V. Barras Tulacro

To Catch a Mockingbird Like Chocolate

Holden Caulfield was the first man Victoria ever loved. He played saxophone in the marching band, his upper lip puffed out when he played, and the soft blond hairs above his lip were barely visible. He was wickedly smart, quick to roll his eyes at a classmate's dull contribution. Later, he would become his class' salutatorian. But he wooed her with poetry, slipping it into her Spanish book, something she pretended to understand.

They spent weekends in her backyard, in the rotting hammock, the horses in the background brayed for the lover's attention. Sometimes he would paint her toenails, and sometimes she would feed him peach rings or spicy Fritos, grapes being way too cliché for the pair. This was the summer of '93, when Victoria wore heavy combat boots every day, even in the most feminine of dresses. When she took his virginity, he cried, which to her felt oddly successful: a sixteen-year-old boy crying in a cocoon of her Little Mermaid sheets. She promised not to tell, but promptly told all of her best friends.

Holden was difficult to get along with; some weeks willing to make out with her in the back of his dad's European minivan, sometimes banishing her from Thursday night Bible study. Nine months later she dumped him, exasperated by his prolonged moments of silence, and the wealth of guilt and anger that followed his lust. He cried, again, in band class no less, and when she tried to walk away he screamed he had never loved her. Only years later did she discover his poetry to be Pearl Jam songs. To this day, she still feels slightly victorious when she checks out his Facebook page and sees he's an ad exec. in Manhattan beach. Or whenever she hears Eddie Vedder croon, "Can't find a better man."

Atticus was next; the summer she went away to study literature in Ojai. He was in seminary at the college, chaperoning the boys' dorms. He was older than her—a real man, her mother would've said, her eyes wide and quaking. Atticus hunched longingly over large books in the dark-paneled library. She watched him for the first few days with youthful deference: the veins on the back of his hands, the black watch strapped to his wrist, the razor burn on his neck.

He played guitar around the campfire, while the other students acted out scenes from Troilus and Cressida. He had a voice like cream and it poured over her while the fire clapped. Atticus seemed wise beyond his years, and yet she couldn't understand why anyone would want to give their life to just one thing.

She waited for him outside of Mass, pretending to read lecture notes on the heartsick prince of Troy. Vicki, he stopped, his dark eyebrows raised in surprise, his dimples deep with pleasure. The Father came out onto the landing and called Atticus, but instead of allowing him to return, she grabbed his hand and ran. Through the tall grasses and behind the boys' dorm, they stumbled hand and hand, and didn't stop until they reached the creek, buried in a nest of white fir trees. They breathed heavily. She looped her fingers around his neck and he blinked forcefully behind his glasses. Please don't. But she did anyhow, pressing her mouth to his, pushing her tongue through lips that would confess hours later. In the cafeteria, the Father gave her a crooked look over his dry toast and black coffee, but she smiled back and stabbed at her potatoes O'Brien.

He tried to find any excuse not to be alone with her, but she was only fueled by this. One night, at campfire, he sang, You are too leggy of a blond and God is too good to me. She ran off into the mountains, and cried only when he didn't come after her. But each time she felt defeated by his willful abstinence, he caved long enough to slip his hands through her golden hair or up her pleated skirt.

The closest she ever came to conquering him was on a football Sunday. Her team was winning and the dip he had made in the commons' room was warm with bacteria. They were in his room; his guitar titled in the corner, the Bible split open on his desk, they were on his bed beneath a wooden cross. His boxers were still on, but she was naked, her belly button pierced with a small safety pin. She was reckless, standing up in front of the opened blinds to turn on the radio, but that's what she imagined Atticus loved about her. Jewel crooned about heartache and breakfast. Victoria twisted around him, but Atticus refused, his hands sweaty with sin.

She continued to hunt men in this way, finally tripping over Pedro Munquiz, a man with leathery hands and hazel eyes like olivine stones. His twin brother married her sister, which made their love difficult, if not somewhat incestuous. They loved when they could, and she bore two children, the son unmistakably Pedro's. This lasted eleven years, under shower heads and in strange rooms; their passion always in swells and droughts. To alleviate her agony, Victoria finally conceded to writing, though it was easier to work with pretend love stories than her own. In her office, she dreamed up men and women who she loved irrevocably and frantically.

She spent her days conflating ex-boyfriends with fictional characters she ached for. Until one day, Pedro, jealous of the novel she'd been sleeping with for years, crawled into her computer. When she saw he was there, his hair slick with anger, she followed, hungry for him. Instantly, the computer froze, their bodies tangled in each other, an elbow in the hard drive, toes into the circuit board. The screen seized and blinked; the hum of disk drive turned to a low growl. Afraid, Victoria grabbed onto the printer cable and slid out. Pedro never returned. After she said, There is nothing left to write about except passion and the loss thereof.

V. Barras Tulacro has been called Lady Shaq more than once in her life, and it is neither because she is black, nor does she play basketball.  She often eats cereal for desert and enjoys spouting off French idioms.  In ninth grade, she played the lead role in Romeo & Juliet, and continued to speak in a clipped British accent weeks after the production wrapped.  She is comfortable in 4 1/4" heels (which would help explain the Lady Shaq title).

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