Tully

‘What, by your folks? Nice parents. We got too many kids in my family, no one has anything newer than 1975. I don’t even have a car yet.’

The girls chatted a while longer.

‘Thanks a lot, Tull,’ said Shakie, opening the door, and Tully winced.

‘Is it okay if I call you Tull?’

Tully nodded her head slowly. ‘Rhymes with gull, right?’ she said. ‘Why not? I love birds. My boyfriend’s name is Robin.’

‘Great,’ said Shakie. ‘Listen, are you busy tomorrow? If it’s a nice day, we’re having a barbecue. Come if you can.’

Tully thanked her for the offer and said she would make it if she could.

Luckily it rained on Sunday and the decision was spared her.

‘So, Shakie,’ asked Tully one Saturday night when she was driving her home again and the girls stopped at the Green Parrot, ‘Who are you going out with these days?’

‘Oh, just here and there,’ said Shakie absentmindedly, and then leaned over to Tully and said, ‘Don’t tell my Mom or anything, but I’m waiting for Jack to come back.’

‘Oh,’ said Tully coldly. ‘Where is Jack nowadays?’

‘Oh, Jack.’ Shakie shook her head. ‘He is somewhere. Nowhere. Anywhere.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘I don’t know. Didn’t he have a football scholarship to someplace or other?’ asked Shakie.

‘Why are you asking me?’ Tully said. ‘You went to the prom with him. How should I know?’

‘Well, nobody knows for sure. I think he had a scholarship to a college in California. Palo Alto or something. I don’t think he went.’

‘Ahh,’ breathed Tully, her lips suddenly numb. She tried to bite them. Palo Alto! Palo Alto. My God, my God.

‘Don’t you keep in touch with him?’ Tully asked after long minutes passed. Tully was grateful for the dimness of the Green Parrot.

Shakie laughed. ‘In touch? Nah. He is out there finding himself. People who are finding themselves are always out of touch. So how come you didn’t go to the prom?’ Shakie asked Tully.

Finding himself? Tully thought.

Shakie repeated her question.

Tully shrugged. ‘Didn’t feel like it.’

‘Didn’t feel like going to your own Senior Prom? Wow!’ exclaimed Shakie. ‘We had a bitchin’ time. Bitchin’. Jack and I were King and Queen.’

Oh, I’m sure, thought Tully. I’m so sure you were, Shakie Lamber, cheerleader and Homecoming Queen.

Shakie took a sip of her Miller Lite. ‘I’ll tell you something, Tully, because you’re a friend. I was pretty crazy about that Jack.’

‘No kidding,’ said Tully weakly.

Shakie smiled. ‘Well, he certainly had some craze-inducing parts to him, yes, I can tell you that right now.’ She ordered another drink. ‘But he is gone. I think it was just this high school thing between us. But! I keep hoping, nothing wrong with that, right? Oh, I’m not just sitting on my behind, though, Tully. I’m going to beauty school. The Topeka School of Cosmetology. I want to work at Macy’s. In the fine makeup department. Chanel or something like that.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ said Tully. She finished her beer in two gulps. ‘Listen, it’s kind of late. I gotta get to sleep. Let’s go.’

Tully and Robin were invited to Shakie’s for Thanksgiving, 1979. Robin didn’t go; he was spending the holiday with his brothers.

Tully went alone and met Shakie’s three brothers, her huge six-foot-six lumberjack of a dad, and her five-foot-nothing mom, who got all the male Lambers to help her with dinner by screaming at them at the top of her lungs, while Shakie sat with Tully in the living room.

‘I’m the youngest and the only girl,’ Shakie explained. ‘I never have to do anything.’

‘Martha! Dinner!’ yelled Shakie’s mom.

‘Martha? Who’s Martha?’ asked Tully.

Shakie laughed uncomfortably. ‘Oh, that’s me,’ she said. ‘Martha Louise Lamber.’ And when they got to the dinner table, Shakie whispered fiercely to her mother, ‘Shakie, Ma, Shakie!’

A few days later in Tully’s trailer, Robin asked, ‘So, is Shakie a replacement friend?’

‘Replacement for who?’ snapped Tully.

Robin looked away. ‘For Julie,’ he said. ‘Maybe for me.’

‘Certainly not for you, Robin,’ Tully answered. ‘But Julie is far away. I can’t help it if Shakie likes me. We’re not that close, though.’

‘You’re not that close with anyone,’ said Robin.

‘No,’ said Tully, ‘1 guess I’m not. Still, though, what a brave thing to say to me, Robin DeMarco.’

‘Do you like Shakie?’ Robin asked.

‘What’s not to like?’ said Tully. ‘And as if I have other options. What would you like, Robin, for me not to be friends with anyone but you?’

Robin sighed and made room for her in the bed, pulling the quilt over both of them. ‘As if what I wanted really mattered, Tully,’ he said.

‘Jack is back!’ said Shakie happily as the girls started their Saturday night shift.

It was nearing Christmas.

‘He is, is he?’ said Tully. ‘Why?’

‘Oh,’ said Shakie, brushing her hair in the middle of the restaurant, ‘His dad died. So he’s back! Sounds like a song, doesn’t it? “I’ve been waiting to happen/till Jack comes back!/Now, Jack is back/and I’m ready to happen/Jack is back/and it’s straight in the sack!”’ She sang and danced and flung her blond mane all around the empty tables.

Tully watched her and then laughed. ‘Shakie, you are so full of shit.’

‘He really is back, Tully,’ Shakie said seriously.

‘No, that’s not it. What about all that bullshit that it was just a high school thing?’