Home and Away

by Candice Montgomery

  He asks me who I came with. He smells like chocolate Axe. I know it’s chocolate Axe because Tristan had a phase.

  I let out one hard, forced bark of a laugh. Everything about tonight feels hard and tangible and emotionally monochromatic and God, why wouldn’t she say something if she’s known about me all this time?

  Redhead Guy offers to open the water and I almost let him, even though that’s against the Drunk Girl rules that Slim and I came up with.

  I finally get the water open by myself and I breathe through my nose as I sip it slowly.

  Redhead Guy asks people who I belong to and then asks me if I want to sit somewhere that’s not the curb because “It’s not safe to be so close to the street.”

  I agree and he helps me sit at a red-bricked planter.

  Sam and Cole come walking up fast. “Oh my God, there you are!” Sam holds me close and Cole says, “Told you she was fine.”

  “She’s not fine, Cole,” Sam says, all hard, jumping consonants. Sam’s whole life is hard. “Jesus. Try not to be a dick right now, just because she’s with Kai.”

  Cole scoffs. “That has nothing to do with anything. But thanks for outing me.”

  “I didn’t out you—you did that yourself.”

  Cole shakes his head and walks away. “Whatever, I’ll get Kai.”

  I lean on Sam. God, I’m sleepy. I don’t want to take the train home because it reeks and I feel like if I have to puke later it’s gonna be real hard to manage.

  “It’s okay, T. I got you,” Sam says. And then to Redhead Guy, “Thanks for taking care of my friend.”

  “Think she’d give me her phone number if she were sober?”

  “No! You literal shit-stain on Grandmother’s couch, no. She wouldn’t. Can you back off? She has a boyfriend and she’d kick your ginger ass if she were sober.”

  Redhead puts his hands up and backs away and a second later, Kai comes out and exhales hard. “Oh my God, thanks, Sam.”

  Sam releases me into Kai’s arms and I slump against him.

  Kai whispers, “You drank too much, little wino?” He laughs.

  “Don’t call me that,” I mumble. I know those words don’t come out right.

  “I’m gonna take her home.”

  Sam and Victory nod. They’re the only ones still outside with us.

  When did Vic even get outside?

  “I’ll come with you,” Sam says.

  “Me, too.” This from Victory. “Who gave her that water?” Her hand brushes up against my cheek.

  Sam ticks with a series of hard Ns before he can get out, “I think that guy that was helping her.”

  “Toss that shit,” Kai says. “Tory, can you get her another one from the bar? Or maybe, like, some ice chips?”

  She nods and runs off and she’s back fast. Like, so fast. So fast it makes me dizzier.

  I giggle. “That stupid fucking box. She wasn’t even gonna tell ’im ’bout me.”

  “What the hell’s she talking about?” Victory says.

  Sam’s cologne is starting to make me sick. “No idea.”

  And then we’re on the train platform. Kai’s sitting on the floor and I’m sitting next to him and he’s running an ice cube against the back of my neck. He kisses the black X on my wrist.

  A homeless man walks up and asks for spare change. Kai gives him everything in his wallet, which probably isn’t more than thirty dollars, but, still, it’s everything.

  I think I love Kai. He’s so good. But probably you’re not supposed to trust feelings that big when you’ve had as much to drink as I have.

  Then we’re on another train. This one’s blue and orange instead of green and gray like the first one.

  And then we’re in Victory’s car. And then we’re at V and Pépé’s and I’m in bed.

  Kai’s bed.

  It’s cold and Kai helps me out of my Vans as I mumble about becoming a shut-down cornerback, out of my dress, into his shirt, out of my haze, and he stays.

  I know he lives here but there is an ever-present sense of comfort I get knowing he doesn’t go far from me at all. He stays.

  Kai stays with me. I just breathe and apologize.

  I whisper “I’m sorry” six times and wonder if maybe things aren’t meant to be this hard after all.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  When your hair is brittle and your skin is tight and your palate is dry and you can feel a literal ball of puke sitting in your throat.

  That is me, in all my underage drinking glory, the next morning.

  Despite the fact that I have clearly been hit by a Mack truck, I still know exactly where I am. I’m in Kai’s bed. Kai sleeps, curled into a tiny ball on a nest of blankets on the floor, which I know V probably made him do.

  He’s unmoving. Doesn’t snore. Doesn’t even twitch. He’s a lot like that when he’s awake, actually. Always in a resting state. He comes most alive when he’s touching me or when he’s creating things, and it’s especially magical when those two things live inside one another.

  I drink the glass of stagnant water on the nightstand, which wasn’t there before, I know. It may or may not have been set there for me, but it’s mine now. Plus, I mean, I don’t wanna be tasting the alcohol twelve hours from now during the game tonight.

  After finishing, I crawl shamefully toward Kai’s floor-nest. I curl up and shove my way under him. He rolls, his long legs stretching, pushing into my space, his lanky, Slenderman arms pulling me toward him. He murmurs, “What time is it?”

  “Six fifteen,” I say, which means I don’t have long to linger here, since I have to be present and accounted for during the school day in order to be eligible to play tonight.

  He groans, “Fuuuuuck …” but pulls me closer.

  Pause here. I don’t know what to do with the very obvious morning wood pressed against me. If I’m obligated to do something about it or if it’s like a wandering pigeon, something that just is, a thing you ignore until it goes away.

  Eww.

  When I think about sex, I think about it being beautiful and vocal and ripe and, like, maybe a good workout or pastime or whatever. I don’t think about it being obligatory or coincidental all because morning wood is an unavoidable biological response.

  Still, I reach for Kai’s boxer brief-clad hips, rub my hand against him. He flinches away and shakes his head. “Shhh …”

  It’s his version of “you don’t have to, it’s fine.” Okay. So, basically I was right about the bird. Ignore it and it will go away.

  But now that he’s telling me I don’t have to, I’ve suddenly decided I want to. I need to. I’m starting to throb and it’s a good feeling. I want to prolong it.

  I kiss his neck, pull his hand toward me, between my legs, and he doesn’t hesitate, even though his eyes are still closed, even though he’s still at least sixty percent not-awake.

  I lift my shirt—Kai’s shirt that I am wearing—higher.

  He pushes my panties aside.

  I panic about the state of me for literally only the moment it takes him to say, “You’re okay. Let me? Please?”

  When I don’t say anything he says, “Do you want me to? Or not want me to?”

  I don’t even know the difference.

  “You can say no.”

  I nod and breathe, “I’m scared.”

  He pulls back fast. He is officially eighty percent awake. “Are you a virgin?”

  “No,” I say. “Not—” technically. “No.”

  He gets it. I see it in his cracked, mismatched eyes. Slow. He knows this means go slow.

  He rubs me again. Staring into my eyes to be sure that it’s okay to pull my panties aside once more. And when I do it for him, he smiles a little.

  Insistent, fast pressing and then the slick slide of one knuckle into me.

  Kai doesn’t kiss me. I don’t kiss him. But he holds my stare like he can break my eyes up into the same colors as his.

  I want him to.

  I want him to.

>   I want him to.

  I come apart. I nod to him and I come apart.

  Later, I tiptoe into the bathroom, doing my damnedest to avoid V. I wash my face, pat my neck down with water, and swirl toothpaste around my mouth. Tie my mountain of hair into a bun on top of my head and find Kai down the hall, in the living room.

  Normally we’d catch a single bus and be back at Merrick’s but it seems we’re both incredibly languid and made of water, and also needing to punch a metaphorical clock to get to school, so we Uber to Merrick’s and get there in fifteen minutes, and Kai piggybacks me up the stairs to the garage apartment.

  We almost die twice and it’s great.

  I don’t think about the box once.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  GAME 4 – EL CAMINO REAL VS. CRENSHAW COUGARS

  For a lot of high school football players, Friday Night Lights is more than a TV show starring perfect human specimen Kyle Chandler. It’s the time we’re basically made into kings, revered for what we can do with our bodies, our time, our dedication.

  I die a little inside when our team walks onto the field to start warming up. It’s not that I haven’t seen the field before. I have. It’s just that it’s a different thing entirely at seven o’clock at night, lights blazing from high above, a crowd full of people watching, their chatter barely a hum from where I stand. I’m no one right now. Aside from those scant few who do know me, everyone else will have to wait and figure me out as the night goes on.

  It’s been a pretty brutal ass-kicking, trying to get Coach to start me. Two-a-days are required. I add on one more, a solo, to really push myself. To put my skills on a figurative display shelf.

  Plus, Taze Quirk lives for the opportunity to prove people wrong on the field.

  Though, as much as I breathe for this, the inside of my mouth goes numb with anxiety. I can barely feel my mouthpiece. My pulse beats heavy in my wrists and the bottoms of my feet.

  It’s not comfortable, no. But it’s also the happiest I’ve been in a long time. Slim has always been right to call me a pain slut. Not many people could do what I do on this field and enjoy it. Talk about it like it’s precious metal.

  I go through our warm-up drills feeling like I’ve got wings. That is, until the anthem. The teams line up on their respective sides and the announcer welcomes the friends and families to tonight’s game, then requests all to rise for our national anthem.

  All around the bleachers, people stand and hands come up to meet chests. The faces blur together. A girl from our school named Endira is introduced to sing.

  I’m kneeling with both hands crossed on one of my knees.

  I hear somebody swear behind me. It’s probably Coach. A few guys from the team laugh or mutter things like, “She’s mad fucking disrespectful. My dad’s a Marine.”

  Teeth gritted, I say nothing, continue to kneel, eyes forward.

  To my left, Adrian and Guy both kneel as well and it’s then and only then that I can breathe a little easier, that I settle into who I am as an athlete, a woman, a Black girl. Only then, when two other Black kids join me. This is the first time I’ve knelt, although police brutality against Black people has been a longstanding tradition in America. I think maybe I’ve just started a new pre-game tradition of my own.

  After the last note’s been sung, I stand and pull my helmet over my braids, and Adrian pulls me into a hug, smashing his helmet against mine in solidarity.

  “Black girl magic,” he says.

  “Black boy joy,” I volley back.

  And then, smiling too hard at each other, we get ready for the coin toss.

  We’ve played an entire half and it’s not going too hot. On both D and offense, we’re all dicking up every single play. I’m having trouble getting to the ball in time and Cole isn’t reading their QB, who’s young and probably inexperienced, because he’s basically just firing off these whack-job shots like his receivers are Speedy frickin’ Gonzalez. This should’ve been easy for us!

  I watch Cole screw up his billionth play and then amble off to the sidelines, where I pull my own helmet off and march up to him.

  “Cole, are you shitting me, use your fricking brain—why aren’t you plugging these gaps and driving this RB into the dirt?” I shove him.

  He shoves me back. “Piss off, Tasia.”

  “Maybe I would if you could just pull your head out of your ass. I don’t care if you’re mad at me because my boyfriend used to be yours. You’re pissing all over this game for me—”

  “Screw you, Tasia! This isn’t about him. But maybe if you pulled your head out of your cunt for a second—”

  I shove him again and, ohh, it’s a good one. But he shoves me back even harder and I’m about to Hadouken the shit out of him when Coach Rass lifts me up by the waist and practically throws me across the field.

  “What in the actual fuss bucket, daggonit! What is this shit on my field?” Coach can never decide whether he wants to be a man that swears or not.

  “She started it,” Cole says. His helmet’s off now. I didn’t even notice that’d happened.

  “He’s the one running around the field like he’s Stevie Wonder out here.”

  Cole yells, “Work your own position!”

  I ignore him. “This is why y’all aren’t winning games. And I swear to God, if I have to play on this team when y’all lose one more—”

  “Oh, screw you, Tasia. Seriously. Don’t worry. Kai doesn’t care whether we win or lose. As long as you suck his—”

  “HEY!” Coach yells.

  Half our team erupts in laughter. The opposing players on the field, too. I can’t find it in me to worry about how they’ve all just witnessed me losing it.

  Especially since, after Cole’s comment, I’m going off like a Tasmanian Devil and it’d almost be funny if it were anyone but me all, Hold me back! Hold me back! Somebody HOLD. ME. BACK.

  “BACK OFF. BOTH OF YOU. NOW. AND YOU’RE BOTH BENCHED FOR THE SECOND HALF.” The veins in Coach’s neck stand at attention, all the way up to his very red face. The red’s pretty odd for him, considering he spends so much time in the sun, soaking himself to a toasty bronze. “Maybe we can win without either of you knuckleheads convoluting up my team’s plays.”

  No. No, no, no, please, no. “Coach!”

  “Coach. I got scouts here! Please,” Cole says.

  Coach lifts an eyebrow. “Maybe y’all should’ve thought before you popped off at the mouth? I’m not just training you to use your body; use your head, too. Now get your asses on that bench and rest your feet. Monday’s practice, you got death waiting on you in the form of suicides.”

  I’m silent because I know this is mostly my fault. And because if Cole really does have scouts here, I might have just upended his entire future.

  I don’t even have the option of playing college football because no team is letting a girl play. I don’t have any illusions of grandeur about that. But I feel exactly like a hot pile of sludge that my temper messed this up for Cole.

  Jesus, what is wrong with me?

  No. I know what’s wrong with me. I just don’t know who I am anymore. I’m not this person who completely … loses it like I just did.

  There’s no winning here. Not on this field with Cole and not in last night’s messy situation with V and the box and whoever frickin’ sent it. I can’t breathe.

  I make the mistake of glancing up into the stands. Merrick’s eyes meet mine.

  If the answers to this riddle aren’t what I needed to feel better, then what is? How do I end this disquiet with who I am? How am I supposed to feel better about myself?

  Still no answers. A thousand and one more questions.

  Chapter Thirty

  Two not stellar things happen on Saturday morning.

  A woman leaves the apartment wearing nothing but Merrick’s T-shirt and her own combat boots, a pair of white jeans folded over her arm.

  I’m so grossed out, I drop the spoonful of Frosted Flakes that’s halfway to my mo
uth. It clatters harshly in the room, but I do this on purpose. I want this I-don’t-give-a-shit girl and Merrick to know how much I don’t approve.

  As I push my bowl away, Merrick follows shortly after and his hair is a mess of waves and curls that, again, tell you just how EU he really is. He yawns and scratches his T-shirt–clad stomach like he does every morning. He is predictable, and this is the thing I’m telling myself when I want to beg him to grow up and stop doing this “romance” dance.

  I leave the apartment with an almost negative amount of words to Merrick. When I text Kai and ask him if we can just walk around the pier, I get a picture text back. It is a really extreme, very intense close-up of Dahlia’s growling face. In the background, I can see Kai with a spray paint can. The text just says, beat you to it. Like we’re in a competition for his time. And maybe we are. Most especially when he’s creating something.

  He’s so lost in whatever he’s drawing now. I can tell that, even from a single picture on a grainy screen. The air and the space around him, when he’s like that, is so stagnant and impenetrable. I don’t even blame him for that.

  I feel a quick pang that they’re hanging out without me. That Kai is somewhere using up his creativity with Dahlia as a witness.

  It almost felt like his creativity belonged to me, for a second. Which is a really selfish way to look at things. I’m not that narcissistic. But this is the second stupid thing that happens and my throat suddenly hurts.

  While I’m walking circles around the parking lot, I get several messages back to back to back, my text alert assaulting me. It’s Tristan.

  tasia

  Then, hi

  Then, good morning

  did you know there are no clocks in vegas casinos???

  why would I know that tristan, then, why do YOU know that?

  lol, then, kinda miss you

  That hurts me so much. I haven’t avoided his messages so much as forgotten that it’s our primary line of contact.

  miss you so much, then, is mamma there