Sarah Mlynowski - Monkey Business

“How’d we do? Another B-plus?” We’ve already gotten loads of B-pluses. The professors seemed to have made a communal decision that we’re good but not that good.

“Nope,” he says, smiling.

“Not a B-plus? Are you sure? How about a B?”

“Nope.” Still smiling.

“A-minus?”

“Nope. An A, dude. We got an A. We’re now the A team.

Mazel-tov! “An A? How is that possible?”

“We’re brilliant, what can I say? Who knew? We’re celebrating tonight at Kimmy’s. It’s her birthday, so now we have twice the reason to party.”

Kimmy’s room! I’m finally getting back inside Kimmy’s room! She’s been looking so hot lately. Low-cut shirts, pushup bras, tight leather pants-it’s fantastic. She even started bringing lollipops to class-bright, big red ones she licks and sucks, turning her lips bloodred.

“Pat yourself on the back, dude,” Nick says. “It was all your wacky ideas and stellar writing that got us the mark.”

“I’m the king of the world!”

And my queen awaits me.

After lunch, I stop back at my room to get the list of books I need to buy, and the phone rings.

“Good afternoon!” I say brightly.

“Jamie?”

“Marnie! How are you?”

“Fine thanks, how are you? How’s school?”

“So far so good. How’s the store?”

“Busy as usual. I wanted to let you know that I delivered the daisies this morning.”

“Did she answer the door?” I ask.

“Yup.”

“How’d she look?”

Pause. “She was in her bathrobe.”

Same as every year. I thank Marnie and hang up.

Twice a year, on October 27 and April 20, Dara’s birthday and the anniversary of her death, my mother locks herself in her room and I send her flowers. When I was a kid, I’d sit by her door and listen to my mother cry. The year I was six, I called ten florists until I found Marnie, who agreed to deliver thirteen dollars and twenty-five cents worth of daisies, my mother’s favorite flowers.

My mother has never thanked me for them, but she keeps them on her night table until they die. She never talks about Dara, either. Neither does my dad. There’s only one album of her, and my mother keeps it in her room, separate from the family albums overflowing with photos of me, Amanda, Erin and Erin’s four-year-old daughter, Jenny. There aren’t too many photos of Dara, anyway. She died when she was about six months old.

Amanda was only two when Dara died of SIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, so she doesn’t remember anything, but Erin was five and remembers a lot of screaming, a lot of crying, and police and relatives swarming the house.

The flowers are my way of saying I’m sorry, even though I know I’m not responsible.

If Dara hadn’t died, my parents wouldn’t have had me. My mother had always wanted three kids.

I get dressed and head to the bookstore. Unfortunately, the books I need are nowhere in sight. I find a clerk counting LWBS T-shirts, and I ask for help. He checks his computer and says, “None left.”

“Can you look in the back?”

“None left,” he repeats. “Sorry.” He resumes counting.

Oy. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

He looks at me like I’m an idiot. “We ran out a month ago. Sorry.”

“How am I supposed to do my reading?”

“Tell your professor you waited too long. Maybe he’ll order more.”

I’m sure that’ll earn me an A.

6:30 p.m.

My face is bleeding.

Twenty-six and still don’t know how to shave properly. Having to do it in public isn’t helping the situation. I don’t know how to floss properly, either. The Toronto dentist I went to warned me my teeth would fall out if I don’t start flossing. The dental hygienist actually demonstrated the right way to do it: wrap the floss around the middle finger so you can use your thumb and index finger to maneuver it. Every night. Come on! Does anyone floss every night? I bet superheroes don’t need to floss.

“Getting pretty for the big night?” Nick says, slapping me on the back.

“Beard was bothering me,” I lie.

“See you in Kimmy’s room?”

Kimmy’s room. Haven’t yet been inside Kimmy’s room. Did everything possible not to be in Kimmy’s room. Being in Kimmy’s room can’t lead to anything good. Actually that’s the dilemma. It can lead to something good, and I’m not talking ethics. “See you there.”

“You can make it? No javelin club or anything?”

Nick thinks it’s funny that I’ve signed up for every club at school. “There’s no javelin club.”

“No? I hope you’re not paying membership fees to all the clubs you’ve joined.”

“No membership fees. Just my blood.” Truth is, I may have piled too much on my plate. Yesterday, after class I played some ball, then met with the marketing association, then the real estate association, then with the group to work on our OB assignment, then had a smoke with Kimmy and ended up talking to her for two hours. Sharon would kill me if she knew how much I was smoking. Cigarettes, too. But it seems like such a natural thing to do here. After the smoke, I finished up my presentation for Integrative Communications then called Sharon, and then I couldn’t sleep so I went downstairs to the common room. Kimmy was there, said she couldn’t sleep, either, so we went for another smoke.

“No one will care if you drop one or two,” Nick says.

I think someone will. Especially because I’ve somehow managed to be on the executive committee on everything except basketball. “Maybe I’ll drop basketball.”

He clutches his hand to his chest. “A spear through my heart, dude. Anything but basketball.”

“See what I mean? I can’t choose. I don’t think I’ll drop any of them. Besides, I like them all. I wouldn’t want to miss out.”

“I may be out late tonight,” I tell Sharon, pressing a tissue against my still leaky chin. “I’m going to a party. Should I call later?”

“How late will you be back? Where’s the party? Don’t you have class tomorrow?”

Oh, man. Lately Sharon’s been grilling me about everything I do, and it’s getting on my nerves. And now she’s mad at me for not coming in for Canadian Thanksgiving. “Don’t know, at a friend’s place, and yes, I have class in the morning.”

I don’t tell her that the friend’s name is Kimmy. And that I spent the entire day watching Kimmy licking her red lollipop. I sat in class, mesmerized, watching her insert it in her mouth and out again…in and out…in and out…When I asked her what I should bring to the party, she purred, “Just yourself. Just come.” She emphasized the word come. At least I think she did. Did she? I think I’ve been letting my other head do the thinking lately. I’ve spent all day imagining her in a black push-up bra and matching thong and holding the string of a red balloon.

“Don’t be snarky,” Sharon says. “I was just asking. Excuse me for taking an interest in your life. Maybe if you came home once in a while…”

“You know I’m sorry I couldn’t come home. But I’ll come in for American Thanksgiving.”

“Whatever. If you have time.”

Why is she always making me feel guilty? Doesn’t she realize how important my education is? “I have to go.”

“Fine. Bye.” She hangs up, without telling me she loves me and to be good. She always tells me to be good. I wonder if that means I can be bad.

“Welcome,” Kimmy says, opening her door. Instead of a push-up bra and thong, she’s wearing a tight, low-cut, short red dress and strappy red heels. Oh, man.

Jamie, Lauren and Nick are already sitting cross-legged on the floor. So far Jamie has been late to every class this semester, but for this he’s on time.