by L. Philips
“No, you’re not. You’re hurt.”
“I’m seventeen. I’m not—”
“Not supposed to cry?” Landon finishes for me. He arches a brow. “Is that like how we’re not supposed to want a boyfriend who actually cares or freak out when sex actually means something? Come on. You know that shit’s not true either.”
It’s the first time Landon has even come close to talking about what happened between us, and the pain already present in my heart from Gus coils around older, deeper pain for a moment.
“I don’t want to cry over him.”
“Then don’t. But if you feel like you should, you can.”
Landon says the words but I know they’re meant to be from Meg as well, because she squeezes me tight in her thin little arms. I’m not sure how much time passes, but it’s long enough that my mother calls my cell phone to check on me, and Landon reluctantly offers to drive me home.
I dream about Gus that night, and the list. In the dream, we’re in the cemetery and a burst of wind yanks the list out of my hands, and it flies into Gus’s. Then all I can do is watch hopelessly, struggling not to cry, as he rips the list to shreds.
Eight
A Cheez-It hits the tip of my nose.
“Earth to Sam.”
It’s the Tenth Circle of Hell, otherwise known as lunch period on Monday, and I would rather be anywhere, anywhere on earth, than Athens High School. Usually I say that jokingly, because I’m nerdy enough to actually enjoy the learning part of school. Nothing’s more satisfying than a philosophical talk about Animal Farm or a challenging set of calculus problems. But today rumors are swirling all around me; I hear my name and Gus’s paired in hushed tones in the hallways, and it serves as a reminder that I won’t be walking him home anymore, or sneaking a quick kiss before eighth period.
Over Meg’s voice, I catch a nasal, female voice behind me saying, “. . . but then he left with Landon. Do you think . . . ?”
“I’m sure, Marie,” another unfamiliar voice answers. “You know, gay guys can be sluts too.”
I close my eyes and wish I could be invisible. And deaf. And perhaps comatose too, just for good measure.
“Sam.”
I grunt and open my eyes. Meg’s staring at me, face looming in front of mine as she leans over the cafeteria table. “Come on. You’ve got to eat.”
I pick a cucumber off my wilted sandwich and stuff it in my mouth, smacking my lips as I chew with my mouth open. “I’m eating,” I say through cucumber bits, then swallow.
The table shakes and I turn to my right as Landon plops down beside me. His lunch period isn’t for another twenty minutes—Gus’s lunch period, I remind myself with a groan—so he’s skipping out on something.
“Okay, so I’ve done rumor control on the baseball team, the basketball team, the lacrosse team, the AV Club, Latin Club, Honor Society, the cheerleaders, the 4-H kids, and most of the orchestra, but there’s no way in hell I can catch all of the band. I’m sure most of them have heard the story from Gus. At least his version of it anyway, whatever he’s saying.”
“What is Gus saying?” I ask, hating the hopeful notes I hear in my own voice.
Landon gives me a sad smile. “Just that he wants you back.”
“Good,” I grumble. “He can just keep on wanting.”
“Good for you!” Meg coos, patting my hand on my can of Diet Coke. “Besides, you want to be single when the Goddess brings you the real Perfect Ten.”
“If your goddess had anything to do with Gus, I think I’ll pass on the next one too,” I say.
Meg sticks out her bottom lip and I think she’d probably argue with me or call me a blasphemer if this were a different day, and I didn’t look like I’d been flattened by a Zamboni machine.
“Thanks, Landon,” I say, turning back to him.
“No problem.” He leans on the table, elbowing my disgusting sandwich out of the way. “I’ve had a lot of people congratulate me, actually.”
“Congratulate you?” I ask. “About what?”
His eyes are dancing with humor. “About us getting back together.”
I laugh—a weird, shocked kind of laugh that’s a little clipped. Landon chuckles too.
“Of course, then I had to explain that we weren’t back together or anything, which kind of took the fun out of it. But . . .” He smiles at me, all warm and kind of wonderful, almost like he used to. “Seems like we had a few fans.”
“Who knew?” I laugh for real this time. “Anyway, thanks. Hopefully in a few days I’ll stop hearing the words ‘Sam’ and ‘filthy whore’ in the same sentence. And, you know, people won’t think we’re together again.”
“Yeah. Hopefully.” Landon’s eyes drift to Meg’s before he takes a determined interest in his fingernails. “Anyway, better get back to band . . .”
“Donkey after school?” Meg asks him, and I jerk my head in her direction. I’m surprised at the offer. It’s usually me who does the inviting where Landon is concerned.
Landon’s whole face brightens. “Sure! See you guys then!”
When he’s gone I raise an eyebrow at her, but she just shrugs and shoves a fistful of Cheez-Its in her mouth, saying around a glob of orange, “Eat, Sam. Or I’ll make you.”
And because Meg has, on occasion, actually followed through with a few of her threats, I take a bite of my sandwich and swallow it down.
By some miracle (or maybe that whole Goddess thing is trying to work for me still), I don’t see Gus until Wednesday. I’m walking through the hallway just after the dismissal bell, ready to grab my coat and get something warm and filled with caffeine from the Donkey, when I hear Gus’s deep voice coming from around the next corner. In a panic, I dart into the first open door I see.
Unfamiliar smells assault my senses. It’s kind of like sweet dried grass in the summertime, and sawdust, and something like plastic with a bit of a chemical zing. At first I wonder if I’m in the shop room, since I’ve never seen it and honestly have no idea where it is in the school. I stay as far away from things that could lop off an appendage as I can.
But then my eyes catch up to my nose. All around me are canvases, hung on walls, situated on tables, posed on easels. It’s the canvas frames I’m smelling, and the paint. I’m in the art room.
And holy Moses, don’t artists ever clean up after themselves? The place is a mess. Everything’s covered with splatters of paint, making it look deserving of the modern art section of every museum I’ve ever visited. Brushes are everywhere, jars with mysterious liquids inside them, scissors, random scraps of paper, tubes of paint, and even what looks to be a human head, although on further inspection I can tell it’s just a model.
I take a few steps toward one of the tables and pick up a sheet of paper on it. It’s a sketch of a bird, but it’s unlike any bird I’ve ever seen. It’s prettier than any bird I’ve ever seen. It’s sleek, with long feathers and a long neck, and a needle-nose beak that curves slightly downward.
“It’s a Jubjub bird,” a voice says somewhere off to my right, and I jump five feet in the air. It’s Jamie, from Seven Sauces, and he’s smiling shyly, though he’s clearly pleased with himself that he was able to scare me.
I clutch at my chest. “Are you trying to kill me?”
“Not really.” He steps close to me and takes one side of the sketch, turning it so we can both see it. I study the drawing, now realizing that it must be his.
“The Jubjub bird from Through the Looking Glass?” Jamie nods. I look again at the beautiful bird, impressed. “It’s good. Really good.”
Jamie takes the drawing from me and lays it on the table again before wiping his hands off on his cargo pants, which I can see are stained with all colors of paint. “Lewis Carroll says it lives alone but also in a perpetual state of passion.”
The Jubjub’s plight sounds all too familiar, and
I have to wonder what made Jamie want to draw it. “It must be very lonely,” I say, feeling a tug at my heart.
He doesn’t answer. “Are you lost?” he asks instead.
“What? No.”
He studies me, and I have the feeling that he can see things I’d rather keep secret. “Hiding, then?”
I wince. “Yeah, I guess.”
“From Gus?”
So he knows about Gus. I immediately feel awful about asking for Jamie’s number. I nod slowly.
“Oh. He’s really gorgeous, Sam.”
Guilt bubbles in my stomach, gurgling and uncomfortable like bad gas. “Thanks, but we’re not exactly together anymore.”
Jamie sniffs. “I know. I was at Milo’s.”
“You were?” I ask, and immediately regret it because Jamie’s pretty face falls. “I’m sorry. I didn’t see you.”
“You had other things going on.” Jamie shrugs it off. “Anyway. I’m sorry about Gus. Did you really like him?”
When he asks, the whole thing seems to come back at me all at once, and before I can get a grip, tears prickle in my eyes. “Yeah. I guess I did.”
“I can see why. I mean, I certainly can’t hold it against you for not calling.”
Ouch.
“Hey.” I reach out and touch him, and although he raises a brow at it, he also moves closer so that my hand can make more contact over his bare skin. “I shouldn’t have asked for your number when I did. Gus and I, well, I guess we were already having some trouble then. But I meant what I said.”
“About?” Jamie asks, hopeful.
“About you being cute.” I watch his porcelain skin turn soft pink. “But I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. At least not then.”
“Well, you can still call,” Jamie says, then smiles shyly, adding, “If you want.”
My stomach flutters. He’s just so pretty, with his golden-blond hair and those big eyes and pouty lips, and I can’t help but think of what Meg said. Maybe Gus wasn’t the one I was waiting for. Maybe, just maybe, the boy of my dreams isn’t going to come in on horseback, wearing a suit of armor, ready to save me from this loneliness. Maybe he won’t even be terribly charismatic and have an adorable accent. I didn’t ask for those things, after all. Perhaps the boy of my dreams will sneak into my heart quietly, and his shy charm will hook me better than any alluring Frenchman could.
“I’d like that.” We smile at each other, and a beat passes before I can gather my wits enough to make conversation. “So why are you here so late? Working on the Jubjub?”
“No,” Jamie says with a slight shake of his head. “I’m working on a painting. A . . . well, a watercolor, I guess. It’s over here, if you want to see it.”
“I’d love to see it.”
Jamie crooks his finger, silently beckoning me to follow as he heads back into a little nook in the room, small enough for just one person to work in. He bites his lip as he points to his current project, which is on an easel in front of a stool.
I step in front of it, and I am stunned.
The canvas looks like it might be on fire. Bold reds mix with vibrant orange and sunny yellows, contrasted with sweeping lines of black. The curves create a feather here, a wing there, a beak at the top corner. It’s another bird, even prettier than the Jubjub, and this one is flying, wings outstretched, reaching toward the sun.
“It’s a phoenix,” he whispers as I’m admiring his work. “I kind of wanted to capture the moment when it burst into flames, right before the rebirth from ashes.”
“Jamie, this is beautiful.” I turn to him in awe. “I mean, I know nothing about art, but this looks like it should be in a museum, not . . . well, here.”
Jamie laughs, and again I’m taken aback by the airy quality of his voice, like how the wind whistles through tree branches. I find myself wanting to close my eyes and just listen. “Thanks. It’s not done yet. I still don’t have the flames quite right. But most of the others aren’t done either. I like to wait for inspiration to hit, and you just never know when it will strike.”
“Others?” I ask, then answer myself as I look around his small workspace. There are painted birds everywhere—a peacock of blues and golds and greens, a hawk in reddish browns, a dodo in purple and pink, swans, seagulls, and creatures that look like they’re straight out of Middle-earth or some other fantastical universe. “Wow.”
Jamie just smiles. “I love watercolors. Some people don’t because they don’t give you a precise line, but that’s why I like them. They’re the opposite of precise. They’re chaotic and surprising and imperfect.”
“You like imperfection?” I ask.
Jamie nods, eyes sparkling with humor. “There’s a lot of beauty in imperfection.”
I look at his phoenix. There is certainly a lot of beauty there, but I can’t say I see any imperfections. “Can I watch?”
Jamie turns to me sharply, incredulous. “You . . . you want to watch me paint?”
“Yeah, unless it’s too personal. I get that. I don’t like anyone standing over my shoulder while I write.” He squints at me. “I like to write,” I explain.
“I know,” he says. “I read your articles in the school paper.”
“I’m glad someone does, though they’re not very good. I’m really more into fiction.”
“Like your father?”
“No,” I say, a bit too quickly, and although it shouldn’t be a surprise that he knows my father is a writer, it still catches me off guard. “Not really like my father at all. Dad and I are . . . very different.”
“Different styles?” Jamie asks.
I nod. “I’m the Douglas Adams to his Shakespeare.”
Jamie ducks down, catching my lowered gaze and bringing it back up. “The world needs both Douglas Adamses and Shakespeares. Otherwise we’d have the same stories, over and over again.”
“Thanks,” I say. “So, anyway, would I make you nervous if I sat here while you painted?”
“No,” Jamie says. He wrinkles his button nose. “But I do have to warn you. I get into the zone while I work. I may not be much of a conversationalist.”
I laugh at that because I can totally understand “the zone.” “I hear you. I’ll keep my chattering to a minimum. Wouldn’t want to disturb the artiste.”
“Chatter away, Sam. Sometimes I listen to music while I paint, but mostly it’s just silence. Some conversation would do me good.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” he says, his soft voice floating. “Stay.”
So I stay for an hour, watching him as he works on his phoenix. Even though he clearly doesn’t mind my company and we chat a bit, getting to know each other, I do try to stay quiet as he works, and I watch, enraptured. From my vantage point, it’s hard to tell what’s more beautiful—the phoenix like a bright flame on his canvas, or the way his pretty face relaxes in ecstatic bliss as he strokes his brush over the canvas, again and again.
“You missed lunch today.”
It’s Friday afternoon. Meg couldn’t go to the Donkey because her older sister is in town and they’re all going out to eat tonight and she’s expected to be a willing participant. So Landon and I are at his house, and his parents still aren’t home, which means we don’t even bother opening the windows since it’s colder than a witch’s you-know-what outside. No offense to Meg, of course.
Landon blows out smoke and then hands me the joint, which I take and lean back against the pile of pillows as I take a hit.
“And apparently you missed band.”
Landon snorts. “Your lunch period is way better than Sousa’s ten millionth march. No one should be forced to endure hearing three piccolos playing at the same time.”
“I went to watch Jamie work.” Landon raises a brow at me, so I explain. “He’s a sophomore. Jamie Fisher? Blond? He’s into art and stuff.”
I kick lazily at Landon, who’s sitting cross-legged by my feet. He reaches up and steals the joint back. “No, I like watching him paint. He’s, like, serene or something when he does it. I have this theory that we both go to the same place—when we’re working, I mean. He’s in this creative, peaceful headspace. It’s exactly where I am when I write. I keep thinking that if I was writing at the same time he was painting, maybe we’d meet up, and he’d start painting me, and I’d write him into my story.”
Landon blinks. “Wow, this pot is stronger than I thought.”
“Shut up.”
Landon laughs and slides down on his stomach, stretching out beside me. “I think I know him. Hangs out with Sean Houser and Kit MacDonald?”
I try to think. “I don’t know. Maybe? We don’t talk all that much.”
“Too busy ‘watching him work’?”
I glare at him. “It’s not like that.”
Landon nods, a know-it-all smirk spreading his lips wide. “Sure. You and the pretty boy just talk. But not about his friends.”
“There’s nothing going on with us. Really.”
“But you want there to be?”
I take the joint and breathe in, turning the thought over in my mind. “I don’t know. I like him, but I don’t want to jump in like I did with Gus. I think he might fit my list better than Gus, when it comes down to it. He’s really shy but that doesn’t stop him from being fun. Or ambitious. You know, he works as a busboy at Seven Sauces to pay for art school when he graduates. And there’s something so charming about how quiet he is. But I’m kind of scared I’ll spook him, you know? Like if I’m too forward, he’ll just run away.”
“Is he out?”
“We’ve never really talked about that either,” I answer. Landon shoots me a dubious look. “I really do just watch him paint most of the time.”
Landon sits up suddenly, shaking the bed and disturbing my comfort. “Gus asked me about you today, by the way.”