Page 40 of Yearning Difficulties

‘Yeah,’ I croaked.

We listened in silence for a few minutes. The current song had a pounding bass which contrasted with the high soprano of Cherry’s voice. She sounded melancholy and angry all at the same time and it made me proud to know she’d looked at me. Seen me. Said my name.

‘Got an idea for tomorrow,’ he finally said, breaking the calm and speaking over Cherry’s haunting voice. Most of her other songs were ballads and they made me want to cry. ‘If you’re open to it.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Don’t wear a coat to school.’

‘Sorry?’

‘We have the same class first period. Don’t wear a coat.’

‘You want me to walk to school, catch hypothermia and do what? A good Marianne Dashwood impression in front of our whole English class?’

‘Well, it’s the class to do it in.’

‘Can I know why?’

‘You will tomorrow.’

‘All right, keep your secrets.’

He threw me a sideways glance and a small smile. ‘That’s a Fellowship quote.’

I felt a slight flush of embarrassment. ‘So?’

‘It’s a very autistic thing, you know. To speak in movie quotes.’

My eyes shot forward and I stared straight ahead, at the long woodland road we were driving down. ‘Huh.’

‘Yeah. Fun fact for you.’

I felt a tremor in my voice and I glanced down at my chipped nail polish. I never could keep my nails perfectly manicured and dainty, no matter how hard I tried. ‘Max and I were both obsessed with Lord of the Rings. Particularly the films.’

I felt him watching me, while I studied some raindrops on the window of the car. I watched one break apart and fall on its own. Quickly at first. Then slowly. As if suddenly realizing it was by itself. ‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah,’ I said softly. ‘Max, she . . . wants to be a propmaker. Because of those films. And we used to joke about Lake Pristine being just like the Shire.’

He laughed at that. ‘Accurate.’

‘We both . . .’ I didn’t know what was making me speak. Maybe I just needed someone to hear. ‘We both became friends because we’d been ejected from two different friendship groups. Neither of us were sure of the reason, but we fell in with each other. I remember she said that when it came to making friends she always felt like Sam, trying to fight against Gollum’s lies. And I knew exactly what she meant because that’s just how I felt too. I wanted so badly to be a friend to people but someone in each group would always decide I was wrong and then – that’s it. You’re out. Alone on the mountain, unable to fight the narrative you didn’t even know was being woven against you.’

I suddenly felt like crying.

‘I tried to get her to love The Wizard of Oz, but that never stuck. She didn’t like it.’

He glanced at me. ‘I love that one.’

‘It’s the blueprint.’

‘Chris always found the wizard creepy when we were kids so I would torment him by yelling quotes at him.’

I smiled. ‘I like the scene near the end, where the three of them are trying to bust Judy Garland out of the witch’s room. Right before the melting.’

‘When they’re in those guard uniforms and her hourglass is almost up?’

The fact that he knew right away made my heart ache.