Missing From Me

~Daisy

It was the first day of summer 1975, and while I should have been enjoying lazy days with my boyfriend, his parents forced him to go away to camp and the only contact we were allowed was letters through the mail. Jon Tugman was my first boyfriend and he was perfect to me, but I knew what others thought of him. I knew what they thought of me too, but I pretended not to hear their ugly whispers.

I met Tug in 1974 at the beginning of our freshman year of high school when he transferred into St. Joseph’s. At fourteen it was the first party I had ever been to, and apparently the popular kids thought it would be funny to shove the two fat kids into a closet for a game of Seven Minutes in Heaven. The joke was on them though, because in the dim light of the closet we found we liked each other very much after conversing for only seven minutes.

We were inseparable after that day and there was nothing I looked forward to more than spending an entire summer with him, our days and nights free to do as we wished without school getting in the way. His parents, however, had a different plan. The last week of school they informed Tug that they were sending him to camp, but not just any old camp—fat camp.

Tug and I were both overweight for our age but neither one of us thought it was enough to be so spastic over. He was the spitting image of his father, a celebrated defensive lineman in college, well over six feet tall with red hair and bright blue eyes. Tug wasn’t quite six feet, so he was a lot shorter than his father, and he wasn’t athletic in any way, which meant his added weight didn’t benefit anyone. He stood out from all the other boys with his red hair and freckled nose, and I loved that he didn’t look like anyone else. And he loved me the way I was when all the other kids saw was an easy target for their verbal abuse and fat jokes.

Tug and I lived in very different households. While his parents constantly badgered him about his weight, my parents never said a word about mine. His father was a sports commentator for the local television news, and his mother was a college professor with her nose in everyone’s business. My ten-year-old brother Davy took after our mom, with her thin physique, bouncy blonde hair and brown eyes. I took after our dad, a large Italian man with curly black hair, bright blue eyes and weight issues of his own.

My dad was the first generation of his Italian family to be born in America, and as soon as he was old enough to work he saved every penny in order to start his own business. My parents owned the local bakery and worked their fingers to the bone to make it a success and to provide a decent life for Davy and me. My dad had achieved his dream, but we hardly ever saw him. My mom was there in the morning when we awoke, and home in time to prepare dinner, but in between she was at the bakery with my dad, leaving me to look after Davy whenever we weren’t in school.

Davy was a good kid, so it didn’t bother me when I had to keep an eye on him, but at fifteen years old I was hoping for a little more freedom. Seeing as Tug would be spending his summer away from me at fat camp, nothing really mattered anyway. In a fit of rage that first day of summer, sweating to death from the unusually high temperatures, I took a pair of scissors to my hair and cut it all off. My beautiful black curls, the one thing about me that anyone actually envied, were gone, and there was nothing I could do to it. My hair was so short I looked like a fat-faced preteen boy, and when I finally finished crying after an hour or so, I put on my bathing suit and went into the back yard with my transistor radio and a pad of paper to write a letter to Tug.

As I got settled on my lawn chair I turned on the radio, which was already dialed in to Chicago’s popular station, 95 WSNK, The Snake. Captain Cobra had just started his coveted afternoon time slot with The Sweet’s “Teenage Rampage” as Davy bounded out of the house to tell me he was going to check out the new neighbors moving in next door.

When the elderly couple next door died within months of each other a year ago, their modest little one-story home was sold and torn down only to be replaced by a modern monstrosity that took up most of the two lots it sat on. While I was curious about who was moving in, I didn’t give them much thought. My thoughts were consumed with Tug and the tearful goodbye we shared that morning before his parents packed him into the car and took off. I promised to write him every day, and he promised to do the same.

~Jett

I stood at the window in my new bedroom, a cool corner room on the second floor at the back of the house. I could see into the back yard of our neighbor and watched the girl in the red two-piece as she got situated on a lawn chair and began writing on a pad of paper. There was nothing extraordinary about her, and I wasn’t even sure it was a girl until I realized no boy would be caught dead wearing a bathing suit like that.

Moving was hard enough, but starting in a new school was something I didn’t look forward to. I especially hated the fact that my sixteen-year-old stepbrother was going to be spending the summer with us; I just wanted him to go back to California where he lived with his mom. It was going to be a summer of taunting and bullying and I wasn’t looking forward to any of it.

“Hey doofus,” I heard Kip’s voice behind me. “We’re not done unloading the truck.”

“I know.”

Kip–his name tasted like black licorice covered in tuna fish.

“It’s your fault my dad had to move. You and your colors and your tastes. You better not screw things up for him again or I’ll kick the crap outta ya.”

I knew it was my fault they had to move. I promised my mom that I would do my best to be normal, but I wasn’t sure I could hold up my end of the bargain.

“Whatcha looking at?” I soon felt Kip’s presence next to me and my insides clenched. “Perfect,” he sneered.

“For what?”

“Fat chicks are lonely and I need to get laid. Watch and learn, freak.” He clapped his hands together and laughed his way out the door and all I could do was roll my eyes. I was ten; what did I know about girls?

I slowly made my way downstairs and out the front door to the moving truck that was parked in the driveway. As I grabbed another box and headed back down the ramp, a kid about my age appeared out of nowhere.

“Hey,” he said. “I’m Davy, I live next door.”

Davy—his name tasted like chocolate cake with truffles.

“Jett.”

“That’s a cool name.”

The familiar sensation of itches on my soul that I couldn’t scratch returned in full force. They were deep, they were dark and they burned like hot peppers.

Don’t be weird. Don’t be weird. Don’t be weird.

I didn’t want to get close to anyone, but this made me smile. “Thanks.”

“Need some help?”

“Honey, don’t forget….” My mom stopped in her tracks when she saw Davy. She smiled and said hello.

“I’m Davy. I live next door.”

“Nice to meet you, Davy. I’m Midge Manchester. This is my son, Jett Fontenot. My stepson Kip is somewhere around here.”

“Need some help?” Davy asked again.

“Well if you’re volunteering I won’t say no!” she said with a laugh.

Davy climbed up into the truck and grabbed a box, then followed me into the house.

~Daisy

As I professed undying love for Tug in my letter, signing it with lots of x’s and o’s, I was interrupted by a voice I didn’t recognize. I looked up to see a boy about my age entering the back yard, smiling and waving shyly.

“Hi,” he said, slowly walking closer. “I’m Kip… my dad and his new family just moved in next door.”

My skin burned as he smiled at me; he was the most beautiful boy I had ever laid eyes on. Which begged the question, why was he in my back yard talking to me? I stared at him blankly, trying to remember how to form words. I was frozen in my chair, clutching Tug’s letter in both hands so tightly it was beginning to wilt in the summer heat.

“You’re the baker’s daughter, right?” he asked.

I smiled and nodded, managing to say, “Yeah.”

As soon as I opened my mouth his expression changed, and he struggled with what to say next. My braces.

“New family?” I asked.

He began nervously rubbing his hands together as I stared at him, especially his short brown hair that was perfectly feathered toward his face. “Um… yeah. My dad and his new wife… and uh… her son. He’s kinda weird, you know, but I’ll only be here for the summer, so I probably won’t be around much….”

“I’m Daisy.”

His demeanor had completely changed from when he first walked into our yard. “Yeah, okay then… I guess I’ll see you around. Maybe.” He turned to leave then looked back and added, “Your dad make much money with you eating all the profits?”

He quickly walked away, my face burning fire and my chest heaving angrily. How dare some stranger walk into our yard and insult me that way! If he were the last boy on earth I would never speak to him again.

~Jett

As we each dropped a box on the floor in my room, I noticed Kip walking out of the neighbor’s yard and it looked like the girl in the red two-piece was crying.

“Is that your sister?” I asked Davy.

Davy joined me at the window and sighed heavily. “Yeah, that’s Daisy. Her boyfriend left for camp this morning and she’s been crying ever since.”

Daisy—her name tasted like the sweetest watermelon of summer.

I had a sinking suspicion she wasn’t crying because of her boyfriend, but I kept my thoughts to myself. Davy followed me back outside where Kip was heading straight for us.

“No way,” he grumbled at me. “I can deal with blubber but ten miles of railroad tracks, no way.”

I rolled my eyes hard as he went into the house, his place on the driveway replaced by my mom. She placed her hands gently on my shoulders and said, “Time for lunch. You boys hungry?”

I remained silent as Davy replied, “I have to go water my dad’s garden. Wanna come with me?”

I didn’t know the answer, looking up at my mom for guidance. A brief smile flashed across her face as she said, “Sure… okay. Jett, just behave… please.”

I nodded, embarrassed, then followed Davy next door as he half-ran, half-skipped ahead of me saying, “Wanna see my drums after? They’re dynamite!”

“Cool, sure.”

I followed him into the back yard next door as he began to unravel the garden hose from its holder attached to the back of the house.

“Hey Daisy, this is Jett! He’s moving in next door!”

I watched as the girl in the red two-piece slowly turned her head to give me the once over. I couldn’t tell by the look on her face what her first impression was, so I just held up my hand in a lame wave.

Davy began to water the biggest garden I’d ever seen, with every vegetable possible in every color of the rainbow. I fought the urge to grab the hose out of his hand to take a drink of water.

“How long is Pumpkin Head gone?” he asked his sister.

“Very funny, squirt. He’s gone all summer.” Then she looked straight at me and said, “Your name is Jett?”

I felt twitchy and sweaty all over. I was never good at meeting people for the first time, and all of my insecurities were running roughshod through my veins, rendering me speechless.

“Do you talk?” Daisy asked, causing my face to burn fire.

“Um… Jett, yeah,” I stammered.

“Interesting name.”

“My um… my dad’s a pilot.”

“Is that jerk Kip your brother?”

“Stepbrother.”

“Don’t be like him,” she warned.

I struggled with my feelings toward Kip. I knew he was a scuzzball, but he was really popular and the girls loved him. I loathed him and admired him at the same time, which caused great conflict within me. I was always seeking some sort of acceptance from him, but he treated me like a fly that kept buzzing in his ear and landing on his food. I was unwelcome.

My thoughts of Kip were quickly a memory as chaos erupted all around me, and in seemingly slow motion. Davy decided it would be funny to spray Daisy with the hose, sending her flying out of her lawn chair and shrieking like a crazy person as she ran after him. I stood like a statue with my mouth agape watching as this overweight teenage girl chased him like a cheetah hunting prey, yanking the hose and knocking him onto the grass. As they wrestled each other for control of the hose, water drenched them both and I suddenly realized one of her boobs had popped out. Daisy was eventually victorious, standing with the hose in her hand and drowning Davy with the hardest spray setting possible. He didn’t even try to fight her anymore, lying motionless on the grass like a dead animal.

~Daisy

I was out of breath after chasing Davy for the hose, and once he was motionless in the grass knowing he lost, I noticed Jett staring at me with his finger pointed in my direction. He was a strange kid, small and skinny like my brother but with a head of dark, curly hair.

“What?” I snarled. “You wanna be next?”

He jabbed his finger in my direction then covered his mouth with his hand. If I didn’t know better I’d think he was afraid of me.

“Your boob,” he managed to mumble.

I looked down at my chest and sure enough, one of my nipples had escaped in the melee with Davy and the garden hose. I felt my face burn several shades of embarrassment as I secured my breast back inside my bathing suit top. I glanced at Jett who had not moved since saying the word ‘boob’ and wondered if he said something that was taboo in his household.

“What’s wrong with you?” I shouted at him.

When he didn’t respond in any way I turned the hose on him. Instead of running away he seemed to enjoy it, raising his hands to the sky as he closed his eyes and smiled. This kid was definitely a weird one.

When I finished drowning Jett with the hose I tossed it on the ground and went inside to get some towels. When I returned to the back yard Davy was once again watering my dad’s garden and Jett stood there, soaked to the bone, holding my transistor radio in his hand and staring at it as Elton John’s “Bennie and the Jets” crackled through the air. Without a word he turned and went back home, taking my radio with him. Davy and I watched him wordlessly, trying to figure this new kid out.

“Did he just take your radio?” Davy asked.

“Yeah.”

“Want me to go get it?”

“Nah, that’s okay. It’s just my crappy outside radio.”

~Jett

I was soaking wet as I walked home, but I barely noticed as I was entranced by the song playing on the radio. I was oblivious to everything else around me until my mom’s voice broke through the clutter in my brain.

“Jett!”

I stopped in my tracks before running into her, looking up at her face.

“Why are you all wet? Where did you get that radio?”

I turned my head to look at the neighbors’ house, then at the radio, then back at my mom.

She covered her mouth with her hand and with great anguish said, “Jett, we talked about this. You promised.”

“But Mom, it’s my song!”

She tried to smile as she replied, “Jett, not every song with your name in it belongs to you, remember?”

My heart thundered in my ears as the radio became unbelievably heavy in my ten-year-old hand. “But Mom—”

“Elton John did not write that song for you. Elton John doesn’t even know you.”

I knew I was defeated and hung my head in shame.

“Did you take that radio from Davy?”

“Daisy.”

My mom gently grabbed my arm and pulled me across the driveway through the side yard and into the neighbors’ back yard where Davy and Daisy were drying off with towels. I noticed a third towel sitting on the chair that I now realized was for me.

My mom acknowledged Davy, then turned her attention to Daisy, saying, “Hi Daisy, I’m Midge Manchester. I must apologize for my son walking off with your radio.”

My mom nudged me in the back, pushing me forward. I held the radio out to Daisy and mumbled, “I’m sorry I took your radio.”