The Museum of Heartbreak (14 page)

“Penelope, I'm so sorry. I'll get Eph.” She pushed off the couch and left the room, her feet moving hurriedly up the steps, the wine sloshing precariously in the glass. I heard her call Eph, her voice loud and uneven; then a door slammed upstairs.

George gave a hefty sigh and stepped outside without saying good-bye, a draft of cold wind sneaking in as he left.

The door closed with a resounding click.

The room around me felt haunted with their absence, as if by leaving the way they had, they had left George- and Ellen-shaped empty spaces in the room. I shifted uncomfortably, kicking the curling edge of the oriental rug.

Eph walked slowly down the steps, frowning.

“Is my dad gone already?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“My mom's pretty pissed,” he said under his breath, glancing over his shoulder up the stairs.

“We don't have to go out if you don't want.”

He frowned. “Nah, I think she's going to go to her Bushwick studio, and she doesn't want company anyway.”

I followed him outside, pulling the collar of my denim-jacket-replacement fleece coat up against the chill of the evening. Eph was silent, his shoulders hunched against the wind, which had picked up considerably since the sun went down.

“You need a coat,” I said, scanning his tee-thermal shirt combo.

“Whatever, I'm fine.”

“Soooo . . . ,” I said, trying to gauge his mood and deciding to plunge in anyway. “That was kind of intense seeing your parents fight,
like ten levels of awful. Is that something new?”

He pushed his hair behind his ear, moved to the side for a jogging mom with a stroller, shrugged at me without making eye contact, and walked ahead of me again. I ran to catch up with him, fiddled with a gum wrapper in my coat pocket, and waited for him to say something.

Nothing.

“Would you mind if we stop at a vintage shop in the East Village before the comic-book store? We have time to walk over after, right? I need to look for something.” I thought of Audrey's beautiful homecoming dress. Maybe I could find something equally cool. “Keats and I are going out tomorrow—did I tell you that?”

“Yeah, we have time,” he said, ignoring my news. I decided to let it lie.

“So I've been thinking more about your dinosaur illustrations. The world should get to see them—not just the Coney Island Sideshow poker crew,” I said, nudging his elbow, hoping to call him back from the surliness threatening our evening.

The result was a halfhearted grunt.

I chewed my lip, debating my next move. “I think they're good, Eph, really good. Like Pratt Art Institute good.” I waited for him to open up to me, to share that he wanted to go to art school, to tell me that his new drawings were from all the secret parts of him, the parts that woke up sweaty and racing in the middle of night or that put unwarranted big hope in fortune-cookie predictions or that still believed, like he had when he was six, that there were real dinosaurs living in the museum.

Instead he jogged down the subway steps, sidestepped a used condom, and pulled out his MetroCard.

“Hey, I'm talking to you, if you didn't notice,” I said, grabbing his hand. It was bone cold. “Jesus, you're freezing.”

I clasped both my hands around his, trying to warm him up. He jerked away, scowling and shoving his hands in his pockets.

“I'm fine, Pen, okay? Drop it.”

My insides curled up, like they had been kicked.

Jerk.

•  •  •

When our D train finally arrived, it was crowded but not impossible, with Friday night energy pulsing through the car—the couple sloppily making out in front of us, the kids in basketball uniforms good-naturedly shoving each other in the aisle, the old woman with lavender hair smiling benevolently at everyone around her.

When we transferred to the F at Rockefeller Center, Eph flopped down in a seat across from me, eyes closed, his head leaning against the wall, which was fine because I didn't much feel like continuing to try to elicit conversation when he was clearly being an a-hole. Oblivious to Eph's Mr. Hyde mood, a small boy decked out in Yankees regalia plonked down next to him, his mom standing watch overhead, and after scoping Eph out, the little boy leaned back and closed his eyes too, mimicking Eph.

After no less than one stop he was sound asleep, his tiny crew cut resting against my Eph's shoulder as if he'd always known him.

I swayed with the movement of the car on the tracks.

My parents fought. But their fights weren't fights—more like tiffs or disagreements—small
irritations discussed and bickered over until one or both of them got past it.

But Ellen . . . Ellen was shipwrecked. Like it was about so much more than George working late, like the very fate of her heart was at stake. And George's frustration had boiled to the surface so quickly, so angrily, it scared me.

I couldn't imagine seeing my parents fight like that and
not
talking to Eph about it. I talked to him about everything.

A mariachi band got on at the next stop, playing loudly, but the little boy's mouth stayed open and he snored slightly. The kid's mom smiled gently at me while a guy with a guitar plinked out “La Cucaracha.”

Finally, when we reached Fourteenth Street, the small boy leaning against Eph sat up and screeched, “Mom, I'm hungry!”

Eph startled awake and I stood, gathering my bag and grabbing Eph's, too. Some Batman comics poked out from the top.

“Exactly how many did you bring to get autographed?” I asked.

He ignored me, grabbing the bag and saluting the little boy, and we headed up the station steps. Outside, kids were break-dancing on the sidewalk, a crowd watching and cheering, tourists filming it on their iPhones. I smelled charred meat from a halal vendor, wove around a drunken bachelorette party debating whether or not to get tattoos. The city's weekend energy was creeping into my bones.

I was going on a date with Keats tomorrow! My first real date!

Eph must have felt the energy too, because as soon as we came aboveground, he seemed lighter, his parents' fight behind us, taking in the movement and the people around us, pointing out a man walking by with a cat standing on his head.

“Ford
would murder me if I tried that,” I said.

“You'd at least lose an eye,” Eph said. “Nice necklace by the way.”

I held up the token. “This may surprise you, but when you gave this to me, I thought you were full of crap.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“But I'm happy to say it has brought me endless luck,” I said gleefully.

“I might need that back,” he said.

We walked east on Thirteenth Street, and when we got to Hong Kong 8, I was surprised how crowded it was on a Friday night.

Eph inclined his head back toward the guys' section. “Heading that way. Meet you back here in a bit? We're going to have to leave here by seven thirty if we want to get to Forbidden Planet in time for the talk.”

“Sure,” I said, already hopefully scanning the rack nearest me for something to wear.

I grabbed a bright red polyester shift covered with garish orange flowers and headed to the dressing room, laughing when I saw the strategic placement of the two biggest flowers right over my boobs. Instinctively I grabbed my phone to take a picture and text Audrey, but then I remembered we weren't talking, and like in some Japanese horror film, the badness started creeping in like a dark stain.

Twenty minutes and at least six outfits later, I was beyond irritated, each click and slide of a hanger along the rack the mark of something that was wrong with me.

I was lost without Audrey's opinion.

I had tried on an old
High School Musical
T-shirt and jean-skirt combo, but worried the irony would backfire and Keats would think
I was a sixteen-year-old Disney fan. I tried to squeeze into a black cocktail dress that looked
Breakfast at Tiffany's
–ish, but after studying my mess of thick hair and how the dress hit at the point that made my calves extra stumpy, I determined I was not very Audrey Hepburnish, plus that reminded me of Audrey, which made me sad. I rejected a wispy poet-girl Anthropologie dress (too pregnant milkmaid) and a preppy fitted navy blazer with olive khakis (too young Republican).

My hands felt dirty and my clothes felt dusty and my body felt dehydrated.

What if Keats and I didn't have anything to talk about?

What if the sweater I was holding was infested with bedbugs?

What if Keats spent more than a half hour with me and determined I was a weirdo?

Why were they selling T-shirts with visible sweat stains?

What if Audrey and I never talked again?

Did I even want to know what that was wadded up under the dressing-room stool?

What if I sweated the whole time and grossed Keats out with my clammy palms?

Did anyone even wash these clothes before they put them up for sale?

Was Ellen okay? Was she crying in her studio right now?

SCABIES.

The oppressively loud techno music in Hong Kong 8 was making me more jittery, and I left the women's clothing section in search of Eph.

I found him in the T-shirt corner, talking with none other than Mia. God, she was everywhere. Her strawberry-blond hair was arranged in a braided crown, and with her sequined silver cardigan
she seemed even more like elven royalty than she had the previous two times I'd seen her, which was saying something.

“Oh, hi, Penelope,” she said brightly as I approached Eph.

I tried to smile, but by that point I was so worked up that I was pretty sure if I tried one more outfit that didn't work, I'd burn the whole place down.

Eph raised an eyebrow at me.

“We should go. We're going to be late for your comic-book thing.” My voice, I knew, was too loud, but I couldn't help it. It came blurting out of me that way: uncalm, uncool, probably the way I'd sound with Keats tomorrow. The guy next to Mia gave me a snotty hipster eye roll and headed to a different rack of clothes.

Eph turned to her. “See you tomorrow, yeah?”

She smiled, and I tugged on his sleeve. He followed me out of the store.

When I got outside, I stood on the sidewalk, jiggling my leg, then stopped when I realized it was exactly what my dad did.

“So that place kind of sucked. Eighty dollars for a vintage Led Zeppelin shirt when I can get the same thing for a buck at Goodwill? No thanks, amigo,” Eph said.

I didn't say anything.

“Did you find something for tomorrow?”

My bottom left eyelid starting twitching, the energy from my leg needing another outlet. “Let's go to Forbidden Planet. Tomorrow's not a big deal anyway.”

“Huh,” he said, a little surprised. He kicked the sidewalk for a second before turning decisively, like he knew exactly where he was going to go.

“Forbidden Planet is that way,” I called.

“I know.”

“We're not going to get to the talk in time.”

“I know.”

I was tired of myself. I wanted to be the kind of person who didn't freak out when she was going to a party, who didn't want to vomit when she saw a guy she liked at school, who was able to find the perfect first-date outfit without having an anxiety attack.

If I didn't move now, I'd lose Eph in the crowd. I thought about the way Keats had handed me the note, the way I'd seen his hair curl on the nape of his neck, and I sighed, jogging to catch up.

Eph was moving ahead of me like he was on a mission, beat-up boots kicking stray leaves along the sidewalk. I bet he was cold again. I sped up to match his long strides, and out of the corner of my eye I saw him slowing down to match my shorter steps, and after a few seconds we found an even rhythm.

The thrift store we entered was regular and unglamorous and old. No hipsters or hipster music here, only an old lady with a cart full of sweaters, some elevator music, weird bluish industrial lighting, and a musty rest-home smell.

I followed Eph as he browsed a section of old T-shirts and pointed out a few, in his words, “dope” ties.

We ended up in the shoe section, weaving around a tall drag queen who was admiring a pair of silver leather knee-high boots.

“Sweet,” Eph said. “Kind of old-school
Star Trek
.”

“Thanks, darling, that's what I think,” she said, taking the boots and heading toward the counter.

The bench in the middle of the aisle was calling my name, so
I sat cross-legged on it, watched him scan the rows of worn shoes.

Eph grabbed a pair of old green-and-yellow neon Nikes, checked the size, frowned, and assessed my feet.

“No. Absolutely not. Stranger foot sweat,” I said.

He pointed at a pair of battered combat boots splattered with paint, and I shook my head.

“Too clunky.” I paused. “Eph, why aren't we at Forbidden Planet?”

“You need something for tomorrow. That last place sucked.” He held up a pair of bright orange stilettos with marabou puffs at the vinyl base.

“I don't think I'm going to go tomorrow.” As soon as I said the words, the anxious questions buzzing around in my chest disappeared, leaving behind stillness. And maybe a little disappointment.

He put the shoes back on the shelf. “What? That's fucking ridiculous.”

“I was thinking more about it. Maybe Audrey's right,” I said. “I couldn't even go to that party without freaking out. Every time I think of Keats, my heart gets all fast and my hands get all clammy, but not in a good way. There's something wrong with me. I should be over the moon. And I am, but . . .”

Eph wordlessly held out a pair of cherry-red cowboy boots that were scuffed at the tips, the outside parts of the heels worn down to an angle.

I automatically untied my high-tops, kicking them off, sliding one boot over a rainbow sock, then the other, continuing. “I mean, what do I do if he kisses me and I mess it up and he laughs at me? I'm almost seventeen and I can't even find an outfit for a date without freaking out.”