Husky Read online

  Sophie and Allegra climb over the back of the couch and come to take a look too, but Allegra stays a lot more interested in her phone. Rosalinda passes out plates and everybody kneels up on the table to look as closely as they can at all the stuff. Hannah does too, still keeping a tight hold of my hand.

  “Poor Allegra, you’re really missing out,” Sophie says as she grabs the red velvet cupcake.

  “It’s no big deal. I don’t want all that sugar,” Allegra says, still typing on her phone. Sugar! She can’t have sugar either. How many ways can I go wrong with Allegra today? Should I go punch her dog or something? This is awful.

  I move a little closer to her and say, “I’m really sorry, Allegra, I didn’t know. I would have brought you something else. I mean, my mom makes gluten-free . . .” And almost every word I’m saying, just like Sophie said, Allegra mouths back at me. It’s small, so she’s not making big faces, like she would if she were making fun of me, but really, why else would you do that? And then because she does actually know the words that I am saying, right on cue, she looks up and puts her hand on my arm.

  “OMG, Do Not Worry. How would you know that, it’s not like we’re friends.” And she smiles this big floppy Ohyoupoorfatidiot smile at me and goes right back to her phone. And I look around to see if Ellen or Sophie or Charlie heard it. But so far no one else in the room even noticed what she just actually said to me. Allegra just actually out loud said to me that we are not friends. Just like that. “It’s not like we’re friends.” Just there. Just out there. And it is true, we’re not, but why would you say something like that if this was a person you wanted to be friends with? Allegra just word-punches me right in the gut, and no one even notices. No one. Hannah smiles, and Ellen’s eating and heading back over to destroy more evil zombies, and Sophie’s loving her red velvet, and Charlie is staring at me, but why? Only Hannah holds my hand and feels it get sort of clammy but just squeezes harder.

  You have to love someone like that.

  For being cool, Allegra doesn’t say much. At least not to me. It’s not like we’re friends. She’s mostly on her phone, and when she sees something funny or cool, she shows it to Sophie and only Sophie. Ellen doesn’t notice or care because she’s killing things, so is Charlie, but he keeps trying to talk to me. I give him just one-word answers. I can’t get caught in anything long, in case Sophie and Allegra want to talk to me. He keeps asking me how my summer was and if I’m ready to go back to school. I try to keep my short answers happy and interesting, hoping that something will grab Sophie’s and Allegra’s attention. But so far, nothing. Hannah moves her dolls around on the table, trying to get me in the mood to play, but I can’t. I’m not here for that.

  After a few minutes, Sophie turns her magazine around to me and says, “Don’t you know her?” and hands me the magazine. There’s a big picture of Renée Fleming, who’s one of my favorite opera singers. I love when Sophie does this stuff. It’s my red velvet.

  Allegra looks up from her phone, thinking probably that I must be a lot cooler than she thought if I know someone in a magazine. I guess she wants to make sure that I’m not. So she moves closer, just in case.

  “You, like, know know her?” Allegra says.

  “No, she’s an opera singer, right?” Sophie smiles.

  “She’s one of the best,” I say, looking down at Renée, who looks so happy and faraway, which is exactly where anything happy has to be at this moment, because it certainly isn’t here. Not on this couch with Allegra.

  “Davis is really into opera. He listens to it all the time. It’s pretty cool.” Sophie smiles at me, hoping I will say more, but I don’t.

  “Isn’t it just a bunch of fat people?” Allegra laughs.

  “She’s not fat,” Sophie says, pointing to Renée.

  “And isn’t it all in another language, or something?” Allegra asks.

  “Well, it comes with a book most times, or at least your records do, right?” Sophie tries again.

  “Yes, a libretto,” I say, still looking at Renée.

  “So you have to read to listen? That sounds like a lot,” says Allegra, going back to her phone.

  “It’s like a musical. You use the book just to find out what’s going on,” says Sophie.

  “My uncles Mark and Phil, they’re gay. They took me to see Wicked,” says Allegra. And then she looks at me, right at me, and says, “It sucked.” And as quickly as it happens, she’s gone again. Back to her phone, far away from here and these losers. Me, in particular.

  And that’s it, I hate her. Hate her. Forever. I want to put her in Ellen’s video game and let Ellen blow her up with all the other zombies. I want to force all the gluten I can get my hands on into her mouth and watch her puke or die or whatever would happen. I want her phone to explode in her face. I want her gone, and I want her gone now. It’s not like we’re friends. And the “sucked” was all about me. Not Wicked. Everyone knows Wicked is great. Charlie even tries to defend it, but that’s not the point. Not at all.

  Hannah stops moving her dolls and grabs my face, pushing it to hers, and smiles her biggest smile at me. Hannah always tries to save the day. But this time, she’s too late.

  CHAPTER 8

  I couldn’t stay for dinner at Ellen’s. Hannah started to cry a little until I promised that I would come over another day. I had to leave. Charlie wanted me to stay too. Sophie knew better and hugged me good-bye, but Allegra stayed.

  The thing that made me crazy was being not even a person to Allegra. Being nothing at all. She barely looked up at me, and the only person she ever really talked to was Sophie, all in this weird girl whisper, which sounds exactly like snakes. Honest. Snakes. That can’t mean they’re saying good things, right? And then her laugh, which is just gross, because it’s not really a laugh, she just opens her mouth and breathes. It’s fake. Fake and Mean and Awful and the Worst Evah. If I were assigning adjectives, those would all be hers.

  By the time I ride home, I’m sweaty and winded and all I want to do is go to bed. In the dark I want to lie there and stop thinking about everything and maybe listen to Aida. Maybe. Maybe just lie there. Sometimes with me, the quiet is just as big as an opera. Maybe bigger.

  But when I open the door, Nanny is standing there with her pocketbook in her hand and waiting for something. That something is me.

  “What time do you call this, now?” she says to me.

  “Was I supposed to be home?” I ask. I don’t think I was, really. I wouldn’t have forgotten, especially today. But before I can find out—

  “Look at the state of you. How can you go to Martinetti’s with me and the Mrs. like that?” She looks me over as she sucks her teeth. “Go upstairs and put on something, now, and don’t diddle around up there or we’ll be late and I won’t have it.”

  I start up the stairs two at a time, because when Nanny won’t have something, that’s pretty serious. I didn’t remember having to go with her to Martinetti’s tonight and especially with the Mrs. I would have remembered, because I would have been worried about it all day. But it would have been a great excuse to leave Ellen’s even earlier.

  The Mrs. are both nice and usually one at a time I can handle them, but the trouble starts when you put them all together, all three Mrs., it’s a lot. Too much, really. They all talk over each other and their accents are confusing, jumbled up all on top of one another. It’s a mess. And they always have a thousand questions for me, that I think they want the answers to. But they don’t wait for me to answer them. So for me it’s a night of nodding or looking off or apologizing to other tables with my eyes for all the noise. I either get really ignored or have to be at the center of three old ladies bickering for attention. Both sound pretty awful tonight. All I want to be is left alone.

  When I get upstairs, Mom’s door is shut, which is weird. Is she home? It’s Thursday. Is she coming with us? I would knock, but the whole thing is j
ust so unusual that I decide to leave her alone, whatever she’s doing. I grab a shirt and put it on. Something with buttons, which will make Nanny happy. Nanny thinks buttons are fancy. And a new pair of shorts, which she won’t like but that she’ll understand because it’s hot. I’m all ready quick, but I need to brush my teeth and comb my hair, or at least try. Maybe with a few fingers or something. I don’t want to knock, but I have to now.

  I walk slowly over to her door, and knock real lightly so that Nanny doesn’t hear and blow it. Three little light taps on the door. Too light, really. I knock again, a little harder, but not hard enough. I can hear the hair dryer, so she must be getting ready too. Is she coming with us? Because that would be so good. Mom knows how to handle the Mrs. best, a whole lot better than me. And if she is there, at least I’ll have someone to talk to.

  I wait until the hair dryer is done and knock again Then I hear clicks, the clicks of high heels, and the door opens to find Mom with a curling iron and a big smile. And a bra. And a slip. That’s it.

  “Hey, don’t you look nice,” Mom says.

  “Thanks,” I say, not looking up, because that is just not okay. “I just need to brush my teeth.”

  “Sure, c’mere,” Mom says as she walks back toward her bathroom with the curling iron still curling away. I follow her, looking only at her shoes. I would say she looks nice, because her shoes do, and the slip she’s wearing is pretty, but I feel like if I said, “Hey, Mom, you look really nice in your bra,” that would be so gross, she might tell me to leave and then I would never be able to brush my teeth. And I do need to go, or at least get out of here.

  “The Mrs. can’t wait to see you. Mrs. Zhang called earlier and asked if you were coming especially,” Mom says from the bathroom. I wait at the door.

  “Don’t you need to brush your teeth?” Mom smiles. “It’s okay. You can come in.” Mom laughs at this, probably thinking I’m silly or something. I mean, it’s just a bra. On my mother. A bra. That’s it.

  I walk over and grab my toothbrush and start to brush. I don’t look in the mirror even though it’s right in front of me, but Mom is in the mirror, bra and all, so I sort of look down and brush faster than I ever have before.

  “How was Ellen’s? Did you have fun?” asks Mom.

  “Yeah, it was fine,” I answer with the brush in my mouth.

  “What did you do?”

  How much does she want me to answer with the toothbrush in my mouth? I’m already foaming all over my face from her first question. But I keep brushing and try to talk through the bubbles, just getting out that we played video games and hung out. That’s it.

  “Nice. Was Sophie there? It’s her birthday soon. I’ll have to make her red velvet cake.”

  Maybe you won’t, because I’m not invited. At least to the Spa Day. Let her get her own cake with Allegra then. No gluten for either of them. I spit into the sink and look in the mirror to make sure I wipe off all the toothpaste, and when I do, Mom takes my face and squeezes my cheeks.

  “Look at this face. You’re getting so good-looking, Ducks,” she sort of Cookie Monster growls at me. It’s this voice she does when she likes something or right before she tells me something is about to get different. The voice is sort of swallowing, like it wants to bring you inside to get you comfortable. It sounds nice, but there’s definitely this feeling that she always wanted to eat me. I used to get a little scared of it, but sometimes it’s nice. I guess.

  Now is not one of those times.

  Mom bends down close to me and puts her head right next to mine, I guess to show me the cheekbones that she and I both have that I should be so proud of, she always tells me. But she says, “You know I love you more than anything else in the whole of this world and the next, don’t you?”

  She looks serious at me for a minute in the mirror, like she needs to say this before something terrible happens. I don’t know why she gets like this sometimes, sort of weepy about stuff. She doesn’t need to be. Honest. Every day I get notes about how much she loves me and little cakes and stuff. I think she gets worried that I don’t think that she does, because she has to work so much. But I never think that. Never once. I think she loves me the most, and especially tonight, since she’ll be saving me from the attack of the Mrs.

  Nanny yells up the stairs, “I’m counting till you get down here now, and this is not the way I want to spend my time this evening!” I start to rush out of the bathroom, but Mom doesn’t move, she just keeps curling her hair, like she hasn’t heard the threat of Nanny. She’s still just there, curling her hair, with no shirt on.

  “Ducks!” Nanny calls from down the stairs.

  “You better run, she’s counting,” Mom says, shivering from the yell.

  “Aren’t you coming?” I ask from the doorway.

  “No. I’m going out tonight.” Mom smiles. “I’ll be home later.”

  “If I have to count again!” Nanny threatens from three flights down. I run down, fast and pounding. By the time I get down she’s already at the door, waiting and counting. “You’re worse than your mother. Let’s go.”

  Maybe. But where is Mom going?

  Martinetti’s is an old Italian restaurant in Park Slope that Nanny has been going to for years. So many years, that they have her picture on the wall with Jock. It was their favorite place. Every time she comes, she goes over to the picture and smiles, and says, “Hello, Jock.”

  Jock was my grandfather’s nickname, but I never met anyone who ever called him anything else. Even me. Jock was quiet most of the time, except when he laughed, which he did a lot. Especially at Nanny. He thought she was the funniest woman alive. He would always say things like, “Why do I ever need to go to a show when I got all this at home?” and then would slap both his legs hard and walk around the table to her.

  That was Jock.

  People loved him, like people love Mom. They were always happy to see him, even if they didn’t know him. He was someone who you just had to smile at. I always did. When Jock died, it was like the whole house went quiet. Even Nanny couldn’t make a sound for days. I’d never seen her like that before. I’d never seen anyone like that before. Sad, but more like empty. Like everything in her got taken out, and she sat there, waiting for it to come back, and looking around to see if it would. It was the scariest thing I’d ever seen. Or heard.

  And then one morning Jock’s TV was blaring, and she was filled up again.

  Nanny still misses Jock. We all do. Jock helped Mom open the bakery and got her to make the rolls for Martinetti’s. He wanted her to do well. And he started the Blunder Wall, you can see some of his hands in the pictures. And his is the only face you can see in any of them. Jock wanted the best for Mom. And me. And especially Nanny. He asked Mom to stay there and look after her when he got sick. So we do. Even now.

  Mrs. Zhang already has a table in the back and waves to us to come. But first Nanny needs to say hello to everyone she knows in Martinetti’s, which is everybody. And it’s not just hello. It’s: How’s your father? How’s the boyfriend? How’re you doing with the balding? What’s the special? Did Tony make it or Ernesto? She knows everybody’s story and life, and she knows everything that goes on in the restaurant and only wants to know more. Or at least be kept up to date.

  Heather, who just started working there and sings in a band, takes us back to the table where Mrs. Zhang has already ordered us sodas, because she knows, like everyone else in Martinetti’s, what we’re going to order. We get the same thing every time.

  Mrs. Zhang likes me a lot. She thinks I’m very smart and polite, which I guess I am. I mean, I don’t feel like that most of the time, but I am to her. Mrs. Zhang also loves to touch my belly. Always. She rubs it a little, not in a creepy way, but in a friendly-head-pat way. But it’s not my head, it’s my fat. I don’t like it, but I don’t know how to say, Please stop touching me, without seeming like a freak. I don’t
like it because I want to forget that my stomach’s there. I don’t want to think about it. And that’s hard when someone pats it as a reminder.

  “You look so good, Davis. So nice. So healthy,” Mrs. Zhang says, patting my belly. “Everyone here will be so jealous we have such a handsome boy with us tonight, won’t they, Maeve?”

  Handsome is an old-lady word for Good-Looking. They think it means Hot, but it really just means Okay. Like a pair of boots, or a nice table. It’s not really a word for people—or it shouldn’t be.

  “Well, it took him long enough to get mucked up like this. Honestly, I don’t know another boy I’ve ever seen take so long to get ready,” Nanny complains. She had to count to forty-five, which in her mind means she can complain about me at least that many times tonight.

  “He wanted to look nice for us, that’s not a bad thing,” says Mrs. Zhang. “At least he tries. My Phillip . . .”

  And off they go. Phillip is Mrs. Zhang’s son who works in Manhattan, studying to be a doctor, and lives in a little studio apartment and doesn’t use his oven at all. It’s never even been on once. The subject changes to how people don’t know how to take their time or enjoy themselves. Which means it’s going to be a very long dinner. Everything—the world—according to them, is just blips and taps on cell phones. Cell phones they have and barely know how to work so why are they complaining anyway? I wish someone would give one to me. I’d rather be part of the world.

  Mrs. Martinez is late, but they don’t usually mind. Mrs. Martinez has babies that she watches for her neighbors during the day and sometimes at night. It’s her excuse, and it’s nice for her. She really likes babies. A lot. And when she likes you, she sort of treats you like a baby. I thought it was just me, but it’s everyone. I once saw her tuck a napkin into Nanny’s shirt like it was a bib. Nanny smiled and then took it out. She and Mrs. Zhang both smiled and said, “It’s all right, Maria. We’re grown-ups.” Mrs. Martinez smiled a little and then got embarrassed. She never did it again.