Seven Ways We Lie(33)

“Fancy.” I unroll the poster, flattening its edges under a pair of textbooks. “Man, I want to go to London. Mexico’s on my to-visit list, too. I’ve never been out of the country, so.”

“Yeah?” Matt says. “I’ve visited Mexico a few times, for, like, two weeks at a go, but I always feel so fake-Mexican, ’cause I’m only half. I haven’t lived there or anything, so all my Mexican relatives think of me as white-bread American.”

“Do you speak Spanish?”

“Claro que sí.”

“Aha,” I say. “Yo también, sort of.”

Matt smiles, pulling off his beanie. His messy hair falls across his forehead. “So, this poster thing. Should—”

“Matt?” says a voice.

I look over my shoulder. The cutest child in the world, probably, stands in the doorway. A mop of dark hair tops his tan little face, and unlike Matt’s, his eyes are bright blue. When he sees me, his mouth shuts, and he takes a step back.

“Hey, Russ,” Matt says, standing. “You came down the stairs by yourself?”

“I can climb down stairs,” Russ says, the picture of three-year-old indignation.

I grin. Matt lifts his hands. “Right, obviously, my bad.” He points to me. “This is Olivia. Want to wave hi?”

Russell flaps a hand frantically at me. “Hi. My name is Russell.”

“Hey, Russell,” I say. “Nice to meet you. I like your house.”

He doesn’t reply, looking back to Matt with pleading eyes.

“What’s the matter, Russ?” Matt says.

“I want car. The car was . . . the car was too high. I tried to climb.”

“Oh jeez, don’t climb your shelves,” Matt says. “I’ll get it for you.” He glances at me. “Give me a sec?”

“Sure,” I say. “I’ll start this.”

“Thanks.”

As he vanishes into the hall, I start writing INFERNO across the top of the poster. I know perfectly well how to spell inferno, but I catch myself starting to draw the wrong letter twice. Something about these giant, red, unsubtle letters makes the word stop looking like a word.

Matt returns before I finish the N. “Sorry,” he says, sitting down. “I gave him a bunch of stuff to keep him busy, but three-year-olds are sort of, you know. Attention-thirsty.”

“He’s adorable.”

“Yeah, I know,” Matt says. “And he’s super smart for his age. I couldn’t do actual sentences until I was five or some shit, but Russ already knows words like—what did he say the other day?—‘effective’ or something. And ‘philosophy.’ It’s crazy th—” He cuts himself off. Something in his eyes happens, like shutters closing, hiding away the fondness. “Anyway.”

I fight back a smile, returning to the poster. “You’re a good brother.”

“What?”

“You are. You’re, like, enthusiastic about him. It’s cute.” I glance at him, but he avoids my eyes. “Um,” he says.

We sit in silence for a second. I examine him—his narrow brown eyes, his thick, heavy brows—and our phone conversation swims back to the forefront of my mind. I want to tell him how Kat acted last night—progress!—but he could so easily turn back into the kid from English class, the too-cool-to-care guy. He could say, Oh, I was high on Thursday, and dismiss it.

“So,” he says carefully. I tense up. I don’t know why or what I’m expecting him to say.

“What’s up?” I ask.

After a second, he picks up one of the sheets of paper strewn across the poster. “I—nothing,” he mumbles. “Nothing. I, uh, I didn’t finish reading Inferno.”

“Oh. Right. Me neither.” I cap my marker. “I’m a slow reader.”

“Really?”

“You surprised?”

“I don’t know,” he says. “I guess I am, a little. ’Cause you’re smart.”

I grin. “Hey, thanks, but I’m also slower than a slug in quicksand. Anyway, I got a bunch of themes and stuff off SparkNotes, so we can put the important bits on here.”

“I did start it, though,” he says. “I swear, I read like fifteen cantos.” He sounds so urgent, you’d think his Inferno progress was the only thing standing between us and Tartarus. A hint of intensity shows in his face, too, the corners of his thin mouth tightening.

I tilt my head. “I mean, I believe you.”

“Right.” He flaps the sheet in his hand. “Right, I . . . yeah.”

I look down at the poster for a long second, not thinking about the project at all. “Hey, um,” I say.

Matt meets my eyes. I’ve never seen a brown that clear. Like dark honey, or amber, with something bright crystallized deep in the center. The tightness in my chest winds up.

“I wanted to thank you, I guess,” I say. “For talking on Thursday. I . . . yeah.”

He sits quiet and still. I hold my breath, praying he won’t shrug it off. Talking with him felt like it meant something, late at night like that, quiet and unexpected. I don’t know why I mentioned Mom like that, in retaliation, but he didn’t throw it back at me. He traded me a little piece of his life, instead, and that deserves a thank-you, in my eyes.