When My Heart Joins the Thousand(28)

“Balsa wood, mostly.”

“They need that. Their teeth never stop growing.”

“Yeah.” A pause. “So, uh. You hungry? I could start dinner. Or I could show you the rest of the house. Though there’s not much to see—”

“Show me.”

He leads me down a short hall. We pass a closed door, and I pause. “What’s in there.”

His expression shifts, just for a half second. I wonder if I will ever learn to read his face. It feels like watching a computer screen with code rapidly scrolling past in long green lines, too fast for me to make sense of. “Just an extra bedroom.”

I follow him to the end of the hall, through another door. He flicks on the light. “Here’s my room,” he says.

The bedspread is blue and very old, threadbare, with a pattern of yellow moons and stars faded to near invisibility. His computer, sleek and new, sits on a plain yellow pine desk. There’s a shelf next to the bed filled with model planes in every color, shape, and size. More model planes hang from the ceiling. I count thirty-two in all.

I touch the bedspread, lean down, press my face against his pillow, and breathe in. It smells like lemons. “I like your fabric softener,” I say, my voice muffled by the pillow. Then it occurs to me that he might not like me shoving my face against his bedding. “Sorry,” I say, straightening. “I should have asked permission before doing that.” Then again, asking, Can I smell your pillow? probably wouldn’t be considered normal, either.

So far, I’m not doing very well.

“It’s okay,” he says. “Really. If I seem a little uncomfortable, it’s not you. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a guest.”

This is new to him, too. Somehow, the thought relaxes me.

I tilt my head back, studying the planes hanging from the ceiling. “Did you make these.”

“Yeah. I started building models when I was a kid, and I just never stopped. I guess it’s a little silly. I mean, a grown man with a room full of toy planes.”

“I like them.” I start to reach for a dark green World War II–era fighter, then stop. “Can I touch this.”

“Sure.”

I lift the plane. It has a row of shark’s teeth and a pair of eyes painted along the nose. Most planes painted in this style are meant to look menacing, but this one is smiling. I trace the curve of its mouth. Then I turn it over, examining the joints. There’s a snap, and the wing comes off in my hand. I freeze.

Stanley winces. “Whoops,” he says, as if he’s the one who did it.

I stare at the broken-off wing. “I—I don’t know how that happened. I thought I was being careful. Sometimes it’s hard for me to judge how much pressure I’m applying—”

“Don’t worry about it.” He takes the plane and its wing from my numb hands and sets the two pieces on the desk.

I cross my arms, sticking my hands under my armpits, where they can’t do any more damage. “I’m sorry.”

“I’ll glue it back on. It’s just a toy, anyway.” He touches the plane gently, like it’s an injured child. “No big deal.” He smiles but doesn’t quite meet my eyes. “I should get dinner ready. You can watch some TV in the meantime, if you like. It shouldn’t take long.”

I follow him out of the bedroom.

In the living room, I sit stiffly on Stanley’s living room couch, listening to the clank of metal and the hiss of sizzling butter from the kitchen.

“The remote’s on the coffee table,” he calls.

I turn on the TV and flip past talk shows and sitcoms, looking for a nature or science program. There aren’t any playing at the moment, but I find a channel showing a medical documentary on brain surgery. I watch the surgeon’s bloodstained, white-gloved fingers slicing through the dura mater with a scalpel, probing the glistening, gray-pink folds of the cortex.

Stanley steps into the living room. “Dinner’s—oh Jesus.” He pales and covers his eyes with one hand.

I change the channel.

He peeks out between his fingers. “Can you really watch that stuff before eating?”

“It’s informative.” I’ve never understood why so many people hate looking at the inside of the human body. We walk around all day with blood and organs inside us. It seems silly to be horrified by something so commonplace.

He lowers his hand, still looking a little pale. “Well, the food’s ready.”

I follow him into the tiny kitchen. There’s a white cloth on the table, along with two flickering candles in silver holders. In the center of the table is a platter covered with a silver dome-shaped lid. He lifts off the lid.

“You made pancakes,” I say, surprised.

“I wanted to be sure it was something you’d like. I got five different flavors of syrup.” He waves a hand toward the row of glass bottles on the table: strawberry, blueberry, butterscotch, maple, and banana.

I can’t find my voice. There are moments when I wonder if he can possibly be real, or if I made him up. But I don’t think my imagination is that skilled.

His smile fades. “You don’t like it? I could make something else—”

“No. This is good.”

The tension eases out of his shoulders, and we sit down to eat. The pancakes are warm, tender, and chewy.