Jersey Tomatoes are the Best Page 19
“Do you know what this is about?” he asked. She shook her head. Mark plunged ahead.
“Do you feel uncomfortable around Ray for some reason?” he said.
“Oh, Dad, for crying out loud, don’t make a federal case out of it!” I exclaimed. I was incapable of cool. “See? I knew you’d immediately get all paranoid. That was why I hadn’t said anything about Ray before. I’ve been trying to be positive.” He put one hand up, cutting me off.
“Whoa, whoa,” he said. “I’m not being paranoid. And I have no problem ending the lessons. I’m always happy to save money. I’m just surprised and want to make sure it’s not just some mood, or … or something else is going on that you’re not telling us.”
I knew what he meant. It made sense. Why else would I suddenly go so cold on Ray Giordano? What else could turn a kid so quickly?
It was as if I held a grenade, and had a split second to decide whether to pull the pin or not. And if I did, where would I toss it?
Only one thing was absolutely clear to me at that moment: Ray had to go.
The thing is, when you set off a grenade, stuff flies out in a million different directions, ripping into everything and everyone in sight. You set off a grenade, there might not be anyone left standing when the dust clears.
“Dad,” I said carefully, “everything is cool. I just feel like this thing with Ray isn’t a great fit. Like I said, he’s starting to repeat himself, and the workouts are getting boring. Plus I think he’s here too much. He hangs out after the lesson is over, and it’s like he’s trying to be my friend and not just a coach. It feels a little … icky.”
Dad looked at Mom triumphantly. As if he’d just won a big argument.
“Kids know, Marian,” he declared. “They have a sixth sense about this sort of stuff. I told you, I never felt right about the guy.…”
“Oh, stop it, Mark. Please,” she said angrily. She half dropped, half slammed her plate of pasta down on the table, spattering sauce on the tablecloth. “It doesn’t matter who it was. You never would have liked anyone else coaching Henry. And now she’s given you the excuse you were looking for.” She looked at me accusingly. As if I’d done something wrong.
“Ray Giordano genuinely cares about our daughter,” she continued. “She’s right. He does linger after lessons. And during those times I’ve had several conversations with him about the poisonous, destructive dynamic that can develop between an overbearing parent and a talented child. You worry about people who want to ruin Henry? Well, I worry that by the time the two of you are done fighting with each other, she’ll never pick up a racket again. Or if she does stick with it, you’ll turn her into such a trash-talking brat, no one will speak to her on or off a tennis court!”
She stared, hard, at me. I couldn’t believe what I heard. Was she trying to say all that coziness on the patio was about me?
Mark slammed his hands on the table. Mom and I both jumped.
“Who the hell is this guy, that he thinks he can talk about me behind my back to my wife?” he roared.
It was all downhill after that. Pretty typical, actually. No dinner was eaten by anyone; I do remember leaving the table and retreating to my room. That very evening Dad called Ray and uninvited him to our home ever again. He said “the check is in the mail” for the last lessons, sayonara, god knows what else. My mother was so blisteringly angry that she got in the car and drove off. I think I must’ve been asleep when she finally came back.
The next day, a Saturday, Ray Giordano pulled in to our driveway. He walked around the house, to the tennis court where Dad was watching as I called the dogs.
It escalated to yelling almost immediately. Dad shouted, “Get off my property!” as Ray was pleading, then loudly insisting, “Shut up and listen!” I felt numb and nauseous and disbelieving all at once. At some point I started shouting, too, something like “Stop it! Just stop it, both of you!” and the ruckus got so bad that the neighbors heard and called the cops.
It was definitely our awfullest, sickest Lloyd moment.
Ray left after the police arrived. My dad didn’t press charges. My mother threw together an overnight bag and spent the rest of the weekend at my uncle’s, returning by Monday morning. Greeting me, wordlessly, in the kitchen, with a hot breakfast and the smell of fresh coffee before I boarded the bus to school. Somehow, the three of us limped through that day. Then the rest of the week. A month. A year.
My mother and I never spoke about what happened. And until Jerry Goss appeared out of nowhere, Ray Giordano was relegated to the back of the closet. Packed away, chloroformed. A locked box with a DO NOT DISTURB sign taped to the top.
Chapter Twenty-Six
EVA
Sounds and voices float over and around me like a haze. Splashing and little-kid laughter. Faraway conversations. Paige. Paige’s friends.
“I mean, could my hair be more frizzed? I hate f-ing summer!”
“Dude, chillax. Your hair is fine. You just burned it into submission with my straightener.”
“Burned? Does it look burned? Oh my god!”
“It looks fine, Paige! Jeez, you are so obsessed with your hair.”
“You know, I thought I smelled something when I was using your straightener. I think the settings are wacked.”
I’m stretched out beneath the shade of a beach umbrella. Wrapped in a towel. Rubbery bands of a folding chair press into my back, my legs. Bounce slightly when I move. It’s cold.
“That is a $180 salon-approved, ceramic-paddle hair straightener, and it is not wacked.”
“Oh my god, you paid $180 for a hair straightener! Are you f-ing kidding me?”
“I didn’t pay for it. My aunt gave it to me for my birthday. It’s a Chi.”
“Still.”
“Where is Paige going?”
“Probably back to the bathroom to look at her hair.” Laughter.
“What did you pay for yours?”
“My what?”
“Duh! Your hair straightener.”
“Thirty-seven-fifty at Target.”
I’m breathing through a cocktail straw. The air just won’t come. There’s a line of pain the length of my arm.
“You can’t get anything but crap for thirty-seven-fifty. If you want to fry your head, be my guest, but I’d toss that thing in the Dumpster.”
“Yeah, well, Paige managed to fry her head on your $180 crap, so I’ll keep my Tar-zhay special, thank you very much.” Pause.
“It was burned, wasn’t it?”
“To a crisp.” Laughter.
“We should have told her.”
“What’s the point? You can’t unburn hair.”
Someone is pressing a fist into the middle of my chest. Pressing, right between my boobs. I try to breathe, but the air won’t fit. I need to say something, but I can’t remember their names. Paige’s friends.
“Ouch! What the heck, Paige! You just hit me with a wet towel!”
“I hate you guys! Why didn’t you tell me I burned my hair?”
“You didn’t burn your hair! It looks great!”
“By the time you came out of the locker room, it was too late. You can’t unburn hair.”
“Screw you people! I’m outta here. Eva, are you ready to leave?”
Leave. Move my legs. I can’t get up.
“Paige, c’mon. Don’t be mad.”
“Oh, and you wouldn’t be mad if you toasted your hair and no one told you?”
Something’s not right. I’m not right.
“Dude, she is white.”
“Who’s white?”
“Eva.”
“Eva’s always white. She hates the sun.”
“So she comes to hang out at the swim club … why?”
“No, I mean like sick white. Look at her.”
“Eva? Talk to me. Is something wrong?” Paige speaking. Close to me.
I need air. If I don’t get air I’m going to faint. Or throw up. Or both. I feel sick and floaty and my arm hurts.
I think I close my eyes.
“I don’t feel right.” Me, speaking. My tongue feels heavy. My voice sounds far away.
“Hey, guys, something’s wrong. Something’s really, really wrong.” Scared voice.
“She’s, like, drenched in sweat.”
“Should we call her parents?”
“Somebody, run, get the lifeguard.” A chair scrapes.
“Eva! Eva! My god, why doesn’t she say anything?”
Why can’t I say anything?
“I’m calling nine-one-one.”
“Just wait for the lifeguard, okay?”
“Girls, is there a problem?” Woman’s voice. Splashing. I hear “Marco!” Voices answer “Polo!” “Marco!” “Polo!”
“Everyone stand back!” Man’s voice.
Someone leans on my chest. Presses my chest so that I can’t squeeze the air into my lungs. The pain from my arm shoots up my neck. Someone is crying.
There are sirens, far away. My eyes are closed, I know that now, and I’m slipping, drifting. Everything is muddled. The person sitting on my chest has turned into a mountain. Crushing me. I’m disappearing. Only little puffs of air slip into my lungs. That’s all I’m allowed.
At some point I feel lifted, on a cushiony soft cloud. And it’s such a relief, to fly.
Then everything goes quiet.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
HENRY
Aida’s Reception Ballroom is like nothing I’ve ever seen. Or imagined.
Gold. Pillars. These little carved trees, in massive clay pots, line the walkway entrance. A fountain, painted gold, spews water straight up so when it rains down it looks like shimmery gold fragments. A white Hummer limo, seven windows long, is parked outside. Women with some serious bling walk arm in arm with men in tuxedos.
“Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore,” I murmur into David’s ear as we walk from the parking lot. He squeezes my arm, which is wrapped around his. He is gorgeous in his slim black jacket, which smells faintly of aftershave, not his usual laundry detergent.
The vestibule is loud with people speaking Spanish. We elbow slowly toward a double-door entrance at the back. On one side, propped on a large artist’s easel, leans an enormous framed photo display of Yolanda. In the center is her formal picture with the white gown and tiara. Around that are less formal pictures, showing all the different “faces” of Yoly. I like one of her standing in front of a tennis net, dressed to drill, holding her racket.
We wander into a massive ballroom. On either side of us, there is a sea of round tables and chairs, elegantly set with white linen and flowers. Before us, a gleaming wood dance floor extends to red-carpeted steps with a curtain at the top. A four-tiered cake is displayed on one side of the steps, and a DJ has set up his equipment on the other.
A waiter carrying a tray of glasses approaches. David slips his arm from mine, plucks two from the passing tray, and hands one to me. Bubbles float dreamily to the surface. I wave the rim beneath my nose. Champagne.
David clinks his glass against mine.
“Cheers,” he says. He sips, his eyes smiling mischievously.
“We’re underage and supposedly in training,” I say dryly. He winds his free arm around my waist. He moves in close and we rotate, dancelike.
“We’re celebrating,” he corrects.
“What?” I reply. He considers the ceiling for a moment, then looks at me again.
“Yoly’s quinces,” he says, “to start.” I narrow my eyes at him. “I don’t know. Truth and beauty? Love and friendship?”
My heart skitters. Seriously, an EKG machine would reveal a skipped beat. I feel his breath warm on my face as he speaks. I take the tiniest of tastes. I’ve never had champagne before. It’s surprisingly unsweet. The bubbles fizz, like Pop Rocks, on my tongue.
“A real taste, Henry,” he says softly. I lift the glass to my lips and fill my mouth. It’s like drinking sparklers.
“You’re corrupting me, David Ross,” I tell him.
He laughs. He twirls us just a little faster. By the time we find our way to our table, both our flutes … he tells me that’s what they’re properly called … are empty.
Yoly has seated us with Enrique, who’s already there.
“Hey, Henry! Cómo estás?” He’s with a pretty girl in a red, shimmery dress. He wears a tux with a light blue vest, indicating that he’s family. Yoly told me that light blue would be the unifying theme color tonight.
“Muy bien, Enrique,” I reply. “Y tú?”
He replies in a pleased blizzard of Spanish, and I put my hands up in surrender.
“Sorry! Hello-how-are-you is as good as I do.”
“So far,” he says pleasantly. “A little more time in Florida and you’ll be fluent. We’ll make a real cubanita out of you!” He turns to his date. “This is my friend Maria Arreche. Maria, this is Henry Lloyd, who lives with Yolanda at Chadwick, and her friend David. How are you, man?” They shake hands. Enrique looks at me with an expectant smile.
“So,” he says, “are you ready for your first quinceañera?” Maria’s eyes widen.
“You two have never been to a quinces?” she asks. I shake my head.
“Until I met Yoly, I’d never even heard of a quinces,” I confess.
“Where are you from?” Maria asks. I think she half expects I’ll say Mars.
“New Jersey,” I tell her. She frowns.
“Right next to New York, how could they not know quinces?” she says, more to Enrique than to us.
“Well, all I can say is that you’re both in for the fiesta of a lifetime,” Enrique says.
At that moment the DJ says something into his microphone, and the packed ballroom becomes eerily quiet. Then a rhythmic drumming, just shy of a construction-site jackhammer, fills the room. It booms from the DJ’s giant speakers and the crowd picks up the beat with enthusiastic claps, swaying hips, cheers. The dance floor clears.
The velvet curtains at the top of the staircase part, and Yolanda appears, to wild applause, holding hands with some tall, dark-haired boy.
Her hair is styled in this updo and held in place by a rhinestone and pearl tiara. In her ears she wears long, matching drops. Someone has done her makeup, and even though I’ve never given a thought to lipstick in my life, I make a mental note to ask her the name of this color. Acres of cloudlike gauze and satin billow around her; she gleams with pearls and sequins. But it’s the perfect smile, the complete happiness, radiating from Yoly that makes her the most beautiful girl in the room.
She and her partner dance-strut in unison to the center of the floor. They face the staircase and join in the rhythmic clapping themselves.
Couples descend the red carpet to wild applause. The guys are dressed in black tuxedos with blue vests, the girls in floor-length gowns of baby blue. The DJ announces their names as the girls line up on one side of the dance floor, the boys on the other. As soon as they are all in place, the DJ switches gears, the rhythm changes and Rihanna fills the room:
It’s getting late
I’m making my way over to my favorite place
Rihanna fans whoop when they recognize the words to “Don’t Stop the Music” and the opening dance by the chambelanes and damas begins.
In and out they weave, in perfect time. Yoly and her partner lead them at the head of the formation and … the girl’s got moves. I knew she could pound forehands; I knew she could run. But shimmy in a ball gown? Amazing.
David bumps his hip against mine. Laughing, we bump and clap with Rihanna.
“Did they practice this?” he says loudly, leaning toward me.
“They hired a choreographer,” I reply, trying not to yell. “They had rehearsals and everything.” He shakes his head in wonder.
It’s too noisy for me to tell him all I know. About the agonies Yoly endured trying to pick this song. “I mean, can you imagine Abuelita rockin’ out to “Don’tcha wish your girlfriend was a freak like me?” she had explai
ned, singing to me one afternoon. She’d finally settled on Rihanna, even though some of her friends thought it was way tame.
I look to my left at David. When he feels my eyes on him, he breaks out one of those heart-melting smiles. He is so gorgeous. I want to dance with him … can he dance? I can feel the music clear down to the small of my back, and I want to move with it. With him.
Then suddenly it’s over, and another, slower tune begins, something Yolanda has played for me. The dance floor clears, and Mr. Cruz approaches Yoly and her partner, who places her hand in her father’s and steps away. Strains of “Find Your Wings” fill the room, and the traditional father-daughter dance begins. The DJ plays the Spanish version, but Yoly has told me what the words mean. About a girl becoming a woman, and her father’s wish: to give her wings and let her fly as high as she can.
The crowd becomes quiet as they dance. Yoly leans her head against her father’s chest. Some people start to gently clap.
It occurs to me that I might truly be in Oz, or on Mars. Definitely not any place I’ve been before. Where fathers dance with cherished daughters and the rooms aren’t big enough to hold all the friends and relatives.
“Are you okay?” David says to me. I put my hands to my cheeks; they come away wet.
“C’mon.” He wraps one arm around my waist and leads me toward the exit. I point my face toward the floor. Don’t make a scene. Don’t wreck this for Yoly. Don’t ruin your makeup. I try thinking of everything possible to stop the waterworks, but the tears keep coming.
At the far end of the now-deserted vestibule, David finds a small couch. We sit; he reaches into his jacket and pulls out a handkerchief. I take it and dab my eyes.
“Is there another eighteen-year-old guy on the planet who carries a handkerchief?” I wonder aloud.
“Comes with the monkey suit,” he deadpans. We both laugh.
“Thanks,” I whisper. I ball the hankie tightly in my lap. He places his hands over mine and I notice, not for the first time, that he has wonderful hands. Long, tapered tan fingers. Strong wrists.
“What’s making you cry?” he says softly. Which brings on another gush.