by Gregory Ashe
Chapter 28, Tuesday 27 September
I dropped into my seat at lunch, eyes grainy.
“You alright?” Shane asked.
“Yeah, you don’t look so good,” Mary said. There was a hint of satisfaction in her voice.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Just tired.”
“How much sleep did you get?” Wyatt asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. Too much time spent tossing on my bed, thinking about that damn tree, about growers, about my total helplessness. “Couple hours.”
“Ha,” Wyatt said. “I don’t get much more sometimes, but you don’t see me complaining.” He said it teasingly, but it still irritated me.
“I didn’t say anything,” I reminded him. “Shane did.”
“What are you doing up that late, Wyatt?” Shane said. “Wonder what we’d find if we did a quick search on your web history.”
Wyatt flushed as Taylor let out a giggle and slid closer to Shane. “Talking to Abby,” Wyatt said.
“You convince her to play WoW yet?” Shane said.
Wyatt shrugged. “Don’t really have time for it; we spend too much time talking.”
Shane let out a whistle. “Giving up WoW for a girl? This must be pretty serious.”
With a grin, Wyatt blushed and nodded.
“So?” Taylor asked, her close set eyes widening. “Did you ask her?”
“Oh yeah,” Wyatt said. “It was no big deal.”
“No big deal,” Shane said.
“Yeah,” Taylor said. “You were freaking out about it. What happened?”
“I made a video and sent it to her,” Wyatt said.
Shane whispered something in Taylor’s ear. She turned red, but she laughed.
Wyatt’s face looked like it was about to burst into flames. “Come on,” he said. “Grow up, Shane.”
“Sorry,” Shane said. “Sorry, I couldn’t help it. Go on.”
“That’s about it,” Wyatt said. “She said yes after she saw the movie.”
“You’re going with a girl you haven’t even met?” Mary asked.
“We’ve talked a ton,” Wyatt said. “And we’re going to meet at the Harvest Festival, the day before the dance.”
“Oh my God,” Mary said. “I would never just meet up with a guy.”
“Chill out, Mary,” Taylor said. “I’m sure Abby will be great.”
Mary stood and marched out of the cafeteria. I looked up and saw Olivia coming towards us. Still pale, she didn’t look like she was feeling much better, but then, what did I expect? Maybe staying away from the cemetery would help her; it seemed like her dad went through cycles. But I didn’t know, and that ignorance was like a knife in my gut. How did I help my girlfriend when I didn’t even know what exactly was happening?
“God, what’s her problem?” Taylor said.
Olivia sat down next to me. I reached out and squeezed her hand.
“How’re you?” Wyatt asked her.
“Feeling better,” Olivia said. “Just a rough weekend.”
“Flu?” Shane said.
Olivia nodded, picking up one of the chicken fingers from her lunch tray. “I got good news,” she said, giving me a smile.
“What?” Wyatt asked.
Before Olivia could speak, a shout cut through the chatter of the lunch room.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
In unison, we turned to find the source of the voice. Standing, her chair askew, Ashley Snyder, blonde, tan, beautiful, stared down at Mike. Ashley grabbed her bag, kicked her chair back, and took two steps into the middle of the lunch room. She turned, her blonde hair swaying.
“You’re a prick, you know that?”
And then she stormed out of the room, her face a mask of anger. Mike slid down in his seat, as though weighed down by all the stares. After a moment, he grabbed his backpack and slouched out of the room.
I stood up before I had even realized it; I could tell Mike was in pain, just from the way he walked, and I responded to that without thinking.
“Where are you going?” Taylor asked.
“I, uh—”
“They fight all the time, dude,” Shane said. “After a couple months, you’ll get used to Ashley making a scene.”
“No,” I said, scrambling to think. “I was going to check on Mary. She hasn’t come back yet.”
“Leave her alone,” Taylor said. “She’s been bitchy for weeks now.”
“I’m just gonna go check,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
I hurried out into the hall, looking for Mike. I don’t know why, but I headed toward the bathrooms where he had taken me after Chad and his friends had beaten me up. It wasn’t really a conscious decision; it just seemed as good a direction to go as anyway. Before I had made my way past the second stretch of saffron-colored lockers, Mary came around the corner, her eyes red, a streak of mascara escaping the corner of one eye. When she saw me, she froze, then turned around again.
“Mary, wait,” I said. I sprinted down the hall and caught her just as she went around the corner. At the next intersection, I saw Mike leaning with his forehead against a row of lockers. I hesitated for a moment, my eyes going back and forth between him and Mary.
“What?” Mary said. “What do you want? I’m fine.”
I gave Mike one last glance, then gave my attention to Mary. “What’s going on? You seem like you haven’t been, you know, very happy lately.”
“Yeah, right,” she said. “Thanks for asking, but I’m fine.”
“Look,” I said. “I know I haven’t been super friendly; things have been rough for me. More than just the move. Family stuff. A lot of things. I’m sorry I wasn’t very nice when I moved here. But you have been kind to me since my first day, even when I was a jerk; you’ve been a friend when a lot of people wrote me off. I’m grateful for that.”
“You’ve been pretty friendly to Olivia,” she said, her cheeks turning red again.
“Is that what this is about?” I said.
She let out a sigh that was almost a sob, and I saw tears leak down her cheeks. “No,” she finally said. “Yes. I don’t know. I mean, I thought you were cute, but I know we didn’t really have anything. You were just dark and mysterious; even kind of dangerous.”
“Until Chad beat the crap out of me,” I said.
She gave a hiccup-y laugh. “Well, I had my doubts after that,” she said with a smile. “But you were still cute. It wasn’t that you ended up with Olivia, though—I mean, I know she’s prettier than me, I’m not blind.”
“That’s not—” I started.
She talked over me. “It’s not a big deal, Alex. You don’t have to build up my self-esteem. It’s just that—this is going to sound so awful—but it’s just that, even Wyatt has a girlfriend now. I mean, what’s wrong with me? Why can’t I get a guy interested in me?”
“Nothing’s wrong with you, Mary. I mean come on, you’re great. And I’m not really the one to talk to about relationships.” I glanced over her shoulder at Mike, trying to ignore the coiled-spring tension inside my heart.
“Seems like you’re doing fine with Olivia,” Mary said.
“That’s just cause she’s incredibly patient with me being an ass all the time,” I said. Mary let out another half-crying laugh. “Look, Mary, you’re going to find a great guy. I don’t know, maybe it won’t be in this high school, or even this town. But there’s a big world out there, and you deserve to find the right guy, the one who likes you for who you are. And I imagine that making him a prize-winning pie will only help your case.”
This time she laughed for real, and she wiped her eyes. “Thanks, Alex.”
“I mean it,” I said.
“I know; that’s why everyone likes you,” she said. “Something about you. You’re so closed up that, when you actually do talk to someone, well, it’s kind of significant. You’re very . . . sincere, I guess. Not to mention you have the prettiest brown eyes I’ve ever seen on a guy.”
Sudd
enly I felt my cheeks burning. “Um, thanks?”
Mary laughed again. “Alright, I’m going to go wash my face. Don’t tell anyone about this, will you? I don’t want people feeling sorry for me.”
I nodded. “Not a word.”
“Thanks again, Alex.”
And with that, she was walking down the hallway, past the rows of lockers that here were painted a mint green. When she had gone a few yards, I started down the other way, and at the next hall I turned. Mike still stood there, arms and forehead pressing against the off-white lockers. It was strange to see him without the foci, without his amber ground. Like he was a different person here, someone I didn’t know as well as I thought. I traced the lines of his shoulders, of his side tapering to his waist, for a moment. It felt strange, like I was intruding on something private. Plus the fact that we didn’t ever talk at school. It just never seemed necessary. We moved in different worlds, and besides, I got to spend plenty of time talking to him when we were practicing quickening. But right now, I felt like I needed to do something.
“You ok?” I said.
He gave a jerk and glanced over his shoulder at me. No sign that he had been crying, but he did look a little messed up. Like he was carrying a great load.
“Perfect,” he said. “Just the person I need to see.” And then he set his head against the lockers again.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing, Asa,” he said. “I’m not trying to be rude, I promise, but—do you mind leaving me alone for a little bit? I need to be by myself.”
“Sure,” I said, but I could feel a gap widening between us. Something I had said, perhaps. Or not said. I couldn’t tell. “If you ever need to talk, or anything—”
He nodded his head, and I stopped talking. As I turned and started walking away, Mike said, “Hey, Asa.”
I turned. “Yeah?”
“Thanks for asking.”
And that made it better somehow, even if it wasn’t perfect. Strange how I could feel those shifts, the precariousness of the bridge that was stretched between us. In that moment, I had never been more aware of the difference between Mike and Olivia. The strange, thrilling, frightening rollercoaster of being near Mike. The solidity of what I felt for Olivia, the way it was rooted deep inside me, the calm of the storm in my soul. I felt strange comparing the two of them, but it seemed right somehow.
The rest of the day passed like normal, school and work a blur. I shifted the heavy, potted plants that sat along one side of the lot. Sweating and swearing, I rearranged them, bringing the best looking ones to the front, watering them, trimming dead branches or shoots. It was relatively easy, and it gave me something to think about, aside from my problems. The tension I felt building between what I felt for Mike and what I had with Olivia. The problem of the grower, which my mind circled like a vulture. My fears for Olivia. The sense of my own powerlessness. In contrast, the heavy plants, the humid, Midwestern summer, even Mr. Wood’s legible displeasure with me, they were all pleasant distractions.
“Alex,” Mr. Wood called from the store, his voice sharp as a whip.
I glanced back at him, letting a pot settle back onto the pallet. I felt a chill run up my spine when I saw him. Something was wrong. He was pale, showed none of the anger he normally did. Just seemed concerned. Frightened even.
“Get in here, quick; your dad is on the phone.”
I ran across the lot, unsure of why I ran, propelled by the fear that was settling across me. Mr. Wood passed me the phone, and I pressed it to my ear.
“Dad?”
“Alex,” Dad’s voice was cracked; I could barely understand him. “You’ve got to come to the hospital right now. Your mom—” here he broke down completely, and I could barely hear because of the blood pounding in my ears, the panic gripping my throat.
“Your mom tried to kill herself.”