Perfect Chemistry

One thing in life is certain—I am not making out with Alex Fuentes.

Thankfully Mrs. Peterson had us busy doing experiments all week, giving us no time to talk except about who’s going to light the Bunsen burner. Although every time I looked at Alex’s bandaged arm it reminded me of when I whacked him.

I’m trying not to think about him while I gloss my lips for my date with Colin. It’s Friday night and we’re going to dinner and a movie.

After double-checking and triple-checking myself in the mirror, and attaching the Tiffany’s bracelet he gave me for our anniversary last year, I head to the backyard, where my sister is in our pool with her physical therapist. My mom, wearing her pink velour cover-up, is lounging on a chaise reading some home-design magazine.

It’s pretty quiet, except for the physical therapist’s voice instructing Shelley.

Mom puts down her magazine, her face tight and stern. “Brit, don’t be out past ten thirty.”

“We’re seeing an eight-o’clock movie, Mom. We’ll be home after that.”

“You heard what I said. No later than ten thirty. If you have to leave the movie early to get home on time, so be it. Colin’s parents won’t respect a girl without a curfew.”

Our doorbell rings. “That’s probably him,” I say.

“You better hurry up and get it. A boy like that won’t wait forever, you know.”

I rush to the front door before my mom does it for me and makes a fool out of both of us. Colin is standing on our front stoop with a dozen red roses in his hand.

“For you,” he says, surprising me.

Wow! I’m feeling stupid for thinking about Alex so much this past week. I hug Colin and give him a kiss, a real one on the lips.

“Let me put these in water,” I say, stepping back.

I hum happily as I walk to the kitchen, smelling their sweet fragrance. Putting water in a vase, I wonder if Alex ever brought his girlfriend flowers. Alex probably brings his dates sharp knives as gifts, in case she’ll need one when she’s out on a date with him. Being with Colin is so . . .

Boring?

No. We’re not boring. We’re safe. Comfortable. Cute.

After cutting the bottoms off the roses and placing them in the vase, I find Colin chatting with my mom on the patio, something I really don’t want him doing.

“Ready?” I say.

Colin flashes me his super white million-dollar smile. “Yep.”

“Have her back by ten thirty,” my mom calls out. As if a girl with a curfew equals high morals. It’s ridiculous, but I look at Shelley and swallow my argument.

“Sure thing, Mrs. Ellis,” Colin responds.

When we’re in his Mercedes, I ask, “What movie are we seeing?”

“Change in plans. My dad’s firm got tickets to the Cubs game. In a suite right behind home plate. Baby, we’re goin’ to watch the Cubbies.”

“How cool. Will we be back by ten thirty?” Because I know without a doubt my mom will be waiting at the door for me.

“If they don’t go into extra innings. Does your mom think you’ll turn into a pumpkin or something?”

I take hold of his hand. “No. It’s just that, well, I don’t want to upset her.”

“No offense, but your mom is strange. She’s a hot MILF, but totally off the wall.”

I take my hand back. “Eww! Colin, you just called my mom a MILF! I’m completely grossed out.”

“Please, Brit.” He glances in my direction. “Your mom looks more like your twin sister than your mother. She’s hot.”

She works out so much, I admit her body looks more like a thirty-year-old’s than a forty-five-year-old’s. But to think my boyfriend is hot for my mom is plain yuck.

At the game, Colin leads me to his dad’s corporate suite at Wrigley Field. The box is crowded with people from a bunch of downtown law firms. Colin’s parents greet us. His mom hugs me and gives me an air-kiss before leaving us to mingle with other people.

I watch as Colin talks with the other people in the suite. He’s so at home here; he’s in his element. He shakes hands, smiles wide, and laughs at everyone’s jokes whether they’re funny or not.

“Let’s watch the game in the seats over there,” he says, leading me to the suite’s seats after we get hot dogs and drinks from the food bar.

“I’m hoping to get an internship at Harris, Lundstrom, and Wallace next summer,” he says quietly, “so I gotta get face time with these guys.”

When Mr. Lundstrom appears next to us, Colin goes into full-on business mode. I watch in admiration as he talks with Mr. Lundstrom as if they’re old friends. My boyfriend definitely has a knack for schmoozing people.

“I hear you want to follow in your father’s footsteps,” Mr. Lundstrom says.

“Yes, sir,” Colin responds, then they start talking about football and stocks and whatever else Colin brings up to keep Mr. Lundstrom talking.

Megan calls on my cell and I give her highlights of the game and we talk while I’m waiting for Colin to finish talking to Mr. Lundstrom. She tells me she had the best time at this dance club called Club Mystique that will let in teens. She insists Sierra and I will love it there.

At the seventh-inning stretch, Colin and I stand and sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” We’re totally out of tune, but it doesn’t matter because right now it sounds as if the thousands of Cubs fans singing are as out of tune as we are. It feels good to be with Colin like this, having fun together. It makes me think I’ve been overcritical of our relationship.

At nine forty-five, I turn to Colin and tell him we need to start heading home even though the game isn’t over.

He takes my hand in his. I think he’s going to excuse himself from his conversation with Mr. Lundstrom. Instead, Mr. Lundstrom calls over Mr. Wallace.

As the minutes tick by, I’m getting nervous. There has been enough tension in my house. I don’t want to cause more. “Colin . . . ,” I say, squeezing his hand.

He puts his arm around me in response.

At the top of the ninth inning, when it’s past ten, I say, “I’m sorry, but Colin has to drive me home now.”

Mr. Wallace and Mr. Lundstrom shake Colin’s hand, then I pull him out of the park.

“Brit, do you know how hard it is to get an internship at HL&W?”

“At this point, I don’t care. Colin, I needed to be home by ten thirty.”

“So you’ll be home at eleven. Tell your mom we got stuck in traffic.”

Colin doesn’t know what my mom is like when she’s in one of her moods. Thankfully I’ve been able to avoid bringing him around the house often and if he comes over, it’s just for a few minutes or less. He has no clue what it’s like when my mom goes off on me.

We pull into my driveway not at eleven, but closer to eleven thirty. Colin is still pumped about the possible internship at HL&W while listening to the after-game recap on WGN radio.

“I gotta go,” I tell him, leaning over for a quick kiss.

“Stay here a few minutes,” he says against my lips. “We haven’t fooled around in, like, forever. I miss it.”

“Me, too. But it’s late.” I give him a look of apology. “We’ll have more nights together.”

“Hopefully sooner rather than later.”

I walk into my house, prepared to be yelled at. Sure enough, my mom is standing in the foyer with her arms crossed. “You’re late.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“What do you think, that I make up arbitrary rules?”

“No.”

She sighs.

“Mom, I really am sorry. We went to a Cubs game instead of a movie, and the traffic was terrible.”

“Cubs game? All the way in the city? You could have been mugged!”

“We were fine, Mom.”

“You think you know it all, Brit, but you don’t. For all I know you could’ve been lying dead in a city alley and all along I thought you were at a movie. Check your purse to see if any money or your ID is missing.”

I open my purse and check the contents of my wallet, only to appease her. I hold up my ID and cash. “It’s all here.”

“Consider yourself lucky. This time.”

“I’m always careful when I go to the city, Mom. Besides, Colin was with me.”

“I don’t need excuses, Brit. Did you not think it would be nice to call and tell me about the change in plans and that you were going to be late?”

To have her yell at me over the phone, and then again when I got home? No way. But I can’t tell her that. “I didn’t think about it,” is all I say.

“Do you ever think about this family? It’s not all about you, Brittany.”

“I know that, Mom. I promise next time I’ll call. I’m tired. Can I just go to bed now?”

She dismisses me with a wave of her hand.

On Saturday morning I wake up to my mom’s screaming. Throwing the covers back, I rush out of bed and run down the stairs to see what the commotion is all about.

Shelley is in her wheelchair, which is pushed up to the kitchen table. Food is all over her mouth and splattered on her shirt and pants. She looks like a little kid instead of a twenty-year-old.

“Shelley, if you do it again you’re going to your room!” my mom yells, then places a bowl of her blended food on the table in front of her.

Shelley swipes it on the ground. My mom gasps, then narrows her eyes at Shelley.

“I’ll deal with it,” I say, rushing to my sister.

My mom has never hit my sister. But my mom’s frustration is in overdrive, which stings just the same.

“Don’t baby her, Brittany,” Mom says. “If she doesn’t eat, she’ll be tube fed. Would you like that?”

I hate when she does this. She’ll talk about the worst possible scenario and not work on fixing what’s wrong. When my sister looks at me, I see the same frustration in her eyes.

My mom points her finger at Shelley, then at the food on the floor. “That’s why I haven’t taken you to a restaurant in months,” she says.

“Mom, stop,” I say. “You don’t need to escalate the situation. She’s already upset. Why make it worse?”

“And what about me?”

Tension starts building, beginning inside my veins and spreading to my fingertips and toes. It bubbles up and bursts with such force I can’t keep it inside any longer. “This isn’t about you! Why does it always go back to how everything affects you?” I scream. “Mom, can’t you see she’s hurting? Instead of yelling at her, why don’t you spend the time figuring out what’s wrong?”

Without thinking, I take a washcloth and kneel beside Shelley. I start wiping her pants clean.

“Brittany, don’t!” my mom yells out.

I don’t listen. I should have, though, because before I can move away Shelley’s hands go in my hair and she starts pulling. Hard. With all the commotion, I forgot my sister’s new thing is pulling hair.

“Ow!” I say. “Shelley, please stop!” I’m trying to reach around and push down on her knuckles like her doctor told us to do to make her release her grasp, but it’s no use. I’m in the wrong position, crouched at Shelley’s feet with my body twisted. My mom is swearing, droplets of food are flying, and my scalp feels raw already.

Shelley isn’t loosening her hold, even though my mom is trying to pull her hands away from my hair.

“Knuckles, Mom!” I yell, reminding her what Dr. Meir suggested. Holy crap, how much hair has she pulled out? It feels like an entire section of my head is bald.

After my reminder, my mom must have pressed hard enough on her knuckles because my hair is released. Either that, or Shelley pulled out whatever chunks she’d grabbed.

Falling onto the floor, I immediately put a hand to the back of my head.

Shelley is smiling.

My mom is frowning.

And tears come to my eyes.

“I’m taking her to Dr. Meir, right now,” my mom says, shaking her head at me so I’m aware she’s blaming me for the situation spiraling out of control. “This has gone on long enough. Brittany, take your father’s car and go to O’Hare to pick him up. His flight comes in at eleven. It’s the least you can do to help.”