The Indifferent Children of the Earth

by Gregory Ashe

  Chapter 20, Friday 9 September

  I avoided Olivia for the rest of the day. Wyatt and the rest of them too, for that matter. I needed to be alone, needed to think. I don’t know why asking her to the dance was such a big deal, but it loomed up in front of me, an insurmountable barrier. Once I spoke those words, once I let them loose into the air, there was no calling them back, and things would change forever. And in that change, I could feel the seeds for something else, threatening to take root and blossom.

  And I didn’t know what that would bring.

  After work, I closed up the store and went home. No Olivia tonight. That meant I was home much earlier, while the sun still hung, red and weary, above the horizon. Mom and Dad were sitting in the great room when I got home; I could hear them talking. I went straight to my room, lay down on the bed. Still an hour or two until dinner, when I’d be forced to drag myself downstairs, face my parents. Not right now, though. A little time to think.

  It wasn’t that I didn’t want to ask Olivia to Homecoming. I had no interest in dances, no interest in dancing, really, although I probably wasn’t as bad as some people. It just never interested me. And I liked spending time with her, liked the way she made me feel, liked the way she laughed and smiled and could make me laugh and smile in return. Not forced. Genuine smile, genuine laughter.

  But asking her to the dance was a big deal. It meant a shift in our relationship, a step toward something even more solidified, and it also meant a risk. It meant that she could say no. Or, if things went poorly at the dance, she might break up with me. What if I had another panic attack? What if I couldn’t get myself out of bed that day? What if—and this was the root of it—she saw me for who I was?

  A tap at the door. In the padded silence of our house, it was a scream.

  “Alex,” my mom said. “Can I come in?”

  “Yeah.”

  The door opened and she came in; I had my eyes tight shut, but I could smell her. She didn’t wear the perfume I had given her last year for Mother’s Day; she’d already stopped wearing it when I came out of the coma. But I smelled the damp freshness of turned soil, and something lighter, probably a flower I didn’t recognize. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t look at her. Not right now. All I could think about was the missing body between us, where Isaac should have been. Isaac would have just asked Olivia, and she would have said yes. Isaac wouldn’t have had to worry about losing her, wouldn’t have had to worry about her finding out who he was. Isaac wouldn’t be causing our parents all this grief.

  The bed shifted under me as she sat down. One of her hands found my leg, her touch almost unfelt through the denim. I could feel the nervousness in that touch, the suppressed flinch. It lasted for a long time. It was like having a spider perched on me.

  And then, to my surprise, she rested her hand firmly on my calf and began to rub my leg. The way she had before everything had gone wrong. Just a touch, a way to say she was there.

  “Alex,” she said. “Why aren’t you at Olivia’s house?”

  “You’d rather have me be there,” I said.

  “You know that’s not true.” A pause. “Is everything ok?”

  I felt that same crumbling sensation from when we had talked in the garden. I knew she was lying, that she couldn’t stand to be near me, but I also knew she was trying. And I was so desperate that it was enough.

  “Homecoming is coming up in a few weeks,” I said in a half-choked voice.

  “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “I’m supposed to ask Olivia.”

  “Don’t you want to go with Olivia?”

  “Yes,” I said, screwing my eyes even tighter shut. “No. I don’t know.”

  “Why? Olivia would be happy to go with you. She seems lovely.”

  “What—” I had to work around the taste of broken stone in my mouth. “What would Isaac do, Mom?”

  “Oh Alex,” my mom said, her voice soft and sad. Defeated. “That doesn’t matter. Why can’t you—”

  She stopped earlier this time, but I knew how that sentence ended. Be like Isaac. The question we all asked ourselves, every day. I was trying, dammit. That’s why I was asking. But why couldn’t I? I don’t know. If I’d been like Isaac, none of this would have happened. Isaac would still be alive. Christopher would still be alive. We’d still be in New York. My parents would still love me.

  But I hadn’t. Because I wasn’t like Isaac. I wasn’t smart and strong and popular. I didn’t have his easy way of making people like him. I was me. Sullen, proud, broken.

  We were both quiet for a time, but I think Mom was crying. Then she said, “Alex, any girl would be lucky to go to that dance with you. And you should go; you deserve to be happy.”

  When I spoke, I felt myself on the brink of tears. “What if she says no?” It was the closest I could come to saying everything else, all my fears about her finding out who I am, all my fears about losing her.

  “She won’t say no,” Mom said. “You’re too much of a catch.”

  “Ha ha,” I said.

  Mom leaned over, the bed shifting under us, and kissed me on the forehead. A teardrop fell on my cheek, hotter than the Midwest sun. “You are. And you deserve to be happy,” Mom said. She squeezed my leg one last time, got off the bed, and left.

  I had to hand it to my mom; she was trying her best. Trying to make things work, trying to make it seem like we were a family again. If I hadn’t known what I’d done, if I didn’t remember that night in the subway station, I would have felt normal, cared for, loved. But I could feel it in the way we moved near each other, afraid of upsetting a delicate balance. Their grief. I didn’t deserve them, not after what I’d done. But I was grateful for Mom’s efforts anyway. She had made me feel a little better.

  She hadn’t answered my question about Isaac, but that’s because we both knew the answer. And that’s what my parents wanted: a son like Isaac, someone they could be proud of. Not a fratricide. So I was going to keep trying to do my best. Because they deserved a son like that. And that meant, in spite of my fears, in spite of everything, I was going to ask Olivia to the dance. Because that’s what Isaac would have done.

  But first, I was going to need a car.