What's Mine and Yours(72)

“You think it’s a problem?”

“It’s different. Like a mystery. But it’s cool—not everyone gets to know you.”

Gee shrugged. “I don’t know. Nobody says everything they think.”

Noelle smiled. He had caught her in her own lie.

“You want to go out after rehearsal?” she said, and proposed Cedar’s, the sandwich shop at the bottom of the hill.

Gee wondered what Noelle wanted, why she had picked him.

“Don’t you have a boyfriend? That goth kid?”

“So?” she said.

“My grandma is picking me up.”

“That’s fine. She can come, too.”



Linette drove them to Cedar’s in her grimy golden sedan. The day was bright and breezy, and they sat at a picnic table outside. He and Linette shucked off their jackets and gulped their sodas while Noelle waited in line for their food. Linette didn’t comment, but her eyes on Gee made him squirm, as if he were doing something naughty, and she was happy to be his accomplice.

“Come on, Linette,” he said finally.

“What’s that? What did I do?”

“She’s just my friend.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“How could it be a date if you’re here?”

“That’s a good point.” She winked at him. “How could it be?”

Linette paid for their food, and Noelle thanked her profusely. She did it like it was nothing, although Gee knew she hadn’t earned an income in years. But Linette seemed more awake than he’d seen her in a long time, enlivened and pleased to be out, even if the food Noelle had ordered wasn’t the kind she favored: chili dogs and Tater Tots, wings, and soggy fried okra.

“You know I used to own a bakery not far from here. Long before Cedar’s, or any of these other businesses opened up. Superfine—you ever heard of it?”

Noelle shook her head.

“Gee’s father was my baker. He was very talented, you know. Right after he died, there was a story in the paper about us. There was no picture of him to run with the article, but they had photos of all the things he made his last day in the shop—morning buns and biscuits and devil’s food. Was it cake or doughnuts? I can’t remember.”

“Doughnuts,” Gee said.

If there was something he remembered clearly about Ray, it was the food he would make for him—roast beef with melty cheese and onions, oatmeal cookies and steaming cocoa, red pepper soup, and hot cereal with mashed banana, a heap of brown sugar in the center.

“Your father died?” Noelle said.

“He looks just like him, too. When you’re looking at Gee, you’re looking at Ray.”

Gee’s eyebrows went up, disbelieving.

“I’m serious,” Linette said. “Do you know that when you love somebody it changes your brain? The shape of it. Why couldn’t it change your face, too?”

“It changes your brain?” Noelle shuddered.

“That’s why you’ve got to be careful who you love.”

Gee felt his face go hot; he started chewing on the gummy inside of his cheek. First, Ray, and then all this love talk. He shot a look at Linette.

She seemed to get the message, mumbled something about condiments, and got up to give them some room. As soon as she was gone, Noelle leapt at him with her thoughts.

“I can’t believe your father died. You seem so normal.”

“Thanks.”

“What I mean is, something tragic happened to you, and you’re all right. So solid. No one in my family is like that. My father’s a big loser, and my mother’s worse cause she keeps forgiving him. Even if she’s married to someone else. I swear it’s like a tragedy. Everybody’s so pathetic and weak.”

“You don’t seem weak.”

“It’s the all black,” Noelle said, flipping up the collar of her trench coat, and they both laughed. “I don’t even have a reason as good as yours, and I’m all messed up.”

Gee liked the way she talked about herself, so naked, so open. He had the same feeling—he had no reason to be the way he was, not after everything Jade had done, the person she had managed to become, the years that had passed, and how little he remembered.

“Maybe I’m the same way, and I’m just good at hiding it.”

“Then you’re really good,” Noelle said, her eyes the color of honey in the afternoon light. He felt an unexpected pang. She didn’t seem to notice.

“You know my favorite part of the play?”

“You really like this Shakespeare stuff.”

“Don’t you? Otherwise, why are you doing it?”

Because you asked me, he wanted to say. She had been so determined, so direct, but he hadn’t felt she was trying to push him around. It was natural to be near her, even then, standing by the vending machine while she punched in the numbers, handed him his candy.

“Okay, what’s your favorite part?”

Noelle described a part of the play Mr. Riley had cut, and Gee was amazed she’d read the whole thing. There was a scene where the drunken prisoner Barnardine refuses to be executed. The duke wants his head to play a trick on Angelo. But Barnardine simply refuses. I swear I will not die to-day for any man’s persuasion. And miraculously, everyone listens. He is left alone in his cell, and the play goes on.