The Hard Count(19)

“Tell your dad I’ll see him tomorrow.”

The video remains paused in my lap, and the boy on the screen walks away from me in real life, never once looking back. I watch it again when he’s out of sight. I watch it through his eyes, and after the fifth time, I finally see it.

Nico doesn’t want to get caught.





5





Last night I dreamt about Nico. It was one of those odd sort of dreams, only partially making sense. He and I were partners in a game where we had to find a secret room in a house that somehow always had a hallway that led to more rooms and more secret doors and hallways. I slept for six hours last night, but my dream felt as if it lasted for twenty. The search went on forever, and the secret room that held some prize we needed never showed up. But in those few seconds—right before I awoke—Nico turned into me and kissed me on the lips.

I felt it.

It felt…real.

I jolted out of bed and froze, and it took me nearly fifteen minutes to convince myself that it was all just my weary head, the Cheetos I ate for dinner, or the super-sized Mountain Dew. It’s probably due to the hours I spent last night watching my film footage. That’s what I’m telling myself, anyhow.

But sitting here, only five or six bodies away from Nico, the side of his face in full view—the side that turned and kissed me in my dreams—is messing with my head. It’s thrown me off my game, and I haven’t spoken up at all while we discuss the excerpts we’ve read from Plato’s Republic. For once, I honestly can’t find fault with Nico’s position and questions.

I blame the damned dream!

“Plato’s concept doesn’t allow for exceptions,” Nico says. He’s responding to one of our classmates, Megan, who just argued that Plato’s Republic is a sound blueprint for peace. Megan’s father is a Superior Court Judge. Nobody is surprised that she’s arguing that class systems work and put people in place to succeed.

“Exceptions create chaos,” Megan says.

My fingertips tingle, so I tap them on my notebook that I have folded to my chest, my eyes switching between Nico and Megan as if I’m watching a slow game of tennis. I want to join in, but I know I don’t need to. Nico is saying everything that’s in my head. We agree. My God, we agree on something.

“Exceptions are responsible for pivotal moments in history,” Nico says. In typical fashion, his head is down, his chin tucked at his chest and his hands gripping the top of his desk, as if he’s too disgusted by his opponent to look at her.

This is how he argues with me…

“Abraham Lincoln was born in a one-room cabin, the son of a carpenter. Are you saying our world would have been a better place if only he had stuck to his born position in life and built things out of wood?”

“Of course not. Lincoln is different, he’s…” Megan stumbles, her words trailing off. She tries to mask it with a few ums and head-waggles, as if she’s searching for the right words, but Nico doesn’t let her off the hook.

“No, you want to apply it to our world, where guys like me work at Mountain Burger, slinging grease-slathered food into paper bags so we can make eight bucks an hour. While you pull through the drive-thru in your red convertible—Daddy bought for you when you were sixteen—on your way to some college class you only show up for half of the time, because it probably won’t matter since Daddy’s law firm has a spot held for you when you’re done playing college.”

My mouth hangs open. My eyes shift slightly to both sides to confirm that everyone else’s mouth is in the same WTF mode mine is in. And then I realize something even more amazing. Nico’s hand is on the back of his chair, his body twisted so he can look Megan in the eyes, leveling her with a heavy dose of reality—both his reality, and hers. He isn’t wrong. But he is being unfair.

I don’t enter the argument this time. For once I don’t have a good counterpoint. I’m stumped completely. The awkward silence lingers in the room until Mr. Huffman fills it with his off-color humor, saying, “Da da da, and until next time…” just as the bell sounds and the quiet is covered with backpack zippers and the clatter of students rushing out at the end of the day.

For the second time in only a handful of days, Nico and I are the last to leave the room. I waited for him. Though now that we’re alone, my mind is divided—the loud half wishing I hadn’t stuck around. I stand at the closed door while he drags an overstuffed bag out from beneath his desk, swearing under his breath when one of the straps is caught on a chair leg, and when he finally pulls it free, his head tilts up and his eyes find me waiting.

“What?” he snaps.

I manage to keep my mouth shut. My eyes, on the other hand, can’t hide my reaction, and they open wide, my brow lifting.

He’s like an angry bull right now, his nostrils flared while he breathes, standing from his desk chair and tugging his heavy bag over his shoulder. He pulls his hat from his back pocket and smooths his hair back before sliding it in place. When he looks at me again, his rage isn’t as obvious. He breathes in deeply, then releases it in a gust.

“Sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t take that out on you. I just…sometimes it feels personal.”

“I get it,” I say.

“No, you really don’t.”