My Name Is Venus Black(25)

“What about Leo?” she asks.

“What about him?”

“Well, it’s Easter. Maybe he could come even if you can’t.”

Tinker bursts out laughing. This girl has no idea, which is kind of reassuring. Clearly, she doesn’t know Leo.

“Um, I don’t think you want Leo,” he manages, grinning. “That boy’s one picky eater. Probably doesn’t like turkey—”

“We’re having ham.”

“And I also gotta warn you, he doesn’t talk much; he’s not much of a…what do you call it?”

The girl waits. It’s on the tip of his tongue. “A conversationist,” finishes Tinker proudly. He bets this girl doesn’t know such a big word.

“Conversationalist, you mean?” she asks. Before Tinker can agree, she adds, “But we don’t mind at all! Are you planning on leaving Leo here alone on Easter?”

Shit. Now Tinker feels stuck. If they think Leo is being neglected or something, it will raise red flags. Maybe the best thing is to just let Leo go. What can it hurt? It’s not like Leo can tell them anything.

“Tell you what,” he says, like he’s doing the girl a favor. “I’ll ask Leo. He’s not much for strangers. But if he wants to come, then I’ll let him.” This is good. This makes him sound like a real father. A good father.

“How about three o’clock?” she says, acting as if Tinker said yes. “You can drop him off at our door on your way to work.”



And the snoopy little bitch knows his routine! “You got a deal,” says Tinker with a broad smile. “But only if he wants to.”



* * *



—

IT HAD TAKEN some perseverance from Tessa to get her father to say yes to inviting Leo and Phil. She can tell he’s not a big fan of Phil. But she knew he’d say yes in the end, because how could he say no to inviting people to Easter dinner who might not have family around?

“If it means that much to you,” he finally told her, which is what he always says when she wins an argument. And this time, it really does mean that much to her. She is hoping, hoping, hoping that Leo will come. Please, she prays at night, let Leo come to dinner.

It’s not until later, when she’s looking for hamburger in the freezer, that she remembers Phil calling Leo “that boy.” She can’t picture her dad calling her “that girl.” And Phil said Leo probably wouldn’t like turkey. Wouldn’t a dad know if his own son likes turkey or not?



* * *



—

THE MAN IS doing something to Leo’s head. Leo fights him. He feels wet on his head. “I just want to comb your damn hair, now that you have hair to comb!” the man says. He is holding something. Leo recognizes the comb. His dad had a comb. His comb was black. The man’s comb is the wrong brown. Leo liked to play with his dad’s comb.

“Fine,” the man says. “I give up!”

Leo picks up the comb. He runs his fingers on the points. The man says to come. Leo comes with the comb in his hand. He follows the man out the door and down a hall. The man knocks on the door three times. So Leo knocks three times, too.

The door opens. It is the girl who has Cheetos. She is wearing a purple dress that’s the right purple. Leo likes looking at the dress. He hears voices. The man is talking to the girl. “Go on in,” he tells Leo. Leo waits. When the girls says, “Leo, come,” he follows her into a place that he doesn’t know. It smells good.



The couch is the right brown. A man and a woman are sitting on it. Then he sees the rug. It has a lot of colors that are the wrong colors. But it has rows and rows of Vs and Xs. Leo sits down to look. He traces the patterns they make with the comb.

The girl’s brown hands are holding something out to him. It is a red fire truck. It makes him think of his sister from before. The gun. The terrible screaming. But then the girl turns it over. It has very large wheels. She spins them with a finger and hands it to Leo. He feels her sit down near him. He spins the wheels, stares into the turning.





Before Leo arrived—in case he did—Tessa warned her dad, Marco, and Marco’s fiancée, Maureen, that Leo is special. “He’s not normal,” she explained. “He’s, like, special ed.” She went down the list. “Don’t try to touch him. He hates that. Don’t expect him to say anything. He might, but he probably won’t. He stares at things a lot, and sometimes he rocks—”

“Tessa,” her dad had interrupted. “How do you know all this? I thought you’d only met him a few times.”

Tessa blushed. “I know from seeing the other kids like him at school,” she said dismissively. “He just seemed like a kid at school in special ed, and so I’m thinking that Leo is the same.”

Her father’s eyes lingered on her long enough to make her nervous that he didn’t believe her. The timer going off in the kitchen for the potatoes saved her.

Ten minutes later, Phil dropped Leo off. Tessa couldn’t believe it. She was so worried he might not come.

At first, Leo sat on the floor and traced the patterns in the rug with a comb he brought. “He seems like a sweetie,” Maureen offered. Maureen is super short, and her long dark hair has maroon stripes in it. She met Marco when he stopped by while Tony was giving her a tattoo. Tessa likes her because she is talkative. She’s like the opposite of shy, and Tessa thinks her dad would call her “sassy.”