“Yes,” I say. “But I have to go home now.” Milk should be kept at a temperature of thirty-eight degrees F. or below. It is at least ninety degrees F. here in the parking lot, and the milk I bought will be warming up.
“Have a real routine, don’t you?” he says.
I do not know what a false routine would be. I wonder if this is like real heel .
“Do the same thing every day?” he asks.
“Not the same thing every day,” I say. “The same things on the same days.”
“Oh, right,” he says. “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow, you regular guy, you.” He laughs. It is a strange laugh, not as if he were really enjoying it. I open the front door and get into my car; he does not say anything or walk off. When I start the engine, he shrugs, an abrupt twitch of the shoulders as if something had stung him.
“Good-bye,” I say, being polite.
“Yeah,” he says. “Bye.” He is still standing there as I drive off. In the rear-view mirror I can see him standing in the same place until I am almost to the street. I turn right onto the street; when I glance back, he is gone.
IT IS QUIETER IN MY APARTMENT THAN OUTSIDE, BUT IT IS NOT really quiet. Beneath me, the policeman Danny Bryce has the TV on, and I know that he is watching a game show with a studio audience. Above me, Mrs. Sanderson is dragging chairs to the table in her kitchenette; she does this every night. I can hear the ticking of my windup alarm and a faint hum from the booster power supply for my computer. It changes tone slightly as the power cycles. Outside noises still come in: the rattle of a commuter train, the whine of traffic, voices in the side yard.
When I am upset it is harder to ignore the sounds. If I turn on my music, it will press down on top of them, but they will still be there, like toys shoved under a thick rug. I put my groceries away, wiping the beads of condensation off the milk carton, then turn on my music. Not too loud; I must not annoy my neighbors. The disk in the player is Mozart, which usually works. I can feel my tension letting go, bit by bit.
I do not know why that woman would speak to me. She should not do that. The grocery store is neutral ground; she should not talk to strangers. I was safe until she noticed me. If Emmy hadn’t talked so loud, the woman would not have noticed. She said that. I do not like Emmy much anyway; I feel my neck getting hot when I think about what Emmy said and what that woman said.
My parents said that I should not blame other people when they noticed that I was different. I should not blame Emmy. I should look at myself and think what happened.
I do not want to do that. I did not do anything wrong. I need to go grocery shopping. I was there for the right reason. I was behaving appropriately. I did not talk to strangers or talk out loud to myself. I did not take up more space in the aisle than I should. Marjory is my friend; I was not wrong to talk to her and help her find the rice and aluminum foil.
Emmy was wrong. Emmy talked too loud and that is why the woman noticed. But even so, that woman should have minded her own business. Even if Emmy talked too loud, it was not my fault.
Chapter Six
I NEED TO KNOW IF WHAT I FEEL IS WHAT NORMAL PEOPLE feel when they are in love. We had a few stories about people in love in school, in English classes, but the teachers always said those were unrealistic. I do not know the way they were unrealistic. I did not ask then, because I did not care.
I thought it was silly. Mr. Neilson in Health said it was all hormones and not to do anything stupid. The way he described sexual intercourse made me wish I had nothing down there, like a plastic doll. I could not imagine having to put this into that . And the words for the body parts are ugly. Being pricked hurts; who would want to have a prick? I kept thinking of thorns. The others aren’t much better,