Page 34 of The Way I Used to Be
“Good. Do you always eat this slowly, or is it just ’cause I’m here?” He smirks.
“It’s called tasting, maybe you’ve heard of it?” I must be feeling better, good enough to be a smart-ass, anyway.
“I’ve never seen you eat before. You look cute.” He laughs—it sounds so real it makes me want to laugh too.
I stick the last bite in my mouth, thinking this was maybe the best pizza I’ve ever had in my life. “When I’m shoving food into my face?” I say with my mouth full.
He nods his head yes. “You have, uh, like, sauce”—he touches the corner of his mouth—“right there.”
“Eww, stop watching me eat!” I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. “Did I get it?”
“Uh-uh, come here, I’ll get it.” I lean in, still wiping my face. “Closer,” he says, “let me see.” I’m practically on top of him by the time I realize he’s messing with me. He grins as he moves in to kiss my mouth. “Got it.”
I shove his arm gently and lean against him. And he puts his arm around my shoulder. On the TV a man is walking down a city street wearing some ridiculous bunny costume.
“What the hell are we watching?” he laughs.
“I have no idea.”
He reaches for the remote and turns it off, sinks down into the couch and tugs the afghan out from under us, pulling it up around my shoulder so that I’m lying with my head on his chest. “So, why were you crying?” he finally asks.
“I don’t know,” I breathe.
“Was it because of me, ’cause of last night, I mean?”
“No. No, it wasn’t anything to do with you.” I feel him exhale beneath me. “I’m sorry about all that, by the way. I don’t even know what happened.” It amazes me how the apology just slips out, so easy.
“I’m sorry too.”
We breathe against each other, and with every exhale I feel like I’m getting lighter, cleaner, like the residue from all those old, stagnant emotions is working its way out of me. I start drawing these invisible lines on his forearm, connecting the constellations of tiny, sparse freckles. “I got in this big fight with my mom,” I volunteer.
“How come?”
I take a breath and start to tell him about the stupid fight. But then I keep on talking; I tell him about how things have been bad with my parents in general, especially since Caelin has been gone. How they think I’m at Mara’s house. How sometimes I feel like Mara isn’t really my friend at all. How I think I am beginning to truly hate my brother. Words, so many words.
I have an image of the Tin Man stuck in my head. Dorothy and Scarecrow finding him rusted solid in the woods, oiling his mouth and jaws, and then, magically, squeak, squeak, squeak, much like a mouse, he says “M-m-m-m-my goodness, I can talk again.” It is like that. Cathartic. I feel like I might never shut up again.
He listens patiently as the words flow out effortlessly, offering up mm-hmms and yeahs at the appropriate times.
“Sometimes”—I’m not sure if I should say something this terrible out loud—“sometimes, I don’t think I believe in God.” Because what kind of God lets bad things happen to people who so desperately try to be good? “I know I used to, but now—I’m just not sure. That’s really bad, isn’t it?”
“No. Everybody has that thought,” he answers casually.
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. I think that too. It’s hard not to when you look at the way things are. How fucked up the world is, I mean.”
“Mm, yeah,” I agree. But the truth is that right now, in this moment, the world feels pretty amazing to me.
“We all think things we’re not supposed to think sometimes,” he continues. “Like how sometimes I don’t even like basketball.”
“I thought youlivedfor basketball?”
“Actually, sometimes I fucking hate basketball,” he says with a laugh. “You know, if you think about it, it’s just stupid—pointless, really. It’s not like you’re actually doing anything or helping anyone. It’s basically just a big waste of everyone’s time. I hate that just because you happen to be good at something, people automatically think that’s what makes you happy, but it’s not really like that, you know? It’s not that simple.”
“Yeah,” I agree, kind of in awe. I knew he was smart, as in he got good grades, but I had no idea he actually thought this deeply about things, that he was maybe more complex than I imagined, more than just a nice guy with killer eyes.
“You know, I got this basketball scholarship, and I don’t even really want to go to college. I want to take a year off. Travel or something. I don’t even know what I want to go to school for, but my parents won’t hear me. They want me to be something big. Like a doctor or a lawyer or a CEO, or something. Not that they would have any clue what’s involved—neither of them even went to college.” He laughs, and then says, “My parents.” That’s it.
