Beast(20)

“Hey, uh, Adam Michaels? Talk to him yet?”

“Shit.” I totally forgot. And/or slightly hoped Adam Michaels had paid up by now. He’s kinda older and not as big as me but big enough to leave a mark. I like it better when they can’t fight back. “Will do.”

“Thanks, man.” JP jerks to launch another round of flame bullets at the little baddies protecting the big baddie in the corner. “How’s the Wormhole?”

“Amazing,” I say, because it is. Then I chuff to myself because it’s funny, the stupid things we do for each other, JP and I. But fine, I’ll go talk to Adam Michaels.

Mom leans in from the kitchen, bringing the smell of simmering spaghetti sauce with her. “You guys ready for dinner?”

“Yeah,” JP answers for both of us.

JP puts the game on pause, hops up and out of the beanbag chair, and trots into the kitchen like a dungaree-wearing farm boy whose mama done rung the dinner bell. Left for dead, I lug my corpse up from the deepest depths, mentally scream in agony because my leg freaking hurts like hell whenever I move, and hop stupidly to my place at the table. Even if I’m not supposed to be up and about just yet, I have no choice. My wheels are folded up and left by the door like an umbrella because our house is too small for me to actually use it indoors. I have to use a cane to hobble around the house instead. I try to gently bumble, but when was that possible back when I had two working legs?

The wooden chair groans under my weight. I lift my cast for elevation and wait for the pain to stop. It doesn’t and I wish I could rub the bones straight. Mom ladles organic, grass-fed meatballs onto the plates heaped with pasta and sauce. Two for her, five for JP, and twelve for me. Fair is fair. “Ready?” Mom asks.

Both her and JP bow their heads. Mom thanks the Universe. JP thanks God because unlike me, he’s an actual Catholic and not going to St. Lawrence because it’s the best education in town. While they say their own version of grace, I pretend to. Although I never know where to send prayers, so I just think: Hi, Dad.

Their heads pop up and we begin to eat. “Go easy on the cheese,” Mom says to me.

I lift the Parmesan from the grater. “Why?”

“Because that’s the last of it for the month.”

Money. As in, as soon as I finish dinner, I’m off to go study so I can get a full ride to Stanford or Yale or Harvard or MIT with all the bells and whistles. One day this mutt will have a pedigree.

But as I shovel food in my mouth (from the ever-rising food bill we never ask JP to help pay because apparently lost boys eat for free), I wonder…would I change places with my best friend? The answer is yes. In a heartbeat.

I imagine waking up in his body. One smile from my perfect teeth that align one perfect row on top of the other, and I’m wrapping up girls in my new lean arms. My brains in his body with all his money? Unstoppable. The world won’t know what hit it. I’d never give his body back. He’d be stuck inside my old one and man, would he be miserable. But I bet, dollars to donuts, he’d take my body and do something real stupid with it. He wouldn’t turn to a book to keep it in check. He’d go whole hog and end up in prison. No doubt.

My hand squeezes into a fist underneath the table. Sometimes I wonder what would happen if my fuse really lit. I haven’t punched anyone since last year. Some junior. JP had asked me to do it, like he’d done a thousand times, but this time I enjoyed it. Way too much. It’s not my size that scares me. It’s what I’m carrying inside. My secret Hulk is always crouching under the surface, needling me. But I know the tricks to keep it locked up.

JP doesn’t have control. He’s all id: I want, I want, I want.

He’d want to beat the shit out of someone and he wouldn’t know when to stop.

I drop the fantasy. He’ll always be him, and I’ll always be me. He’ll have his face, his genes. All he has to do is hold on a few more years and he’s gone. His dad will pay for college without breaking a sweat. JP can dick around for four years and earn some bullshit degree, smile with his pretty teeth, and he’ll get by forever. Not me.

But whatever. It’s science. It’s fine.

Mom reaches out and lays a hand on my shoulder. “You okay, sweetie?”

“Huh?” I snap to.

“You look a little down.”

“I’m okay,” I say. My plate is empty, food eaten on autopilot.

JP guides half a meatball through thick red sauce, his eyes tracing its trajectory. “It’s been one of those weeks.”

“Right?” I side with him.

“You’re not kidding,” Mom agrees. “Can’t believe it’s only Wednesday.”

“Hump Day is the worst. It’s like all I can do to make it to Friday,” JP says. “And even then, I don’t want to deal with Saturday and Sunday.”

“You know you’re always welcome here,” Mom says.

JP nods. “Thanks. It’s just, I don’t know, like my mom’s like even worse these days and it’s like no matter how—”

My chair shrieks to the side as I get up. “I have a test on Friday. I should go study.” Throb goes the leg as soon as I stand.

They both stare at me. Mom frowns.

JP puts on the same face I catch him in all the time at school when he’s talking to the guys at our lunch table. The slightly glazed half smirk. His mask. “Kill that test with fire, Beast,” he says, one pump of his chin to finish off the sentence.