“So I guess it’s for the best that she ended it,” Zach says. “But it still feels so recent.”
He waits for me to speak and I don’t. Silence is my only recourse.
“I’m trying to be honest, Addie,” he says softly, and I nod, feeling like a world-class idiot. Feeling like a jerk for wanting to say,Three months is alifetimeago!To ask what is so great about Lindsay anyway. Lindsay, whose refusal to lend her trampoline had, just this afternoon, led to Raj sighing heavily with him and Kevin having to hoist me (in nun costume) up at every third count from Zach. When that had failed, they bring in a spring mattress from the guest bedroom for me to jump up from to make it look like I was flying through the air.
But instead, I say, “Thanks for telling me, Zach,” the way my mother has taught me to, and then plot word for word the text I will send Zach later tonight, informing him that I rode into a postal truck on my way home from his place and have broken too many bones to continue filming. Or, alternately, that I’ve developed a sudden and ferocious allergy to anything red—ketchup, hishair—and, as such, can no longer be part of anything with which he is associated.
AFTER
January
I call first thing in the morning and make an appointment with Overton for after school. The receptionist is a woman with a crisp European accent, and when she asks what I’d like to see the doctor for, all I can think of to say is a checkup. I’m expecting her to ask more, but she just takes my name and tells me to get there fifteen minutes early for my appointment at four. If I have to pay for anything, I’ll have to dig into my savings.
I’m hurtling out the front door, swallowing the last bite of my bagel, when I see him. Bus Boy. I’m not exactly surprised, because I’ve been thinking about him. Wondering where he is when he’s not with me. I mean, he has togosomewhere, doesn’t he?
He’s pacing along the sidewalk, a cigarette in his hand, when I step outside. He freezes and smiles when he sees me. The hundred-watt smile from the bus. A smile of the tummy-turning, heart-teasing variety.
Get a grip, Addie,I scold myself when I realize that I’m grinning back.
This is exactly why I need medical help.
Loose flakes are falling from the sky. It’s the kind of snow that won’t stick and looks like salt being sprinkled from a shaker.
Bus Boy takes one more drag of his cigarette, then puts it out and lets it fall on the ground.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hey,” I say. “Want a ride?”
“Don’t know how I’d get anywhere otherwise,” he jokes. But it’s too soon, and an awkward silence follows as we slide into my car.
I start the car and back out of the driveway, letting my wipers swat away any snow on my windshield.
“So, uh, how was your night?”
“Fine,” I lie. I didn’t take a sleeping pill, and the tossing and turning I did last night had less to do with post-accident insomnia and more to do with the Overton appointment. Worrying about whether I could actually get one and if I’d be on hospital lockdown by the end of it.
I shoot a look over at Bus Boy and consider throwing him out of my car. I shouldn’t like the manifestation of my insanity so much.
The lingering smell of cigarette smoke makes my throat feel parched.
“Mind if I turn on some music?” I ask so we don’t have to talk. So I can start preparing myself for when I stop seeing him, which will hopefully be after my appointment.
Bus Boy looks disappointed, like he can tell I’m trying to create distance, but he says, “Sure.”
The car fills with Bartók’s Viola Concerto. A few seconds in, the boy muses, “Wow, you’re really dedicated to your violin music.” I can hear the smile in his voice.
“It’s a viola,” I correct him as I’m changing lanes.
“Right. Jimi Hendrix,” he says. “Sorry.”
When we pull into the parking lot at school and climb out of the car, he looks a little anxious, knowing his disappearance is imminent.
“See you later?” he asks as I’m pulling my schoolbag over my shoulder.
“Yeah, sure,” I say, already striding away from my car. “Bye.”
“Don’t, uh, forget about me,” he calls, almost shyly, forcing me to turn around. Meet his eye. We hold each other’s gaze for a long second, his eyes twinkling some message that neither of us can understand. The skin on my back tingles like it’s being brushed with a feather, and Ireallydon’t know what’s wrong with me. He’s invisible, for God’s sake.
