Page 45 of Secondhand Smoke
He didn’t have the qualifications or the ability to make someone feel better. Part of him itched to reach out and take her hand, give her some form of comfort. But the more he hesitated, the further the moment passed until he simply gripped the handlebars tighter.
They walked for a long, long time, with only the sounds of their steps on the asphalt and the chirp of summer crickets.
“This is the part when you tell me something about you,” she finally said, and though her face still shone with shed tears, there was a soft, ironic upturn of her lips. “So I feel better.”
“Nothing I could say about myself even compares to that,” he admitted, cursing his cowardice and passing on the chance to take her hand before.
“It doesn’t have to compare. It just needs to be something.”
Barrett wracked his brain for something, anything, that he could say about himself. What he came up with was: “My favorite color is black.”
Nell paused, then let out a twinkling laugh. Her hand gently brushed at streaks, wiping them away, as she shook her head in amusement. “See, anything works.”
Barrett sighed, relieved, and found himself unable to hold back a smile. “I’m glad I could help.”
She laughed, softer this time, and shook her head. “I don’t get it. Why are you so nice to me?”
Now that was a complicated question. Barrett didn’t very well feel like he could go into the deep history he had with her, which she didn’t even know about. He’d probably ruin everything if he told her of his old crush. He enjoyed being around her too much to make things awkward now.
“You’re a nice person, based on what I saw in high school.”
“Iwasnice,” she corrected.
Barrett could agree to disagree because, despite what she thought, she was still a nice person. The version of herself that she thought was gone was still there, just below the exterior. He knew it. He saw it.
“Plus, I think we’re similar,” he added.
“You think?”
He shrugged, giving her a sidelong glance. “We both don’t quite belong anywhere. We’ve both had people turn their backs on us.”
“Who was yours?”
It was his own damn fault for bringing it up.
He cleared his throat. He’d already given her a piece of the story, but there were things he’d not told a whole lot of people. He didn’t like to get too close.
But, once again, he owed her. A secret for a secret.
“My parents.”
“Oh.” She immediately seemed to recognize the connection to his first story. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was their choice. Honestly, I don’t think they even realized they had a son half the time. I was young, so most of it is a blur, though I remember bits and pieces. Enough for itto . . .” He shook his head. “Anyways, it kind of makes us similar. Don’t you think?”
She nodded, contemplating, and then smiled up at him. “I think you’re right. That’s got to be it.”
He wanted to ask what she meant by “that’s got to be it”, but she was already looking forward again, her face having sculpted into a new, colored version of what it had been before.
Barrett really didn’t understand art, but he’d sure like to.
* * *
“You’re off tempo again,” Dennis chastised Barrett, who ran a hand through his hair for the hundredth time.
“Sorry, sorry.”
“Pull it together, man,” Paulie said.
