She nodded slightly. “Did you explain to my dad? I mean, was he upset that I didn’t come?”
“No.” Evan touched her hair, pushing it behind her ear. “He seems fine. That place—it’s not as bad as it looks. I mean, it’s so overwhelming from the outside, but—”
She stood up, and he followed. He was standing so close that she caught the sharp metallic scent of his sweat. She knew, from his scent, that he was anxious.
He kept talking.
“I mean, I just wish you had been able to see your dad, you know? He wasn’t … It wasn’t…” He paused. “I’m rambling. I should shut up now.”
He took her left hand in his and studied it. Alma placed it on his chest and felt his heart beating fast.
“You’re nervous,” she said. “It’s over now. You can relax, Evan.”
“Yeah,” he said. “OK.”
“I met a woman while we were waiting,” Alma said. “She invited us to have lunch before we go back. She has a house—like a place for people to stay.”
“That’s kinda weird, Alma,” Evan said.
“I know,” Alma replied. “It’s like a church group or something. She’s nice. You’ll see.”
Evan shrugged and got into the car to drive. He was starving, and too exhausted to challenge her. Plus, there was nowhere to eat around here. There wasn’t even a gas station in this little town.
Before long, Evan was digging into his third helping of turkey tetrazzini, allowing the animated conversation to wash over him. Honestly, he barely remembered how he got here. Maybe it was some sort of post-traumatic stress response. All he knew was that the food tasted good. By now, he was accustomed to sitting around a table where everyone was speaking a language he didn’t understand. He usually felt frustrated, but now he just felt relief—he had an excuse to shrink into himself and focus solely on the creamy spaghetti making its way down his throat.
“Evan,” Alma turned and spoke to him.
“Yeah?”
“Claire has invited us to stay tonight so that I can visit dad tomorrow. She says ICE is never there on Sundays.”
There was no way in hell Evan would leave Alma and her grandmother with a stranger in this creepy town.
“Alma, I have to travel for a tournament tomorrow,” Evan said. “I have to get back tonight. I’m already on the verge of getting kicked off the team.”
Alma sighed. “I know. I don’t want you to miss it, but—”
Evan broke in. “I have to be there, Alma. I’m really sorry.”
Seeing Alma’s face, Evan struggled to work out another solution in his head. Maybe they could stay in a hotel in Columbus. He counted the hours backward, trying to find a way for Alma to visit and for him to get back in time. The detention center allowed visitors at nine. He needed to be on the team bus by one.
“We have to leave tonight. I can bring you back next weekend.”
“Claire lives in Cumming, and she’s going back tomorrow. She offered us a ride.”
Alma smiled at the volunteer, who nodded eagerly.
Evan’s heart sank. Claire was very kind, and even though this house was small and the furniture was sort of worn-out, she and the other volunteers were so friendly, the place felt kind of homey. He just hated the thought of leaving Alma in this pathetic town. She seemed so vulnerable here.
“How will you get from Cumming to Gilberton?”
“I can take them, Evan,” Claire said. “It’s only a half hour out of my way.”
“And are you sure it’s safe? I mean, for Alma to go to the detention center? How will she fill out the paperwork?”
“We can’t be sure of anything,” Claire replied.
“She explained the risk,” Alma broke in, “and I’m willing to take it to see my dad. I just sort of freaked out today. I’ll be fine.”
“And what does your grandmother think?” Evan asked, looking toward Doña Lupe, who was dousing her noodles with hot sauce.
“She supports whatever decision I make,” Alma said.
Claire stepped away from the table and went into the kitchen. She returned with a container of homemade chocolate-chip cookies. As she offered them around, Alma stood and cleared the plates from the table.
“You should go soon,” she told Evan. “You need a good night’s sleep tonight.”
Glancing at the clock on his phone, Evan nodded. “Yeah, OK.”
Evan felt so wrong about this, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to convince Alma to leave with him.
“I’ll walk you out,” Alma said.
* * *
Evan leaned against his car door in the dusty gravel driveway and pulled Alma into him. The deep ache welled back up in her chest as she struggled to focus.
“I’ll miss you,” he said.
She needed to say it. How was she going to do this?
“I’ll miss you, too,” she began tentatively. “But it’s probably a good thing. I mean, we need to start getting used to this, you know?”
Evan glanced around. “Getting used to what, exactly? Cuz I don’t think I can get used to this.”
She knew he was trying to make a joke. He was talking about the neighborhood. It was a ghost town, with abandoned trailers and dilapidated houses. Irrational anxiety welled up in her—was this what it would be like to live in Mexico? She had never been in a place this poor. In Mexico, she knew, they called towns like this triste—sad. She understood that now. This little town made her so deeply sad.
“We need to get used to being apart, Evan,” she said. “I’m going home.”
Her mind lingered on the last word.
“Home?” Evan asked, as if reading her thoughts. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, I think you know I’m going home soon, back to Mexico.”
He dropped his hands from her waist. She heard them land on the car door with a dull thud.
“Since when is Mexico your home?”
Alma stepped back so that she no longer felt his body against hers.
“It’s always been home, Evan. You know that.”
“Like hell I do!” Evan said, standing up straight. “This is your home, Alma. You belong here.”
Alma couldn’t help releasing a harsh laugh. She gestured toward the hulking detention center a half mile down the road. “Yes. I guess I do belong here, technically. But they have a different prison for women. Remember?”
“You know what I mean, Alma.”
His back fell against the car door again and he lifted his hand. She knew he would run it slowly through his hair, as he always did when he was worried or confused. She turned her gaze, not letting herself see it.
“You should go, Evan. We can talk about this later, OK?”
She tried to walk away.
“Alma,” he said.
She didn’t know how to keep from turning back toward him. It was so natural and unavoidable, like the pull of gravity.
“I don’t belong here,” Alma heard herself say. “I understand that now more than ever. I want to go home with my family.”
“We can fix this, Alma.” He was pleading. “I want to help you.”
Don’t confuse mercy for love, Alma.
The words surged through her mind, and she hated them.
“God, Evan,” she replied. “You have got to stop lying to yourself. We’ll never go up against that.” She nodded involuntarily in the direction of the detention center, with all of its barbwire and windowless walls. She couldn’t see it from here, but she felt its stifling presence.
Evan reached into his car.
“Just give me a second, OK?” he said.
He rummaged around in the glove box. When he stood to face her, he was holding a small black box covered in velvet.
“What are you doing, Evan?” she asked. Her heart was pounding. He couldn’t possibly be doing what she imagined.
“Ms. Chen,” he said. “She told me how to fix it. She said we can get married, you know?” He was talking fast, tripping over his words. “It
has to be soon—like now. She said it would work—or at least, she was pretty sure it would.”
“What?” she asked.
He was walking toward her, with the little black box still tightly shut, teetering on the edge of his trembling hand.
“We can get married, Alma.” He spoke anxiously.
“You’re kidding, right? And what? I’ll go live in your dorm with you?” she asked.
“No, we’ll stay. I mean, I don’t know—”
Alma remembered the conversation with Mrs. King so many months before. She should have known better. She should have stayed away.
“You’ve lost your mind.” Alma shook her head in disbelief.
“Wait, let’s just back up, OK? I’m screwing this all up.” Evan stumbled over his words. “Can we just start over?”
He opened the box to reveal a gold ring with a shimmering diamond perched at its center. Alma was speechless. She stepped away involuntarily.
“I want to marry you, Alma. Your dad already gave me permission.”
Her dad? Hot with anger, she screeched a reply. “You asked my father’s permission? Without even asking me what I think about this insane plan?”
“I just want to fix this, Alma. And I don’t want you to leave me.”
“And when,” Alma asked, her voice filled with angry sarcasm, “has two teenagers getting married ever fixed anything? Tell me that.”
Evan looked into Alma’s eyes and walked toward her. He reached out with his empty hand—the one without the ring, the one that was scarred and wounded.
“Alma, why are you so angry?”
This was easy. Thanks to his mother, and to those words she couldn’t forget, Alma knew exactly why.
“Because, Evan, you seem to think that you and your perfect life can just come in and save me, swooping down like some knight in shining armor or something. This isn’t a fairy tale, Evan. You’re not my handsome prince, and I’m definitely not your charity case.”
“My. Perfect. Life.” He enunciated each word slowly, almost growling. “Who the hell are you kidding, Alma? Have you been paying any attention at all? Have you noticed anything at all about my perfect life lately?”
He turned back toward the car and slammed his closed fist onto the hood. She stared at him and realized that she was afraid. She wasn’t afraid of him, not worried that he would hurt her. She was afraid for him. She had never seen him like this, so out of control.
“I haven’t slept for weeks because every time I close my eyes, I see Conway on top of you. I got wasted trying to forget and gashed my hand on a broken liquor bottle, and now the damn thing refuses to heal. I completely suck at soccer now, the only thing I love, the only thing I used to love.”
He sank down to the ground, pulling his knees toward his chest.
“My father left us, for real this time, and by the time I get back to Gilberton, I’ll probably be disowned by the rest of my family.”
He looked up at her, and her heart broke open.
“Christ, Alma. I’m falling apart. Can’t you see that?”
“I didn’t know, Evan,” she whispered. “I didn’t know any of it.”
“You didn’t ask,” he replied coldly.
Alma struggled to find the right thing to say. She refused to ruin another person’s life by bringing him permanently into her mess, especially not the person she loved so deeply. He didn’t love her that much, though. He couldn’t. His mom had it right. He felt sorry for her, and she didn’t want his pity.
“Evan,” she said slowly, “what we have—all of this—it can’t be love.”
He looked up at her. “What are you saying, Alma?”
“It’s not love, Evan. Look at you! Love doesn’t destroy people.”
“Are you saying you don’t love me?”
How would she bring herself to say it? She couldn’t even nod her head.
“Are you?” he demanded, standing up slowly.
“I guess so,” she said quietly.
“Say it! Say you don’t love me.”
She couldn’t breathe. She needed to take in air, but her body refused to comply. She pushed the words out weakly. They slurred together with the last bit of air in her nearly empty lungs.
“I don’t love you.”
He spun around and lurched into his car.
“I’m done,” he said as he slammed the door shut.
He backed the car away and sped out onto the empty road, leaving the black velvet box on the driveway, covered in a fine gray dust and half buried in weeds.
It was still open.
PART THREE
TWENTY-THREE
Flowering Cactus
Evan let the water run cold. Closing his eyes, he splashed it against his cheeks, feeling the shock run through his otherwise numb body. He lifted his face and covered it with a towel. It had been forever since he left Alma standing on the streets of that pathetic town, but he still couldn’t look at his own reflection in the mirror.
Five weeks.
Thirty-five days.
Eight hundred and forty-four hours.
How else could he mark the passage of time? He could count the number of minutes between classes—the short stretches of time when he studiously avoided her, ignoring the pain. He had pushed it so deep inside that it was as if, somewhere near the pit of his stomach, he had grown a new organ—one that processed the toxic waste of love not returned.
He could mark time with the forty-five minutes that split each weekday into two equal halves: the slow hours of quiet dread that came before they were in class together, and the quick bursts of anger that came after. Or he could measure those forty-five minutes when he sat so near her that he could smell the clean scent of her shampoo, could see the outline of her bra underneath her shirt, could almost taste her on his lips.
He had wanted to switch seats, to move to a far corner of the room. Maybe from there, their classmates would disperse the energy that pulsed between them. But he didn’t move. Was it just part of his struggle to save face—to make it seem that this was easy for him? Or was it because he needed to feel the sweet pain of her presence, the only thing that could remind him he was still alive?
No, not the only thing. He would measure the time in another way:
Seven games.
Six hundred and thirty minutes.
Five goals.
Eleven assists.
Three perfect penalty kicks.
Only on the field could he focus fully and completely on the present. Only there could he forget the past and shield himself from a future without her.
He slowly buttoned his shirt and lifted the collar. He pulled a tie from his top drawer, looped it around, and tightened. For a moment, it felt like a noose, pulling against the thick cords of his neck.
Downstairs, Evan took his mother’s keys and pulled her Escalade around the driveway, letting it idle loudly at the front door. His mom never wanted to ride in his hybrid, so he drove her car instead. He used to complain about having to drive it, but he didn’t complain anymore. It didn’t matter.
Mrs. Roland opened the door and gracefully lifted her small body into the passenger seat, her tall heels tapping quietly against the running boards. She was so thin that she seemed to float in the broad cushions of her SUV’s leather seats. Evan told her she looked nice even though he barely noticed what she was wearing.
They arrived at the hotel, and the valet carefully helped his mother down from her perch and then pulled away. Evan watched the car descend into the garage, abandoning him to another night, another party. He took his mother’s arm and led her into the hotel.
This was his penance. This was how he apologized to his mother, without ever saying a word.
Three charity auctions.
Eight Sprites.
Two chicken breasts in cream sauce.
One poached salmon with asparagus.
One ugly painting for his mom ($1,100).
One signed Chipper Jones jersey for him ($400).
* * *
The room still looked like Raúl’s. She’d been living in it for months, but the baseball caps still hung in neat rows across the far wall, the soccer jerseys and ticket stubs stayed tacked above Raúl’s bed. Not even the books on his desk, reminders of the community college courses he never would complete, were out of place. Moving anything seemed like a betrayal.
But in a few short minutes, he would call and she would have to beg him not to return. How would she do it? What could she say to make him stay in Mexico?
Alma took the phone from her bedside table to check the time. Evan gazed at her from the screen, lips curved into a sly grin, as he did from that photo each time she touched her phone. Why hadn’t she erased it? Every day she allowed herself to study this image only once. She had so many opportunities to speak to Evan, but she didn’t know what to say. Would she tell him she still had the ring buried deep inside a drawer? If only she could bury her regret there, too. But there was no space.
Evan had forgiven her so much, but she felt certain he would not forgive her this betrayal. She had revealed so many of her bruises and scars, and she thought he had loved them, too. But maybe he had only wanted to blot them out, to make her right, so that she would be able to live in his world.
But she didn’t want to live there, and neither did he. She knew that much.
* * *
It was the only luxury hotel in town, and he rarely came here. Usually the benefit parties were held at the club. The venue was different, but everything else was the same: same people, same silent auction items, same music, same arrangement of tables.
He looked around the room, trying to avoid eye contact. He knew almost every person here, and had no desire to talk to anyone. He walked over to the bar and ordered a Sprite for himself and a chardonnay for his mother. The bartender looked him up and down and questioned whether he was old enough to order wine. This was a difference, he guessed, between coming here and going to the club. At the club, all the bartenders knew that he was BeBe’s regular date, that it was his responsibility to supply her with a steady stream of chardonnays since his father couldn’t, or wouldn’t.
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