Whip It (3 page)

True to form, she’s got her T-shirt hiked up in mock Girls Gone Wild stance before I yank it down like an uptight parent trying to keep her three-year-old daughter from flashing her panties on the playground.

“We’re leaving,” I say, grabbing her wrist.

“Sure thing.
After
you give a little love to the spy cam,” she insists. Pash follows her command with a look that says,
We’re in this together,
guilting me from letting her take the potential fall for both of us.

So, like lightning on the prairie, I flash with quickie speed. T-shirt up, T-shirt down. Now, let’s get the hell out of here.

We stroll toward the exit and sweetly wave good-bye to the eighty-year-old lady workin’ the door (apparently,
she’s
allowed to have blue hair, but I am not).

When we cross the parking lot, Pash and I are home free. Wal-Mart never knew what hit ’em.

Back to Fool Shopping

O
kay, I don’t know which saint to salute or god to bow down to, but I just witnessed a minor miracle in my very own bedroom. Brooke actually knocked on my door (a shocker in its own right), and upon gaining entry, she offered to take me to Austin to get some school clothes. Austin! (Angels sing, clouds part, sun shines down, and I am skipping through fields of daisies.)

You must understand that, compared to Bodeen, Austin is New York City. Anything cool that happens in Texas happens in Austin, end of story. You see, Austin has this thing that Bodeen doesn’t: It’s called “civilization.” Cool movie theaters, stores you’re not ashamed to shop at, and real music clubs! Not that crap like Ricky’s I-10 Roadhouse, where rednecks go to “boot-scoot-boogie,” but real places where indie and punk bands play live music
every night.
If Austin were some standardized test question, it would go something like this:

Cool is to NYC as _____ is to Texas.
Answer: Austin.

Austin is only an hour’s drive from Bodeen, but it’s a “whole ’nother world,” as they say. Since I have yet to procure my own vehicle (Pash and I are working on it, trust me), my only chance of leaving town is in
la limousine de Brooke.
I take her up on her offer
tout de suite.

I am so crazy excited, I ignore all the warning signs that suggest this wave of Oprah-inspired, mother/daughter love just might come crashing down on the shores of reality.

Warning sign #1: Pash is not allowed to come with, which usually guarantees good Brooke behavior. Now I’m on my own without my best-friend protective shield.

Warning sign #2: Contrary to the just-us sales pitch, my mom suddenly insists Sweet Pea tag along so she too can get some new clothes (her pint-sized wardrobe is already twice the size of mine). This means there will be a Disney Store excursion, and it is against my beliefs to step foot in a Disney Store.

Warning sign #3: Brooke seems to be ignoring my meticulously researched Internet data concerning the best places to shop—i.e., near the university, the epicenter of cool.

But none of this squelches my excitement. On the drive up, I am perfect. I don’t even flinch when Brooke tosses my Hot Hot Heat CD in the backseat to make way for her Céline Dion sing-along with Sweet Pea. My Stepford-daughter performance is so convincing that I wonder if I am in fact a great undiscovered actress. I picture myself winning an Academy Award and giving a speech so brilliant it inspires misfit girls everywhere to rise up against their oppressors. I am a one-woman revolution.

But two hours later in a crummy suburban mall, my façade is beginning to crack. For Brooke to pay for my clothes, Brooke has to approve of my clothes, which requires careful diplomacy. She hates everything I like, and I hate everything she likes. There is no middle ground.

Why can’t I be one of those kids whose parents just let them take the credit card and get what they want without interference? Somebody please fill me in on the magic potion that gets your parents to obey these laws of teen shopping.

The more I withdraw, the more Brooke pushes. Pink, pink, and more pink. At one point she even holds up a pair of jeans with pink suede fringe running down the legs (!) and dares to ask why I don’t like them. Seriously, if there were a Smithsonian exhibit of America’s butt-ugliest jeans, these would be the pièce de résistance. And she wants me to tell her what’s wrong with them?

“Um, everything,” I say.

“Well, that’s your opinion,” she snaps, all offended.

“I think they’re just darlin’. They’d be great for Shania’s new cowgirl talent routine. I’m gonna get them for costume inspiration.

Oh, pardon me, I had this whole day wrong. I thought we were back-to-school shopping for Bliss, but apparently we’re pageant shopping for Shania. I didn’t get that memo.

We head to the Gap, aka “the Crap” (b/c Pash and I find their version of cool a little too forced), but I can at least buy a couple of T-shirts to cut up and customize. I grab anything and everything, make a beeline for the dressing room, and treat myself to a much-needed break from Brooke.

I can hear my mom roaming the store making singsong chitchat with someone about “how difficult” I am to shop for. That two-faced cow. Excuse me, why should I have to take fashion advice from a forty-one-year-old who considers the Michaels craft store her house of couture?

In the mirror I discover a monster zit in the middle of my forehead. It looks like a baby horn. Lovely. On top of it all, I’m becoming a unicorn. I bite my tongue to keep myself from crying.

As we head for the car, I finally let my mom have it.

“Why can’t I just go to one, one store that is not in a mall? One store where I might actually find something that I like? You promised me a trip to Austin. This isn’t Austin, this is a suburban mall.”

There is a long pause, like Brooke can barely comprehend what I’m saying, as if it never occurred to her to shop outside of a mall. At last she says, “Okay, Bliss, what is your idea of Austin?”

“Well, like, down by the college, where the noncorporate stores are. It’s not even ten minutes away.”

She gives me this martyr sigh, like I’m asking the impossible, like I expect her to carry me there on her back.

“Fine,” she says. “One store.”

“Awesome! Let’s go to Atomic City. They have the best shoes!” I squeal, well aware that my mom is desperate to see me in something other than these busted Chuck Taylors with the silver duct tape around the toe (a fuck-off fashion do if there ever was one).

I enter Atomic City, a rambling store in an old house that caters to the local punks, rockabilly kids, goths, hippies, ravers, mods, and anyone else not represented by the mainstream. I practically sprint past the Manic Panic hair dye, the Japanime T-shirts, the kiosk of cooler-than-thou sunglasses, and retro pin-up dresses in search of what I came here for: John Fluevog shoes. And the selection is even better in person than what you see online. Score!

I try on several styles and gather opinions from a trio of to-die-for cute boys who are also shopping. They are way college-aged, and Brooke is in full spy mode, so I have to keep the flirting to a min. But trust me, I am swooning on the inside. Big time. I even forget (momentarily) about my unicorn zit.
This
is my kind of Austin.

I finally decide on a pair of chunky Mary-Janes in bright purple with two turquoise straps. Cool and comfy and worth every penny of the 175-dollar asking price (my entire back-to-school budget, plus some saved-up baby-sitting money). Best of all, this fab footwear says, to even the most casual of observers, “I was not purchased in a mall.” Maybe on Mars, but definitely not in a mall.

Even Brooke seems relieved to be buying me something I obviously love. She is just about to slap down the plastic and seal the deal when something across the store catches her eye: a shelf of bright-colored glass illuminated by the late-afternoon sun.

“Ooh, now those are pretty!” she exclaims a little too loudly before realizing what it is she’s admiring. It’s a shelf of foot-long bongs.

My mother’s face goes white, as everyone in Atomic City turns away and laughs their collective ass off.

Brooke is mor-ti-fied. It takes exactly three seconds for her to reconsider my prized purchase. “Bliss,” she says, so piously I can practically see the halo hovering above her head, “I don’t think I would be doing my job as a mother if I bought you your back-to-school shoes from an establishment that also sells drug paraphernalia. Do you?”

“Mom,” I say, trying to calmly navigate the choppy waters of my mother’s mood swing, “I just want the shoes, not the bong.”

“First it’s the shoes, then it’s the bong.”

“Yeah, right.” I laugh. “Shoes are the gateway drug.”

“Very funny, Bliss,” she scoffs, not laughing. “Apparently you don’t mind supporting drug dealers.”

“Whatev,” I protest. “Have you ever seen the delivery guys who work for Dad? Hello. They’re all about the ganja. Does that make Dad a supporter of drug dealers?”

My mom throws her hands over Sweet Pea’s innocent ears. “You are out of line!”

I’m out of line? She’s out of line. This whole damn shopping trip is out of line! Brooke wouldn’t even be pulling this stunt if Pash was here. She’d be too busy showing off, playing the perfect parent.

“C’mon, Mom, please. Just let it go,” I beg.

“You know what, if you can convince your dad to let you get these shoes, then they’re yours,” she declares, whipping out her rhinestone cell and dialing away. I can feel the whole store watching our little drama, rooting for me. I want to tell them to keep their expectations low.

Brooke gets Earl on the phone and completely blindsides him with her propagandistic spin. Classic Brooke.

“Hi, sugar, it’s me. Would you mind telling your sixteen-year-old daughter why it is inappropriate for Christians such as ourselves to buy one-hundred-and-seventy-five-dollar shoes from people who support drug dealers?” Brooke asks in her tone that tells my father “you’re either with Brooke or against Brooke.” And Earl never wants to be against Brooke. Ever. She hands me the phone and smugly mouths “good luck.”

“Dad, it is so not even like that—”

“Girl, what do you need with a-hundred-and-seventy-five-dollar shoes?” he interrupts.

“I’m helping pay, and that is so not the point!” I counter.

“Is to me.” He sighs. “Look, I don’t have time to play referee. I gotta Mexican family in the middle of purchasing a full living room suite. You know those people pay cash. I gotta close this deal, so whatever your mom decides is fine by me.” He hangs up.

And just like that, this day has officially become a major suck-a-thon.

On the drive home, I refuse to sit up front with my oppressor. I hang in the backseat, furiously plotting all the ways I could commit suicide and really break her heart. I imagine my funeral: the music, the casket, the flowers (all white calla lilies). And then it occurs to me that if I die my mother will get her ultimate wish. She’ll get to dress me. And that thought just pisses me off even more. I vow to stay alive in protest.

I look down and discover that I’m still holding one of many band flyers I grabbed before leaving Atomic City, advertisements for concerts I’ll never get to attend. At least I can use them to decorate my room.

A lime-green flyer catches my eye—a fab picture of a tough girl in ’70s-style roller skates, fishnet tights, and a shredded miniskirt (a fashion statement I fully support). The ad is not for a band, but for a Roller Derby league. It reads:

Skirts, Skates, & Scrapes!

ALL THE OLD-SCHOOL SKILLS
WITH A NEW PUNK-ROCK ATTITUDE

Come See

THE LONE STAR DERBY GIRLS

AUSTIN’S ALL-GIRL ROLLER DERBY LEAGUE

THE HOLY ROLLERS VS. THE FIGHT CREW
HALFTIME CONCERT BY THE CHIMNEY SWEEPS

This ain’t no cheerleading clinic, y ’all!

Okay, I’m not exactly sure what this whole Roller Derby thing even is, but some inner alarm goes off inside me, and I know I have to check it out.

I glance at my mom in the front seat, blithely singing along to her bad CD as she drives closer and closer to Bodeen, taking me farther and farther from my soul-mate city.

And I think,
Fuck you and your Céline Dion Muzak. The sun is quickly setting on the days when I need your permission to leave Bodeen. From now on, I’ll go to Austin if I feel like it. Just try and stop me!

Hell on Wheels

M
ajor development on the transportation front—Pash’s parents gave her a car on the first day of school (proof they’re a thousand times cooler than Brooke & Earl).

Thanks to the Pashmobile, I can now retire from school bus–riding hell. Yes, to all you freshmen in the back row who think armpit farts are the height of hilarity, to the quartet of Corbi wannabes applying gobs of cheap, stinky perfume, to the hicks who serenade me each morning with your country-music-inspired gangsta rap (a crime against humanity, trust me), and, yes, even to Mortimor—you bus-driving fool, you, with your mismatched polyester socks and government-issued hearing aids—I bid you all adieu. (Thank God. I thought this day would never come.)

Seriously, I had the single freakiest bus route in the history of freaky bus routes. And not freaky good, just freaky freaky. I know technically we are “all God’s children,” but one look at the people on my bus and you couldn’t help but conclude God has some seriously f’ed-up offspring. And yes, I’m including myself.