Boys Like You

by Juliana Stone

  “A meteor shower,” I answered, watching the shooting sprays arc across the sky. The last time I’d watched one had been a few years back. Trevor and I and a few guys from the football team had gone out to Baker’s Landing with a couple of six-packs. We’d stayed the night. Got wasted and watched the sky.

  It had been pretty cool, but nothing compared to tonight. To being out here under an endless sky with Monroe tucked into my side like she belonged there.

  We watched the light show for hours, it seemed, and when the dew fell and Monroe began to shiver, I pulled the blanket over us and wrapped us up like a cocoon. I felt…peaceful, and I would have stayed that way forever if I could have.

  “It’s beautiful,” she murmured. “I’m not much of science nut, so I have no clue why they happen or what it is I’m seeing.”

  “It’s the tail end of a comet coming close to our sun. The bits that fly off hit our atmosphere and,” I nodded to the sky, “that’s the result.”

  “Amazing,” she whispered.

  “Yeah.”

  I stared up into the sky and felt small. I felt small beneath its bigness and I wondered…

  “Do you believe there’s something out there?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  Stupid. What the hell? Why was I getting all deep and shit?

  “Nothing. Forget it.”

  She wriggled and loosened the blanket enough so that she could look at me. “Do you mean God?”

  I shrugged but didn’t answer, mostly because I didn’t know what to say. The lightness was suddenly gone, and I was pissed that it was my fault.

  “I believe there’s something,” she nodded, her pale eyes shimmery, like they were filling with tears.

  Which made me feel worse.

  She exhaled a long, shuddery breath and tried to smile, but it didn’t really work. She looked so sad, so…broken.

  “I used to think there was nothing. No one out there. No God.” Her eyes squeezed shut. “Just nothing. But then I realized when you don’t believe in anything anymore, what’s the point of living? What’s the point of breathing or water fights and summer picnics? What’s the point of…loving?”

  I didn’t know what to say to that, so I was silent. I stroked her hair, and she relaxed against me again.

  “There has to be something out there, some greater power, don’t you think?”

  “I guess so,” I answered. My family wasn’t overly religious, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been to church. This kind of shit wasn’t something I thought too much about, so why the hell had I brought it up?

  “There has to be,” she whispered. “I need for there to be. I need to believe that Malcolm is somewhere. That when he died, he didn’t just end.”

  I wanted to know who Malcolm was. What happened? How did he die? And why did Monroe blame herself? I had so many questions, but I didn’t ask any of them because I didn’t feel as if I had the right to. I just stroked her hair and pulled her as close as I could.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. They were only two words, but they were all I had.

  There was a pause.

  “I know.”

  A heartbeat passed before she whispered, “I’m sorry too.”

  And then she began to cry.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Monroe

  I don’t know how long I cried. I only know that when I finally stopped, I felt empty and my heart hurt.

  Nate’s arms, his warmth and strength, never left me, and for that I was grateful. I hadn’t let this much emotion out since that awful day. In fact, I don’t think I’d cried since. Not even at Malcolm’s funeral.

  My therapist had been trying to get me to this place—a place where denial didn’t live and some sort of acceptance did.

  A place where maybe I didn’t blame myself. I’m not sure if I would ever really not blame myself for what happened that day, but I was one foot in that direction, which was one foot farther than I’d been.

  Who knew that all it would take was a southern boy and a meteor shower?

  I relaxed a bit. My face felt tight, and I was glad it was dark because I was pretty sure I looked awful. My eyes felt swollen, my tongue thick, and I knew how blotchy my pale skin got when I was upset.

  I felt Nate’s warm breath along the top of my head and turned slightly, resting on his chest with my eyes closed. I never wanted to leave here. If I could stay in his arms forever, I would, because right now, his forever was safe.

  Several long moments passed. My chest tightened and then released as a wave of memories and images from that day crashed into me. I had only talked about it once, and even then, all of the little things—the things that mattered—I’d kept to myself.

  But I didn’t want to do that anymore.

  “Malcolm was full of summer, you know? He looked like my dad, with wavy, blond hair and these big blue eyes that pretty much guaranteed he got away with a lot. He had dimples, freckles across his nose, and he bit the inside of his cheek sometimes. It used to drive my mom batty.”

  That was an understatement. My mom had tried everything to get him to stop, but nothing worked.

  “It was hot that day.”

  Nate stiffened, inhaling deeply and then exhaling as he continued to stroke my head and hold me.

  My eyes were squeezed shut, and though I was here with Nathan, in Louisiana, in my mind I was back in New York City. I saw the blinding, relentless sun and felt the heat on my cheeks as I hurried down the sidewalk so fast Malcolm could barely keep up. He’d worn a Batman T-shirt and faded cargo shorts.

  I smelled the exhaust from the buses and taxis and cars. Sausage from the vendors. Garbage piled up in the streets, waiting for the trucks to drive by and collect.

  That afternoon, I’d been full of resentment and annoyance, and it killed me to remember those particular things. But I had to. I needed to get it out. I needed for Nate to understand even if I didn’t.

  Because Nate’s pain was as real as mine, and maybe he could be saved. Maybe he’d never get to the place where I had been.

  “It was wicked hot in the city, like record heat, and he wanted to go to the park. He’d bugged me about it all morning until I snapped. I thought he was doing it just because he knew I wanted to stay home. God, there was a Walking Dead marathon on, and I hadn’t seen the show yet. I just wanted to chill and watch it with my best friend, who was in the Hamptons with her family.”

  I thought of my friend Kate. We would spend hours texting each other when we weren’t together. Boys. Songs. Gossip.

  But that day it was gonna be about zombies, and I hadn’t seen her since the week before, so I was looking forward to painting my toenails, watching the zombies, and sharing all of it with her.

  “Malcolm knew I didn’t want to go, but he didn’t care. I guess most seven-year-olds are kind of selfish that way.”

  I could have said no. I could have told Malcolm that the smog and humidity wasn’t good for his asthma. But I didn’t. At the time I thought, “Okay, you little twerp. We’ll see how much you like it when you have trouble breathing.”

  It was mid-July, and there were weeks ahead of us. With Mom and Dad working until vacation in August, weeks where I was in charge. I wanted to teach him a lesson. I just didn’t know it would all go so wrong.

  “I remember Mick, the guy who sold sausages on the corner near the park, telling us we were crazy to be out.” I paused. “He was right.”

  I had marched by, glaring at the back of Malcolm’s golden head, and I had thought, “You little shit. Just wait, buddy. You should have listened to me.”

  “The funny thing was, when we got to the park, there were a lot of kids out. It was like a switch had been turned on or something. Malcolm gave me the biggest hug. His arms were thin—God, they looked like spaghetti noodles—but he was strong. He whispe
red in my ear, ‘I love you, Roe,’ and just like that, he made me feel like a total bitch for not wanting to bring him. I roughed up his hair a bit and told him he had an hour, tops.”

  I paused, overwhelmed, and then whispered. “He was fine with an hour. After all that, an hour at the park was enough for him.”

  Malcolm had run to the swings while I found a grassy spot under a tree and sat down. It was maybe a few degrees cooler but still so hot. I’d brought a book and lay down on my stomach to read. I didn’t mean to fall asleep; it just kind of happened. I read a few pages. Texted with Kate and then closed my eyes.

  “I would give anything,” my voice broke, “anything to have not fallen asleep. I remember waking up and not knowing where I was at first. I felt the breeze, smelled the grass, and heard the kids shrieking and giggling as they ran through the water pad on the other side of the swings. I don’t know when I realized that something was wrong.”

  I shrugged and burrowed deeper into Nate’s arms.

  “Maybe it’s why I woke up in the first place. Some weird sense that something was wrong.”

  I paused again, remembering how my stomach fell all the way to the ground and took me with it.

  “I looked everywhere for Malcolm…but he was gone. I was frantic, yelling his name and shouting at the kids like a lunatic. This mother came over to me and asked me what was wrong. When I told her that my brother was missing, she looked around and then she shook my shoulders. She asked me when I’d seen him last and I told her…I told her that I’d fallen asleep and then I couldn’t speak anymore. The look in her eyes…I’ll never forget. She knew I had let it happen.”

  I thought that I was all cried out, but hot tears burned my itchy, blotchy skin.

  “I screamed in her face. I yelled, ‘It’s not my fault,’ but it was. And then when I found his inhaler in my bag, I just knew that something bad had happened. It was too hot. He needed his inhaler. By this time, the place was crawling with cops. I don’t know who called them. It wasn’t me. But they were there and they were asking me questions, and every time they did, I saw that woman’s face. I saw her accusation.”

  My voice broke.

  “I saw the truth.”

  “Oh God, Monroe. You don’t have to do this,” Nate breathed into me, his nose near mine, his dark eyes shiny.

  But I did.

  “They found him almost immediately, in the trees that cut through the park. I think he was trying to get back to me because he was in trouble, but I was asleep and totally unaware. I bet he yelled for me. He had to have, and sometimes I hear him, you know? I hear him screaming, ‘Roe, where are you? Come get me!’

  “He was already gone when they found him, and by then my mother had made it to the park.” I shook violently at the memory. At the sound of my mother wailing. At the image of her pounding her fists into the police officer’s chest. Her nails were scarlet. Blood red and pointy.

  Funny the details you remember.

  “The coroner told my parents later that he died because of a severe asthma attack, and I remember my mom asking about his inhaler. ‘Where was his inhaler?’ she kept asking, saying it over and over. I could never answer, but I think that she knows. I’ve never told her or my dad that I had his inhaler. That I still have his inhaler. I never told them that…”

  I clung to Nathan, trying to block out the sounds of Malcolm’s cries and the images of his face. My chest was so tight I could barely breathe, but eventually it fell away and I was nothing but a limp bag of bones and flesh.

  “Jesus, Monroe. I’m so, so sorry.”

  I was hollow. Spent.

  “Yeah,” I answered slowly. “Me too.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Nathan

  I woke up because the sun was in my eyes. It wavered for a bit and then disappeared again.

  Shit. It was morning, and we were still in the maze. My hair was damp from the dew, but with Monroe still in my arms, burrowed beneath the blanket I’d brought, I was warm and dry.

  It felt right somehow to be here with her, and I realized that for the first time in a long time, I was exactly where I wanted to be.

  I don’t think I slept much, but then how could I? I was still so angry for Monroe. I wanted to punch something. I wanted to smash and destroy and get rid of the anger inside me. It had festered and pulled real hard, just like it had the night after my accident when I’d woken up in the hospital, and Trevor didn’t.

  But I did none of that. I held Monroe until she’d fallen asleep, and then with no one but the lonesome owl nearby to hear me, I cried like a baby.

  I cried for a little boy I’d never met and his sister who had come to mean everything to me in the space of a few weeks. I cried for Trevor. For his mom and dad. I cried like I hadn’t cried since I was a kid in fourth grade and my collie, Abram, died. The bus had pulled up to my driveway, and there he was, lying in the middle of the road, killed by a car or truck.

  I had to pull Abram out of the way for the bus driver, and I remember dragging his big body all the way to the porch, where I sat and cried until my dad came home.

  We never got another dog after that, because me and my parents couldn’t deal with the dying thing. Still couldn’t. Here I was, nearly eighteen and still having trouble.

  Everything fell out of me, and no one witnessed it except whoever the hell was up there, looking down on us. I wasn’t sure if I liked him or not. I mean, what kind of God lets shit like this happen to little boys?

  What kind of God lets someone like me get behind the wheel and destroy his best friend?

  “Shit,” I muttered, wincing as a ray of light fell into the center of the maze again, hitting me in the face like a big F U.

  I guess it was his way of telling me that He didn’t let any of us do anything. If we screwed up, it was on us. We had to own it. We could think. We could do.

  It was up to us to make the right choices, but maybe it was up to Him to help with the fallout.

  Maybe it was He who had sent Monroe to me.

  Or maybe it was just fate.

  Or maybe none of it was real. Maybe none of it mattered. Maybe I was so tired I couldn’t think straight.

  I tried to wiggle my legs a bit because my muscles were tight and cramped, but all I did was manage to send shooting pains up my thighs and to wake up Monroe.

  She moved against me, her hair a wild mess that spilled over my chest. It took a few seconds to clear it from her face, and when she did, her eyes, those pale, crystal clear eyes, gazed up at me in a way that made my heart twist.

  “Hey,” she said, her voice raspy.

  I didn’t answer because nothing seemed to be big enough. No one word or phrase could cover what I was feeling. Instead, I bent forward and kissed her forehead, my hand seeking her jaw, and then I brushed the softness of her mouth.

  “Thank you,” she said softly.

  I nodded and just held her for as long as I could. She didn’t say anything else, and I was cool with that. Somehow, it was easier to confess and reveal when you were in the dark, but here in the early dawn, it was harder.

  For now, holding her was enough. At least, I hoped it was enough for Monroe, because I would do anything to take away the pain I’d seen the night before.

  Anything.

  “Oh my God!” She squirmed and sat up. “We’ve been out here all night!”

  Monroe rolled over and was on her knees before I had a chance to do or say anything.

  “Gram is…I don’t know what Gram is gonna say, but I need to get to the house now. Maybe she won’t know I left. Maybe she’s still in bed.”

  I nodded.

  “Okay. Let’s go.”

  It was Monday and I was due to be here in an hour or so anyway. I figured it was around six in the morning. I would have enough time to go home, eat breakfast, shower, and then start my day. But befo
re I could do that, I had to make sure things were going to be cool between Monroe and her grandmother.

  The meteor shower had been my idea, and though I hadn’t meant for us to fall asleep, I liked waking up with Monroe in my arms. Any blowback would be worth it.

  I packed up my bag. Tossed in the uneaten chips and Cokes I’d brought and then rolled up my blanket. When I glanced up, Monroe was staring down at me. I couldn’t quite read her expression, and my gut twisted.

  “What? Are you okay?” I asked, trying not to show panic, but man, she ripped me apart without even trying.

  She nodded, a small, tremulous smile on her face. “I think so,” she said almost carefully, as if she wasn’t sure she should say anything at all. “I mean, I feel…lighter.” She moistened her lips.

  Slowly, I got to my feet. “Last night…” Shit, I needed to get this right. “I just want to make you better, Monroe. I don’t want you to hurt anymore.”

  She stepped forward, slipped her arms around my waist, and rested her head on my chest. As soon as she touched me, my heart sped up and I buried my nose in her hair, loving the way she smelled. The way she felt.

  “I haven’t talked to anyone about Malcolm. Not even my therapist.” Her breath hitched and my arms tightened.

  “After it happened, I just wanted to forget everything about him. I wanted to forget how the sun made his hair look like liquid gold, or how, when he smiled, his dimples appeared like tiny little craters that I wanted to kiss. I wanted to forget how he’d made me so angry, and I wanted to forget how sorry I was. How guilty I was.”

  “It’s okay.”

  She shook her head. “You don’t understand, Nate. I couldn’t even tell my parents the things they wanted to hear. The little details that told them he would be fine. After he died, they kept waiting for me to start talking…to start moving. I can see now how they existed in a state of nothing. They weren’t moving forward. They weren’t going back. They were just stuck in this horrible place, and they needed me to lead them out, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t strong enough. Instead I cut my wrist, which wasn’t so much an attempt to kill myself as it was a way to make myself feel.”