by S. K. Falls
It’s a mask I wear, painted on thick
My skin miles underneath
I can’t see, can’t see the surface from here
But maybe it wasn’t meant for me.
A creeping sort of prickling crawled across my scalp, turning my guarded thoughts molten. I refused to acknowledge them, trickling into my brain, whispering: Look at us. Hear us.
Without looking at him, I slid the napkin back across the table. “This is… great.” The inadequate compliment sat between us, false and ugly. What I really meant was: You’ve performed magic with a fistful of words. How could your song be my song when we’ve only just met?
He shrugged and laughed a little, seemingly not offended by my apathy. “I’m still working on it. Writing the words down as soon as they come to me works best. I’ve tried holding on to them in here before”—he tapped one temple—“and… yeah. Not making that mistake again.”
“Do you sing, too?” I could imagine his voice, slightly rough around the edges when he talked, buffed to a rich baritone as he sang.
But the waiter interrupted us before Drew could answer, his arms full of a platter of steaming Chinese doughnuts. He smiled. “Enjoy.”
“Oh, we will, believe me,” Drew replied, shaking out his napkin.
I grabbed one of the steaming doughnuts with two fingers. Setting it down on my plate, I said, “This doughnut has a lot to live up to. I mean, you’ve built it up so much now. I’m expecting, like, a doughnut miracle.”
He laughed easily as he popped a whole doughnut into his mouth. He chewed as if in ecstasy, his eyes closed, face upturned. I watched him in awe, my gaze drawn to his mouth, his strong jaw. And then he opened his eyes and saw me staring at him. I looked away quickly, my cheeks heating.
“Aren’t you going to try one?” Though I wasn’t looking at him—couldn’t look at him—I heard the amused smile in his voice. It made me want to melt into a small puddle on the floor.
“Um, yeah.” I kept my eyes on the table as I bit into the warm, sweet dough. Wow. This was good. Unfortunately, the fact that Drew had just caught me staring at him made it impossible for me to actually show him I was enjoying it. I sat there, chewing robotically as I stared at the powder left behind on my plate. When I was done, I swallowed, took a sip of water, and reluctantly met his eye. “It’s good. Great.”
He was still smiling. I felt humiliation rise up again. I wanted to run out of the restaurant and forget about this whole thing. “You know, there’s no shame in admitting that you like something. That you’re enjoying it.”
I didn’t know if he was talking about the doughnut or him, so I just nodded vaguely. “Yeah. I know.” But I didn’t know, not really. My entire life I’d been playing it safe. Never letting friendships form, never letting on just how much I needed my mum. The only thing I’d ever reveled in without holding back was illness.
Thankfully, he let it drop after that.
We talked for the next few hours over more food, inconsequential nattering about New Hampshire and restaurants and the winter. Inoffensive. Casual. We talked like two people getting to know each other. Two people saving the best for later. I basked in the charade, unwilling to peel the curtain aside and peek at the truth. This was it for me. It’d never go further with Drew.
We stood outside as darkness gathered, saying good-bye. I tasted snow in the air as I talked, crystal cold. “I had a great time. But I… I want to clarify. This wasn’t a date.” It took an immense amount of effort for me to say the words, to confront the situation head-on. I’d see Drew again on Thursday, and it’d be more than awkward if we met up at Sphinx with two different impressions of what was going on.
His face didn’t fall; he didn’t get angry or tongue-tied. Instead, he held my gaze. “What are you so afraid of?”
My hand automatically flew toward my chest again, and I had to divert it at the last minute, as if I’d meant to play with the button at my throat all along. “Afraid? I’m not afraid. Of anything.”
In answer, he gently tucked a lock of hair behind my ear, setting my pulse skyrocketing. Leaning in, he said softly, “It’s okay, Grayson. We’re all scared.” Then he straightened up and smiled. “I’ll see you Thursday?”
By the time I nodded and scrounged up a “sure,” he was already walking away, tall body hunched over his cane.
Chapter Thirteen
I took a cab to Sphinx Thursday night. It felt too much like charity, asking Zee to pick me up. The bar was across town, halfway between where the both of us lived. And besides that, I wasn’t completely sure how to address the new dynamic between Drew and me. Would there even be a new dynamic? I was fairly sure there would be, but I wasn’t exactly a relationship guru. I felt more comfortable making an entrance on my own.
Sphinx was hopping. The lights had been turned down low and music played loudly, vibrating in my head before I was even inside. At the door, a chick about my age asked for my ID. I handed it over and she scanned for my age.
“Okay, so I can’t stamp you, since you’re not twenty-one yet,” she said, screwing up her little pierced nose as if this was a personal regret.
I nodded, and then I was allowed to roam around the world of legal-aged adults. Drew and Zee were already there, which I’d guessed from seeing her car outside. They sat at a little circular table, sipping beers.
“There she is!” Zee said, holding up her beer bottle to me. “Yay!”
I smiled, tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. I was very focused on not focusing on Drew. “Thanks for inviting me. This is nice in the evening.”
Drew laughed easily. His cane was hooked over his knee. The barstools were high, and the end of it didn’t quite reach the floor. “Don’t lie. It’s trashy and they play some awful Top 40 songs to get people to dance, but we like it.” I met his eye briefly, and something there caught, both of us remembering what had passed between us two days ago.
Then Zee leaned in toward me, like she was filling me in on an important secret, and the moment was gone. “Drew’s a celebrity with the night crowd.”
My first thought was, Because of his FA? But I pushed it aside for a more appropriate response. “Really?”
“Zee exaggerates just a tad.” He leaned forward, his elbows on the table. His black jacket sleeves slipped up, exposing the pale flesh of the underside of his arm. I had to tear my eyes away from this sudden expression of vulnerability, a flash of skin hidden from the rest of the world, but bared to me in this fleeting moment.
“Not really.”
I turned at the voice. Pierce was right behind me, pulling up another stool. I helped him, and he smiled gratefully. He was still wearing his mask. “Drew really is a celebrity with this crowd. He has an angel’s voice.”
I raised my eyebrows and turned back to Drew, remembering the song lyrics he’d let me read. “So you sing?” I almost said, So you sing, too? but caught myself at the last moment. Somehow I knew he hadn’t told either of them about our time together.
He raised one hand. “Guilty. I also play a little guitar.”
“That’s impressive,” I said. “Are you going to play tonight?”
“Nope, I’m just here to drink,” Drew replied.
“Are you allowed to drink?” The question flew from my mouth before I had a chance to stop it. My face felt like it was on fire. “I’m sorry. I… just ignore that.”
“It’s a valid question,” Drew said easily. “My doc told me I shouldn’t binge drink because it can really mess up my already less-than-stellar balance.”
I smiled a little, grateful for his ability to be tactful when I clearly wasn’t.
“I’m going to get a drink.” I hopped up from the stool. “Does anyone want anything?”
“I’ll take a house wine, Saylor. If that’s okay with you, I mean,” Pierce said, his eyes locking seriously on mine.
Aghast, I fell silent. I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
But then he burst out laughing. “Oh man, look at
your face! I’m kidding, dude. Relax.”
Zee laughed and Drew hit him lightly with the head of his cane. “Come on, bro, don’t scare her away.”
“Sorry, sorry.” Pierce raised both hands. “But you’ll get used to me, I swear.”
I laughed to show I didn’t mind his ribbing, that I belonged there with them and their jokes and levity. I was completely out of my element, but adamant that they wouldn’t catch on.
When I returned to our table with their drinks—turned out the bartender didn’t care about stamped or unstamped hands—and a smile still on my lips, Pierce and Zee were gone.
“They’re over there, dancing while they still can.” Drew gestured to the floor a couple of yards away.
“And you can’t anymore,” I said, sitting down. “Or do you just not like to dance?”
“More of the second, but I like to say it’s the first.” He grinned, took a sip of his beer. “What about you? Dancer or not?”
“Believe it or not, I haven’t ever been asked,” I said, taking a sip of my Dr Pepper.
Drew looked at me. I expected him to say something like, “Oh, I don’t believe that!” but he didn’t. I didn’t know whether to be appreciative for the lack of bullshit or slightly offended that it was so easy for him to believe me.
After a moment, I smiled over my glass. “So, uh, have you recovered from the insane amount of sugar you inhaled at China Garden?”
He laughed, but didn’t rush to answer. I was right, I realized; he didn’t want to talk about that here, though I wasn’t sure why. After another quiet moment, he said, “You seem to be doing fairly well. For having the aggressive version of MS. I knew a woman when I was little who had it, and she had the tremors within a few months of being diagnosed.”
I took another sip, as if having liquid in my mouth could be an unending excuse for not answering his unasked question. But finally, I swallowed, shrugged. “Yeah. I guess I’m lucky.” I couldn’t quite meet his eye.
“Lucky is one way to put it. Balanced at the edge of a hole with a man-eating lion in it is another.” He shook his head. “Sort of what I feel like most of the time.”
We sipped at our drinks as the speakers blasted out some pop song or another. Was it awkward? I couldn’t tell. We’d just met and we weren’t talking, which automatically might qualify as awkward territory. But somehow, sitting there, it didn’t feel like it. The silence wasn’t exactly a comfortable one either, though, because it seemed like we each had a lot we wanted to say, but couldn’t quite figure out how to start. I’d never experienced anything like it.
Even though I sat there and watched Pierce and Zee dance under the multicolored lights, my entire body was tuned in entirely to Drew’s frequency. I was hyperaware of his every movement, his hand grasping his beer bottle, his head nodding to the beat. I was the sunflower to his sun, following his every movement. The intensity of it all scared me a little. What was it about this boy? What was happening?
A few minutes later, Pierce and Zee made their way back to us. Zee’s shirt was drenched with sweat, her pale skin visible under the wet cotton. Pierce looked paler than usual, his hair plastered to his forehead.
“I think we overdid it,” he said, sitting down and pulling his wine close.
“Yeah, definitely.” Zee was trying to control her breathing. “Wouldn’t it be just awesome if I passed out here and they had to call an ambulance?”
Drew grabbed Zee’s purse off the back of her chair. “Okay, I’m taking you home.” He pulled her keys out.
“No. Way. In. Hell,” she said, struggling to pull the words out. “You can barely press the pedals with those wonky-ass feet.”
“He’s right, though, Zee,” Pierce said. “You need to be on your oxygen tonight.” He looked worried for her in spite of his own obvious overexertion, his eyebrows pulled together like one long black caterpillar. I didn’t quite know what to make of his selflessness. On the one hand, it was touching and noble, but on the other, I found it completely baffling that he’d downplay his own discomfort.
“I’ll take her,” I replied, before my brain had even processed that I was going to say it. “I can drive. I’m just not usually allowed to use my mother’s precious car.”
“I’ll come with, just in case she passes out and can’t direct you.” Drew shook his head and stood up, leaning heavily on his cane.
I turned to Pierce. “Would you like a ride home, too?”
“Nah,” he said, looking back out at the dance floor. “I’m gonna rest a bit and then head back out there. I had my eye on something pretty.”
I wondered, but not aloud, whether the pretty “thing” he had his eye on would bother tossing him a glance in his current state: harrowed, pale, sweating, and wearing a surgical mask.
“Okay,” I said instead. “See ya.”
Chapter Fourteen
In spite of the snow and ice threatening to derail our hastily assembled human train, Drew, Zee, and I made it safely across the parking lot to Zee’s car. Somehow, Drew and I managed to wrestle her into the front passenger seat. It wasn’t that she was heavy; she was just limp and way too tired to do anything for herself. Of course, Drew’s loss of balance and his cane didn’t help matters, and there were a few times I was intensely worried that we’d fall in a helpless heap to the frozen concrete. But finally, she was buckled in. Drew got in the back as I hurried over to the driver’s side.
By the time the car was in reverse, Zee had her head resting against the window, her breathing ragged.
I looked from her to Drew in the rearview mirror. “Should I drive to the hospital instead?”
Zee turned to me with some effort and shook her head. “Don’t. You. Dare. My mom… kill…” She didn’t finish her sentence, but I got the gist of it.
“Unfortunately, this has happened before,” Drew said from the back as I hit the gas and shot down the road. “Zee is, uh, famous for pushing herself to the edge.”
“It’s… the only way… to live,” Zee wheezed.
I arched an eyebrow. “Yeah. Clearly.”
“You say that now, but wait till your MS begins to catch up to you,” Drew said. “You’ll find yourself making not-great choices, too. Comes with the territory. Make a left here and then a right two miles down onto Ashley Street.”
I turned left. “Have you made some questionable decisions, too, then?” I asked him, looking into the rearview mirror again.
Zee wheezed and coughed, apparently laughing at my question.
Drew crinkled up his nose, which made him look adorable in a mischievous sort of way. “Uh… You could say that. My doctors suspected I had FA because I kept falling over. I swore the rugs in my apartment were moving, you know, defying gravity and rising up to tangle with my feet. Anyway, so after the tests and everything, when my doctor told me I’d likely lose my ability to walk sometime in my twenties, I got this crazed, competitive, ‘I’m going to defeat this thing, you just watch you stupid doctor, you’ mentality going on. So I blew my paycheck on hiking boots and a hiking backpack.”
“No.” I glanced up from the road into the rearview mirror yet again. “You didn’t.”
“He sure did,” Zee said, her breathing much calmer now. Her laugh actually sounded like a laugh.
“Yep, I went hiking that weekend. Alone, up in the White Mountains.”
“And?” I turned on Ashley Street.
“Go about a mile and a half and then make a left onto Cameron Street.” He cleared his throat. “And I was lucky my cell phone got a signal out there or I might’ve died in the wilderness like an asshole. My friend Zach came and got me, took me home. I was fine once I got some rest and took off those damn boots.”
“Wow.” I shook my head slowly, trying to imagine someone with Drew’s limping, slow gait hiking a mountain. “Wow.”
“Yep. We all do it. Stupid decisions based on panic and defiance.”
“Mm hmm,” Zee said. “Like me. I just found out I’ve got mets in my lungs. Can’t
stop me from dancing or doing other stuff, though. I guess I’ll learn at some point.” She looked at me, grinning. “Maybe.”
It made me vaguely uncomfortable, talking to them like I was a part of their club. I had no right to do it, to claim their friendship through this channel, by pretending to be just as sick, just as unfortunate.
But a part of me loved the power. I loved being the girl I’d wanted to be since the day I swallowed that needle at seven years old, I loved wearing the badge of disease proudly instead of clutching it in my sweaty hand while my therapist posited why, exactly, I was so screwed up.
I turned on Cameron Street, and Zee pointed to a squat brick house to our right. “That’s me. You can keep my car. Just come pick me up tomorrow and we’ll hang out again.”
“Only if you promise you won’t dance,” I teased.
Zee laughed a little shakily. “I promise.”
“Want me to help you to your door?”
“Nope, I’m feeling better.” She opened the car door and heaved herself out into the frigid night. “See ya, losers.”
“Bye.”
Drew got out and made his way around to where Zee’d been sitting. He gave her a brief hug, one I examined very closely. Could they really be such great friends, going through such similar, life-changing experiences and be strictly platonic? The big cynical bitch inside me smirked at the idea. But I saw no evidence of anything but friendship in the hug, at least from Drew’s side. Zee might’ve held on just a second too long. Then again, she was tired. Maybe it was just that.
As we pulled out of her driveway in her car, I watched her hobble up the drive and let herself in to her house. When the door closed behind her, the night was silent and still once again, as if she’d never existed. The world went on.
Chapter Fifteen
I drove back down the street, the streetlights striping the car in brief flashes of orange. Drew was in the passenger seat beside me, his knees up because his legs were too long for the small space, even with the seat pushed as far back as it would go. “So, where do you want to go next?”