With my headphones on, I avoid eye contact and elbow my way to a seat. I’ve used BART for years and it still skeeves me out. You always, and I mean always, get the creepy leering guys who stare at you for a second too long. Muni is better because you’re usually aboveground, but it’s all public transportation. Which is why I carry Mace.
The doors slide shut, and the train takes off, bumpy at first, then slick and fast. The smudged windows expose the cement underground tunnel flying past. My reflection is a dark and pale blur, marred by red lipstick that lasted the entire day.
Dad’s in denial about the thousands of dollars in back rent, or he plans on letting Jesset terminate Bigmouth’s lease. Evict us. Fortunately, I’m made of tougher stuff than Dad. Or that’s what I tell myself as the train lurches to a stop and I move on autopilot, taking the stairs up to ground level.
San Francisco is a contradiction of hills and valleys, but I’ve lived here my whole life. According to the story, I was conceived in the bathroom on a ferry to an Alcatraz Island tour. Amusing, but super gross. Point being, San Francisco is my blood, it’s my oxygen, and when I die, I’ll have an urn at the Columbarium or my ashes scattered illegally across the city.
I start up a hill and pass pastel-colored houses, narrow and campy, on either side of the one-way street. With each pounding step, I try reassuring myself Bigmouth’s can survive Art Jesset. While I want to help my father—he’s the only parent I have left—I want to save Bigmouth’s more. Not for Bigmouth’s sake, but the bowling alley and San Francisco are linked. If we lose one, we lose the other. We can’t afford to live here, and our house belongs to the bank.
When I spot our yellow Victorian on the hill, the thought of moving from San Francisco to the barren desert wasteland of Arizona makes me want to scream. My grandfather bought the property in the sixties, the only reason our struggling middle-class family snagged such fine real estate in one of the most expensive cities in the United States. Even if it sold, and it’d go for over a million, we’d never be able to afford another house in the city until the bubble bursts. Thanks, housing crisis.
Nestled in the colorful Hayes Valley, our home belongs on a postcard, or at the least, in the opening credits of Full House. There’s no lawn, only a strip of sidewalk with flowering weeds, a single-car garage, and a small staircase leading to two stories of old-timey Victorian charm painted daffodil yellow. The front door is cherry red, the shutters white.
My mom died fourteen years ago, when I was three. I don’t remember how bad it was before Aunt Fee stepped in two years later. But I do remember my aunt’s face when she arrived at the yellow house, soaking in the wreckage, the disorganized chaos, and wondering if an earthquake had rolled through San Francisco and hit only our house.
We were a mess, inside and out. Yet we scraped by. We persevered. And there has to be a way to keep my family in San Francisco. Where we belong.
Four
AUNT FIONA CAN’T cook. The woman tries, and I’m thankful. But my stomach always does this inverted hunger growl whenever she gets innovative in the kitchen. My aunt loves Pinterest, and when she’s not writing articles for local magazines and various online platforms, she’s pinning ideas for meals. Recipes for experienced cooks with refined palates. Aunt Fee is not a chef; nor does she have a palate, let alone a refined one.
The smell of her dish mutating—I mean, cooking—downstairs is pungent in my attic bedroom. Like most ancient Victorian homes in San Francisco, the yellow house is narrow and tall, and my bedroom is a converted attic space. The ceiling slopes with the roof—peaked in some areas and feet from the floor in others—and the walls are unpainted. A twin-size bed rests in the center, and an ancient knotted rug covers most of the hardwood in nubby fabric and exotic designs. Aunt Fiona helped me decorate the plain walls with fairy lights, the delicate strands looped around nails in patterned swirls.
Along the dusty top of my bookshelf is the collection of wigs on mannequin heads I inherited from my mother. There are five in total—medium-length honey curls with a side bang, messy center-parted blond locks, French-chic black bob, super-long brown waves, and a peroxide-blond cut with blunt bangs. The mannequin’s faces are ancient, some pink and painted with eyes and makeup, others blank. All creepy, which is half of why I love them so much.
My cat, Jean Paul Gaultier, is curled into a bun on the edge of my mattress. For years I resisted the urge to adopt, because Beckett was highly allergic. Losing Beckett’s friendship allowed me to take in JP, and he became my new feline partner in crime. I kiss him on the head, and he opens his eyes only to glare at me.
I hang my coat on the rack and settle on the floor with my clunky old MacBook. First things first—I cancel my spot on the FIDM tour. Then I piece through one of my bags of vintage clothes, tossing the nicer items beside me. In the end, I find several high-quality pieces worth selling.
My heart aches as I style them on my dress form with jewelry, using an unpainted wall as a background, and snap stylized photographs with my phone. I had plans for these items—sewing them into something new, deconstructing them and harvesting the materials—and I hate parting with them like this. But it’s not like I’m swimming in options, so I suck it up. I list the less-fancy ones on my new eBay account with the auction closing in seventy-two hours. The nicer items go on Etsy.
There’s no way I’ll make eight grand, but it’s better than nothing. If I earn some money and turn it over to Dad, it’ll show him how much I care. How badly I want to stay in this city.
Dinner’s not ready yet, so I play a record on my secondhand Pioneer and slouch onto my bed with my phone, pulling open Instagram. After my friendship breakup with Beckett, I told myself I’d have four years of college to form real friendships. You know, with people who won’t betray my trust. But I’m not immune to loneliness.
Thank God for the Internet.
My fashion-centric Instagram account has amassed a small following. There, and on several vintage fashion forums, I’ve forged a few friendships. But the only person I’ve truly connected with is Mila—or MavenMody95. We met on an international vintage clothing forum last summer, and we co-run the Instagram account M&C Vintage. Our account has 10K followers, which is small compared to others, but it’s enough to keep my heart happy on my lonelier days.
While I post pictures of San Francisco and the truly unique items I find or sew, Mila—who lives in Poland—models clothes and makeup. Mila’s supposed to visit the States this summer, and we might meet in real life. Hopefully she’s online, because I need to vent about the bowling alley and Beckett Porter.
I switch from checking on our Instagram to WhatsApp, where Mila and I trade messages. But she’s not online. Not surprising; it’s early in Warsaw. With a sigh, I close the app and rest my phone on my chest. Sometimes it sucks when your only friend lives time zones away.
As hard as I try, my mind keeps circling back to Beckett. Usually, the Internet is a decent distraction, but not today. It’s impossible to forget what happened during lunch. Beckett’s outrageously weird offer has me on edge, but the sudden appearance of him is even more disconcerting. Why now? Because he feels bad for my dad?
When we were friends, Beckett was the son Dad never had. And yeah, he apologized. But he still hurt me, and trying to help save Bigmouth’s won’t repair the rift in our friendship. I press the heels of my palms to my eyes, forcing myself to forget about Beckett Porter and his super-illegal plan to earn eight grand.