The Art of Feeling

by Laura Tims

  Did I do something wrong? (1:55 p.m.)

  The last one is more than a week old.

  I’d be such an asshole to text him now, but I’d be even more of an asshole if I abandoned Rex.

  I know this is weird, and that I suck and haven’t replied, but could you give me a ride somewhere? I don’t have anyone else to ask. (2:32 a.m.)

  I delete the last part, then put it back because it’s true.

  Minutes stretch out. All my message probably did was remind him of how mad he must be at me. I’m ashamed of how relieved I am that I won’t have to face him.

  But then his car pulls into my driveway, the lights off.

  I buckle myself in, my sweaty fingers slipping on the belt. “Thank you so much. My brother’s stranded at that house where Anthony’s friends hang out.”

  He doesn’t say hello or tell me how pissed he is. He just nods and drives off, his profile glowing in the streetlights. He’s paler, the circles under his eyes deeper. He cut his hair. I suddenly comprehend the gravity of three weeks.

  Then Tito licks my elbow, scaring the shit out of me.

  “I was bringing him back when you texted me,” says Eliot, breaking the silence.

  I rub Tito’s ears gratefully. His presence makes this less excruciating in the way dogs somehow manage to do. “Thanks for walking him, despite . . .”

  “No problem.”

  He’s not cold, just careful, and all at once I’m positive that after tonight ends, he’ll let me go right back to ignoring him without bringing it up once.

  This makes me want to puke, but my only excuse is, It just sort of kept happening, and I don’t have a lie to replace it with.

  We reach the house where Eliot’s shoulder was dislocated. All the windows are dimly lit, low voices punctuating the night.

  “Stay here with Tito,” I tell Eliot, but he follows me out of the car anyway.

  I text Rex and wait on the porch, but he doesn’t show up. Finally I have to knock. If Anthony answers . . . but it’s one of his friends who all look the same, white guys in their twenties trying out beards.

  “I’m here for Rex,” I say bravely.

  He turns and yells into the house, and a minute later Rex comes staggering out, crashing into me so hard I nearly topple over on my crutches. I do my best to guide him to the ground rather than straight up drop him.

  “Sam! You came,” he says, and immediately starts crying.

  “You’re Rex’s sister?” asks the guy at the door with interest. Realization dawns in his expression as he glances at Eliot, who’s observing Rex’s tears from a safe distance. “And you’re Eliot Rowe. I’ve heard about you.”

  This is exactly why I wanted him to stay in the car.

  I move to propel both him and Rex to safety, but the guy’s voice floats out behind me. “You’re the stupid asshole who narced on Anthony.”

  Adrenaline surges into my throat, and suddenly my hand whips up and across his face. The slap almost drowns out Eliot’s startled noise.

  The guy trips backward and falls into the house, and the only way I convince Rex to mobilize in time to flee is by hissing, “Tito’s in the car waiting for you!”

  Once we’re all inside, Eliot speeds down the road, a giggling Rex sprawled in the backseat as Tito takes advantage of his incapacitation to lick every available inch of his body.

  “What did you take?” I snap, but the smell on his clothes answers me. I try to make my sigh sound irritated and not relieved.

  “I’m sorry, Sam.” Rex struggles to sit, but the twelve or so pounds of Tito is too much for him. “I was out, and I couldn’t ask you for more, not when you were too nice to yell at me about the Vicodin in front of Lena and Dad, even though I could tell you wanted to. Lena’s right. I’m a bad example. A bad big brother.”

  He starts blubbering again.

  “Rex, it’s okay,” I begin, before electing not to waste a pep talk on a stoned fool.

  Eliot pretends he wasn’t listening. “Am I delivering him to your place?”

  Rex hears the voice of a human male and shoots upright, launching Tito across the car. “Where the hell did you find this guy?”

  I open my mouth, but Eliot cuts me off. “Sam and I met when she stopped Anthony from beating me up, which was unnecessary since I have congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis; but she has a habit of hitting people who aren’t nice to me, which, confusingly, has persisted even though we aren’t friends anymore.”

  What?

  I figured he’d be mad, but—not friends anymore?

  Rex interprets this pretty much how I expect him to. “I said to tell me if you got a fucking boyfriend so I could fucking check up on him. You, boyfriend! How many girls have you been with?”

  “Touching people and being touched are not in my skill set, or list of interests, for that matter,” Eliot says.

  I can’t believe this is happening.

  “So you don’t play?” Rex demands.

  “Only mind games, reportedly.”

  “And that weird-ass disease, that isn’t like an STD?”

  “If it could be passed on that way, I’d be fending off a lot more attention than I currently am.”

  “All right.” Rex sinks back out of sight, dazed. “It’s what I’ve always said, Sam. You can date a pussy, just don’t date a dick.”

  “So you wanted Sam to be a lesbian,” says Eliot politely.

  This is the end of my life.

  “You’ve never said that, Rex,” I grit out. “Please keep not saying it.”

  “Dude, it’s my only wise saying. Shit, I should copyright it. What if Drake steals it?”

  When we arrive at my blessed house, I drag Rex and Tito out of the car but hesitate before closing the door.

  “Don’t go yet,” I tell Eliot.

  Rex slumps into my shoulder. “Take her out to dinner three hundred times before you kiss her.”

  It takes a while to sneak Rex upstairs, and I pray Eliot doesn’t leave. Finally I dump him on his bed. He bobs right back up and wraps me in a damp bear hug.

  “Are you depressed again?” he asks miserably. “We’ve all been way worried—me and Lena hardly even fight now, and Dad’s been on the phone with the insurance company, finding a new therapist.”

  Somehow I still haven’t learned that time passes for others even when it stops for me. Turns out people mind when you take a weeks-long break from their world. I took a six-month break from the lacrosse team, and they had the perfectly reasonable reaction of moving on, and I resented them for it anyway. Even Eliot is ready to cut his losses. But my family just worries and waits, every time.

  Rex is sniffling. “Is it my fault because I’m a bad big brother?”

  “You are not a bad big brother,” I say fiercely. “I love you, you ass.”

  “I . . . I thought I was being cool about your leg. Not like Lena.”

  I sigh. “My leg doesn’t define me, but it doesn’t not exist either. That’s all.”

  “Stop being so much cooler than me,” he mumbles.

  “Yeah, it was so cool how I yelled at you all and then ignored you for three weeks.” I’m hot with shame. “Rex, I’m sorry.”

  “Just warn me in advance next time you’re going into zombie mode. Just so I know.” He topples back into bed. “Thanks for the ride. . . . Tell your boyfriend thanks, too.”

  I cover him with a blanket and stick Tito on his chest so he can alert the house if Rex starts dying in his sleep.

  I’m terrified that Eliot is gone and we’ll be Not Friends Anymore forever, but when I race to the driveway, his car is still there. I dive into the passenger seat like he’s going to start accelerating.

  “I am so sorry,” I practically yell. “Please don’t hate me forever. That would suck so much, you don’t even know.”

  He’s frozen.

  Okay, starting over. “Sometimes when I’m dealing with too much, I stop dealing with anything. That’s no excuse. But last time I assumed I couldn�
��t get back any of the life I lost, so I didn’t try, but I’m going to try really hard not to lose you.”

  I can’t tell what kind of silence his is.

  I take a long breath. “I know it’s three in the morning, but I have the most ridiculous craving for McDonald’s right now.”

  More quiet. And then he says, “I’ve never been to McDonald’s.”

  Inside the restaurant, which is deserted apart from the exhausted-looking cashier girl, Eliot orders us both Big Macs, fries, and sodas, plus one of those mini-apple pies, which he hands to the girl without a word.

  I like that that’s the only impression of him she’ll ever have, a kind guy who bought her a snack and didn’t expect anything back.

  We take a corner booth. Eliot sets his bag down unopened. “So it wasn’t something I did wrong? I thought it must have been either when you spent the night, or during the next day, with Trez. I thought you came across one of those little bombs.”

  I shake my head. His voice is casual, but his eyes aren’t. Of course he’s ready to cut his losses—he’s been prepared with scissors since the start. He didn’t try because he thought what I was doing was fair.

  I lean forward. “You can be mad at me, Eliot.”

  “That would be unreasonable.” He tears open his bag mechanically. “I don’t resent people for taking the rational step of walking out when they can’t deal with something. You said it: when you’re dealing with too much, you stop.”

  I’ll have to hack his own stupid logic to get through to him.

  “You’re new to friendship, and I’m not, so my information is technically more reliable, right?” I say. “So you have to trust me, scientifically, when I say it was shitty of me to close you out and not explain. Again, I am sorry.”

  “Apologies are a waste of time.”

  “I’m still sorry.”

  “You don’t—”

  “Just let me be sorry, okay?”

  He blinks a few times. “I refuse to cry. I haven’t cried since I was six and our dog died.”

  I wince. “I’m sorry about your dog.”

  “He was hypoallergenic, and he had to wear a muzzle and claw caps whenever I played with him. We robbed him of his natural defenses. Although I guess they wouldn’t have mattered against a car anyway.” He takes a bite of his burger. “This is delicious.”

  I let my head flop against the booth. “God, I missed you.”

  “I missed you, too,” he says quietly.

  And then, suddenly, more businesslike: “You need to figure out what you’re going to do about Trez, or you’ll stay stuck in this rut.”

  Right. “It’s like . . . a big ball of stress in my brain, and if I go near it, I feel like I’m freaking out.”

  “So I’ll go near it. It’s not a ball of stress for me.”

  I shred a fry so I don’t do something stupid with my hands like cover my face. “I thought if I remembered, we’d have closure. But what if involving the police is the opposite of closure?”

  “Maybe it’s not about closure,” he says. “Maybe it’s about what Trez deserves.”

  “It wasn’t just her fault. She told me—”

  “I know about Anthony. I talked to her at school. Wanted to see if she had anything to do with you being out.”

  Thank God. I really wasn’t ready to explain it. I don’t even understand it. “It’s wrong, her being the only one who gets punished.”

  “Isn’t one better than neither?”

  “Anthony made her do it.”

  I don’t know why the idea of ruining Trez’s life makes me feel worse, not better. Maybe there’s something wrong with me.

  “She still did it,” he says.

  It’s simple for him. But it needs to be simple for me, too. “Anthony acted this whole time like he didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “He doesn’t think he did. The best liars aren’t really lying—they believe themselves. No one will take Trez’s version over Anthony’s because she blames herself, and he blames her.”

  “I’m just lost,” I say numbly. “We grew up together. We were his friends. I wish I understood.”

  “It takes a messed-up brain to understand a messed-up brain. Luckily you have one at your disposal.” He taps his forehead. “When you’re a smart little kid who gets bullied, you tend to decide that the bullies are just stupid, shallow, jealous. And maybe they are—they’re kids. But you internalize this when your brain is programming the section on dealing with people forever, so even when you’re older, you still operate under the assumption that everyone is a middle school bully.”

  “I won’t feel sorry for him.”

  “Don’t. It’s his own fault. If you refuse to give people the chance to be something different, you’re the one who stays stupid and shallow, stunted forever, unable to comprehend the depth of anyone else.” His voice is hard. “He never hated you. He probably likes you. He just didn’t think it mattered if he hurt you, because you’re lesser than him.”

  “That’s worse,” I rasp. “I don’t think I can come back to school with him there.”

  “We’ll get him kicked out, see how he likes it.”

  “It’s literally impossible to get Anthony Moore kicked out.”

  “No, it’s literally impossible to prove he’s at fault for the accident. But we can prove he’s dangerous and violent, and we can show that proof to the world.”

  The smug mysteriousness is unbearable.

  “This time, can you not do the stupid thing without telling me first?” I ask.

  “I’ve already done it.” He has the decency to look a little abashed. “Except it’s not stupid, it’s brilliant, obviously. It’s a surprise for you. You’ll see.”

  And however much I plead, he won’t explain any further, until finally I just have to eat my cold fries and wonder about it until I’m so tired I have to ask him to take me home.

  Chapter Sixteen

  THE NEXT MORNING, REX IS APPARENTLY feeling better, because he wakes me up early by pummeling my door.

  “Sam! Let me in!”

  “It’s unlocked,” I moan into my pillow.

  He barrels inside in jalapeño-patterned boxers and jumps onto my bed like he’s ten, waving his phone in my face. “You need to see this.”

  I roll over. “I’m not using my eyes for anything until you put on pants.”

  “Isn’t this your boyfriend?”

  I roll back immediately.

  It’s a video of a crowd, tinny shouting, and then it zooms in. “Shit.” The video’s titled “High School Kid Doesn’t Feel Pain!” And there’s . . . “Oh, shit.”

  “Yeah, it’s a lot of views. That is your boyfriend?”

  I scroll through comments:

  new superhero origin story!

  Is he faking? I literally cry whenever I stub my toe!!!

  Did he survive to press charges tho blondie needs to fricking chill

  And the reply: His name is Anthony Moore, he goes to my friend’s school :(

  “It’s on BuzzFeed.” Rex opens the page and reads the title. “‘15 Annoyingly Common Injuries that Make Us Envy This Guy Who Can’t Feel Pain.’ And look at this other article.”

  This High School Student Has Real-Life Superpowers

  You might have seen that video of a teenager surviving a beatdown that would bring a pro wrestler to tears—without showing an ounce of pain. (Seriously, he’s like a jack-in-the-box—he just keeps getting up.) But there’s a name for his condition, and it would make a superhero jealous.

  We contacted the uploader of the video to learn that the secret identity of this Wolverine is Eliot Rowe, a senior at Forest Hills High School in Vermont. Rowe suffers from congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis—which, in medical terms, means he can’t feel pain.

  “We had no idea about that. We just thought he was high or crazy,” said the student who filmed the fight. “We were pretty freaked out by them both.”

  The incident had not been reported to the
school or police prior to its online presence. When contacted, the school’s administration shared this statement: “FHHS has a zero-tolerance policy. The consequence for seriously harming another student is immediate expulsion. It will absolutely apply in this case.”

  The attacker’s name is Anthony Moore, a straight-A senior on track to attend Yale (UPDATE: as of this morning, Yale has reportedly rescinded their acceptance). He was arrested early this morning for assault and battery.

  The words spin. Immediate expulsion . . . rescinded acceptance . . . arrested . . .

  It’s the most I could have hoped for.

  This is Eliot’s surprise. While I was ignoring him, he was orchestrating this.

  “I can’t believe I called your boyfriend a pussy.” Rex replays the video, shaking his head. “This is what I was talking about when I told you to stay away from Anthony. Too bad. He used to be an okay kid.”

  I hug him, which confuses him. Then I kick him out, because I have to call Eliot. But after ten minutes of ringing—he won’t set up his voice mail in case Gabriel leaves him one—my shivery joy fades.

  This is Eliot’s worst nightmare, the world having an excuse to treat him even more like an alien.

  I’m dressed in a millisecond and at Rex’s door. “Did you get your truck back?”

  “You just evicted me five seconds ago!”

  “It’s an emergency. I need a ride to Eliot’s.”

  He grumbles, but he gets dressed even faster than me.

  He’s incapable of driving fast enough, though, because that would be light speed. When we’re halfway there, he remarks, “Your boyfriend mentioned that disease last night, didn’t he? He didn’t say it was a superpower thing. Can he sneeze on me so I catch it?”

  I picture Eliot semiconscious on his kitchen floor. “It’s not a superpower thing.”

  I’m expecting mobs of reporters, SWAT teams—isn’t that what happens when something goes viral?—but we arrive to find his car alone in the driveway.

  “This is where your boyfriend lives? I would have been way nicer to him if I knew he was loaded,” says Rex, disgusted.

  “Thanks for the ride. I’ll see you after school.”