The Cake is a Lie Read online

  “Lol, no.” She laughs back, what.a.relief. This is going much better than I expected. And whattt?, she’s single. Well, she’s not dating a celebrity. Small victories.

  “How are you? How is Seattle?” She’s insistent to turn the conversation towards me, social intelligence 101.

  “I’m alright! Dreading another gloomy Seattle winter.” The gloomy Seattle winter line is good, she knows what that’s all about. I am also validating her decision to move to California. The “I’m alright” is good too, maybe should of left off the exclamation point. I never know what to say when people ask me how I am. Stupid small talk. I should have said, “I’m alright, except I’m 23 and not rich and famous yet.” That would have got big laughs.

  She’s actually talkative, lots of “LOL’s”, even some “hahahas.” We chat for like twenty minutes. Out of all the people she has met in the five years since I have seen her–1700 Facebook friends, famous people, NFL players–she still wants to talk with me. Maybe if she didn’t live in L.A…

  She tells me she’s a publicist for a big company in L.A. A big, big company. I pray it’s not as cool as it sounds, but I know that it is. I think about her life, how she did everything right. How she’s reaping the success of all that work. I think about my life and focus on all the negatives. What do I have that compares?

  She eventually doesn’t respond to my last question, it wasn’t an important question anyways. I wait five minutes… nothing. It’s okay, I was expecting this much earlier. Overall, this was successful. I wait another five and then type, “Hey you keep rockin it, and when you’re in Seattle, hit up who you know it’s past time since you saw and told your stories too.” Oh god, that’s so terrible. WHAT WAS THAT?

  There is hope because Oakley loves guys that will never truly love her: big time ballers. This is the nature of the game.

  And lastly–and most importantly–there’s hope because she loves to read.

  3. Loren Larsen (Summer, 1998)

  A few blocks from my childhood home—two if you knew the shortcut through the house at the end of the street—there was the official park of Richmond Beach. One of the sound side towns in the Seattle suburb where I grew up, Shoreline.

  Before best friends, there was just me and my mom spending our afternoons in the park. Richmond Beach Park, “the park” to us, was not by any means the most impressive park I’d ever explored, in fact just down the road was the actual Richmond Beach. But the pond and little hills were in all the right places and it was familiar. I knew all the secret trails on the outside of the fence and played in all the best climbing trees.

  The park is where I first displayed my social prowess. My mom would brag to anyone that would listen about how I would fearlessly approach any kid, adult or dog and ask them where they were from or compliment them on something they were wearing. It wasn’t all natural ability, at first my mom fed me the questions and encouraged me.

  “It’s unbelievable how socially intelligent he is at such a young age,” She would always say.

  If you want to have a high social IQ this is where it all starts, saying “hi” to strangers on the playground.

  The bright summer sun felt like a spotlight on my concerned face as I entered the park with my mom. Even from afar, I could tell something was off. All the kids were running around in a big group, from one spot to another, sitting down around one tree for a few minutes before taking off to another spot. Normally there would’ve been a bunch of scattered groups.

  We were going to a picnic some parents had organized to meet a new student joining our 4th grade class. I stayed close to my mom like a cub as she walked over to the group of adults. I kept an eye out for Loren. Loren Larson was my one semi-best friend at school. Loren was a year older than me, but he lived in my neighborhood and our parents were friends so we had play dates. Loren was super skinny, even his face was thin and boney, but his shaggy dirty blond hair and big personality were unmatched. We got along. We both knew how to raise our voices to tell a story. He was my social idol. But Loren was a year older, so he gave me the cold shoulder more often than not at school.

  Loren was the only reason I went to that picnic. My mom had repeatedly assured me he was going. You can’t just go to a fourth grade social event without someone to talk to. These weren’t strangers at a park, I saw these kids every day. Plus, I wasn’t all that impressed by the other the kids in my grade, I spent my days dreaming about hanging out with Loren and the older kids.

  I overheard from the parents that the new student was a boy named Jonsen. It was the most unique name I’d ever heard. His mom couldn’t stop raving about him, how he was a star soccer player. I was now in full fledge crisis mode. I’d been so sure the new student was going to be the love of my life. Our grade only had one beautiful girl, Mari Smith, and she spent most of her time hanging out with the older girls. And now she was going to fall in love with Jonsen.

  Eventually, I built up the courage to go take a look at the big attraction for myself and headed over to a bench the group had temporarily settled around. As I walked towards the group I could hear Loren’s voice loudly joking around with some other kids from our school.

  “Why is your Tamagatchi so hungry Kathy? Are you raising it to be anorexic? You’ve got some serious issues Kathy. Why can’t you just love it for who it is?”

  “Loren, give Kathy her Tamagatchi back.” David commanded.

  “Why won’t this glorified calculator have babies already?” Loren kept going, “I keep feeding it and feeding it. No I’m not going to take you for a walk, you need more food, more food.”

  I was already laughing as I squeezed onto the bench. I took off my coat and held it in front of my chest to hide my pudgy belly. When I sat down I did this with a pillow or something when I could. I mean I wasn’t super big gulp fat, but I wore a shirt at the water park.

  It was worse than I imagined. Jonsen was huge, clearly more developed than anyone our age, tall with an athletic physique, tan skin. Not the most handsome face I’d seen, but still handsome. On the plus side, his hair was buzzed so short that his ears stuck out like an elf. But as a package he was so good looking that even his flaws just became uniquely handsome themselves.

  I’m ruined, I thought, everybody panic!

  Loren was sitting right next to Jonsen, “Man, I’m telling you, first day just stick with me. I’ll take care of you, I know everyone.” As he spoke Loren padded Jonsen’s chest with the back of his hand to forcefully demand his attention–the boy could talk. Loren didn’t even give me a second glance.

  But before he could finish, Jonsen got up smiling to himself and ran off, leaving the group of enthralled classmates in disarray until one-by-one they started running after him like a pack of dogs at the dog park.

  I didn’t chase after him and fight for his attention like the rest. What fools, groveling for his attention, I thought. I couldn’t believe Jonsen wasn’t that impressed with Loren. This punk knew he was special, knew he was better. I stayed behind and walked back to the adults. I’d talk to Jonsen another day. I’d learned to wait for your time. Besides, Jonsen wasn’t totally perfect, he had a very noticeable smell, almost like canned fruit, it was awful.

  4. Jonsen Palmer (Fall, 1998)

  I might have been short and chubby, but it spoke to my comic genius that I was able to become Jonsen’s best friend. Once I got a handle on sarcasm and swearing it was all over. Real recognize real. Grade school Comedy 101: Drop “fuck that” into almost any situation.

  “Hey Marco, did you put a valentine in Rachel’s Mailbox?”

  “Fuck that.”

  Laughs every time, pretty edgy stuff coming from an innocent, genuinely nice 4th grader. I had other token phrases too.

  “Hey Marco, you wanna go to the park after school?”

  “Have your people call my people, we’ll work something out.”

  “You any good at foursquare, Marco?”

  “You already know I’m all that, and a bag of chips.”
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  “Hey Rachel, I like your jacket…For me to poop on.” God that was classic.

  In moments of awkward silence my favorite line was “Sooo, how ‘bout them Mariners?” Be the first person to say something enough times and it becomes yours, the other kids aren’t allowed to say it. I’d made some wise investments and had a monopoly on all the good catch phrases. This was the spark in my eye that teachers were always writing about in my progress reports. It was my golden age of comedy.

  I got all the lines from my older brother, Carlo. He was the coolest person ever, and being cool wasn’t always easy in our house. When my older brother was growing up my parents didn’t want him watching R rated movies or listening to Parental Advisory CD’s. But my brother was no push over, not that one. He mustered up some epic tantrums. When my mom wouldn’t let him see “Braveheart” with his friends in 7th grade he threw a tantrum to end all tantrums.

  “You awful bitch. I fucking hate you.” My mom would lock herself in her room to escape the never ending onslaught of verbal abuse. I would watch him lie on his back, kicking upwards against her door for hours. Eventually he’d get tired and bored lying there, so periodically he would have to dig deep and work himself into a tizzy all-over again just to continue. I loved both of them so I always stayed pretty neutral, but when push came to shove I always sided with my mom.

  “Braveheart’s too violent, Carlo.” My mom and I would sit in her room together, listening to the monster on the other side of the locked bedroom door. He would yell until he lost his voice, then yell some more. He kept it going for over a week. Eventually she compromised and allowed him to see “Braveheart,” but only if she could go with him and could cover his eyes during all the parts she didn’t want him to see.

  I never had this problem. I saw all the R rated movies I wanted. Jonsen showed them to me. We shared everything. I taught him what my family talked about: history and politics. He taught me about what his family talked about: sex. Like what “The Clitoris” was in the South Park movie. His favorite song was “Gimmie That Nutt” by Easy-E. He memorized all the lyrics. I memorized them, too. I didn’t understand them. Especially the nut part, like a squirrel nut? I’d try and get Jonsen to explain them to me, he would change the subject. I didn’t want to seem needy or stupid so I didn’t push it. I told myself that maybe he didn’t know what they meant, but he did, he just didn’t want to tell me.

  I had something else that grade-schoolers recognize as cool. Old eyes. Eyes you only get from people telling you “you’ve had it rougher than other kids” all your life. Early on I added, “are you parents together?" to my list of getting to know you questions. When the kids would say “no,” I would encourage them to talk about it with follow up questions like “that must be really tough, what’s that like?” What fun. I liked getting out the pain everyone was hiding, that’s where real life was at.

  5. Jonsen and the Ladies (Winter, 1998)

  A breeze gently rocked the pair of spring horses Jonsen and I were sitting on as we waited patiently for some cute girls to come to the park. Jonsen probably started puberty in 2nd grade. He loved the ladies, and the ladies loved him. While I dreamed about our elementary school collapsing during an earthquake, killing everyone accept for me and Mari Smith, leaving us trapped alone together for months. Mari was dreaming about Jonsen proposing to her on ice skates in some lame girl fantasy. On our 4th grade class trips to the theatre, while I brilliantly schemed to innocently end up sitting next to Kat Peacock, so I could spend the whole play dreaming about playing footsy with her. Well Jonsen would end up sitting on the other side of her actually playing footsy with Kat Peacock.

  When I heard about it from one of the girls during intermission my stomach plummeted into my feet. During the second act the slightest ruffling jarred me like a nuclear explosion. He didn’t even really love Kat.

  I always took it like a champ though, bounced back. Not that Jonsen wasn’t generous, there were plenty of perks to being his best friend. All the girls wanted to play spin the bottle with Jonsen. They even liked to flash him.

  Just our luck, two of the cutest girls we’d ever seen came strolling into our trap. We watched them for a while, Jonsen professed his love for the taller asian-looking girl–he loved the asians. What an idiot. Her petite brunet friend was the prettiest girl I’d ever seen. Glorious day. Remarkable day.

  “Yah man, the Asian’s hot.” I agreed.

  The girls suspiciously didn’t even glance at us. Eventually, Jonsen jumped into action, on his lead we just walked over to them and introduced ourselves. The Asian was Elan, the brunette was Jamilee. Elan was talkative and friendly and immediately claimed Jonsen first by laughing loudly at anything he said. Jamilee could’ve cared less, she was a year older and had an attitude, an “I’ve seen it all” air about her.

  It was touch-and-go at first as we talked about what schools we went to, Jonsen kept moving closer to Elan and she kept telling him, “You’re in my bubble,” motioning around herself for emphasis.

  Jonsen and I laughed, it sounded like something a parent would say. Then Jonsen antagonistically poked her shoulder.

  “Hey, quit bursting my bubble.” She warned.

  I poked Jamilee’s shoulder. She glared at me before poking me hard back in the chest.

  I turned to Jonsen with a look of shock, “She ruined my beautiful bubble…they’re monsters Jonsen, you have to save yourself.” Jonsen took a few hesitant steps back from the girls before Elan started chasing after him with a pointed finger.

  Soon we were all chasing and poking each other. It was our inside joke and the ice came crashing down.

  We invited them to walk the trails behind the fence with us. As we plunged into the secrecy of the trees I gleamed with anticipation, knowing that the hard part was over. It was only a matter of time before we convinced them to play truth or dare.

  Little did I know Jonsen had other plans. Without warning, he leaped up into one of the tallest trees and began climbing. It was a huge tree with only a few branches, far too dangerous to be climbing.

  “What a show off.” I joked sarcastically. We shouted at him to come down to no avail and watched as he settled on the tallest branch.

  “I’m going to kill myself,” he yelled down. We all looked shockingly at each other. We’ll there go your chances you fucking idiot, I thought.

  The girls stared at me for an explanation, I had none. This was the first time I’d seen him do this kind of thing. He liked to huff white-out sometimes, I thought that was weird.

  “Attention,” I assured the girls, “He just wants attention.”

  Elan bolted up the tree after him.

  “Come on, Jamilee, let’s go and eventually he will come down.” Elan had actually made it pretty far up the tree after him. Jamilee and I walked back to the park and eventually Jonsen and Elan came out to the field.

  The girls left and Jonsen and I sat and watched them walk away into the sunset. He apologized for what he did and tried his best to describe to me what he was feeling. It didn’t come out right. I told him I loved him and then we talked about how amazing each of our girls was. I told him that overall the day was a great success, Jamilee even left her half-drunken coke bottle behind. I flashed him a peak of the bottle, while holding it preciously, then I began worshipping the holy Coke that Jamilee put her angelic lips upon.

  I placed it upon the altar of my palms and held it up to the sky as an offering, “Please god, make Jamilee love me.” And then I began French kissing and slobbering all over the cap of the bottle, assuring Jonsen it was basically the same thing as making out with her–no matter how many times he told me that it didn’t actually count.

  “It totally counts. I can still taste her sweet, fruity chap stick.” We laughed until our sides hurt.

  Spring, 1999

  Jonsen was telling me about his new crush, Alia Lee, over the phone. He’d been hitting on her all week and she was loving it. I didn’t understand why he liked her. I mean, she w
as one of our friends, funny, in the smart-program at our school, but I just didn’t think she was that pretty.

  “What do you like best about Alia, Jonsen?

  “Man, I love her big rack, have you seen those things? I can’t take my eyes off them.”

  “Jonsen Palmer! You can’t talk about women that way! How dare you.” My mom yelled from the other line. I was overcome by shock and embarrassment.

  “Sorry, I’m sorry.” Jonsen apologized. I immediately hung up.

  I ran into the living room and gave my mom hell for listening in on my phone conversation. She was horrified that a 5th grader was talking about women like that. She spoke very sternly to me about respect for women and not treating them like objects. She never got this upset. I argued back that I did not myself say anything about Alia’s breasts and that Jonsen couldn’t help how he was raised.

  “I don’t even care about breasts at all, mom.”

  I slammed the front door on my way out, I had to get to Jonsen. He wasn’t staying at his house in Richmond Beach for some reason. He’d been staying at a bunch of different places lately, but his dad moved into a new apartment and he’d promised me he’d be staying there for a while. I’d been to the apartment once, but it was by the middle school on top of the hill, Einstein. It was farther than I’d ever walked before. I walked to the menacing road that lead up out of our neighborhood. It veered up steeply before disappearing behind a horizon of trees. My frenzy overrode my fear and step by step I climbed out of Richmond Beach for the first time.

  When I got to the apartment, one of Jonsen’s ghetto-ass sisters answered the door and I ran past her into the arms of Jonsen. We both started crying, we professed our love for each other.

  There was no T.V. in the apartment and his dad wasn’t there. We played around with a soccer ball he’d been juggling. His sister’s bitchy voice rang through the house. She could hit that special note of meanness that made 10-year-olds cower. His brother was on a cell phone with some friend, talking in heavy slang about some fight he got in.