Garrett Nickelsen Tastes Like Fart

I woke up a bit before eight the next morning, a golden mess in Heather’s wrinkled skirt and shirt. When I opened my eyes, all I saw from my jumble of sheets was the family cat staring at me from my windowsill, the second half of his body hidden behind my blinds, cracked open to reveal the miniscule sunlight and the invisible dust particles floating around my room. He mewed very quietly before jumping off the sill and running out of my room like the absolute fright he was. I almost fell back asleep, but my attempt at a deep post-party slumber was interrupted less than a minute later by the annoying tap of my mother’s knuckles against my door.

She was dressed in a light blue robe, an old, baggy t-shirt and cutoff pajama shorts peeking from underneath. A steaming coffee mug was in one hand, the house phone in the other. The tacky mug screamed L.L. Bean with stick-figure sketches of us kids, our names written underneath in fake childish print. Her face was gracefully lined, but from the deep wrinkles under her eyes, she was obviously tired and, from last night’s wine with Father, a bit hungover. When she spoke, her voice was groggy but familiar all the same.

“Leesey, sweetie, there’s—” She paused as I groaned underneath the sheets and slowly stretched my muscles. “Heather’s on the phone. She says she needs to talk to you.” She paused, her crow’s feet crinkling in a confused expression. “But this early on a Saturday? Where’s your phone?”

My phone. I patted my thigh, hoping to find it shoved in the pocket of my skirt, but it wasn’t there. I grunted in annoyance at her questions, too many for the time of day, and ripped the Lion King sheets off my body. I squinted my eyes at the light coming from behind my blinds and peered at my alarm clock over my shoulder.

“Why does she have to call at eight in the morning?” I grumbled, rolling my eyes up to stare at the Paul Simon poster stapled to the ceiling. “Okay.” I stretched out one hand to pinch the bridge of my nose and the other off the edge of my bed for the phone.

My mother inched into my messy room over the small pile of white clothes and the other mound of darks to be washed. “Here,” she said, setting the phone in my outstretched hand. “And tell her to limit the calls to your cell.”

“Hmmm,” I mumbled, not even daring to bring up my limited phone plan and that I had ran out of calling minutes, once again, four days earlier than planned. At least I had some texts left.

“Are you going to get up?” she asked, inching away from my bed.

“Sure, just… yeah.” I nodded my head and slowly sat up as my mother left my room, leaving the door open and turning off my ceiling fan. I always kept it going: I preferred a cold room where I could snuggle up under lots of blankets at night rather than a warm one where I broke out in a sweat after five seconds. “Mother!” I yelled, a groan still groggily etched in my voice.

“What?” she yelled back from down the hall.

“Stop turning off my fan!”

I waited for her useless apology, and then put my ear to the phone, only to hear incessant laughing on the other end.

“Shut up, Heather,” I grumbled, swinging my legs over the side of the bed, the thin sheet catching my feet and falling to the floor.

She giggled a bit more, and abruptly stopped, letting out a deep breath.

“Sorry for cock-blocking last night.” I could hear her trying to cover up even more giggles with a cough.

“Ew. Heather, that’s just disgusting,” I mumbled, massaging my collarbone.

“Whatever. You should be glad I came when I did. But guess what?”

“What?” I whined, ready to fall back asleep.

“I have your phone,” she stated triumphantly.

“I left it in your car?” My voice shot up a pitch as I stared at the cat peeking from behind the door.

“I... uh.” I heard some shuffling and a muffled voice before she spoke again. “Yeah. It must’ve slipped out of your skirt or something,” she muttered, he voice airy.

If I knew Heather – and I did – a light voice was a dead giveaway that she was lying.

“You’re lying,” I stated firmly, pulling the fallen bed sheet back onto my bed next to Tornado, my stuffed mud-brown horse. I patted his head and sat him on my matching Simba pillow.

“I... uhm.”

“Where was it?” I stood up and crossed my room in a couple of steps, grabbing a towel from the small stack of my favorite albums from Father’s vinyl collection I called my own.

“I… uh… Just promise you’ll come over? I was going to take you out to breakfast, remember? So what if your phone shows up in a mysterious way.” I could imagine her shrugging her shoulders in the most apathetic way possible. “Not my fault.”

“Fine. But I want my phone back.”

“Oh, you’ll get it back,” she muttered, the television muffled in the background.

“And you’ll be paying for breakfast?” I asked, flipping on the switch to my ceiling fan and closing my bedroom door behind me, the towel slung over my shoulder.

“Why do I always have to pay?” she whined. “Why can’t you pay for once?”

I chuckled lightly. “If you want to eat breakfast on my five-dollars-a-week allowance, I’d be happy to oblige,” I said, opening the bathroom door.

“Whatever,” she muttered. “At least I have a job.”

“And a very sucky one at that, Heather.”

“Shut up, Leesey. You’re just jealous of my stellar Bobby Burrito costume,” she mused.

Heather had applied to the same burrito shop we visited once school let out only days before Finals Week. She was lucky enough to score a spot shoveling cheese, beans, and rice into burrito wraps for $7.50 an hour. My favorite part of her job description?

“That burrito getup is the stupidest thing ever, but I love it. I still don’t know how you manage to make it seem cool that you’re dressing up as some… I don’t know. A burrito-shaped rancher.”

“Named Bobby.”

I laughed. “Yeah.”

“Cowboy hat and everything.” She chuckled as well. “Whatever. See you in an hour?”

“Yeah. Bye.”

As I set the phone onto the bathroom counter, I caught a glimpse of my haggard reflection in the mirror. I backtracked and stared at myself with a mix of self-humiliation and pride. My hair was a bird’s nest all over and matted on one side, and as I brushed a couple of fingers against my reddened lips, I couldn’t help but blush at the thought of what happened on the porch swing in the dark last night. I inwardly groaned at the possibility that Mother had seen them, too, quick to shut the bathroom door behind me before she could see me as she was just coming down the hallway.

“You okay, sweetie?” she called from behind the door, giving it a light tap.

“Yeah,” I said, taking a step closer to the mirror, “I’m fine.”

“What time did you come in last night?” she asked again. I cleared my throat and eyed the door over my shoulder. I didn’t want to lie to Mother; after all, it was Father who had always been the lenient one, and if he didn’t care that I came in five minutes late (or what was more likely the case, forgot), then I’d let him decide.

“Can’t remember, I was really tired. Ask Father, will you?”

It was a few moments before she answered. “Sure.”

I took one last fleeting look in the mirror before turning around and starting the shower.

|||

The second I stepped foot outside after showering and throwing on a pair of running shorts, a sports bra, and Luke’s old ASU soccer jersey, I knew it was too hot to walk the mile-and-then-some to Heather’s. We lived in the desert, so it wasn’t that odd to have 70-degree mornings and 100-degree afternoons. I usually would walk to Heather’s house (during the winter, it was practically a given), but now that summer was bearing upon Scottsdale, I decided against it and instead jumped back inside to easily convince my father to give me a ride.

He dropped me off five minutes later with a kiss on the cheek and a twenty-dollar bill in my pocket, and told me to have fun before I waved at him as he drove away. It was a bit too easy to get money from my father because he always felt a bit guilty for being MIA during most of the school year. I hated taking advantage of him, but Heather was always complaining about how she always bought everything, so I decided to pay for her breakfast this once.

The funny thing about Heather’s house wasn’t something you could see; it was her doorbell. When I pressed it, I hummed along to the familiar Can-Can tune that always followed and waited for Heather to answer the door (her parents were away that week at a teachers’ conference). Heather soon opened the large oak door wearing a pair of pajama pants and a tank top, her hair tied in a messy, beach-blonde bun at the nape of her neck.

“Hey, bro,” she mumbled, her voice groggy. She scratched her cheek with a couple of fingers before looking back inside over her shoulder and nodding. I crinkled my eyebrows, curious as to who would be at her house since I was sure Jude was too plastered last night to even consider waking up before noon.

“Hey. Why… why aren’t you ready yet?” Heather might have been one to curse like a sailor or talk like a boy on the football team, but when we would go out to breakfast together, she’d always dress up more than I would in just a pair of running shorts and some type of old t-shirt. She’d go all out: slimming jeans and a flowery blouse, or even on occasion, a sundress. Not only was she confident, which was something guys had always found sexy, she was curvy and tall. She was practically a model, except she sometimes had a really bad taste in clothes and wore size ten jeans.

“Come in,” she mumbled meekly, backing up behind the door to let me in.

“Okay…?” I lightly chuckled and walked in, kicking off my flip-flops by the umbrella holder.

When I looked up from my bare feet into the living room, I saw a mop of auburn hair. He was looking into his lap, his hands folded together and his thumbs squirming. His right knee nervously bounced up and down, and when he looked up from his hands, his lower lip was caught between his teeth.

To say that seeing Garrett Nickelsen in Heather’s house at nine in the morning made me confused was an understatement.

“H-h-hi,” he mumbled, shooting straight up from the couch. I could feel Heather give me a small nudge from behind as I inched forward into the living room, a bewildered expression on my face.

At first, I thought he looked tired. But once I took a moment to soak up his appearance, I realized he was absolutely exhausted, with dark lines under his eyes and his hair sticking up at the ends as if he had just gotten out of bed. He had on dark blue jeans, tighter than the jeans that Jude always wore, ratty, dirty white sneakers, and a striped tank top. A few zits spotted his cheeks and cascaded down his neck, but I tried not to stare. That would be rude. Heather cleared her throat next to me, and I tore my gaze from Garrett.

“Garrett came by because… well, tell her, dude.”

He gave Heather a look, his eyes wide and his lips slightly curving downward. Smiling widely, she nodded her head in encouragement and brushed past him into her kitchen. She folded her arms onto the counter that separated the living room and kitchen, a steaming mug of coffee next to her elbow.

“I, uh…” He bit his lip and reached up to ruffle the hair at the nape of his neck. He looked up and gave me a crooked smile before digging into his pockets and pulling out a crinkled, folded piece of notebook paper and my cell phone.

“I… You left this at the-the, um, the coffee table last night.” He nodded and walked the few steps towards me, my phone in his outstretched hand. As I took it from his fingers, my eyebrows furrowing, I could see small patches of dry skin on his fingers and a few calluses under his knuckles as well.

He cleared his throat and momentarily teetered on his heels before handing me the notebook page as well, his eyes set on me, startlingly unwavering.

“I crossed off two of them,” he said, running a few fingers over his bangs before brushing them to the side of his face.

“You what?” My face instantly heated up, and I could feel my cheeks burn a deep crimson. I clamped my lip between my teeth and seethed at Garrett before looking over his shoulder at a simpering Heather taking a sip of her coffee. She just shrugged her shoulders and turned around against the counter, hopping up to sit on it, her back facing the living room.

“I crossed off two of them,” he repeated, barely biting back a harsh tone as well. “I didn’t really—”

“Do you usually go around snooping into stuff that isn’t yours?”

“I didn’t think you’d be so worried about a fucking list, god damn.” I flinched at his choice words, and by the way his eyes softened and his eyebrows smoothed over, he noticed as well.

I sucked in a breath between my teeth before shoving the list under his pimply nose. “This freaking list, Garrett, is personal. I don’t expect some freaking boy to pick it up and look at it, okay? It’s personal,” I lowly repeated, taking a step closer to him. Only after the words ran from my mouth did I realize how stupid I sounded.

“Well, maybe you should have thought of that before you left it on the table,” he weakly shot back, taking a step closer as well as he haphazardly flipped his wrist.

I started, my teeth clenching together as I racked my brain for some sort of comeback. “Well, maybe you should think about that before shoving your tongue down random peoples’ throats.”

He steeled himself, rapidly blinking his eyes, before pointing a finger at me. “Well maybe you should—”

“Shit, you guys! Will you give it a rest, yeah?” Heather interrupted from across the room. She had her cup of coffee in one hand, the other clutching her forehead as she shook her head dejectedly. She ran her hand down her face and took another sip from her mug. “So what? He fixed your list. Way I see it, dude was just doing you a favor, Elise.”

I grunted and crossed my arms over my chest, mustering up the best stink eye I could send Heather. She shrugged her shoulders and took another sip of her coffee before egging Garrett on again.

“Now what else were you going to say, Garrett?”

He looked at Heather over his shoulder and shrugged, bringing up his hand to pull at a clump of hair at the top of his head, making it stick straight up. I quietly giggled at the sight, and Garrett glanced back at me with a light smile on his lips.

“Yeah,” he stretched out, and he cleared his throat. “Sorry I just...” He cleared his throat. “Just... Sorry. That… about that. Uh, I just...” He paused and took a deep breath, his chest rising underneath his thin tank top. “It’s a to-do list, yeah?”

I nodded, sticking my hands into my pockets. I wiped any trace of a smile from my lips as he looked down at me.

“Well, Heather and I talked a bit before you came here, and, um, I was wondering if you’d like to, I don’t know, just, like, grab some breakfast or something? Talk about the list or what-whatever,” he stuttered, still keeping his eyes on me.

Of course, that explained why Heather hadn’t showered and was still only in pajamas.

“I, uh…” I looked at my feet and was suddenly reminded of my overly casual outfit choice from this morning, my short legs peeking from under my pink and black track shorts. “I don’t think I’m dressed for eating out or… whatever,” I muttered, looking back up at his bright blue eyes.

“Oh,” he mumbled, scuffing the heel of his shoe over the cream carpet under our feet.

I could hear Heather snicker from the kitchen, and both Garrett and I turned to look at her as she let out another stronger laugh. “You know, you were going to go to breakfast with me dressed like that, Elise. Remember?”

“Frick,” I muttered under my breath, my cheeks getting warm again. I could hear Garrett trying to hide a chuckle under an obviously fake cough.

“You should just go,” she said, taking another sip of her coffee.

“Will you excuse me one moment?” I said to Garrett as I brushed past him into the kitchen. I could see him nod his head from the corner of my eye.

“What the heck are you doing?” I whispered as I rounded the corner of the kitchen, my fingers curling into fists.

“I’m just helping you out here, Elise,” she easily replied, not lowering her voice one bit. I gave her a wide-eyed look and she muttered an “Oh!” before nodding her head and setting down her mug of coffee onto the counter. “Sorry,” she whispered.

“I don’t like him,” I said, crossing my arms.

“Didn’t look like that last night, bro.” She simpered at the deadpan look I shot her, crossing her arms as well.

“Shut up. I just don’t want to go to breakfast with him.” Why would I want to? It’d be unbearably awkward for me and completely uncomfortable for him. I had just made out with him only ten hours ago. So instead of explaining all of this to Heather, I took the easy way out, feigning disgust. “He looks like a tool.”

“And he also looks like he’s staring at you.”

“What?” I quickly turned around and saw Garrett intently studying a family photo of Heather’s from when she was just a toddler, his cheeks the lightest shade of pink.

“Told you,” Heather smirked when I looked back. I groaned again and stomped my foot, not caring that I looked like a diabetic child trapped in a candy store.

“Chill, bro,” she said, taking a step towards me and backhanding my shoulder, pointing a finger at me. “Hey, the dude’s only trying to help. The least you could do is let him.”

“Yeah, okay. I’m sure that he’ll be a huge help. After all, he did… cross off… yeah.” My sarcastic tone tapered, and I grunted in frustration again. I could feel a few goosebumps pricking at my forearms at the memory.

Heather smirked again, setting her hands on her hips. “After he helped with ‘going to a party’ and ‘kissing a boy’?”

“Shut up,” I muttered again.

She quietly laughed and turned to grab her coffee from the counter. “You should just go.”

“I… I don’t…” I took a deep breath. “Really?” When it came to boys, I had no idea what to do or even what to say. That was Heather’s kind of thing. She knew guys. She knew guys so well that she even talked like one. So that morning, I decided to trust her on Garrett.

“Go, Leesey. And report the full details when you get home. I want to know everything.”

“Great,” I mumbled, uncrossing my arms from my chest and running a few fingers through my hair.

“Hey, stop complaining. If I weren’t dating Jude, I wouldn’t mind a breakfast of eggs with a side of Garrett.”

My cheeks heated up once again and I gave Heather a look. She just raised her hands up and put on an innocent smile, nodding towards Garrett, who was fidgeting and pacing through Heather’s living room like a kid with ADHD.

When I sauntered back out of the kitchen, Garrett shot his head up from staring at a miniature globe Mr. Floyd kept on top of the TV cabinet, and pointed a thumb over his shoulder. “You wanna take my car? I walked here, but I only live only a couple blocks away.”

“Yeah, sure.” I shrugged and led the way to the foyer, slipping on my mud-brown surf sandals. Garrett opened the door for me, and I muttered my thanks before slipping back out into the dry summer heat as Heather yelled “Have fun!” behind us.

The sun was already high up and it was nearing ninety degrees when Garrett and I stepped outside. He brushed past me, lightly setting his hand on my shoulder before wordlessly pointing to the right. We cut across Heather’s dead, yellow lawn and I followed closely behind him as he tucked his hands into his pockets, keeping his eyes on the ground.

He soon shortened his steps and fell back beside me, giving me a small smile. “Did you make curfew?”

“Yeah,” I said, squinting in the sunlight.

He only nodded and gazed back at the ground.

We didn’t talk for the next five minutes before we arrived at his place. He pointed at a cream, two-story house with the fake Christmas wreath still on the front door. We walked up to the porch and Garrett unclipped a set of keys from his pocket, unlocking the door and letting me inside before him, the same small smile on his face.

“I don’t know why we keep that Christmas wreath always up there.” He chuckled as he closed the door behind him. “I just need to go grab my wallet, and we’ll leave.”

I nodded and he quickly bounded up a small, spiraled staircase to the left, numerous family photos lining the wall as it ascended. His house was roomy and very white, except for the deep brown wood floors of the far-off living room and the beige carpet under my toes. The kitchen and living room were dark and the blinds were all shut, but the lights in the hallway upstairs were on, cascading down to where I was standing and making small shadows of the stairs’ handrail.

He came bounding down the stairs less than a minute later, stuffing his wallet into his back pocket. He gestured over his shoulder to the kitchen, and I followed him through the garage door. When he flipped on the light, I saw an older Chevy sports car painted a brazen yellow. There was a slight dent in the rear passenger door and its windows were down, probably to make sure it didn’t heat up over night.

Garrett brushed past me and flipped the garage door switch, ambling over to the front of the driver side door with his keys dangling in his hand. When I didn’t inch forward from the threshold, he looked at me with his brow furrowed, his lips slowly curving into a smirk.

“What?” he dragged out, flipping his key chain around his finger.

I crossed my arm over my chest and scratched my shoulder. “It’s… uhm.” I pointed to his car, my nose involuntarily scrunching up. “Did you… uh…”

“Sorry?”

“I could have sworn this is that car we—well, Heather almost ran into the last day of school.” I bit my lip, looking over the car again.

Garrett chuckled, rushing a hand over his hair. “I think I remember that…”

“Sorry about that,” I muttered, walking over to the passenger side, my hand on the door handle.

“No, it’s, uh… It’s cool, Elise.” He smiled again, shoving his keys into the door. “No one died or… or anything, y’know?”

I nodded, and waited for the door to unlock before slipping in.

The inside of Garrett’s car wasn’t dirty. Granted, you could see sneaker imprints on the windshield, but it’s not like he was sporting this car at a dealership or anything. There weren’t any fast food wrappers on the ground, unless you counted the half-empty bottle of Diet Pepsi tucked away in the cubby in front of the gearshift along with a small CD booklet and a couple of sticks of gum.

“I wouldn’t have expected your car to be so… clean,” I said, pointing to the pine tree air freshener hanging in the rearview mirror.

He gave me a crooked smile before reaching for some brown wayfarers in his door and slipping them on.

“My, uh, mom raised me right,” he said, sending me another smile before starting the engine.

The car ride to whatever breakfast place we were heading to was silent. I would’ve pinned Garrett as someone with mix CDs haphazardly thrown in the backseat, music blasting the second the car turned on – someone like Heather, really. But it was completely silent in the car, save for the wheezing of the transmission when he stopped at a stop sign. Even I thought it was too quiet in his car, and that was saying something, considering awkward silences like the one we were sharing were kind of my thing. But as we eased on out of Heather’s neighborhood, he uneasily spoke up over the Cavalier’s puttering engine.

“So, hey, what happened last night?”

I peered over at Garrett, an eyebrow quirked. He nervously licked his lips, a small blush traveling up his neck.

“I, uh… It’s, um.” He mumbled some more before clearing his throat. “I, uh… I-I’m sorry.”

“Oh,” I squeaked, and looked back out my window. “For what?”

“It’s just…” He cleared his throat and slowed down in front of a red light, flipping his turning signal. “I shouldn’t have, y’know, taken… taken advantage of the whole… uh, situation l-like that.” He fumbled over his words, lazily gesticulating with his hand.

“Um…” I looked back at him, and he was looking straight at me, his lower lip caught between his teeth.

“I don’t expect you to forgive me or anything.”

“It’s…” I didn’t want to say I enjoyed the kiss. I was not a forthright person. I wasn’t crassly blunt like Heather. So I let slip the first thing I thought of. “I don’t care.”

Garrett started, his neck once again turning pink and his eyes widening just the slightest. He opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted by a honk from behind us; the light had turned green. So instead of saying anything, he hit the gas and took a left. He cleared his throat and reached for the Diet Pepsi sitting on top of the worn brown CD booklet, twisting off the cap as it hissed, not bothering to say anything else the rest of the ride to breakfast.