Matt & Zoe

by Charles Sheehan-Miles

  “Thank you!” I cried.

  “Don’t think you won’t work for it, Matty. You’ll earn that money.”

  Dad was as good as his word. He made me work hard to earn that money.

  ***

  I don’t remember anything that happened that Friday morning. I must’ve woken up, eaten breakfast, gotten ready for school. I must have ridden the bus to school… but I don’t remember it. I do know that I forgot to take my lunch that day, but only because of later events. The first three periods of the day—gone.

  What I do remember is walking toward the lunch room. My throat was closed and it was hard to swallow. My hands were damp with sweat, and I felt a peculiar twisting in my stomach, like a wash rag being coiled and twisted to wring all the water out.

  It was loud that day in the halls. No—the hall was the same as always. It was me that was different. The shouts and laughs and talk of the other students as they changed classes and went to lunch grated on my nerves. I felt as if I were making my way into a dark tunnel, a torch held high in front of me to light the way. Strange how strongly emotional experiences create such a vivid impression. I can still hear the sound of the other students talking. I can remember the quality of the light streaming in through the windows. I remember the smell of frying potatoes drifting out of the cafeteria.

  That smell still sometimes makes me break out into a sweat.

  When I got to the table, she was already there. She wore a dark blue dress that complemented the color of her eyes. She smiled when she saw me and I felt a sense of relief. It was if she was reassuring me that I had nothing to be afraid of.

  I knew if I didn’t do it right off, I might never. So I sat down across from her at the table.

  She looked at me, her expression quizzical. I hadn’t put a lunch bag on the table, because, of course, I’d run out and forgotten my lunch.

  “Aren’t you going to eat lunch? Are you buying today?”

  “I will in a minute. First… I need to ask you a question, Carlina.”

  My use of her name when speaking directly to her like that appeared to catch her attention. She sat up a little straighter and asked, “What is it?”

  This was it. This was the moment. My stomach cramp suddenly became worse, and my throat dried up robbing me of the ability to speak.

  Ask her dammit. Don’t be an idiot. Just ask her.

  “Carlina… I…Uh will you… Go to the winter formal with me?”

  I had pictured this moment a thousand times. She would flush red and put her hand on her chest and say, “I’d love to, Matt.” She would faint and I would rush around the table and catch her before she fell to the floor. She would burst into joyous tears. Or, in my simplest of daydreams, she would simply say “yes, I’d like that.”

  That wasn’t what happened. Instead, I barely got the words “will you” out of my mouth before I saw her face fall. Into… what? Disappointment? Sadness? Embarrassment? Whatever it was, I wasn’t enjoying it. By the time I finished my question, her eyes had grown wet. She shook her head. “Matty… I can’t… Red already asked me.”

  “I don’t understand. Red isn’t even here.”

  “They just moved here for the rest of the winter. He… His dad… There was some trouble. I don’t know what.”

  That’s because he and his father are both criminals.

  She screwed up her face into an almost angry expression, and says, “Anyway… I don’t like you that way Matty. You know that.”

  I tried to play off her last statement. I tried to hide the devastating blow I just received. My throat seized as I said, “I… I… I meant as a friend. If you didn’t have another date.”

  Red and his dad had moved here? This was a disaster.

  I don’t think I was very convincing. Carlina’s eyes drop to the table. “I’m gonna get my lunch.” I got up and left the table before she could say another word. I stood in line, and got my lunch. It was an unidentifiable meat with cheese and tomato sauce on it, tater tots, and a cup full of mixed fruit drenched in syrup. I stood there in indecision after I paid for my lunch. How could I go back over there and sit and talk like everything was normal?

  I couldn’t. I had to try, or she would know how badly I’d been hurt.

  Walking back to the table wasn’t like walking through a tunnel carrying a torch. Instead, it was like walking through death row to the execution chamber, and when I arrived the executioner was there. Red, a year too old for the eighth grade, sat next to Carlina. He had a smarmy grin on his face. Carlina’s cheeks were flushed red. The color of his name.

  They didn’t see me.

  Wasn’t that’s the way it always was?

  ***

  I was too ashamed to tell Papa. He had been so absurdly pleased that I was asking Carlina to the dance. I spent the next two weeks doing extra chores around the house, earning the money for a nonexistent date.

  As the night approached, Papa asked, “Do we need to pick her up?”

  “Her father’s bringing her.”

  I’ve always been a terrible liar, but that night I succeeded. He didn’t question it. The night of the dance he dropped me off in front of the school, and insisted I call before midnight to be picked up. The dance ended at 10, so I would be calling long before midnight. I waited until he was gone, checked to make sure there were no teachers or chaperones in sight, then ran away from the school. I spent the next hour and a half in a filthy diner down the street.

  The next two months were agonizing. I was a ghost, wandering the halls of Williams Middle School, invisible, untouchable. I ate lunch alone and rode the school bus alone for the remainder of my three months in Tampa. I can tell my parents were concerned—I’d stop going out after school or asking to stay late. I’d stopped actively participating in life. When we weren’t at practice, either in the gym or at the fairground, I sat in my room reading. It was with massive relief that March arrived and it became time to pack and begin touring again.

  Chapter Seven

  Donuts (Matt)

  Strike or not, my alarm goes off at six in the morning.

  I fumble for the alarm, hand flailing against the bedside table several times. I almost give up, but then my hand slaps into the alarm clock with a loud crack and I feel a sharp pain in my hand.

  Damn it! I sit up, suddenly wide awake. Light floods through the windows, and I remind myself that there will only be a few more weeks of decent weather. Winters here are ugly. Cold and wet. When I was growing up I spent the winters in Central Florida. Cold has an entirely different definition there.

  My morning routine is all over by six forty-five. I have no idea what to do with myself. Normally I’d finish my coffee, put it in the sink and walk outside to head to work.

  Not today, though. A small number of teachers will symbolically picket each school, but it’s not expected. The strike won’t last long—teacher’s strikes are illegal in Massachusetts—but with luck the closing of South Hadley’s four public schools will get the attention of the town’s residents. The union has been distributing flyers and talking with the parent teacher organization for almost two years, and negotiating with the school committee just as long. No one was interested.

  I bet they’ll be interested now.

  I open my laptop and browse to Masslive.com. Right at the top of the page is the headline, South Hadley Teachers Stage Walkout. The subtitle says, Parents scramble for childcare as strike begins.

  I read through the article. All in all, it’s mostly correct. Mostly. Dianne Blakely is quoted, of course, noting that the teachers of South Hadley actually sprout horns and eat children at night. Or something like that. I browse away from there to the entertainment pages. Maybe there’s a decent play or something coming up.

  I freeze.

  At the top of the page: Binder and Mills Circus to Perform Six Nights in Pioneer Valley.

  Oh, that’s just fantastic. If I’m not back at work by then, I’ll go join the circus. I scan the article. They’re performing in
Albany, Boston, and Worcester first, and will be here just before Thanksgiving.

  I stand up, out of sorts, as if I were going somewhere. Anywhere.

  But … Christ. I grab my phone and dial Tony. The phone rings without answer. I disconnect, wait thirty seconds, then try again.

  He answers on the first ring.

  “You gotta be kidding me. Six months I don’t hear from you, and you gotta call me at six in the morning?”

  “It’s seven,” I say.

  “Not in Madison.”

  “Oh, bummer.”

  “What do you need, Matty?”

  I shrug, then realize he can’t see it. “Just wanted to check in. See how you were.”

  “Bullshit,” he replies. “You saw the schedule.”

  “What schedule?” I say. He knows I’m lying.

  “Whatever. You should come join us. It would do you a world of good.”

  I shudder, thinking of the helpless terror of Papa’s hands slipping out of mine. “No, thanks, Tony.”

  “Will we get to see you at least? Dinner? Anything? Mom’s all broken up she never sees you anymore. You didn’t even come home for Christmas. What’s that about?”

  “Tony, I didn’t have the money. Elementary school teachers don’t get paid all that much.”

  Tony mutters something under his breath. Then silence. Silence that drags on, because it’s heavy.

  I finally break the silence. “Yeah. We’ll have dinner.”

  “That’s real generous, Matty. Real generous. Yeah. We’ll talk later.”

  He hangs up the phone, leaving me with silence and guilt. I can deal with one, but not the other. It’s time to head out.

  I lock up the apartment and walk down the wooden stairwell to the parking lot. I live in a one-bedroom apartment next to South Hadley Common, just above a restaurant. It’s a good location, plus the rent is cheap. Hard to beat. My commute is usually less than five minutes.

  As I unlock the car I think, once again, about buying a bike. I’ve been going to the Gold’s Gym on memorial drive pretty regularly—okay maybe regularly is an exaggeration—but every once in a while anyway. And I run a lot in the mornings. I’m nowhere near the shape I was once in, when I had to perform five nights a week.

  The car is new to me, but not new. I took the insurance money from my old car and bought a 6-year-old Honda Civic. It had 45,000 miles on it and is paid for. I’m happy.

  I drive to Dunkin’ Donuts and go through the drive through, ordering an assorted dozen and two large cups of coffee. I take a guess and get cream and sugar for both, then head back up College Street until the white colonial is in view. Paint, once white, is peeling all over the house, and the front steps are crooked and bare. The house needs a lot of work.

  Zoe’s minivan is in the driveway.

  I pull in, my tires crunching in the gravel. Is it weird that I just show up here? Will she think it’s weird? No, she asked me to not disappear, to be here for Jasmine. That’s what I’m doing.

  Okay, maybe it’s weird.

  Anyway, I open the door and grab the donuts and the two cups in their cardboard carrier. I carry my load to the front door, cups in one hand and donuts in the other. I don’t make it to the porch before the front door opens.

  Zoe is there. She’s wearing a gray Army sweatshirt and blue sweatpants, and her hair is disheveled, not long enough to tie back easily. Loose nearly-white hair hangs in front of her left eye. Her expression is… not exactly hostile. She tilts her head to the left slightly and purses her lips and her eyebrows squish together.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “You said I can’t just disappear. I’m not. I get it. Here’s some coffee and donuts, if I don’t drop them.”

  Her eyes widen slightly and she reaches out to takes the coffee tray from my left hand. “Come on in.”

  Her voice betrays no enthusiasm.

  It’s dim in the front room as we enter, shades drawn. She sets the coffee down and starts opening the shades. “I wasn’t expecting company. Come on in the kitchen. I don’t think Jasmine’s awake yet.”

  She walks on past the long living room into a doorway capped with a wide, shallow arch. I follow through the dining room (dominated by a large scarred farm table) and into the kitchen. A small table sits in here and the room smells heavily of smoke. An old Apple laptop is open on the table next to a mug of coffee. It has characters in Chinese or Japanese or some other Asian language, along with a bright pink heart:

  私は東京を