“Hi,” the kid said. His name tag read “Brady.” “I’ll be done in a jiff,” he said. “Already got the back door done.”
“I’ll get you a check,” Nessa said, and led Daltrey into the house. He ran for the kitchen, presumably to find Isabeau.
“This is a great house,” Brady the locksmith said.
“Thanks,” Nessa said.
The kid stood. “Hey, your babysitter or whatever told me you’re the Nessa of Unknown Legends.”
“That’s me,” she said. She really didn’t want to have a conversation with this guy, but she didn’t want to be impolite either.
“You’re not how I pictured you at all,” he said, looking her up and down.
“We never are,” she said. She tried to convey with body language that she had many important tasks to attend to, but he ignored this.
“Hearing you on the radio. I never would have pictured you as a soccer mom.”
But somehow I could have imagined you as a locksmith’s part--time employee.
“I figured you were like a riot grrrl type, you know—-covered in tattoos, piercings, that kind of thing.”
She almost said, Oh, I’ve got piercings, all right. I just don’t put anything in them anymore, other than tasteful rings in my lobes.
And tattoos? Oh, she’d had her some tattoos, all right. An entire sleeve on her left arm, which had taken two years, thousands of dollars, and a lot of pain to remove. Of course, the yellows and greens were nearly impossible to laser off because of those ink colors’ reflective properties, so you could still see some parts, which was why Nessa wore long sleeves in every season, even the sweltering, humid, miserable Kansas summers. Too much identifying information.
The only one she couldn’t bear to have removed was The Glimmer Twins on the soft underside of that arm, which in appearance and location had perfectly matched her high school best friend’s.
Candy, her twin, her last real friend. Her soul sister.
Oh, no. Nessa was going to cry in front of this kid. She turned away.
“And you have that blog too, right?” Brady said. “It’s pretty good.”
“I need to fix lunch for my kid,” she said, her sinuses backing up, her eyes filling. “I’ll go get your check.”
“Okay,” he said. “Good talking to you.”
Nessa went into the kitchen and leaned over the sink, afraid she was going to vomit.
Every day. Every day it was a struggle not to think about Candy.
Shit. Now Nessa would have to write about Candy in her AA personal inventory blog tonight.
Under “Regrets.”
Under “Harms or Hurts.”
6/1 part 2
Confession: I judged the locksmith kid. Who the hell do I think I am anyway? Oh, yes, I’m a star, baby. The star my mom always wanted to be, but the irony is no one I ever knew in my old life knows I’m a star.
But that’s not what I need to inventory today.
For the first time in a while, I’m going to talk about Candy. It’s hard to cry and type at the same time, so I need to cry for a while first.
Okay. When I first saw Candy freshman year of high school, it was like walking toward a full--length mirror. Candy had my exact haircut—-short and dark with blond spikes (it was the early ’00s, remember), brown eyes like me, same face shape, same general body type. We hated each other immediately.
We went to one of the worst--performing high schools in the US, which I’m not going to name, because who cares? Metal detectors at the doors, security guards everywhere, lots of gang stuff. I’d already been in trouble for shoplifting at this point, had a solid D average, had been smoking pot and drinking since I was twelve, lost my virginity at thirteen. (Sounds like every cliché bad--kid ever. Pathetic.) Because Mom was rarely home—-she was out hustling. I have to give her props. She was always looking for an “opportunity,” a way to make lemonade with the lemons life was always handing us. She schemed harder than anyone I’ve ever met—-constantly coming up with crazy get--rich--quick ideas, some of which actually worked out. Getting a job, though, was for ordinary -people. Why she thought she wasn’t ordinary is a mystery.
She also went on auditions and got a few bit parts here and there. Whenever the movie Death Book plays on late--night cable, I watch it until the scene where Mom’s behind the counter at the DMV and gets a pair of scissors in the ear.
But every once in a while, she’d get a job—-receptionist, or cocktail waitress, or temp worker, until she inevitably got fired.
So anyway, when I found out that Candy was a harlee, what used to be called a goody--two--shoes, I made it my mission to corrupt her. Mostly because I couldn’t have her wrecking my street cred with the Latina girls, with her good grades and her . . . okay, I’m going to cry some more now.