Lidia Yuknavitch - Dora - A Headcase

A waitress waddles over and scowls at him and shakes her jowls. “Sir, you can’t do that in here. We’re a non-smoking establishment.” She points to a sign behind Little Teena’s head.

“Ah, fair lady,” Little Teena says, “so true.” He grabs my black crayon, sticks it in his mouth, and lights it. The waitress backs away like she’s a little frightened.

I snatch the black Crayola back, blow the flame out, and rub some of the melted black on my lips. Then I douse it in my glass of water. Smells like melted kid hope.

My head itches. My hair is coming back but I look … patchy. I wipe my mouth with the sleeve of my hoodie — great. I’m so pissed I’m frothing a little. I suck spit back into my mouth and finish what I’m writing and shove the napkin over to Little Teena. It’s not FINISHED. Don’t you get it? It’s MINE.

“OK, OK,” Little Teena says, using the napkin to dab at his forehead.

“I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry,” Ave Maria sort of whimpersings at me. “This is the I’m sorry song.” She improvises a happy little tune. I look at her. She makes her eyes all big. She rests her head on her fists atop those goddamn pencil thin wrists. “So soooooooorrrrrrrrrry,” she sings. She pulls the hood of her hoodie up around her head and yanks the strings tight. In a neon pink hoodie with the hood pulled tight around her face, well, it’s pretty impossible to be mad at someone who looks like a bright pink singing penis with a girlish face. She blinks.

I write: your sorry song stinks and throw it at her.

The problem is this. Ave Maria told one of the teen misfits we let view the footage on the wall next to the troll statue that he could film it on his fucking iPhone. “I guess,” she said, out of earshot, so I didn’t know it was even happening. Sometimes she just doesn’t think.

Well he filmed it all right, but the new G4 iPhones? Yeah. They have HD video recording and FaceTime video calling. So the guy pretty much filmed the whole rough cut and shot it off to god knows how many of his wanker little buddies … there’s no way to stop the transmission of images once they signal through the flames. I’m so pissed off I want to punch a hole in the crappy pumpkin color vinyl booth seats. Ave Maria bobs up and down a little. No way am I gonna laugh. I try for a Stop. Moving. Now. Face. I write: you’ve got cum on your chin and slide another napkin over to Ave Maria.

“Nuh uh!” she says, then wipes, then tastes it, then smiles.

“Anyone want the rest of my bacon?” Obsidian asks, holding a slab of swine up in the air.

I give her the you know I want the bacon, asshole look and she smiles and hands it over. Everyone else gives me what’s left of their bacon too. Everyone knows bacon is my favorite food. I chew and stew. The sound of my chewing is all anyone says for a bit. The chorus of short orders and grill sizzling is in the background. I half want to record.

“I was only trying to help,” Ave Maria says. “I thought if more people saw it,” she stabs a strawberry with her fork and chucks it over my head, “we could get you out of your fucked up dungeon household and back into the world — I was just trying to create … whadya call it?” She looks pleadingly at Little Teena.

“Buzz,” Little Teena says, lighting and smoking his straw. Burned plastic smell.

“Yeah! That. Buzz,” Ave Maria says. She shuts up and puts her neon pink head back on top of her wrists. “Don’t be hatin’ on me, Ida,” Ave Maria says. “Or I’ll cry. Like right here. In Shari’s. Really loud.”

I study her face. I think I know what that would sound like, given her high notes. Her eyes well up.

Goddamn it I quickly scrawl out on the paper placemat — don’t fucking cry. My cell vibrates in my hoodie pocket just underneath my rib cut. I don’t care who it is. I’m with the only people besides Marlene that matter, so fuck it. It buzzes and buzzes against me. Maybe it’ll make my rib cut scab bleed. Whoever you are? Leave a message, punkass. I figure it’s Mrs. K. She can suck it.

“Look,” Little Teena says all fatherly, “that footage won’t last long on Facehooker because they’ll figure out there’s giant COCK going on sooner than later.”

Ave Maria is bobbing her head up and down maniacally. “Yeah,” she goes, “You can’t have vag or tits or cock on Facehooker.”

Little Teena douses his straw in his coffee. “I can figure out a way to hose the signal on YouTube, but it’ll take me at least a day. So will you get your panties out of a twist and calm down? By the time you finish your man movie, it will be a goddamn masterpiece. Check that big beautiful ego of yours, madame artiste.” He puts me in a faux head lock and nuggies me.

I wrestle free. Fuck. You. I write, then: I’m not wearing panties. Then I charley horse him.

“OW. That fucking hurt you know,” Little Teena says. Good thing I have blubber. I’m a higher mammal.”

“What about me,” Ave Maria goes, bopping up and down, “don’t I get one?” She’s smiling like a giddy little penis cartoon.

“You, my bulimic beanpole, have no blubber,” Little Teena says.

I give Ave Maria a good kick in the shin underneath the table.

“Thank you!” she sings five octaves higher than human.

Then we’re just who we are again. My cell buzzes my gut again. I whip it out of my hoodie pocket. Huh. No idea who that number belongs to. Must be Indians trying to sell me something. That could make decent soundscape though, so I hold my phone to my ear to listen to the voice mail.

“Gross. My thighs are stuck to the seats,” Ave Maria says. She’s wearing old school navy blue gym shorts and white tube socks. Before we get our check, we make a break for it out into the parking lot, a fat waitress with sweat stains from her pits to her boobs chasing us and screaming, “You dirty little fuckers, get your asses back here!” But it’s not like she’s gonna, you know, chase us, and like I said, the cops don’t congregate before 4:00. Obsidian shoots her the bird and takes her T-shirt off and swings it around in the air and throws it in our wake. Briefly I’m stung by the beauty of her undershirt. Those Italian white ribbed stretchy kind. Did I think she’d be wearing a bra?

My voicemail kicks in as we run. “I have been trying to reach you. You have something of value that I am in a position to procure. I have a lucrative offer to make to you.” I don’t even listen to the rest. Must be a wrong number. Or Indians trying to sell me shit. Doesn’t even make any sense. I shove my cell back into my hoodie pocket. Whoever that is can wait.

We run. Together. Chaotic and mismatched. I may not be able to yell, but I can sure as shit run, and nothing beats the sound of docs on pavement. I flip on my H4n in my Dora purse. Clompclompclompclompclomp. Beautiful. My heart pounding. My rib cut stinging. I still have the crayon. I put the Crayola crayon in my mouth between my teeth. I forgive Ave Maria.

“To the cigarettes!” Little Teena yells, with his arm jammed forward and his lighter lit like we’re leading some kind of teen monster charge, a crass ample gay boy, an anorexic pink penis cartoon girl in tube socks, a bad ass Native American, and a raging mute — I bite therefore I am — through the black Crayola of night.

“YOUR FATHER WOULD LIKE TO SPEAK TO YOU.”

That’s what I wake up to after maybe two and a half hours of sleep. The voice of Mrs. K. through the crack of my bedroom door. For a second I think I’m dreaming, but nope, I have to pee and my rib cut hurts.

“I know you were not here last night,” Mrs. K. says in a low demon tone from the other side of my bedroom door.

Creepola.

“Don’t think I won’t tell him,” Mrs. K. says.