“Anyway,Emma,” – Shelby turned off the disagreement with Gigi and switched on the BS for my lady friend and me – “Rocky was framed. It wasn’t his fault. He was only borrowingthecar.”
I rolled my eyes. Anything that reflected negatively on my mother was sugar-coated with as many lies as possible. The truth was, fifteen months my junior, Rocky had been involved with shady people all his adult life and had been in and out of jail for years. The prison sentence resulted from a bust on a chop shop operation my brother ‘worked’ for. Rocky was the idiot who stole and strippedthecars.
“Don’t roll your eyes, Indiana-Jones.”
And there it was, bomb number two. Emma’s eyebrows rose to new heights as she attempted to quell the snickers. “Your name is IndianaJones?”
I glared at my mother. “Obviously not by choice… and just so you know, it’s not Indiana Jones but Indiana-Jones. She made sure to hyphenate the words, so teachers would be forced to use my full first name inclass.”
“Indiana-Jones,” Emma whispered to herself,amazed.
“It could have been worse. Her second choice was Obi-WanKenobi.”
“I’m a huge movie fan,” Shelby said, as if that explained saddling her son with a moniker that would get his ass kicked multiple timesaday.
“So, would your other son be Rocky-Balboathen?”
“Ah ha, you’re catching on,” I said, impressed. “You see the pattern forming here? And I have a younger sister named Princess-Buttercup and another namedPrincess-Leia.”
“They just don’t appreciate my creativity,” Shelby said, waving off my ridicule. “But without my flair for the dramatic, Indiana-Jones wouldn’t be where he is today. You know he’s a famous actor,right?”
“No, Shelby, notfamous…”
“You’ve been in elevenmovies.”
“Slasherflicks!”
“Still, that’s famous in my book,” shechallenged.
But not in Emma’s.She, of all people, could call bullshit on Shelby’s misguided proclamations of celebrity. I passed a repentant glance in Emma’s direction, but she seemed to be thriving in the stifling environment I waschokingin.
“Everyone in town knows who he is,” Shelby said, addressing Emma, pride swelling her already enflamed ego. “They ask for autographs andeverything.”
Oh, how I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Telling Emma, whose brother wasactuallyfamous, that I was a freaking celebrity was just mortifying. The remorseful expression I’d adopted from the earlier humiliation was still on my face, so I just allowed it to remain for this new wave ofmortification.
“How did you come upwithFinn?”
“My middle name:Finnegan.”
“So let me get this straight. Your full name is Indiana-Jones FinneganPerry?”
“Yep. That’s right. It’s a mouthful,isn’tit?”
“Now I see why the ticket lady wasquestioningyou.”
“When I decided to become an actor, I changed my name. I obviously couldn’t have Indiana-Jones on mySAGcard.”
“No. That probablywouldn’twork.”
“Anyway,” I said, hoping to move this torture along, “can I have my keys? Emma needs to get home, and I’ve got to show her how to get back on thefreeway.”
“In those clothes? You’ll get your car seats all jacked up. Go change. I’ll keep your prettysaviorbusy.”
My eyes swiveled in every direction, unsure what to do. How many more zingers did Shelby have in her arsenal? Of course, I knew the answer to that. When it came to embarrassing tidbits, she was a bottomless pit. And my mother wondered why I never introduced her to the women Idated.
“Go, Indiana-Jones,” Emma said, waving me off. “Shelby and I willbefine.”
Against my better judgment, I jogged down to the room Rocky and I had shared for years. It was now home to his kids, but our stuff was still there, lingering amongst all the newer clutter. It took me a minute or two to locate my brother’s things and another minute to change out of my soiled clothes. I knew giving too much time to Shelby would result in unimaginable humiliation, so I hurried my ass back downthehall.
