Death and other side eff.., p.13
Death and Other Side Effects, page 13
“Damn it, now I really want a burrito,” I say, unable to stop thinking about it now.
“I think I might be in love with you,” he says, a few moments later when he thinks that I’ve fallen asleep.
15
“Sex and Candy”
—Marcy Playground
“I better be seein’ things, cuz if I’m seein’ what I think I’m seein,’ you two wrapped up like a couple a ropes a red licorice—”
Jonah’s body stiffens next to mine. He starts to talk, but stops, making us look guiltier than we are.
“Nothing happened, Rhonda, and even if it did, isn’t that mine and Jonah’s business?” I ask, a little annoyed that she’s treating us like children.
“Not in here, under my watch it aint’,” She says, sternly.
“Oh, come on—this place is like spring break, in Miami. Only instead of college kids getting freaky, it’s the retirees.”
“Watch it, young lady,” Rhonda says, a smirk gracing her plump lips.
“I’m not that young, Rhonda, and I’m old enough to know what a double standard is.”
“Don’t sass me, or I’ll have to tell your parents about this,” Rhonda warns me.
“Tell the Pope, I don’t care.”
“What’s gotten into you, girl? Talkin’ to me like that—”
“Sorry, Rhonda. I just don’t see what the big deal is.”
Jonah nudges me with his elbow, signaling me to shut up. He’s been so quiet this whole time, I almost forgot he was here.
“Just get yourself outta that bed and come to the cafeteria. I need you to show Selena around this place. She could use a friend.”
“Ok,” I agree, deciding to play nice.
“And as for you, young man, I better not find the two of you in that bed again,” she says, pointing her long, gold glittered nail at Jonah.
“Yes, Rhonda,” Jonah says, still too embarrassed to make eye contact with her.
Rhonda leaves the room and I turn to Jonah to give him a disapproving look.
“We didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I know, but Rhonda scares the crap out of me,” he admits.
“She’s not going to do anything.”
“She could tell your parents.”
“What are they going to do, ground me?”
Jonah laughs. For the first time this morning, the muscles in his face start to relax and the color comes back into his cheeks.
“I guess, you’re right,” he says, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
“Are you gonna come out there with me, or are you still too scared?” I tease him.
“I’ll come, just let me ring Rhonda, so she can help me into my chair.”
“I can do it.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, you’re not that heavy.”
“Ok, just don’t hurt yourself.”
As soon as I get Jonah into his chair, Rhonda peeks her head into our room, probably to make sure that we’re not up to anything. God forbid we act our age. I mean, we’re a couple of teenagers locked up in this room together… Hasn’t she ever heard of hormones? It’s not like I’m going to put a red light out my window or anything. I just wanted to feel normal for once in my life. Is that too much to ask?
Rhonda answers my silent question with a glare.
“You better hurry up, before the food gets cold,” she scolds me, before leaving the room.
“Someone is having a bad day,” Jonah says, under his breath.
“She probably just needs to get laid.”
“Yeah, probably,” Jonah laughs, agreeing with me.
“Ready?” I ask.
“Yeah. Who is this girl that Rhonda is talking about anyway?”
“Her name’s Selena. She’s cool, you’ll like her.”
“Oh, ok. What’s she in here for?” Jonah asks, casually.
I laugh louder than I mean to and an old man in the hall gives me a dirty look. I blow him a kiss, just to mess with him and he stops right there in his tracks, mouth as wide as the Grand Canyon, while Jonah and I breeze past him.
“What’s so funny?” Jonah asks when I laugh again.
“Nothing, you just make it sound like we’re in prison or something.”
“We kind of are although I didn’t mean it that way,” he responds.
“Yeah, come to think of it, this place is probably worse than jail.”
“Yeah, in Canada, they give you lobster and melted butter when you’re locked up.”
“They do not. How do you know that?” I ask, not believing a word he says.
“Trailer Park Boys.”
“The show?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s not real,” I say, rolling my eyes at him.
“Tell that to anyone who’s ever lived in a trailer park.”
“Have you?”
“No, I just know. There are some things that you just know, like—”
“Don’t stick your tongue to a frozen pole,” I finish the sentence for him.
“Yeah, or don’t pee in a bottle while driving on a bumpy road.”
“I could do that.”
“You could not.”
“If I was a guy, I totally could.”
“Ok, whatever. The point is—”
“Ok, ok, I get it, you’re a trailer park aficionado. Hey, there’s Selena, over there by Bette,” I say, pointing them out.
“We better save her before Bette starts revealing all her sexcapades to her. She looks pretty innocent. I don’t know if she can handle Bette, raw and unfiltered.”
“You’re right, we better hurry.”
Selena is sitting in her wheelchair, listening to Bette when we walk up, and if I’m not mistaken, her face is slightly red. We’re too late…Oh well, we tried and if it didn’t happen today, it would have happened tomorrow. Listening to Bette tell stories about her younger, more agile days, her words not mine, is kind of like an initiation around here.
“I was in this night club, in San Francisco, and I’m tellin’ you, sweetheart, he looked like a young Richard Nixon, I couldn’t help myself. I mean, really, what’s a girl to do? So, I followed him into the men’s bathroom—”
“Hi Bette,” Jonah interrupts before she can go any further.
“Oh, hey sweet thing. Why don’t you turn around and let me get a good look at that keister,” Bette says, in a sultry voice, that sounds like she’s smoked a pack a day since the 1930s.
“I’d love to, Bette, but the chair kind of complicates things.”
“Oh, silly me. Then, come over here and let me get a good look at that handsome face of yours. That will have to do for now.”
Jonah inches towards her, hesitantly. Bette grabs the arm of his wheelchair and pulls Jonah closer herself, clearly too impatient to wait for him. She places her wrinkled hand on Jonah’s cheek, the side with the scar and Jonah flinches at her touch at first. It’s funny how Bette’s frail hand on his face, only makes Jonah’s scar look more attractive, in a manly sort of way. It looks like Jonah wants to pull away, but he doesn’t.
“Just as I remembered…gorgeous,” Bette says.
“Um…thanks, Bette,” Jonah says, backing away slowly from the line of fire.
“Selena, this is my um…friend, Jonah.”
I have no idea why I just said it like that. Of course, Jonah is my friend. It’s not like we’re dating or anything. Not officially at least. He did say that he wants to be with me and only me, though. So, I guess that means we’re exclusive…if you can even be exclusive when you’re not even sure if you’re dating. I glance up at Jonah, still unsure of myself and where we stand, but Jonah, being well…Jonah—takes my hand in his own with a purposeful reassurance. I smile up at him and let his warmth seep into my skin like a drug. My veins tingle and twitch. I’m a Jonah addict, and he’s the only drug I need.
“Actually, Selena—I’m Jonah, the boyfriend, love of her life, soul mate, partner in crime, finisher of her burritos.”
“You wish. I’m not giving you any of my burritos, but the rest is true,” I say, giving Jonah’s hand a gentle squeeze and feeling more like myself than I ever have before.
“You guys are the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. I wish I had a boyfriend like you, I mean—” Selena backpedals, afraid that she has said something wrong.
“It’s totally cool, I know what you mean. He’s great. Anyone would be lucky to have someone like Jonah for their boyfriend,” I draw out the last word, letting each letter roll off my tongue, enjoying the way it feels and sounds.
“And we can definitely find you a man. I mean, this place is crawling with potential…” Jonah says, waggling his brows.
“Isn’t everyone—old here?” Selena asks, glancing out the corner of her eye to make sure that she hasn’t offended Bette.
Bette is otherwise occupied, though and hasn’t heard a word of our conversation. It seems that one of the men sitting across from our table is making eyes at her, as Earl used to say…He used to get so jealous when other men checked Bette out. It was kind of cute, actually. Bette bats her eyelashes at the man, who is sitting there in his Seahawks fleece pajamas, a lone tuft of hair sticking up straight in the air. When he doesn’t take his eyes off of her, Bette looks away. A rose-colored blush spreads over her cheeks. My eyes widen at the interaction. I don’t think that I have ever seen Bette embarrassed.
“It depends on your definition of old. I prefer to think of them as well seasoned, or wise,” I hear Jonah say to Selena, while I am still watching Bette and Alfalfa. I can’t help myself from interrupting when I hear Jonah’s response though.
“Jonah has a penchant for older women,” I explain to Selena.
“I do not,” he argues.
“Don’t make me bring up the whole Joan debacle again.”
“Joan debacle?” Selena asks, confused.
“You know, Joan R—”
“Jett!” Jonah interrupts me.
“You were going to say, Rivers!” Selena exclaims, excitedly.
“Don’t listen to her. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about,” Jonah tells Selena, giving me a disapproving look, but I know that he doesn’t really care.
“I can’t believe you have the hots for Joan Rivers!” Selena says so loud this time that she catches the attention of the whole cafeteria.
When Selena realizes that everyone heard her, she mouths a silent apology to Jonah. He just shakes his head and laughs.
“I’m never going to live this one down,” Jonah says, covering his face with his hands.
“If I had known that you fancied us older gals, I would have put my name in the drawing the day you got here, sweet cheeks,” Bette says, ruffling the top of Jonah’s hair.
“He’s kind of taken. Sorry, Bette,” I say, teasing her.
“You know, I probably know a trick or two that this spring chicken here has yet to learn,” Bette not so subtly whispers to Jonah, while giving me a sly look out of the corner of her eye.
“Bette!” I exclaim.
“No need to fight over me, ladies.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” I tell Jonah before his puny head explodes from all of the attention.
“I’ve got it! I challenge you to a mud wrestling match, and whoever wins gets the boy,” Bette says, decidedly.
“Me?” I ask, Bette, not sure what we were even talking about now.
“Who else, hot stuff?” Bette challenges me.
“I don’t know, Bette—me, in a bikini…is not the prettiest sight.”
“Who are you kidding? If I had your body, sweetheart, I’d wear nothing but a bikini all day long,” Bette says, giving me a good once over.
“She’s right, and I’ve seen you in one, so you can’t argue with me,” Jonah pipes in.
“That wasn’t a bikini…” I point out, trying my hardest not to blush at the mention of the night I went skinny dipping in my Bart Simpson underwear.
“Close enough,” Jonah retorts.
“Now, we’re getting to the juicy stuff,” Bette says, practically drooling for more information.
Selena, on the other hand, is just sitting there quietly, watching us all, and probably wondering what the hell we’re talking about and what she has gotten herself into. At the very least, she seems amused.
“Excuse them, Selena. They’re a little, how do you say, loco en la Cabeza…”
“Don’t worry about it. As my Abuela would say, “All you gringos are crazy.”
“Your Grandma said that?” Jonah asks.
“Well, I’m paraphrasing, but yeah, that was the just of it.”
“She sounds like a funny lady,” I comment.
“Yeah, she’s really cool,” Selena says, a tinge of sadness coloring her voice.
I guess Jonah picked up on it too because he asks her, “You miss your family already?”
“Yeah, isn’t that pathetic? I’ve only been here for one night. You guys must really miss your families,” Selena adds.
“Sometimes, I imagine that my family is just on vacation without me and that they’ll be here soon to pick me up,” Jonah says, quietly.
“What happened?” Selena asks, hesitantly.
“They died in a car crash.”
“I’m sorry. You must really miss them. My Grandma says, that no one ever really dies, that our spirits live on forever and that one day, her spirit will watch over me too,” Selena tells Jonah, trying to ease his pain some.
“Yeah, maybe,” is all Jonah says.
It must be nice to believe in something greater than yourself, like Selena and her family. In the long run, maybe it’s better. Maybe, hope isn’t such a bad thing…It’s not like we have anything to lose by hoping—I guess, maybe our pride, if we’re wrong in the end, but does pride really matter when you’re dead?
“You kids need to lighten up. All this talk about death is making me hungry,” Bette chimes in, giving us all a reproving look.
“Making you hungry?” Jonah scoffs.
“Yes, making me hungry, because once I’m dead, I won’t be able to eat any more of this delicious chocolate pudding and pudding is my favorite thing, aside from sex,” Bette says, not missing a beat.
We all laugh at Bette’s blatant honesty. It’s an admirable quality to be able to say exactly what’s on your mind. I decide right there and then, that I want to be like Bette when I grow up…Selena is still laughing, long after Jonah and I have stopped. I find myself attracted to her, not in the I want to taste her cherry chapstick kind of way, but as a person. There’s something about her that makes me want to know her better. She’s so…happy. How can that be, though? She’s paralyzed. Jonah could get a prosthetic leg if he wanted to, but Selena is going to be stuck in that chair for the rest of her life, and I think she might just be the happiest person I have ever met. As if on cue, Selena smiles at me, two rows of perfectly gleaming white teeth, shine like rays of the sun and I can’t help but smile back at her. It’s not a natural thing for me, smiling, not like it is for people like Selena, who make it look effortless. It’s more like a challenging yoga pose, the kind that feels like your muscles may snap like a rubber band if you stretch any further—that’s the way my mouth feels when I stretch it into a smile. Somehow, once I get past the foreignness of it, it manages to feel good.
16
You’re Like a Third Eye Blind Song
“What do you think about Selena?” I ask Jonah, once we get back to our room.
“She’s cool.”
“Yeah, I like her,” I agree.
“So, what do you want to do now?” Jonah asks.
“The possibilities are endless.”
“So, TV?”
“Yeah.”
Jonah wheels himself over to his bedside table to grab the remote. Once he turns the TV on, I help him get out of his chair and into bed. I plop down next to him, sinking into the mattress.
“What about Rhonda?” Jonah asks, looking a little worried.
“What about her? Like I said before, we’re not doing anything wrong.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“Now, quit being such a girl and put your arm around me,” I say, grabbing his arm and wrapping it around my shoulders, too impatient to wait for him to do it.
Jonah let’s out a breath of air as I breathe in. Pretty soon our breathing is in sync. He’s watching some show on Comedy Central, but I have my eyes turned to him. Every time something funny on TV is said, Jonah’s whole body shakes with laughter. I can feel the vibration of his laughter reverberate through my own body. It’s the best feeling. I scooch myself closer to him and Jonah tightens his grip on me, still watching the TV. All at once, I am overcome by a feeling of boldness, of need. The next time Jonah opens his mouth to laugh, I cover it with my own. He stops laughing immediately, at the sudden contact.
At first, he is completely still, but after a few short breaths, he not only joins my mouth in its caress, but he takes over, making the kiss his own. Jonah’s heart beats in rhythm with mine and his tongue strums its own chords, within the walls of my mouth. A melody plays in my head as he continues his exploration. Our bodies pulse and crash into each other. The need I felt earlier intensifies, with every give and take. I crush my mouth back into his, gnashing my teeth against his. Jonah deepens the kiss, consuming me like a greedy capitalist and I have never been more willing to conform.
Then, he pulls away unexpectedly, and my lips feel like they have been burned. After a moment too long, Jonah looks into my eyes, the hesitation that was there earlier no longer pools in his irises, instead his dark pupils dilate as he inches his way back to me, and like a mad man, he blazes a trail of scorching fire-lipped kisses down my neck. I relax into his touch, relieved that he hasn’t stopped this dangerous game that we are playing.
“Alex—”
“Huh?” I ask, still in a daze.
“Are we…moving too fast?” Jonah asks me, uncertain of himself.
“No. I didn’t think so.”
“Oh. ok. Sorry,” he adds, after a minute of silence has passed between us.
“You don’t have to be sorry. I guess I’m just confused,” I explain to him.
“Yeah, so am I. I don’t know…I can’t explain the way that I feel right now. I just had to stop and…breathe, I guess.”
