Crush

by Laura Susan Johnson

  He sighs. "She can't keep a secret to save her."

  "Why me, Tammy?"

  It takes him a long time to gather his thoughts. "There's something about you, Baby. You're beautiful, but it isn't just that. There's something in your eyes. It's like... they called to me. That day... in church... there was something so familiar about you. I knew you. I couldn't put my finger on it. It just... it felt like we knew each other... and when you held my hand... it was like... a miracle."

  I gasp, "Yes."

  "Then one day, I remembered," continues Tammy. "I remembered meeting this beautiful little boy in a grocery store when I was only four years old. He was so pretty, like a little angel. It was you. I know it was."

  How I wish I could remember too!

  He stares at me endlessly. "Your eyes... they're so happy sometimes, so sad other times. Whenever you were sad I wanted to talk to you.

  "That last night that I was here... I loved it. It was one of the best nights of my life," Tammy murmurs. "I think I knew, really knew, that I loved you, that night. I never forgot you."

  "I never forgot you either."

  "I looked at pictures of you in the yearbook, night after night—the ones of you in choir."

  "Those dorky pictures?!"

  "You were never a dork!"

  "My razzleberry hair!" I blush.

  "I loved it."

  "On Valentine's Day I got you a card. I left it on your car."

  "That was you?!"

  I nod.

  "I wanted it to be you," he says in a tremulous voice. "I wanted to ask you. I wanted to so badly, but I couldn't."

  "Why?"

  "I was shy."

  "Shy?!" I laugh. "You're not shy, Tammy Mattheis!"

  "Yes, I am!"

  "Now I've heard it all," I sputter helplessly.

  "I put an envelope with those candy hearts in your locker."

  My eyes are stinging, leaking. "I didn't think it could have been you. I wanted it to be, but I just knew it couldn't be."

  "Why?"

  "Because I figured you hated me. I wanted you so much but I knew you were straight. I couldn't believe you could possibly like me, not like that."

  "I never, ever hated you."

  "You acted like you hated me. You yelled at me about that ball," I sniffle. "You made me cry." Why does that incident with the soccer ball still bother me so much? I guess it's because that was the cruellest he'd ever been to me.

  "I'm sorry, Jamie. I yelled at you because I liked you. I know I was an asshole. I'm sorry."

  "Well, just so you know, you broke my heart."

  "I never hated you. I loved you. I know I treated you like shit. I didn't mean to make you cry. Honestly..."

  He kisses me.

  "I kept those conversation hearts," I whisper. "I still have them."

  "I still have your card."

  He offers another confession on my altar. "That night, in the pool... I wanted to kiss you, right in front of them."

  "I wanted you to," I breathe against his cheek. "But I understood why you couldn't."

  "I should have just planted one on you," scowls Tammy. "Why did I give a shit what they thought?!"

  "You made it up to me very shortly after," I sigh. "Our first kiss..."

  "No, our first kiss was in the grocery store," he insists.

  "You're really sure that baby was me."

  "I know it was you, dammit! I cried in the car all the way home, telling Mom how I wished I could be friends with you forever. I already loved you. I've loved you almost all our lives!" He shudders and hides himself against my neck.

  I pray that one day I'll remember it. God, how I'd love to remember that.

  "You were eating Red Vine liquorice," he says.

  The scent of it fills my nose.

  "After you were beaten up, you changed," says Tammy. "I was so worried about you. I should have stayed. I could have been here, with you, all these years. I know we would have made it. I know it. But I ran away. I'm a coward. I loved you and I didn't know how to deal with it!"

  "Don't worry about it anymore, Tammy. We're here now. That's all I care about."

  "I'm a coward. I couldn't deal with it. I didn't want to deal with it. So many years, wasted."

  "You're not a coward!" I say vehemently. "People like us are persecuted, beaten up, killed. Maybe you knew that, and that's why."

  "It just proves I'm a coward," Tammy mutters. "I want to kiss you, hold your hand in public. It's ridiculous how we have to hide, how Ray treated us when he found out."

  "Sometimes," I offer timidly, "Not always, but sometimes... I wish I was a girl."

  "Why?" he asks, and I see something like panic in his face.

  "Because, I've always been picked on. I'm small. There's nothing I can do about it. I've been beaten up so many times... I just think life would be easier for both of us if I was a girl."

  "Would you want me to be a girl?" he asks. His mouth twitches as he tries not to smile.

  "No!" I almost shout. "No!"

  He lets his smile spill. "I don't want you to be a girl. You're a boy—a man—I love you, I've always loved you, just the way you are. You're perfect."

  "I'm not perfect," I mutter.

  "You are to me," he whispers. "You're a man, Jamie. I love what you are."

  I shiver inside. "But... what if one day I decide I want to become a woman?"

  "Uh..."

  My heart begins to falter.

  "If you really wanted to," he whispers, "I'll have to get used to the idea. But... if it would make you happy..."

  "But I want you to be happy too."

  Tammy is quiet for a long, long time. I allow him to think. "I would still love you."

  "Are you sure?"

  "You would still be Jamie. Maybe your body would be different, but your brain..."

  "I'm not saying I'll do it, but it might make things easier for us. People... might tolerate us..."

  "Why should we worry about whether people can tolerate us?" he asks with a small grin.

  I shrug.

  He sighs, "I hate the way we're treated, just because we're both men."

  "We live in a small, hick town," I soothe. "It's just the way it is. That's why I want to move to the coast. I'm sick of this place!"

  "Yeah."

  "I don't know why being near the ocean would make our lives peaceful, but somehow I know it would."

  "God, Jamie," Tammy whispers, running his knuckles over my cheek. "This is almost too perfect."

  I feel a frown pinching my forehead. "What if something goes wrong?!"

  "No, don't say that," he shakes his head. "We've been punished enough, both of us."

  I hold his head between my hands, look into his eyes. I delve as deeply as I can go, and it shakes him up bad.

  "What?" He tries to wiggle free of me.

  "I can see your soul."

  His breathing quickens. "My soul."

  "Your soul."

  "Is it good or bad?" Suddenly his eyes flood.

  "It's good, Tammy," I whisper, kissing his mouth again and again. "It's very, very good. Strong."

  He shakes his head. "You're the one who's strong. I'm not strong at all."

  "Yes, you are," I argue. "You're very strong. I see it in you. You're smart, you're strong, and you have a good soul. I feel it, Tammy."

  "I've done things," he sobs. "I've done horrible things! I'm an evil, horrible person!"

  He tells me, about the anger, the rejection, the jealousy, the hate he felt, for his dad and his uncle and himself, after his uncle molested him.

  "Your uncle fucked with you?"

  "Yeah," he says softly, incapable of meeting my eyes. "When I was about eleven or so."

  "What did he do?" I ask before thinking.

  There's no reply, and I say, "Forget it. It's none of my business."

  "No, I want to tell you. It's just... I'm ashamed."

  If only he knew how I understand.

  "He made me love him.
He told me I was beautiful. He told me he loved me! He told me that what we were doing was beautiful and right, because we loved each other. He told me I was special! Then he just... threw me away... like I was nothing!"

  I never would have guessed.

  "I was so angry. I did things..." Tammy tells me about stealing his cousin's Barbies and mutilating them. He tells me about how he and his friends shot birds. He tells me how he used to be cruel to his puppy. He tells me that for a while, he was obsessed with death, serial murderers, and writing violent stories in diaries.

  Gooseflesh rises along my arms.

  "When I put my fingers inside of you..." Tammy divulges haltingly, "I... remembered Cotton. I sort of molested him... when I was young... I put my fingers in him." He swallows audibly. "I saw Uncle Price do it to Natalie... put his fingers in her vagina, when he was changing her diapers. I don't know why I did that to Cotton. It was sick... I get sick every time I remember it. I'm so ashamed. I almost... couldn't do what I did to you... I almost had to stop... but I reminded myself... I wasn't hurting you..." But his voice is laced, tangled, with humiliation.

  He stops, nestles against me, waiting.

  I'm afraid.

  Afraid of Tammy, afraid of these revelations from deep within him, afraid of what could yet lurk there.

  My faith in him wavers.

  I'm fourteen again.

  He's only playing with me. He doesn't love me.

  I should excuse myself and go, now. Out of his life. To preserve my own.

  Is he evil? Does he want to hurt me? Has he been planning to hurt me all this time?

  "I liked it when Uncle Price touched me down there!" he cries. "I was in love with him. It was wrong! He knew it was wrong!"

  I blink. No. Hell, no. I'm looking into his eyes, his soul. I'm seeing the very opposite of evil. I mustn't be afraid.

  He's opened himself.

  To me.

  I have to stop believing that Tammy hates me simply because I love him.

  He needs me to help him. I have to rise above my perpetual distrust of the human species and help him.

  He doesn't want to hurt me. He loves me.

  He went away for sixteen years. He left me without saying goodbye. He did hurt me.

  He just explained why, Jamie, I scold myself. He's tried to explain his struggles. He's opened his heart and revealed things that anyone with an ugly soul would never dare unveil.

  He trusts me.

  And I, for one, understand lifelong guilt, the revolting flashbacks, the disparaging voice of the Accuser, the spoilage of irreplaceable moments and the tainting of treasured memories. The sins committed against the powerless by the lecherous, the leftover ruination that turned me into an amoebic recluse who believed I was content with my life and my self.

  The same kind of shame turned Tammy into a confused, restless seeker of comfort and self-acceptance, who found only more self-hate.

  I understand.

  And it's high time to show him I trust him. He's the only human being I'll ever love like this, and if I can't trust him, I might as well live in a sea cave. He wouldn't have revealed these staggering secrets if he didn't trust me.

  "You haven't hurt anyone, have you." I say it, I don't ask it.

  "No, Jamie, I swear. Except Cotton, the birds, the cats. I don't know why I did it."

  "You were a boy," I tell him. "You were hurting. You were crying for help."

  He sobs, "Yes!"

  I hold him close to me, and he cries and cries. "You have a conscience, Tammy. Evil people don't have a conscience. Evil people do evil things and they don't feel sorry afterward. They never feel sorry."

  The difference between the saved and the damned, I think to myself. Was Hitler sorry? Did a glimmer of remorse ever cross his eyes? Was Saddam sorry? Is Bin Laden sorry? What about Bundy, Gacy, Dahmer? Were any of them sorry for the things they did? Will they be in heaven?

  "I can't believe I wrote those stories! I can't understand myself!"

  "Feeling guilt isn't pleasant, I assure you," I say, holding his face in my hands. "But I'd rather feel bad about something I did wrong than go through life not feeling any guilt or remorse. You felt it. You still feel it. You let it change you, make you a better person. That's why I know your soul is good. That's why I know you'd never hurt anyone now."

  "I don't understand! Why? Why did I do those things?! Sometimes, I just want to kill myself! Because I hate what I did! I hate it!"

  "Kids do weird things. They don't understand how cruel they're being. You were a child, angry and hurt, and that was how you expressed it. You're an adult now. You feel bad about those things. Your uncle never apologised to you. I wonder if he's ever repented. I hope so, for his sake."

  "He's senile," Tammy sniffles. "He doesn't even know where he is half the time."

  "I'd rather be you than him, not feeling any guilt. All the kids he's hurt!"

  "I didn't report him! I should have!"

  "You were a child. You didn't know how to report him. You didn't even know what he was doing was wrong." I sigh. "No wonder you're so torn up."

  He weeps, in soundless misery. It's not fake.

  "It's going to be okay, Tammy."

  "I don't want you to be afraid of me now, Baby. I told you all this, and now I'm so afraid you're afraid of me."

  "I'm not afraid of you, Tammy," I decide. "You're a good person. And you have to forgive yourself. We all do bad things. We all make mistakes. Have you ever asked God to forgive you for those things you feel so bad about?"

  Barely above a hoarse whisper, he speaks. "I don't know if I believe in God, Jamie."

  "You should, Tammy. How can you have hope without God?"

  He shrugs.

  "I have to believe in God. I can't, I won't, listen to people who say that people who believe in God are too weak or lazy or stupid to rely on themselves." I pull his face to mine. "We are weak, and delicate, and mortal. If I didn't believe in God, I wouldn't be alive today. I went through some things, Tammy. I'll tell you about it. I'll tell you everything, someday, very soon."

  "How can you believe in God, when you went through so much?"

  "If I hadn't prayed, Lloyd wouldn't have found me." Of course, I leave out that I had prayed to die, not to be found.

  "Maybe it was God's will that Uncle Price messed with me," Tammy explores. "Maybe He's trying to teach me something."

  "No, Tammy. It wasn't God's will. It's never God's will for innocent children to be violated, or beaten up, or worse..." A hot shiver rattles my entire frame. "A God that cruel I refuse to believe in."

  "Then why does He allow terrible things to happen?" asks Tammy. "Why? I thought nothing could happen unless He allows it."

  "I don't know," I admit quietly. "But it's something I intend to ask him one day... I think it's the least He can do... answer a few questions that are nagging me..."

  "Me too." Then, "What happened, Jamie?"

  "Not tonight."

  "Tell me," he pleads. "I want to know you. I care about you."

  "I know, and I will... soon. I promise... It's going to be very hard for me, but I owe it to you. I'll tell you. Just not tonight, please?"

  He nods. "Okay."

  I love him so much. He's not prodding me, pressuring me. He's tied with Stacy as my best friend.

  "I will say this. I don't believe in hell." I shake my head resolutely. "Or maybe I do, but I've already been there."

  His arms tighten around me.

  "Anyway, can you believe in your own soul if you can't believe in God?" I whisper. "Our bodies die. Our souls live forever. We don't just vanish into nothing when we die."

  He doesn't look at me when he asks, "Do you believe Lloyd's soul is okay?"

  "Absolutely."

  "In heaven?"

  "Not yet. He's asleep," I say. "He's asleep and knows nothing. That's in the bible. His ashes are at the coast, and his soul is with God, but he's asleep. He's waiting."

  "Waiting? For what?"

>   "For God to wake him up."

  "You took him to the coast."

  "Yes, and when I die, I want to be scattered there too, right where he is."

  "You want to be cremated?"

  "Sure," I reply.

  "Ugh! I could never be burned. How can you stand the thought of it? I thought you hated fires and burning."

  "In movies," I clarify, "When someone's being burned alive..." I shudder. "I can't stand that. Like in The Temple of Doom. They tore that guy's heart out and put him in that lava pit. The way that actor screamed... it was so horrible... it gave me nightmares for years. Lloyd was so upset with himself for letting me watch that." I take a deep breath. "When you're dead, you feel no pain. That's not you anymore. It's just the body, Tammy. It's just organic material."

  "But doesn't the bible also say that our bodies are supposed to be glorified or something when Jesus comes? I heard Pastor say that once. How can a body be glorified if it's been burned up?"

  "Well, God can do anything. He can piece anyone back together. What if we died in a car accident? Got burned beyond recognition? Don't you think He'll still know it's us?"

  "Yeah, I suppose He would." Tammy shudders. "I don't want to talk about this anymore, Baby. It's too..."

  "I know," I whisper. "Let's not talk about it anymore."

  I try to assuage him. "If you ask God to forgive you for the things you've done wrong, He will. And you have to forgive yourself too, Tammy."

  I should talk. I still haven't forgiven myself for the things I've done.

  I dread the day when I try to explain it all to him...

  twenty-five:

  tammy

  (december 28)

  Mom is released from the hospital the night of December 28th, and after I take her back to the house and settle her in the living room with her favourite John Wayne film and a bowl of potato soup with the bits of ham fished out, I head over to Jamie's.

  I have a belated Christmas gift for him.

  I sit on one of the dining chairs and pull him into my lap. When he opens the small square package, his eyes are shining, his lips are quivering.

  It's an angel made of pewter, and a silver chain.

  "I didn't know if you'd want the angel as a necklace or a keychain," I say, and then I add quietly. "Thank you for taking care of my mother, Jamie."

  He's in hot water now, and he knows it. "Now, now, I h-had no ch-choice. I-I g-gotta pay that m-malpractice insurance p-premium-m every year, y-you kn-kn-know?" His eyes glimmer wetly. He's as gorgeously agitated and vulnerable as he was the afternoon of the Christmas party.