My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One Night Stands | Page 4

This upset me deeply. I wanted her to be a

strong gladiator type, the kind of girl I envisioned myself at thirteen. A weight lifter with a

steadfast disposition and a designer wardrobe. But she was a sissy, and I could not follow

suit.

It was becoming clear to me that the only way out of this was to turn the tables on my fath-

er. Instead of running, I would never leave the basement. Not even if he begged me. I would

tell him how sickened I was by what I saw and that I now had reservations about going out in-

to the real world without a psychiatrist by my side. I would insist on therapy two to three times

a week and also insist that it take place during school hours. I would demand an entirely new

wardrobe and that they allow me to move into the master bedroom, while my parents took my

room. I would make them beg for my forgiveness while threatening them with lawsuits: unfit

parenting, involving a minor in sexual activities, pornographic exposure to a minor, the list

would go on and on. I saw Irreconcilable Differences. I was no dummy.

My father knocked on the door for the last time that night. “Are you ready to come out and

get your smack?”

“I want Mom,” I said. There was no response from the other side of the door. I wondered

how Sloane's sandwich tasted with her bloody lip. I wondered if the Huxtable children had

ever walked in on their parents having sex. It was important to occupy my mind with other

thoughts, so I decided to do some laundry. Maybe when my mother came and saw that all the

laundry had been done she would tell my father, who would come to the conclusion that I

wasn't such a bad kid after all. I took one look at the laundry machine with all its buttons and

dials and decided sleep was more appealing.

I woke up sometime in the middle of the night after feeling something crawl over my foot. I

jumped up and ran to the top of the stairs. Slowly, I opened the door. All the lights were out.

No one was in sight. I went straight to bed and fell asleep.

My father came in my room at seven A.M. to wake me up. “It's time to get up, love.” Then

he walked downstairs.

I was ecstatic. Sloane should have listened to me the whole time! I got dressed for school,

had a bowl of Lucky Charms in celebration of my personal victory, and brushed my teeth.

My father said he'd be outside warming up the car. You never knew which car this was be-

cause we had about ten in our driveway. My father fancied himself a used car dealer, but as I

understood it, “dealing” meant buying and then selling. Cars would pile up in our driveway for

years at a time, and on most mornings my father would have to jump-start one or more to get

us to school. Each car was more embarrassing than the next and none were made in the dec-

ade in which we lived.

I went outside and jumped into the car that was smoking, which was a fluorescent tur-

quoise Plymouth something or other with vinyl interior. I was flying so high from my victory, I

decided to compliment him on the car.

“I love this color, Dad.”

My firm yet supple seven-year-old ass had hardly touched the vinyl when my own father

sucker-slapped me. Right on my nose. I was in pure, titillated horror. I couldn't even respond

with words. I thought for sure my nose was broken, but then the tingling sensation died—just

when I was starting to enjoy it.

“You thought you were gonna get away without a smack, didn't you?” he said.

I instantly broke down and cried like a little girl. I knew, of course that I was a little girl, but

I did not like acting like one. And I was both hurt and angry at having to drive to school with

someone who just smacked me. I felt like such a moron for thinking I could outsmart my fath-

er with some lame compliment about his piece-of-shit car. This was definitely a feeling I didn't

like then, or the hundreds of times I've felt it since.

I didn't say anything the whole ride. When we reached the school, I got out and slammed

the door. He drove away with some sort of car part scraping the sidewalk, possibly the

muffler.

Now when I look back at that experience, I realize that maybe walking in on my parents in

all their glory was what led me to embrace my own sexuality. The way those two were enjoy-

ing themselves made me realize there was more to life than macaroni and cheese and The

Brady Bunch. I wanted in on that action and didn't appreciate having to wait another ten years

to get the real party started.

I wiped my tears, picked off a Lucky Charm that was stuck to