One Lonely Degree

by C. K. Kelly Martin

  My throat swells thinking about it, but I won’t give in. I’ve bawled enough for one summer.

  AuDreY e-maILS me every day from her cousin’s computer. She’s been spending a lot of time on the paddleboats at the park down the road and has become a pro at mini-golf. Her twelve-year-old cousin, Justine, is completely enamored with Audrey’s Shakespearean-style love affair, and as well as allowing access to her computer any time of day or night, eagerly soaks up whatever Jersy details Audrey will share. Audrey says she wishes she were at Play Country with me, despite how bad I make it sound, and that she’s so tan from paddleboating that she could be Daniel’s Mexican sister.

  She understands exactly how I feel about my dad and tells me it’s only natural that I’m not in a hurry to talk to him. “Don’t worry about him,” she says. “Just take care of yourself.”

  I e-mail her daily too, sometimes twice. I’m forever stumbling across Internet stuff she’d be interested in, like today’s Sagittarius (her sign) horoscope: “Recently forces have been mobilizing against you, leaving you feeling defeated. Be patient and let the drama play itself out, and you’ll be surprised how the battle ends.”

  The last thing I should be doing on a summer day is surfing the Internet for astrological predictions I don’t believe in, but my days off are long and boring, and Saturdays are the worst. Mom alternates between pacing restlessly around the house, her hair in a limp ponytail, and napping on the living room couch. The ever popular Anti-Me’s over at the waterpark with friends, his favorite summer activity. In the past Mom would’ve nagged me to get off the computer and do something, but now she can’t even muster the energy to pick up the ringing telephone.

  I eye it warily as it rings for the fourth time. It could be Dad again or the woman who keeps calling to say Mom’s won a free gym membership at the Women’s Health Club two blocks away. I could pick up and explain that Mom’s eleven-hour sleep schedule doesn’t leave much time for a gym membership, but I let the answering machine do the job for me.

  Afterwards I play the message back. Anna Mikulski wants to set a dinner date with Mom. I wonder if Jersy told her about my dad leaving. It’s not a secret. Maybe a night out with Anna would do her good. I leave her a note on the kitchen table and take Samsam for a walk down to the lake. He doesn’t chase geese like he does squirrels; he stares distastefully at them as they honk. It’s the weirdest expression, and I giggle to myself as I pull him towards the water. His retriever half is genetically programmed to obsess over sticks, and I toss them repeatedly into the lake and let him play out his genetic destiny.

  Behind me a group of younger guys are playing hacky sack. A teenage couple at the nearest picnic bench are kissing heatedly, the girl straddling the guy’s lap. My head wants to turn and watch them like a pervert. They remind me of Audrey and Jersy on my bed, and embarrassment wells up inside me, dragging me away.

  Before September, I used to think about sex a lot. Sometimes I still do, but it’s different when you have to police your mind so that the thoughts don’t mutate into bad memories. And now I get nervous when guys make dirty jokes or wolf-whistle from cars. Conversations with Kevin from work have the potential to make me queasy. Of course Kevin makes all the girls he works with queasy, but there’s absolutely no way I should be visualizing my best friend with her boyfriend.

  “C’mon, Samsam,” I tell him, fighting a blush. “Let’s go home and drag Mom off the couch.”

  When we get there, my mother’s clearing stale food out of the fridge and sanitizing surfaces. She hasn’t plucked her eyebrows since Dad left, and tiny hairs are growing in under the previously perfect arch. “Wet dog smell,” Mom notes. “You let him go in the lake?”

  “It’s hot. You know how sluggish he gets in the heat.”

  Mom purses her lips, a bead of sweat gathering between her eyes. “Now that you’re home, maybe you can help me clean up a bit. The living room needs vacuuming.”

  Mom takes a shower as I vacuum. When she comes back downstairs to check my progress, the tiny hairs under her eyebrows are gone and she’s wearing salmon-colored nail polish with matching lipstick. “Your dad’s on his way over for a visit,” she says. “He’s picking up Daniel along the way.”

  “What?” I scrunch up my eyebrows. “How come you didn’t say that before?” The makeover’s more than coincidence. She’s still trying. Unlike me. I have no intention of hanging around to make nice.

  “I thought you might try to take off somewhere,” she admits. “He really wants to see you.” So now she’s an accomplice to the guy who made her miserable? Dressing up for him and making the house gleam? Does she have an ounce of self-respect?

  “If he wants to see me so much, he shouldn’t have taken off to Orillia,” I retort.

  “You know that had nothing to do with you or Daniel,” Mom says in a high-pitched voice.

  Of course I do. “I’m going out later anyway,” I lie. “Over to Jersy’s. He dropped by the store looking for me yesterday.” That last part’s the truth, at least.

  “You never mentioned that.” Mom glances at her watch. “Talk to him for a few minutes at least, Finn. He should be here soon.”

  Dad walks through the door with Daniel over thirty minutes later. Anti-Me rushes towards the fridge, but Dad hangs back, waiting for Mom to invite him in. “Can I get you something to drink, Alan?” Mom asks. She looks nervous around him when she should be giving him attitude.

  “That’d be nice.” Dad smiles at me as he follows her into the sparkling kitchen. “How you doing, Finn? I’ve had a hell of a time trying to get you on the phone. Every time I call your cell, it goes straight to message.”

  “I’ve been busy with work,” I grumble. “We have to leave our phones in our lockers.” Daniel sticks a purple freezie in his mouth and sucks at it like a vampire. He’s the only one who doesn’t look tense, and he flashes Dad a purple grin before careening out of the room.

  “I know you’re busy.” Dad nods sympathetically, trying to make up for his impatience that night coming back from Audrey’s.

  “Uh-huh.” My tone’s edgy. In my mind I’m leaping away from the table and sprinting over to Jersy’s. There’s no way he’ll be home on a Saturday night. I should’ve phoned Jasper and Maggie and begged them to go to the movies with me. They’d be surprised to hear from me outside of the school year, but they might say yes. Aidan Lamb’s starring in a new action flick. Maggie wouldn’t be able to resist that.

  “Well, I’d like to put together a schedule of when the three of us can see each other,” Dad continues doggedly. “You, me, and Daniel. We can juggle it around your work schedule. With school out and Audrey away, you must have some time.”

  Mom sets an iced tea down in front of Dad and edges discreetly out of the kitchen. “The thing is, I don’t have time to go over it right now,” I say. “Me and Jersy are hanging out tonight. I’m already late.”

  Dad clasps his hands together on the table. “You’re avoiding me.” He rubs his forehead and sips his iced tea. “It’s not easy for me being away from you and Daniel, Finn. It’s not the way I wanted things, but your mother and I—we’re not good for each other right now, and that wouldn’t be good for you and Daniel.”

  “What about the counseling?” I ask bluntly. “You guys were going every week. I thought things were getting better.”

  Dad sighs. “It’s not as simple as that, Finn.”

  “Okay, fine,” I say, like talking about it’s boring me. Dad looks discouraged, and I’m glad. He can’t tear our family apart and expect everything else to stay the same. It’s not as simple as that. “Can we do the schedule thing over the phone? I have to go.”

  Dad doesn’t answer. His cheeks sink into his face as he takes his hands off the table.

  I blink down at him as I stand. “I’ll call you, okay?”

  It takes all my strength to pretend that I couldn’t care less how he feels. If he knows me at all, the way I’m acting should make it clear how wrong he was to leave
.

  “Will you?” he asks quietly.

  It’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard. It breaks my heart, but I’m going just the same.

  “I’ll call,” I tell him. “I said I would.”

  I run most of the way to Jersy’s house. My chest’s pounding and my throat hurts like I just had my tonsils scraped out with a jagged piece of glass. I can’t catch my breath, but it doesn’t matter. Jersy won’t be home, but that doesn’t matter either. Nothing matters much. Except getting away.

  I slow down about a block from Jersy’s house and smooth my hair into place. I don’t want the Mikulskis asking me what’s the matter. I wish I could sneak into their house unnoticed, like the Invisible Woman, and just be somewhere calm and normal for a change. I could sit on the edge of Jersy’s bed and stare at him and he’d never know.

  The thought jumps up and down inside my head, making me shudder. I shouldn’t think things like that. He’s Audrey’s. Don’t be crazy, I lecture. You’re just sad. You’re reaching out in any direction. It didn’t mean anything. The shock lasts for about ten seconds, and then I’m back to being miserable.

  Christina sees it in my face when she answers the door. “He’s out on his dirt bike,” she says apologetically, her eyes squinting with concern. “Why don’t you come in and wait awhile?”

  “No thanks.” I push my lips into a rigid smile. “Just tell him I stopped by.” It was a bad idea to start with. I should’ve called Jasper or Maggie. Nishani might’ve wanted to hang out with us too.

  “’Kay,” she says. “I’ll let him know.”

  I walk purposefully down the driveway, in case she’s watching, but my shoulders slump at the end of his street. It’s too soon to go home, but where do I go? I’m kicking myself for not getting Nishani’s number and simultaneously trying to choose a first runner-up (Jasper or Maggie) when I spy a guy pushing a dirt bike up the road in the distance.

  It has to be him. My hand shoots up to wave, and he hesitates a second before waving back. I keep walking and meet him halfway, sadness coiled so tightly into my lungs that it aches to breathe.

  “Hey, Finn,” he says, coming to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk.

  “Hi,” I say back. “I didn’t think you’d be home.”

  “Not much point in coming to visit me then, is there?” He smiles and starts walking again. His strides are longer than mine, despite the fact that his legs are shorter, and I practically have to jog to keep up.

  It’s obvious that he’s not going to ask me what happened. He can’t read my mind like Audrey. He probably doesn’t even know something’s wrong.

  “Did you bring your swimsuit this time?” he asks. “You didn’t, did you?”

  “No.” I shake my head. “I didn’t really think you’d be here. I was having a crisis moment.” Suddenly I can’t stop talking. “And I just ran over here, thinking you’d be out. Not actually thinking, if you know what I mean. Just running. And then your sister answered the door and—”

  “What happened?” Jersy cuts in. His eyes are pure blue in the evening light.

  “My dad came over and I didn’t want to talk to him. Seeing him just makes everything feel worse.” The coil squeezes as I continue. “I don’t want to worry about my parents or us as a family anymore. It’s too hard. I wish I could’ve gone away for the summer instead of Audrey. I wouldn’t even care about being bored. At least I’d be gone, you know? I’d be out of it.”

  “Yeah, but you can’t really be out of it, can you?” Jersy says. “They’re your family.”

  “I know. That’s the problem.”

  “Yeah,” Jersy repeats. We stop at the end of the street, and he adds, “I dropped by your work a couple days ago to see how things were going, but you weren’t around.”

  “I heard.”

  “So.” Jersy cocks his head. “You coming in with me? I have something to do later, but I have a couple hours.”

  I want him to ask me a second time. To make sure he really means it. “Does your mom know what’s going on?” I ask.

  “Yeah, she talked to your mother earlier today.” I’m glad to hear Mom called Anna back. She hasn’t been returning most of her friends’ calls these days, but she needs someone to talk to.

  We start walking again as though I’ve agreed to go with him. Jersy puts his dirt bike in the garage, next to a snowboard, and charges through the front door with me in tow. The smell of tomato sauce wafts forward to greet us. “Fifteen minutes, Jersy,” Anna shouts from the kitchen.

  He glances over his shoulder at me. “You hungry?”

  “Not really.” I’m starving. I just don’t want to sit around the dinner table making polite conversation with the Mikulskis.

  “I’ll get something later,” he yells back. “Finn’s here. We’re gonna hang out for a while.”

  Anna emerges from the kitchen looking homey and together. My mom looked together earlier too, but it was a lie. “I spoke to Gloria this afternoon,” Anna says gently. “I was sorry to hear about the trouble with your parents. Are you doing okay?”

  “I’m fine.” I fix my eyes on the tile floor.

  “If you ever need anything, just give me a call, will you?” I look up at her and see that she means it. That chokes me up and I nod, unable to get the words out.

  “Upstairs or downstairs?” Jersy asks, tugging at my sleeve.

  “Upstairs, I guess.”

  We leave Anna behind and go up to Jersy’s room. I surprise myself by closing the door automatically behind me. It feels all right, and I sit down in front of his computer while he flicks on his docked iPod. “I know what you’ll want to hear,” he says, scrolling through the menu.

  “American Idiot” blasts through the speakers. I know the words by heart, and I bob my head along, singing in silence. Jersy smiles as he stretches out on his bed.

  “You’re not gonna fall asleep on me, are you?” I ask.

  “I’m not that kind of tired,” he tells me. “My body’s tired, but my brain’s completely alert.” He props his head up with his hands. His hair looks soft, like it’s never been subjected to a styling product. “I’d ask you to come to this thing tonight, but it’s not your scene.”

  “What thing?”

  “My birthday thing. A few of us are driving over to Joel’s brother’s place in Windsor. He says there’s always a party going on somewhere.”

  “I didn’t know it was your birthday,” I chirp. “Happy birthday.”

  “It’s tomorrow.”

  “Well, ‘Happy birthday’ for tomorrow then.” That makes him a Cancer: intuitive but changeable. I seriously have to cut down on the bullshit astrology sites.

  “Thanks.” A grin carves into his cheeks. “When’s yours?”

  “Not until October.” Libra. Supposedly that makes me sociable and well balanced with amazing taste but a tendency to be lazy. It’s about half right, which is enough to keep someone with a lot of time on their hands checking their horoscope.

  We both tune into “American Idiot,” absorbing the lyrics. I don’t understand how somebody can appreciate Green Day and listen to crap like 50 Cent. It blows my mind.

  Jersy blows my mind, and I’m trying to fit the pieces together, watching his head move to the beat of the song, when someone raps loudly at the door. Mr. Mikulski swings Jersy’s door open and stares over at me. He switches his gaze to Jersy and motions for him to turn down the music. I reach over and turn it down myself. It’s really not all that loud. We could understand each other just fine.

  “The door was closed,” Mr. Mikulski says sternly.

  That’s my fault, but Jersy’s eyes bug out at his dad. “It’s Finn.” Jersy points at me like his father’s being ridiculous.

  “That doesn’t make any difference. You know the rules.” The crisscross lines on Mr. Mikulski’s forehead make him look like Frankenstein. “We want this to be a safe place.” Mr. Mikulski’s heavy stare makes Jersy blink.

  Twenty seconds ago I was comfortable in my own
skin. Now the dread’s back. What does Mr. Mikulski mean about wanting this to be a safe place?

  “Okay,” Jersy says quietly. “Sorry. Leave it open.”

  His dad stands in the doorway for a few seconds before turning and walking away. I get up from my chair, check to make sure he’s gone downstairs, and then sit penitently down again. “I’m sorry,” I tell him. “That was me. I didn’t think.”

  “It’s okay. You don’t know the house rules.” Jersy smiles as he continues. “I guess Audrey didn’t tell you everything.”

  “Yeah.” I slide my ass to the edge of the chair, ready to fly. “I should get going anyway. You need to rest up for later.” My palms are moist and my jeans are sticking to the backs of my knees. I’m amazed my voice sounds normal.

  Jersy rolls off the bed and turns up the volume again. “Don’t let him throw you. He’s like that with everyone. It’s a family policy.” The bed creaks as Jersy leaps back onto it like a skydiver. “No members of the opposite sex allowed behind closed doors.”

  My parents don’t have house rules like that; I never needed them.

  I check out Gizmo and find his beady eyes staring back at me. “He can see you,” Jersy teases, quoting me from that first time at his house.

  I roll my eyes at him and then sweep my gaze around his room. It doesn’t look any more finished than it did four months ago. Actually, it looks more like a walk-in closet than a bedroom. Jersy’s cell phone’s on the hardwood floor next to a jumble of mismatched running shoes, socks, and a deodorant spray. He’s taken the pictures off his mirror, leaving it blank, and I wonder if the Chinese girl’s smiling secretly away in his desk drawer.

  “Your photos are gone.” I point at Jersy’s reflection. “Do you still keep in touch with your friends in Kingston?”

  “We IM,” he says. “And I’m going up there for a week at the end of August.”

  “That’s good.” The nerves haven’t gone, and neither have I. There’s nowhere better to go, and Jersy’s pretty easy to deal with, for a guy. I slide down in my chair and concentrate on Green Day. If you listen closely enough, you lose the separation between yourself and the music. I won’t get there now, with Jersy in the room, but I can feel it in my pulse and that’s good enough.