Clayton shifts around in his seat, digging his phone out of his pocket and passing it to me. “Here,” he says. “Want to pick a podcast or something? Pin is 3141.”
I blink, shocked by how easily he handed it over. My own phone is a fortress of embarrassing Google searches and screenshots of other people’s Instagram stories preserved for further perusal; I’d rather throw the thing into Lake Michigan than give anyone else the code. “Uh, I’m sorry,” I say as I key in the digits. His background is a photo of the entire soccer team—Clayton’s arms draped around the shoulders of a couple other guys I recognize, all of them sweaty and muddy and smiling. “Is your phone password the first four digits of pi?”
Clayton grins. “Busted,” he says. “You know you’re the only person who’s ever picked up on that?”
I feel my cheeks warm, dorkily pleased. “Yeah, well, I’m a nerd.”
“Me too, evidently.”
My lips twist, all skepticism. “Mmm, doubtful.” I click on his podcasts app, fully expecting to have to feign enthusiasm for The Best of Barstool Sports in the name of love, but I’m surprised to find an assortment of options, ranging from sciencey stuff to the latest NPR whodunit to American history and government. “Okay,” I concede, clicking on one called [environ]Mental. “Maybe you are kind of a secret nerd.”
“I’m saying!” Clayton laughs as the tinkling theme music plays. “These dudes are super interesting, though. They go all around the country exploring the aftermath of major environmental disasters that have these massive implications, but that basically no one has ever heard of or remembers. Except, obviously, the people who live near them and whose kids are, like, being born with gills and fins.”
We listen in silence for a few minutes as the hosts explain about an eighty-four-acre solid waste containment area where a dike ruptured, spilling over a billion gallons of coal ash slurry into the surrounding area. It is interesting, in a horrifying kind of way. Most of all I like the way Clayton listens: head tilted to the side in concentration, swearing under his breath at the worst, most infuriating parts. Usually I’m the one geeking out over stuff, getting worked up about minutiae nobody else seems to care about. It’s kind of nice to see someone else do it.
“So this is something you’re interested in?” I ask during a chipper, slightly manic-sounding commercial for a smoothie-delivery program.
“What?” Clayton asks, glancing over his shoulder and changing lanes as a giant truck blows by us. “Podcasts?”
“No, like, the environment. Our rapidly heating planet, the inevitable breakdown of civilization as we know it.” I smile brightly. “You know, fun stuff like that.”
“I am, yeah.” He nods. “Really interested, actually. I’m going to Marquette because of the soccer scholarship, but I picked it over a couple other options mostly because they have a pretty great environmental studies program.”
“Oh, wow,” I say. “Okay, so you’re like, really interested, then.”
“Yeah,” Clayton says. “I mean, I don’t know what I want to do with it exactly, but I figure I’ll have time to work it out.”
I think of what Carrie said the other night, about the Art Institute. Neither of them has the future all planned, but it doesn’t seem to bother them. It must be sort of liberating—that is, along with being terrifying and probably ill-advised. “So soccer isn’t a long-term thing?”
He laughs. “You mean be a professional soccer player? Uh, no.”
“I don’t know!” I laugh too, embarrassed. “I have no idea how professional sports work. You’re good at soccer, are you not?”
“Not that good,” Clayton says firmly. “Plus, like, you have to really love it.”
“And you don’t?”
Clayton hesitates. “It’s not that I don’t, exactly. But not enough for it to be my whole life. And also, like…I don’t know.” He chews the corner of his lip. “Sometimes I wonder, like…”
“What?” I prod, knowing even as the word comes out of my mouth that I sound a full click too eager. Confide in me, I want to tell him. I promise I’m a person you can trust.
“I don’t know,” Clayton says again. “Just, like, if I wasn’t this guy—Soccer Dude, or whatever—would anybody still give a shit about me?”
“You mean, like, would you still be the actual Most Popular Person in our graduating class?” I tease.
Clayton shakes his head, those long eyelashes catching the sunlight as he casts his gaze downward for a moment. “That was embarrassing,” he says, “when that list came out.”
Not as embarrassing as not being on it at all, I suspect, but I don’t say that out loud. “You could always reinvent yourself at college,” I tell him, thinking again of Dr. Paula and her three-pronged plan for self-actualization. “Be, like, Recycling Nerd instead of Soccer Dude.”
“You know, most people don’t realize this, but recycling is actually not the solution to any of our environmental problems whatsoever,” Clayton says immediately. Then he smirks at himself. “Anyway, I don’t know if it’s going to be that easy. I’ve got this whole scholarship, you know? They’re paying for Soccer Dude.” He glances to his blind spot before pulling around a large tour bus emblazoned with a giant red maple leaf. We must be getting close. “How about you?” he asks in a voice that makes it pretty clear he wants to change the subject. “Northwestern in the fall, right? What happens after that?”
“Northwestern in the fall,” I agree, surprised. Sure, I could basically have written an unauthorized biography of Clayton Carville for my senior research project. Still, it’s strange to think he knows even this much about me. “Then law school. Internships with the Equal Justice Initiative or the Innocence Project. Sit for the bar. Clerkship. Practice for a while. Then, if I play my cards right, judgeship.”
“Well, all right then,” Clayton says, lips twitching. “Very decisive.”
“I mean, yeah,” I say, not sure if he’s making fun of me or not. “I don’t understand why more people aren’t, honestly.”
Clayton considers this for a moment. “What happens if something doesn’t go according to plan?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Like if you don’t pass the bar?”
I turn to look at him, alarmed. “Why would I not pass the bar?”
Now Clayton laughs for real. “I am sure you will pass the bar,” he assures me. “But it does happen, you know.”
I shake my head. “I’ve never failed at anything I’ve really tried to do.” Of course, I tend to only attempt things I know I won’t fail at, but that’s neither here nor there. “I kind of don’t believe in failure as a concept.”
Clayton nods slowly. “You’re kind of an intense person, huh?”
Right away my whole body warms, prickling and unpleasant. “I…have been told that in the past, yes,” I admit, glancing down at my hands. I know I can be a lot sometimes, how hard I work and how badly I want things, how rigid my rules have always been. But it’s like I don’t totally understand how to dial it back before it—before my whole personality—tips into being Too Much. “Sorry.”
“No no, it’s not a bad thing,” he amends quickly. “I’m just…observing.”
Something about the way he says the word has me glancing over at him, curious. When I do, I find him gazing back at me, the same inscrutable expression on his face from the other night at the stoplight, in the instant before he looks back at the road.
“Anyway,” I tell him, my skin heating up all over again, “you’re one to talk. You’re not exactly a failure yourself over there.”
Clayton shrugs. “I’ve failed plenty of times,” he says easily. “I play soccer, remember? I’ve lost more games than I’ve won. I don’t think it’s always a bad thing. Sometimes the failures are more important than the wins, you know?”
In my experience, this is emp
hatically something losers say in order to make themselves feel better; still, something about hearing it from Clayton makes me think about it a little differently. I worked so hard in high school to make sure that I would never fail. It’s weird to hear someone like him talk about it as if it’s actually a good thing.
“Huh,” is all I say, reaching down into the grocery bag and pulling out a bag of Swedish Fish, ripping it open. Clayton holds out an open palm.
Clayton pulls off the highway in Mackinaw City, a town on the northern tip of Michigan. “I thought maybe we could take the ferry to Mackinac Island for lunch,” he explains as we drive through town, turning into a parking lot near the water. “That sound okay to you?”
He literally could have suggested a meal of truck stop Funions and I would have been like, Yep, sounds delicious, but my smile now is wide and genuine. “That sounds awesome,” I say truthfully. If this is a date—and I definitely, possibly think it might be a date?—it’s 100 percent the best one I’ve ever been on.
It’s also the only one I’ve ever been on, but still.
I grab my DiPasquale’s hoodie off the floor of the SUV and trail Clayton across the parking lot, where we buy our ferry tickets from the kiosk. Clayton’s phone dings twice with texts as he’s paying for his, a frown passing over his face when he tugs it out of his pocket and glances at the screen. “Everything good?” I ask, his thumb flying as he keys in a hurried response.
Clayton nods briskly. “Yup,” he says, shoving it back into his pocket without offering further explanation. “We’re great.”
Once we board, we head up top for a better view, settling ourselves into two seats near the edge of the boat as I tug my hoodie over my head, shivering in the chilly wind coming off the water. The ferry is bigger than it looks from the causeway, with a jet off the back that sprays a huge rooster tail of water as we tool along in the water. “That doesn’t make it go any faster,” Clayton tells me, gesturing with his chin. “It’s just supposed to look cool.”
“Hold on,” I say, “should I add Ferry Captain to your list of aliases? Along with Soccer Dude and Recycling Nerd?”
“Frequent passenger,” he corrects with a shake of his head. “We used to come up here every summer, that’s all. My grandparents actually lived in Berlin, so we used to see them twice a year: every August here and every Christmas at their house.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Berlin as in Germany?” I ask, and Clayton nods. “How’s your German?”
He makes a face. “I mean…Oktoberfest?” he tries, and I laugh.
“Sure,” I agree. “Also weinerschnitzel.”
“Volkswagen,” he counters.
“Kummerspeck,” I remember suddenly.
Clayton shakes his head. “I’m sorry,” he says, “what now?”
“It means ‘grief bacon.’ ” It was a crossword clue not that long ago that stumped both me and Dad for the better part of the day. “Literally, at least. But it’s like, the food you eat when you’re emotional.”
“That’s not real,” Clayton says immediately.
“It’s totally real!” I protest. “You can Google it!”
“Oh, I’m going to.”
“You do that.”
“I will.”
“Okay, then.”
We’ve turned to face each other now, my knees pressing against his on the bench seat; just for a second, Clayton’s close enough to kiss. What if I just did it? I wonder suddenly. What if I just leaned in, closed my eyes, and—
Clayton clears his throat, straightening up again. “Kummerspeck,” he mutters, shaking his head one more time.
* * *
Once we arrive on the island, I stake out a picnic table, posting up underneath a giant yellow umbrella while Clayton picks up food at a place called the Dog House. He’s left his Tottenham hoodie—which I returned this morning, a little sheepishly—and his phone on the bench beside me, the phone basically glowing like a ten-thousand-point bonus prize in an old video game. I know it’s wrong—that it’s a gross violation of his privacy, that it crosses the line into actual creepy stalker territory—but I can’t help but wonder about those texts he got earlier, and if they were from Bethany. Yeah, Clayton said they were broken up, but he also said things were complicated between them, which is basically the world’s vaguest cop-out. I just need to understand what I’m dealing with, that’s all. I just want to know what’s going on.
I glance over at the line in front of the Dog House, making sure Clayton can’t see me.
Then I pick up the phone and key in the first four digits of pi.
Sure enough, his most recent conversation is with Bethany: I am beyond sad today, she wrote as we were paying for our ferry tickets. Can you come over? Bring green Pringles.
I’m sorry kiddo, Clayton responded. Can’t today but I’ll call you later. Are you okay?
This whole thing just sucks, that’s all. What are you doing?
“Hey,” Clayton calls, headed back in my direction with an overflowing plastic tray. “Hope you’re starving.”
“It fell off the bench,” I blurt out immediately, holding the phone up. My heart is pounding, both at the idea that he might have caught me and in confusion over what I just read. What “whole thing sucks” exactly? Bethany and Clayton’s breakup? And why didn’t he text back when she asked him where he was? If anything, I’ve got more questions now than I did before I snooped. “Sorry, I just…picked it up.”
“Oh,” Clayton says, apparently willing to take me at my word. “Thanks.” He sets the tray on the table and tucks his phone back into his pocket. “Nothing but the finest,” he jokes, handing me a hot dog and a bag of kettle chips, plus a black cow in a waxy paper cup. “Didn’t know how you take your dogs, so I brought a little bit of everything.”
“Mustard,” I say absently. I’m super picky about my condiments. “Only mustard.”
“You’re going to have to learn how to appreciate Chicago-style next year,” he warns me, doctoring his own hot dog with pickle relish, mustard, and ketchup. Then, once he’s taken a giant bite: “You okay?”
“Oh,” I say, realizing abruptly that I haven’t touched any of the food in front of me. “Um, yeah.” Nonna would probably say it serves me right to feel this way, that I got what I deserved for invading someone else’s privacy. Dr. Paula would probably tell me to buck up and shine it on. And both of them would be right, theoretically, wouldn’t they? After all, nothing has changed since twenty minutes ago. I still have no idea what’s going on between Bethany and Clayton.
But Clayton is still here with me.
“So,” I say brightly, reaching for my bag of kettle chips. “You guys used to come here every summer?”
He nods. “Usually my dad could only get away for a long weekend, but my mom and Ruthie and I used to stay for a couple weeks, sometimes even longer.” Clayton shoos an obnoxious gull that keeps trying to hop up on the edge of our table.
“Does your dad work a lot?”
“Kind of. All those hips and knees that need replacing. And my mom is on like every board and committee imaginable, so. Neither of them are around a ton.”
I think of my parents and Nonna, all of us perpetually on top of each other between the house and the restaurant, minding each other’s business and breathing each other’s air. It drives me up a tree sometimes, sure, but I also think I’d hate having it any other way. “That sucks.”
Clayton shrugs. “It’s fine. I mean, it was hard when I was younger. I just didn’t understand why other kids’ parents were always there and mine weren’t.” He makes a face. “Now I think it’s, like, probably for the best.”
I remember that night at DiPasquale’s—the four Carvilles and their dour expressions, his parents’ barely contained fight. “Are they…?” I trail off. I’m trying to figure out how to put it delicately when suddenly some
thing swoops down onto the table and in one quick movement, grabs the rest of my hot dog from its paper sheath. It smacks frantically against my face as it beats its retreat. I scream, more shocked than hurt, but Clayton jumps up, practically throwing himself on top of me and knocking me off the bench in the process.
For a moment I just lie there on the scruffy, rocky grass, Clayton sort of on top of me with a completely bewildered expression on his face. “What the heck was that?” he asks breathlessly, pushing himself partially upright. Our ankles are still tangled together, his bare skin touching the gap between the hem of my jeans and my sneakers.
“Seagull,” I say, pointing behind us to where it flitted away. My skin is tingling—the adrenaline rush from an avian near-death experience, sure, but that’s definitely not all.
“Aggressive bastard.” Clayton flops back against the grass beside me, both of us laughing. “I thought it was like, an alien invasion.”
While our food is left unprotected on the table, a few more gulls start to approach. Clayton scrambles to his feet to try and chase them off, but I shake my head. “Let ’em have it,” I tell him, catching him by the wrist. “You want to get out of here?”
“Let’s do it,” he says, taking my hand and pulling me to my feet.
* * *
We hop onto the ferry, climb back into the car. “You sure you’re ready for this?” Clayton teases, keying the Canada Border Services Agency into his GPS and pulling out of the parking lot. “Not going to chicken out at the last second, are you?”
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