“My mom thought it would be okay,” Gretchen said. “They don’t want being criminals to keep me from having a normal life.”
“Then ask her if you can see E.T.,” Abby said, getting back to the important subject. “If you want to have a normal life, you have to see E.T. People are going to think you’re weird if you don’t.”
Gretchen sucked the gravy off the tips of her hair and nodded.
“Okay,” she said. “But your parents will have to take me. If my parents and I are seen in public together, a criminal might recognize them.”
Abby exhausted her parents into agreement, despite the fact that her mom believed seeing a movie more than once was a waste of time, money, and brain cells. The next weekend, Mr. and Mrs. Rivers dropped off Abby and Gretchen at Citadel Mall to see the 2:20 showing of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial while they went Christmas shopping. Because she lived a sheltered life in the Witness Protection Program, Gretchen was clueless about how to buy tickets or popcorn. It turned out she’d never even been to a movie on her own before, which was bizarre to Abby, who could ride her bike to the Mt. Pleasant 1–2–3 and see the $1 afternoon matinees. Gretchen may have had criminals for parents, but Abby felt a lot more worldly.
The lights went down and at first Abby was worried she wouldn’t love E.T. as much as all the other times she’d seen it, but then Elliott called Michael penis-breath and she laughed and the government came and Elliott reached for E.T. through the plastic wall and she cried, reminding herself once more that this was the most powerful motion picture in the world. But as Elliott and Michael stole the van right before the big chase at the end, Abby had a horrible thought: What if Gretchen wasn’t crying? What if the lights came on and Gretchen was sitting there sucking on her braids like this was an ordinary movie? What if she hated it?
These thoughts were so stressful, they kept Abby from enjoying the ending. As the credits rolled, she sat in the dark, miserable, staring straight ahead, too scared to look at Gretchen. Finally, she couldn’t stand it anymore, and as the credits thanked Marin County for its assistance she turned her head and saw Gretchen staring at the screen, her face totally blank. Abby’s heart cramped and then, before she said anything, she saw the light from the screen reflecting off Gretchen’s wet cheeks, and Abby’s heart unclenched and Gretchen turned to her and said, “Can we see it again?”
They could. Then they had dinner at Chi-Chi’s and Abby’s dad pretended it was his birthday and the waiters came out and put a giant sombrero on his head and sang him the Mexican birthday song and gave them all fried ice cream.
It was the greatest day of Abby’s life.
“I have to tell you something serious,” Gretchen said.
It was the second time she’d slept over. Abby’s parents were out at a Christmas party, and so the two of them had eaten frozen pizzas during The Powers of Matthew Star and now Falcon Crest had just ended. Falcon Crest wasn’t as good as Dynasty, but Dynasty came on Wednesday nights, a school night, so Abby wasn’t allowed to watch it. Gretchen wasn’t allowed to watch anything. Her parents had strict TV rules, and they didn’t even have cable because it was too dangerous to have their names on the bill.
Three weeks into their friendship and Abby was used to all the strange rules of the Witness Protection Program. No movies, no cable, barely any TV, no rock music, no two-piece swimsuits, no sugary breakfast cereals. But there was something Abby knew about the Witness Protection Program from movies, and it scared her: sometimes, with no warning, the people under protection disappeared overnight.
And now that Gretchen had something important to say, Abby knew exactly what it was.
“You’re moving,” she said.
“Why?” Gretchen asked.
“Because of your parents,” Abby said.
Gretchen shook her head.
“I’m not moving,” she said. “You can’t hate me. You have to promise not to hate me.”
“I don’t hate you,” Abby said. “You’re cool.”
Gretchen kept picking at the plaid sofa, not looking at Abby, and Abby started getting worried. She didn’t have a lot of friends, and Gretchen was definitely the coolest person she’d ever met, after Tommy Cox.
“My parents aren’t really in the Witness Protection Program,” Gretchen said, clenching her hands in her lap. “I made it up. They won’t let me see PG-or R-rated movies. They’ll only let me see G-rated movies until I’m thirteen. I didn’t tell them I was going to E.T. I told them we went to see Heidi’s Song instead.”
There was a long silence. Tears slipped down her nose and dripped onto the sofa.
“You hate me,” Gretchen said, nodding to herself.
Actually, Abby was thrilled. She’d never totally believed the whole Witness Protection Program story anyway because, like her mom said, if something seemed too good to be true then it probably was. And if Gretchen’s parents treated her like a baby, that made Abby the cool one. Gretchen needed her if she was ever going to see a PG movie or keep up with Falcon Crest, so they’d always have to be friends. But Abby also knew that Gretchen might stop being her friend now that Abby knew a secret about her, so she decided to give her a secret back.
“You want to see something gross?” she asked.
Tears splatted onto the couch as Gretchen shook her head.
“I mean really gross,” Abby explained.
Gretchen kept crying, clenching her hands until her knuckles turned white. So Abby got a flashlight out of the kitchen drawer, pulled Gretchen off the sofa, and forced her upstairs into her parents’ bedroom, listening for their car pulling into the driveway the entire time.
“We shouldn’t be in here,” Gretchen said in the dark.
“Shhhh,” Abby said, leading her past the trunk at the foot of the bed and into her dad’s closet. Inside, behind his pants, there was a suitcase. Inside the suitcase was a black plastic bag, and inside the black plastic bag was a big cardboard box containing a videotape. Abby switched on the flashlight and shone it on the VHS box.
“Bad Mama Jama,” she said. “My mom doesn’t know he has it.”
Gretchen wiped her nose on her sleeve and took the box from Abby with both hands. On the front cover, an extremely large black woman was bent over, dressed in nothing but a string bikini, spreading her fanny wide open. She was looking back over her shoulder, wearing orange lipstick that matched her nail polish, smiling like she was thrilled two little girls were looking up her butt. The caption under the photo read: “Mama’s got supper in the oven!”
“Ew!” Gretchen squealed, throwing the tape at Abby.
“I don’t want it!” Abby shouted, throwing it back at her.
“It touched me!” Gretchen said.
Abby wrestled her onto the bed and straddled Gretchen’s squirming body, rubbing the tape all over her hair.
“Ew! Ew! Ew!” Gretchen screamed. “I’m going to die!”
“You’re going to get pregnant!” Abby said.
That was the moment. When Gretchen stopped lying to Abby about the Witness Protection Program, when Abby showed Gretchen her dad’s secret sex fetish for large black women, when Abby wrestled with Gretchen on her parents’ bed. Starting that night, they were best friends.