Every Other Weekend

by Abigail Johnson

  I wanted it so badly that every inch of my skin tingled in anticipation.

  Unfortunately, there was plenty of info that chased that tingle away. I had to write an essay about why I wanted to be a filmmaker and the kinds of stories I wanted to tell, solicit a letter of recommendation from someone who could “discuss my creative strengths in relation to film and filmmaking,” and submit three short films. Between the first music video I’d made for Venomous Squid, the second one I’d already started storyboarding, and the undefined project that I was shooting with Adam, submitting the films wouldn’t be a problem, but my school didn’t have a film program so there weren’t any teachers I could ask to write me a letter, and the essay was weighing heavily on me. I knew how to tell a story visually—I could see it in my mind before I ever picked up a camera—but communicating through images was very different from communicating through words.

  The letter and essay weren’t even the worst obstacles though.

  Asking to go away for three months was going to be an issue with my parents, a hair-pulling, screaming, and possibly homicidal issue. What would they maliciously fight over if I wasn’t around?

  Then there was the cost. Dad had the money. Mom probably did, too, but getting either of them to part with it seemed utterly beyond me as I stared down at the figure.

  My fingers curled around the edges of the pages. I felt the paper cuts I was giving myself, but I didn’t care. I had to find a way to glimpse a future where I could tell the story I wanted, instead of starring in the never-ending nightmare my parents had cast me in.

  I rose up on my knees on my bed and, feeling very Vivien Leigh from Gone With the Wind, made my vow. “As God is my witness...”

  For some reason I thought of Adam as I struck my pose. If he’d been there, I’d have tried to get him to deliver a slightly modified Clark Gable line and say, “Frankly, my dear, it’s time to give a damn.”

  I think he’d have done it, too.

  He might have even let me draw a mustache on him.

  And I know he’d have offered to help me with my essay.

  He was still such a new part of my life, but he trespassed into my thoughts all the time. In that moment I imagined him sitting at my desk triple-checking whatever homework he’d brought with him and occasionally glancing over his shoulder to gauge my progress. My mouth curved up a little at the way his eyebrows would pinch together when he saw that I hadn’t even opened my laptop.

  “I’ve finished six months of extra credit for all my AP classes and you haven’t even started yet?” imaginary Adam would ask.

  “My muse will come to me when she’s ready,” I’d say.

  “See, I don’t think it works that way,” imaginary Adam would say. “I think you put words on a page, and then you put more words, and then after that, you put even more words. Good words, awful words, wrong words.”

  “That sounds wildly inefficient.”

  “As opposed to not writing any? Get enough of the wrong words down and see what you have left.”

  “Hmm,” I’d say. “Maybe you’re more than just a pretty face.”

  Imaginary Adam would wink at me. Okay, not even imaginary Adam would do that, but he’d smile at me and he’d make me pull my laptop onto my lap.

  And even though he wasn’t there, I filled my lungs with air and held it in until it started to hurt, then I let it out in a loud whoosh, opened a new document, and started typing.

  I want to become a filmmaker to escape my parents.

  I wrote another sentence, and another after that. I filled an entire page with awful, wrong words, and maybe, just maybe, a few that were okay.

  IN BETWEEN

  Jolene:

  You never told me what you’re dressing up as for Halloween.

  Adam:

  I don’t know your costume either?

  Jolene:

  I kind of don’t think I should tell you.

  Adam:

  Why not? Unless it’s, like, a sexy lawn gnome or something.

  Jolene:

  I guess it would be embarrassing if we dressed up in the same costume.

  Adam:

  Ha ha.

  Jolene:

  Okay, but prepare to feel bad about whatever your costume is.

  Adam:

  Okay.

  Jolene:

  I’m Chewbacca!

  Adam:

  That’s cool.

  Jolene:

  No, I mean I rented a legit Chewbacca costume. It even has mini stilts in the legs to make me Wookiee height. Like I could walk on the set of a Star Wars movie and everybody would be like, “Hey, Chewy.”

  Adam:

  Awesome! You have to send me a picture.

  Jolene:

  Totally. My friends Cherry and Gabe have this party every year and I never win the costume contest, but nobody’s beating Chewy. Okay, now you.

  Adam:

  I’m just helping out with the Halloween carnival at my church, so I didn’t go all out.

  Jolene:

  But you’re doing something, right?

  Adam:

  I found a purple suit at Goodwill, bought some spray-in green hair color, and face paint.

  Jolene:

  Okayyyyy?

  Adam:

  I’m the Joker.

  Jolene:

  Heath Ledger or Jared Leto version?

  Adam:

  Classic Joker.

  Jolene:

  Ah, Jack Nicholson. Very cool! Send me a pic, too.

  Adam:

  I will.

  Jolene:

  What are you doing later? And don’t say starting next week’s homework or your nerd status will transcend time and space.

  Adam:

  That’s not a thing.

  Jolene:

  Noooooooooo. I’m right?

  Adam:

  I have to go to someone’s house to work on a group project for school.

  Jolene:

  That’s still technically future homework, nerd boy. What’s the project?

  Adam:

  It’s an English thing.

  Jolene:

  An English thing? Do I detect a note of frustration? Let me guess, the other guy plays video games and ignores you while you write the whole thing?

  Adam:

  It’s a girl, and no, she does her share.

  Jolene:

  A girl? What’s her name?

  Adam:

  Why does that matter?

  Jolene:

  I’m just curious.

  Adam:

  Erica.

  Jolene:

  Do you always go to her house?

  Adam:

  So far. Why?

  Jolene:

  No reason. Are you almost done?

  Adam:

  Close. You haven’t told me what you’re doing tonight?

  Jolene:

  I guess I’m doing my own group project. I started filming a music video for my friend’s band.

  Adam:

  Cool.

  Jolene:

  It’s just footage of them playing the song for now, but I have ideas for the story element that I’ll shoot later on. G2G get my stuff together.

  Adam:

  I gotta go, too. TTYL.

  Jolene:

  I’d say have fun, but it’s you and school stuff, how could you not have fun?

  Jolene:

  What, no response?

  Jolene:

  Adam?

  Jolene:

  I guess I’ll catch you later.

  ADAM

  It wasn’t the first time she’d done it, but having Erica Porter wrap her arms around me wasn’t a sensat
ion I’d ever get over.

  “Adam, hi!” She squeezed me for a few seconds longer than she had the last time I’d come to her house, leaning into me in a way that forced all rational thought from my mind, like the fact that her dad was a few feet behind her and we were on her front porch. “Come in.” She pulled back, and I had to remind myself to let her go. “Dad, you remember Adam.”

  I stepped inside and shook his hand. “Mr. Porter.”

  He wasn’t a big man, but he had a presence, and he kept the pressure of his handshake strong and steady as he held my gaze, communicating very clearly that he was capable of protecting his daughter if need be and that there’d better not be a need.

  “How are you, Adam? Ready to get to work?” Even though I’d been to Erica’s house half a dozen times since we’d become partners, I’d only met her dad last week, because he’d been away on a military assignment.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You two have been working hard. Must be almost done.”

  In truth, we didn’t need to meet as often as we were. Our PowerPoint presentation was close to finished, and our report was half-written already.

  “It’s worth a quarter of our grade. We need it to be perfect.” Erica smiled at her dad, and after telling us to call out if we needed anything, he headed upstairs.

  “Sorry about my dad,” she tossed over her shoulder as she led the way to her kitchen and the rustic oak table we usually worked on. “He thinks every guy I bring over is waiting to maul me the second he turns his back. He’ll lighten up once he gets to know you.”

  I was betting he wouldn’t, but I kept that thought to myself as Erica grabbed us a couple Cherry Cokes from the fridge while I set my bag on the table. Wanting to agree with everything she said, I’d made the mistake of claiming it was my favorite flavor, too, when she’d offered me one the first time I came over, and now I had to choke down a can each time. I smiled when she handed it to me.

  “What about your dad?”

  I coughed, and the carbonation burned in my nose. “Uh, no. He’s not much of a tough guy.”

  “Hmm,” she said. “But you don’t have any sisters, just brothers?”

  “Brother,” I corrected, the burn spreading to my eyes.

  Her can halted at her mouth. Slowly she lowered it to the table. “Right. It’s been a little while and I forgot for a second. I’m sorry.”

  I shook my head. “It’s fine. Like you said, it was a while ago.”

  “I didn’t know him know him, but I do have this one memory of Greg helping my friend Missy when her cat fell through the ice in the middle of the pond by the elementary school a few winters ago. He jumped right in, didn’t even take his shoes off or anything. She still has the cat.” She let her gaze go unfocused from the memory before blinking and taking another drink, oblivious to the fact that my own can was denting in my hand. “He was really brave.”

  “Yeah,” I said, my voice low and gruff. She kept talking about how amazing Greg had been that day but I didn’t even hear the words. I knew the cat story. Actually, there was probably more than one. Greg had done stuff like that all the time without ever thinking about his own safety. He could have died saving Missy’s cat, found himself trapped under the ice, too, or had the edges break under his fingertips when he tried to climb back out, one-handed because the other was wrapped around a panicked cat. He could have frozen solid while Erica and her friend watched from the bank.

  “Oh,” Erica said, sliding closer to me and brushing her fingers over my face. I tried to shrug her off, but she only moved closer. “It’s okay,” she said. “I’m here.”

  She was there and she smelled like cherries, and the skin of her fingers was so soft as she brushed my cheek. The kitchen was empty, and the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen in real life was touching me. I couldn’t think clearly. My chest hurt like I was somehow trapped underneath thick layers of ice, feeling my thrashing limbs grow sluggish and heavy as I fought to free myself from a memory that wasn’t even mine.

  Greg hadn’t died in a pond or trapped beneath ice. He’d come home that day half-frozen but exhilarated, laughing as he told Mom about his latest rescue over a steaming cup of hot cocoa.

  “Weren’t you scared?” I’d asked him.

  “Sure,” he’d said, sucking a marshmallow into his mouth. “But I was more scared of watching a little girl witness her cat drown and seeing the panic in that animal’s eyes and knowing I could have helped but didn’t.” He’d grinned at me. “Plus, I’ve got thick skin. A little ice wouldn’t have hurt me.” But his teeth were still chattering, and there’d been a blue tinge lingering on his lips despite the hot cocoa.

  Later that night I’d heard Dad tell him he had to be more careful. Dad said he knew better than to tell Greg to let the next animal go, but to think of all of us, his mom, his little brothers, and how we would feel if he didn’t come home. Greg had given Dad his promise.

  But we’d still buried him a year later.

  And there I was in Erica Porter’s kitchen, surrounded by the cookie jars that her mom collected, trying not to let tears track down my face. Instead I tried to focus on her, on Erica and the way her gaze kept lowering to my mouth.

  Part of me knew what might happen, in that moment when it was just Erica and me and she was much too close and moving closer. The surprising thing was that, even though I’d thought about it for years, once it was happening, something felt off. It was more than the raw memory of my brother still wrapped around me, messing with my head. I’d expected to be more excited. Well, I was, but mostly I couldn’t help thinking that Erica’s hair wasn’t long enough, and that I wished her teeth weren’t so perfectly spaced. But it was one of those foggy thoughts that pass through the mind without any substance or lasting power. It had no sooner formed than it dissipated, and the girl of my dreams was an inch away from me. Only an idiot would have let that moment pass by.

  I wasn’t an idiot.

  FOURTH WEEKEND

  November 6–8

  Jolene

  Adam had become a parasite in my life, except not the gross tapeworm kind that coils in your intestines and steals all the nutrients from your body. He was like the benevolent kind that massaged your muscles and brain cells simultaneously, making you smarter and stronger at the same time. I didn’t think that kind of parasite existed, but, how awesome would it be if they did? I would call them Adamites.

  Adam took exception to my parasitic metaphor.

  “I’m the parasite? Me? You’re the one who climbed into my room!”

  “After you climbed onto my balcony.”

  “Still, you are clearly the parasite in this relationship. Also, I’m pretty sure the Adamites were an early cult of some kind.”

  “Why do you have to be such a know-it-all all the time? Fine, we’ll change the name. How about something with worm? A lot of parasites have worm in the name.”

  “How about we stop calling me a parasite entirely?”

  “Even a muscle-growing, brain-building kind?”

  “Yes. And how do you figure anyway?”

  “Well. I used to spend my weekends here watching movies in my room. Ever since you moved in, we go places, we talk about stuff. I’m moving and thinking. Those are the exact parasitic perks I attributed to you.”

  “Huh.”

  “What does huh mean in this context?”

  “I’m mildly less insulted.”

  “Oh, good. I did mildly mean to insult you as well as compliment you, so...where are we going anyway?”

  “What do you mean where are we going? I was following you.”

  It was Saturday afternoon and Adam and I were apparently wandering aimlessly around the neighborhood. It was one of those perfect snowy days. Everything was blanketed in white, and the snow had that iced edge to it that made it glitter in the bright sunlight and crunch underfoot. There wa
s no wind, no clouds. It was the kind of cold that made everything, including the air, feel clean.

  Adam hadn’t bothered with a hat or anything beyond his coat with the fleece collar. I was already regretting my scarf. It was almost too warm.

  “We could walk around,” I said. “Shoot the breeze, chew the fat, bandy words.”

  “That’s all we do anyway. Not all we do, but whatever we’re doing, we always talk.”

  “I know, but you realize there is still a ton we don’t know about each other. We sort of skipped the usual Q&A that most people go through.”

  Adam laughed. “’Cause we knew we were going to be stuck with each other regardless.”

  “Exactly.”

  “It worked out though.”

  “As far as you know. What if you find out I’m a closeted Trekkie or I discover you’re a Bronie?”

  “What’s a Bronie?”

  “A guy who likes My Little Pony.”

  Adam’s voice boomed, “WHO TOLD YOU?” When I stopped laughing, he said, “See? It’s too late. We’re already friends.”

  “I still have questions.”

  “I guess I do, too. You never told me much about that film program.”

  I hunched my shoulders a little. “It’s not a big deal,” I said, fiddling with the zipper on my jacket. “There’s a thing in LA for high school students. If I get accepted, I’ll get to learn all about moviemaking and, in my case, directing.”

  Adam’s eyebrows rose and I couldn’t tell if he was impressed or thought it was stupid.

  I hunched my shoulders more. “Like I said, it’s not a big deal.”

  “You’ll get accepted. You’re super bossy, and that music video you showed me was incredible.”

  I bit back a smile and scrunched up my face. “Am I really that bossy?”

  “Oh yeah, but isn’t that like a prerequisite for a director?”

  Deadly serious, I said, “I really hope so.”

  Adam laughed. “I think it’s cool.”

  “Yeah?”

  He nodded. “So what’s the application process?”

  “I have to write an essay, send in a few short films, and get a letter of recommendation from someone who can—” here I added air quotes “—discuss my creative strengths in relation to film and filmmaking.”