The Art of Being a F*ck Up - Chapter 17: Chapter 17

Finally things are starting to look up, it's been a few days and I'm shocked by how well I've managed to retain this resolve. The nice thing about being on break is that I get to work full time at the garage, which while coming with its own hazards like having to spend extra time with my dad, means more money in my pocket. I'm going to need that if I really plan on going through with the newest idea that's been invading my every waking thought. Why wouldn't I though? Forgetting for a second all the unknown that comes with taking such a huge step like marriage, this is the first thing since my accident that's made me feel anything other than asleep.
I haven't gotten to talk to Jonah about any of it yet, he's back to being occupied with his competition, but I can't help but feel like that's going to change soon. It'll have to change, like so many other things—in the best way. I haven't even had anything to drink since Jason and Lilah's anniversary party, my life's been going too fast to really stop and think about it. This is good, this monumental decision I've been debating feels like it's everything I've needed—everything I've been missing. I'm filled with so much warmth that not even the test I'll be going to in just a few short hours, to get tested for a learning disability, can bring me down.
Today's already a day proving to be packed to the brim, I've spent almost my entire half hour on lunch scouring social media for proposal ideas—a super cheesy and unmanly act that none of the guys at the frat house or garage would ever let me live down. That's why I did it outside in the fresh air and sunshine, away from any curious eyes that might've saw the hearts floating over my head. Now that I'm just getting back though, I come upon a whole new scene. There's a paper bag filled with takeout from my favorite place on my desk, enough to almost monopolize my attention if not for the unlikely pair catching up right in front of it like old friends.
"That's the god's truth, I'm telling you, I caught him dancing to one of my cassettes in a pair of my old lady's shoes," Bill laughs, a full sound. While I can't quite decide how, I can see he doesn't look the same as when I saw him last, but to hear him I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. "His face when I walked in was priceless."
"I don't doubt it, I can picture it so clearly in my head," Maddy laughs with him, tapping him lightly on the arm. "You know that look he always gets, the one where he tries to play dumb? Hilarious! There was this one time in freshman year when I tried to convince him to take ballet with me, and I swear he about had a heart attack."
"His dad wouldn't have liked that too much."
"Probably not, but could you imagine? It would've been so funny to watch."
"If you want some real embarrassing stories all you got to do is ask. He ever tell you about when I took him to the zoo, about the thing with the panda?"
"What in the unholy hell is going on?" I butt in, making myself known before my uncle can go any further with that humiliating tale. There are some things we don't talk about. Both he and Maddy turn to look at me, seemingly unaware that they should be ashamed that I caught them talking about me, but otherwise they only return blank stares. We stand there gawking at one another for longer than I'm really comfortable with before I choose to be a little more specific. "Seriously, what are either of you doing here?"
"Well, I haven't heard from you in a while, and since you seem incapable of using those meaty thumbs to text, I decided to drop by. Then I ran into your uncle," she smiles over at him, polite and on her best behavior. "Sounds like I'm not the only one you've been avoiding—I'll give you two a minute to catch up. It was so nice talking to you, Bill—I hope you feel better soon."
"Yeah, you too, thanks." Bill nods with a strange look of approval, no doubt still just as impressed with the girl he once thought I'd marry. What would he think if I told him I want to marry Jonah now? After Maddy slinks off I'm left with a list of prying questions for my uncle, the bulk of which he avoids by shuffling into his office. "Before you go getting all excited, I just came to grab a few things, there are a couple calls I have to make that I don't trust your dad to do. Don't tell him I said that. What happened to all my files?"
"Dad rearranged them," I say. "I would've ran them over to you if you asked."
"I'm not helpless yet, and I've been dying to get out of the house for something other than a doctor's appointment." My uncle rambles mostly to himself while he rummages around in the cabinets. "It's good to see you, kid, you ought to come around more. Seems like the last time you were over at my house was when you were real little—I remember you used to love waking me up by blaring those goddamn cartoons every Saturday morning."
"Between you and me, I think I'm a little old for cartoons, Bill." I'm still not blind, those pseudo-happy memories are tainted with the knowledge that I was only over there every weekend because my dad was too drunk to take care of me or he simply didn't want me around at all. More than that, I know why Bill's bringing it up now, because I can only come up with one reason why a private and stoic man like him would be so readily sentimental. I broach the subject after a long hesitation, "how are things going anyway, with the doctors?"
"They want me to see another specialist, it'll be the third one in as many weeks, at this point I don't think any of them know what they're talking about anymore. Things been alright over here though?" Bill fishes out the file and stands, eyeing me casually as he turns the tables. It's an effective maneuver that puts me on the defensive instead, and I begin to suspect that his visit today isn't as innocuous as he initially let on.
"Things have been great," I lie. He's a sick man, what good would it do to burden him with the ugly reality? I've found that as each person in my life gets progressively more invasive, terribly worried for my own wellbeing for whatever stupid reason, lying is the best option. I can be what every last one of them needs—I can take the weight of the world so none of them have to. With all that the people I love have given me, this is the only thing I'm capable of giving back.
"I'm glad to hear it. I better get going, I've still got some running I have to do and you should eat your lunch before it gets cold. Take care of yourself, Brent, and next time you get takeout make sure you bring some back for me." With a final joke to hide any of the glaring emotion showing through, Bill smacks my shoulder and heads for the door. I look again at the paper bag on my desk, further confused, because I had been sure it was a gift from him. There are only a few minutes left until my lunch is up, which is more than enough, so I nab the bag and head to the breakroom, only thinking about Maddy again after she hunts me down.
"How rude, were you totally going to leave me out there?" Her mass of cascading blonde curls bounces after her as she comes into the breakroom, and though I consider for a moment telling her she's not allowed back here, that seems to be the least of her concerns while she glances around for someplace to sit that isn't covered in the kind of grease she'd never be able to wash out of those fancy white jeans I know she can't afford. She points to the bag, "I hope you're going to share that, because I haven't been charging you anything for the tutoring and I'm practically broke and starving."
"You mean this wasn't you?"
"Excuse you? You're the one who should be buying me food after the way you've been ghosting me." Though the mystery continues, Maddy has little care for it while she ogles the takeout, so I give in and grab an extra fork before sitting down. She sits too and waits for me to open the box so we can share a meal. I'm grateful she has the decency to let me get a few bites in before she starts, "seriously, what's going on with you? Are you like mad at me, or something?"
"I'm not mad, things have just been weird for me lately. I should have texted you back though, it must've been hell getting all the way over here in those heels." I tease her lightheartedly, hoping this won't have to be some great heart to heart about hurt feelings. "What made you decide to come here? You should've come by the house since you're so tight with Lilah apparently."
"Gross, you really expect me to show my face anywhere near there? That's where you literally cheated on me with your boyfriend." She knocks my fork aside, which isn't all that hard when I stop to glare at her. She smirks, "oh my god, relax, I'm kidding. See? I can do it too. I did think about it, but honestly I decided against the whole thing altogether until I was sitting in my dorm earlier—bored out of my mind—and needed something to do."
"You're still at school? I thought you would've went home like everybody else."
"My parents don't want me there." Her answer is fast and decisive. I know her parents disowned her, and I knew it was bad, but do they really not want anything to do with her? Like, at all? How she reacts, how she continues to look at me, I feel like there's more to the story. Yet it's apparently not a story she's keen to tell, and I watch as she brushes it off as though it doesn't bother her at all. "Besides, they're probably in Cancun by now, the fascists."
"That's fucked up."
"Right? Whatever, we've all got to deal. Which brings me back to you—are we going to talk about the elephant in the room? We can't keep avoiding what happened with exams."
"How am I avoiding it, are you really going to act like you don't know?" After all, I have no doubt that she's the architect behind the whole scheme. "I'm getting tested today, like you wanted."
"Is that why you've been avoiding me?" Maddy has another laugh, as if my fears are one, big comedy. "Let's start by losing the attitude, this is a good thing! It could give you a major boost when you take your make-ups. What's the problem?"
"Maybe. It's just not how I pictured my life, you know?" Odd how things turn out so different. She must understand that, because then it's not as funny anymore.
"Are you scared?"
"I guess." When it's so easy to lie to everyone else, I wonder why I tell her the truth now. No matter the reason, that vulnerability in my armor cuts uncomfortably so I adjust accordingly with half a lie. "But mostly I'm doing my best to stay positive about it, like you said. I'm not really sure what's going to happen from here, but I do owe you. I know you were only trying to help, and it's the most anybody's done for me in a long time."
"You definitely owe me big, don't think I forgot." Maddy's next smile is genuine. "I'm glad you're doing this, even though you don't want to. For what it's worth I'm with you, my life didn't turn out anything like I expected either."
"I know," I think again about how her parents abandoned her, and all the nasty rumors that have followed her throughout the years. I think about that glamorous place that I had dreamed for her only so that she could wind up here. We are alike, and that makes me feel better. "I heard what you were telling Bill, about ballet freshman year. I remember that too. I remember how much you loved to dance, how I used to come over before a big game so you could show me the cheer routine you had been practicing for weeks. Sometimes I kind of miss it."
"Me too." Nostalgia hits the both of us harder than I think either of us could expect, but Maddy surrenders to it more completely. "That was one of the things my parents could never agree on, my mom wanted me to follow it, and I even got accepted to this awesome program for after I graduated. Shame it didn't work out though."
"Why not?" This was after we had broken up, when she was so mad that I wasn't allowed any part in her life. I'm hearing it for the first time with new ears.
"Things got pretty rough that summer," she answers, detached and cool, a hint at one of those nasty rumors that she hasn't been able to shake.
"That really sucks, I heard a little bit here and there."
"And what did you hear?"
"I don't know, that you ended up in rehab."
"Ew, as if." There's more. God, there's so much more, but she refuses to part with any of it. Whatever happened, whatever derailed her life and sent it on a completely different course, she's not willing to relive it. That seems fair so I don't push it, and in return I'm rewarded with a little more. "Actually that might have been better. I've made my peace with it, those were kid dreams anyway."
"You could still do it." I suggest. She had a gift, I'm not sure what's become of it now. My dad comes into the breakroom then, doing a doubletake when he spots Maddy sitting across from me, scraping the last little bits of food out of the container. The look he wears is as weird as Bill's, I know he had high hopes for us before. Either way he tosses the remnants from his own lunch into the trash and leaves, signaling that I've run out of time to shoot the shit with her. I get up, "somebody has to dream big."
"Personally I think we're better off focusing on what's in front of us, so how about we worry about making sure you pass your exams for right now?" Maddy joins me, rising to her feet. "I'll let you get back to work, but you should call me tomorrow so we can figure out when we're going to study. Or, better yet, you could call me tonight instead to tell me how it goes with the test, that would be the decent thing to do."
"We'll see. Thanks again, Maddy." I watch her go, taking the bag over to the garbage to dispose of it. When I do though, I'm surprised to see an identical one already in there—the one my dad had just thrown away from his own lunch. Life really can be unpredictable sometimes, it's no wonder she and I both ended up in completely different places than anyone would've thought. I still think about her; I think about the bad things she's been through—so much so that she doesn't even want to talk about them. And I get it, I'm like that too, there are just some things we don't talk about.
The rest of my shift flies by in the blink of an eye while I continue thinking about it—that and more. Wanting to marry Jonah fades the furthest from my mind than it has in days as I pack up and wait outside for Lilah to show up so she can take me to the test. I was shocked my dad didn't say anything about me having to leave early, but then, he's full of surprises today. I have so many questions about him, and Maddy and Jonah, and about what this test is going to be like, but I'm left without any of the answers when Lilah finally pulls into the parking lot. I thought I was ready but I'm not, and no matter how brave I pretend to be—how brave Lilah tells me to be after I get into the car—all I am is terrified to know.