Prologue
June 10, 1986
I hear my mother's shrill voice echoing throughout the neighborhood.
"Donald, I know you're hiding from me!"
I cringe at the sound. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard, only worse. Sometimes I have to hide from my mother. I know it's bad, but she gets on my nerves. A lot. So I disappear for a while until she regains her sanity. Right now I'm on the roof of our apartment building, messing around with a busted Radio Shack computer that I got from a pawn shop. Mom hates computers. She says they take away people's jobs. I think she's nuts, like right now, the reason she's screaming for me is because she wants me to help her fluff out Mr. Chuffy's tail for the dog show tomorrow. I'm not joking, though I wish I was. We have a Pomeranian named Mr. Chuffy and he eats better than I do.
I hear Mr. Chuffy barking. He's getting pissed off. Soon he'll be gnawing on the coffee table, while my mother chants to him about his inner child. I never knew dogs had inner children. I put on my headphones and turn up the volume of my Walkman as far as it can go. Now I can only hear Tears for Fears sing about people ruling the world. I look down at the sleepy town below me. We live in Cabin, Silver, Maryland not too far from the ocean. I can hear the ocean at night when I leave my bedroom window open. I press the keys on the keyboard of the computer. I'm gonna get this thing to work. I just know it. Just like I know the secret code to explain the universe, well I don't really know that, but I know I'll know it someday and I'll make a trillion dollars and marry that girl from Van Halen 's Hot For Teacher video who dances on the desk after class is dismissed. Hey, I can dream, can't I?
I feel someone grab my shoulder and yank off my headphones. I smell Aquanet hairspray and Charlie perfume. Sharp fingernails dig into my skin. I glance down at the hand that's claimed me, the wrist jangles with silver bracelets, and a diamond ring glitters in the sunshine. She really needs to take that damn thing off. Dad's been gone since fourth grade. I try to play it cool.
"Hey, Mom, how's it going?"
She rolls her eyes and pulls out a pack of cigarettes from the back pocket of her cut off shorts and lights one up.
"Like you didn't hear me before."
"I had on my headphones," I say, looking up at her.
She takes a drag from her cigarette and points to the computer.
"Not this again."
"Computers aren't bad."
She blows a few smoke rings.
"Mr. Chuffy is having a breakdown. He's nervous about tomorrow. Put that thing away."
"Mom, I'm inventing something."
"Inventing what?"
"I don't know yet. It's something major."
She flicks a few ashes and they drift about in the wind before landing between the keys of the keyboard.
"You need to meet a girl."
"What?"
"None of this is healthy."
"And fluffing a dog's tail is?"
"You know what I mean, Donald."
I turn away from her and look at a group of girls walking down the street. They were clad in neon colored bathing suits, their wet hair sticking to their tanned backs. Smooth legs, skinny limbs, narrow hips. A tall blonde tosses her head around as if she is the leader of the group, her legs go for miles and she's barefoot. She catches me watching them and she stares at me for a moment, narrowing her eyes. Then she whispers something to the girl next to her and they laugh. I look away. That's usually how girls see me. A joke. Or the guy to help them with algebra. My mother pats my head.
"Come on inside, it's hot as hell out here."
"Ok."
I pick up the computer and follow her into the building. My mother starts talking about Mr. Chuffy's new diet, but I'm not really listening. Instead my mind is filled with the blonde girl laughing at me, and my father's post card from Costa Rica, where he lives in a hut and eats coconuts all day. I make a checklist of what I need to invent: an artificial father to take me to the Science Museum, and a girl who likes nerds.
