I’d totally forgotten about our plan to finish the bookcase this weekend. The vampire touch of math drained my soul out of my body, but suddenly all that energy floods back. “Fuck yeah!”
She laughs. “Perfect.”
The clouds darken as we head out of the North Seattle neighborhood where Jayden and Makayla live and back toward our house. It’s not evening yet, but the impendingstorm makes it feel that way, and the clouds open up as we cross the I-5 bridge toward downtown. I look left toward the Cascades instinctively; sometimes Mount Rainier is visible there too, but today they’re all hidden. Shar turns her wipers up to the highest setting, the blades whacking back and forth to keep the rain at bay.
When we pull into the driveway, we jump out of the truck and beeline for the garage, both of us shrieking as the downpour hits us. Shar fumbles with the lock for a second and then we’re safe inside, the bite of sawdust hitting my nostrils as she turns on the space heater. I stand in front of it, letting my slightly damp sweatshirt dry while she drags the lumber she cut last week for the new bookcase out of the corner where it’s been waiting. I put my safety gear on and join her at the sander.
“All right,” she says, setting a power tool on the table in front of us. It’s black and teal, the brand’s letters in red across the side. “This is a random orbital sander.” The tool is a lot smaller than I expected, a cylindrical part on top where you hold it attached to a short cone-shaped base with a dust filter. The bottom is the widest part, and it’s where the sandpaper attaches. She shows me how to grip the top, where to turn it on, and how much pressure to apply as the base spins. “There are different kinds of sanders, but for most projects like this, a random orbital will do you just fine. I’m going to have you watch me for a bit now, and then you can do it yourself, OK?”
I nod and stand back as she sets the wood up on her work table. There are small holes drilled into the table’s length,and she positions the wood along them, pushing small pegs into the holes on either side of the wood to hold it in place. “These are bench dogs,” she says, and I giggle at the unexpectedly cute term.
She turns the sander on and presses it to the wood. The grain goes smooth under the tool, and a few minutes later she turns it off and steps back. “Feel that.”
I put my fingers on the lumber where she was working. “Whoa, it’s so soft.” The wood grain is more muted now, as if it’s being blended like eye shadow in the makeup tutorials Anna loves to watch.
“Your turn.” She hands me the sander. “Always pay attention to what your other hand is doing while you sand; you don’t want your fingers anywhere near that base. In fact, why don’t you hold it this way.” She positions both my hands on the sander.
I take a deep breath and press the red button to turn it on. The roar of the tool is dampened by my earplugs, but the vibration is unmistakable, tingling in my hands and up through my wrists as I hold the sander in place. I move it across the wood, slowly and smoothly the way Shar did, leaving perfectly sanded lumber in my wake. I don’t know how much time passes between the press of the button and the moment I reach the other end of the board, but my hands are warm and still tingly when I turn it off.
Straightening up, I look around, and Shar grins at me from her perch on a stool nearby. “Nice work. How’s your arms?”
I lift them up and watch my forearms tremble slightly. “Noodles.”
She laughs. “Why don’t you take a break? I’ll work on the next piece. It can take a minute to get used to the feeling.”
We switch places, and I watch her work. It’s so cool, the way we can take lumber and shape it into something completely new. After a while, my arms are feeling less noodley, and I have another go. Pretty soon all the lumber is sanded, and she gives me a high five.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m getting hungry,” she says. “Wanna work on this together with me next weekend?”
“Do I get to learn more tools?”
She nods. “Absolutely.”
In my room a little later, I sit on the edge of the bed and open the text thread with Dad. It’s been almost a week since he texted me, and I’m done procrastinating. If I can use a random orbital sander without crushing my fingers, I can text my dad.
Hey, sorry for the late reply,I type.School was a lot this week. Do you want to hang out next weekend?For a moment, I hover over the blue button beside the text box, then hit it, sending the text.
I toss the phone aside and sigh, flopping back onto my bed. My stomach is swooping, legs tingling, but I did it. I feel a little bad about blaming my ghosting on school, but it’s not a complete lie. Schoolwasa lot this week.
The phone buzzes and my stomach isn’t just swooping now, it’s full-on flapping, like a crowd of angry crows chasing an eagle. I grab my phone.
Hey kid, good to hear from ya. Next weekend is great. How about Sunday? We could go hiking for old times’ sake.
I stare at the text for a minute, then switch over to my calendar app. The only thing I have next weekend is studying with Jayden on Saturday. Part of me wishes I had a lot more plans, just so I could put it off longer. But I shouldn’t feel that way. I should want to see him. I should want to spend several hours walking through a forest with nothing to do but talk to him. It’ll be great. Absolutely fantastic.
Sounds good!I say before I can chicken out.
Pick you up about 11:30?he asks.
See you then.I add a smiley face emoji, delete it, then add it again. It feels fake, but it also feels weird not to include something that shows I’m happy and excited about this. Even though I’m not. But I don’t want Dad to know that, so I send the text, smiley face included. It grins up at me from the screen, a little digital lie.
I come into school Monday morning with a mission: Find Forrest at lunch and make him agree to do whatever I want with the club next. First, though, I want to make him sweat a little. However he justified it, he went behind my back, and he deserves to feel like shit for it. So in first-period English, I ignore him completely. I’m aware of exactly where he is at all times, of course, because my brain can’t seem to turn off its Forrest scanner, but I don’t make eye contact with him even once.
At the end of fourth period, I have all my stuff ready to go, and I book it to the junior hallway lockers so fast I almost knock a freshman down the stairs. At my locker, I grab my stuff and then dawdle, pretending to text someone while I wait for him to walk up.
When he does, Alexander’s with him, the two of them laughing about something. Alexander leans against the wall beside him while Forrest digs something out of hislocker. I stuff my phone into my hoodie pocket and march up to them.
“Hi,” I say. They both turn to me, and I cross my arms. “Forrest, can I talk to you?”
