue out. I laugh, delighted.
