Try, Try, Try

There was screaming and cursing, mostly from Mom as she complained that no one listened to her and no one would check in.
Alex and Wednesday rebutted that they would call her at work but she wouldn’t ever answer so they would leave a message and then go do what they wanted to. When mom finally called back, no one answered the phone. I sat on the edge of my bed, hoping she would not call my name. I wished that for at that moment I was just the little kid who didn’t know any better, but she already drilled into my head that I should know better, that I should be the one to rise above my siblings by not smoking pot, not going away for days on end, not talking about how rotten my home life was, and not getting pregnant.

Shit. Could I trade that in for the pot smoking? Perhaps excessive drinking or compulsive lying?
She never called me down.. Which was good because at the moment I was ready to snap like a twig and tell her that Josh was in my room and it happened maybe a month or so ago, or maybe more…and maybe it wasn’t in my room, but maybe his or out in the woods and as her expression went from blank then surprised to either pissed or excited I’d feel like pissing my pants in fear and relief.
Alexis, didn’t come until late Sunday morning and Mom was at work. Alexis simply walked into the house like nothing happened at all, like she didn’t have to answer to anyone. Wednesday came home sometime in the morning with Paul they were both still asleep when I woke up at ten. I usually woke up earlier on Sunday for some reason. Not that we went to church as a family, I’d sometimes go with Christy since her grandmother dragged her down to the Presbyterian church in Reardan.

The kitchen was a complete and utter wreck, but there was coffee in the pot so I assumed either Alexis made it or Alex was still at home; which would be amazing since he made it habit to never be home on Sunday mornings and now I knew it was because of Diane. Maybe she was teaching him how to grow up; like a reversed “My Fair Lady”. I walked out to the laundry room and into the garage. We had parked the car inside it at one time, but then it collected car parts, tools and junk, all arranged in various waves and piles. Mom’s wood shop tools, Dad’s car parts and growing equipment that was used for a at least a year before he vanished. Alex had taken some of the heaters and moved them off to a small storage area in the garage that was hidden from view by tarps and other junk that hung from the rafters in the unfinished ceiling. There were times when I saw him near the tarps, looking at something within. I never asked nor ever tried to go in as it involved risking your hands on saw blades and other crap.

“Alex?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you take me to Reardan today?”
“We’re forced to go there tomorrow. Why would you want to go today?”

I could’ve put a scowl on my face, lean on one of the support beams and yell that I want to wallow in pity with my friends about my predicament instead of sitting in anguish in my room.
“Just to hang out with my friends.”
There were several clangs and sounds of broken pottery.
“Can I give you a maybe on that? See if Paul and Wednesday go and do whatever it is they go and do on a Sunday, you can go with them.”
I nodded to the air and walked back into the house.

I climbed the ladder back upstairs and went back to my room. If I had headphones I could blast my stereo but since I didn’t, I seldom ever turned it on because of the lack of actual walls—our rooms were separated only by wooden studs and sheets draped across them to kind of simulate Sheetrock walls, but with no sound-proofing and you could see through it if the light conditions were right. I laid back on my bed and stained at the roof, as there was no ceiling and the floors were simple plywood floors.

Mom said one day she would finish the upstairs and I had wanted to be the first to have a door so I could at least slam it when my siblings pissed me off enough. However, since just about every night I’d have to hear them going at it, I would say that completing Wednesday’s room would make everyone in the house happy. That, or having her move out and maybe stay with Paul. Mom would never let that happen but I sometimes wondered why she tolerated Paul even being at our house at all.
“I found a few of my mom's rings. I can give those to Len.”
“Lenny's going to give you how much for everything?”
“Five hundred, almost, maybe more. Depends.”
“I guess I can get a job too.”
“I’ll worry about the money. You just keep looking at the magazines.”
“Do you like this design?”

Their bed creaked with a loud groan, one that I hoped would not continue into something else. It wouldn’t matter if I screamed for them to stop because I could clearly hear them. Luckily, a set of footprints hit the floor.
“I’m going to take a shower.” Paul said.
“I’ll join you a minute or two.”
“I like the sound of that.”

I almost wanted to throw up. It was bad enough that I always had to hear the sound of a squeaky bed at night and in the middle of the freaking day; their non-stop talk about wedding preparations, dresses, and moving to somewhere; but now I that mental image etched into my brain too. I once asked Alexis what she did to avoid hearing them, she replied with showing me a pair of headphones and a novel she was reading. She was on the other side of the attic and I was closer to them.

I didn’t ask them take me into town as I felt I’d have to explain why I wanted to go and I had high doubts they would come home at a decent hour—or if ever—and I would be late for school in the morning. I laid back down in bed and stared at the rafters. I thought long and hard about what had to be done. Who I would have to tell and how. I had to tell Josh. Not because I thought it would bring him back to me. No, that wasn’t going to happen. I thought it might have over a week ago after we had an argument over the stupidest shit imaginable. So stupid that I couldn’t even recall what I said. Maybe I called him a jerk or an ass and he just had all he could take of it.

Maybe it was because he was commenting on the size of my breasts.
Yeah, that actually was it.
We were looking at one of Wednesday’s bridal magazines when he pointed out the tits on one of the models just came right out of the wedding dress and I slapped his arm.
“You’re looking at the dress totally wrong.”
“I’m looking at like the photographer is and they’re like right there, daring him to grab them.”
“It’s a sexy dress, she should be able to wear it without someone wanting to stare or juggle them.”
“I’d juggle them,” Josh replied with a grin and so I slapped him again.
“Cut that shit out.”
“This isn’t a porno magazine.”
“It might as well be. That chick’s like one, she’s just wearing an expensive dress.” Yeah, I guess that was true. Maybe I never looked at it like that, but each page had some model that had a lot of cleavage. It kind of made me wonder who the magazine was really for and if Paul felt the same when looking at it with Wednesday. “And they look nice.”
I closed the magazine. “Seriously?”
“Hey, you made me look at them.”
“I didn’t make you do anything. You just had to point out—”
“—That she has bigger ones than you?”

I wanted to punch him but instead I walked out of the living room and out the front door. I walked down the street in my socks and I kind of expected him to come after me. Maybe to apologize. Maybe to hear me berate due to now hurt I felt. I must have walked a mile before I stopped and turned around.
Josh wasn’t behind me.

He wasn’t even half a mile away as Little Falls Road was kind of flat until one got to the turn to head to Wellpinit, so I could still see my house from there and he wasn’t in the driveway. I stamped my foot and regretted it as I slammed my heel on a rock. I wanted to pick up a large rocky take it back home and slam him in the face with it but I didn’t go home. Instead, I continued walking until I came to the first dirt road and then turned onto it.
I sat a ways from the road, next to a fence post, and waited, once again, for Josh to walk up. He would come up with his head and hair hanging down and he would say he apologized for being a dick and comparing me to some airbrushed photograph.
But he never came. I stayed away from home for over two hours and he never came. Instead, his dad came to pick him up less than thirty minutes after I left the house. He took the magazine with him.

“Where did you go?” Alexis asked from the kitchen counter. She was perched on the corner near the window. “No, it’s my little sister. She just walked in the house.”
“Walking.”
“Josh left.”
“Good,” I replied, “I hope they have a wreck.”

Alexis rolled her eyes and returned to whoever she was talking to as I walked into the living room and up to my room where I immediately started slashing at pictures and ripping up notes. I would have to tell Josh that that poem, that song he wrote for me? That I think it was copied form someone who was far-more talented than he would ever be! I would have burned it all in my room but there were so many notes. So many intricately-folded missives we wrote to each other that I would burn the house down in the process of trying to gain inner peace through fire.

Mom came home after six o’clock; followed by Alex and then Wednesday and Paul made an appearance by walking into the kitchen and grabbing the remaining hamburgers that were in the oven. Mom sat in the living room with her plate, coffee cup and ash tray on the coffee table. I sat on the opposite side of the couch and Alexis sat in a chair she brought in from the kitchen.

“Hello, family.” Wednesday shouted as Paul held onto two plates. Alex tried to sneak by but Wednesday stopped him.
“Hey, no wait, Alex. We have an announcement.”
A part of me hoped she would say she was pregnant. Maybe then I would also be accepted, or at least tolerated when I revealed my news.
Everyone, except for Alex, looked at Wednesday.
“We. Are. Engaged.”
She flashed a large ring at everyone.
Alexis leaned forward to see it.
Mom looked like a semi had slammed into her, head-on, while she was naked.
Alex took a glance and continued walking to his room.
I had to wonder what store Paul stole it from.
” You’re what?” Mom asked. I wasn’t sure if it was from shock, annoyance or just nerves. “When?”
Wednesday and Paul looked at each other and laughed. “We don’t know.”
Alexis stood up and walked into the kitchen as Mom got up and walked over to Wednesday.
“Do you have any idea what you’re getting into?” Mom asked as I continued to watch Alexis’ face contort and twitch so much she was ether having a seizure or a heart attack. She grabbed a dish in the sink and made a motion to smash it against the counter but stopped. She turned away from me and placed her hands on the wall.
“Marriage can be hell, you know that, right?”
The tiny voice in my head nudged me to walk over to her and ask if she was alright, or to maybe tell her everything was going to be okay.
“We know, mom, but we’re ready to make the best of every bad situation and we’ve had a lot of practice, right Paul?”
Alexis spun away with a smile on her face. I had seen that smile before…it was not a friendly smile. It was a ‘I’m going to kick someone’s ass’ smile. I would have preferred to see Alexis crying or her RBF than that expression.
She walked past me and back into the living room.
“Congratulations, to both of you,” Alexis said as hugged both Wednesday and Paul. “You’re about to take a great adventure.”

I admit, I was still waiting for Wednesday to say she was pregnant too.