I shrugged, still picturing the life I used to have.
“Isn’t it funny how one day you’ll be hoping for something, like snow, and the next day you’ll be hoping it goes away?” Haley motioned toward Mike’s big windows, where the snow was still coming down.
We watched it for a while, then Haley told me about the time she first became aware of race. She didn’t know why, but last night, the memory came to her out of nowhere. Maybe because of something she was watching on TV. Anyway, she was a little girl living in a wealthy suburb outside of Portland. And for her sixth birthday, her parents took her into the city to see a musical. They made a big thing of it, got dressed up and everything, hopped in her dad’s Mercedes and made the drive. Haley said she remembered driving by this one McDonald’s, in a sketchy part of the city, where she saw a group of black women dressed strangely, wearing tons of makeup—they were prostitutes, though she was too young to understand that. Haley was in the backseat, in her fancy white dress, staring at these women, because she’d never seen anything like it. Her dad stopped at a light right in front of them, and while he waited for it to change, Haley stared and stared, until one of the women turned and met eyes with her. But Haley still couldn’t look away. She was transfixed. After a few seconds, the woman wobbled right up to Haley’s window, in her sparkly high heels, and pointed a finger in Haley’s face. “Wha’chu staring at, white girl? You trying to steal my story?”
“I don’t know why I just told you that,” Haley said. “I don’t think I’ve shared that with anyone before. Not even my closest girlfriends.”
We both stood there awkwardly for a few seconds. It was like we’d ripped open our chests and revealed our beating hearts. And how do you transition back to small talk after that?
Finally Haley cleared her throat and said she was going to clean up. She seemed embarrassed. I went over to the couch and tried to read my book, but all I could think about was Haley’s story. Did she tell me that because I was part Mexican? Because she thought I was from a bad neighborhood? Or maybe it had nothing to do with me. We were just two people alone in a building, during a blizzard. As soon as the skies cleared, maybe this strange little dream we seemed to be sharing would slip away from us forever.
I read the same paragraph about sixty straight times, but I still had no idea what I was reading. And then Haley walked back into the living room, her hair wet, makeup freshly applied. She looked more beautiful than ever. “God, I love being clean,” she said.
“Me, too.” I pulled my weak body off the couch.
“When you get in there today,” she said, “maybe try and do something with that hair?”
I pulled off my beanie. “You mean this?”
She took a few steps toward me and rustled my hair a little, which caught me off guard. “At least you don’t have to worry about going bald,” she said.
I pulled my beanie back on.
“Anyway, if you change your mind about dinner just come up. Doesn’t matter what time.”
“Cool.” I opened the door for her.
Haley did the “eye contact” thing, which led to the “unbalanced” thing. “Because I don’t see how a call home can take all night. But whatever.” She gave a little wave and left.
It wasn’t until a few hours later that I discovered Haley had left her towel and bathroom bag in Mike’s master bathroom.
Breaking Point
I didn’t go up to Haley’s for dinner that night.
Didn’t call home, either.
I ate the rest of Mike’s chocolate bar and drank a plastic cup full of vodka and played music in the bathroom, and then I did something kind of weird, I guess. I fell asleep in the bathtub. I don’t even know why. It’s not like I passed out or anything. I just didn’t feel like going to the living room. Or the spare bedroom. So I lay Mike’s guitar on the bathroom floor and climbed into the tub and slid down so that I could rest my head against the lip of it, and I closed my eyes and thought about my life.
Back home I had known exactly who I was, but out here, in New York, I didn’t have a clue. Everything seemed to be spinning out of control. And I was brutally hungry now. It felt like someone was wringing my insides out like a washcloth.
All I wanted to do was have one of those deep talks me and my mom used to have.
But I couldn’t.
When I woke up, I had a slight hangover and Olive was sitting on the toilet, staring at me, and I had this intense feeling of shame. Because of the cat. Seriously. I didn’t want her to see me this way. Sleeping in a bathtub. You know how they say animals can sense emotional shit way beyond what humans are capable of? I wondered what Olive was sensing about me as she sat there staring.
Or maybe I didn’t want to know.
Just as I was climbing out of the tub, I heard Haley knocking again. I pulled on my beanie and rushed to the front door. Before I opened it, though, I had a moment of panic. My clothes. I was wearing the same jeans and shirt she’d seen me in the day before. But it’s not like I could pretend I wasn’t home.
I swung open the door, saying: “I’m the one who got catsup all over myself today. I had to change back into my clothes from yesterday.”
Haley was standing there with more than a change of clothes this time. She had a plate of muffins, too. “I baked these this morning,” she said, ignoring my catsup lie, “and I need them out of my house so I don’t, like, eat every single one in the next fifteen minutes.”
“Thanks,” I said, feeling another strange surge of emotion.
Instead of handing me the plate, she pushed past me and went into the kitchen. “They’re banana nut, by the way. I’ll stick them in the fridge so Olive doesn’t—”
“No, wait!” I shouted.
But it was too late.
Haley froze, staring into Mike’s empty fridge. It took a while before she turned around, wearing a confused expression. “There’s nothing in here.”
My heart sank.
She stuck the plate of muffins on the shelf and closed the fridge and turned her attention toward the empty cupboards. I didn’t even try to stop her this time, just watched her open and close all the doors. “Why’d you lie to me?” she asked in a hurt voice.
I tried to laugh it off. “Lie to you? I didn’t lie.”
“You said Mike and Janice left you groceries.”
“They did,” I said, trying to maintain my smile. “I just … went through them already. Pretty stupid, right? It’s not even Christmas until tomorrow. Guess I’ll go pick a few things up at the corner bodega.”