Caterpillars Can't Swim

by Liane Shaw

  I wonder if Jack has noticed.

  We head into a big open room, which I assume is the skating rink most of the time seeing as there are bleachers all around it for watching games. Even though it’s still filled with people, it doesn’t feel quite as cramped as the rest of the building, and I actually feel like I can move without running into anyone.

  There are tables all around the outside with merchandise on them, and at the far end there’s a bunch of food trucks sending out smells that are making my stomach complain loudly about the lack of attention I’ve been paying to it.

  We head straight to the food, ignoring the tables that will later probably completely drain Cody’s wallet. Cody gets there first and lines up with the rest of the people looking to eat giant Polish sausages with masses of sauerkraut.

  “I don’t really like sausages. I’m going to get some Chinese food,” Jack says, gesturing toward a truck advertising stir-fry and egg rolls. I go with him. I’d rather have a sausage, but stir-fry is probably safer in this place anyway.

  Jack orders for both of us because it’s easier that way.

  “I’ll get this,” he says, waving me away when I try to hand him some money.

  “Okay, but I’ll pay for you later then.”

  “Deal.”

  We get our food and look for Cody. It doesn’t seem like there’s much chance of actually finding a table to eat at. It’s not a problem for me, because I’m already sitting down, but Jack looks like he could use a break from standing around.

  “Over here!” Cody’s voice pierces its way through the eating noises. He’s standing on a table, waving his arms at us. Jack just shakes his head.

  “Nothing like making sure the whole world notices us.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s just Cody being…Cody, I guess,” I say as we make our way across the room. No one actually seems to care. They’re all too focused on eating and talking and making sure everyone else notices how cool they look to pay attention to three little dweebs from nowheresville.

  “Hey. So, this is Clare a.k.a. Rogue. And this is Sophia a.k.a. Storm. Or the other way around.” Cody is sharing a chair with one girl and gesturing toward another sitting beside her at the end of a table with about a dozen people sitting at it. Both girls are in costume and give us big smiles.

  “You’re right, he is cute. I love red hair on a guy,” Sophia or Clare says, smiling directly at me. I just stare at her trying to think of something intelligent to say while my cheeks start heating up. The girl cuddling with Cody looks at my chair, checking out my legs for a few seconds before looking up at Jack.

  “You can share Clare’s seat,” she says to him, gesturing toward the girl who likes red hair. Jack clutches his food against his chest, shaking his head.

  “No, I’m fine standing up,” he says, heading over to lean against the wall behind the table.

  “So, Cody says you’re on the swim team together. That’s cool.” Clare smiles at me again. This time I remember to smile back.

  “Yeah. I guess so.” I guess so? I guess I’m on the swim team or I guess it’s cool? Smooth, Ryan.

  “Of course it is. Any team that has me as a captain is going to be the best,” Cody says, helping himself to some fries off the plate of the girl—Sophia, obviously—who he’s practically sitting on top of. Steve would be interested to know that Cody has been self- promoted to team captain. Especially since we’ve never had a team captain before, seeing as Steve believes there should only be one person in charge, namely the coach.

  “Right. Captain Cody. Definitely the best.” I shake my head at him. For some reason that makes everyone laugh. Including me.

  “So, Sophia and I are going to the costume competition after lunch. You guys want to come and watch and then maybe hang out for the afternoon?” Clare smiles at me for the third time. I’m pretty sure I’m blushing, which is never my best look because bright red and bright orange tend to clash. I try to concentrate on eating for a few seconds, chewing slowly so that I can get my face under control.

  “Sure,” I say too quickly so that I swallow and talk at the same time, making myself choke like an idiot. I lean forward to try to catch some air and hide my red, sweaty face at the same time.

  “Are you okay?” Clare says, coming over and patting me on the back. I wave my hand at her as I try to stop myself from hacking up a lung.

  “Fine. Just swallowed the wrong way.” I wipe at the tears that decided to join the party and make my face look even stupider. My nose is probably running too. I am such a sexy guy.

  “He just gets all choked up around beautiful women,” Cody says helpfully, which makes everyone laugh again. I laugh too, but this time I’m faking it because I don’t want the girls to know how stupid I feel. I sit up straight again, wiping at my face and trying to get everything under control.

  “So, are we on for the afternoon?” Sophia asks. Cody looks at me with a big shit-eating smile, wiggling his eyebrows and nodding. I clear my throat, hoping I can answer without throwing up or something.

  “Sure. Just let me check with Jack.” Who I just remembered is behind us by himself trying to eat rice standing up. I look over my shoulder but I can’t see him. I turn my chair completely around, scanning the wall as if somehow he slid down to another spot. Still no Jack.

  “He isn’t here.” I turn back to Cody who is busy whispering something into Sophia’s left ear. “Cody! Jack isn’t here!”

  “He’s probably just in the can. He’ll find us. Go on ahead, ladies. I’ll catch up. We don’t want to be late.” Cody stands up and offers a hand to each of the girls, who both laugh and stand up with a little curtsy thing before heading off toward the exit.

  “We have to look for him. He won’t know where we are. I think there’s something wrong!” I shout at his back. He turns and glares at me.

  “Nothing is wrong except that you’re acting like your mother, worrying about the guy like he’s some baby. I’m going with them. I told you it should have been just us.” He turns back with a big smile, picking up the pace until he joins the girls. He hooks an elbow with each of them before heading off into the crowd.

  I watch them go and then look around the room full of people, none of whom seem to be Jack. Where the hell is he?

  Twenty

  He’s just not here. He could be anywhere!

  It’s not like he was having any fun. He’s probably upset.

  I take out my phone and dial his number. It rings about six times and then goes straight to voicemail. I think about texting, but if he’s not answering when I call he’ll likely ignore a text, too. If he’s ignoring me.

  Maybe he can’t answer.

  Shit.

  Cody was right. This was such a stupid idea. What was I thinking taking some messed up, suicidal kid on a trip out of town?

  I wheel around the massive room, searching every face that isn’t covered by makeup or a mask. The panic is taking hold, making it feel like I’m back in the river trying to find a yellow skirt floating underwater.

  It was so obvious he wasn’t enjoying himself. Any idiot could see that. But I just ignored him because there were a couple of pretty girls at the table.

  How long was it? A few minutes, tops. Right?

  Did he tell me where he was going and I just didn’t hear him?

  Was he upset?

  What am I supposed to do now? I doubt they have one of those lost and found desks like at shopping malls where you can put on an announcement for your lost kid.

  Then again, maybe they do. After all there are a lot of people here.

  I could have him paged.

  Then I’d find out Cody is right and he was just in the bathroom, and he’ll be embarrassed that I paged him and I’ll make everything worse than it already is.

  I won’t have him paged.

  I’ll just look for him. Calm down
and just look!

  It’s not like there’s a large body of water around here for him to wander into. At least I don’t think there is.

  Just a giant highway five minutes down the road.

  Is there a river in Bainesville? Why don’t I know? Why didn’t I find that out?

  What if he’s so upset he decided to find some way to finish what he started?

  Why the hell did his mother and counselor let him come with us in the first place? Seriously irresponsible.

  My head spins around every nightmare scenario as I spin down every open space I can find. The food smells are starting to make my stomach churn. First I choke and now I feel like I’m going to puke. This is ridiculous.

  He isn’t in this room. I’ve been around it, like, ten times. If he was in the bathroom, he’d have been back near the table long ago. He obviously left.

  Maybe he just wanted to look around on his own.

  Sure he did. Because he’s so fascinated by fucking Comic Con that he decided to brave wandering around in the middle of a gazillion strangers.

  I manage to find my way out of the ice-rink-turned-cafeteria and head down into the maze of side rooms that have the other events going on. I look in one doorway and see people standing on a stage in full costume while the audience cheers and claps. Cody is obviously in there. I should go in and kick his ass. Or punch him in the gut anyway. He’s such a prick. He should be helping me look for Jack.

  Except that he didn’t want Jack with us in the first place, and it would only piss him off more than he already is if he spends his whole first day running around in circles.

  I didn’t think about this when I came up with my brilliant plan.

  That’s not true. I did think about it but I decided I was being paranoid. He told me the water was like a spur of the moment thing. He didn’t plan it. He wasn’t trying to kill himself. Not really.

  That’s what he said. I think.

  I don’t know anymore!

  What if he planned this whole thing? What if that’s why he worked on his counselor and his mother to let him go to something he obviously has no interest in? So that he could actually…what did he say?

  Make the hurting stop.

  Which means making his own hurting stop because he’ll be making a whole world of hurt for everyone else if he actually goes off somewhere and figures out a way to end it.

  And it’ll be my fault.

  Where could he have gone?

  Obviously not inside the building. I have to go look outside.

  Maybe he’s just getting some air.

  Maybe he’s jumping off the roof.

  Shut up, Ryan!

  I consider trying to find Cody because he’s a hell of a lot faster running around outside than I can be wheeling over the rough pavement and grass. But even if he would consider helping me just to be a decent human, I don’t think I can find my way back to him at this point.

  I can vaguely see a red EXIT sign in the distance and I head toward it, hoping it’s a way outside. It takes a few minutes, but I manage to get there and am totally relieved to find that it’s the door we came in.

  I have to show the ink stamp on my hand to leave. The guy tells me that I have to get back in less than an hour or today’s stamp will expire and I won’t be able to come back in to have more fun.

  Outside, I sit for a moment, trying to slow my insides down so I can think. Jack is a little guy and not exactly an athlete. He can’t be too far away, right?

  This is stupid. I’m sitting staring at a giant parking lot full of cars and trucks. There are roads on all sides of the building. There’s a great big field on the other side of one of the roads that leads to more roads. Even if I had a car and could drive it, I wouldn’t have any idea where to start looking.

  I can’t calm down. My heart is pounding like I just finished the 800 and my stomach is jumping around so much it feels like it’s trying to exit my body. What the hell am I supposed to do now?

  I close my eyes, willing my body to just slow the hell down so I can think. Deep breaths. Slow breaths.

  “Ryan? What are you doing out here?”

  The voice makes me jump as my eyes fly open, everything revving up to full speed again.

  “Jack! Where have you been?” The words fly at him, double-edged and sharp so that he actually takes a step back to avoid getting stabbed.

  “I told you I was going for a walk. I got talking to someone and it took a little longer than I expected.” He looks offended. I try to get my voice under control so he doesn’t know how upset I am.

  “I didn’t hear you say anything.”

  “I haven’t been gone that long. I’m sorry you didn’t hear me. It was noisy in there and you were…busy.”

  He waits for me to say something. Anything I want to say is some version of I was scared you had gone off to kill yourself. Since I don’t think any version of that is going to make this day get better, I keep my mouth shut for a couple of seconds.

  “What, are you pissed at me or something?”

  I am pissed at him. Completely and totally. Pissed at him. Pissed at Cody. And pissed at myself.

  “No, no it’s fine. You just surprised me. I thought you might have got lost with so many people here or something.” Pieces of the truth.

  “Well, I kind of did. But it’s okay because I actually met someone interesting. We got talking. I guess I was gone longer than I thought.” He’s trying to look apologetic…I think…but it also seems like he’s in a better mood than he’s been in the whole trip so far.

  “Oh?” I say, thinking about Clare and how I missed the chance to talk to her. Not that I would have managed to come up with anything very interesting. Although she seemed to enjoy my choking routine.

  “Yeah. I was walking around outside, trying to get back to the right entrance when this guy came up to me and asked if I was lost, and I said I was, and then we just started talking.” He stops and looks at me, as if he isn’t sure he should keep going.

  “And?”

  “Well, he was wearing a costume. A Wonder Woman costume.” He stops again.

  “Oh, yeah. I think I saw him earlier. Nice legs. For a guy, I mean!” I add the last part so quickly that Jack laughs at me.

  “Yeah, right. I don’t even think he was the only Wonder Woman guy here today. I didn’t expect any guys would be dressed in women’s costumes, but no one seems to care who’s wearing what here.”

  “I noticed that too. I bet Wonder Man wouldn’t go over very well back at school though.” He snorts, making me laugh.

  “No, definitely not! Anyway, I asked him about his costume and if it means anything. He just kind of laughed at me and said that it means he likes to wear whatever he wants to wear. He told me some guys who cross-dress at these festivals are gay, but not all of them. He’s gay though.”

  “That’s cool.” Is that the right thing to say?

  “Yeah, it is to me. I’ve never actually talked to anyone else who’s gay in my life. At least, not that I know of. And I told him that I’m gay too, because…well, just because it felt okay to do it. Safe, I guess. Does that make sense?”

  “Yeah, of course.” Jack smiles a bit like he’s pleased with my answer.

  “Anyway, he, Caleb, goes to the college here and he was telling me that there’s actually a group on campus that gives support and advice to people. They put on social stuff, too, that anyone from the city can come to. They even have a float in the Pride Parade every year.” Jack sounds amazed by everything he’s telling me, as if he’s describing some kind of magical world that he’d never imagined could actually exist.

  “He said that there’s a pretty high level of acceptance in this city, but that there are still homophobic assholes around. But the support networks make it easier.” He pauses for a second and looks at me. “I’m thinking that I
should apply to go to college here.”

  “Sounds like a pretty good idea,” I say. “I’ve been thinking about it too.”

  “That would be cool. I’m not sure my mom even wants me to go to college though. But even if I didn’t move here for school, maybe I could find a job or something.” He sounds almost hopeful.

  “Once you’re old enough you can do what you want.” I’m planning on it.

  “Yeah, well, the trick will be surviving Thompson Mills until I’m old enough to leave.” He looks down at the ground, kicking at some gravel and making a small cloud of dust.

  I open my mouth to say something encouraging but get instantly drowned out.

  “What are you guys doing outside? I’ve been looking for you two idiots for ages. If you hadn’t noticed, the festival…and the girls…are all inside the building.” Cody comes toward us. He has a big, goofy hat on that I don’t recognize from anything I’ve ever read or seen. He’s strutting toward us like he’s the best-dressed guy in the place—big grin on his face and stupid hat wobbling every time he takes a step.

  Jack takes one look and actually bursts out laughing. I join in and Cody just glares at both of us in complete disgust, shaking his head, which makes the stupid hat bounce around even more, so that we laugh even harder as we follow him back into the fantasy factory.

  Twenty-One

  “Okay, let’s see if we can find the car and then head to Shady Rest,” Cody says as we’re basically swept out of the building by the crowd at the end of the day. We managed to salvage the rest of the evening by getting a few autographs, meeting up with Sophia and Clare again for a while, and then watching the final costume competition of the day. Cody didn’t give Jack any grief for disappearing, and Jack stopped looking like he wanted the floor to open up and swallow him. So, a pretty good end to an otherwise bizarre and stress-filled first day.

  Until now.

  I forgot to tell Jack about the motel. Again. He’s going to be royally pissed with me. I don’t think he’ll believe some big lie about plans changing at the last minute.