What My Mother Doesn't Know Read online

  for my slow motion watch to tick off

  three

  full

  minutes.

  I’m sidling over

  and sneaking through the same hole

  into the shadows,

  into the warm flanneled arms

  of my partner

  in delicious crime.

  EVERY DAY WHEN I GET HOME FROM SCHOOL

  I find televisions on in the living room,

  the family room,

  the kitchen,

  and each of the bedrooms.

  There’s even a little teensy one on

  in the bathroom.

  My mother says

  it’s so she won’t miss anything

  when she’s going around sweeping

  and dusting and putting away laundry

  and emptying out wastebaskets

  and cooking.

  Which is what she does all day long.

  Except for when she’s lying in bed

  watching television.

  That’s where she is

  every afternoon

  when I get home from school.

  She glances up and says hello,

  then goes back to watching.

  I walk from room to room

  switching off all the other sets,

  wishing she would show

  half as much interest in my life

  as she does in Luke and Laura’s.

  HER SOAPS

  My mother says

  they keep her company.

  But it’s just the opposite for me.

  Listening to that music

  that swells up in the background

  whenever someone announces they’re pregnant

  or dies of a drug overdose

  or maybe finds out

  their husband is having an affair

  with their best friend’s

  stepsister’s daughter-in-law,

  makes me feel lonelier

  than when I was little

  and my mother used to

  make me wait for her in the car

  while she did her errands.

  I used to be so scared

  that the car would roll away.

  So scared that my mother

  would never come back.

  Sometimes,

  when she’s watching her soaps,

  it feels like she never did.

  MAYBE DAD LOVES ME

  But it’s sure hard to tell.

  I don’t think he’s ever

  kissed me or hugged me

  in his life.

  Sometimes I hug him

  but he doesn’t hug me back.

  His body just goes all stiff,

  almost like he’s scared of being touched.

  Sometimes he jokes around

  by putting his palms on my cheeks

  and then leaning in

  and kissing the back of each of his hands.

  When I was real little,

  he used to hold his long arm out straight

  and put his hand

  on my forehead.

  Then he’d challenge me

  to try to reach his body

  with my short arms.

  And of course I never could.

  He seemed to think this was a riot

  and I used to laugh right along with him,

  but secretly I wished

  he’d cut out the stupid game and hold me.

  Dad’s not that way though.

  Even before they started fighting,

  I never saw him touch Mom.

  Not even to hold her hand.

  I guess he’s just not

  the affectionate type.

  And come to think of it,

  neither are his parents.

  Maybe it’s hereditary or something.

  I sure hope I’m not going to be like that.

  But judging from how hard it is

  for me to keep my hands off Dylan,

  I seriously doubt it.

  DURING LUNCH

  We’re

  searching the campus,

  hand glued to hand,

  hip glued to hip,

  looking for a place

  behind every hedge,

  for just one small

  and private spot

  where we

  can be alone

  long enough

  to do the serious kissing

  that we absolutely

  can’t live without

  for one more

  minute.

  ART CLASS

  Mr. Schultz

  has us building

  found-art sculptures

  with all this trash we gathered

  from under the bleachers

  next to the football field

  and I’m so into it

  that until the bell rings

  I don’t even notice

  that I haven’t

  thought about Dylan once

  for the entire forty-eight minutes.

  I think I just set

  my new world record.

  SECRET SHELF

  I’m rifling through the dust and jumble

  of my parents’ walk-in closet,

  searching for the perfect belt

  to wear with my new blue skirt,

  when I happen to glance up

  and see a small shelf

  above the door

  crammed with paperback books.

  Strange to think that

  I’ve been in this closet

  hundreds of times before

  and never once noticed it till now.

  I pull over the chair

  from my mother’s dressing table,

  climb up to take a closer look,

  and just about faint:

  here are some of

  the dirtiest books

  I’ve ever seen

  in my life.

  I try to picture

  my mother and father

  sitting around reading them,

  but it’s just too gross

  and I suddenly realize

  that I’ll never be able

  to think of my parents

  in quite the same way as I used to

  and that every time they go out

  and leave me alone in the house,

  I’ll be racing right back up here

  to grab another one off the shelf.

  MOM AND DAD USED TO BE IN LOVE

  Way back in the beginning anyhow.

  I know because I can see it in their eyes

  when I watch the old home videos

  of when I was a baby.

  They were really in love,

  like people in the movies.

  But now they have

  these hideous battles all the time.

  They scream their guts out

  at each other about things like

  how they should be raising me

  or about money or the in-laws

  or even just what movie to go see.

  Their shrieking whips around inside me

  like a tornado.

  And no fingers crammed in my ears,

  no pillows held over my head,

  can block it out.

  It makes me want to throw on my coat

  and rush over to Rachel’s

  or to Grace’s.

  But I can’t bring myself

  to set foot outside.

  What would I do if

  I ran into one of the neighbors?

  A neighbor who’s heard

  every

  single

  foul-mouthed word?

  I’VE GOT THIS PROBLEM WITH CRYING

  Once I start,

  I can’t stop.

  And what makes it so awful is

  that if I cry any longer

  than five minutes

  (which of course I always do)

  my eyes swell up like a boxer’s

  for at least twenty-four hours.

&nb
sp; I’ve tried ice packs.

  I’ve tried the cold cucumber cure.

  I’ve even tried raw steak.

  But nothing works.

  Ever.

  So when I’ve been crying,

  I pray for sunshine

  because if it’s cloudy out

  everyone keeps asking me

  why I’m wearing my sunglasses,

  and I get so embarrassed

  that I start to cry,

  and once I start,

  I can’t stop.

  DINNER DOWNER

  Seems like Dad’s been going

  on more and more business trips lately.

  And when he’s not out of town,

  he’s at his office twelve hours a day.

  But once in a while

  he makes it home by six

  and the three of us have dinner together,

  almost like a regular functional family.

  We sit down at the kitchen table,

  Dad flicks on the TV,

  and we watch the evening news

  while we eat.

  Sometimes

  I wish

  I could just

  switch it off,

  so we could actually make

  dinner conversation,

  like they do over at Rachel’s house,

  and at Grace’s.

  Every now and then,

  during the commercials

  Dad will say something like,

  “How was school today, Sophie Dophie?”

  Once I said, “We played strip poker

  during third period and I lost.”

  Dad just said, “That’s nice,”

  without even looking up from his meatloaf.

  Lately, I’ve been trying

  to concentrate on Dylan during dinner.

  On imagining we’re at Miss Mae’s Diner.

  Just the two of us.

  It helps a little.

  AT MISS MAE’S DINER

  tucked in the corner

  of our favorite booth

  next to each other

  instead of across

  I’m trying hard to focus

  on reading the menu

  but his hand has slipped

  under the tablecloth

  and his fingers

  are stroking my knee

  DYLAN AND I BUMP INTO HIS OLD GIRLFRIEND AT THE MALL

  She’s

  batting her lashes at him,

  touching his arm,

  saying how great he looks

  and calling him Pickle, as in Dill. Ha. Ha.

  He’s

  blushing and

  flashing her these intimate grins,

  as though her calling him that stupid name

  is bringing back all these

  secret fond memories.

  And I’m

  just standing here

  with this paralyzed smile on my face,

  wishing I could grab his hand

  and make a dash for the elevator.

  BY COMPARISON

  Watching Dylan

  with his old girlfriend Ivy

  makes me feel

  like I’m some sort of

  Amazonian freak of nature,

  like I’m the Mount Everest

  of teenage girls.

  I bet whenever they went to the beach

  he used to pick her up

  and throw her in the water.

  I bet if he tried to pick me up

  his knees would buckle.

  Not that I’m fat.

  It’s just that I’m tall

  and there’s so darn much of me.

  I’m thinking

  Dylan should be with someone

  more like Ivy,

  someone petite and blonde

  and infinitely perky.

  I’m wondering what he’s doing

  with huge old, mousy brown,

  terminally sluggy me.

  But when she finally wiggles away,

  Dylan turns to me and says,

  “Man, I used to hate it

  when she called me Pickle.

  And I forgot how tiny she was.

  How could I ever have gone out

  with someone who looks like

  she could be my baby sister?”

  Wow.

  He always says

  just

  the right thing.

  How does he do that?

  I’m the luckiest

  fifty-foot woman alive.

  IN ENGLISH CLASS

  If Mrs. Livingston glances up

  from the stack of essays she’s slashing

  with her famous red pen,

  it will appear as if I’m reading

  The Grapes of Wrath.

  But if she comes around

  to look over my shoulder,

  she’ll catch me

  staring at the photo

  I’ve tucked into the center of the book,

  the one

  that Dylan slipped into my pocket

  last night

  just before

  we kissed goodbye,

  where he’s

  standing on the beach

  with this surfer boy smile on his lips,

  the wind tossing his blond curls

  everywhere,

  the one that says:

  “for Sapphire

  from a secret admirer”

  inside a little heart

  on the back,

  the one where he looks so amazingly cute

  that Mrs. Livingston might

  just find herself

  staring at him too,

  instead of giving me detention.

  DURING FRENCH CLASS

  Je ne peux pas conjugate the verbs

  parce que I’m sitting right across

  from my old boyfriend Lou

  and his lips.

  I feel myself turning green

  when I look at them:

  thick, chapped,

  gleaming under a drizzle of spit.

  How could I ever

  have let him kiss me?

  I can even remember

  wanting him to kiss me.

  What could I have been thinking?

  That mouth of his,

  so perpetually overflowing

  with saliva.

  It touched mine.

  Just last spring

  that drooly tongue was in

  my mouth.

  More than once.

  I think I’m gonna be sick.

  WALKING HOME FROM SCHOOL WITH RACHEL AND GRACE

  Listening to Grace moan about

  how horny she is and about how if

  she doesn’t find a boyfriend soon

  she’s going to die of lackonookie disease,

  and to Rachel complain about how

  Danny can’t take her out on Saturday night

  because his parents have grounded him

  again,

  I see Murphy

  trudging along up ahead

  looking so immensely

  alone

  that I have to fight the urge

  to run to catch up to him

  and fill that huge empty space

  by his side.

  I’d never

  be able to explain

  a move like that

  to Rachel and Grace.

  ANOTHER NUCLEAR MELTDOWN

  My parents just had

  World War Twenty-seven.

  Dad slammed out the door

  and tore off in the car,

  burning rubber like a thief

  escaping from the scene of the crime.

  Mom started bawling

  and said that Dad

  was a selfish son of a bitch

  and that he makes her life miserable

  because he doesn’t give a damn

  about her feelings.

  She would have said

  a whole lot more

  but I told her I
didn’t want to hear it.

  I said she ought to go see a therapist

  if she was so unhappy,

  and tell the therapist about it.

  Mom said,

  “If your father sees a therapist,

  I’ll be cured!”

  I guess that just about

  sums up her world view

  in a nutshell.

  GROWING UP . . . AND OUT

  My Aunt Betsy,

  who lives in Hawaii,

  has a bamboo forest growing in her backyard.

  She says a bamboo stalk can grow

  as much as four inches in a single day

  and that if you sit there and watch it

  you can actually see it getting taller.

  Well, my breasts

  have been growing

  so fast lately

  that if I were to sit there

  and watch them for awhile,

  I think I could actually

  see them getting bigger.

  Dylan hasn’t said anything,

  but I see him sneaking peeks

  all the time.

  It is pretty astonishing

  how my molehills

  have turned into mountains

  overnight.

  ICE CAPADES

  Sometimes

  on chilly nights

  I stand close to my bedroom window,

  unbutton my nightgown,

  and press my breasts

  against the cold glass

  just so I can see

  the amazing trick

  that my nipples can do.

  IT’S THAT TIME OF THE MONTH AGAIN

  I wore

  my brand-new white satin panties

  to school today.

  So,

  naturally,

  I got my period.

  When Rachel gets hers,

  she calls it riding the cotton pony.

  Grace calls it surfing the crimson wave.