Fat kid rules the world Read online

  “Well … uh … you boys … yell … if you need anything.”

  Our waitress backs away for fear she will miss something. I can’t blame her. I don’t touch my food the whole time Curt is eating. No one but the cook makes any noise while Curt fills his skinny body with ketchup and processed cheese. The world stops while the skinny kid eats. Fuck that, I think. But I also think, God I wish I were him….

  When he’s done Curt leans back, drums on the table with one finger, and practically weeps again. The waitress has been hovering and now she asks if he wants dessert. Curt looks up as if he’s surprised to see us, then shakes his head.

  “No, thank you,” he says. The waitress leans forward.

  “Are you sure?” she asks. “On the house?”

  “Can’t,” he says, then looks at me. “Besides, Troy hasn’t eaten yet.”

  He’s right. For once, I haven’t eaten a thing.

  4.

  “LUCKY FOR YOU I was at that station,” Curt says as he watches me eat. “I mean, since I saved your life and all.” His eyes track each bite I take, but when I offer him my fries he won’t take any.

  “I wasn’t going to jump,” I say, holding a french fry in the air. I’m lying, but only halfway.

  Curt scoffs.

  “Were,” he says as if there’s no argument. “I was watching you for, like, an hour. That rude, twirpy kid left, then three trains passed and you never looked up from the tracks. Then the insane laughter and I knew you’d lost it. I said to myself, Curt, you save this kid’s life and he will surely buy you lunch.”

  He says all this with a deadly serious expression and I wonder if he’s mocking me. But it makes sense. Why else would someone save the Fat Kid before he takes the leap? And Curt does appear to be starving.

  “I wasn’t going to jump,” I say again with my best resolute look. “I was just thinking. Just thinking.”

  Curt considers this at length.

  “How come?” he finally asks.

  The question is absurd. Unless he means how come I decided against it. But I don’t think he does.

  I want to give him the you-moron look the kids at school have perfected. Maybe say something sarcastic like, “Use your imagination.” I want to say, “Open your eyes. I’m a fucking three-hundred-pound teenager living in the most unforgiving city on earth. I’m ugly and dumb and I make stupid noises when I breathe. I annoy and bewilder my only living parent, mortify my little brother, and have no friends.”

  I shrug.

  To which Curt shrugs back. We sit together in silence, then he stands up quick.

  “Oh, man, I’m sick,” he says. “Shouldn’t have had the french fries.” He slides out of the booth and disappears, leaving me stranded, wondering how my life became so absurd.

  5.

  I’M CONVINCED HE’S SHOOTING UP in the bathroom. Maybe he is. Who knows? All I care about is that it’s tight in the booth and I’m sweating again. Any minute now the waitress is going to come over and see me perspiring like I’ve just run the New York City Marathon. I imagine her face as she hands me the bill. A grimace. Maybe she doesn’t even hand it to me, just drops it on the table.

  I wish I were home in front of the television. It occurs to me that my brother is home already, thinking I’ve killed myself. I wonder if he’ll be disappointed.

  There’s time to pay the bill and slip away while Curt’s in the bathroom. I agonize over the decision and by the time I look up to signal our waitress I see Curt instead. He slumps across the diner and slides back into the booth, curling into one corner.

  “Order something else,” he says. “I don’t feel good. We gotta stay until I feel better.”

  We? I think. But he really doesn’t look good. Still …

  “I’ve got to get home, Curt. I’ll order you something else, but my father is expecting me.”

  Curt looks directly at me for the first time since the subway station. “Come on, man,” he says. “Please? I gotta stay until I feel better. Just order a soda or something.”

  It’s the “please” that gets me. No one has said please to me in a long time. There’s something about being fat that makes everyone think they’re doing you the favor.

  I look to our waitress, who is barely restraining herself from coming over now that Curt is curled into a tiny ball, stick-thin arms twisted around filthy jeans. He’s confined to one-eighth of the bench. The exact width of one-half of my butt cheek.

  I nod. “Okay.”

  Curt grins and reaches deep into one pocket. He pulls out a pile of lint and a whole slew of tablets. Of course they’re not drugs. Drugs don’t come in individually wrapped pharmacy-sealed silver packets, do they? Maybe they do. I freak. I’ve never seen drugs before and I can see the headline: FAT KID ARRESTED FOR POSSESSION. Beyond humiliating.

  Curt sees the look and scoffs. He holds up one foil packet and says “Imodium” really loud. “Not heroin. Imodium.” Then he grins, having cracked himself up. I blush with embarrassment. I’m not going to ask him about the other pills, the ones that are not Imodium. Not after that. Besides, Curt’s too pleased with himself and I’m too mortified.

  Curt closes his eyes and chews the tablets, then leans his head back and settles in.

  After a while he says, “Let’s just state from the beginning that I don’t have AIDS or some mysterious disease. I’m not dying. I’m not even homeless all the time. No one beats me or fucks me without my permission. Got that?” He pauses. “This isn’t some after-school special where you learn to love yourself by saving my sorry ass. I saved you, remember? Let’s keep that straight.”

  My eyes can’t find a single safe place to look. I’m so red I’ve turned purple and I keep making that stupid huffing sound. Curt digs farther into his pocket and rescues a cigarette butt from the lint. He relights it and takes what would be a long drag if the butt weren’t so bedraggled.

  “I like to lay things on the line,” he says. “Life ain’t Hollywood.” He curls up tighter. “Life is shit.”

  6.

  I WANT TO LEAVE, but Curt wants to talk. He’s entered this strange zone between hyper and comatose. He runs his fingers obsessively through his greasy hair, but keeps his eyes shut the whole time he talks.

  “Where do you live?” he asks. I shift nervously.

  “Lower East Side. Just off Stanton Street.”

  “Yeah?” he says. “What school?”

  “W. T. Watson.”

  “No shit?” One eye opens. “That was my school.”

  “Mmm,” I say, unsure how to respond.

  “Like it?” he asks.

  The question throws me, in part because no one ever asks me that, but mostly because it seems legit, as if Curt’s mind can honestly conceive that I, a six-foot-one-inch, three-hundred-pound seventeen-year-old could possibly enjoy public school in a city full of aspiring models. It’s an astounding mental leap that cements in my mind the fact that Curt MacCrae really is insane.

  “No,” I say.

  Curt doesn’t respond. After a while he says, “I liked school. It was okay.”

  I’m thinking, Of course you did. You had a band. You were cool. Everything you did was a statement. People wanted to be you.

  I don’t say that. Instead I say, “Where do you live now?”

  It seems like a fair question, but Curt hesitates, then starts obsessively eating all the saltines from the cracker basket.

  “That’s a good question,” he says at last, tugging at a plastic packet. “And I can tell you the answer because I wouldn’t keep anything from my friend who just bought me lunch.”

  It hadn’t occurred to me that I’d asked a question one might not want to answer.

  “Well, I didn’t mean—”

  Curt holds up a hand. “No, it’s really very simple.” He takes a deep breath. Shifts position.

  “You see, technically, and this is only in the technical sense, legal court orders and all, so, yes, technically I live with my father, but that’s hard to do, re
ally, so I don’t. You know, mostly ’cause he’s kicked me out a couple times. And left. But that doesn’t mean it’s out of the realm of possibility that I could be living with my father….” He pauses, thinks things over, reassesses. “And there are some aunts and uncles sometimes, too, but it’s safe to say without exaggerating that they don’t like me in the sense of the word ‘like’ that would imply you might be allowed to live with someone.”

  Definitely confused. I try asking a clarifying question. “What about your mom?” I ask, to which Curt nods vigorously.

  “Well, yeah, of course that’s where I live. Mostly.” Another pause. “Except she married this asshole who”—he coughs—“is a wife beater hypocrite asshole, so really it’s more like I used to live with her, but now not really some of the time.”

  I find myself staring at his lips as if I’m deaf.

  “So, where exactly does that mean you live?” I finally ask. Curt shrugs, as if it’s obvious.

  “You know, all over. With my mom. In lobbies. Friends. Smack Metal Puppets.”

  The last is the name of a local punk band in the Village. I have everything they’ve ever produced, from demos to handmade posters, hidden in my sock drawer. It’s hidden so Dayle can’t make fun of me for liking them. They are amazing musicians—ultrahip in an emaciated, alienated sort of way—but if Dayle thought I listened to them he’d be on my case. So, I’m a closeted fan.

  “Smack Metal Puppets?” I say, hopefully.

  Curt sits up. “Yeah. You like them? Ever gone to a show?”

  I can’t help but stare, slack-jawed, before swallowing hard.

  “No. I mean, yes. I like them, but I’ve never gone to a show.”

  Curt is animated for a second, then leans back and closes his eyes.

  “Man. Big T, you should go. Raw stuff.”

  It’s at this precise moment that I decide to stay as long as Curt wants me to. He doesn’t know it, but he’s just uttered the one word, the one letter, that will buy him whatever he wants for the rest of the day. Fat Kid just got a nickname.

  Curt keeps talking, but the conversation is over. All I do is grin, hoping he’ll say it just one more time.

  7.

  IT’S BEEN AN HOUR and Curt still hasn’t said we can go. I’ve ordered two pieces of pie and eaten them both. FAT KID EATS TWO PIECES OF PIE. Is this okay? I wouldn’t have ordered them except Curt asked me to. He said I had to buy him some time. Made me feel like we were in a spy movie, waiting for something big to happen. Except nothing big happens. Curt goes to the men’s room and I’m left staring at two empty pie plates.

  Curt gets up a third time, but I’m too embarrassed to order more pie. I settle for inconspicuously cleaning the plate, but the waitress slides in across from me just as I’m running my finger over the white plastic, scooping up the last of the cherry filling. I’m caught, red-handed, but it’s too late to abort the mission.

  “Who’s your friend, sweetheart? Is he all right?”

  God, she’s hot. I sit there with cherry pie filling on my right index finger, trying to decide if I should lick it off or pretend it’s not there. I compromise by wiping it on my napkin, hoping she won’t notice, then wonder if someone as disgusting as I am will ever—ever—see a woman naked.

  I clear my throat. “Yeah. He’s all right,” I say at last. “He just … gets sick a lot. He’s got stomach problems and he doesn’t get to eat, so when he does eat he gets too excited and it makes him sick.”

  “Does he need to see a doctor?” she asks. I can tell she wants to offer him money. Maybe clean him up and take him there herself. She doesn’t know what to make of me, but she’s sympathetic because I’m with him.

  “Naw,” I say, sounding like an expert. “He’s done that before. He just needs to eat better.”

  She nods in agreement as the bathroom door at the end of the diner opens. She winks at me and slides out of the booth. I can feel the heat rising through my body as she leans in close.

  “Tell him he can eat here anytime,” she whispers, her hot breath on my neck. She walks away and I can’t take my eyes off her. That’s more attention than I’ve received from a female in my entire adolescence. I want to stay for the rest of the day, but Curt comes back and announces he’s ready to leave. He’s more subdued than he was on the way in, doesn’t run around me in a circle as I pay the bill, but once we’re outside in the glaring sunshine he sort of half jogs, half skips beside me. I’m mortified. SKINNY KID SKIPS BESIDE HUGE FAT KID.

  Then I have to laugh. It comes out as a huff, then a chortle choked between my fat lips. Then I’m laughing so hard I don’t give a damn. Curt’s laughing, too, and I think for a minute, he understands.

  8.

  SO, NOW I’M STANDING ON the curb at Bleecker and Broadway trying to hail a cab. Five empty ones have passed and it’s starting to annoy me. I’ve never enjoyed hailing cabs—something about raising my huge fleshy arm like a target, then stepping toward traffic—and most of them don’t stop for me anyway. Why stop for the Fat Kid when there’s a skinny person one block over? Usually I make Dad do it, or take the subway, but at this point the thought of walking even one extra block is too much. I expect Curt to take the hint and leave, but he doesn’t.

  “So, uh … I gotta go,” I say at last.

  A yellow cab is finally maneuvering through traffic, cutting off a half dozen other cars in order to reach me. I can already see the driver—a Chinese guy—debating his decision. What does he see? Huge freak with cab fare? Curt pretends he doesn’t hear me.

  “What’s your instrument?” he asks as if we have all the time in the world. I suppose in Curt’s universe everyone naturally plays an instrument. I glance at the cabdriver and he glares, so I answer quickly.

  “Drums. Junior high.”

  Curt nods appreciatively. “That is most excellent because the very thing …” His voice is lost in the drone of traffic as I shuffle forward. I have to walk around the cab because Curt is leaning against the door on the passenger side. Typical New York, everyone pretends they can’t see me waddling into traffic. As soon as I attempt to open the door there’s an explosion of car horns culminating in a bagel truck slamming on its brakes and the driver giving me the finger. I look over at Curt to see if he’s noticed, but he’s oblivious. His eyes are squeezed shut, his face is contorted, and he’s playing air drums. Based on my minuscule confession, he’s now demonstrating his all-time favorite drum solo.

  “A bam, bam, braaat, braaat, bam, bam, bam, braaat, braaat, bam, bam, braaat, braaat, bam … and then this sweet bass line jumps in and it’s weeeehhh …” Curt makes a high-pitched scream right there in the street and everyone who’s been staring at us looks away. Desperate, I fling open the cab door and slide in quick as I can, hoping Curt’s scream will mask my departure. Then I realize he’s climbing in the other side.

  “What are you doing?” I ask, but Curt pretends he doesn’t hear. I know he heard me because he raises the volume on his music monologue. I have to lean forward and shout to be heard by the driver as I yell my address.

  Curt talks the whole ride home. He talks about chord progressions, then guitars. He names all the makes and models, then rates them. Then he lists them again in order of his rating. Then he changes the list and recites the revised version twice as if cementing it. He does the same thing, for my benefit I presume, with drum sets. Then he starts on bands.

  It’s only a few blocks, but by the time the cab pulls up to my apartment building I think I might strangle him. Not only is he driving me insane but his stench is making me nauseated. I’ve tried to roll down the window without being too obvious, but when the cab stops, I bolt. I waddle over to pay the driver and Curt stands on the curb with his hands dug deep in his pockets. I hope he won’t notice as I take out my hidden ten-dollar bill, the one I told him I didn’t have, but he just stares at the pavement as the cabdriver grabs the money and steps hard on the gas.

  I move onto the sidewalk and Curt and I stand there watching
our cab disappear into the sea of cars making their way up and down Houston. The moment already makes the Awkward Hall of Fame, but as per my life, it has to get worse. Just when I’m thinking I’ve made a huge mistake letting this skinny kid follow me home, I see my little brother rounding the corner. Dayle’s holding a basketball, dripping sweat, and it’s obvious he’s been shooting hoops at Roosevelt Park while he waited to find out if I’d killed myself.

  He swaggers forward, with attitude, moving the way you’re supposed to move when you live on the Lower East Side—the way I can never move. I think, He fits here. Unlike me, Dayle belongs in Manhattan. He’s good-looking, athletic, and he can fit in anywhere. Take Dayle to the Upper West Side and he’d be dating a stockbroker’s daughter. Take him to the Village and he’d be playing football with the college kids at NYU. Me? I can live in the same neighborhood my whole life and still stand out like a sore thumb.

  I watch him approach, wishing just once he’d trip and fall flat on his face. I’m dreading the moment he realizes Curt’s with me, and sure enough the first words out of his mouth make me cringe.

  “You have got to be kidding.”

  Dayle takes one look at Curt and knows I’ve done the wrong thing. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood and Dayle wishes I’d taken the one that ended in front of the train. He won’t even look at me. He’s not only disappointed, he’s angry. He glares at Curt as if he’s already intuited Curt’s role in thwarting my attempt.

  “Who is this loser?” he asks.

  Curt breathes out slow.

  “Ah,” he says, like a guru on a mountaintop, “the rude, twirpy one.”

  Dayle sneers and I give him my “big brother look.” The look hasn’t worked for years—not since Dayle turned seven and started beating me in sports—but I always try it anyway. Got to make the attempt, right? That’s what I think, but then I decide I’m kidding myself. If I were Dayle, would I listen to me?