Ten Thousand Saints Page 0,77
aligned teeth. “Tada!” she said, and in this single word, Jude swore he smelled American Spirits.
“Have you been smoking?” He came close and sniffed her. “Do you smoke now?”
With the heel of one of her boots, she shoved him away.
“What are you smoking for? It’s like seven in the morning.”
“Give me a break. You used to smoke more than cigarettes.”
“You’re not smoking pot, are you?”
“What is this? Because you’re straight edge now, you get to harass me?”
“That’s what straight edge is all about.”
Prudence shot him a look of distrust. “What did you do with my brother? The guy who used to sniff Sharpies while we watched cartoons? That was like two weeks ago.”
“Well, you were Citizen of the Week like two weeks ago. What happened to you?”
She went to her dresser and spritzed on some perfume. “I liked you better before.”
“You like Johnny, and he’s straight edge.”
Prudence shrugged. “Johnny’s cute.” In the dresser mirror, she rolled up each sleeve of her T-shirt. “So I don’t get it. They’re married, but they sleep in separate beds?”
“Prudence.”
“It’s sort of weird, isn’t it?”
Jude sat down on the bed, picked up the teddy bear, and put it down.
“I guess it would be weird, too,” Prudence considered, “if they slept in the same bed.”
“Where would they sleep, anyway?”
“Mom has that big mattress in her studio. She doesn’t give a shit. They’re married. But Eliza said Johnny said Mom wouldn’t let them.”
“Eliza said that?”
“I’m just saying. I don’t care.”
“You don’t have any idea where they are?” He was staring blankly at the calendar, at Mr. May, and now his eyes went to the thirteenth. “What’s today, Friday?”
“Yeah, Friday the thirteenth. Boo!”
Jude had known the day had been coming, but he had managed until now to push it from his mind. He wanted to smoke something, a cigarette, a joint.
“Look,” Prudence said, “she can sleep in here, whatever.”
“Thank you, okay?”
“But what is it, like a marriage of convenience?”
“Prudence! Where did you get that?”
“Well, they don’t seem . . .”
“What?” Jude asked. He wanted to know. He wasn’t sure what sort of marriage it was. They hadn’t kissed at the wedding, and their first night home, when Eliza realized she’d left her toothbrush at the hotel in New York, Johnny had gone out and bought her a new one. At eleven o’clock at night, instead of just letting her use his.
“Like, in love. Like a husband and wife.” Prudence zipped up her backpack and slung it over her shoulder. “Like Mom and Dad used to be.”
The first night Eliza stayed at the St. Marks Hotel, her mother had shown up at Les’s apartment and bullied him through the intercom until the super chased her away. Les assured her that Eliza was safe, and Eliza hadn’t heard from her since. She wondered if her mother thought she was staying at Les’s, or somewhere else in New York, if she were checking hotels by now, or calling the people she thought were still Eliza’s friends. Sometimes Eliza assumed she’d get the police involved, and sometimes she thought it was the last thing she’d do. She knew Di was as ashamed of Eliza’s running away as she was of her pregnancy—she simply wouldn’t want anyone to know. Her purpose had been served, anyway—Eliza was out of sight in a place where she couldn’t embarrass her mother. No doubt she told people Eliza was still away at school.
That first night in the hotel, Johnny had stripped to his boxers, folded his clothes neatly on the chair, stretched out on the bed beside her, and said good night. She was wearing her gray toile pajamas and she’d just washed her hair. He lay there, eyes closed, arms folded across his waist. He’d turned off his bedside lamp, but by the light of hers she admired the curve of the Krishna beads across his throat, each bead as tiny as a baby tooth, and the artwork across his belly and chest, winding around his arms. She’d never seen so much skin so darkly tattooed, the ink so heavy it looked three-dimensional, and she couldn’t help it: she placed her fingertips on the green wing of his shoulder.
He flinched, eyes bolting open. He sat up, then lay back down. She apologized, her face was burning. “We’re going to be married in a few days,” she reminded him. “Isn’t this what you meant? When you said we were going to be a couple?”
Johnny tried out a nervous laugh. “Of course,” he said, sweeping his knuckles over