The weird feeling in my gut got worse as I watched Mayra walk out the door and down the walkway to the drive. There was also a little tickle in the back of my head, which usually meant I was forgetting something. I walked all around the house—checking the doors and windows to make sure they were locked, verifying the stove was off, and seeing that all my homework and books were back in my book bag for tomorrow. I couldn’t figure out anything I had missed, but the tickle was still there. It drove me nuts half the night. I went back and forth, wondering if I was forgetting something or if it was the Valium-induced nap.
I couldn’t manage to sleep, so I got up and worked on my websites instead.
The day had started off pretty bad, but at the moment, I felt content.
Win.
~oOo~
Mayra picked me up and drove me to school the next day. I thought about it and thought about it beforehand, but I hadn’t taken into consideration what other people were going to think of me getting out of her car in the morning. The entire parking lot was full of students and cars, and it seemed like they were all watching me as I climbed out of the blue Porsche.
Mayra came around the front and smiled at me. She didn’t even seem to notice the way the other kids were looking at us as we walked into the school together. She talked the whole time, but I had no idea what she was saying.
I was just trying to keep myself breathing.
“I’ll see you in ecology!” Mayra called out as she left me at my locker to join her friends. I didn’t answer but spent a minute reorganizing my things and hanging up my book bag. After a few more breaths, I managed to get myself together enough to go to class.
Lunch was…weird.
I usually sat with Joe at lunch. When we were younger, Joe’s friend Scott would join us, but now he sat with the other guys from the football team. These days, Joe and I sat alone at the end of one of the long tables. Mayra’s friend, Aimee, always sat with Scott. I was pretty sure they were a couple now. Joe was usually sorting through his collection of Magic: The Gathering cards while snarfing down a few slices of pizza from the cafeteria, and I would eat the same thing I always made for lunch—peanut butter and strawberry jam, a mini bag of Doritos, carrot sticks, an apple, and a can of Coke.
I’d eaten the exact same lunch every day for as long as I could remember.
I had just dropped down onto the bench seat and opened up my lunch when Mayra came up beside me.
“Hey,” she said quietly, “how’s your day going?”
Joe stopped eating and looked up from his pizza. His gaze darted back and forth between Mayra and me. I froze with one of my hands halfway in my lunch bag.
“It’s okay,” Mayra said. She slowly reached out toward me, and her finger brushed lightly over the top of my hand. “I’m not staying or anything. I just wanted to let you know I have to leave early today. Dad has to take his car in for maintenance in Hamilton, and I need to drive him back. I won’t be in ecology class and won’t get home until later tonight. I talked to Travis, and he said your Aunt Bethany will pick you up when school is out. We’ll work on the project some more tomorrow.”
“No project tonight?” I said with a rush of breath. I didn’t realize I had stopped breathing.
“No, I’m sorry,” Mayra replied. “I didn’t even know until about an hour ago.”
“You talked to Travis?”
“Yeah, he gave me his cell number.”
“Oh.” I stared down at my sandwich. The edge of the crust was bent outward a little bit, and I wondered if the whole loaf was like that.
Mayra pulled her hand back and then leaned forward on the table. It put her lower than my head level, and she dropped even lower, turned her head sideways, and tried to look up into my face. I glanced at her but looked away again when she smiled.
“I’ll be there tomorrow,” she said. “Promise.”
“Okay,” I said. I started pulling the rest of lunch out of the bag.
“See you then,” Mayra said as she stood back up and turned away.
I continued to arrange lunch. The sandwich, chips, and carrot sticks all went together, since I ate them all together. I would always eat one bite of each in a circle and try to make them come out even as I ate. I was pretty successful at it, too. I drank the Coke throughout, and the apple was always saved for last.
As I ate, I felt weird. That little tickling sensation was back again, and I didn’t understand why. It occurred to me that I was a little disappointed that Mayra wouldn’t be driving me home or coming to my house this afternoon. Why was that?
I was startled out of my thoughts by a loud bang caused by Justin Lords jumping up onto the bench seat of our cafeteria table and then sitting on the tabletop itself. I tried to ignore how wrong that was—sitting on the top of the table while feet rested on the seat—but I couldn’t. His actions were so obviously wrong, no one would have to point it out to a high school senior.
“You aren’t supposed to sit on the table,” I said in a low whisper.
“Fuck you, you fucking freak.” He practically snarled as he glared down at me. He placed his hands on either side of where my lunch was arranged on the table and leaned his face close into mine.
I wanted to back away, but I was frozen at the same time. His hands were so close to my lunch, it was nerve-wracking, and I couldn’t focus on anything else. I was starting to get lightheaded and wondered if I was hyperventilating.
“I don’t know what the fuck you are trying to do,” Justin said, “but I was really close to getting Mayra back in time for prom until she got distracted by the little stray dog project named Mattie Rohan.”
“Hey, Lords—leave him alone,” Joe muttered. “He hasn’t done anything.”
“Did anyone ask you for an opinion, Joe-Joe?”
Joe didn’t respond.
“So here’s what going to happen, stray,” Justin said as he leaned even closer to me. “You’re going to stay the fuck away from Mayra, you hear me?”
“We have to work on the ecology project,” I heard myself say in response.
“Finish it yourself!” he snapped. “I don’t care what you have to do as long as you stay the fuck away from my girl.”
That was when he reached his meaty hand over and flicked out his fingers. They came into contact with my apple, which then went flying off the table and onto the floor.
On the floor.
The floor.
Apples definitely shouldn’t be on the floor, especially not the one I was going to eat for lunch.
Shit, shit, shit.
I couldn’t eat that apple now. There was no way. I also had to have an apple with my lunch. I had an apple with my lunch every day. I didn’t have any cash on me, so I couldn’t buy another one, and I just had to have an apple.
I closed my eyes and started to count to one hundred by tens as fast as I could. I knew Justin was still talking, and I felt him smack my shoulder, but I didn’t open my eyes. I just kept counting, switching the method every time I got to one hundred. I counted by twos, then threes, then prime numbers.
It wasn’t helping.
Where was I going to get another apple?
Joe was saying something to Justin, but I couldn’t make that out, either.
Could I just wash the one that was on the floor?
No.
Definitely not.
Combined with thoughts of the apple were thoughts of Mayra and thoughts of not working with her on the project anymore. She wouldn’t come over to my house if we weren’t working on the project. When my car was fixed, she wouldn’t drive me to school anymore, which meant I would go back to only seeing her in our ecology class.
Sitting right by Justin Lords.
The thought of not being around her was almost as bad as the apple on the floor.
I couldn’t even fathom it, so I opened my eyes and met Lords’ gaze.
For the longest time we were just staring at each other. My entire body was tensed as if it were ready to spring,
and there was definitely a part of me that wanted to haul back and punch him, but I wasn’t wearing my gloves. Aside from not having my gloves on, Justin had this little dribble of slobber on his lower lip. It actually made a little bubble sitting there.
He was drooling.
I couldn’t help myself; I laughed out loud—one single, explosive burst.
Justin reared back, and his eyes went wide as he moved back to the edge of the table and nearly lost his balance. That was even funnier, and I laughed again.
“What the fuck is your problem, freak?” he yelled, but I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to respond.
Joe started snickering as well, though I don’t know if he noticed the lip-spittle or not. Maybe he was just laughing at Justin nearly falling off the table. I told Justin sitting on the table like that wasn’t right.
Justin shoved himself off the tabletop and stood back on the floor where he was supposed to be. He continued to cuss me out, but between Joe’s laughter and my own, I couldn’t really focus on his words. The little bit of spittle ended up on his chin as he backed away from the table.
“This ain’t over, Rohan,” he said. He pointed a finger at me and shook it. “Not by a long shot!”
He spun around on his heel and headed out of the cafeteria. I looked over at Joe, who was still snickering as he got up and retrieved my apple.
“I don’t suppose you are going to eat this now, are you?” he asked.
“No,” I replied.
Joe rubbed it on his shirt before taking a bite out of it.
“Gross,” I mumbled as he walked away.
I watched Joe head over to the cafeteria line, buy another apple, and bring it over to set in front of me. I glanced up at him and gave him a half smile.
“Thanks.”
“No problem,” he said. “What the fuck is wrong with that idiot?”
I shrugged.
“So…are you dating Mayra Trevino now?”
“Um…” I didn’t know what to say. “I don’t think so.”
Joe laughed again.
“You think maybe you should figure that out?”
I just shrugged again, and we finished the rest of lunch in silence.
~oOo~
“Your uncle is a big idiot,” my Aunt Bethany said as soon as I got into the car. “Now tell me about the girl.”
I looked down at the strap on my book bag. I wound my fingers around the strap, and then I wound the strap around my fingers. Beth didn’t press; she just waited for me to answer.
“Her name is Mayra,” I finally said as we pulled out of the school parking lot.
“I got that from Travis,” Beth said. “I also got the idea he sent you off to the internet for info, which I told him was about as irresponsible as it could possibly be.”
I didn’t have anything to say about that though the conversation about using Google to research certain topics played back through my head.
“Did you?” Beth asked.
“Did I what?”
She let out a long, exaggerated sigh.
“Google sex,” she said.
“No.”
“Good.” She sighed again. “That’s the last thing you need.”
Bethany turned into my subdivision and headed toward my street. She gripped the steering wheel kind of tightly, and I wondered what she was thinking about. She seemed agitated, and I wasn’t sure if it was something I had said or done. When she pulled into my driveway, and I started to get out, she stopped me.
“Matthew, you know you can talk to me, right?” she asked.
I went back to staring at the strap of my book bag.
“You can,” she said again. “You can ask me anything you want—about girls, relationships, sex—anything.”
I could feel my body starting to rock back and forth in the seat. I tried to stop it, but that word—sex—kept going around and around inside my head. Bethany said something else, but I didn’t catch what the words were. I felt her hand on my arm.
“Relax,” she said quietly. “It’s not something to be afraid of.”
“I’ve never even kissed a girl,” I said quickly. “I’ve never been even close to doing that. I don’t think I could.”
“Of course you could.”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“What do you do before you try anything new?” she asked.
“Read about it,” I replied. That was always my first step. “Then talk about it.”
“I think this time it should be the other way around,” Beth said. “Let’s talk first, and then you can read more about it if you want.”
“No.”
“It won’t hurt.”
“It might.”
“I’ll make you dinner.”
I glanced over at my aunt, whose cooking rivaled my mom’s. She didn’t do it often, either, and when she did, it was usually a special occasion like a holiday or someone’s birthday. She made the best cakes in the world, too.
When Travis first met Bethany, neither Megan nor I would even acknowledge her. Megan didn’t like her because she didn’t wear a watch, and having someone new around the house set us both on edge. Megan would actually scream and cry when Beth came into the room. That all changed—for me, at least—the first time she took over my mom’s kitchen and baked a cake.
My parents started using Bethany’s cooking as a reward system for my therapy, which ended up being more successful than anything else my doctors and therapists had tried. My aunt and her cooking were a large part of the reason I was able to function in a mainstream school, and her cake had a lot do to with it. There wasn’t much of anything I wouldn’t do for a piece.
“Cake?” I whispered.
“Sure.”
“Chocolate?”
“If you promise to try to stay calm while we talk,” she said.
I thought about it for a while as we sat in the driveway in silence. The last time Beth had made a cake had been for New Year’s, and it hadn’t been a chocolate one. It was all white with sparkly fireworks in the frosting.
She knew my weakness, and with a sigh, I glanced over at Beth and nodded.
I couldn’t say no to cake, so I guess we would be talking about sex.
Even though it made me feel like a nine-year-old, I sat at the kitchen table and licked the drippy chocolate batter off the beaters. It didn’t even matter that I was still stuffed from dinner.
Beth was just finishing up so she could put the cake pan in the oven. I watched her smooth out the batter with a spatula, and the way her arm and the utensil moved together looked like a dance. She hummed while she worked, and I thought about my mom standing in the same spot, making dinner for me and Megan.
“You okay?” Bethany asked.
“Yes,” I replied automatically. It was one of the few questions I had been trained, for lack of a better word, to respond to quickly. Mom worked with me forever after I cut myself on one of Dad’s tools in the garage and just sat there bleeding while she waited for me to answer. Once she figured out I was hurt, she completely freaked out, and then she spent months making sure I would at least respond with a yes or no to those two simple words without having to think about it.
Beth opened up the preheated oven and slid the sheet cake inside while I finished licking the second beater. I groaned a little at the taste. It was just so good, I couldn’t help myself. My aunt snickered and folded her arms across her chest.
“I wish your sister took to cake as well as you did,” she said. The one thing you could always count on with Bethany was that she was going to say what she was thinking. Other people might hide their thoughts, but she never did.
“She never took to anything,” I said, “unless you painted numbers around your face and attached clock hands to your nose.”
She shook her head slowly.
“Come on,” she said. “No stalling. Tell me more about Mayra.”
I picked up the mixing bowl and beaters and took them to the sink. Beth sat at the table an
d watched as I washed everything. She didn’t wash or dry right, and she knew I wasn’t going to let her help. She didn’t bother to ask anymore. What she lacked in dishwashing skills, she made up for in patience. Beth sat and waited without talking until I had finished the last of the measuring cups.
“I don’t know what to say about her.”
“Tell me what she looks like.”
“She has brown hair and brown eyes,” I said. “She’s short.”
“She’s short or just compared to you?”
“She’s short. She only comes about halfway up my chest.”
“Hmm…” Beth hummed. “Go on.”
“Her hands are small,” I told her, “and I like the way her eyes look when she smiles.”
“Is she pretty?”
“Yes,” I replied without hesitation.
“Is she in your class?” Beth asked. “A senior, I mean?”
“Yes.”
“She had a lot of boyfriends?”
I almost dropped the bowl I was putting away.
“I…I don’t know,” I finally said. “Some, I think.”
“She’s got the advantage,” Beth said.
My hands started to shake.
“Stop it,” she said with a warning in her voice. “You promised, and we’ve hardly even started. You still want that cake?”
“Yes.”
“Then take a deep breath, get a drink, and join me in the living room.”
I sat in the big, blue, overstuffed chair, and Beth sat on the matching couch. I pulled my knees up so I could wrap my arms around my legs—I felt safer that way—and waited for Bethany to continue.
“You like her?” my aunt asked.
I shrugged. I didn’t know. I didn’t even know what that meant, and I told her so.
“How do you feel when you are with her?”
I shrugged again, and Beth sighed dramatically.
“I’m going to take that cake home to Travis…”
“I don’t know what to say!” I blurted out, a little concerned she would make good on her threat. “I feel…okay with her, I guess.”
“Just okay?”
“Yes…no…I don’t know!” I tightened my grip on my own legs.