Page 17 of Twice
The Composition Book
I was a late bloomer when it came to adolescence, Boss. I didn’t cross the five-foot mark until junior high. That summer I grew two inches, and during eighth grade I grew another three. My bones hurt. My calves and knees ached every night. But in the mirror, I noticed the new heights from which I was looking at myself. This part, I didn’t want to redo. I spent my entire freshman year of high school almost never tapping out, because I didn’t want to be shorter. For a while, I even stopped recording events in my notebooks, because I wasn’t planning to repeat any of them.
By tenth grade, I had sprouted to over six feet. I was hungry all the time, but nothing I ate seemed to stick to me. I was a knobby assemblage of limbs and angles. I walked like a skeleton shuffling.
“Put on a belt,” my father would scold me, “your pants keep falling down.”
By the time I turned fifteen, girls had completely taken over my orbit. I found my eyes darting at them when we passed in the halls. I spent a stupid amount of time in front of the school bathroom mirrors, adjusting the way my thick hair fell over my ears and forehead, or wetting the cowlicks to keep them from sticking up. Although I’d heard a few girls say I was “cute,” I hated the way I looked; my ears were too prominent, my brows too thick. I had a full mouth, which I hated. I wanted a flat upper lip because mustaches lookedbetter over those, and I dreamed of growing a mustache and looking older.
I did a hundred push-ups every night to try and make my scrawny chest thicker. I rolled up the sleeves of my shirts, because I thought it made my shoulders look broader. I had gotten pretty good at music—my piano playing had led to guitar and bass playing as well—and I tried walking around with the aloof sneer of my favorite rock stars. But every time I caught my reflection, I looked like a fish.
Conversing with the opposite sex was also a challenge. Without a mother to advise me, I was lost.
“How do you know if a girl likes you?” I asked my father once.
“Hard to say, Alfie.”
“Isn’t there some clue?”
“Well, if she doesn’t walk away when you say hello, you have a chance.”
That wasn’t much help. Although I had the power to erase bad first impressions, I still seemed vulnerable to every mistake. Once, at a local diner, a group of girls was sitting in a booth. I had a serious crush on one of them, Natalie, a sophomore who pinned her blond hair back with two pink clips. She seemed shy and friendly and sometimes smiled when I walked past her in school. My buddies and I were in another booth, and they egged me on to speak with her. One bet a dollar I couldn’t hold Natalie’s interest for a minute.
I slowly approached the table. I had a nervous habit of moving my hands when I spoke, and when I finally madeeye contact with Natalie, I began to say, “Hi, how are y—” when my right wrist flicked forward and knocked a glass of chocolate milk into her lap.
Her elbows shot out sideways. “Oh my God!” she yelled. When she glared up from her now-soaked jeans, all I could mumble was: “Look at that.”
Look at that?
Needless to say, Itwicedmyself out of that situation. But the second time didn’t go much better. I avoided the chocolate milk but was so focused on controlling my hands, I ran out of things to say after hello. Once she rolled her eyes at her friends, I knew I was toast. I dug my palms into my pockets and walked straight to the men’s room, where I hid for the next fifteen minutes. That was the end of my crush on Natalie. And the dollar.
?
It was about this time when my father, who had grown sideburns and let his hair lengthen beyond the crew-cut stage, came home with a bag of McDonald’s cheeseburgers. He put two on a plate, slid it in front of me, and sat down across the table. As I unwrapped the yellow paper and took my first bite, he announced he was getting married.
“What?”I said, choking. “To who?”
“Her name is Adeline.”
“Who is she?”
“She works as a Realtor.”
“I don’t understand. When did you meet her? When doyou see her? Why do you want to marry her?” All those questions belied the loudest one screaming in my brain:What about Mom?
“I know this is probably hard for you, Alfie. But it’s time for me to have someone in my life.”
“You have me,” I mumbled.
He smiled. “Not a son. A wife. It’s good for a man to have a wife. Adeline is a lovely woman. You’ll see.”
“How long have you known her?”
“Six months. We met at the bowling alley.”
“Where is she going to live?”
“What do you mean? She’s going to live here.”
