Wake

by Abria Mattina

  “Feel,” he mutters. The interruption throws me off my train of thought.

  “What?”

  “What you feel,” he corrects me. “You said think.”

  “What’s the difference?” I blow out a sigh and he shrugs.

  “Everything.” He sounds so blasé. “What do you feel?”

  I have a strange urge to lie. “Nothing.”

  “Sorry, I’m not yet fluent in Willa-ese.” Is he teasing me? “What does ‘nothing’ mean in English?”

  “Don’t make me say this shit. You know I don’t do feelings.”

  The corner of Jem’s mouth twitches in a sad smile. He reaches across the short gap between our chairs with his first two fingers extended. They nudge my hand where it rests on the arm of the chair, weaving between my fingers.

  I love you.

  I can’t for the life of me remember why I thought it was a good idea to show him that gesture.

  “Be with me.”

  “This isn’t going to work.”

  “Pessimism is my job,” he tries to joke, but it falls flat. “Try.”

  “Why bother?”

  “Because it’s painful not to.”

  That pain behind my ribs rears its ugly head again. My first urge is still, and probably always will be, to kill it with smoke.

  “I need to think about it.”

  Thursday

  So knocking number one off my to-do list didn’t work out so hot. But that doesn’t mean I can’t take a stab at number two: sorting out the rest of my life. Luke falls under that category, and he’s as good a place as any to start. I owe him apology for what I did to his face and wrist. I’m also owed an apology, for what he said. We need to settle up.

  I arrive at the Thorpe house to find Luke in the kitchen, cooking fries in hot oil. It’s spilling everywhere and the kitchen smells like grease. Complaining about the smell is Briana, who occupies the chair closest to the kitchen door. She’s polishing spoons. I guess this is her folks’ idea of keeping her busy and out of trouble.

  Luke looks up when I walk in and nods. “Hey.”

  “You got a second to talk?”

  “Talk?” Briana interrupts. She looks at me over her shoulder. “Have you learned how to use your words like a big girl?”

  I ignore her and look to Luke for an answer. “Sure.” He sets his spatula down and leans back against the counter, arms folded and hard-faced. I suppose not many happy-go-lucky smiles have come across his busted mouth lately.

  “I came here to apologize.”

  “Okay.”

  “And to set some limits—about what it’s not okay to say about my family.”

  “What about her family?” Briana cuts in.

  “You have no lines in this play.”

  “Nothing,” Luke says, staring me straight in the eye. “She’s just a selfish bitch who hurts her family as often as she can manage.”

  Fuck him.

  “I’m sure your mother would be proud to hear you talk like that.” Mrs. Thorpe has been dead for more than twelve years, and my words finally seem to get to him. The belligerent expression fades from Luke’s eyes, but he still doesn’t look away.

  “I heard your parents shipped you off to live with Frank ‘cause she couldn’t stand you anymore,” Briana says to me. Luke has been running his mouth.

  “And your dad’ll do the same to you if you keep it up.” I nod to her hands, holding the spoon and rag. It’s pretty toasty in this house to be wearing long sleeves. “If you meant it you would have cut up the wrist, not across it.”

  “Fuck you.” Briana scoffs. She glares at me over her shoulder like it’s my fault for seeing through her. I’m not picking a fight with this wounded girl. I didn’t come here for that. I walk around the table and stand between her chair and Luke, blocking her out of this conversation. I’m shit at apologizing anyway and I don’t want to prolong this.

  “I’m sorry I roughed you up so bad.” Luke’s eyes are still bruised and there’s a mark on his jaw where I punched him. His wrist has faded welts around the bone, but at least he’s not wearing his tensor support anymore.

  “You hear that? The dumb bitch is sorry,” Briana snarks.

  “Interrupt me one more time; I dare you.” I give her a hard look and she wrinkles her nose at me. Briana doesn’t say anything. I turn back to Luke, prepared to finish my apology, when she speaks up from behind me.

  “Bitch.”

  That is fucking it. I turn to her and snap, “You think acting out will make people give a shit about you? If you mattered at all they would already care.”

  Briana stands up and squares her shoulders like she’s going to hit me. Luke quickly jumps up to put himself between us. “Hey!” He puts his hands on Briana’s arms, holding her back. I’m not sure if he’s trying to stop the fight or protect Briana, but either way, it feels good to be feared.

  “I don’t understand why he fucking likes you,” she spits at me. Briana throws Luke’s arms off and storms out the door, muttering curses as she goes.

  “That was low, Willa,” Luke tells me sternly. What do I say to that?

  “I have a temper.”

  “You’re disgusting.” Now there’s a phrase that never tires with use.

  “Likewise, Luke.” I turn to go. “Sorry about your face.”

  “I meant it,” he calls after me.

  “So did I.”

  *

  Jem can sense that something is off with me when I meet him at the clinic for his dialysis session. “My life has no shortage of people who piss me off,” I say.

  “Who pissed you off today?”

  “Luke.”

  “You did almost break his arm.” Jem looks like he’s trying not to smile when he says that.

  “That’s not all I did,” I tell him that I called a troubled fourteen-year-old girl a worthless attention seeker and told her to give up and accept obscurity.

  “What is your issue with keeping your damn mouth shut?”

  “It has these hinges on the sides, you see.” I open and close my jaw, demonstrating. Jem calls me a smartass and I tell him it takes one to know one.

  “Have you thought about…?” he hints.

  “Still working on that,” I tell him. “Be patient.”

  “I can be patient,” Jem assures me. “Kind of. I’ll try really hard.”

  That makes me laugh. “What does ‘trying hard’ look like for a lazy bastard?”

  “You’re right, I give up—have you thought about it yet? Huh? Have you? What are you thinking? Tell me.”

  “Oh shut up.” I try to embrace the fact that I like it when Jem makes me smile during a lousy time.

  Jem takes my hand and holds it on the armrest of the clinic recliner. “Take your time, Willa,” he tells me seriously. “It’s not like I’m going anywhere.”

  Jem: May 26 to 29

  Friday

  It’s depressing, seeing the little green pill in my morning handful of ‘candy.’ Two weeks ago I thought I would be done with this crap forever. It sticks in the back of my throat as I swallow. I manage to wash it down, but the image of the little green pill—of the bottle on the bathroom counter—sticks to my ego. I’m too screwed up to go without painkillers.

  They said the joint pain would fade within a year, probably less. I’m still waiting on that.

  I give the bright side the benefit of the doubt as I get dressed. There are a few things to look forward to today: two days worth of missed assignments and lecture notes; eating yogurt for lunch, because my stomach is still weak from the fluctuating opiate doses; having to justify yet another absence to the school secretary, who shows pity all too readily. In fact, today would be entirely crap if not for the fact that I’m going to see Willa. I send her a text as I look through my drawer for my blue shirt—the one she likes because it actually fits.

  You’re lending me your Soc notes.

  Her answer makes me smile: Make me.

  *

  I find Willa in th
e parking lot before school. She’s standing by her car, digging through that black hole of a backpack. She’s so absorbed in her search that she doesn’t hear me come up behind her. I put a finger to her back like a gun and say, “Give me your Soc notebook and no one gets hurt.”

  I expect a snarky remark, but she just hands her notebook over her shoulder. “Just a heads up,” Willa says as she zips her backpack. “That freshman blabbed.”

  “What?”

  “There are a few rumors drifting around. Nothing major.”

  “What rumors?”

  Willa shrugs and looks away. Now is a really lousy time to be evasive. I should smack her over the head with her notebook.

  “That we made out, and that we’re secretly dating because you’re dying and I pity you.”

  I shouldn’t be surprised, given the general level of intellect at this school, but what the hell?

  “Have you said anything?”

  “No.”

  “So, what? We ignore it?” I don’t want to. I want the rumor to be true—the part about dating her, anyway. If everyone thinks I got a piece, but only out of pity, her pack of dumbass admirers might redouble their efforts in an attempt to show her a better time than Cancer Boy ever could.

  “I think that would be best.” Willa turns to go inside and I grab her sleeve. I’m not done with her yet. I’ve got one more burning question before she walks away and we pretend to be nothing more than friends.

  I pull her in close enough to speak lowly in her ear. The words won’t come. I don’t know how to ask this, or if I really want to hear the answer.

  “Um…”

  Willa sighs. “No, I don’t pity you.” Thank God she can read my mind.

  “Have you thought about…?”

  “It won’t last.” So she keeps saying.

  “That’s not a no.”

  Willa arches an eyebrow at me. “And that’s a technicality.” She turns to walk away. I follow her, and Willa actually adjusts her pace to walk with me. For once she isn’t pulling away. Cue the choir of angels.

  I slip my hand into hers as we enter the main building. Her fingers don’t grip me back and she’s got a worried look on her face. “You didn’t say no,” I remind her.

  Willa’s fingers curl around mine one by one. She hasn’t actually said it, but the willingness of her touch, the display of affection in a very public school hallway, is better than hearing her say yes. Her hand is my proof that she does care. Willa does want me.

  *

  Whoever said schadenfreude is wrong obviously never met Chris Elwood. He looks like he’s just dying to say something, the way he eyes Willa and I. She brought me a thermos of soup today, and Chris can tell from the way we eat one-handed with angled arms that we’re holding hands under the table.

  Would it be rude of me to shout, “HA!” at him across the table? Probably? Well damn.

  Paige keeps eyeing Willa with looks ranging from curiosity to shrewdness. I bet she’s going to corner Willa the first chance she gets and make her spill about dating Cancer Boy.

  “Come over tonight,” I say to her.

  Willa spares me a glance. “Fine.”

  Fine? Just fine? Not ‘I’d love to’ or ‘sounds good’? Anything to make it sound like she isn’t agreeing out of pity for a poor sick freak like me?

  Chris leans over and asks Willa if they’re still on for tomorrow night. What’s tomorrow night? I give Willa a questioning look, but she ignores me to invite Brian and Hannah along. It’s a group outing to the movies.

  I squeeze Willa’s hand to remind her that I’m right here and she has the audacity to turn to me and say, “What?”

  “You could invite me, you know.” I try not to sound like a bratty child, but it’s tough.

  “Isn’t it implied that you’re coming?”

  We’re automatic dates now? I actually like the sound of that… Plus it makes Elwood the fifth wheel. I am so there.

  “What time?”

  *

  I think Eric is bugging the crap out of Willa, but she hasn’t told him off yet. He hovers around the kitchen island, watching intently and trying not to drool while Willa shows Elise how to test the readiness of pork chops. Elise loves the attention, and she loves learning to cook.

  “So where’d you learn how to do this stuff?” she asks as Willa slides the chops back into the oven.

  “My grandma loves to cook too. I had to learn—my mom’s idea of a balanced meal is frozen pizza.”

  Elise tells Willa about the time Mom tried to make cornbread using blue corn. The result was grey squares of starch that tasted like sandpaper and felt even worse going down.

  Eric presses his face to the oven window, watching the meat. “Are they done yet?”

  Elise rattails him with a dishcloth and tells him to get away from the oven. On the stove, pots of sweet potato and green beans bubble away. Willa is making fresh apple compote—whatever the hell that is—for the pork. Eric keeps trying to taste it. Finally Elise slaps his hand and tells him to go set the table.

  “Do you really think the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach?” she says as Willa drains the sweet potatoes. So that’s why my sister wants to learn to cook, and why that Latham jerk was here last weekend for fresh chicken sandwiches.

  “Depends on the man,” Willa says.

  “It does not,” I interject. Elise doesn’t need any ideas about wooing that jackass with food. Willa looks over at me with a raised eyebrow. Crap. Food was the first thing that made me warm to her.

  Elise puts her scrawny arm to work mashing the sweet potatoes while Willa glazes the green beans. Elise complains that all the steam is making her hair gel lose its hold. “It’s at such an awkward length right now,” she complains.

  Sorry, sis.

  Willa smiles at Elise’s hair woes and says it probably doesn’t help that her hair never lies flat.

  “Ugh, I know.”

  “Mine doesn’t either,” I remind her. She’s not alone with her wild hair.

  Willa pauses with her hand on the blender and smiles at me. “Doesn’t? Present tense?”

  “Never mind.”

  “Can I see?”

  “No.” She lets it go, but Elise can’t resist making a crack at my expense.

  “He’s prone to wicked hat head, you know.”

  Saturday

  I head over to the Kirk house late in the morning. I have no plans for today, except to spend it in Willa’s company.

  She’s gonna get sick of you, the way you’re always showing up.

  Never.

  I let myself in and all I can hear is “I’m Gonna Be” by The Proclaimers blasting in the living room. Willa is in the kitchen, mopping the floor and singing along with such enthusiasm that I know she doesn’t think she has an audience. No one sings with that much gusto in public unless they’re drunk. I stand in the hall and observe her, enjoying the show even though I know she’s going to give me hell when she finds out I was watching the whole time.

  It’s when she starts playing air guitar with the mop that I can’t help but laugh, and she catches me. She looks absolutely horrified, which only makes the situation funnier.

  “Encore!”

  Willa marches up to me. For a second I worry that she’s going to break the mop handle over my head and beat me to death with the pieces, but she just hands it to me with narrowed eyes and tells me to pitch in.

  “Do I have to sing along?” I tease her.

  Willa pretends to punch me in slow motion. I lean into it for the sake of the joke and she opens her hand to touch my face at the last second. She strokes my jaw in a subtle, welcoming way.

  “You mop. I’ll clean windows.”

  I want to touch her through that baggy flannel shirt.

  “Sure.”

  “I made myself a chore list for before we go out,” she says as she heads to the kitchen. She reaches under the sink for the bottle of Windex and oh that ass…

  “Brian is driving. I
s that cool with you?”

  “Of course.” Going out tonight wouldn’t be my first choice of activity, but I can fake enthusiasm if she really wants to go. If it were just a double date with Hannah and Brian, and Willa and I had some clear label on whatever it is we’re doing, I’d enjoy it more.

  “We don’t have to go.” I give her a (hopefully) persuasive smile. “We could stay in and rent something to watch.”

  Willa hums noncommittally. “I owe Chris some friend time.”

  She owes that douche nozzle what?

  “Don’t give me that look.”

  “What look?”

  “It’s that look that dogs give their owners before they leave the house. You don’t have to come tonight if you don’t want to.”

  “I do want to,” I assure her. I push the mop across the kitchen tiles as she wipes the windows. “So…are you wearing that?”

  Willa looks down at her torn black jeans and hand-me-down flannel. “Are you serious?”

  “You look comfy.”

  “I look homeless.”

  I set the mop against the counter and show her how huggable flannel is. Willa doesn’t pull away, either. She wraps her arms loosely around my neck and rests her head on my shoulder while I trace the shape of her ribcage.

  “Where’s your brother?” I murmur.

  Willa sighs. “No, I will not screw you while he’s out.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that.” I rub her back through the flannel, trying to console her. How could she have such a cheap thought? Would she expect that kind of behavior from me?

  “So he’s not home?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’d rather not get the living shit beaten out of me for kissing you.”

  “You haven’t kissed me.”

  “I want to.” I press her weight against the counter and cup the back of her head where it rests on my shoulder. I use it to guide her face up to an angle where I can touch her lips. Willa kisses with her eyes open. It’s weird, but I try not to mind it. It’s like she doesn’t want to stop looking at me. And watching the way her face changes, the way she responds to each kiss with more than just her lips, I wonder what I missed with other girls while my eyes were closed. Did their eyes turn dark like Willa’s? Did their cheeks turn pink and warm? Did they negotiate with their eyes as well as their lips, demanding, teasing, asking for a different pace, goading and hinting at ideas?