The Family Fang - Kevin Wilson [27]
On the TV, the barrel bobbed in the water, bouncing off of rocks, headed toward certain doom. “Oh,” Annie said, “this is gonna be good.” Just as the hero arrived at the edge of the falls, the barrel tumbled over and disappeared in the spray of water. At the bottom of the falls, shards of wood rose to the surface. “Goddamn,” Annie whispered. And then, a form beneath the water, the heroine resurfaced, a look on her face like motherfucker, I can’t be killed. She swam to the bank of the river and climbed out, shaking any last remnant of death from her body. The music slow and deliberate, the heroine marched, uncaring as to where her beau was and why he had not arrived in time, in the direction of the villain, ready to put things right. Annie turned off the TV. “I can’t watch anymore,” she said, “I’m going to kick a hole in the wall if I watch anymore.”
“Is there anything you wouldn’t do if Mom and Dad asked you?” Buster asked his sister.
She considered the question. “I wouldn’t kill anybody,” she said, “and I wouldn’t do something to an animal.”
“Anything else?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” she said, obviously bored with the question. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“I don’t want to be a girl,” he said.
“Well, sure,” Annie answered.
“I’m going to do it though,” he said, at that moment making his decision.
“Well, sure,” Annie answered.
He pulled away from his sister and stepped into the hallway, the burden off his shoulders and then, after just a second of lightness, resettled on him.
He pushed open the door of his parents’ bedroom. His mother was wrapping rubber bands around his father’s fingers, the appendages tomato-red and segmented in ways that suggested amputation. They looked surprised to see him but made no move to hide their actions.
“I’m going to do it,” he told them and Mr. and Mrs. Fang whooped with delight. They beckoned to him and he jumped onto the bed, worming his way in between them. “It’s going to be great,” Mrs. Fang whispered to Buster, kissing his face over and over. Mr. Fang snapped the rubber bands off of his hands and then clenched and unclenched his fists, a pleasant, easy feeling passing over his face. Then the Fangs draped their arms over Buster and fell asleep, Buster the only one still awake, the weight of his parents’ bodies holding him in place and easing him into something that was not sleep but felt safe.
Buster made the final strides to the edge of the stage with a previously unknown confidence, his heels clacking on the slick walkway, clack-clack-clack-clack-clack, his rear swinging in time to the rhythm. When he reached his mark, he turned sideways, raised his lead shoulder, hand on hip, cocked his head, and looked out at the audience, who cheered. As he turned and walked back to the other girls, he lifted his hand just over his head, a gesture of farewell that could not be bothered to do more than acknowledge the fact that the audience was being left behind in favor of something much, much better. The other two girls looked at him, a stranger, no one they’d ever seen before, with nothing but bad intentions. Buster stared them down and then took his position in line, the final three.
Buster could hardly focus, his teeth bared as though he was about to eat a small animal. He was loving this. The glamour of the dresses and shoes and hair and fingernails, the attention from people who did not give him attention. The fact that, inside this costume, he was still Buster, which meant that, really, there was something essential inside of him that made this work at all. It was a magic trick, and he had to keep reminding himself not to reveal the secret, something so simple and easy if you knew how to look at it, which is what made it magical.
Blah-blah-blah, aren’t they lovely, blah-blah-blah, done so well, blah-blah-blah, all winners tonight, blah-blah-blah, second runner-up, blah-blah-blah,