The Loser's Guide to Life and Love (11 page)

I told him I hated him. Not just once either. I told him multiple times.

He'll never speak to me again. Ever ever ever.

I strip off my Reel Life uniform and throw it onto the pile of clothes in my closet. Then I flop down onto my bed in my underwear and sob into my pillow.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

For months I have dreamed of the moment when Ed (finally) looks at me “with desire.” And he did. He so so SO did. Tonight. More than once. He even kissed me as we sat together listening to Annie Lennox purr “Love Is a Stranger” on the radio in Ben's car.

Okay. Before I go on here, I want to stop for a minute
and think some more about The Kiss. I'll leave it to the romance writers to fill you in on the mechanics of the thing. Instead, I want to concentrate on how it made me feel.

Ed's kiss was like eating raspberries straight from the garden—sweet and hot as the summer sun—raspberries that burst on your tongue and stain your lips with scarlet juices so that you can still taste the memory of the fruit long after the fruit is gone.

I love raspberries and I loved Ed's kiss, which made me feel strong and beautiful.

UNTIL IT MADE ME FEEL GUILTY.

And now I understand why I told Ed that I hate him—he made me forget all about Ellie.

Here's the part I didn't mention when he looked at me “with desire.” While Ellie and I were shelving DVDs, she said she thought it would be fun if the two of us started hanging out and asked for my cell phone number and email address. Then she confessed to me that she might like Sergio, otherwise known as Ed.

So what would you do if someone shared a secret like this with you? Would you go out THAT VERY NIGHT and start kissing THAT VERY BOY?

And here's another thing.

I hated Ed because after all these months he has finally given me what I wanted.

And now I am even more afraid.

References to the moon turn up in the most unlikely of places.

For example. I was flipping through a book of poems tonight and found the archaic term “moon-cursor,” which comes from the seventeenth century.

The footnote explained that a moon-cursor was a decoy—a boy who offered to lead travelers to safety by the light of his lantern on moonless nights. Only instead of taking them to the nearest inn, the moon-cursor led them straight to a gang of thieves waiting to rob them.

Moon-cursor.

Thy name is Ed.

So here's how things stand when I go to work: Both of my best friends totally hate my guts.

Gee. Ain't life grand?

I punch in and check the schedule to see if Scout is working with me. She's not, and to tell you the truth, I am really glad. I definitely need some time to figure stuff out.

Unfortunately, I am working with T. Monroe, who's telling me (again) about the time he turned himself into the police when he discovered he was going five miles per hour over the speed limit in his minivan.

“Really, T. Monroe?” I say to him through clenched teeth. “I didn't think it was aerodynamically possible to
break the speed limit in a minivan.”

At the moment I hate T. Monroe for being such a self-righteous minivan-driving moron.

As you can easily tell, I'm having a very bad day—a bad day that only gets worse. Remember that guy in the locker room who I snapped with my towel? The guy who looked exactly like Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger? The guy I hoped to never ever meet again in this life? Or the next?

SURPRISE!

Well, he just sauntered into the store. No kidding.

The false Arnold strolls casually to the counter where I am working and gives me one of his false-Arnold smiles.

“I'm looking for some dude named Sergio.” He says this like he's issuing an invitation to a rumble. It'll be me and him and our boys. The Sharks and the Jets at Pioneer Park on the west side of Salt Lake City. Midnight.

I gulp, hoping he won't recognize me. “I'm a guy named Sergio. See? It says right here on my name tag.”

The smile stays on Arnold's face, but his eyes narrow as he holds out his boxing glove of a hand. “I'm Rick. Mary and Ellie's Rick. I understand we've both done time in Brazil.”

Rick.
Senhor
Rick.

My stomach drops like a loose elevator on its way
straight to the cellar of a very tall building. I cannot believe this. Rick is False Arnold—the guy I once assaulted with a wet towel.

“Pleased to meet you, Rick,” I lie, offering my hand. Rick casually takes it, mangles it, and returns it to me—a mere shadow of the hand that it used to be.

“Como vai?”
he says, leaning across the counter so that his face is just inches from mine. I feel his hot breath.

Lucky for me, I've been prepped for this one. “Oh you know. Same as always.”

Rick pulls back a little and studies me like I am material for the world's easiest pop quiz. He rattles off line after line of fluent Portuguese, then finishes up with an easy smile.

“Sim,”
I say. I attempt to laugh lightly, but instead I accidentally make a snorting noise. Also, I am sweating. Heavily, like Ed and not like Sergio.

“Sim?”
Rick's eyebrows shoot up in mock confusion.

I nod.

“But I didn't ask you a yes-or-no question. I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean.”

But of course he does understand. Perfectly.

Just my luck. The United States of America is probably full of amazingly stupid bodybuilders who don't speak a single word of Portuguese. Why does Mary the Big, Bad, Mean Roller Derby Queen have to know a smart one?

LIFE IS SO UNFAIR.

“Houston,” Rick says, cracking his oversized knuckles, “we've got a problem.”

“
Apollo 13
. Tom Hanks. 1993.” I buzz in with the correct response. If I were handing out Oscars, I'd present one right now to
Senhor
Rick for Best Adaptation of a Famous Screen Line for Personal Use.

Rick chooses not to be diverted by my friendly game-show banter. “Mary asked me to check you out,
Sergio
.” He pauses for dramatic effect. “I guess she has a right to be suspicious.”

I don't say anything, just bow my head like some poor stupid dog who knows he's gonna get the crap kicked out of him by Arnold S.

Rick shoves his Arnold S. face back into mine. “I don't know what game you're playing, dude, but I want you to count Ellie out.”

I swallow and nod, fear and shame coursing through my veins like salmon swimming upstream.

“I'm giving you a choice,” Rick went on, “because I'm fair like that. Either you come clean with her, or I'll do it for you. Okay?”

“I'll tell her myself,” I say.

“Is that right? Well, I'm the kind of guy who appreciates details,” Rick says. “Exactly when will you clear up this misunderstanding?” He cracks his knuckles again, which reminds me of bones breaking.

My bones.

“This afternoon,” I promise. No birds like stars then. No picnics with
banana fritas
for dessert. No moonlight.

I stand up straight, square my shoulders, and look Rick straight in the eye. “Tell her to come by. I get off work at four.”

Rick nods slowly. “Okay then.” He backs up and looks me over. Is it just my imagination, or do I see a glimmer of respect in his eyes?

Nah. It's just my imagination.

“We're protective of Ellie, Mary and me,” Rick says. “You aren't the first guy that's lied to her.”

“I'm sorry,” I say.

“Seems like I've heard you say those words once before,” says Rick. “You had a gym towel in your hand that time.”

Can this possibly get any more humiliating?

“Apologize to Ellie,” Rick said. “And if you don't, I want you to remember something.”

“Yes?”

“I'll be back….”

 

It's a couple of minutes before four, and T. Monroe is asking me if I think it's blasphemous for a believing person (like himself) to watch actors (probably sinners) portray Christ (definitely not a sinner) on the silver screen.

“I wouldn't know,” I say. “I try not to think about
stuff like that, and frankly I think it would be better for your mental health if you didn't either. You're driving yourself crazy over phantoms, T. Monroe. Save your guilt for something real.”

“Such as?” he huffs. Clearly T. Monroe does not want to be beaten in the Guilt Derby.

“SUCH AS SCREWING OVER INNOCENT PEOPLE WHO TRUST YOU!” I snap. “NOW THAT'S A REAL SIN!”

I'm on edge, as you can clearly tell.

“Hi, everybody!” Ellie breezes through the door as if on cue, bathing both T. Monroe and me in one of her radiant Ellie smiles.

T. Monroe looks like the heavens have parted and he's just seen a vision. He greets Ellie, full of Christian love and fellowship.

I smile weakly at Ellie, conscious of the fact that she won't be wanting smiles from me soon enough. “I gotta punch out and then I'll join you. We—we need to talk.”

Ellie gives a light, unconcerned shrug as she twirls her beautiful long hair with her beautiful long fingers. For all she knows, I could be planning to ask her if we could swap
banana frita
recipes.

“Rick said you wanted to see me about something,” she says.

I swallow and nod (also weakly), then leave her standing with T. Monroe while I fly to the back office to punch
out. I throw open the office door and jump—eek!—in surprise. I thought Ali was gone, but here he is sitting at his desk.

He swivels around. Deliberately and slowly. For the first time ever, he takes his sunglasses completely off to look at me, only I get the distinct impression that he's looking
through
me—directly into the dark heart of Ed McIff, where strange and unknown evils lurk.

I turn away from his gaze and find my time card.

“What are you about, baby?” he asks as I punch out. His voice sounds like distant thunder rolling down Mount Sinai.

I slip my time card back into its slot and turn around to face him. Also deliberately. Also slowly. I look at him straight. Eye to eye.
Ojo a ojo
.

“I'm getting ready to take care of a little personal business, Ali,” I say. “I'll see you tomorrow night at the party.”

He nods like he's not sure he believes me and returns to business of his own.

 

From the time Rick left until the moment Ellie walked through the door, I have been stewing about how to tell her the truth. Should I buy her a nice dinner first, then break the news? Or should we go for a walk, possibly past a grocery store where I can go inside and buy her a rose from the cooler? Should the two of us return to Liberty
Park, where we can remember our first kiss and also feed a few ducks?

Would any of this make her feel better?

Or am I just stalling?

As soon as we walk outside into the parking lot, I decide to tell her the sorry truth and get it over with. A hot breeze picks up and an empty Burger King bag skitters past our feet. I sigh. Telling her the truth beneath a remorseless sun in a parking lot seems appropriate somehow. A dreary setting for a story with a dreary ending.

“So what did you want to tell me, Sergio?” Ellie asks, her face glowing. She reaches out and tenderly smoothes back the hair that has fallen into my face, and I realize that I am truly hating every guy who has ever lied to her—especially myself.

I take her wrist gently and hold her eyes with mine.

“Ellie, I am a fraud.”

She's still smiling, but confusion steals like a cloud across her sunny summer face.

“My name isn't Sergio. It's Ed. Ed McIff.”

“But your name tag…,” she falters.

“It belonged to someone who worked here before I did.”

“So you're not really from Brazil,” she says slowly, tasting the bitter implications of her words.

I shake my head. “No, although I know somebody
who lives in Brazil. Ben. Scout's big brother.” Like THAT matters. I give it a try, however, because I am just desperate enough to fill the chasm growing between us with talk, no matter how lame.

“So,” she begins, “you don't really speak Portuguese?”

“No. But I would like to.” Like THAT also matters.

Ellie's arms are folded tight against her chest as though she's protecting herself. From me. She stares at the ground.

“Why did you lie to me?” she asks, still looking down.

I cut directly to the chase. “Because—because I'm a jerk.”

Although her head is still bowed, Ellie raises her eyes, and I go on.

“When you walked through the doors that first night, I thought you were the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen, and when you noticed my name tag—well, I decided to go for it. I turned into Sergio.”

Ellie thinks about this. “How do you know I wouldn't have liked Ed just as much as I liked Sergio?”

I let rip with a ripe royal snort. “Give me a break.”

She looks at me with surprise.

“Girls like you don't notice guys like me.”

For a split second, Ellie looks wounded—like she's been smacked hard across the face. Then she recovers.

“You may think you know all about
girls like me
,” she
says, biting off each word. “But that's not the same thing as actually knowing
me
, now is it?”

No doubt about it. An icy breeze is blowing my way.

“Who knows?” Ellie says. “Maybe I could have walked through the door and thought you were pretty cute. Maybe I could have said, ‘Your name is Ed? Well, I'm Ellie Fenn from Santa Clara, and I'm very pleased to meet you!' Maybe you could have said something funny and made me laugh and maybe you would have laughed, too, in which case I would have noticed that you're even better looking when you smile, that actually you have a smile to die for. Maybe we could have been friends. Maybe we could have been more. Maybe.

“But now we'll never know how it could have been between us, will we,
Sergio?
”

She spins sharply on her heel and walks off without looking back.

As final exits go, it's absolutely perfect—controlled, well-timed, brutally elegant.

 

So this is what I do. I start to walk and I do not stop, and as I walk I take a good hard look at all the scumbag things I've been up to lately. Here's a list in case you want to review for a quiz later.

1. Lying to Ellie.
   
2. Making Ellie fall in love with Sergio.
   
3. Two-timing Ellie with Scout in her brother's Mustang convertible.
   
4. Kissing Scout after Quark has confessed that he himself is in love with Scout.
   
5. Making Scout furious enough to toss me out of her brother's Mustang.
   
6. Shooting Bambi's mother.
   

J/k about Bambi's mother. Even I'm not that bad. Not yet.

Slap. Slap. Slap.

My shoes pound the ground as I walk down sidewalks and across streets. The hot sun sits on the horizon like a white all-seeing eye, staring down on me (the Guilty One) so that my lovely frilly white shirt is soon soaked in sweat. Ed sweat.

An old Firebird with a throbbing stereo slows down. Someone inside shouts something at me in Spanish, then follows up by making little kissing noises. Everybody laughs. Ha! Ha! Ha! The car, still vibrating with bass, peels off and leaves me and my limp frilly shirt in the dust.

That's when I look up and notice where I am—in the heart of Salt Lake's Central City neighborhood where the phrase
Se habla español
appears on most of the signs.

And that's when I notice the shrine next to the bus stop.

I've heard about the shrine on the news. About two or three years ago, the city decided it was a lawsuit waiting to happen and made a move to shut it down, but so many people protested that the mayor backed off. Now here it is, right before my naked eyes.

The shrine is actually this huge old tree where the image of Jesus supposedly appeared. Some of the local residents were pretty excited about this event and built a little platform around the tree's trunk so that people can get a better look at the exact spot where Jesus showed up. There's also a small covered bench for kneeling and praying in front of the tree, as well as two low tables covered with burning candles that flicker in the breeze. Everything is covered with faded pictures of Jesus and Mary, as well as garlands and bouquets of pink and orange and yellow plastic flowers. There are other things, too, like balloons and stuffed animals and old school photos—things a kid would leave if he wanted to give Jesus a present so that Jesus would do him a favor in return.