I don’t have an answer for that, so I just call, “We’re ready.”
Carroll comes out from behind the pillar with his head down. His hands are clasped behind his back like he’s hiding something. I wonder if his real plan is to shoot his parents. Maybe he’d prefer that.
“Son, it looks as though you want to talk to us,” I say to start him off.
“Yes, Mom, I do.” He looks at Samantha, takes in her crotch-grab and purple fishnets, and manages to stay in the scene. “You, too, Dad.”
Samantha takes another drag.
“Go ahead, Carroll,” I say. “You know you can always tell us anything.”
Carroll frowns at me, then turns to look at his hands.
Samantha and I wait. And wait. I wonder if he expects us to give him another prompt, and I try to think of what else I could say, but he says, “Forget it. I can’t.”
He stomps back to the pillar.
“Carroll!” I jump up and go after him. “Yes, you can. It’s just us. Just practice.”
“You threw me off,” he says. “With that part about how I can tell them anything. They’ve never said that. They would never.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t know.”
“Yeah, well.” He runs his hand through his hair. “I’m all off track now.”
“Can we try again?”
“I don’t think so. I’m too freaked.”
“How about we take a break and then come back to it?” I say. “Let’s go out. We can get some candy at the deli.”
“The novelty of that has worn off, my dear.”
I can’t tell if he means for that to hurt my feelings, but it does.
“I’m really sorry,” I say.
“It’s okay. I’m tired anyway. Let’s just go upstairs.”
We go. Samantha keeps up the dirty-old-man act in the elevator, still smoking her imaginary cigarette, not noticing Carroll’s disdainful expression. My phone buzzes with a text from Toni.
Dead from work. Cannot write anymore. Cannot read anymore. Going 2 fail, get expelled, etc. Send help.
“What’s the missus want this time?” Carroll asks.
“Nothing,” I tell him.
I text back.
You’re such a liar. You just finished your last paper didn’t u.
Toni replies:
Whatever. I’m dead from work all the same.
I smile down at the phone. It’s nice to have a normal exchange with Toni. Lately we’ve been having all these tense conversations that seem an awful lot like fights. We always pull back before we actually start to argue, but I can still feel the anger there, bubbling below the surface.
The elevator gets to our floor, and now I’m exhausted, too. Samantha has dropped her cigarette act. She yawns.
As she opens the door to our room, Carroll pulls me back. His eyes are shiny.
“It’s going to go okay, right?” he asks once Sam’s closed the door behind her.
I can’t remember the last time I saw him this earnest. No joking around, no over-the-top gestures.
“Yeah,” I say. “It’ll be fine. Just remember to relax. It won’t work if you go in there all wound up.”
He nods superfast, turns on his heel and takes off down the hall. I go into my room. Samantha has already fallen into bed, still in her fishnets.
“Hey,” I say, nudging her foot. “You’re going to rip those if you sleep in them.”
“No, I won’t.” Her eyes are closed but she sounds wide-awake. “I’ve been falling asleep in fishnets for years. There’s an art to it. You bend your legs just so before you fall asleep so you won’t be tempted to kick all night.”
“Or you could just take your fishnets off,” I say.
Sam opens her eyes and glares at me. Then she sits up, pulls up her skirt, pulls down her fishnets and collapses back into bed.
“Sorry,” I say. “I wasn’t trying to be annoying.”
“I know,” she says. “You never actually manage to be annoying. By the way, that is, itself, annoying.”
I don’t know what to say to that.
It’s still late, but I’m not tired anymore. I change into my sleep T-shirt and shorts, and think about doing my Met Studies reading. Instead I stare at my phone, wondering if I’ll hear from Toni again or if that complaint about homework was all we had to say to each other today.
“If you want to really succeed in not being annoying,” Sam says, “you could turn out the light.”
I flick the switch. “Hey, can I ask you something, or are you sleeping?”
“I am obviously not sleeping.”
“How did you decide to be goth?” I’ve been wondering since September. I know it’s not the music, because all Sam listens to is Katy Perry. “Was it because you liked the clothes, or was it something your friends were already into?”
“None of my friends at home were goth,” she says. “Ridge Spring, South Carolina, does not have a goth scene.”
“Oh. So was it, like—did you really like Vampire Diaries? Or—”
“Look, not all of us are gorgeous blond lesbians, okay?” She yawns. “Some people have to work to get noticed.”