What to Say Next(48)

“Home.” David’s eyes meet mine. “Did I make you run away the other day? I don’t know what I said—”

“You? No, it wasn’t you. It was…that…place,” I say, and he nods like he understands, and maybe he does, but then again maybe he doesn’t. It’s hard to tell with him. Sometimes I think he is the only person who understands how to have an actual conversation with me these days, and then I think about his notebook, how different he is, and wonder if I’ve been imagining it all. If I’ve been so desperate for a real friend that I’ve created this other David in my mind who doesn’t exist.

“You’re fast, you know,” he says, and for the first time since I sit down, he smiles. He looks even better this way: happy. I don’t think I’m making him up. I really don’t. “I mean, I’ve never seen anyone run that fast.”

“Yeah, well.”

“You talk to your mom?” he asks, and I shake my head. “You will eventually. When you’re ready.”

His voice is certain, and I hang on to that. Because whenever I think of talking to my mom, the tears bubble up fast and the words get clogged in my throat. I have been ignoring her knocks on my bedroom door, her text messages, her calls. I look up at David, trying not to cry. I’ve been holding everything back. Boxing these feelings up, throwing a label on the outside, organized and sorted, like I can convince myself that they take up barely any space at all. Just a corner of a closet shelf.

You know what actresses actually are? Really good liars.

Before I have a chance to say anything, the entire football team approaches our table. A block of biceps and thick thighs, standing shoulder to shoulder. And then, like we are in a bad teen movie, Joe Mangino, a beefy guy with buck teeth, steps forward. He flips David’s lunch tray. An empty milk container goes flying onto the floor.

“Are you serious?” I ask, and stand up, though now that I’m on my feet I have no idea what I can do in the face of all these muscles. These guys are big and they are not my friends. I can’t just ask them to stop, like I did with Justin and Gabriel. Well, I can ask, but they’re not going to listen.

“Stay out of this, Kit. This little shit needs to die,” Sammy Metz says, who looks like—is—a linebacker. A giant oak of a boy. He’d look good next to Willow.

“Don’t you think that’s extreme?” David asks the question like he genuinely wants to know the answer. There isn’t an ounce of fear in his voice. So calm and collected it’s borderline creepy. Suddenly he seems less alien, more robot. “You want me to die? I’ve spent almost three days thinking about it, and I still can’t figure it out.”

“Not only do I want you to die,” Joe says, “I want it to hurt. Badly. I’m just deciding: Should I shove my boot down your stupid throat or should I feed you your own nuts?”

“You know, if you shove your boot in my face it’s unlikely to fit in my mouth. And I have no intention of eating my own testicles,” David says, and then turns his head away, as if he is no longer interested in the conversation. Takes a bite of apple, then puts it back on its plate. We watch him, and when he looks up again, he seems surprised we are all still here. “What do you want? Everyone’s watching. Obviously you can’t touch me right now.”

“We’re going to get you, Drucker. When you least expect it. We’re going to get you,” Joe says, again with the horrible clichés. Is that what he does on weekends? Watches bad movies and practices the resident jock’s lines in front of a mirror? Step one: Flip lunch tray. Step two: Make scary but generic threats. Step three: Take more steroids and grow even bigger breasts.

“Move it along, gentlemen,” Mrs. Rabin says, approaching the table and ushering the football guys away. She doesn’t ask David if he is okay, though. Instead she glares at him and shakes her head.

“What’s up with Mrs. Rabin?” I ask.

“What?”

“That look. What’d you do to piss her off?” David motions to his notebook.

“Uh-oh.” I wince. “Teachers too?”

“Yup.” David shrugs, up and down, like he’s being manipulated by an amateur puppeteer. His body language, I realize now, is as stilted as everything else about him. “Hope this doesn’t hurt my college recommendations.”

—

Later, in AP World History, Ms. Martel drones on about the impact of the Industrial Revolution: blah, blah manufacturing and steam engines and terrible factory conditions blah blah. I text David. We both have our laptops open so we can iMessage and look like we’re just taking notes.

He’s sitting three rows over and one ahead—I guess he’s been sitting there since September—and I study his profile. I like his lush eyelashes, and the slope of his cheeks and the way he cocks his head to the side and stares out the window.

Me: Are you scared?

David: Of what?

Me: The whole frickin’ football team!

David: No. Do you know what I am scared of, though? Sentient artificial intelligence. And global warming. In equal measure.

Me: They could kill you.

David: I know. If we create machines that can learn to feel the whole range of human emotions, we are all dead. And I think we’ve long passed the tipping point in global warming. I expect apocalyptic weather will soon become the norm.