History Is All You Left Me(81)
“Your socks are going to be so dirty,” I say.
“I don’t care,” Wade says. “I don’t care about the socks and I don’t care why you’re here. In a good way.”
There’s the Wade we know, Theo. He’s always getting the sentiment right and the words wrong, but there’s no getting mad at him because it’s almost as if saying the wrong thing is his first language, and he can’t quite shake it off. He stops hugging me but cups my elbows and I wish I wasn’t wearing this coat right now so I can feel his palms against my flesh. “I want you to come inside, but I have to ask my mom first. I know that shit makes me sound like we’re twelve again.”
“Is everything okay?”
He sighs. “I’m on lockdown like never before. Long story.”
“Short version?”
“I was skipping school.”
“Why?”
“Wait for the long story.” Wade walks back to his front door and is hesitant to go in, a lot like when we all went to Coney Island and he didn’t want to go on the roller coaster, which I feel even more awful about today since I got to hold your hand while I was freaking out and Wade was forced to sit with a stranger. “You’re going to be here when I get back, right?”
There’s no saying no to that vulnerable, don’t-break-me look of his.
“I’ll be here,” I promise.
His you’re-piecing-me-back-together look says he believes me.
You’ve never seen this side of him, Theo, which makes sense because people reveal different parts of themselves to different people. I don’t know why I could never see that before. How I was with you isn’t how I was with Wade, and how Jackson was with me isn’t how he was with you.
Wade returns to the hallway with a fitted white T-shirt that hugs his shoulders, and he waves me in. The apartment is very warm and smells like vanilla, which I mistake for a candle before quickly remembering it’s probably the smell of his mother’s flavored vodka floating around.
I walk into the living room where Ms. Juliette is half asleep and watching some game show. She says hi and asks me how I’m doing, but not in the same way everyone else has been, as if I’m a fragile piece of glass. The normalcy is almost a relief. Ms. Juliette asks Wade for water, which I hope isn’t code for more vodka, but Wade fills a glass from the kitchen faucet, and she downs it in almost one gulp.
She announces she has a headache and is going to go to bed early and that I shouldn’t stay too late because Wade shouldn’t even have company in the first place. She’s pissed for reasons I’ll learn in a second, but she still kisses Wade on the forehead before retreating to her bedroom.
“The room has changed a little bit,” Wade says, pushing open his bedroom door.
Understatement. His room looks like it’s been robbed. There’s an outline on the floor where his rickety home studio used to be and I wouldn’t be surprised if the damn thing finally collapsed and he had to throw it away, except that doesn’t explain what happened to his flat-screen TV or his Xbox. His laptop isn’t in its usual spot on his desk, and his charger is nowhere in sight, either. The only things that remain are his bed; his chair and desk with a textbook currently open underneath the lamp; a bookcase well stocked with nonfiction books, which he rarely finishes because he gets over each subject due to “information overload”—the opposite of you; and his phone. It’s sitting in the corner of the room and propped up at angle, his trick so his jazz acoustics are amplified.
“I’m really scared to ask where your mother hid your stuff. Please don’t say she sold it.”
“It’s in storage somewhere.”
“What the hell did you do?”
Wade pulls a stick of mint gum out of his pocket and chews it while sitting down on his bed and inviting me to do the same. I go for the chair instead. It’s not very comfortable at first because I’m close to the small radiator, so I take off my coat, reminding myself I shouldn’t become too exposed. The more exposed I am, the easier it will be to remove every last piece of clothing and lose myself in him—in front of you. Wade is confused, no doubt, but he doesn’t pressure me because he knows me well enough that it might push me away.
Wow. Someone knowing me is supposed to be a beautiful thing and not something that prevents him from being open, right? I wish you were here to actually give me an answer.
“I was skipping school last week. Everything kind of fell apart after the library blowup and your choosing Jackson over me. Seeing you and Theo all over school didn’t help make me feel less alone. Not in some ghost-seeing crazy way, but the memories sucked. The next morning I was going to school and forgot my damn tie, so I ran back home because I wasn’t in the mood to stay there for detention. My mom had already left for work by the time I got there, and once the idea to stay home got in my head, it never bounced. I listened to music and played video games and napped. I did it again the next day. But on the third day, the school called my mom to see if I was okay, and shit hit the fan. She came home and I thought she was going to break her never-hit-me rule.”
I nod. I understand. “Did she take all your stuff then?”
“The next day when I got home from school, yeah. She only let me keep my phone because it would’ve been irresponsible of her not to. I can’t even use my laptop for homework, and she’s forcing me to stay late at the library to get work done.” Wade shrugs. “At least I have some games on my phone.”