The Blue-Haired Boy Read online

  “Three packs of Berry Blue, water, and conditioner. Wet your hair.”

  There is no way to get my head under the faucet, which means I’m going to get wet. I slip off my white V-neck, exposing the rainbow of bruises she already knows is there, and wishing they didn’t make me feel like such an underdog.

  “No worries,” she says, as if she understands my embarrassment.

  My words are gone again, so I splash my hair until Gerry approves. Then she has me sit on the toilet lid again. “Shouldn’t you use gloves?” I ask.

  “Yes. One should always use protection.” She cackles at herself, and I smile. Gerry proceeds, without gloves, to coat my hair with the blue paste. First, I’m straight-back-fifties. Then, curly-eighties. She leaves me with a punk-rock Mohawk on top of my head. “This is going to look great,” she says.

  “What color is your normal hair?” I ask her.

  “Blond like yours.”

  “How long has it been green?”

  “Two months. It was cherry before.”

  “Tell me about Lewis,” I say. Without Gerry explaining, I know these colors have to do with her.

  “She loved the Ramones, that stuffed bear in my duffel, and Kool-Aid.” Gerry washes her hands, and when she’s done there’s a little smear of blue beneath her eyes where she wiped her face.

  I smile and clean her face with my thumb. Something I wouldn’t have done before our hug, but now seems like the right level of kindness.

  “Tell me something about your mom.”

  I think. My mom is a paradox. I tell Gerry, “She loves my dad even though he hurts her. Do you think that makes her weak or strong?”

  “It makes her in love. Maybe I’m totally whacked in the head, but to me love is involuntary. Your mom can’t help it. ’Cause if she could, she would.”

  “It doesn’t make sense to love someone who hurts you.”

  “Sure it does. Everyone hurts us. If we stopped loving them because of pain, we’d never love anyone.”

  I don’t want to think about what she’s saying, so I shift the situation back to her. “Tell me something else about Lewis.”

  “Two truths and a lie.” Gerry continues to twist and comb my hair while she talks. “One, we met at a free concert in the park. Two, Lewis’s real name is Lee, which is how we became Gerry Lee Lewis. And three, my girl never came out to her parents.”

  This time the lie isn’t obvious, and guessing seems rude.

  “Tell me about Ben,” she says, before I can respond.

  “How long do we have?”

  She checks the spot on her wrist where a watch would be (but isn’t) and leans back against the door. “Forever,” she says, shrugging. “Give or take.”

  “Ben’s seven years older than me. He joined the army when he turned eighteen, and I don’t see him much anymore.”

  “Is one of those a lie?”

  “No.”

  “Whew. Good.” She wipes her forehead as if it’s sweaty. “I was going to call you Boring Answer Boy.”

  “You kind of already did.”

  “Well, Sweet Cheeks, you can’t worry about me. I’ve got a name for everything.” She laughs more to herself than at me.

  “You guys were close? Ben and you?”

  I stare at the toilet paper dispenser instead of her. “Until he left.”

  “You’re pissed, aren’t you?”

  “At Ben?”

  “No, the Easter Bunny. Yes, Ben.”

  “Why would I be?” I ask.

  A blue water drop rolls down my chest, leaving a pale streak of sapphire on my skin. Gerry uses the underside of her shirt to wipe it away. “He took off,” she says.

  “He turned eighteen. That’s what people do.” I crack my knuckles one at a time and point to my hair. “How long has it been?”

  Gerry doesn’t check her imaginary watch this time. “Don’t change the subject. It might be what people do, but you’re still mad. You’ve only had, like, three looks since I met you: happy, thinking, and worried. This one is new. Anger.”

  I shift a little bit and cut my eyes to the ground. “Sounds like you took off.”

  “I had to.” Her voice sounds different than it has all day. “I woke up one day and couldn’t breathe. Like someone stole all the air from the world, and the only way to get it back was to haul ass. You’ll do it, too.”

  “I won’t abandon my mom like he did.” There’s the anger I try to swallow. “Someone has to protect her. Clean up the mess.”

  “Not you,” Gerry says. “And she’ll make you go eventually.”

  “No.”

  “She loves you. She’ll make you. And if you haven’t already noticed, she didn’t have to. You’re not exactly in Rickman right now, are you? Sorry, buddy, you already left her.”

  “Screw you, Gerry Lennox.”

  “Screw whoever you want. I’m not just right, I know.”

  “Bullshit.” I toss her word in her face. “You think you know because your girlfriend died. It’s not the same,” I say, turning my anger on her. I can feel her inhale from here, which makes me wish there was a vacuum for all the painful words people say. Hurting people is what he does. I . . . I’m not like him.

  I reach out, grab Gerry’s hand. “I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t mean that. You’re right. Everything you said is right.”

  Gerry is still. And quiet. It’s an odd thing to have a conversation in deep breaths, but we do it.

  Me: I hate screwing up.

  Her: I know you do.

  Me: I didn’t mean to lash out.

  Her: I know.

  Her: I’m hurting, too.

  And then Gerry says, “Lewis told me I should leave. She loved me, right?”

  I say the only answer there is: “I’m sure she did.”

  We both sit in the fumes and feel.

  “Bodee, I think we . . . what I mean is . . . would you hate me if I”—another tear slides down Mom’s cheek—“if I suggested you should live somewhere else? I think it’s me he—”

  “I’m fine,” I’d interrupted her, because I’d be damned before I’d go somewhere safe and leave her alone with him. I might sit on the bench in front of the Army Recruitment Center, but I’d never leave. Never.

  “‘Fine’ is a lying man’s response, and you can’t lie to me.” She waits for me to give her full eye contact and says, “You know Laura Beth Littrell. I could talk to her. You could stay with them. They have the space.”

  “No,” I’d said firmly. And despite how she’d argued, that was that.

  Someone knocks on the door behind us, and we both jump.

  “I don’t talk because I’m terrified all of this stuff about home will come rushing out,” I whisper, afraid the moment is gone.

  “I know.”

  They knock again.

  “What made you get on the bus?” I ask, my hand on the door. I want to hear her say it.

  Gerry moves my hand. “I told you already. I woke up and couldn’t breathe.”

  “There’s more you’re not saying; please, I’m trying to understand. Why did she tell you to leave?”

  “I have to pee,” someone says from outside the door.

  “Just a minute,” I yell. Maybe it’s cruel, but I don’t care if they piss all over themselves. Gerry can’t sit on my lap, dye my hair, and dish out truth like slop and hold so much back.

  “Where is this coming from? Why do you care?” she asks.

  “Because we’re halfway to Huntsville. I followed you onto this bus.” I thought it was because of her smile, but maybe pain was the magnet instead. “Gerry, why?”

  She shakes her head. She’s not ready.

  I stand up and dump her onto the floor.

  “Bodee, I can’t. You’ll hate me,” she says, searching for words.

  “You can, and I won’t,” I say.

  The bathroom door rattles as the guy tries the latch. “Hurry up!” he yells.

  I reach over her and unlock the door.

&nbs
p; The sight of us must be unnerving—me with a wet blue Mohawk, Gerry crying at my feet—because a tiny wet spot appears on the man’s khakis before either of us can move.

  I take back that thought about someone pissing himself. Poor guy.

  It turns the entire moment on its head.

  “Sorry,” Gerry says to the red-faced man, unable to suppress her giggles.

  We leave the bathroom.

  “You mad at me?” I ask when we sit down.

  “Naw,” she says.

  Naw is my new favorite word.

  Chapter 6

  NO one notices my bare chest, which says something disturbing about the acceptable standards for bus travel. It’s only a plain white T-shirt, but I don’t have any to spare, so I decide to wait out the Kool-Aid hair session before I put it back on. Gerry makes sure I don’t freeze by offering me a flannel button-up from the bottom of her bag. It’s not hers. Two of her would fit in here.

  “Lewis’s?” I ask as I slip it on.

  “Not exactly. We found it at Goodwill. Keep it. It looks better on you than on either of us.”

  Cold. Hot. Cold. Hot. We transition through each other’s moods as if we’ve been doing this for years. If Gerry’s skin were transparent, I could read the story written in her blood. It’s under the surface, but I can’t quite see it through the scales she’s layered over the pain. Maybe it’s a Lennox trait to hide the truth. If so, maybe I’m not a real Lennox, since I gave up my dragon to Gerry in the first five minutes. What’s her dragon? For all her talk, I’m not sure it’s Lewis. She misses her girlfriend, but that’s not all.

  “Postcard?” she reminds me. “You have time before we wash that out.”

  After I roll my eyes, I take the card and the pen.

  Dear Ben,

  Today I got on a bus with Gerry. Don’t worry, I’m going back home. Just out for a day drive. Gerry has green hair, a great smile, and happens to be a girl. We’re getting off in Huntsville.

  “Tell him we got married,” Gerry says.

  Gerry says to tell you we got married.

  “I can’t believe you wrote that invention in pen.”

  “Me either,” I say. But it’s fine, because I don’t plan to mail this postcard.

  “You really aren’t like this at home?” she asks.

  “No. You disappointed?”

  “For you,” she says.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Question.” She draws the word out. “I mean . . . there’s a real person in there. An incredible person. He should come out and play more often.”

  “Blue hair is a good start.”

  “The blue hair is all me. You’ll go home and revert.”

  “Maybe,” I say. But maybe not. Maybe a change has happened today that’s not just blond to blue.

  “And maybe you’ll miss out on the best thing in your life. You have to commit.”

  “To being the blue-haired boy? I’m pretty sure I’m committed. This stuff is stiff.” I twirl the top of the Mohawk and find that only a little color comes off on my hands.

  She examines my hair and says, “Time to rinse.”

  Gerry and I take our second trip to the bathroom. The honesty we left in here is as potent as the smell.

  “Flip your head over,” she tells me.

  I lean over the tiny sink, and the bright blue ends of my hair fall over my eyes. The water isn’t warm, but Gerry scoops it onto my head handful after handful. When she’s satisfied, she wrings out the ends. “Stay there,” she says.

  As opposed to where?

  Beside me, Gerry slips off her jacket and traps it between her knees. I’m not sure what she’s doing until I cut my eyes to the side and see her bare stomach. Before I can protest, she wraps her T-shirt around my head like a towel and tries to put her jacket on quickly.

  She is not quick enough.

  “I know what those are,” I say, looking at the fingertip-size scars that dot her stomach.

  “Two lies and a truth,” she says while I straighten my body and look down at her. “I was once a volunteer for a top secret Dalmatian project. Some people had chicken pox, I had the eagle pox. And . . . my mom thought I was an ashtray.”

  This is her dragon.

  “Gerry,” I say, unsure of what to say next.

  “You’re dripping,” she says, staring at my hair instead of my eyes.

  “Gerry?”

  “It’s complicated,” she answers.

  “This kind of complicated?” I pull up my pants leg and expose a four-inch scar that came to me courtesy of Dad. “One of many,” I admit.

  She nods. And then, when I expect her to cry, she laughs.

  That damn hyena of healing.

  “Gerry?”

  “Your hair is so blue. I can see it through my T-shirt.”

  After shaking my turban head at her ability to change the subject, I tell her I’m sorry.

  “Don’t pity me.”

  “I don’t. Did she?” I ask, thinking this somehow all leads back to Lewis.

  “Bend toward me,” Gerry says.

  I do, and she removes her T-shirt from my head. She parts my hair where it was this morning and says, “Check it out.”

  Berry Blue is in the freakin’ house. “Oh my gosh,” I say, stunned at the utter and complete blueness of my hair.

  “It looks amazing,” Gerry says.

  Amazing isn’t the first word that comes to mind. “I look like a Smurf,” I say.

  “Nope, we just made sure your outside matches your inside.”

  “So you’re green in there?” I tug on her zipper, which has fallen near her heart.

  She winks. “I’m a rainbow in here,” she says. “Sometimes happy yellow. Sometimes sad blue. Sometimes sickly green. Sometimes angry red. Sometimes lying purple.”

  “I get it. Which color should you be right now?” I ask.

  “Purple. At least, that’s what Lewis would say.”

  “What would Gerry say?”

  “And that’s the real question,” she says, and leaves me in the bathroom.

  Chapter 7

  FOR the last forty miles of our trip to Huntsville, Gerry and I don’t talk, but we aren’t silent either. I expect her to lean against the window; instead she lifts my arm and rests her head on my chest. My heart pounds against her face, and I wonder what world she’s in.

  Lewis’s world? Her mom’s world?

  Bus world?

  And the world I’m in? Last night’s world.

  When the quiet came, I tiptoed up the porch steps and eased my way into our small kitchen. Mom had already managed to stop crying.

  Blood. Broken beer bottle glass in her back. Her singing “It Is Well with My Soul” as I removed the glass shards from the cuts. Her grinding teeth and stiffness as she passed me needle and thread.

  I can see it. Hear it. Smell it. Feel it. I am on the bus with Gerry; I am in the kitchen with Mom.

  It’s the third time this year she’s asked me to stitch up his anger and alcohol.

  “A sixteen-year-old should never have to do this,” she says in a barely audible voice as I take a deep breath and push the needle through her skin. She doesn’t scream; she inhales.

  And passes out.

  I work fast.

  Her eyes flutter open a few minutes after I finish. She is white with pain and too stubborn for her own good. But stubborn forces her upright. My bottom eyelids are tiny ledges for tears I won’t let fall. I’m a scrawny bastard, but I’m tough. I don’t cry until I’m alone.

  “Neither should a forty-year-old,” I say, forcing my own words through gritted teeth as if the needle is in my back instead of hers. “Mom . . .”

  “Don’t say it. You know I’ve tried.”

  She’s right, of course. Leaving a man like my father isn’t as simple as clicking your heels or saying the words.

  I kiss her temple just below her still-blond hairline and say, “I love you,” even though part of me hates her for keeping us here.
<
br />   The brakes on the bus bring me back to the present. If the bus driver warned us we were in Huntsville, I did not hear him. Gerry looks up at me. The fierce girl who fell off the bus and laughed is gone.

  But I like this broken girl, too. I won’t follow her to Panama City, but I wish I could. I smile, and her beautiful smile bounces back to me.

  “I love the blue,” she says, as if it’s the first time she’s seen it.

  “Me too.” And this is the truth. While I was living in my memories, something of Gerry absorbed into me: the idea that I might not be able to create total change, but I can create some.

  Slipping my T-shirt over my now dry hair, I put my hand out to her. “Ms. Lennox, would you like to eat lunch with me?”

  “Why, yes, I believe I would, Mr. Lennox,” she says in her most southern of accents.

  Gerry collects her backpack and duffel bag from under the seat. After I shove Ben’s postcard in my back pocket, I take the duffel bag and hold out her T-shirt. “You wanna change? It’ll be hot out there.”

  She takes the shirt, which has new hints of blue in the fabric, and disappears for a minute. When she comes back, I realize we must look like quite a pair.

  “Bye, Mr. Durengo,” she says to our bus driver as we exit.

  “Bye,” he says, which makes me wonder if Durengo might be his real name.

  The bus station is a copy of the one in Rickman, except it’s in a more industrial area. I thought there would be fast food. Wrong. The only place near here that isn’t filled with blue-collar workers is a house across the street with a neon sign that reads 45 PIZZA.

  Gerry’s already walking in that direction before I say, “You sure that’s a good idea?”

  “Why not?” she says.

  “Uh . . . a million reasons. No one’s there. I’d rather not die of rat poison. I’m actually hungry. Do you need more?”

  “No,” she says, and keeps walking.

  She’s on the second step of the porch when I catch up.

  “Today’s an adventure. This makes the sequence complete. You got on a bus. You dyed your hair blue. You ate pizza that could kill you. That’s a helluva day.”

  “Getting on the bus and dying my hair equal a helluva day without the possibility of death,” I argue.

  “Hmmm,” is all she says.