Buckskin Cocaine Page 9

  “You came! You never come!” His name was Jamie and he was a friend of Shaun’s. I let him take me by my hand and pull. He shut the old, wooden door behind me. “Let me get you a drink. You like beer? Or something, uh, classier? Like vodka? Let me get you some vodka!” I smiled and began following behind him. As we rounded the corner towards the kitchen, I could see that the house was packed with people, drunk, loud people, all screaming over the music at each other, some of them dancing, some of them sitting on old, patterned couches in the corner of the house. I hesitated, and he turned around and smiled and pulled gently, and I let him lead me into the kitchen. He was a football player, and my hand was swallowed by his meaty palm, my arm looking like a long, muscular stick extending out from his, though he wasn’t much taller than I was.

  In the kitchen, we were surrounded by people. My high school was big, so it wasn’t any surprise that I didn’t recognize anyone. But I felt awkward since I never went to parties. I was quiet, thin, had a way with boys, and only talked to jocks. If anyone did recognize me, I can’t imagine they would want to socialize. And what would I say if they did? When the boys would talk about their dreams after high school, about their injuries, about how hard their coaches were on them, I could relate. But except for the occasional female friend, like Sabrina, my concerns were hardly the same as the average high school student. I smiled as Jamie handed me a plastic cup full of vodka and sipped delicately from it.

  “Good, right?” I nodded and sipped again.

  “So, where are you going for college?” I asked. I knew Jamie wanted to play college football, had already been given a couple of really good offers, scholarships.

  “I’m thinking University of Iowa,” he said, drinking half a can of Bud in one gulp.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah, they’re gonna give me a full ride. I mean, and I’m not that bad at school. I’m not one of those jerks who expect to slide. I mean, I’m not like a rocket scientist or anything, and believe me, if I get to play pro I will, but I know this could be it. I plan to take full advantage. I’m gonna major in business, and start my own if the pro thing doesn’t happen,” he said. He looked at me like a satisfied puppy.

  “That’s a great plan,” I said.

  “What about you?”

  “Well…I’m just going to try to get into the best dance school I can in New York and go from there,” I said, sipping more vodka and looking around. A girl ran into the kitchen yelling and laughing, a boy behind her. They both stopped at the keg and pumped beers for each other, the boy slapping her ass in mid-pump. She squealed in mock rage.

  “Hey, wanna meet some of my friends? We’ve met through various games and other sporting events over the years. Not all of them are football players. A couple basketball players, some runners, you know.”

  “Sounds dangerous,” I said and Jamie laughed.

  The music grew louder as we left the kitchen and entered the living room, the smell and noise of young, wild humans filling the air. Jamie walked over to one of the couches, threading his way with his enormous bulk through the crowd. There was a group of boys sitting on the couch, and they seemed to be happy, laughing and talking easily.

  “Hey,” Jamie said, “This is Olivia.”

  “Hi,” I said and they all nodded and a few reached up to shake my hand.

  “So, you…play basketball?” One of them asked me. He was a tall, lanky guy who looked like he definitely played basketball.

  “No. Actually, ballet. I mean, I don’t play ballet, I perform it,” I said, regretting the way that had come out of my mouth.

  “Oh. Well. You look sorta like a basketball player,” he said, “tall and strong.”

  “I could definitely wrestle you if I had to,” I said, sipping my vodka. They all laughed. I liked to say flirtatious things.

  The boys began talking about the last basketball game they’d watched together and I began to drift. This is where what I had in common with jocks faded. I was more into my French class, into reading the books my friend Sabrina recommended. Though I did like watching sports, as long as no one asked me to engage too thoroughly. I sipped at my vodka for a bit, thinking about the homework I should be doing, about how upset my daddy would be if he knew where I was when I realized that I was being watched. I came out of my reverie and looked down at the couch, where a tall, smaller-framed boy was sitting, his legs crossed, his gaze directed up at my face. I blinked.

  “Hello,” he said, I’m Tomás.”

  “Olivia.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  I looked down at him. He seemed very arrogant. I didn’t like arrogant men. They were much harder to control. I looked away and into the party, wondering how I would duck out. What excuses I could make that wouldn’t upset Jaime.

  “Have you seen Shaun?” I asked Jaime, tapping on his massive shoulder.

  “Oh, yeah, he was here. But he left about an hour ago with that chick…Oh, shit, whatsername? She’s a cheerleader. Red hair.”

  “Ah,” I said. It would be easy for me to go. I sipped a little more on the vodka. “Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ Thang,” started thumping through the air. I liked hip-hop, but I wasn’t very good at it. You had to be strong in a different way. I was about to tell Jaime that I was getting tired, that I had ballet the next day when I was interrupted by Tomás.

  “So, dancers are strong?”

  I looked down at him. I felt irritated. He smiled.

  “Yes.”

  “But you’re so skinny.”

  “But I’m very, very strong. And besides, that’s the way it works in ballet,” I said impatiently, turning back to Jaime, who was high-fiving one of his friends and laughing.

  “I know it does.”

  I looked back down at Tomás, my irritation growing.

  “You know what does?”

  “That it works that way in ballet,” he said, leaning further back into the couch as if he was sitting by the fireside in an extremely expensive restaurant. He was a good looking guy, his rich black hair curling ever so slightly.

  “Then why did you ask me?”

  “To get a little rise out of a dancer.”

  My eyes narrowed. “What is your problem?”

  He smiled. “Sit by me.”

  I was incredulous. “Why on God’s green earth would I do that? So you can spend more time getting a rise out of me?”

  He laughed. “Yes. Plus, my mother was a dancer. Ballet.”

  “Well, doesn’t someone have mommy issues,” I said, thinking this would surely piss him off.

  “Oh, definitely. I have mommy issues you can’t imagine. Let me tell you all about them,” he said, patting the couch.

  I sighed with exasperation and turned to Jaime, who was still occupied with his buddies. He was describing a pass with great animation.

  “Give me a chance,” Tomás said. “You won’t regret it.”

  “I already regret it.”

  “You’re sharp. I like you,” he said, drinking out of his red cup. “Sit down and I’ll get you another of whatever you’re drinking.”

  “No. I have to go. I have practice tomorrow, and I never come to these things anyway.”

  “Me either, but I thought, why not? I’m graduating. And you’re only young once.”

  “You’re a very strange boy,” I said.

  “Yes. I am. Now let me get you a drink. Let me redeem myself. I can’t help teasing you. You’re clearly so used to getting your way.”

  I turned to leave and he stood up and touched me on the arm. I looked back like an angry cat, ready to pounce.

  “Can’t you take a challenge?” he asked.

  “Certainly, though I think you’re not trying to challenge me, but piss me off. What I can’t figure out is why.”

  “Maybe because I like you.”

  I laughed. “You hardly know me. And I’m not a very easy person to know. Or a very nice one, once you do get to know me.”

  “I doubt that very much.”

  I
turned to Jaime. “Hey Jamie,” I said, tapping insistently on his arm, “I’ve got to go. Ballet tomorrow.”

  Jaime looked sad. But he understood.

  “Goodbye, Tomás,” I said curtly.

  Tomás shrugged and sat down.

  As I walked out, I thought about Tomás, about boys like him. Why were they so determined to reach inside and grab at something only because it was unknown to them? It was as if they simply couldn’t stand it when someone didn’t just roll over and start whimpering whenever they were around. I opened the front door and I couldn’t help it, I looked back. I could see the couch from the door and there he was, staring back at me. I narrowed my eyes, turned around, and walked out, glad to be rid of him.

  A few days later, I was sitting on my bed, watching the sun go down and listening to Clair De Lune. I was dreaming of Paris, of women in ethereal white skirts moving across a stage, when the phone rang.

  “It’s for you!” dad yelled from the living room. I sighed and picked up the handle of my antique white and gold phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Olivia.”

  “Hi…” I said, not recognizing the voice.

  “Do you remember me?”

  “I’m afraid not,” I said in a friendly but reserved tone.

  “It’s your favorite guy from the party the other night,” he said, and began laughing.

  “How did you get my number?”

  “Oh, Jaime gave it to me. I told him we really hit it off. He asked if it was an ‘Indian thing.’ That’s when I told him I’m Mexican, though certainly I am Indian. Probably Aztec. Or Mayan. Who knows.”

  I sighed. “Are you a stalker?”

  Tomás roared with laughter and half way through, I dropped the phone down into the receiver, knowing he would call back. Two minutes later, the phone rang.

  “Yes,” I said dully, picking up.

  “This game is fun,” he said. “And no, I’m not a stalker. I just like you. And I like teasing people. Is that so wrong?”

  I switched the phone over to my shoulder and lay back. “I’m sure there’s a plethora of girls just waiting for you to harass them. I assure you, they’ll be much less trouble than I am. I only picked the phone up so as not to bother my daddy.”

  He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Say daddy again.”

  “You fool. Don’t call again,” I said, dropping the phone and smiling.

  Tomás began to call regularly, a few hours after school let out. We didn’t go to the same high school, so he knew that was the only way to make contact with me, to try to get me to meet up with him. For weeks, we’d play the same game; I would play coquette, he the teasing but anxious suitor, and I came to rely on those calls, look forward to them, even though I took every opportunity to hang up.

  Finally, after a few weeks, he asked if we could meet. “Just for coffee.”

  “But you’re a stalker. Won’t I just be encouraging you?” I asked, laying on my bed. I usually lay down when I talked to him, the old springs of the daybed creaking heavily despite my small frame.

  “Oh definitely. But I’ll let you press charges if I start driving past your house. I’m generous like that. I mean, for a stalker.”

  “Fine,” I said, trying to sound as bored as I possibly could, when my heart was speeding like a rabbit’s. “I suppose.”

  Tomás laughed softly. “You’re locked up so tight, Olivia. How can you breathe?”

  “I manage just fine,” I said, running my free hand over my bun.

  “Well. I better stop before I lose my coffee date.”

  “Date. Who said anything about this being a date? This is merely coffee.”

  “OK, certainly. It’s merely coffee,” he said. “So don’t make any large declarations of love on our first time having coffee. I know how demonstrative you are, and frankly, it’s terrifying.”

  “Yes. That’s me,” I said, trying not to laugh, “I’m such an extrovert.”

  That weekend, I walked over to the diner around 7:00. Dad had been questioning me about the calls, and I kept telling him it was nothing, just a friend. He had looked at me suspiciously, his wild black eyebrows going up, and his long, thin mouth turning even further down. He was terrified that I would get pregnant, that I would ruin my chances of getting out, of having a better life. I had reassured him a million different times that I felt the same way, that I couldn’t be bothered with boys, that I wasn’t even interested in them, not at this point. But he could see something in my eyes that even I didn’t want to see. Something I could see in the mirror every night, right before bed, after my long talks on the phone with Tomás. I would hang up, walk over to my tiny desk, and start in on my homework. But it didn’t feel the same as it had before. I was restless, and I felt like a young, strange animal. A caged animal. Before bed, looking in the mirror, into my own wide black eyes I would wonder who the person was who had taken residency in my body. She was dangerous, and I didn’t like her.

  Tomás was already there, sitting up front. I felt a little weird having suggested the Denver Diner, as that was my dad’s place and mine, but I liked it there and Tomás had seemed amenable. He had mentioned that he and the guys from his team often went there.

  He smiled when he saw me, that sly little smile that somehow managed to convey sarcasm without a word.

  “What are you so happy about?” I asked, slipping my pink and white jacket off, and sliding as elegantly as I could into a red, sparkling plastic booth.

  “I think we both know the answer to that,” he said and I shook my head and rolled my eyes slightly.

  “I’m quite sure I’m the third girl you’ve seen today. Probably in this same restaurant. Probably even in this same booth.” I put my hand down onto the plastic. “Shame shame. Still warm.”

  Tomás laughed and looked around for the waitress. She was already heading over to our booth. She smiled at me. I liked her. She looked as if she was somewhere in her mid-forties. She looked tired, her thin, brown hair up in a loose ponytail.

  “Just coffee please. I doubt I’ll be staying long.”

  Tomás cocked his head and gave me a pouty look. “So, I’m not the only one with other paramours on the books today?” he said and took a sip of his coffee.

  “Hardly. I have loads of homework and then I go to the studio tomorrow.”

  “I see. I have you for some time?”

  “For some time,” I said, accepting the cup from the waitress, who had returned with my coffee.

  The diner was going for that retro fifties thing, but mainly it was just dingy. I traced the edge of the fake silver rimmed countertops, my finger catching on a loose bit, the plastic flaking off easily.

  “Tell me more about ballet. What drew you to it?”

  I looked at him suspiciously and then took a sip of my coffee. “You really want to know?”

  “Yes. I really really actually and truly want to know. I know you’re an athlete. Remember, my mom’s a dancer. Was a dancer.”

  “She quit?”

  “You could say that, yes,” Tomás said, looking uneasy and running a long brown hand through his hair. “She quit everything.”

  “Everything? How does one quit everything?”

  “She met my father and she had me. And my dad wanted her to stay home and raise me while he worked. And getting pregnant wasn’t exactly what one is supposed to do when one is a young dancer in a company.”

  “Hm,” I said, not wanting to say what I really thought, which was that I didn’t think very well of his father for impregnating his mother at such an important time in her life. “Well, you can’t dance forever,” I said, which was the best thing I could come up with.

  “No. You can’t,” Tomás said, his voice lowering.

  “Did your mom want to quit?”

  “Yes and no. I mean, she met my dad while she was touring. And she was tired. And she was about to turn twenty, which as you know, is terribly old for a dancer. And the competition was so cruel, the women th
ere were awful to her. The goal was to get on in a company in New York, and they were cutting each other’s throats to do it. Not to mention that they did five evening shows a week, two matinees. And almost everyone she worked with was on coke. And she was just a kid from Peru who loved dancing and was good at it. And my dad is a sort of entrepreneur. He has a little chain of Mexican restaurants.”

  “Go on. Tell me a bit more and perhaps I’ll tell you a little about myself. Just a little,” I said, taking another sip of coffee and looking into his eyes. They were like mine, and yet nothing like mine. Black, slanted, but a different shape. And they had the same complications, but from a different source. It was strange to be thinking of a boy like this. I had always avoided it. And it was easy to. They were often so boring, so clearly only invested in the fact that I was pretty and thin, and I was only thin because it was what my art required. I found women who were thin just to be thin tremendously unattractive. And my body was taut with muscle, hard, athletic muscle. Muscle that was there for utilitarian, not cosmetic reasons. Frankly, I found my own naked body somewhat appalling when I looked at it from a purely aesthetic lens. But when I looked at it as instrument, I loved it deeply.

  Tomás sighed. “Well…what other kind of David Copperfield kind of crap do you want to know?”

  “Ha. Oh, just the usual. How they met. Did they love one another. Are they now filled with existential angst,” I said, running my finger over the rim of my white, ceramic cup.

  “Oh, they’re definitely filled with existential angst. They’re middle-class Latinos, so that’s a given,” he said and I thought that I would devote a little time to wondering about that later. “But as to how they met. Like I said, my mother was on tour. One of her stops was in Denver. And my father was doing well by that point. Ah – I forgot to mention that my father is much older than my mother. He’s twenty years older, in fact,” he said, running his hand through his hair again and pausing. He was so pretty, with his brown skin and high cheekbones, his slightly wavy black hair. He didn’t dress like any other jock I knew, though runners were always a little different, a little classier. But even those guys generally wore some version of the high school jock uniform, the jersey or tee-shirt and jeans. But Tomás was wearing a nice looking button down shirt, striped. And I could see his crisp, new-looking Navy Pea Coat tucked neatly beside him. He almost looked like a little baby businessman.