TEN
GO HOME, DYKE.
That’s what they wrote.
Actually, I think they wrote something else, but then they maybe weren’t sure on the spelling, because there was some stuff crossed out. But then they wrote GO HOME, DYKE.
In black spray paint.
On our front lawn.
Luckily I was the first person to spot it out the window, and I tore outside as quietly as possible, speed-calling Berry as I zipped out the front door and onto the grass. The paint was only just dry, sticky on the individual blades of grass, which were already wet with dew. The black rubbed off on my fingers as I listened to the phone click and Berry’s sleepy voice. “WHA? ANNE? What time is—”
“BERRY! I need you to do me a favor, like FAST. Do you have spray paint?”
“Have? What?” I could hear Berry getting out of bed, thumping around her room. “What do you need spray paint for at. . .”
There was a pause. A rustling sound.
“Holy cow, seven a.m.!”
“Berry—”
There was a thump. “Wait. Are you okay?”
“I need to paint over something,” I said, looking back at what I hoped was my still-sleeping house. “Like. Now. Or I need to like blowtorch. But I think paint—”
“I’m coming now.”
Fortunately for me, Lucy wasn’t exactly bursting out of bed that morning, and Millie never liked to get out of bed until after noon if she could help it. I zipped into the kitchen and made coffee and grabbed two muffins out of the fridge and put everything on a tray with some sliced oranges and brought it up to their room.
Knocking first.
“Come in!”
Millie sat up in bed, which was already covered in books and magazines. Lucy was watching the news.
“We’ll be down in a minute,” Millie said.
I held up the tray, “I brought you breakfast. For the bed in breakfast. Which you will eat now.”
“You brought us. . .breakfast?” Lucy sat up.
“I always knew we raised you right,” Millie joked, taking a mug. “Does the living room still smell like dog barf?”
“Only faintly,” I noted, handing Lucy her mug and muffin. “The garage smells more because the rug is in there.”
“Well, we’ll get to that this afternoon,” Lucy said, putting her muffin on a stack of books about education. “I wanted to talk to you—”
“Actually I’ve got some stuff to do,” I cut in. “So enjoy your breakfast and. . .I’ll see you in a bit!”
Millie sipped her coffee. “Mmmm. Hey, isn’t tennis on?”
“I think so!” I called back as I tore down the stairs into the laundry room to grab our beach towels.
Plan B.
Berry screeched up to our curb in Mato thirty minutes later, and, not even breaking a sweat, vaulted out of the car with an armful of spray paint. “I brought black and green and blue and orange and yellow and pink. And purple!” She stepped up toward the letters on the grass and frowned. “Fuck.”
“Yeah.” I sighed. “Fuck. You think this was because they didn’t win the game? Like somehow the tie is my fault?”
“I mean, it could be anything, but yeah, the game probably didn’t help.” Berry straightened her shoulders, dropping the rest of the cans on the grass. “Okay, what’s the plan?”
Shaking the can of pink paint, I stepped up to the lawn and began drawing a pink square around the letters. Then I divided that square into thirds. And thirds again.
“Tic-tac-toe,” Berry asked, shaking the can of green.
“Even better,” I said. “Saturday Night Fe ver.”
Saturday Night Fever, another film starring John Travolta, released in 1977, about New York discotheques. Featuring several key hits by the ultimate disco band, the Bee Gees, an Australian group who wrote three mega hits for the movie including: “Stayin’ Alive,” “Night Fever,” and “How Deep Is Your Love.”
And “We Should Be Dancing.” The best.
I pulled up the image I was thinking of on my phone, which was also the poster for the movie. On it, Travolta, in an iconic white polyester suit and black shirt, stands on a lit-up dance floor, a square platform of lights, his hand up in the air pointing at. . .the stars possibly, maybe at a tech who was standing on a ladder.
I looked at Berry, my heart an exaggerated bass line. Because we didn’t have much time. Because at any moment my parents could decide that it was indeed weird that I was all like, Here’s a muffin in bed. Because I basically yanked Berry out of bed on a Saturday, precious Saturday, and made her bring me all her paint and at any moment she could just get in her magical red car and drive away. I really didn’t know what I was going to do if she did that. Or if she said anything about my Plan A being more like an actual Plan H or W.
“Let’s do it.” Berry nodded, shaking the can and, with expert flair, filling in the top corner square.
Technically the real floor in the movie was an LED floor that changed with the music. But this was kind of an emergency rendition. More of an “inspired by” than a direct copy.
Even though she was not a fan of disco, and had made it clear to me that she would never see the movie, Berry was impressed with the final product. Which looked more like a quilt of many colors on the lawn than a dance floor, but you know what? It wasn’t terr ible.
“What now?” she asked, tossing her can in the cardboard box.
“Wardrobe change,” I said. Grabbing my favorite sequined two-piece suit from where I’d left it on the porch, I pulled it on over my shorts and shirt and slipped on my gross white sneakers because I knew they’d be ruined. The suit was a light pink instead of white, but with my black shirt it looked pretty Saturday night.
Berry pulled out her phone. “Awesome.”
I started playing “Stayin’ Alive.”
“All right.” Berry stepped back, “So. Um. Strike a pose!”
I stepped onto the still-sticky grass, which immediately dyed my sneakers a rainbow of colors. Somewhere under my toe was the faded outline of the word Go.
I pressed my toe into the paint, imagining Tanner’s face getting squished under my shoe. George Herbert was a poet and the first person, I think, to say, “Living well is the best revenge,” in 1640. People still say it, centuries later. I held up my one finger, pointed at the sky, and put my other hand on my hip. I pursed my lips as Berry clicked the photo.
Which is about when Monty started barking her head off and I heard the front door squeak open.
“What the—”
“ANNE!”
Lucy and Millie, still in sleepy robes, holding empty coffee mugs, stood on the front steps. Mouths open.
“What the heck?” Millie gasped.
“You painted the LAWN?!” Lucy stepped forward and bent down to look at the grass, inspecting the damage.
In fairness, it wasn’t as bad as a rug of dog barf. I didn’t say that, but I definitely thought it. I don’t know what Lucy was thinking as she rubbed the paint between her fingers and stared at my suit.
Berry took a huge step back. Awkward.
“Why would you do this?” Lucy asked.
You’re going to say, of all the people that would understand why I would want to cover someone’s hate message on the lawn, Lucy and Millie would be two people who would get it. Also, let’s say, covering the lawn with spray paint is not hitting someone with a piece of pizza.
But I didn’t want them to see it. I didn’t want to see it. I wished I hadn’t seen it. And I didn’t want that to be in their brains like it was in mine. Even if it wasn’t new, I didn’t want one more for Millie or for Lucy. I just didn’t. It was easier for them to be pissed at me, for some reason, than to have them feeling sad with me.
Or that’s what I thought, I guess.
“There was a hole in the grass,” I lied. “So I figured I’d take advantage of it. Make some art. Then I could fix the whole thing.”
Berry dropped her phone by her side and looked at me.
Monty, who had sprinted out of the house after my moms, did a zoom across the front lawn, apparently feeling much better. With great dog zeal, she charged through the painted square. Her paws were immediately soaked in paint.
“GAH! MONTY!”
Lucy shook her head. “I can’t deal with this right now.” And she walked back inside. I think she was talking to herself because she was making angry gestures with her hands.
Millie took a long sip from her coffee, thinking. “What would make you think that it was even remotely okay to cover the grass with paint?”
“I just thought. . .it would look cool. Like an installation piece.” I dropped my hands by my side. “I mean, it’s our property, and you can just replace grass.”
“I can?” I could feel Millie searching my eyes for a hint of something. Millie can read my eyes like a book. I tried to look indifferent: the green of the lawn at the edge of the pink, my ruined sneakers, Monty’s now dyed paws.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I guess it was a bad idea.”
“I guess so.” Millie looked at Berry, who was frozen in place, which is what I would have done. “Well, looks like you’re going to be grounded for the next week. And you can spend the rest of your weekend resodding our lawn.”
I assumed resodding meant putting more sod on there. Because sod is grass, right? Probably not a great time to ask, I reasoned.
“Okay,” I said.
Millie turned and went back inside, and Berry released a very loud sigh of relief.
“That was intense.”
“Yeah,” I said, dropping to the ground, just shy of the paint that would have ruined my suit on top of my day.
“My parents would have grounded me for a month.”
“I mean, we live in Greenville. . .” I held my palms up. “I’m pretty grounded as is.”
The sun was out by then. A big ball of heat seeping through my polyester jumpsuit and turning my skin into something that felt like a cooked egg.
“Why did you lie?” Berry asked.
“Because I didn’t want my moms to spend their weekend thinking that someone left a hate message on their lawn.” I squinted.
Berry looked at her phone. “You think it’s for them or for you?”
I scrambled to my feet. “Good question.”
“Maybe both,” Berry said. But she didn’t sound sure.
The sun was starting to cook my skull. “Maybe it’s all the same thing.”
“So.” Berry stretched. “You want to change or are we resodding the lawn with you in polyester?”
“You already drove a buttload of spray paint to my house,” I said. “I don’t want to put you out. You know. Again.”
Berry shrugged. “What else do I have to do in Greenville on a Saturday?”
Something about Berry’s tone. . .it was kind of lonely, just at that moment. Like it felt the same as when I pictured Berry alone with her soccer equipment when she was little. Suddenly I realized maybe Berry didn’t have anyone else but a bunch of concrete animals to hang out with? Because Greenville sucked?
I don’t know, maybe that made me feel worse for being the new friend that needed. . .help.
Maybe I was also not that fond of wanting help.
Maybe I was standing there in silence, looking at the lawn, and Berry bent down a little to catch my eye.
“Sodding is actually really cool,” she said, with a grin.
“It’s not.” I grinned back. “But thanks. For being here. And helping.”
“When it’s my lawn.” Berry tossed her keys in the air and caught them. “You’ll sod me.”
So we drove to the nursery. And Berry, who somehow knew something about grass (on top of knowing how to play like four instruments and how to play soccer), helped me load six sushi rolls of dirt and grass into the trunk. Then we went to the burger place for breakfast and looked at the pictures from that morning on her phone while I shoved fries in my face.
“You look hilarious,” Berry said, turning the phone sideways. “What do you want to do with these?”
“Photoshop. Then I’m going to post it tonight,” I said, pointing at her phone, “Can you send me that one?”
“Photoshop what?”
“You’ll see.” I slurped up the last of my shake.
“Sending in a message now,” Berry said, and sipped on her soda.
“Got it.”
We spotted Tanner and Sarah in Tanner’s Jeep pulling into the burger place as we pulled out. Sarah stuck her tongue out at me and laughed. Berry, staring ahead, didn’t see. And I didn’t know what to say, so I just looked at my photos on my phone. I wonder what people did with horrible moments before they had phones?
I wouldn’t let Berry help me actually sod. Like, I just couldn’t and I also didn’t want her to get any more cold glares from my moms, who were definitely going to be lurking. I got her to explain it to me and did it myself. Killing at least one of the sushi rolls in the process. And getting mud everywhere. It was kind of like repairing a hole in my pants but with more dirt.
I was about a quarter through and heading back from the garage, with a pitchfork and a dream, when I heard a clip-clop coming up the road. I looked over and spotted a shadow—a tall four-legged shadow on top of which was what I thought was someone saluting.
So apparently there are people in Greenville who have horses? That they ride? On the street?
And apparently one of those people is Gilly Henderson. On top of a big black horse with a big white stripe on its nose. Gilly sat with one hand on her hip, the other shielding her eyes under her helmet. Which was pink with a pom-pom on the top.
I didn’t know helmets came with pom-poms.
But then apparently there were a lot of things I didn’t know.
I froze, pitchfork in hand. For some reason I didn’t want Gilly Henderson to see me working my sod. Not just because I was pretty sure I was doing it wrong and it was possible Gilly knew the right way to fix a lawn.
The horse stopped in front of the house. Gilly stood up in the stirrups. She was looking at the grass. She looked confused.
The horse shuffled forward and Gilly pulled back on the reins. Then she reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone.
Taking a picture of the lawn? For what? To show her friends. The friends who probably, maybe even with Gilly, sent this message?
“Hey!” I yelled out, stepping forward. “HELLO! HEY! GILLY!”
Apparently you have to be very careful not to scare horses. A good way to do that would be to hold up a pitchfork and approach them, shouting.
Spotting me, the horse skittered backward, startling Gilly and me.
“WHOA!” Gilly cried.
“Ah!” I dropped the pitchfork. “Sorry. I just. I didn’t mean to pitchfork at you.”
Her hair was spilling down her back from under her helmet. She looked weirdly glamorous for someone on a horse in what looked like track pants and a T-shirt. She reached down and ran her hand over the horse’s neck. “Just chill,” she whispered. “Chill, man.”
“Hey, uh,” I stuttered, suddenly a dangerous combination of embarrassed and mad. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m just riding,” Gilly pressed her lips together. “What are you doing here?”
“Uh, I LIVE here and it seems pretty obvious that I’m cleaning up your mess,” I seethed.
Making a mess in the process, yes, but let’s stay on point.
“My what?” The horse started walking backward, and Gilly dug her heels in his sides to push him forward. “What are you talking about?”
“Next time you want to leave a message,” I spat, “send a text.”
Gilly blinked. “What are you talking about?”
Okay, in my head that sounded like a much more scathing reprimand instead of just like a request for courtesy.
Could you send a hate email next time?
“Your friends? My lawn?” I pointed. “ ‘Go home, dyke’?”
Gilly shook her head. “I didn’t do anything to your lawn. I didn’t even know you lived here.”
“Right.” I frowned, turning back to my mud-and-sod hole. “Well, I’m pretty busy, so bye.”
I didn’t see Gilly leave, but I heard her horse’s hooves clopping away.
Like I was going to buy her crap a second time? Don’t think so.
I waited till she was gone to resume my sod stomping and poking on grass I basically spent three months of allowance on. When I was done, I sent a picture to Berry and she sent a laughing emoji.
BERRY
What did you do to that poor grass?
ANNE
GAH! Did I kill it???
BERRY
No but I take it back. You are never sodding my lawn.
That night, my parents went out for pizza. I’m assuming I wasn’t invited because of the lawn, although really the last thing I wanted to do was go out into the lion’s den of Greenville.
I assumed the Spencer family also ate pizza.
Instead, I got to work on Photoshop, which was one of my skills of choice, which I learned when I was six, which is what happens when your mom’s a photographer. Which is not as fun as glitter but serves its purpose.
Berry had taken a pretty solid photo. I sort of wished I’d styled my hair, but I realized I could also just Photoshop a nice Travolta pompadour on there.
On top of the photo, in the classic Saturday Night Fever font, a blast of silver blue, I put the text, “STAYIN’ RIGHT HERE.”
I posted it and went downstairs to clean off Monty’s paws and add some lavender candles to the garage.