Susan Phillips - It Had To Be You

She knew Reed would climb up after her if she defied him, and she decided she'd feel safer facing him on solid ground. With a sinking sense of dread, she began descending the maple tree, her plump thighs making an ugly swishing sound as they rubbed together. She hoped he wasn't looking up her shorts. He was always trying to see her there, or touch her, or say nasty things about her bottom, not all of which she understood. She dropped awkwardly to the ground, breathing hard because the descent had been difficult.

Reed wasn't unusually tall for a twelve-year-old, but he was stocky, with short, strong legs, broad shoulders, and a thick chest. His arms and legs were perpetually covered with scabs and bruises from sports activities, bike accidents, and fights. Bert loved to inspect Reed's injuries. He said Reed was "all boy."

She, however, was lumpish and shy, more interested in books than in sports. Bert called her Lard Ass and said that all those A's she made in school wouldn't get her anywhere in life if she couldn't manage to stand up straight and look people in the eye. Reed wasn't smart in school, but that didn't make any difference to Bert because Reed was the star of his junior high football team.

Her cousin was dressed in a torn orange T-shirt, cutoffs, and battered sneakers, exactly the kind of rumpled play clothes she would have liked to wear, except her father's housekeeper wouldn't let her. Mrs. Mertz bought all Phoebe's clothing in an expensive children's store, and today she had laid out a pair of white shorts that emphasized Phoebe's round stomach and a sleeveless cotton top that had a big strawberry on the front and cut her under the arms.

"Don't ever say I've never done anything nice for you,Flea Belly." Reed held up a piece of heavy white paper just a little larger than a paperback book cover. "Guess what I've got?"

"I don't know." Phoebe spoke cautiously, determined to avoid whatever land mines Reed was laying for her.

"I've got a picture of your mom."

Phoebe's heart skipped a beat. "I don't believe you."

He turned the paper over, and she saw that it was, indeed, a photograph, although he flashed it too quickly for her to absorb anything more than the vague impression of a beautiful woman's face.

"I found it stuck in the back of Mom's junk drawer," he said, taking an impatient swipe at the thick, dark bangs hanging in jags to his eyebrows.

Her legs felt weak, and she knew she had never wanted anything in her life as much as she wanted that photograph. "How do you know it's her?"

"I asked my mom." He cupped it in his hand so Phoebe couldn't see it and looked at it. "It's a real good picture, Flea Belly."

Phoebe's heart was pounding so hard she was afraid he would see it. She wanted to snatch the photograph from his hand, but she kept still because she knew from painful experience that he would simply hold it out of her reach if she tried.

She only had one picture of her mother, and it had been taken from so far away that Phoebe couldn't see her face. Her father never said anything much about her except that she was a dumb blonde who'd looked great in a G-string, and it was too goddamn bad Phoebe hadn't inherited her body instead of his brains. Phoebe's ex-stepmother, Cooki, whom her father had divorced last year after she'd had another miscarriage, said that Phoebe's mom probably wasn't as bad as Bert made out, but that Bert was a hard man to live with. Phoebe had loved Cooki. She had painted Phoebe's toenails Pink Parfait and read her exciting stories about real life out of True Confessions magazine .

"What'll you give me for it," Reed said.

She knew she couldn't let Reed see how precious the photograph was or he would do something awful to keep her from having it. "I already have lots of pictures of her," she lied, "so why should I give you anything?"

He held it up in front of him. "All right. I'll just tear it up."

"No!" She leapt forward, the protest slipping through her lips before she could stop it.

His dark eyes narrowed in sly triumph, and she felt as if the sharp jaws of a steel trap had just closed around her.

"How much do you want it?"

She had begun to tremble. "Just give it to me."

"Pull down your pants and I will."

"No!"

"Then I'm going to tear it up." He clasped the top between his fingers as if he were getting ready to tear it.

"Don't!" Her voice was shaking. She bit the inside of her cheek, but she couldn't stop her eyes from filling with tears. "You don't want it, Reed. Please give it to me."

"I already told you what you have to do, Lard Ass."

"No. I'll tell my dad."

"And I'll tell him you're a stuck-up little liar. Which one of us do you think he'll believe?"

Both of them knew the answer to that question. Bert always took Reed's side.

A tear dripped off her jaw onto her cotton top, making an amoeba-shaped smear on the leaf of the strawberry. "Please."

"Pull down your pants, or I'll tear it up."

"No!"

He made a small tear at the top, and she couldn't hold back a sob of distress.

"Pull 'em down!"

"Please, don't! Please!"

"Are you going to do it, crybaby?" He lengthened the tear.

"Yes! Stop! Stop and I'll do it."

He lowered the photograph. Through her tears she saw that he had made a jagged rip through the top inch.

His eyes slithered down over her and settled on the point where her legs came together, that mysterious place where a few strands of golden hair had begun to grow. "Hurry up before somebody comes."

An awful vomit taste rose in her throat. She worked the button at the side of her shorts. Tears stung her eyes as she struggled with the zipper.

"Don't make me do this," she whispered. The words had a wavery sound, as if her throat were full of water. "Please. Just give me the picture."

"I told you to hurry." He wasn't even looking at her face, just staring at the place between her legs.

The bad taste in her mouth got worse as she slowly worked her shorts down over her tummy and thighs and then let them fall. They circled her ankles in a crooked figure eight. She was cold with shame as she stood in front of him in her blue cotton underpants with tiny yellow roses all over them.

"Give it to me now, " she begged.

"Pull down your panties first."

She tried not to think about it. She tried just to take her panties down so she could have the picture of her mother, but her hands wouldn't move. She stood in front of him with tears running down her cheeks and her shorts snagged around her chubby ankles and she knew she couldn't let him see her there.

"I can't," she whispered.

"Do it!" His small eyes darkened with fury.

Sobbing, she shook her head.

With an ugly twist to his mouth, he ripped the precious photograph in half, then in half again before letting the pieces float to the ground. He ground them beneath the sole of his sneaker and ran toward the house.

Tripping on her shorts, she stumbled blindly toward the ruined photograph. As she fell to her knees, she saw a set of widely spaced eyes tilted up at the ends just like her own. She gave a little shuddering gasp and told herself it would be all right. She would smooth everything out and tape it all back together again.

Her hands shook as she arranged the four crumpled pieces in their proper order, the top corners first and then the bottom ones. Only after the photograph was reassembled did she see Reed's final act of malice. A thick, black mustache had been inked in just above her mother's soft upper lip.