I shrug.
“You can call him out on it. If you want, I mean. It’s up to you, and what kind of relationship you want with the man. But you’re seventeen, and he let you down. You can let it go, or you can say something. That’s up to you, mijo.”
“Can I go back to my show now?” I ask.
She shoots me a look but then relaxes her face. “I know,” she says. “It’s a lot. I’ll leave you alone.”
“Love you, Mom,” I say again.
“Love you too.”
A monsoon rolls in overnight.
First comes the alarm buzzing all our phones. They sound five times and the warning from the national weather service appears. Dust storm warning for all of Maricopa County until 3:00 a.m. tomorrow with reports of blowing dust along I-101 in Scottsdale. Blowing dust can reduce visibility to near zero in a matter of seconds, making driving hazardous. If you’re driving, pull aside, stay alive.
I’m in the guest room, pretending to be asleep on top of a beautiful, flowery bedspread, when it comes in. It’s not unusual to get a few of these a week during monsoon season, but overnight ones don’t come too often. I’m staring at the ceiling fan on the white ceiling above me, my arms above my head, my head cradling my hands, thinking about everything, and I get the urge to go outside and watch the storm.
The hot air smells of creosote and dust as I roll open the sliding door from the living room to the back patio. The one at our house creaks when you open it, but this one, not surprisingly, is smooth. Dorcas follows me out.
Our house isn’t ours anymore, and there isn’t an us anymore. I live here now, and I have a headache that could split my whole fucking face apart.
You don’t see a dust storm come in at night. You hear it though. You hear the winds pick up and whip through the palm trees, the fronds slapping in the breeze, and you see the lightning flashes, and seconds later the thunder rumble, and then the neighborhood dogs barking. Not Dorcas. She stands by my side as I look up into the invisible night sky that may or may not be blowing a film of desert dust into the pool I can barely see in front of me.
You’re not supposed to go into a pool when there’s lightning out. Everyone knows that. But not everyone’s as totally over it as I am right now. I sit on the edge and dangle my legs, feel the bath-temperature water soothe my already hot skin. I kick my legs back and forth, making ripples.
“What are you doing out here?”
I hadn’t heard Max slide open the door and join me. His legs are next to me, and part of me wants to lean my head against his knee, and part of me wants — I don’t know. To destroy something beautiful.
I grunt. “Trying to get hit by lightning,” I say.
“Awesome,” is his answer. “Can I join?”
“Sure.”
He sits down next to me and for a bit we just sit there and listen to the winds pick up and the sizzling sound of sand and dust we can’t see zipping by our ears. Then he puts his hand calmly over mine and wraps his left thumb under my right pinky. I squeeze back to show I’m there, but I’m only half, or a quarter.
“I want to hit something,” I say.
He doesn’t respond, which is perfect. He doesn’t grab after my hand when I pull mine away either. Also a good choice. My forehead is pulsing, thinking about everything. I’m so tired of thinking about it. This is why people do drugs. So they don’t have to think. Or gamble, I guess. And you know what? As much as I don’t want to think, or feel, I’ll never fucking drink or gamble or anything, because if I ever made anyone feel the way my mom has made me feel, I would not be able to live with myself either. And thinking about that makes my insides hurt, because I love her still, even though she fucked up my life. Our lives. I can’t even imagine the pain she is feeling because deep down I know she loves me, and yet she did this still. And I know that it’s a disease and not a choice but right now that feels like blah blah blah. She cared more about spinning video slot wheels than she did about me.
Then he grabs my hand and stands up and I resist saying, “Let me go,” but just barely.
“C’mon,” he says. “Let’s go hit something.”
He texts his mom and we’re out the door and in his truck. When he turns on the beamers, I can see the dust blowing brown in the black night.
“They say don’t drive,” I say.
“We’re going like two minutes. Two turns. I think we’ll survive.”
He pulls into the road and I’m in no position to complain. Maybe we’ll get hit and this will all be over.
He takes me back to 24 Hour Fitness. No cars are out front, which is good because I don’t want to see anyone and I don’t want anyone to see me.
And suddenly I’m inside, in front of a boxing bag. Black with red stripes. And Max is strapping black-and-red boxing gloves on my hands.
“I’ve never hit anything,” I say.
He snorts. “Except Kevin.”
“Well he deserved it,” I say.
“This is my favorite way to get out the pain when I’m pissed. When some stupid kid tells me to go back to Mexico, or when Fabio Breen calls someone faggot at practice. I know I say that shit doesn’t bug me, but. Sometimes it does, okay? So I come and I beat the shit out of this thing until I can hardly swing another punch at it.”
I hit the bag half-heartedly. This is a dumb idea. When I said I wanted to punch something, I meant it as a metaphor. Someone from my AP Comp class ought to be able to understand a good metaphor when it appears before them in a dust storm at 2:20 a.m., but apparently my boyfriend is blind to figures of speech during monsoons. The dusty wind must obscure his vision and understanding of language.
“Come on,” he says. “Harder. And punch flat. You can break your hand or wrist if you punch wrong. Make a fist and hit the bag flat with your knuckles, ’kay?”
“Not sure telling me to do something that might break my hand is making me feel more like —”
“Hit. The fucking. Bag. Jesus.”
I hit it. Pretty hard. My bicep wobbles at contact.
“There ya go. Again.”
I hit it again.
“Add a sound.”
I hit it again, silent.
“Listen to me. Let the sound out, however it comes out.”
I hit it again and emit this high-pitched squeal that would make me laugh if it didn’t carry with it my entire broken heart. And Max doesn’t laugh either. Just says, “There ya go. Again. More.”
And I hit and hit and hit, and I scream and then I pound and cry and it’s not a classy, well-put-together cry like I’d want but a messy, snotty wail that comes with so many punches, I get dizzy throwing them. And I’m wailing on the poor punching bag and screaming my guts out, and I don’t want to stop, ever. And sadness bleeds out of me. And grief. And fury. And missing Dad. And missing Mom. I’m sad angry sad angry and I hit and hit until I’m doubled over in fatigue on the scratchy purple carpet.
Max rolls up next to me and spoons me, and for a bit I’m just numb in his arms, spent. It feels … beautiful. I’m spent. I’m not that angry anymore. I mean, I am, but it’s all been screamed and punched out and I’m exhausted and I start to laugh.
He laughs too. “Isn’t that awesome?”
“Yeah,” I say. “You’re kind of awesome.”
“I know, right?”
I elbow backward into his ribs and he rolls on top of me and he’s smiling that wide Max smile and his dark eyes are peaceful and wise and playful and … everything.
And this time we don’t go to the bathroom and claw at each other. We just lie there, looking into each other’s eyes, breathing in harmony, and waiting for the next thing to happen.
“Hey Dad,” I say.
“Broseph!” he yells into the phone. “What up what up?”