He nodded a little, brightening to what I'd said. "I see what you're saying."
"So if I come up to you and say, "Mike, you been fucking Maggie or what?", what are you gonna say?"
He smiled. "I'd say this:" He shrugged, "Maggie and I are just good friends."
I grinned. "You're learning Mike. You're learning."
"You know where I learned that line from?" he asked me.
"Where?"
"From you," he told me.
"From me?"
"Over the last couple a years," he said, "I used to see you with girls from school all the time. They used to be around you at lunch, around you after school, around you before school. Whenever I'd ask you about one of them, that's what you'd say. That you were just friends."
"And friends were all that we ever were."
He shook his head in wonder. "You sly motherfucker," he said respectfully.
The next morning, shortly after breakfast, Tracy and I were playing a game of cribbage in her cave. Tracy was not a happy person being eternally trapped in a den of her parent's house. She was suffering from a full-blown case of cabin fever and was very cranky at best. I was twenty points ahead of her and had just slapped down a double card run, fouling her mood even more.
"You lucky asshole," she said in disgust, throwing her cards at me. "This is a stupid game."
"And I'm about to skunk you at it," I added. "Which means you'll owe me fifty cents instead of a quarter, plus double points."
"Fuck you and deal," she told me. "And please turn off whatever crap that is you've put on the turntable. It reminds me of taking car trips with Mom and Dad when we were little."
"It's the Beatles," I told her. "This is the most classic rock and roll there is. How can you not like it?"
"It's old fogey music. Put on one of my albums, they're much better."
"Eighties music is an atrocity. You can't compare the freakin Thompson Twins to the Beatles. It's not even the same category."
"I LIKE the Thompson Twins," she said. "And I HATE the Beatles. And I'm the one that's injured and you're the one in MY room. So put on the fucking Thompson Twins."
"All right," I gave in, setting the cards down and heading for the stereo. Just then the phone started to ring.
"You got that Bill?" Dad yelled from his perch in the living room. Mom was off at work.
"Yeah," I said, changing course and heading for the phone. "Hello?"
"Bill?" It was Nina and she sounded very excited. "Have you got your mail yet?"
"I don't think so," I said, already intuiting what she was talking about. "Nobody's gone out to get it anyway. Why? Did you get a letter from the college?"
"Acceptance and full academic scholarship!" she squealed happily. "I'm in Bill. I'm in! And I'll be able to afford to go!"
"That's great Nina," I said, getting excited myself. "Let me go check the mail and see if mine's there. Here, talk to Tracy." I handed the phone, actually tossed it, to my sister and rushed out of the room.
Still wearing my sweat pants and no shirt I rushed by my Dad, who looked at me curiously, and out the front door. I went directly to the mailbox by the curb, throwing open the door and peering inside. There was a stack of mail in there. I grabbed it, shuffling quickly through the envelopes, magazines, and junk mail, looking for a return address from the University of Washington at Seattle. I found it near the bottom.
Standing there, holding it in my hand, I was suddenly scared, suddenly afraid to open it. Inside was either a yes or a no. If it was yes, Nina and I would be going to college together. If it was a no, who knows what would happen. I took a deep breath. With hands that were shaking, I finally tore open the envelope. One quick glance told me all I needed to know. I returned to the house.
I tossed the rest of the pile of mail at my Dad as I rushed by him once more. I went back into the den and ripped the phone out of Tracy's hands.
"Me too!" I said happily to her. "Acceptance and full academic scholarship!"
We talked for a few minutes excitedly to each other about our plans, about our excitement, about how much we loved one another. During this, Tracy seemed to actually cheer up and Dad wandered into the room to see what was going on. When I finally hung up Tracy was the first to congratulate me. She gave me a big hug and even a little kiss on the cheek.
Dad was next. "Congratulations," he told me. "I'm very proud of you."
"Thanks Dad," I said, still trying to accept the fact that everything was working out for me.
"Be sure and call your mother right away and let her know."
"I will," I promised. "I'll do it right now."
"It seems," Dad said, "that the mail is full of good news today." He handed me a small folding piece of paper, an announcement. On the front of it was a picture of two bells clanging together.
I opened it and read what was inside. The text was written in tastefully printed calligraphy.
THE STEVENS FAMILY: YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED TO THE BLESSED NUPTIALS OF JACK JACOB VALENTINE AND ANITA LYNN BROWLING SATURDAY, JULY 28, 1984 AT BLESSED SACRAMENT CHURCH, SPOKANE WEDDING CEREMONY 1:00 PM FOLLOWED BY RECEPTION AT ENDERS HALL PLEASE COME JOIN US IN THIS CELEBRATION OF LOVE
It was that evening, long after work, shortly after Mom had gone to bed. Tracy was in the den sleeping the sleep of narcotic intoxication. Dad and I were sitting in front of the television, each of us drinking a beer, the coffee table littered with empty bottles. This was something we did with fair frequency since I'd shared my secret with him and I valued these talks with him. Being treated like an adult by your father, with all of the respect due from such a relationship, is something that I believe every boy strives for whether unconsciously or consciously.
"So what do you think about Anita's wedding?" Dad asked me, taking a sip out of his fourth beer. We were making short work of the twelver he'd purchased the day before.
"I'm so happy about it," I told him, feeling my own buzz loosening my tongue, "that I could shit. Do you know what this means? It means that I was right. That I actually did something right. That one of my plans actually worked. Wouldn't that make you happy?"
He nodded wisely. "It would," he said, "but sometimes I think you sell yourself short. You have a keen head for hatching schemes and putting them into motion. You have a gift for it. When you told me all the trouble you went through just to get them together," he shook his head. "You did good Bill. You should be proud of yourself. But what I wanted to know was if you thought we should go to the wedding. Your mother and Anita haven't really spoken in quite some time. I think you know why."
"Yeah," I nodded. "My fault. And I'm sorry for that. I wish I could tell Mom how sorry I am that I hurt one of her friendships."
"Don't worry about it," he told me. "From what you've said, the relationship pretty much died after they got married anyway, didn't it?"
"Yeah," I said. "It did. Anita left the area and never looked back. I'm glad she's back on track."
"And the wedding?" he persisted.
"I want to go." I told him. "Whether you and Mom go or not, I still want to. It'll give me closure to this whole thing with her."
"Closure?" he said, puzzled.
"Sorry," I chuckled. "Buzzword from the nineties. I used to hate it then but here it is slipping from my mouth now. It means that once I see that Anita is happy, that she is content with her husband, I'll be able to put the episode with her behind me once and for all. To close it."
"I see," he nodded. "Closure. I like it."
"Don't like it too much," I told him. "It'll be horribly overused and you'll hear it so much you'll want to puke eventually."
"I'll take your word for it," he said, draining the last of his beer. "And I'll feel your mother out about going to Anita's wedding. But for now, I think I'm gonna call it a night."