by Sonya Sones
Was he always
that much taller than Dad?
Now he’s lifting Alice right off her feet,
swinging her around.
And now he’s swinging her
back down to earth,
reaching for me, saying, “Lily . . . My Lily . . .
You turned into a woman while I was gone!”
Oh my God.
And Then
Luke’s
wrapping his arms
around me.
And for a few seconds,
while my cheek’s pressed
against his heart,
everything is perfect.
Luke Slings His Luggage into the Trunk
While I stand close to him—
so that when he climbs into the backseat,
I can slide in right next to him.
I picture his thigh
resting against mine,
and my heart floats up into my throat.
But when he reaches for the door handle,
Mom shoos his fingers away,
saying, “Your legs are too long.
I can sit with the girls.”
Alice begs to sit on Luke’s lap,
but Mom tells her that wouldn’t be safe.
Alice scowls and flings herself onto the backseat.
I follow her in and put my arm around her shoulder.
Mom slips in last, and says,
“You’ll have plenty of time to sit on Luke’s lap.
He’ll be staying with us till he finds a place.”
“He will?” Alice and I cry in unison.
“I will!” Luke says.
And as we head home, with Alice babbling
about all the ballet recitals she’ll do for him,
I just sit here snapping pictures
of his long brown hair fluttering in the breeze,
wishing I could weave my fingers through it.
Luke Will Be Sleeping in the Guest Room
Right next to mine!
I’m listening to him unpack, opening and
closing drawers, whistling to himself,
while I lie here on my bed, swiping through
all the photos I took of him today.
Of his hair. His arms. His hands . . .
Then I get a text from Taylor:
Forgive me! Was in mid-experiment.
Available for wardrobe consult now!
(Taylor’s away at chemistry camp.)
I reply: Crisis averted. Then I add a smiley face,
so it won’t seem like I’m mad.
I go back to looking at photos of Luke.
Of his dark eyes. His dizzying smile . . .
Then I get a text from Rose:
Sorry I couldn’t answer before!
Was busy saving a gorgeous guy’s life!
U still need help?
(Rose is in Cape Cod, being a junior lifeguard.)
I reply: No problem! Figured it out. Then I
set my phone to silent. I mean, I love my besties.
But can’t they see I’m busy?
Dinner
Luke’s sitting between Mom and Alice.
I chose to sit next to Dad, right across from them,
so I could gaze at Luke’s face in the candlelight.
Alice is telling him
she doesn’t want him to find an apartment.
She wants him to live with us forever.
Luke is laughing,
saying he’s pretty sure
that would be overstaying his welcome.
And that English accent of his . . .
It makes him sound like he stepped
straight out of the pages of one of my books . . .
He says he’s got a month before
he has to start writing up his research results
for the foundation that sent him to Kenya.
He says he’ll use that time to look for a place.
But Mom says there’s no hurry.
And Dad says we’ve got plenty of room.
And all the while,
Luke’s eyes are smiling
into mine.
I’m Imagining Him Standing Up
And coming around to my side of the table
to take my hand and whisk me off to Hawaii,
just like Olly does with Maddy
in Everything, Everything . . .
Then, all of a sudden,
I notice that everyone’s laughing.
And when I look around the table,
I realize they’re laughing at me.
Oh man . . .
I can feel my cheeks turning pinker
than the cherry pie Mom baked.
“What . . . ?” I say.
“Luke asked you a question, Lily,” Dad says.
“Oh . . . ,” I say. “I knew that.”
Which makes them all laugh
even harder.
“Lily’s always been a daydreamer,” Luke says.
“That’s one of the things we love about her, right?”
And everyone agrees,
while I sit here trying not to faint.
Because Luke just said he loves things about me!
It’s August
So it’s still too warm to light a fire.
But after dessert, Mom carries the candles
from the dinner table into the living room,
and then lights a few more.
Now the candlelight
flickers on our faces,
as I sit here at Luke’s feet,
listening to him tell about
the time he was attacked by a leopard,
deep in the Kenyan rain forest—
about how he had to shove
his forearm into its mouth
to keep it from lunging for his neck.
And while it shook him around like a rag doll,
he somehow managed to pull out his pistol
and shoot it dead.
Then Luke rolls up his shirtsleeve
to show us where the leopard’s teeth
sank in.
And when I see those rough red scars,
when I see how close he came to being killed,
my heart turns over.
Luke Says It’s Time for Presents
He gives Dad a Maasai spear
decorated with bloodred charms.
It looks like it could do some serious damage.
“My only request,” Luke says,
“is that you promise not to use it on me, Sam.”
My father laughs and fakes a lunge at him.
Then Luke gives Mom a handwoven blue blanket,
and says, “It matches your eyes, Julia.”
Mom blushes like a seventh grader.
Next, Luke gives Alice a set of wooden animals.
He says they’re called “the Great Five”—a lion,
a buffalo, an elephant, a rhino, and a leopard.
“I love them!” she cries.
But she hands him back the leopard,
saying, “This one is not so great.”
Luke smiles and pats her on the head.
“It’s not the one that bit me, luv,” he says,
tucking it into her palm.
Finally, he places a small box into my hands.
Inside is the prettiest necklace I’ve ever seen—
each green jewel more sparkly than the next.
“The stones are called tsavorite,” Luke says.
And as he fastens it around my neck,
he whispers in my ear,
“Tsavorite for my favorite.”
Luke’s Always Given Alice and Me
The best presents ever.
Even when it wasn’t our birthdays.
It’s like he knows what we want before we do.
Unlike Dad, who never gives us presents.
Even when it is our birthday.
Though it’s not because he’s cheap.
It’s because he’s go
t to work such long hours
at his tech start-up company
that he hardly spends any time with us.
So he doesn’t really know what we’d like.
Mom works too, at an art gallery,
but only nine to three.
Dad works nine to infinity.
And when he comes home, he’s too tired
to do anything but sit in front of a screen.
That’s why Mom does all the gift buying,
and the wrapping, too.
Then they both sign the card.
But it’s obvious from the look on Dad’s face
while we’re unwrapping the boxes,
that he doesn’t even know what’s inside them.
It’s After Midnight
I’m lying in bed, wearing my pj’s
and Luke’s necklace,
remembering the thrill
that ran through me like water
when his lips
brushed against my ear . . .
Luke’s bedroom and mine share a wall.
Both of our beds touch that wall.
I draw a heart on it
with the tip of my finger,
imagining Luke doing the same thing
on his side of the wall.
I press my palm against
its skin-smooth surface.
Is Luke pressing his palm against it, too?
Are our fingers almost
touching?
My Parents Have to Work
So Luke’s been spending the last few
weeks of summer with Alice and me.
Alice calls it Camp Luke-a-Wanna.
Today we’re at the U-Pick-Em Apple Farm.
The trees sag under the weight
of an early crop, redder than valentines.
The bees hum as we twist the apples
off their stems and drop them into our sacks.
Luke notices that Alice is too short
to reach all but the lowest branches.
So he lets her ride on his shoulders.
Because that’s the kind of guy he is.
Alice grins and raises her arms
over her head like a ballerina.
And as I snap her picture,
I can’t help wishing I was her size . . .
We take a break from apple picking.
Alice dances off after a dragonfly.
Luke leads me over to sit under one of the trees.
He shines an apple on the leg of his faded jeans.
He takes a bite, then passes it to me.
And as he watches me bring it to my lips,
I can’t help thinking how very
Adam-and-Eve-ish this moment is.
At the Cineplex
Alice wanted to see the new Ice Age movie.
And I don’t blame her—I was obsessed
with those films at her age, too.
Of course, I lost interest in them years ago.
But even so, there’s no place
I’d rather be right now
than sitting here
in the delicious dark
next to Luke,
listening
to the sound of his laughter
rumbling all through him,
his forearm
resting tinglingly close
to mine.
And when he reaches into my lap
to dig a handful of popcorn
out of the bag,
my breath catches.
Because the Truth Is
No guy’s ever reached into my lap before.
Not for popcorn or for anything else.
A few have tried to kiss me.
But I just ducked out of the way.
Because compared to Luke,
they all seemed so immature.
Though I did let this guy named Jason
kiss me after a school dance last year.
I barely even knew him,
but I was getting tired of listening
to Taylor and Rose swap stories about
all the boys they’d been making out with.
Tired
of being the one
who’d never been
kissed.
Jason’s breath smelled like beer.
His tongue was thick and slimy.
I almost gagged when he pushed it
into my mouth.
I mean, I don’t understand how exchanging saliva
with someone can feel so weirdly . . . impersonal.
There has to be more to it than that.
There just has to be.
Alice Lobbied Hard for Bowling
So today Luke’s taking us
to Looking Glass Lanes—
one of those places that’s geared
toward little kids, with balls that weigh
less than cotton candy, and bumpers
that keep them out of the gutter.
When we walk through the door,
Alice starts twirling around,
crying, “We’re in Wonderland!”
Luke grins at her and says,
“Everywhere is Wonderland
when we’re with you, Alice.”
He tousles her curls,
and just as I raise my camera,
to capture this moment between them,
he looks over at me,
and gives me a secret wink.
My knees go all wobbly.
Then,
for the next few hours,
Luke cheers Alice and me on
like we’re Olympic champions,
even when we just knock over a few pins.
Everywhere is Wonderland
when we’re with Luke.
But When We’re with Dad
Everywhere
is more like
I-Wonder-Why-Not-Land.
Alice and I
came here with him
last summer.
But he didn’t cheer us on.
He mostly just stared at his phone
till it was his turn again.
I’m making him sound like
a much worse father than he actually is.
He’s not that bad.
It’s just that he doesn’t know
how to relate to Alice and me.
He doesn’t seem comfortable around us.
Like he thinks
we’re these delicate crystals
that might break if he looks at us sideways.
Which probably explains why he never hugs us.
Or maybe that’s just a story
I made up in my head
to let him off the hook.
Because I Do Love Him
And, I mean,
it’s probably not even his fault
that he is like he is.
Mom’s theory is that his parents
never used to hug him—so he just figures
that’s how people are supposed to be.
He doesn’t
hug Mom either.
At least not in front of us.
I wish I’d gotten to meet his parents.
But they died in a car crash, with his little brother,
when Dad was just a freshman in college.
Mom thinks that’s why he wanted
to get married and start a family
before they even graduated—
to replace the one he’d lost.
And I’m Pretty Sure He Doesn’t Regret It
I can tell by how
he sneaks into my room at night
when he thinks I’m asleep,
how he tucks the blankets around me,
and rests his hand on my forehead,
like he’s checking to see if I have a fever.
And Alice says
he does the same thing
to her.
It’s so strange—like he can only
show us how he really feels about us
when he thinks we aren’t looking.
>
My dad may be messed up,
but I’m pretty sure he loves us.
And we love him back.
I just sometimes wish
he could act more
like Luke.
Luke’s Been My Dad’s Best Friend Forever
They both went to the same university.
Dad was working as a teaching assistant
to help pay his way through grad school.
And when Luke was a freshman,
he enrolled in one of Dad’s classes.
They started hanging out right away.
Even though Dad was like five years older.
Mom thinks it’s because Luke sort of filled the hole
left in Dad’s life when his little brother died.
And Luke’s family lived in London,
where he was raised, so my parents
kind of became his American family.
It’s weird to think that Luke was already
fifteen years old when I was born—
a year older than I am now.
He used to babysit for me all the time.
I cringe whenever I think
about that.
I mean, he used to change my diapers
and give me baths.
Luke has seen me naked.
I was only a toddler, but still.
If You’ve Just Done the Math in Your Head
Then I can guess
what you’re thinking.
Something along the lines of:
“Wait. What?
You mean Luke’s twenty-nine?
That’s practically thirty.”
But
lots of couples
have big age differences.
And I mean, girls fall in love
with their teachers all the time.
This is no different than that.
You’d
understand
why I’m so into Luke . . .
You’d understand how . . .
how epically . . . epic he is,
if you knew him
like I do.
For Example:
When I was
four years old,
I choked on an M&M.
I tried to call for help,
but no sound
would come out.
It was Luke who found me
a few seconds later
and told me to sit up,
Luke who thwacked me on my back,
and made that M&M
fly out of my mouth,
