A Million Miles Away(23)

“Tell me about home. What did you do last night?” He set aside his guitar and leaned close to the screen. “By the way, I told my sister about us. She wants to know why she can’t find you on Facebook.”

“Because…” Kelsey licked her lips, buying time. “Because I deleted it. You inspired me, I guess.”

Peter held up his hands. “What can I say? It’s just a waste of time.”

“Yeah, it really is. And homework,” Kelsey said, in answer to his question. “That’s what I did last night.”

“What about the night before?”

“Homework,” she said, smiling. “And we ate at Dad’s restaurant.”

“Night before?”

“I went to a party.” Kelsey swallowed, aware she was answering as herself. She didn’t know if this was right or wrong. But Michelle went to parties, too.

“Oh, yeah? Was it fun?”

A loud boom sounded in the distance. Peter twitched slightly and clutched something in his lap. His gun. He turned his head, listening. They waited.

“A muffler,” he finally said. “So was it fun?”

Kelsey resisted the urge to cry out. Her hands were shaking again. “I left early.”

Peter was taking deep breaths. He nodded, egging her on.

She put on a smile. “I took a walk.”

“Then what?” They were both listening for another boom, Kelsey knew it. But they were pushing each other forward, lifting each other up.

She relaxed her voice. “It was freezing. The game was still going on, so the streets were pretty empty. I visited Ian at La Prima Tazza. We talked about Warhol.”

Peter flashed a smile, raising his eyebrows. “Your favorite subject.”

Kelsey had looked through Michelle’s Andy Warhol book, but she still didn’t understand why the multicolored prints had anything to do with her. One of them was a still from a film of a girl eating a hamburger. That was it. She shrugged. “What can I say?”

“Speaking of, did you see that sculpture I told you about? The one in the middle of the Flint Hills?”

“Remind me,” Kelsey said, and his eyes started to look more alive.

“It’s just a steel circle. Painted red. But it acts like a picture frame for the landscape, right? No matter how close to it you are, or how far away, the portion of the Flint Hills that you focus on is determined by the circle.”

“What if you decide to look outside the circle?” Kelsey asked.

“Then you’re still being influenced by the circle. Get it? Because you’re looking away from it on purpose, but whether you rebel against it or accept it, it’s still on your mind.”

“So that’s what modern art is.” Kelsey tried to sound sure of herself. “An interruption you can’t ignore.”

“An interruption!” He was thoughtful. “That’s good, Michelle.”

Her sister’s name aloud seemed to echo from his mouth, the way he looked at her. Goose bumps rose on her skin. It was strange, how easily she fell into this conversation with Peter, a conversation that would have seemed impossible if she wasn’t thinking of Michelle. Kelsey adjusted her position on the floor, her eyes locked on his through the screen.

Peter’s voice sounded, low and soft, less wired up than before. “We might have to move from the Province.”

“When?”

“I’m not sure. It depends. I might not get your letters right away, though.” He looked concerned.

“Oh, don’t worry about that. Just worry about staying safe.”

Peter shook his head. “No, they’ll get them to me. They have to. But no matter what, don’t stop writing. Because if the first one doesn’t come, then at least the second one will. And I never know when I’m going to get access to a computer.”

“Okay.” Kelsey swallowed, knowing what she was agreeing to, that she would have to imitate her sister’s handwriting again. She still hadn’t figured out Michelle’s email password, either. Of course, none of this would matter if she could just tell him the truth.

“Everything you say to me about home is, like, nourishing. You get it? It’s like each memory is a piece of food that I can eat—” He made a scooping motion with his hand. “It makes me stronger.”

Kelsey smiled in spite of nerves. “You want me to feed you another one?”

“Feed me another one.” He opened his mouth.

She laughed. “What are you in the mood for?”

“How about the Flint Hills? Oh, I know. You could paint them! Paint them.”

Kelsey cleared her throat again. “Nah,” she finally said. “That will take too long. Let me tell you about them, instead.”

This she could do. Her family had made the drive from Lawrence through the hills a million times, to Seneca, to Manhattan, to Wichita.

Michelle was always in the backseat next to her, watching out the window. The Flint Hills were one of the few things, their parents said, that would keep them from punching each other.

Kelsey settled into the rug on her floor, resting her chin in her hands.

Peter leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

“So you’re on 70,” Kelsey began, “heading west, and there’s nothing but overcast sky and fence and prairie. Until all of a sudden, you see this wrinkle in the flat lines. It’s almost a hallucination. Until you see another wrinkle, and another one, and the land is moving like the ocean. And each hill is spilling into the next. The grass is a color you’ve never seen before and you’ll never see again. It’s orange, gold, white, green, brown.…”