E. Lockhart - Real Live Boyfriends

“You don’t even like the chanting.”

My mother coughed. “I’m learning to like it. Anyway, I was waiting for you to call and you never did.”

“We’ve been married twenty years. I’m your real live boyfriend, okay? If that’s what you want to call it.” My dad went back to his desk in exasperation.

“Mom!” I waved my hand to get her attention. “Don’t read my stuff. If it looks remotely personal, don’t read it. Even if you’re holding the notebook for some completely justifiable reason. It’s not your business.”

She held up her palm to silence me. “Ruby, not now. I’m talking to your father.”

“It’s hard enough to have any privacy living in this tiny houseboat without you reading my notebooks,” I went on. This was something Doctor Z had suggested I do when the opportunity came up. To make very clear to my mother how I’d like to be treated and ask her to respect my privacy.

Only, Doctor Z has never tried to be clear with Elaine Oliver. Mom gave no indication whatsoever of having heard me.

“I don’t know whether there’s going to be kissing either,” she complained to Dad. “Honestly. The other night I rubbed your neck and you didn’t even turn around.”

Ag, ag, ag and more ag.

“Oh, help me, Elaine. I was working under deadline. Are you trying to start an argument?” Dad barked.

“I’m expressing myself!” yelled Mom, leaping up from the floor. “You always want us to share our feelings, and now when I’m sharing my feelings you say I’m starting an argument! That’s so unfair!”

Polka-dot hates when they argue, so he stood up and started barking. Rouw! Rouw!

“I’m your husband, Elaine!” yelled Dad. “I don’t know why you’re suddenly questioning everything!”

Rouw! Rouw!

“But are you my boyfriend ?” Mom cried. “Ruby says the whole point of a real live boyfriend is that you can tell he’s your boyfriend.”

Rouw! Rouw!

“Ruby’s in high school,” Dad called over Polka. “Why are you listening to her?”

Rouw! Rouw!

“It’s just how I feel!” stormed Mom. “Maybe because I haven’t done a show in so long. Maybe because of what Juana said the other day.” [Blah blah blah. Insert long monologue about her personal issues that’s completely uninteresting to anyone under the age of forty-five]. “I don’t know,” she finished, nearly in tears. “I just can’t tell! I can’t tell if you’re my boyfriend!”

Dad opened the door to our houseboat and called out into the night. “I am Elaine Oliver’s real live boyfriend! I want everyone to know! My name is Kevin! I am a gardener of rare blooms! I am her boyfriend forever and ever!”

Rouw! Rouw!

Dad kept yelling. “I’m telling you , Seattle! Elaine Oliver is my woman!”

Mom started laughing. “You’ll wake the neighbors.” She wiped her nose with a tissue.

Dad started singing, off-key but loud:

“ I don’t wanna sleep ,

I just wanna keep

On lovin’ you.… ” 6

“Okay, okay!” Mom cried.

“Don’t you love Speedwagon?”

“Kevin!”

“I know all the lyrics. I can sing it from the beginning.”

She shook her head. “Not necessary.”

“You want me to stop now?” Dad asked.

She nodded.

“You believe I’m your real live boyfriend?”

She nodded again.

Dad walked over and gave her a hug. Polka-dot made a dash for the door and galloped the length of our dock, which he loves to do at every opportunity.

“Ruby, go collect the dog,” Dad said, his face buried in Mom’s hair.

When I got back the two of them were kissing.

Ag.

I am sure it’s obvious why I need therapy.

A week after Dad serenaded the neighborhood, Noel DuBoise suddenly baked me chocolate croissants and wrote me a letter.

An apology.

An explanation.

Not a love letter, really. But a perfect letter.

All the badness between us washed away, and what I had been insane to wish for—insane to even think about—became a reality.

Noel and I were together.

He kissed me and sat with me at lunch and listened to me without checking his texts. Wrote me e-mails and called me and made me laugh.

Noel DuBoise was my real, live boyfriend.

An e-mail from early in the summer:

Hi Roo.

Tomorrow, your presence is requested at a meeting of the Mutual Admiration Society. Time: 4 p.m. Location: the Harvard Exit movie theater.

Do not go online and check what they are playing. Show up with faith in the Society’s good intentions and taste in cinematic entertainment.

Also: bring Fruit Roll-Ups and Toblerone. The Society’s only other member will bring drinks and spring for popcorn and movie tickets.

Confirm your attendance at your earliest convenience.

Noel

Another e-mail:

Roo,

I just dropped you off and came home to find the house dark. Parents asleep, little girls asleep, everyone in bed before my curfew.

I banged on Mom’s door so she knew I was home, then climbed out on the porch roof outside my bedroom window. Tried to stealth it down the rose trellis. Figured I’d sneak back out and see you again because: all of a sudden I missed you like a complete sap. Even though I just saw you.

Planned the grand romantic gesture.

Nearly died trying to climb down rose trellis.

Really. Nearly died.

Seriously.

Okay, didn’t nearly die. But did scrape my arm on some thorns.

The need for Band-Aids trumped my plan to sneak up to your bedroom window and throw pebbles until you saw me standing there in the moonlight.

Grand romantic gesture crashes and burns.

Bright side: I did use the bacon Band-Aids you got me. There are three on my arm with actual blood soaking through.

In the moonlight,

Noel

Even though I know there is no such thing as a happy ending 7, a little part of me thought I had found one.

Even though some people hated Noel and me being together.

Even though having a real live boyfriend didn’t solve my mental problems or fix my family.

Even though life wasn’t a movie.

It still felt like a happy ending. It did.

Until eight weeks later.

1 Scamming mate: You fool around, but you don’t hang out. Ever. 2 Friend with benefits: You fool around, and you do hang out, but you are not going out. 3 Kind-of, sort-of, it’s-all-very-confusing boyfriend: Self-explanatory. 4 Polka-dot is a harlequin Great Dane, spotted like a dalmatian. He is not a reasonable dog to have living with me, my mom and my dad in a tiny houseboat.

But then, nothing about my life is reasonable. 5 Greg is my dad’s friend who has panic attacks so bad he never leaves his home. Which is completely what will happen to me if I don’t get a handle on the panic badness that happens to me ever since the debacles of sophomore year. If you want to see Greg, you have to go over to his garbage-y, plant-filled apartment and bring him Chinese food. It is deeply pitiful. 6 “Keep On Loving You”: Retro power ballad by REO Speedwagon. Dad is obsessed with retro metal. I think it makes him feel like he’s still seventeen. Though why anyone would want to feel like they’re seventeen I have no idea. 7 You can’t have an ending. It’s impossible. Because unlike in the movies, life goes on. You’re never at the end until you die.