by Justin Sayre
I slowly walk down the hall to the front door, speeding up only when I get to Ryan, grabbing his arm and heading out the door, before Auntie can say anything else. Outside alone, and a little cold, we both start to laugh, which is nice. Because at least if this is a “thing,” it can be a fun “thing.” Can’t it?
CHAPTER 18
Ryan talks a lot on the way to the movies. His breath freezes as it puffs out in front of his face, like he’s a train speeding off to somewhere else. I nod along, not that I’m not interested, but because I don’t totally know what to say or talk about now that I know this is a “thing.” If it was just the movies, or even a walk, I could talk about something when and if Ryan asked me. But now there’s a flower and he met my auntie and cab money is in my pocket. It’s a thing and I don’t know what you’re supposed to say on a thing.
We make it to the theater pretty quickly and look through what movies they’re showing. Ryan picks a superhero something because I don’t say much and I don’t really care. The more I’m with him the less it seems so serious. We’re laughing and talking just like after school. I hope it stays like that, I guess that will depend on us. Ryan pays for my ticket, which I keep telling him he doesn’t need to do, but he keeps telling me that he wants to. It’s a nice thing to do, it is, but it’s also a date thing to do. I smile and head into the theater with him. His hand is clammy as he holds on to mine, even though I’m the one that’s nervous.
Ryan orders popcorn and asks if I want anything, but I don’t. Seriously I don’t. But I also don’t know if I’m supposed to eat candy or popcorn on a thing. I would have gotten gummies and a Coke and even though I said I didn’t want any popcorn, I will steal his halfway through this stupid blow-’em-up movie I don’t even want to see. I just order a small Sprite. Ryan lets me at least pay for that.
Ryan gets us seats while I run into the bathroom, just to look at myself and see if I’m the same, which luckily, I am. I adjust my dress and wash my hands, which are a little gunky from Ryan’s clammy palm on the way over. Looking in the mirror, I remember to text Auntie about the movie and what time it gets out. But there are already like ten other texts from Ellen, Allegra, and Ducks, through Ellen, on my phone asking how it’s going. I don’t answer any of them, and go back in to find Ryan. Just as the previews start, I find him sitting alone in a row toward the back with his popcorn sitting on the chair next to him. I guess that’s for me.
Ryan likes to laugh. It’s something I should have noticed but haven’t up until now. The thing is, now when he laughs, he looks over at me to make sure I’m laughing too. If I am he’s happy and he laughs louder, but if I’m not he stops. Is that what I’m supposed to do all night, just laugh along with him? It seems like a lot. I smile and nod when I’m not laughing, just so he knows it’s okay if he does. I don’t want him to miss out on this movie he picked.
He doesn’t hold my hand through the beginning of the movie, I think because he’s eating the popcorn, but about halfway through when the mutant guy finds something that will help him beat the other mutant, he wipes his hands on his jeans and puts his open palm on the seat rest between us. That’s it. It just sits there and waits. He starts looking over at me, and I smile. I guess I’m missing the hint to take his hand. Finally he smiles and takes my hand and puts it in his. It’s fine, I mean at this point I don’t mind holding his hand. I’m kind of glad he did it. I curl my legs up underneath me and get cozy in my seat, almost putting my head on his shoulder as I watch the stupid movie. There aren’t a lot of other people in the theater, but sitting with Ryan like this, it almost seems like we’re the only ones. And that seems kind of nice. I guess this is a thing.
When the movie ends, the world is saved and I’ve held Ryan’s hand throughout the entire battle. It didn’t seem too bad, I think I would have even liked it, if I’d seen it with someone else and could pay more attention to it. That wasn’t happening tonight. We get out of the theater and walk to the little circle across the street, where Ryan walks on the benches and loudly tells me his favorite parts of the movie.
“Did you like it?” he asks after a while.
“Sure,” I say quietly.
“You don’t have to,” he says.
“Oh good. I didn’t.”
Ryan laughs at this and sits down next to me on the bench. We play with each other’s hands and talk about nothing at all for a little while. He wants to go as a zombie doctor for Halloween, and I don’t want to do anything like that. He also wants to go to a party at Brian’s, which sounds worse. I tell him we can talk about it later, but he keeps going.
“Well, you could be my zombie nurse?” He smiles.
“Or your zombie boss,” I say, laughing at him loudly. He laughs back but then he does the weirdest thing and puts his hand on my face and kisses me. I don’t close my eyes at first, but once I know what’s happening, I close them. I think that’s what you’re supposed to do.
Ryan’s lips are small and wet and he moves his head around trying to poke his tongue into my mouth. He’s a little nervous about it, and I guess I am too. It feels good to be this close with him. Some of that is because it’s cold, but the rest is that I like him close to me. I like having his cheek on mine and his hand on my face, with my hand on his shoulder. It feels lovely and nice.
He moves away after the first kiss and smiles. I smile back, but I just want to go back to the kissing part. It makes the most sense right now. I put my head on his shoulder and listen to him talk about how much he likes me. His heart is beating a mile a minute, and he keeps crossing and uncrossing his legs, which might be from the cold but I don’t know. We go back to kissing pretty quickly.
Kissing is tingly. It makes sense why in movies when the big kiss happens all that music picks up and the rest of the world fades around it, because it does sort of feel like that. The rest of the world is gone and you’re lost in the kiss for a minute, when it’s good. And a few times with Ryan it’s good, very good even. Other times, I’m cold or one of our phones goes off. A few times our faces don’t match up right, and we both laugh.
It’s getting late, so I call a car and I offer to drop him off at his house, but he says he’d rather walk. When the car gets there, he kisses me one last time, and we hold on to each other a little longer than we ever have. I feel numb and a little dizzy, maybe from the cold and the kissing, and get in the car.
Alone in the car, I don’t text anyone. I just sit and feel my face, which just seconds ago had Ryan near it. This was a thing and I’m glad it was. It was a sweet thing, nothing serious or life changing, just something sweet. The movie and the flower and everyone making a big deal still seem silly to me.
We get to my house in only about five minutes, but it seems longer because there’s lots on my mind. I rush up to the door, trying not to be even a minute late. But at the door I stop because I start to wonder, if after all of this, if this was a big deal, a changing thing like everyone thinks. Will I look different? And if I do, will Auntie be able to see it? I stop for a second and breathe out a long trail of frost, then open the door and head in.
“Sophie, baby, is that you?” she calls.
I race up the stairs and find her sitting on the edge of Janet’s bed, reading. She looks up at me and smiles. I smile back. “It was fine.”
“Just fine? All right. You sleeping with me?” Auntie says.
“Okay,” I say, heading to the bathroom. I look at myself and see that I’m still me. I feel a little older, maybe. Everything is mostly the same, but in my eyes, I see something I didn’t know was there before. It’s just a little flicker of happiness, and I’m excited for it. I take off my dress and fold it up. I brush my teeth and put cocoa butter on my face and arms, but I keep looking at myself, looking for the flicker in my eyes and trying to remember if it’s ever been there before.
I go to Janet’s room and lie down beside Auntie Amara, who’s still reading.
“Did that white boy treat you well?” she asks, holding open the covers for me.
I get in and get close to her. “Yes. He did. His name is Ryan.”
“I know. Good, he seemed all right.” Auntie smiles. I lie close to her, the way I was close to Ryan, and listen as she reads part of her book to me. The name of the author is in bold type on the cover of the book—Zora Neale Hurston. I start to drift off as she reads.
“It had called to her to come and gaze on a mystery. From barren brown stems to glistening leaf-buds; from the leaf-buds to snowy virginity of bloom. It stirred her tremendously. How? Why? It was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again. What? How? Why? The singing she heard had nothing to do with her ears. The rose of the world was breathing out smell.”
CHAPTER 19
Sleeping in my mother’s bed with Auntie makes me feel even closer to her, if that’s possible. The first night, it was after everything and we both needed each other. But the second, I’d just come home from my “thing” with Ryan, and I felt so different, I didn’t want to be alone. I was afraid she might wake me up and send me on to my room in the middle of the night then, but she didn’t. I like being there with her, close, hearing her read or ask me questions. I thought about going to my bed on my own, too, but it seems like she’s enjoying the closeness as much as I am.
Saturday morning she lets me sleep in late. When I finally do wake up, she’s gone. I start to worry for a minute, mostly out of habit. I get up slowly and look around the room. Even though I’ve been in here so many times, I’ve never really looked around. When I’m in here with Auntie, I don’t look much past the bed. But now, alone, I start to look at all my mother’s things. Her earrings and other jewelry are all laid out on her vanity by the window in neat little rows, which seems so fake to me now. How could she be this organized about anything in the world? Her closet is the same way. Even the few pictures up are all straight in a row, right down a small stretch of wall separating two windows. Two are of me, both from a long time ago, laughing and hanging on to Janet. It’s strange to see these pictures because I know they had to have happened, but I don’t remember them. We seem like other people now. It all reminds me of her and the thought that she’ll be home soon. This is probably one of the last times I’ll be in this room.
There are at least twenty or so texts from Allegra asking about last night. Each one basically says the same thing, but she almost sort of gets in fights with herself about if she should ask me or not, then gets mad at me for not answering. Ellen sent fewer texts, but hers are shorter and angrier until she’s just sending question marks. Ryan texts that he had a great time and says he will text me the next morning, but he hasn’t yet. I guess I should be nervous but I’m not. I just start texting the girls back.
I tell Ellen it was fine.
Just fine???
It was great.
Just great?????
Yes. I will tell you more later.
When?
Later. I’m going to Ducks’s, come over.
maybe?
With Allegra I have to get a little more involved. She wants to know what movie we saw, and when did we see it? Did he say anything about her? Anything about Brian? Did we kiss? Were there tongues? I type short answers, knowing that no matter what, I will have to answer all over again when I see her and for the next few days after that. I tell her I will call her later.
Auntie asks what I want to do today, and I tell her I’m going to Ducks’s to hang out, if that’s okay. “Now what boy is this?” She smiles at me.
“It’s Ducks. From down the street.”
“Oh, with the opera. Okay. Is it all right with his mother?” Auntie asks.
“She’s at work, it’ll just be his grandmother.”
“Well, she’s all right.” Auntie smiles and laughs to herself. “Just loud.” We both laugh at that because everyone knows how loud Ducks’s grandmother is.
“Call me later. And be good,” Auntie yells to me from the kitchen, but I’m already out the door. I’m excited to be with Ducks. Ducks’ll be the most excited and easy about Ryan, even though he doesn’t like him. Ducks doesn’t like rough boys like Ryan, but to be totally honest, he doesn’t really know Ryan at all. He just gets nervous around him.
I knock on Ducks’s door hard and hear his grandmother yelling from inside. Then him yelling back and racing down the stairs to get to me before she does, as if he’s afraid of what she’ll say. Sometimes she does say weird stuff to me. Nothing exactly awful, just little things where she comments on my hair or my skin, saying things that are always nice but are always nice for being different, never just nice on their own. She doesn’t intend to be mean, in fact I think she means just the opposite, but it gets a little uncomfortable.
Ducks, completely out of breath and smiling, finally opens the door. I smile back and walk past him into the house.
“Well, look who’s this?!” Ducks’s grandmother yells from the kitchen, wiping her hands and getting up from the table to come out to us. “Don’t you look a sight! So grown-up, a fine young lady you are, pet. Are you hungry?”
“No, I’m fine, Mrs. Flynn. Thank you.”
“Always with the manners, would that you could teach this one. Brazen and bold is him,” she says, pointing to Ducks and fixing his hair with her wet hand. “Well, run up. Go on,” she says, waving us away and heading back into the kitchen.
Upstairs in the living room, Ducks has laid out piles of his records on the floor. I know there is a method to it, I just don’t know what it is. He’s very into this music, and he’s explained to me a thousand times why and how good it is and made me listen to more than I ever would have otherwise, but I honestly don’t get it. I mean, I can understand that it’s pretty or beautiful, and it must be hard for all those people to sing so high or loud, but it’s just not my thing. I’m glad it seems to make him really happy.
“So I went to the movies with Ryan last night,” I say, looking at the piles of records.
“What did you guys see?” he says, moving a few records back to the shelf.
“I think Thor was in it?” I laugh. He laughs too.
“Well, that does sort of narrow it down. Was it good?”
“I think so.”
“What did you guys talk about after the movie?” He smiles.
“I don’t know,” I say, trying to skip to the real stuff. “It’s weird because we don’t really talk about much. I mean, he talks. He talks a lot. We, like, say words, but I don’t know that it’s ever really about anything.”
“Well, what do we talk about?” Ducks smiles and moves a pile of records.
“We talk about stuff. We talk about people and, like, stuff. Don’t you think?” I ask.
“Yeah, I guess so. I’m not trying to be rude or anything, honest. I’m just trying to understand,” Ducks says, taking a big pile of records and standing them up on his lap. “I mean, he’s a boy, maybe you should talk about Boy stuff with him.”
“You’re a boy.” I laugh.
“Barely.” Ducks laughs.
We both smile at that. I’m glad he’s not a boy like Ryan, and I think he is too. Sometimes I think we know each other so well, like, to the bone of who the other person is, so that we’re afraid of it, and we want the other person to have a little space. It’s, like, almost too close. Maybe that’s why he has to turn everything into a joke.
“I kissed Ryan last night,” I say, staring at Ducks, who’s still looking at his records.
“You DID?!” His eyes widen and he looks up at me.
“Okay, like, I don’t want to make a big deal about it.”
“It’s such a big deal,” he says even louder.
“It’s not, it’s a kiss,” I say, still trying to quiet him down.
“But it’s your first. Isn’t it?” he says back.
“Yes,
” I answer.
“What was it like?” he asks, finally quietly.
“Wetter than I thought it would be, but nice.” I smile.
Ducks starts being goofy about it, which helps, and making a fake fuss about it, but still I want to really talk about it with him, and when he’s bugging out his eyes like this, it gets hard.
“Tongues?” he asks.
“A little.” I laugh.
“Wow, do you love him?” he asks, getting quieter than I’m even asking him to be.
“I don’t know. What does that even mean?” I say. And without saying a word, Ducks gets up and goes over to an organized stack of records to find exactly the one he wants and puts it on the stereo.
“This. This is what it is.” He smiles to himself.
Music comes out of the big speakers, two big voices, a boy and a girl, singing in something like Italian, maybe German, it’s hard to say. I see how much he loves it and how much it seems exactly like what he thinks a kiss is like, but to me it doesn’t make any sense. This wasn’t my kiss, and I doubt it is for anyone else.
“It’s just how everything fits together. They’re together. And it sounds right, it’s a little like that hum, when they hit the right notes, each separate but they go together, you know?”
“It’s not totally like that,” I answer. “It’s cold noses and spit. It’s a lot different.”
“Okay. So it’s gross?” Ducks laughs.
“No. Not totally. It’s sweet,” I say, for the first time out loud.
I smile and don’t say anything else. He knows what I mean, I think. But I think he wishes it was something a little bigger than sweet. Maybe I do too.
CHAPTER 20
When I get up on Sunday, there are a bunch of emails from my father, and none of them are good. His last message to me is just call.
He didn’t even use punctuation, so he must be furious. I lie on my bed for a while, thinking of how I should handle it. It’s going to be rough. It will start with, “I’m worried about you.” Then I’ll have to sit through a long list of everything that’s wrong with me. At least what he can tell from another continent. He hasn’t even seen me in two years. He was in New York about three and a half months ago, but he and Janet were fighting about something so I didn’t get to see him. That was my fault too. When he gets through this long, long list, he’ll tell me he misses me. It’s all such a lie. But it’s a lie I’m going to have to sit through and even play into. I sit for another minute wanting to put it off, until I finally turn on Skype and call my father.