Twenty-Nine
This year, for our combined birthday party, Paul and I are trying something new. Not another pool party. Nothing that requires paper plates or streamers or a store-bought buttercream cake. We decide this summer has seen enough pool parties. We decide that since we are turning eighteen and twenty, we should celebrate like adults. We’re a little ironic about it, but we’re a little serious, too.
So we plan a dinner. A joint family dinner to take place at my house. We plan it for the night of August 27—the date positioned evenly between our two birthdays. It’s a Thursday night, nothing special, and no one else is allowed to help us prepare. Paul comes over to the house at four o’clock, right after his astronomy class at BCTC , and he and I cook the meal to a playlist that’s an even mix of Travis songs for him and St. Vincent songs for me. Closer to six o’clock, I light candles, even though it’s still sunny outside.
Mrs. Harlow is away on one of her business trips, but Mr. Harlow and Jack arrive and join my parents in the dining room. Paul and I come in and place the food on the table: a large salad of mixed greens tossed in vinaigrette, a basket of hot Sister Schubert’s rolls, and the main event, fettuccine Alfredo. Because fettuccine Alfredo is Paul’s favorite dish too.
“This is so wrong,” Jack says, once we’re all seated. “I can’t believe you cooked your own birthday dinner.”
“Not the cake, though,” says Dad. “The cake was all me.”
This is because Dad threatened to ground me if I made my own birthday dessert. Apparently, that is a line birthday girls do not cross.
“We’re adults,” I tell Jack. “Adults cook their own birthday dinners.”
“Don’t lecture me on what adults do,” she says. “Adults go to fancy restaurants and get drunk on fine wines. That is what adults do.”
“And where are you getting that information?” Mr. Harlow asks her, but Jack shrugs enigmatically and reaches for the salad tongs.
Mr. Harlow does not look good. He is thinner, though I don’t know if he began to look like that before his chemotherapy and I am just now taking note. He doesn’t look good, but he’s wearing his usual unaffected smile. According to Jack and Paul, he’s still gardening every day.
I offer him the platter of fettuccine first, ignoring an ugly look from Jack, who has already accused me once of treating her dad differently since the diagnosis. She says I was much cooler about the cancer thing as a kid than as a teenager, and I remind her that when I was a kid I was pretty self-absorbed and didn’t know what “prostate” meant. Regardless of Jack’s dirty looks, I think Mr. Harlow deserves the first serving of pasta.
It’s been years since our two families have had a dinner like this. We used to do them a lot more often when Jack and Paul and I were little. Mr. and Mrs. Harlow and my parents would eat in the dining room, and we kids would scarf down our food at the kitchen table before running into the living room to watch Disney movies. Recently, I started to get nostalgic about those dinners. I told Paul we should reinstate them, and he agreed, and what better occasion for dinner than our joint birthday celebration?
Things won’t be the way they were before, of course, because Klaudie is no longer here, and these days sneaking a glass of red wine sounds a lot more fun than repeated viewings of The Little Mermaid . But I like this new way. I think I like it even better than my memories.
Dad has made us a hot chocolate meringue cake, which is just as ridiculous as it sounds. He places a single candle in the center, and everyone sings “Happy Birthday” before Paul and I blow out the flame. Then Dad sloppily slices the cake—there’s no way to do it but sloppily—and we dig into our crunchy slices with forks and knives.
Somehow, our parents get to talking politics, and that is when I throw down my napkin and say, “Is it all right if we head to the living room?”
“Tash, honey, what have I taught you?” says Dad. “Birthday girls do not ask , they inform .”
“Okay. Dad. Mom. Mr. Harlow. We’re going to adjourn to the living room.”
This satisfies Dad, who flings his arm toward the living room in a gesture fitting a benevolent dictator.
So in a way, this night is turning out like all those memories. I’m actually about to suggest we pick out one of our old Disney DVD s, when Paul places a small, square package in my hand. It’s wrapped in black-and-white-striped wrapping paper.
“What’s this?” I ask. “My present?”
I already gave Paul his present on his real birthday, three days ago. It was a giant bag stuffed with packages of white chocolate macadamia nut cookies, Mr. Goodbar candy bars, and three 2-liters of Dr Pepper—all Paul’s favorite snacks. At the bottom of the bag was some quirky book I found at Urban Outfitters called College Students—Where Are They Now? Subtitle: Dead, Unfulfilled, or Having a Midlife Crisis. Tucked in the front flap of the book is an unevenly cut slip of computer paper with a handwritten note that reads, IOU one Ping-Pong table, once I have money.
I wasn’t expecting a gift in return until three days after today, on my actual birthday. This seems to be what’s on Jack’s mind too, because she says, “Paul, you effing asshat, how dare you.”
Paul shrugs and taps the edge of the present, a pleased smile on his face.
“You want me to open it now?” I ask.
“Of course.”
I take a seat on the couch, next to Jack, who is aiming lethal laser eye beams at Paul.
Paul pays no heed and instead sprawls out on the floor. His natural resting state.
I rip open the paper to reveal a wadded-up bunch of soft, jersey knit fabric. I lift it from my lap and it falls into its true shape. It’s a light blue T-shirt in my size. On the front is the Seedling Productions logo Paul designed for us. The colors of the watermelon and sunburst are vibrant; they pop right off the tee. On the back, written in glittery black lettering, are the words Team Zarlow .
Jack cusses low and long. She rounds it off with a kick to Paul’s shin and says, “Thanks a lot. Now I’m going to have to buy her a private island.”
Paul props his neck on his folded arms and gives me a hopeful smile.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” I say. “You know it’s perfect.”
He settles his strained neck back down, smiling away.
Jack says, “Seedling Productions, you bastard brain child.”
“Our blessing and our curse,” I agree.
Moments like this I still have trouble believing Unhappy Families is all over and we’re not just on some extra long hiatus. I’m not sure I’ll ever fully believe it until I start filming something new.
Jack says, “So, I pulled a total you the other night, Tash, and made this list about what we can do to improve our game.”
“Uh-huuuh?” I say cautiously.
“I think one of our goals should be to purposefully not pick up any more fans. I can’t deal with the pressure.”
I grin. “Me neither.”
“In fact, maybe we should do something that will scare off some followers.”
Paul lifts a hand and says, “Get me to act in your next production. Better yet, get me to sing.”
“No,” says Jack. “YouTube thrives on people making idiots of themselves. We’d go even more viral.”
“I’m sure we’ll think of something,” I say. “Who knows? Maybe we’ll get lucky and pick up a few more silverspunnnx23s and Horn-Rimmed Glasses Girls.”
“We can only hope.”
• • •
Isn’t it funny how something can be serious for so long until one day it isn’t? One day it becomes a joke. One day you can laugh about it, and the effort doesn’t ache or rip out any sutures. It’s painlessly amusing.
That’s how I know Seedling Productions will start another project. It’s how I know I am over the haters and disappointments and not-quite-professional moments of Unhappy Families . That’s how I know I’m ready for a whole new wave of hate and disappointment and unprofessionalism.
A few weeks later, when I tell Jack and Paul about my new idea for a vlog, they both ask if I’m really okay with being that open. Because a vlog like this won’t be a made-up story or tea-guzzling fangirling. And when critics come after me this time, the wounds might cut deeper.
I’ve thought about this, though. I’ve thought about it a lot. I’ve decided I can’t be the only girl in the world whose mom got pregnant way later than usual. Whose best friends’ dad is duking it out with cancer. Who loves Jane Austen and J. J. Abrams. Who has awesome, artsy friends. Who’s nervous about college. Who misses her older sister. Who identifies as romantic asexual. Not a robot, not a freak, not confused . Just a girl.
Out of all Seedling Productions’ current 84,203 subscribers, there has to be someone else who is, feels, experiences at least one of those things. So I’ve decided to talk about them, without tea and without Tolstoy. I might never live a life as impressive as Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy’s. I might not be the next Francis Ford Coppola. But now that I understand a little better what it takes to be both those guys, I don’t think I want it. I just want to be . . . honest. I’m going to say what’s on my mind in a topical video every Monday morning. It may be a disaster. It may bring the trolls out from all the dark corridors of the Internet. It’s a splendifying prospect—and at the moment, it’s more terrifying than splendid. But it might be exactly what I need.
I turn on the camera. I settle in my seat. I look straight into the lens.
“Hi, guys! It’s Tash here, officially back from hiatus. Today, I’m excited to announce a new project. . . .”