Stuck in the 70's Page 2

  That’s the last thing I remember at Jake’s house. Next thing I knew, I was in a different tub, half as small as the Jacuzzi bath. And a boy was hanging over me, and it w asn’t Jake, and he was claiming it’s 1978.

  What the hell was in that champagne?

  3

  A beautiful girl has been (1) in my bed for over four hours, (2) wearing my favorite T-shirt, (3) not wearing any underwear.

  This could be a prank. Am I on Candid Camera? I doubt it. Allen Funt might put a girl in someone’s house, but not a naked one.

  I wish I had this on camera. Recorded evidence that a beautiful girl spent the night in my room would probably do wonders for my social standing, or lack thereof. No one would believe me otherwise. Except Evie, of course, but she doesn’t count.

  The girl stays half under my sheet, propped on one elbow, obviously still braless, and stares at me. She’s gorgeous even in the morning, with her blond hair frizzy and untamed around her face, which is pale as typing paper.

  “What if your mom or dad comes in?” she asks while I load my backpack for school.

  “They respect my space.”

  “What, you mean your parents ignore you too?” She laughs. “I need a toothbrush and a hairbrush. New ones, please. And coffee. I could so use a grande nonfat latte from Starbucks right now.”

  “What’s Starbucks?”

  “Good one,” she says. “Look, if we’re pretending it’s 1978, we should take your Pinto or Ford station wagon or whatever, and drive up to Seattle and see if you can invest in Starbucks coffee.” She bites her lip. “I’m still in California, aren’t I?”

  “Yes, of course. The Valley. But I don’t own a car.”

  “You got to be kidding.”

  I don’t care how sexy she is, my hospitality is wearing thin. I glance at my digital alarm clock. Eleven minutes until I need to leave.

  She sits all the way up in my bed.

  Okay, I do care how sexy she is. Her breasts are fantastic. Like ripe grapefruit. Their shape, anyway. I doubt they have a bumpy peel or sour taste. I can’t think about the taste or I’ll lose all semblance of control. But, man, her breasts.

  Too bad she can’t stay. I’ll tell my parents and they’ll straighten this out. She’s either a runaway or crazy or both. But she doesn’t look crazy. Certainly not like Linda Blair in The Exorcist,or any of the Manson girls.

  “Can you peel your eyes off me for a second and get me a new toothbrush, a hairbrush, and coffee?”

  I force my gaze away, to my Einstein poster on the wall behind her. What would Einstein do? For one thing, if he wanted to impress a gorgeous girl in his bedroom, he wouldn’t hang a picture of a physicist on his wall.

  Think, Tyler, think.Einstein said kindness, beauty, and truth are the most important things in life. So I should be kind to this beautiful girl, but tell my parents the truth.

  I check the digital clock again. Nine more minutes. “I’ll look for a toothbrush and comb.”

  “Brush,” she says. “A new brush if you can find one. And I have to drink some coffee.”

  “How you doing, kids?” Mom calls from downstairs.

  “Fine!” I squeal.

  “Kids?” the girl asks.

  “Has anyone seen my pocket dictionary?” Heather yells from her room.

  “Not me!” I respond in my new, unintentional Mickey Mouse voice. “Your dictionary’s definitely not in my room.”

  “You have a sister?”

  “Shh. Yes. Let me find those things for you.”

  I leave the room and run downstairs. I see Mom in the kitchen, but I can’t bring myself to tell her about the girl I’m hiding, not just yet. With four minutes to spare until official school departure time, I manage a new toothbrush, a used comb rinsed out in the bathroom sink, a can of soda, and a sesame seed bagel.

  I race upstairs. She’s still in my bed, the sheet now lowered to the level of her hips. I try to suppress my grin while handing her the bagel. “I couldn’t find coffee.” I give her the soda. “I think this has caffeine.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Tab.”

  She peers at the hot pink label. “That’s a diet soda? Huh.”

  She takes a bite from the bagel, scattering crumbs all over my blanket. “I need some underwear at least, and a bra would be nice.”

  No bra!I plead silently. “You could try my sister’s room for, uh, a brassiere. It’s right next to my room. Heather goes to school the same time I do.” I avoid looking at the girl’s chest, which I know will never squeeze into my sister’s bras. Or my mom’s for that matter. Ugh. No boy should have to picture the girl he lusts after in his mother’s brassiere. “Just stay in my room. You can come out after ten forty-five. My mom always has a hairdresser appointment at eleven on Wednesdays, and then lunch with her girlfriends. The house should be free for two and a half hours at least.”

  What am I saying? I’m going to leave her alone in my house? What if she steals everything we own? Our nineteen-inch color TV? My Commodore computer, which took me over ninety hours to construct?

  “Don’t leave me alone,” she says.

  I shake my head. “I have to get to school. I can try to help you afterward.”

  “Please.” She stretches her legs beneath my blanket. Holy cow, they’re long.

  “Maybe I can leave school early,” I tell her.

  “It’s easy. I cut classes all the time. Caveat emptor.”

  “Buyer beware?”

  She shakes her head. “Seize the day.”

  “That’s carpe diem.”

  “Whatever. Just act like you have somewhere important to go. Walk fast through the halls and hold your head high.”

  “I’m applying to colleges soon. I can’t afford to get in trouble.”

  She bites her lip again. It’s an alluring look for her. But then again, what isn’t?

  “Okay, I’ll try to get home early for you,” I say. I mean it.

  4

  After Tyler leaves, I snoop around his bedroom like I’m on Room Raiders. A girl can learn a lot from the contents of a guy’s room. For instance, Jake has Penthouse magazines and baggies of weed in his closet, and condoms hidden under his bed.

  Tyler has a poster of Albert Einstein’s hairy head, and another of a very young Robin Williams with a perky brunette girl, captioned Nanu, Nanu. The bed I slept in is covered by a Star Wars blanket. Under the bed is a teddy bear. Sweet. A neat desk is occupied by a humongous, antique computer. Above it are shelves crammed with books—literary crap, textbooks, and a bunch of books about Einstein: The Man Behind the Math, Albert Speaks, The Greatest Mind Ever.

  Just when I ’ve pegged him for a total dweeb, I see a Charlie’s Angels calendar. It’s from the old TV show, not the movie remake, and it’s definitely from 1978. There’s nothing here—no iPod, DVD player, cordless phone—to prove I’m not in 1978.

  I’m getting freaked out.

  I open and close dresser drawers. He wears briefs. I knew he w asn’t the boxers type.

  I move to his closet and leaf through a few boxes containing a baseball card collection. All the cards are really old, nothing later than 1978.

  In the back corner of the closet I find a plastic pitcher. It’s heavy. Coins clank inside it. I ’ve hit upon Tyler’s stash.

  I c an’t help myself. I pull the lid off the top of the pitcher and shake out the money. I reach in with my fingers to make sure I ’ve gotten all the bills. He has mostly coins, but also a lot of ones folded neatly in half, two fives, and a twenty. T hey’re all old bills with dull faces. Maybe he inherited them from someone. I lay the paper money on the rug and count it. F orty-s ix dollars.

  My purse still must be at Jake’s house. Gawd, I hope no one stole it.

  I put the coins back in the bank and hold the bills. I w ouldn’t take Tyler’s money unless I absolutely needed it. He got me a towel last night, let me sleep in his bed without attempting a pass, found me that Tab drink and a toothbrush.

 
But it’s not like I have my own money here. Besides, how do I know Tyler d idn’t steal my purse? Maybe he kidnapped me yesterday and took me to his house. Maybe the nice-guy image is all just an act.

  I hide the bills under Tyler’s mattress and return the pitcher to the back of the closet. To keep my mind off my guilt, I look through the closet again. I pick up an old junior high yearbook from 1976. Not my school, but a feeder to my high school. If it really were 1978 now, Tyler’s picture could be in the book.

  I leaf through the yearbook, telling myself it’s only because there’s nothing else to do. The boys have hangdog hair. The girls wear theirs either long and droopy, or cropped to stick out like a wedge of hard cheese. Both sexes wear wide, clownish collars.

  There are handwritten notes, though not anywhere near as many as in my middle school yearbook. Tyler, Thanks for all your help in geometry. From, Cindy; To Tyler Gray, one of the smartest guys I know. Louise; Tyler, Sorry about the spitwads. Thanks for the science tutoring. I hope I’m in more classes with you next year. Larry.

  His picture’s with the n inth-g rade class, captioned Tyler Gray.

  I’m getting even more freaked out.

  Computer trick, I tell myself. Clever. Or maybe that’s his dad. The Tyler I met might really be Tyler Gray, Jr. Or Tyler Gray the Second. Whatever. It’s not his picture.

  Or I could be on Punk’d. A new, n on-c elebrity version. I look around for cameras. Maybe t hey’re hidden in that oversized computer. “Is this a trick?” I whisper into the computer. “It’s getting old.”

  No response.

  A camera lens on the ceiling?

  No. Just that ugly popcorn stuff which is probably crawling with asbestos.

  “Jake? Mariel?” I call out softly.

  Nothing.

  I take three deep breaths, clutch the yearbook to my chest, and return to Tyler’s bed.

  I flip through the book for more Tyler sightings. He was in Honor Society and backgammon club. There’s a long note next to a picture of a grinning,flat-c hested, skinny girl holding up a trophy. The sloppy handwriting is in orange ink. Here’s to lots more backgammon championships,it says. It lists all these geeky memories like I ’ll never forget that 7-hour backgammon marathon we played, or that time we snuck into the computer lab.Blah blah blah. Love, your best friend, Evie.

  I c an’t believe I’m reading all this.I’d never hang with the guy, normally. But in this situation, whatever it is, I guess it’s better to end up at a semi-d ork’s house than, like, a felon’s. He even trusts me in his bedroom. Dumb of him.

  5

  “ You’d be a fool to cut classes for a girl,” Evie says as we walk to English class.

  “Normally, I’d agree. But this girl is gorgeous. Need I remind you I saw her naked?”

  “You needn’t. Please.”

  I elbow her. “Oh, sheesh, look who’s coming.”

  Plowing down the hallway is Rick The Dick, next to a guy who looks like a giant Weeble.

  Evie shrugs. “I’m not worried.”

  “Watch out!”

  The Weeble’s globular leg sticks out in front of us. I stop walking just in time, but Evie topples onto her face.

  I pull her up and hand her glasses to her. Then I glare at the laughing Weeble. “Be careful.”

  “Sorry,” The Dick says as he and his friend continue down the hallway.

  “Sure he’s sorry. It wasn’t even his leg sticking out. I bet The Dick’s friend weighs two and a half times as much as you,” I tell Evie.

  She examines her glasses. “I’d rather be smart than big. I bet my IQ is fifty points higher than his.”

  “You’re a genius. I know, I know.”

  She punches my arm playfully. Not that she could have packed any power even if she’d wanted to. To Evie’s annoyance, she’s never broken five feet or a hundred pounds. I’m not sure what’s worse for her social life: her small size, her intelligence, or the fact that she doesn’t seem to mind being in the out crowd.

  “High IQs don’t help us in the school hallways,” I tell her. “We should try to fit in better so the jerks won’t pick on us so much.”

  “It’s mostly me they pick on.” She puts on her glasses and resumes walking. “I have no inclination to fit in.”

  “You should. This is our last year here, Evie, our last chance for popularity. When I look back on my high school years, I want to remember at least a few parties and girls, not just physics class and backgammon.” I nudge her. “Look at that foxy girl walking toward us. I think she’s actually staring at me.”

  The girl points to Evie’s ankles. “Waiting for a flood?”

  “Okay, maybe she wasn’t staring at me,” I say.

  “We’ll never be cool,” Evie says. “Not in a googolplex years.”

  “We’ve got to try. Hey, maybe I should grow a moustache like Burt Reynolds and my dad. They’re both pretty cool.”

  “You should concentrate on growing your GPA. You look cute as you are, Tyler.”

  “Cute? Hardly. Even if I am, mere cuteness won’t make me popular. Evie, I don’t want that girl in my house finding out about my poor social ranking.”

  “She probably already knows. I bet someone just planted her in your bathtub as a sick joke to make an Honors Society student ditch school.”

  I shake my head and picture the girl in my room, waiting for me, still braless.

  “Eighty to one odds she won’t be there when you get home,” Evie says. “Probably as we speak, she and her friends are laughing about the stunt they pulled. Do you think it’s one of the cheerleaders? Last week, this cheer-leader—”

  “I hope she isn’t going through my stuff.”

  “Tyler?”

  “What if she finds my teddy bear?”

  “Earth to Tyler.”

  “Did you say something?”

  Evie shakes her head. “She’s got you, hook, line, and sinker.”

  I smile. “I want to be scaled, boned, and eaten.”

  Huh? Why is Robin Williams staring at me?

  It’s a poster, and oh my gawd, I’m still in this weird house. I must have fallen asleep.

  The giant digital alarm clock says it’s already 11:06. Tyler’s mom should be gone by now. Time to get out of here.

  I pull down Tyler’s robe from the hook on the closet door and wrap it around me. It has a nice musky smell. I head to the bathroom.

  Damn. Same bathroom as early this morning. Why c an’t this be just a bad dream? Splashing water on my face does nothing but get me wet. At least I haven’t lost my looks here, according to the mirror.

  I flee the bathroom and tiptoe down the stairs, passing more of that red flocked wallpaper. The carpet downstairs is gold and shaggy. In the tiny living room is one of those L a- Z-B oys or Barcaloungers or whatever, with a newspaper on it.

  It’s the Los Angeles Times, dated September 27, 1978. On the front page: “The Bee Gees Storm the States” and “President Carter Urges Energy Conservation.” Ads show the grand opening of a new Typewriter City and $60,000 houses for sale in L.A. Someone’s pulled out all the stops for this joke. The newspaper pages a ren’t even yellowed.

  “Good one! But I’m so onto you!” My voice trembles.

  There’s no response. I look for camera lenses again, but come up empty.

  I walk into the little kitchen, ugly and dated with its olive green counters and floor of g old tinged linoleum or vinyl or something equally awful. The room is spotless. On the counter is an o ld-f ashioned phone with a curly cord and a dial.

  I call my house.

  “Hello?” Some man answers.

  Mom has a new guy? “Is Camelia Saunders there?”

  “You got the wrong number.”

  “How about Shay Saunders?”

  “I never heard of no Saunders,” he says and hangs up. I put the phone on the cradle. Then I pick it up again, hear a dial tone, bite my lip, and redial my number.

  “Hello?” Same guy.

  “Is my mom
there? It’s Shay, her daughter. Shay Saunders.”

  “I told you. There’s no Saunders here.”

  “Is this 448-0475?”

  “Yeah, but there’s no Saunders here. Stop calling.”

  So I hang up, then dial my number one more time.

  “Yeah?”

  “Sorry to bother—”

  “Knock it off, you crazy bitch.” He hangs up on me.

  What the hell is going on? Has my whole family been kidnapped? If you can call me and my mom a whole family. Did my mom decide to get rid of me?

  Wandering into the living room d oesn’t give me any answers. The TV has a dial on it too. I push the On button and change channels. Bizarre versions of That ’70s Show play on every station. There are only five of them. The Price Is Right is hosted by a young Bob Barker in a bright orange suit and fat tie, and an ancient General Hospital features skinny ladies in miniskirts and moustached men with permed hair.

  It has to be a trick. “Who’s doing this? One of my friends?” I try to laugh like a good sport, but my high-p itched “ha” just sounds scared. “Come on out already.”

  No one comes out.

  It’s a big setup. Time travel is something you see in romance movies with fancy old costumes, or read about as a kid so the author can feed you history lessons. Time travel is not real.

  “Great joke,” I announce. “Is this, like, s enior-c lass prank or an early surprise birthday party?”

  Nothing but happy screams from the TV set. On The Price Is Right, a girl with a Farrah Fawcett haircut and bright green eyeshadow just won a brand-new King Cobra Mustang, valued at $6,803.

  I need chocolate. Fast.

  I go back to the kitchen. The cupboards are full of weird boxes and cans of food with no nutrition labels on them. A large bag of raisins is stamped “Best used before 12/28/78.” Behind it is a package of Oreos, stamped “Purchase before 1/8/79.” The Oreos taste fine. Except I like Double Stuf better.

  At first I untwist each cookie, eat the filling, and gobble up the sandwich part. After the first few cookies, I start cramming them in my mouth, one after another, no longer tasting them, but feeling their fullness inside me. I use my fingernails to pick up the crumbs which fall on my legs. I eat the crumbs too. “Mariel? Jake? Mom!” I call out with my mouth stuffed, but no one answers.