color,” said Pagan, pushing a lock of hair off her forehead. “‘Desert Blossom’ my ass.”
I considered the rancid pink-orange walls. “More like ‘St. Joseph’s Baby Acid.’ ”
“Pepto-peach ass-baby,” said Sue. “But it looked totally apricot back at the store.”
“ Ass-baby?” said Pagan. “What the hell is an ass-baby?”
“Fuck off,” said Sue.
Mom stepped into the room and squinted at the glare. “Did you guys take the paint chip outside and look at it in the sunshine? They probably had fluorescent lights.”
“Maybe it will fade?” I asked.
Mom shook her head. “Reminds me of the time I tried dyeing the turnips blue for Thanksgiving. Complete disaster.”
“That was nasty,” I said. “Crème de la hippo.”
“Crème de la hippo shit, more like,” said Pagan.
Sue stepped down off the ladder for a re-dip in the paint tray just as a car alarm went off outside. The shock of noise made her drop the roller, splattering fat plops of orange up the legs of her jeans.
“Fucking yuppies,” she yelled over the flamenco yelps and Bronx cheers. “I’m practically ready to bash in all their windshields just to get it over with.”
The noise died down and Mom looked around the room. “Keep the lights dim tonight.”
“And you’d better put extra vodka in the Jell-O shots,” said Pagan, pointing at me. “This is like meeting your hangover before you even start drinking.”
Dean rang up from out front, needing help wrangling the keg and a case of Smirnoff upstairs. Sue buzzed him in and propped the front door open.
The elevator dinged a minute later, and Dean walked a hand truck backwards down our narrow entry hall, ducking his golden head a reflexive inch to pass beneath the living-room doorway’s lintel.
At six-five, my strapping farmboy spouse was scaled too large for city life. We were lucky to have this much space—a studio apartment would’ve felt like sharing a starter aquarium with Godzilla.
I trailed my fingers along his hip as he wheeled past, which made him turn toward me and grin.
“Hey, Bunny,” he said.
“Hey back.”
Then he saw the new living-room color and winced. “Don’t tell me—All-You-Can-Eat Peyote Day up at the paint store?”
I helped him muscle the keg into a dryish corner. “Nah, we figured it’d be cheaper to shove Oompa Loompas through a woodchipper.”
“Hardy har har,” said Pagan, climbing down off the sofa.
“I may have just contracted a new disease,” said Dean, shading his eyes with one hand.
“What?” I asked.
“Sno-Kone blindness.”
“Fuck,” said Sue. “We forgot ice.”
“I should get going,” said Mom. “It’s a long way back up to Maine.”
“You sure we can’t convince you to stay for the party?” I asked.
“I’ve been invited to crew in a regatta tomorrow,” she said, “on a Hinckley.”
Only those with suicidal tendencies dare stand between my mother and a boat. She’d been, like, the Mario Andretti of sailing—even winning the Women’s Nationals immediately after marrying my father.
Dad sat out their honeymoon on the beach at Coronado. Mom made Sports Illustrated. The woman is still so psycho-competitive on the water that by fourth grade I’d joined Pony Club in self-defense.
Pagan’s the yachty kid, along with our baby half-brother, Trace. But Pague and Mom are the only ones who still routinely bet each other a hundred bucks to see who can tie a bowline faster. I credit this to my sister being named after Mom’s first boat, a Snipe she’d sunk off Cooper’s Bluff in Oyster Bay trying to ride out a sudden squall in 1957.
Trace had traded in sailing for surfing, now that he was living with his dad on Oahu and trying to graduate from the fourth high school he’d attended in as many years.
I kissed Mom’s cheek.
“Wear sunscreen,” I said, “and don’t scare the lobsters.”
Pague and I walked her to the door.
Mom glanced back at us from the top of the stairwell.
“Talk to strangers!” she said, twinkling her fingers in farewell.
Sue and I had just finished pouring the final tray of Jell-O shots when Dean joined us in the kitchen.
“I’m taking dinner votes,” he said. “So far we’ve got one for Benny’s Burritos and one for Indian delivery.”
“I hate Indian!” yelled Pagan from the living room.
“Philistine!” Dean yelled back.
“Let’s do pizza,” I said. “I’m totally broke.”
“I’m down with pizza,” said Sue. “We want delivery?”
“Let’s walk it,” said Dean. “We can just get slices.”
“Cool.” I picked up the finished Jell-O tray and shouldered the freezer open.
Sue shook her head. “Not enough room in there.”
“Sure there is,” I said. “Just grab that thing of Bustelo.”
She snaked an arm past me to pull the yellow coffee can