Page 37 of After Hours at Dooryard Books
“I wish we didn’t have that in common,” Patrick says. To Nathaniel’s relief, he doesn’t look surprised.
“Yes, well, we’re both doing swimmingly now. You’re a living saint and I went for an outing without nearly fainting.” He touches Patrick’s sleeve. “Patrick, I just wanted to make sure you weren’t trying to hurt yourself.”
Patrick looks like he wants to fight about that, like he can’t take the idea of his safety being anybody else’s problem. But he deflates and says, “Fine, okay, sure.”
They walk a few blocks in silence, but when their shoulders bump, neither of them moves apart.
11
Nathaniel shuts the algebra textbook with an air of finality. “If you don’t both get an A on your final exam, I’ll burn down your school.” From the front of the shop, he can hear Patrick snort.
“It’s the Regents we have to worry about,” Iris says.
“You don’t have to worry about anything.” Nathaniel taps the book. “You know all of this. This summer we can do trigonometry, if you like.” His theory is that if he can teach Iris and Hector a year’s worth of math over the summer, the school might let them go directly into calculus, and then they’ll be on track to do advanced math in college.
“Could we really?” Iris asks.
“I’d rather die, no offense,” Hector says.
“Fair. Can you get your hands on the textbook they use?” Nathaniel asks Iris. “Maybe get a calculus textbook too, just in case.”
“We aren’t supposed to take books home over the summer,” Iris says, but she says it like the infraction is an enticement, not a deterrent.
“Then it’s a plan.”
Nathaniel gets to his feet and leaves the twins to study for another class. As he works on the inventory, he hears them gossip about their cousin, debate whether a boy named Raul has a crush on Iris, and complain that peace talks are meaningless if people are still dying.
Iris, in particular, reminds Nathaniel of people he used to work with. She’s just starting to figure out that she’s smarter than practically everybody she knows. The best he can hope for is that she finds a good use for that mind. She’s planning to go to college, thank god.
He’s embarrassed by how much he envies them—envies all the time they have, the chance to do things right. He’ll be forty this summer; he’s crossed the likely halfway point of his life. And what does he have to show for it? Practically nothing. Less than nothing.
“How many pages is that?” Patrick asks, glancing warily at the composition notebook containing the inventory.
“You don’t want to know.”
“Oh, don’t I?” Patrick asks, standing a little too close. Nathaniel feels his pulse pick up at the proximity, and at the flirtatious edge to Patrick’s words.
“Nuh-uh,” Nathaniel says, shaking his head, not breaking eye contact.
There’s something crackling and hot between them. Nathaniel’s instincts all tell him to walk away, to put some space between them. Instead he leans in a little closer, egregiously close now. “Twenty-six pages,” he says. “One for each letter of the alphabet.”
It isn’t that funny, but when Patrick laughs, Nathaniel can feel it, hot on his cheek.
* * *
“I’m starved,” Jerome says. He’s on his second cup of coffee, lounging on a diseased-looking armchair Susan rescued from the trash collectors and dragged to the back of the shop. It’s Nathaniel’s day off, but Susan banished him from her apartment so she can call her manager. He’s spent the morning drinkingcoffee with Jerome. Patrick looks incredulously at both of them every time he walks past, which only encourages Nathaniel to stay put.
“We only have teething biscuits and creamed corn,” Nathaniel says.
“Or we could go out to lunch.”
An excuse is on the tip of Nathaniel’s tongue, but what the hell. Jerome spent the last hour regaling him with stories of backstage drag show drama. He won’t be shocked by anything Nathaniel says.
“Sometimes I get nuts when I go outside,” Nathaniel says.
“What kind of nuts?” Jerome asks, leaning forward, intrigued.
“Frightened.”
