Seven Ways We Lie(10)

Burke shrugs, adjusting his kilt. “It’s got nothing to do with reading, man,” he says. “I’m talking about, literally, anything. I miss when we used to do shit that wasn’t smoking, you know?” and I want to retort, but for the second time in ten minutes, I can’t find justification.

The silence stresses me out. What does he want, an apology?

At a loss for what else to do, I pull out my phone. A missed call pops up. It’s Mom. “I gotta get home,” I say, and Burke’s like, “Yeah, it’s getting cold,” which I guess is sort of true, but I’d stick out even freezing temperatures to remain in the lazy, forgiving environment of late-afternoon Paloma High, because staying here means I don’t have to go home. Also, it’s nice being around Burke, because he’s always thinking something or reading something or making something, and maybe it’s pathetic to live vicariously through my best friend, but my hobbies of sleeping, eating, and avoiding responsibilities seem lackluster by comparison. Not that I’d ever tell him that.

My phone rings. I pick up. “Hello?”

“?Dónde estás?” comes the sharp question.

I sigh and look up at the sky. “I’ll be right there, Mamá. Calm down, would you?”

She hangs up on me. Nice.

“God, she’s the worst,” I say, and Burke says calmly, “I’m sure there’s been worse,” and I give him a glare, because when he gets all reasonable like this, he makes me feel guilty about being unhappy, and that’s unhelpful at the best of times. “Later, man,” he says, rolling off my car. He buttons his peacoat, loops his scarf twice around his beefy neck, and takes off for his Jeep.

I climb off my car. By the time I slide in, Burke’s already gone. Sitting in the driver’s seat, I consider rolling another joint to calm myself down, but then I’m distracted by a glimpse of Juniper Kipling hurrying to her Mercedes, the only car left in the junior lot besides mine.

She slips in, takes a second, and starts bawling her eyes out, which baffles me, because what problems could her perfect life ever have? And couldn’t she go home to do the whole crying thing?

As I shift into drive, I feel like a douchebag for thinking that, because, to be fair, this place is basically empty, and it’s not her fault if she’s going through something personal. But hey, maybe I’m just bitter because people like Juniper have these roads set up, these highways to success. She’s going to go to Yale or Harvard or whatever, partially because she’s a music prodigy and smart as all hell, and partially because her parents are filthy rich. And me? Even if I go to college, my parents sure aren’t paying for it. Once I move out, college or not, God knows if they’ll even stay together. Last night, they argued so late, I had to go in there and ask them to cut it out for Russell’s sake. Who’s going to stick up for my kid brother when I’m not around anymore?

I stare out my sunroof at the dusk. I hate getting angry or sad or upset. About my parents. About anything. It always seems angsty and undeserved. What are you, every teenager ever? says a voice in the back of my head. Be a little original, *.

I take my time driving home.





Finally,

I am the last car here.

I am an island.


I returned here,

tugged back by some irresistible gravity, but I hit the ground too hard.

My knees have buckled,

leaving me prostrate.


Stop crying. You’re in public.

Grip the wheel tight and

drive. Don’t think. Just go.


I’m home, I say,

more a defense than an announcement— because this place is not home anymore.

The only voice to whisper back is the cuckoo clock, click, tock, cuckoo, crazy.

Crazy, because I hear notes in the silence, gentle baritone notes, and no matter how fast I play,

how far my fingers stretch,

how purely the vibrato resonates, I cannot overwhelm the remembered sound.

The bow trembles in my right hand, and under my left, my pizzicato slips.

Start again. Again. Over again.


Those two, trying so hard, they cannot know.

Those two, they will never guess.

Every day I have sat like stone at a slab of polished pine, back-straight/legs-crossed/elbows-in/eyes-down, dodging questions and hiding from warm voices.

It’s been months since I could speak truthfully to those two— months since I could speak at all without fear tightening my tongue, and still they call our house a home.

I am displaced. A watery weight, shifting, my cup dribbling over.


How have I measured these seven days alone?—in breaths, blinks, heartbeats?

With numbers, with questions?

No:

with tweezers, I think,

plucking time out from sensitive skin.

Second after stinging second.


I devour my meal in silence.

Last Saturday, I devoured noise and light and the motion of agitated bodies.

I drank with purpose, drank violently, drank myself to the floorboards.

Last Saturday, I forgot how to feel alone. How to feel.

I forgot clumsy fingers and maple necks, heartstrings and gut strings,

warm sheets and crisp papers.

I forgot the beginning and the end. Da Capo al Fine.

(Hold on until the weekend, Juniper—