by Jen Malone
Eventually, I feel a little less like I might pass out, and a little more like my normal self, so I creep down the hallway and transfer my second load of laundry into the dryer, leaving the closet door wide open and the music blasting from my pocket. I carry my folded clothes back to my room and put them away, all the while silently repeating You’re okay, you’re okay, you’re okay.
What if I’m not okay?
Dad might be very right that I desperately need to relax, but, unique as it was, his idea of how to go about it is not going to cut it for me. I need people, activity, noise, laughter. I need escape from the norm. I need to forget for hours upon hours, the way I was able to when I was hanging out with Will at the bakery last Saturday.
The thought sticks against the side of my brain.
Could that be a solution? Not the bakery, but . . . Will?
My dad calls up the stairs, “Food should be here in about ten!”
“Okay, perfect!” I answer.
I retrieve my iPad from the closet. My home screen is a picture of Amherst’s campus in full autumn glory that I copied and pasted from their website. I click off it as quickly as possible, not wanting the reminder of what might not be waiting for me this fall, if Dr. Wah or my mother push the matter.
When I open Notes, it’s still there and I blow out a breath.
I hadn’t spotted the words until Wednesday, because I hardly ever use this app, but when I’d gone to make an entry about a homework assignment, the lined page that popped open already had two lines of text, reading: Use it anytime, Will, followed by a phone number that began with a 617 area code.
My iPad had been right next to him the whole time at the bakery; he must have typed it in while I’d packed up my chalk supplies.
Last Wednesday I had no intention of ever dialing this number. As far as I was concerned, Will had fulfilled whatever obligation he thought he owed my brother and I wasn’t eager to be anyone’s pet project.
But desperate times call for desperate measures and Will kept his Scout’s honor promise before, except at the very end. Besides, I might be able to endure a few sympathetic looks if, in exchange, it meant hours of relief from a terror that keeps encroaching, ever-faster and ever-stronger, past every barrier I put up to keep it away.
I enter Will’s number into my contacts and open a new text message.
Downstairs, someone knocks on the front door, and the echo of Dad and the delivery guy exchanging niceties drifts up through the floor vents as I type out a quick message.
“Sunshine?” Dad calls.
I hit Send and tuck my phone back into my pocket.
“On my way!” I answer.
Words With Friends notification:
QuitWithTheT-rex played SNITCH for 12 points
12
DING DONG.
Four days have passed since the night on the window ledge with Dad, and I finally get to test out my new plan.
“What the—” my mother says. “Was that the doorbell?”
My chair legs screech as I push back from the table, Dad mutters a eulogy for the wood floors, and Mom beats me out of the kitchen.
“Will?” she exclaims, pulling open the door.
“Hi, Mrs. Linehan,” comes his low, disembodied voice.
“Will!” She tugs him inside and wraps him up in her arms. He embraces her in return, and over her shoulder, he catches my eye and offers a slight waggle of fingers.
Mom disentangles from the hug but keeps hold of Will’s shoulders. “What on earth are you doing here?”
Dad adds, “Alex doesn’t have a surprise visit up his sleeve, does he, because if so, you ruined it. Wanna hide in the coat closet to keep him from realizing? We’re happy to aid and abet.”
“No, I’m afraid Alex isn’t on his way. I’m actually here to grab Amelia.”
“Oh?” Mom asks. She looks from him to me, her eyes narrowing as she sharpens her gaze on mine. “You, missy, are not acting like someone who hasn’t seen this guy in forever.”
I fix a casual expression on my face. “Will stopped by the other weekend. We hung out while I did the Lemondrop chalkboards.”
Braced for the slew of questions I imagine will follow, I’m surprised when she simply raises her eyebrows and offers a mild, “Hmm. You must have forgotten to mention that.”
“Must have,” I say, as my dad and Will do that one-armed hug slash back pat guy greeting thing.
“How are you?” Dad asks him. “School’s treating you well? Your parents good?”
“I’m fine, Mr. Linehan. It’s good, they’re good.”
“Still can’t convince you to call me Jeff after all these years, huh?”
Will shakes his head and grins. “Can’t. Goes against how I was raised.”
My father grins at him. “Well, no case to be made against that then, is there? Do you want to join us for some dinner? We were already underway, but we’ve got enough to feed an army and it just keeps coming.”
I wish Dad wouldn’t bring up the meals being dropped off—it skirts far too close to the reason why they’re landing on our doorstep. I exhale when Will says, “No, thank you, sir. I already ate on campus.”
“Mr. Linehan is one thing, but I’m going to have to draw the line at ‘sir,’ Will. You—”
“I was basically done eating,” I interrupt. “Will and I were gonna head out for a bit. Is that okay? Can I borrow one of your cars?” I turn to Will. “Assuming you took the T here . . .”
“Yup. Too much hassle to have a car on campus.”
My parents exchange a glance, but Dad hands over the keys from his pocket. “Where are you headed?”
I shake my head, my eyes twinkling. “It’s a surprise for Will—we won’t be late, though.”
Mom says, “I hope we can lure you here another time for a proper catch-up?”
“That would be great!” Will answers.
I grab my coat while Dad sticks his head outside and peers around the corner at the doorbell. He presses it several times, garnering nothing but silence, then mutters something under his breath and ducks back inside.
“So,” I begin, once we’re in the car and zooming down Memorial Drive. “Thanks for agreeing to this.”
“Anytime,” he says.
I was vague when I texted, merely asking if he might want to hang out again. I was amazed how quickly he said yes, though it might be because he considers this an extension of his promise to Alex and truthfully, I almost hope it is, so I don’t have to feel guilty about the fact that I’m kind of using him too.
“Scout’s honor rules still in effect,” I remind him.
“Whatever you say. When do I get to learn where we’re going?”
I call on my Mona Lisa smile again.
“Welcome to Jordan’s,” the greeter says a half hour later.
Will mutters a reply, then crashes to a stop just inside the revolving doors. His jaw drops. “This is not real life. This is a furniture store?”
I step daintily around him and grin. “Have you really never been here?”
“No, and I’m currently questioning all my life choices. If I had a clue what I was missing . . .” He sweeps his arm to encompass the cheerful Jelly Belly store, the Fuddruckers restaurant with a hallway to an IMAX theater just behind it, the ice cream stand, the wall of thirty-foot water fountains, and the reason we’re here . . . an indoor ropes course.
If you never made it past the warehouse-sized lobby, you wouldn’t even know you’d come to a furniture store. The only pieces visible from our vantage point are a slew of café tables and chairs set up in the area between the Richardson’s Ice Cream counter and the wall of water. The six fountains lined in a row are lit from above and below with a rainbow of colors, and shoot forceful arcs toward the ceiling in a synchronized choreography timed to the Beach Boys medley that blasts through the whole place. And everything, from a forty-foot-wide banana split perched atop Richardson’s to the café tabletops to an enormous replica of Boston’s State Hous
e, is covered in glued-on jelly beans. Twenty-five million of them, to be exact. It’s every preschooler’s dreamscape.
I point at the ropes course. “So? Is this the best or what?”
Will casts a doubtful eye at the ceiling far, far above us, which the top level of ropes nearly touches. “Uh. I might have to answer ‘or what’?”
I do a double take. “Wait a minute. Do not tell me—no. Not possible. You’re not scared of heights, are you, Will Srisari?”
He cringes and nods slowly.
“You’re scared of heights?”
“You don’t have to sound so shocked.”
I stifle a giggle. “I’m sorry. It’s just . . . you’re always Mr. Smooth. Okay, I’m gonna soak this up for one little second and then I’ll be appropriately sympathetic.”
Will pushes his finger briefly against the bridge of his nose, which must be a leftover habit from years of nudging his glasses back into place. The gesture is endearingly familiar and makes my heart squeeze with a sudden tenderness as I picture him at age ten, all knees and elbows and giant frames spotlighting his eyes.
“Okay. Nice me is back. Look!” I point at the few figures on the course. “You’re in a harness and clipped into a track the whole time! It’s impossible to fall.”
“Uh-huh,” he says, not sounding the least bit reassured. Is he genuinely scared? Like, scared scared?
I touch his arm and wait for him to turn his attention back to me before saying, “I only picked this because it was something different. If you’d rather see what’s playing at the IMAX or—”
“No! If this is what you had in mind, we’re doing it.” He cracks his neck left, then right, like a boxer stepping into the ring. “I’ll be fine.”
To prove his determination, he beelines for the check-in booth and, above my protests about paying, buys us both passes.
“You can treat for the ice cream when we’re done,” he says. “And just so you know, in my mind, I’ve already skipped over this part and am several spoonfuls into a sundae.”
I grin. “Whatever it takes, dude.”
We hang our jackets on the hooks provided and help the attendant feed our arms and legs into harnesses. She buckles them across our chest, grabs for a thick black belt attached to the front of Will’s, and reaches above her head to fit a silver bit at the end of the belt into a track in the metal beam that runs above us. She does the same with mine, though I notice she doesn’t linger nearly as long. She also primarily addresses Will as she gives us a few quick instructions and steps aside, but not before sending a flirty look his way.
Will doesn’t notice because he’s too busy craning his neck at the course above us.
The fact that it’s a school night in prime suburban territory must be keeping most people at home, and we have the course almost to ourselves. There’s a family with two little kids on the upper level, but otherwise it’s just us as we climb the stairs to the lower one.
The first platform has four options for obstacles, spoking out in each direction. One has a rope ladder strung horizontally, with another rope above to grab for balance. Another is also a horizontal ladder, but with thicker rungs and guidelines at hip height on either side. A third has netting hung vertically and the fourth is a long, straight wooden board the width of a balance beam.
“You choose,” I tell Will.
He turns to me. “You know, I just had a thought. Should you be doing this? Healthwise? What if it’s too physical for you with your, um, thing that I promised not to mention and that I swear I won’t again after asking this?”
Instead of answering, I cross my arms and stare pointedly at the tiny kid crossing the balance beam obstacle a level above us. She can’t be more than five or six. If she can handle it without breaking a sweat . . .
He sighs. “Point taken.”
Defeated, he pivots his lead into the track that feeds across the wider of the two bridge obstacles. His hands grasp so tightly to the ropes on either side that his knuckles turn white. One toe edges toward the first rung.
“Wait,” I say, tugging on his shirt to stop him. “Seriously, Will! Tonight was just supposed to be casual and fun. If you’re genuinely freaked out, we should—”
“I’m fine. It’s just a matter of getting my brain in line with logic. Mind over matter, right?”
Oh, do I ever know a thing or two about that. Welcome to my life, Will. While I never meant to torture the poor guy, I have to confess it’s kind of nice to focus on someone else’s drama instead of mine. Does that make me a terrible person?
“Okay, then, if you’re sure,” I say. “Let’s see whatcha got.”
He takes two steps this time, before halting. “I might need you to distract me.”
Hello, irony.
“Talk to me,” he says. “About anything. Gimme some of those oddball presidential facts of yours.”
I laugh. “On it. Okay. Um . . . lemme see . . . oh! There’s a rumor Andrew Jackson taught his pet parrot to curse, which everyone found hilarious until the bird had to be removed from Jackson’s funeral when he wouldn’t stop letting go with f-bombs.”
Will’s eyes are fixed ahead as he progresses forward slowly. “Is that true?” he calls back, never turning his neck.
“Dunno. That’s why I said it’s rumored.”
“Still. I’d buy it. Everything I’ve read makes him out to be an asshole.”
“Uh, yeah,” I agree as Will covers three more rungs, tentative but determined. “Total loofah-faced shit gibbon. Racist. Homophobic. He used to call James Buchanan and his boyfriend ‘Miss Nancy and Aunt Fancy.’”
Will nearly stumbles as he whips his head around this time. He catches himself and clutches the ropes on either side of him more tightly, if that’s even possible. “Did you just call someone a shit gibbon with a loofah face? Because that is oddly specific. And, more important, are you telling me that in addition to already having had a female Native American president, we’ve also had a gay one? Why isn’t that common knowledge?”
“Jackson deserves worse. As for Buchanan, yeah, probably. Most historians think the evidence is fairly conclusive.”
Will faces forward again and takes two more steps to reach the small platform. He visibly relaxes and I scoot across to join him.
“Fist bump! One down and only, like, twenty more to go. It’s not terrible, right?”
He turns pale at the mention of the number of obstacles to come, but taps my outstretched fist with his before staring along the next one.
“Keep talking,” he orders. “Elaborate on the evidence, please and thank you.”
I laugh. “So, there’s a lot of it. Buchanan’s the only bachelor president we’ve ever had, but he lived with a senator from Alabama for more than ten years, even though both guys were plenty rich enough to not need a ‘roommate’ to swing their mortgage payments. There’s also a letter he wrote that says something about going ‘a wooing several gentlemen’ but not getting lucky with any of them.”
“He used the words ‘getting lucky’?”
“I’m paraphrasing.”
“You paraphrased and came up with ‘a wooing’?” Will asks.
I huff out a breath. “No, I think the letter actually said that. You’re kind of a pain in the ass, you know?”
Will turns to me with a proud grin. I don’t know if it’s because he’s just reached the next platform or because he got a rise out of me.
Another horizontal rope ladder awaits us, with rungs spaced farther apart but more netting on the sides. This time Will doesn’t even hesitate before tackling it and I actually have to rush a little to keep up.
“See? These aren’t medieval torture devices, right? You’re doing awesome. Maybe you’re cured. What do they call it when you expose someone to their fears to help cure them?”
“Would you be referring to exposure therapy?” he asks, barely bothering to muffle his snort.
“Duh. Right. That . . . makes a lot of sense.” I puff my hair from my eyes.
“People die from exposure,” he says dryly before stepping onto the next rung. We’ve now covered more than a third of the second level and Will’s footwork becomes sure and steady. He doesn’t seem to need my trivia diversion anymore, so I keep quiet as we work our way through the rest and turn back toward the stairwell.
When we reach it, I bounce on my toes. “You were amazing!”
The family with kids is tromping down the stairs from the third level and the little girl gives us a perplexed look at my effusiveness.
“He’s a big scaredy-cat,” I tell her, pointing at Will, who groans good-naturedly.
Her eyes are balloon-wide and she nods somberly. “My brother was too.” She gestures behind her at a boy who looks a year or two older than she is. “I showed him how easy it was.”
“Little sisters for the win,” I say, slapping her hand.
Her mom smiles at us as they pass. “Good luck up there,” she tells Will, gesturing with her chin.
The girl adds, “Yeah! We’ll cheer you on once we have our ice cream.”
Will slumps against the stair railing. “Great. Now I have to go up, don’t I?”
I sneak a look around him at the girl, who has reached the bottom step and is unbuckling. She waves. “Uh, yeah. Unless you want to be put to shame by a six-year-old.”
“Probably wouldn’t be the first time,” he grumbles, switching his lead into the track heading up.
I smirk and follow suit. He’s cute. Too bad the last thing I need in my life right now is the kind of complications cute boys can cause.
Will got some of his swagger back on the obstacles below, but now that we’re up in the ceiling, I giggle quietly to myself when I hear him whisper, “Don’t look down.”
“Do you need more presidential facts?”
He shakes his head. “No. I just need to confront it head-on. Like I said, it’s more a matter of making the logical side of my brain talk to the illogical one.”
“You just have to give it a stern talking-to.”
“Even if it’s screaming at me that I might die?”
I nod forcefully. “Especially then.”
