“Shut up,” he says, not looking at either of us. “I’ll go pay for these milkshakes.”
And then he slides out of the booth and walks up to the cash register, where a large-of-breast freshman greets him with as much enthusiasm as she can muster for minimum wage.
“What on earth was that about?” I whisper to Ajita, too shocked to crack a joke. “He thinks I’m funny?? What’s next – he thinks I’m also a fundamentally decent human being?”
“Let’s not get carried away,” she says hastily. “But wait, he’s paying for the milkshakes? Danny. Buying us things. Why? Has he been hustling us this whole time? Is he the Secret Millionaire? I think the last thing he bought me was a box of tampons, and that was just his pass-agg way of telling me I was overreacting during an argument.”
Having forked over the moollah, Danny walks back across to the booth, tucking his wallet back into his jeans pocket and looking rather pleased with himself. The Pikachu on his shirt smirks obnoxiously as he almost collides with a waitress carrying three club sandwiches. She shoots him a dirty look, but his gaze is fixed so intently on me that he barely notices. Then he smiles this weird, bashful smile I’ve never seen before. ?Smiles. Danny. I mean, really.
What, pray tell, the fuck?
Wednesday 14 September
7.41 a.m.
The universe is weird. My parents were perfectly healthy and happy when their car was hit by a drunk truck driver [and obviously the truck too, not just the driver himself – that probably would’ve ended differently]. Boom, dead in an instant. But my grandmother, Betty, the woman who raised me from that day forth, is repeatedly told by doctors that she’s going to die soon, on account of her significant BMI. And yet she’s still kicking ass and taking names.
Anyway, even though the doctor repeatedly tells her she has to cut down on fat/sugar/carbs/basically everything fun, Betty makes French toast for breakfast this morning. She’s absolutely incredible at it, due to making delicious batter-based goods 807 times a day at the diner. Our tiny kitchen, full of ancient fittings so retro they’re now back in vogue, smells of sweet cinnamon and maple bacon. The old radio is playing a tacky jingle-based advertisement in the corner.
“What’s on at school today, kid?” Betty practically whistles, ignoring the fact I’m feeding Dumbledore under the table. [Dumbledore is our dachshund, by the way. I’m not hiding the ghost of the world’s most powerful wizard in my kitchen.]
“Oh, the usual. Feigning interest in the periodic table. Pretending to know what a tectonic plate is. Trying and failing to be excused from gym class for the thousandth time this semester.” I stir sugar into the two cups of coffee perched on the batter-splattered counter [try saying that five times without giving yourself a tongue injury].
This is our morning routine: she makes breakfast, I make coffee, and we chat inanely about our upcoming days. It’s been this way as long as I can remember.
“Would you like me to write a note?” she asks. “I’ll explain how your parents just died and you’re having a hard time.”
I snort. “Considering that was thirteen years ago, I’m not so sure they’ll buy it.”
“Besides,” I continue, “a couple of teachers have actually been pretty cool about my career potential lately. That’s kinda motivating me to show up to class a little more often, even if it’s just to show them I care about my future.”
We sit down at our miniature wooden table, tucking into stacks of French toast which slightly resemble the leaning tower of Pisa. She listens intently as I tell her all about my meeting with Mr Rosenqvist yesterday, and about how delightfully Swedish he is, and also about his excitement re my sketches, which I have categorically told Betty not to watch and yet she does anyway. Then I brief her about the subsequent awesome session with Mrs Crannon, and about how the enthusiasm from them both has made me feel slightly more optimistic about my strange brand of social commentary combined with dozens of dirty jokes per page.
“They’re right to be excited, kiddo,” she agrees. “You’re hilarious. But how come you’ve never mentioned this screenplay of yours?”
“I guess I was just embarrassed,” I admit. “Like, what does some random teenager from the middle of nowhere know about writing movies? I feel like a fraud.”
I almost confide in her about my fears of sticking out like a sore thumb in New York or Hollywood, if I ever make it that far, but I don’t want her to feel bad or anything. She knows deep down I don’t care about our lack of money, and it’s not like I blame her for our predicament. But if she knew it was a big obstacle in my career path, she’d only end up feeling guilty. And that’s the last thing in the world I want.
“If your mom were here, she’d say . . .” Betty trails off, blinking fiercely. She almost never manages to finish a sentence about my mom. As predicted, she fixes a neutral expression back onto her face, and I let it slide. “You shouldn’t feel like a fraud. Everyone starts somewhere, right?”
Right. But for most successful people, somewhere isn’t here.
“Maybe we could look at buying you another camera,” Betty suggests, slurping her milky coffee through a straw. “I’ve been working so many doubles at the diner lately that I’m not actually behind on rent for once. You may notice, for example, that the bacon we’re currently consuming is actually within its use-by date. We are practically living in the lap of luxury here. So I’m sure I could scrape together the cents for a secondhand DSLR and a lens or two. You know, if you want.”
The suggestion sends a pang through my chest. Earlier this year, when I’d begun to realize how much I wanted to make it as a comedian, Betty bought me a nice camera and a light box so I could start up a YouTube channel. I filmed a couple videos, and I loved it. People responded pretty well too. One went vaguely viral. But it was a long, cold winter that stretched all the way into early April, and Martha’s was so quiet there wasn’t enough work for Betty. I ended up having to pawn the camera to cover our gas bill. It sucked, but you do what you have to do.
“Nah, it’s all right,” I say to Betty. “I’m just gonna focus on scripts for a while. All you need for that is a working computer, and if worst comes to worst I can always use the library.” I smile gratefully. “But thank you. I promise I’ll pay you back when I sell out Madison Square Garden with my standup special.”
We chat about my weird brand of comedy for a while longer – I get my wildly inappropriate sense of humor from her. She also tells me about how back when she was a young woman, it was considered unattractive for a woman to tell dirty jokes or do ridiculous impressions of political figures. And how that made her want to do it even more.
Every time I catch myself moping about my general lack of parents, or our dire financial situation, I just remind myself how lucky I am to be raised by such an incredible human who’s always taught me how to laugh, no matter what’s going wrong in my life.
I love my grandma. Especially when watching her feed crispy bacon to a chubby wiener dog and singing her own special renditions of popular nursery rhymes. Today it’s: “Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep and doesn’t know where to find them, largely because Little Bo Peep is fucking irresponsible and should not be in charge of livestock.” It’s tough cramming all those extra syllables into the last two lines, but she really makes it work.
8.16 a.m.
Danny meets me at the gates of my housing community so we can walk to school together, as we’ve done every weekday for a decade. I decide to forget all about the weirdness of last night in the diner and write it off as a strange anomaly that will most likely never be repeated.