The Entomology of Parties
Roy’s tongue hurt.
A lot. He gingerly tried to pull it back into his mouth, but it was frozen fast
to the cast iron railing on his front porch. He made a little progress with his
next try, but it felt like the ice was pulling his taste buds off. He was just
about to pull some more when the door opened. Roy looked over and there was his
mother. She did that thing where she settled all of her weight back on one foot
and crossed her arms. “Again?” she said.
Roy gave his
tongue another tug. Halfway done.
“It’s December,
Roy,” his mom said. “What were you thinking?”
One last pull and
Roy was free from the railing. He turned to face his mother and puffed out his
chest. Half of his mouth felt somewhere between stinging pins and needles and numbness,
but he forced out the words, “I’m going da be a thienthist.” With that, Roy
picked up his book bag and walked into the house.
“Is that what you
were thinking when you put your legs in the arm holes of a life jacket and
jumped in the lake?”
Roy rolled his
eyes. “I was four.”
“You drowned.” She
helped him out of his thick parka and hung it up on the hook.
“Almost drowned,”
he corrected her and fought his way out of his boots.
“Whatever you say,
Roy. Now go get cleaned up. The guests will be arriving in only two hours.”
Great. Another
dinner party. Roy picked up his book bag and trudged up the stairs. He dropped
books on the floor with a thud and opened the drawer where he kept all of his
electronics. “How was school, Roy?” he asked in a pretend version of his mom’s
voice. “It was fine, mom. I got an A on my science test.” He grabbed the
microphone he’d built last month and started scanning for the matching speaker.
“That’s wonderful, Roy. I’m so proud of you.” He found the speaker and put it
on his desk next to the microphone. “Thanks, mom.” Roy tested the tuning and
checked the batteries. The broadcast should work for a few hours at least,
especially if he waited to turn on the speaker.
Roy turned on the
microphone and snuck into his mother’s room. He looked around and hid the
microphone under the vanity. His mom was still cooking for the evening’s party,
but he made sure he got out of there fast in case she needed to grab lipstick
or something.
Back in his room,
Roy changed into his nice trousers and an itchy, starchy white shirt. He jammed
his feet into his shiny, black dress shoes and combed his hair flat. He looked
himself over in the mirror. His mom’s clean and proper son looked back at him
out of the glass and shrugged. Roy frowned and defiantly snatched the tie
decorated with methane molecules.
He looked at the
clock. An hour left until the house would be filled with boring grownups. Loud
boring grownups. Loud boring grownups that think they’re interesting and funny.
Those were the worst kind of grownups ever. They did things like pinch cheeks
and pretend not to know about the things he learned in science class 2 years
ago. At least he hoped they were pretending.
As usual, Roy’s
mom went to get dressed for the party as soon as Roy’s dad got home. Even with
almost an hour to get ready, she was always still fixing her hair and makeup
for like 15 minutes after people started arriving. And it was always Roy’s job
to keep them entertained while they waited.
The first doorbell
rang 5 minutes early just like Roy expected. He straightened his tie, grabbed
his homemade speaker and marched down the stairs. After turning the speaker on
and leaving it behind a lamp in the living room, Roy opened the door. “Mr. and
Mrs. Sullivan, come on in,” Roy said.
“Hello Roy, dear,”
Mrs. Sullivan handed Roy her purse and smiled too big at him. He spun round
just fast enough to avoid getting pinched and put the purse in a closet.
“My parents will
be right down,” he explained and led them away from the entry. “There’s plenty
of seating available over here.”
The grownups sat
down on the couch and the lamp said in Roy’s mom’s voice, “Dan, honey, that was
the bell.”
The lamp responded
to itself in Roy’s dad’s voice, “Relax, Esther. Roy’s got it.”
“They’re early.
Who shows up to a dinner party early these days?” his mom said. His dad must
have just shrugged because the room was momentarily quiet.
The Sullivans were
unusually stiff and quiet on the couch.
Roy smirked.
The doorbell rang
again and Roy jumped up to go answer it. Soon the living room couches were
filling up with the Sullivans, the Greens, the Browns, the Yates’s, and the
Turners. With the dining room set for 13 people, that was everyone.
The living room
was quieter than it usually was when filled with 11 people. The only voices to
be heard were Roy’s parents and they weren’t even in the room!
“What do you
think, Dan? The red or the pink?”
“You’re about to
eat dinner. It’s just gonna get rubbed off anyway.”
“Oh, you’re just
useless at this.” There was a pause. “Did you have to invite the Browns?”
“You’re the one
who invited the Sullivans,” Roy’s dad said.
“Oh come on, Dan.”
Roy’s mom said. “You know what Sheila would do if she found out that we had the
Greens over without her.”
“Don’t you think
it’s a little quiet down there?”
“Just a bit, yeah.”
There was the
sound of Roy’s parents’ door closing and footsteps coming down the stairs. They
walked into an uncomfortably silent party. Everything was still until Roy
reached behind the lamp for his speaker. His mother’s jaw dropped a little when
she saw it. “You didn’t…”
Roy smirked.
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