A Flicker in the Clarity

by Amy McNamara

  I slide forward in thick socks and unlock the flimsy glass door between us.

  “Um, hi?” I say, a little confused by his sudden appearance.

  “Hi . . .” He thrusts a warm, cloth-wrapped bundle at me.

  “What’s this?” I ask, taking it.

  “Colcannon,” he says. “My mom was going to send a shepherd’s pie, but she wasn’t sure if you guys ate meat, so she sent this instead.”

  I lift a corner of the cloth and a little steam escapes. Buttery mashed potatoes with what looks like leeks. My mouth waters.

  “And that’s one of the dish towels we sell in the store—it’s for you—you can keep it.”

  “Wow, thanks,” I say. For some reason I’m always embarrassed when people give me stuff. I feel like I should have something to offer in return. “How’d you know where I live?”

  “I’m good at finding people,” he laughs. When I don’t laugh with him, he clears his throat. “Wow. Sorry. That sounded super stalkery.” He laughs again, scratches his head. “No, you gave my mom your address. For your clothes?”

  I must still not look convinced. He looks at his feet a second.

  “She made me come. After she saw the mess in the shop she felt like she hadn’t properly thanked you for saving those posters. She says to tell you to come by anytime and pick one, if you want.”

  “Cool, thanks,” I say, embarrassed again.

  I catch our reflection in the mirrored wall. He looks cute, if a little nervous, and I’m a total disaster. Lying on the couch did my face no favors. I shift the dish to one hand and pull the wide neck of the sweatshirt back up on my shoulder.

  Someone lays on a car horn outside.

  Theo’s head whips toward the door. A beat-up VW van edges into sight with a round, very white-haired man at the wheel. Dwarfing him in the passenger seat is a massive, drooling Great Dane.

  “Yeah . . . so that’s my dad,” Theo says with an embarrassed laugh. “And showing up at your building with an old guy in a beat-up van probably totally ups the stalker quotient, but I assure you, we’re both harmless.”

  The dog barks then, a great baritone woof.

  “Chester, on the other hand . . .” Theo tilts his head toward the dog. “That dude’s a total perv.”

  I laugh. “Well, thanks for coming by.”

  “I had an errand to run over here anyway.”

  Theo turns toward the door, then stops and squints at me. His irises are so pale it’s like being caught in the gaze of an arctic fox.

  “You look kind of weird.”

  “Thanks.” On reflex, I reach up to my hair. It’s twisted in the world’s messiest topknot.

  “Everything cool?”

  “Yeah, I guess.” I shrug.

  Mr. Gray lays on the horn again.

  Theo makes a face, then checks his watch.

  “Uh, you wanna go for a coffee or something? I mean, do you have time? Like, now?”

  He can’t be asking me out. Not when I look like this. I don’t get to answer, though, because Theo’s dad hits the horn again, then taps his watch, waving impatiently for Theo to come.

  Theo sighs. “Gimme a sec,” he says, stepping out.

  I stand awkwardly in the doorway, holding the warm colcannon, while Theo talks to his dad. People’s dads make me nervous.

  Theo leans his whole upper body in through the passenger window and pulls out a sweatshirt and a set of keys on a thick string. The dog sticks its head out the window over Theo’s back and barks another juicy woof.

  Theo slips out from under him, says something, then pats the roof of the van. His dad nods and pulls away, gunning it down our block.

  “Wait! Hang on a sec!” Theo shouts, sprinting after him. I step out a little more to watch. As he runs, he pulls the gray sweatshirt on inside out.

  His dad brakes, midblock, and lets Theo catch up. He leans in the window another second. Then the Westfalia tears off again and Theo sprints back to my door, his wallet in hand.

  “Total menace,” he pants, rolling his eyes. “He’s the world’s worst driver. It doesn’t help that the cut-rate mechanic he uses to keep that thing going has the idle set at like forty miles per hour. He’s going to kill someone one of these days.”

  He stops himself a second. Takes a breath, then grins at me kind of sheepishly.

  “Uh, I hope you’re going to say yes,” he laughs. “I probably should have waited for that.”

  Emma called me a chicken, but a chicken wouldn’t go out with this strange, cute stalker guy.

  I look him right in the eye. “Gimme ten minutes.”

  The First Hold

  I’M DOWN IN TEN LOOKING PRESENTABLE—considering the circumstances—in a nubbly oversize sweater my mom gave me for Christmas and a scarf Emma says makes my eyes look extra gray.

  Theo’s cross-legged on the upper ledge of the planter box outside the door, eating a granola bar.

  “Wasn’t sure if you were coming back or not.” He hops down, popping the last bite in his mouth and shoving the wrapper in a pocket.

  “Hey,” he says, turning on the smile, the one that caught me first thing this morning and made me forget all the chatter in my head. “Wanna go someplace kind of cool?”

  “Where?”

  He grins at me sideways, flashing the edge of that crooked tooth.

  “Very mysterious . . . ,” I say.

  “Yes or no?”

  “Sure.” I shrug, trying to act totally cool, and not like this is the most exciting thing I’ve done in a long time. I send a quick text to my mom so she won’t wonder where I am when she gets home.

  “You were at the gym?” I gesture to his clothes as we head down the block.

  “Boxing,” he says, walking fast.

  I try to keep up. Earlier I thought he was trying to ditch me, but maybe this is just his speed.

  “Wow, for real? Hitting people?” I mime like I’m a fighter, make a fist and send it out toward an imaginary jaw.

  “For real.” He eyes my fist with a smirk.

  “What?” I pretend to be offended. “I know nothing about sports. Are you trying to tell me my form’s no good?” I smirk back.

  “Could use work.”

  “Is it for your act—for the tour?”

  He scoffs. “Boxing? Hardly.”

  His answers are so terse it occurs to me that boxing might be one of those secret tests his brother was talking about.

  I give up trotting like a Chihuahua and drop back.

  He notices and slows a little.

  “Why?” I say.

  “Why what?”

  “Why box?”

  Theo turns like he’s assessing me or something before he answers.

  “I like it,” he says finally.

  “Illuminating, thanks.” If this is a secret test, I failed.

  We wait at a light in awkward silence. Theo is kind of like those swimming holes, full of unexpected cold spots. I look away from him. What’s left of the sun is lazy and pink, slumping lower and lower. I wrap my scarf a little tighter.

  He pulls his sleeves down over his hands. Clears his throat. “Sorry. I just had a giant fight with my parents about it. They want me to stop boxing, among other things.”

  “Will you?”

  “No way.” His voice is clipped, tight.

  The light changes and we cross, heading west toward the Hudson.

  “Wow.” I’m mystified. “You like it that much.”

  “Yeah. Makes me feel better.”

  “Violence makes you feel better. Interesting. Do you always need stitches?”

  He shakes his head, like what I’ve said is a disappointment.

  “Boxing and violence. Not the same thing.”

  “Your face begs to differ.” I point to his lip.

  “This was something else—after the gym.”

  I wait for him to explain, but he doesn’t. Another mystery.

  The wind picks up and blows Theo’s hair down into his eyes. He pushes it b
ack, revealing his forehead. It makes him look younger.

  I try to make light. “So, getting pounded makes you feel better?”

  Theo laughs and looks at me, eyes twinkling.

  “Ah, but you have it backward. I do the pounding.” He pulls a knit hat from the pocket of his sweatshirt and yanks it down over all that hair.

  “I can’t imagine it. . . .” I hunch my shoulders and curl my hands in front of my face, trying to see it. “Someone’s fist flying at me?” I shudder involuntarily. “I’d turn and run out of there so fast.”

  This earns me another laugh. But it’s true, I’m scared of conflict, physical or otherwise.

  Theo keeps walking, eyes down, like he’s thinking. His smile’s faded and I can’t read his mood.

  “So . . . what, then?” I try. “Why do people box? I don’t get it. Why do you? Are you some kind of angry person?”

  His head whips up.

  “Not when I’m boxing . . .”

  “I don’t like anger,” I say.

  He pauses a beat, then his eyes meet mine. “If you don’t like anger, then you don’t like a part of yourself.”

  I focus on the sky. Thready pink clouds trail over us like the sun’s fading wake. I may have misread this—Theo, the day, everything. It wouldn’t be the first time. What I took for flirting was something else, some other frequency coming off this mood-wild blond boy.

  “No one likes it.” I forge on, my heart adding a few extra beats. “Anger’s poison.”

  When I say it, Theo’s eyes flash so pale and sharp I nearly flinch.

  “Anger’s only poison if you deny it, keep it in.” His voice is tight.

  A man walking in front of us lights up a cigarette. A gray cloud envelops us.

  “And that’s literal poison,” Theo says, taking my arm and cutting over to the other side of the street. “Sorry,” he says. “Asthma. But let me ask you this . . . what did you do this afternoon?” He stops a second and brushes the top of my cheek, just below my eye, with the tip of his finger. My heart minnows. “You had a rough day?”

  I swallow, hard. Sometimes when people speak the plain truth it makes me cry.

  “It wasn’t the soda,” I say, so he won’t feel responsible. “It was something else.”

  He nods. “A little sparring might have done you some good. You should try it.”

  I picture it, me in those huge gloves, lips bulged out over a mouth guard. I’d look so badass. The image makes me smile. In my mind I start mapping a ring. A perfect square. Dotted lines crisscrossing it like ferry routes or steps for a ballroom dance, arrowing this way, then that. In one corner, Evie’s prefight optimism, in the other . . . blank.

  “Could my opponent wear an effigy mask?” I ask.

  “That’s an awesomely weird question.” He eyes me from a new angle. “Whose face?”

  I was picturing my own, or Alice’s, but I open my mouth and Emma comes out.

  I try to swallow it back. Fail. Theo raises his eyebrows but doesn’t ask.

  I’m mad at Emma. The revelation’s so big I almost step off the curb against the light, but Theo catches me by the elbow. I squint at him. He read me. Pegged it. I spent the afternoon feeling bad for failing her when she’s dealing with some Mamie situation, but I think I might actually be pissed. I mean, Mamie? And why’d she tell Alice whatever’s going on instead of me?

  There’s a gap between us now, a widening crack that wasn’t there before. I’ve been telling myself it’s because of Patrick, but it started earlier than that. I felt it when Emma started doing stuff with guys. She acted like she outgrew me. Maybe it’s not two-way between us now, maybe she doesn’t need me anymore. A pained oh! slips out.

  Theo looks at me, but I keep my eyes straight ahead.

  Why didn’t I go find her after Alice’s instead of slouching home to lie like a lump on the couch?

  I sigh, huge. I can’t help it.

  “That bad, huh?” Theo checks me lightly with his shoulder.

  I say nothing.

  We turn down a block flanked by a high brick wall.

  “Here we are,” he says, stopping midblock.

  “Huh?” There’s nothing on this side of the street other than this wall.

  “Ready?”

  “For what?”

  He turns my shoulders so I’m facing the bricks and pats them with his hand. “This. How are you at climbing?”

  The wall is high, ten feet easy, and runs the length of the block. All I can see on the other side are the tops of tall trees and spires of a churchy-looking building down at the far end.

  “Ha ha.”

  “No joke,” he says, face straight.

  “You brought me to a cemetery and it’s not a joke? No thanks.”

  He cocks a brow and laughs. “Scared of cemeteries?”

  “Not really. That’s where my dad is.”

  It’s mean of me to drop it on him like that, but he’s trying to make me scale a wall. Desperate times.

  Theo looks surprised.

  “Oh, sorry. I didn’t know. Shit. But it’s not a . . . it’s a garden. Come over here.”

  He grabs my hand and brings me to a section of the wall where some bricks protrude and others have crumbled away or are missing. The year 1820 is chiseled in a cornerstone.

  “See? These are your footholds. It’s like climbing a ladder.” He smiles at me.

  I stare back at him.

  “Are you insane? You’re not kidding. You seriously want me to scale this wall? People lock stuff in New York on purpose. To keep us out.”

  He kicks his head back a bit and looks at me. “So you follow all the rules?”

  I say nothing.

  “Come on.” He pats the wall. “Don’t be scared. Live a little. It’s fun.”

  “I’m not scared!” I protest, but I am. Terrified. I’m no climber.

  Theo presses himself flat to the bricks and, gripping the top of one that juts out, he scrambles up a few feet, makes it look easy, the toes of his sneakers wedged into a crevice here, stepping on a broken brick there. He climbs to the top, then jumps back down next to me.

  “See? I’ll stay here in case you need a boost, but you won’t. The first few holds are the trickiest, but once you’re up, grab the top and swing your leg over. It’s worth it, I promise. There’s this iron pergola thing on the other side. Use that to climb down. I’ll be right behind you.”

  I touch the rough wall. “I’m going to fall and break my neck.”

  “No you won’t, and you won’t regret it. It’s beautiful in there.”

  “It’s winter.”

  “Even in winter.”

  The more cautious parts of my brain are strongly urging me to get out of here. For all I know, once I’m trapped in there he’s going to strangle me or worse.

  He looks at me all innocent. The downward-sinking sun shines through a curl below his ear and adds to the angelic impression.

  I chew the inside of my cheek.

  “You’re nuts if you think I’m doing that.”

  “You should see your face,” he laughs. “Relax. You look so freaked out. It’s not like I’m asking you to suction-cup your way up the side of the Empire State. It’s a fence around a Jesuit churchyard.”

  “A wall.”

  “A wall.” He confirms.

  He follows my eyes to the top. It’s very high. I look back at him.

  “Take a risk,” he says. “I’m right here to catch you.”

  What is it with people trying to get me to take risks, do things I don’t want to do? I must come off as really uptight. I shake my arms out and look at the crumbling brick, then back at him. The rosy light around the edge of his face seals the deal. He bumps me with his shoulder.

  “Might even be better than boxing,” he teases.

  This is me refusing to be a chicken. I blow on my hands to warm them, then press my fingers tight around the first hold.

  No Map of Lack

  I FALL BACK AGAINST THEO THREE times
before I make it high enough to hook my arm over the wide top of the wall. I hang there a second, muscles twitching and shaking, then I hoist myself on wobbly arms until I can swing my legs over.

  He wasn’t kidding. It’s a secret garden. Old rosebushes wear a few winter-battered blooms like gems on gnarled knuckles. A marble bench rings around a dry fountain. Limbs of giant oaks sway and whisper through rusty leaves. I shimmy down the pergola onto another marble bench. It’s quiet enough in here to be another dimension.

  Above me, Theo crests the top of the wall. He grins, then springs down like a parkour superstar, swinging from the pergola into the air, arms overhead, sweatshirt hiked up, showing his stomach. He lands light on his feet in front of me.

  “Pretty cool in here, right?”

  “Now that I’m on the ground again, yeah.”

  “Are you afraid of heights?” He nudges the toe of my shoe.

  “Only ones I fall from.”

  He laughs.

  “Props to you, Ramsey. Few girls would agree to scale a wall like that.” He takes off his hat and pulls on his hair so it stands up all sweat-salty and crazy.

  “Oh. Is this one of your tests? What’s the average length of time it takes for a new girl to say yes to scaling walls with you?”

  “Huh?” Theo wrinkles his brow, looking genuinely confused.

  “Your brother told me you give people secret tests.”

  Theo’s mouth forms a small O, but he says nothing. His eyes darken. He turns and walks the perimeter of the garden.

  Great. I offended him.

  At the other end of the yard, he picks up a rake from a haphazard pile of yard tools and starts to loosen the top of a hill of mulch. The metal tines of the rake skip and jangle over the cold mound.

  Theo’s mad and I’m stuck in here with him. I look around, suddenly aware that we’re trespassing. At the far end of the garden, an old brick building overlooks the yard.

  His rake is noisy.

  “Um, you sure you can do that? Won’t someone hear?”

  He looks up and grins. “Worry much?”

  A flash of embarrassment.

  “Someone has to.”

  “Worry?” He sounds skeptical, keeps raking. A chocolaty smell wafts over.