by Elliot Joyce
Fortunately, Felipe seemed to find Wren funny instead of pitiful, and laughed. “You know a lot of weird stuff, man.” Absentmindedly, Felipe played with the tab on his Fanta. He broke it off, and tossed it into the trash. “So, are you gonna go camping with us?”
Wren froze.
Just a few days ago, he would have preferred sitting through the entirety of Beethoven’s musical career over going on a three-day camping trip. But it was obvious that at least some of the guys liked him and Kyle—well, if they all got along with Kyle, then maybe there was hope for Wren. And besides, it was a chance to make friends. To get close to other people. Wren told himself that it wasn’t just a small, weak hope that he could be good friends with Felipe. There was nothing there for him. At least that was what Wren told himself.
Still, all of that didn’t change the fact that Wren would be voluntarily isolating himself from society in exchange for interaction with cis boys. If things got overwhelming or if he wanted out, he couldn’t just leave. He couldn’t call his dad or barricade himself in his room. There were probably emergency phones or something, but how pathetic would that be?
Ah, yes, I had to leave the trip early. No, not because I broke a bone or got bitten by a snake. I just couldn’t stay because a bunch of guys were being dicks.
Wren sighed. “I dunno. Depends on how my parents feel about it.”
“They let Chris go,” Felipe pointed out.
“He’s cis,” Wren said. Bitterness seeped into his words, but he couldn’t find it in him to feel bad. The memory of a few nights ago floated up and he let out another sigh. “Doesn’t matter. I probably will be busy with college apps or something.”
“That sucks. Camping sounds kind of boring, but it’s really fun. I’m sure Chris talks about it.” Felipe scratched the back of his neck. “Manny keeps saying he misses it. And if you’re worried about sleeping in a tent and bathrooms and shit, Kyle usually shares with me and Travis. We can kick Travis out. He snores.”
“I kick in my sleep,” Wren admitted.
Felipe burst out laughing. “Holy shit, it’s gotta be genetic. Brandon’s always complaining that Chris kicks like he’s trying to win a race.”
Admittedly, that sounded like something August would say about her brothers. Both of them.
Felipe waved off the people who turned to give them looks, and none of them seemed all too concerned. Wren was starting to think that it was almost too easy to get Felipe to laugh, but he also wasn’t complaining. That laugh was going to haunt his dreams.
“It’s okay. We’ll stick you on one end and put Kyle between us. He sleeps like the dead. Seriously. It’s kind of creepy.” Felipe grinned and took a drink from his Fanta. His blue eyes seemed to reflect every light in the room, giving them a bright glow that could blind someone.
Or maybe that was just Wren’s addled brain. He was willing to put money on that.
“I really hope you can go, man.”
“Okay, everyone, we’re finally going to get started.” It was Percy. He wasn’t standing on a chair, but he was still loud enough that it only took a minute or so to get everyone to quiet down. “Wait, has anyone seen Kyle or Travis?” Percy glanced around.
“They’re outside!” someone shouted.
“I think Kyle ate all the marshmallows,” someone else added. There was general grumbling, and Percy had to get them all to calm down.
“I’m sure Mrs. Garcia has been forewarned about Kyle’s sweet tooth and prepared accordingly. Which, let’s all thank Mrs. Garcia for feeding us and letting us make s’mores later.” Percy paused as a chorus of “thank you, Mrs. Garcia” rang out. Wren was surprised to find he had joined in. “If anyone sees Scott, tell him that I need that waiver, or he isn’t going with us to Aspen. By the way, please let me know if you don’t have a ride yet. There’s still a few cars with space.”
“You should come with me and Travis and Kyle. Chris usually goes with someone else, but Travis drives a truck and he’s got room for four,” Felipe suggested. “It’d be cool to have a new guy around.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” Wren replied. He was surprised to realize he meant it. He grinned at Felipe, and for a second, their eyes met. Time seemed to freeze, and Wren could suddenly make out little details he hadn’t noticed before. Felipe’s teeth were a little crooked, and the gap between his two front teeth was only more noticeable so close. He had flecks of green in his eyes, which should have taken away from them but instead made Wren just feel more and more like he could drown in them.
Felipe wrinkled his nose a little when he smiled, and his ears went red before his face when he was blushing.
Wren realized Felipe was blushing and looked away, his own face a little warm.
“Please stand for the pledge,” Percy told them.
Wren was thankful for the distraction. Straight Catholic boy! Not worth it!
In the dining room, Kyle held his hand out toward Travis. Sighing, Travis pulled his wallet out and placed a ten in Kyle’s hand. Wren decided there were some things he’d just never understand.
FELIPE DROVE himself home and carefully pulled up in the driveway, cutting the engine before it could wake up half the block with all its sputtering and choking. He kept quiet as he walked inside, noticing Abuela was already asleep if the lack of lights was anything to go by.
It wasn’t surprising. The meeting had turned into a s’mores fest, with Kyle refusing to eat anything with a single molecule of sugar while the rest of the troop chowed down. Wren and Chris had to leave relatively early since their dad didn’t want to drive so late, but Felipe had somehow managed to instill the better qualities of burned marshmallows onto Wren, so it wasn’t a loss.
The sugar was keeping him awake, though, and Felipe knew he wasn’t going to sleep anytime soon. Still, high energy or not, it was simple enough to sneak into the house using his phone light to navigate the piles of magazines Abuela kept.
I should tell Raquel. She can convince Abuela to get rid of some. Felipe froze, hearing something from the other room. He scoffed when Bribón slinked in, blinked at him, and then kept walking, having apparently decided that this human wasn’t worth her time. Stupid cat.
He loved Bribón, fur clumps and hair balls and all.
The kitchen was just past the maze of Abuela’s things, and he paused at the archway. An old wooden cross hung there, one that Abuela swore her abuela had been given when she was married. Felipe’s mother was supposed to have it, but according to Raquel, Abuela had demanded it back when the kids had all been legally put under her care.
Sometimes Felipe felt sad that things had ended up the way they had, but other times he remembered how close he and his siblings were and knew in his heart that they wouldn’t have been if they had stayed with Mama and Papa. Besides, Abuela was the best person he had ever met, and he couldn’t conceive of a nicer person raising him. Still, he tried not to think about it.
Crossing himself, Felipe passed into the kitchen, shaking the brief melancholy off. He mentally added a Hail Mary for gluttony as he went to the fridge. After a moment’s hesitation, he grabbed a Fanta and a few cheese sticks before heading to his room.
To his utter unsurprise, the precarious piles of papers that he’d left on his desk had fallen over, no doubt influenced by Bribón’s meanderings. A few dozen worksheets and bits of homework now covered his floor, lying on top of the layer of dirty clothes that had begun accumulating. Felipe sighed and put the Fanta on his calc book. It was unlikely to get toppled over on the sturdier surface, and Felipe knew, from experience, that it was a pain in the ass to clean soda up from his floor.
Lots and lots of experience.
During the process of picking up his English, history, chem, and Spanish homework, Felipe also found three dollars and a Peoria Library copy of The Golden Compass that was probably way overdue. He put the book with his other, less overdue library books, pocketed the cash, and sat down at his desk.
He took a sip of his Fanta and stared a
t his homework, trying to decide what to do first. Thinking that the easiest would be the best, he pulled his Spanish assignment over and began looking at it. Considering he grew up speaking Spanish, he probably shouldn’t have even been required to take the damn class, but Felipe guessed he couldn’t complain too much about an easy A.
His phone buzzed about five minutes later, and he sighed. I should ignore it, but he reached out and unlocked it.
Yo are you awake dude? Kyle asked. He was still typing, and Felipe knew, from experience, it was best to let him get it all out of his system before replying.
My stomach is trying to kill me. I actually feel like I’m gonna throw up.
My mom asked if I wanted some ibooprofen and I said no because idk what that is.
*ibuprofen.
I should have said yes.
What’s ibuprofen?
feli are you awake? it says you’re awake.
feli.
feli.
feli.
my stomach hurts.
Deciding that it was impossible to focus with his phone vibrating every second, Felipe unlocked it again and quickly skimmed all the messages.
You shouldn’t have eaten all those marshmallows, idiot, Felipe told him.
Kyle immediately sent a half-dozen angry faces and a few crying ones, just for variety’s sake. I came here for comfort and support and you turn around and STAB me in the back.
Felipe rolled his eyes and glanced at the time. It was almost midnight, but he got the feeling that Kyle was more hyped up on sugar than was medically safe.
I looked up ibuprofen and I should have had some, Kyle admitted.
Yes. Yes, you should have. Felipe silenced his phone and went back to working, but he barely got through another page before feeling guilty for ignoring Kyle. He soon lost that guilt when he saw that twenty of the sent messages were just the poop emoji, with the end morphing into Kyle complaining about how Wren should have stopped him from eating so much sugar.
Felipe snorted. He really didn’t think he could have a better reaction than that.
You’re 16, not 6. You can control your own eating habits.
But I don’t wanna, Kyle said, emphasizing it with more crying emojis. Felipe knew Kyle was just acting this way because he probably was suffering and his energy levels were no doubt completely thrown out of whack, even for him. Privately, Felipe and Travis both thought Kyle needed to be on some kind of medication, but there was no possibility that his family could afford it or that his dad would even be open to him getting on anything else. Testosterone, as far as Felipe understood, had already been a difficult enough fight.
So did you and Wren talk more?
Is he gonna go camping?
Did you offer to let him sleep in our tent?
Theres no more room in our tent were gonna have to kick someone out and it isn’t gonna be me!
Felipe wondered when he had become such an open book before remembering that knowing someone for the better part of four years tended to do this to the relationship. It could have been worse, he assumed. He couldn’t really think of what exactly would make this worse, but he knew it had to exist somewhere.
There had never been any adults telling him that he’d be seventeen, desperately trying to stay on top of his homework and apply to colleges, sitting in his bedroom while a trans guy texted him about another trans guy and whether they were all going to go camping together. And for all the hijinks and madness that surrounded his life, the great number of sleepless nights and the random moments of loneliness that came from no longer having three siblings in the house, Felipe didn’t think he’d change a single thing.
If Wren comes camping with us I’m not leaving the tent we can kick Travis out it’s ok he doesn’t need a tent anyway.
Okay we can get you and wren a tent together would that work.
Well, maybe he’d change a few things.
I’m going to sleep. We can talk tomorrow morning, Felipe lied, only feeling a little bad about it. He tried to be responsible and get his work done, unlike Kyle, and while half of that probably wasn’t Kyle’s fault, it definitely would be his fault if he distracted Felipe into not annotating the entirety of chapter four of Frankenstein.
Fine! Kyle threw in a few angry emojis for no apparent reason. Felipe wondered, idly, if that one, the crying emoji, and the poop one were the only three that Kyle ever used. Good night dude see you tomorrow.
Good night man. Felipe took a breath and settled in for a long night.
“OKAY, LET’S talk about Wren,” Kyle said as soon as he came to early-morning not-tutoring the next day.
Felipe, who was desperately clinging to his cup of coffee, raised an eyebrow at him. It blew his mind that Kyle, who had probably been awake until 2:00 a.m. at best, looked like he had gotten a full ten hours of sleep.
On the contrary, Felipe felt like he had been run over by his car, which he probably shouldn’t be driving with so little sleep. But his abuela hadn’t gotten her license renewed and also couldn’t see more than ten feet ahead of her. She hadn’t been allowed to drive anyone ever since Felipe got his learner’s permit.
Those three facts were definitely correlated.
“What is there to talk about?” Felipe asked.
“Well, you’ve never, like, wanted to make friends with someone this much before,” Kyle pointed out, and Felipe shrugged. “No, really. I made friends with you and that’s how you met Travis. And yeah, you talk to some of the guys and, like, that’s good and all. But dude, you have, like, no friends. No close friends.”
“I have you and Travis,” Felipe pointed out.
Kyle rolled his eyes. “Yeah, well, shut your smart mouth while I’m trying to give you advice.”
“I don’t think I’ve reached the level of desperation where I want your advice,” Felipe replied, and Kyle flipped him off. “Seriously, though, Wren’s just a cool guy. He’s funny. He didn’t run away screaming when I started talking about video games. I think we’ll get along. Is it a crime to want more friends?” Felipe adopted a mock look of horror. “Are you jealous?”
Kyle snorted. “God, you fucking wish.” He rolled his shoulders and leaned back a little, keeping an eye out for the librarian. She had threatened to throw him out the next time she caught him in a chair without all four legs on the ground. Of course, rather than actually being threatened, he took that as a challenge.
Felipe thought it was better him than, well, anyone else. If Kyle did fall, he’d just laugh it off. If Felipe fell, he’d probably freak out about a concussion or any other injury that could mess up his brain.
Abuela had kept him and Manny from climbing too high in the backyard tree by telling them that if they fell, their brains would go splat all over the ground. Some things stuck with him, even if he knew it was absolutely mierda now.
“Nah, man, I’m actually trying to help. I’ll stop being obnoxious about it.”
“Ooh, ‘obnoxious.’ That’s a big word for you. Have you actually been doing your homework?” Felipe asked, expecting the answer.
“Of course not. Who do you think I am, Percy?” Kyle made a face. “But let’s not talk about me. We can keep talking about you.”
“I know what you’re trying to do.” Felipe leaned forward. “You didn’t do a single bit of homework, did you?”
Kyle nodded.
Felipe sighed. He wasn’t even surprised. “Fine. I know a lost cause when I see one.” He slumped back into his chair. “What did you want to tell me about Wren?”
“I dunno. Have you texted him yet?” Kyle asked.
Felipe didn’t respond.
“Okay, have you, like, looked at his Facebook wall or his likes to see if you have anything in common?” Again, Kyle paused so Felipe could say something. Nothing came. “What about, I dunno, making sure that this isn’t, like, some weird minor obsession that’s gonna go away as soon as you find out he doesn’t like The Lord of the Rings?”
“Wren definitely likes The Lor
d of the Rings,” Felipe argued.
“And how would you know? Have you asked him?” Kyle gave Felipe a look. It was a bit surreal to be talked to about his interpersonal relationships by Kyle of all people, but at the same time, Felipe knew he shouldn’t be surprised at all. Kyle had plenty of friends, not only on the soccer team and Boy Scouts, but across the school. He knew when and how to smile, and he wasn’t afraid to be the butt of jokes as long as they made people laugh.
Felipe was too self-conscious for that and his laugh was kind of annoying anyway.
“I offered him a spot in Travis’s truck,” Felipe admitted.
Kyle shook his head. “God, you can’t text him to ask if he wants to see a movie or chill, but you can ask if he wants to sit in a car with a bunch of jackasses for three hours. Great. Really glad to know where your priorities are,” he deadpanned. He let out the heaviest sigh Felipe had heard. Or at least the second or third heaviest. It was up there. “You know Travis’ll be fine with that, but you should, y’know, ask.”
“Yeah. That’s probably a good—wait, how do you know I haven’t asked already?” Felipe crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.
“Because it’s you.”
Okay, that’s fair.
Felipe rolled his eyes anyways. “I’ll text him at lunch. Is there any real advice you want to give me, or did you just want to yell at me for, like, fifteen minutes?”
“Excuse you, I’m not yelling,” Kyle corrected. “I’m chiding. Gently.”
“Okay, sure. Keep chiding. What else do you got?”
“Well, in all seriousness you probably should make sure you actually have something in common before you commit to a three-hour car ride. I’ll also remind you that this is with Travis, who, in case you’ve somehow forgotten, insists on road-trip games. So you might want to mention that to your boy.”
Felipe coughed and scratched the back of his neck. “He’s not—he’s not my boy or anything. We’re barely friends.”