Gone, Gone, Gone(5)

Lio isn’t exactly grungy, but he’s definitely more hardcore something than I am. At least, he’s into ironic T-shirts—the one he’s wearing now has a picture of a football with SOCCER over it—and jeans that sit too low on his hips. Usually black ones. I’m either preppier or lazier. I still wear the kind of clothes my mom said looked good on me when I was ten. Except I’ve grown nearly a foot since then, so I look older than fifteen, but I feel younger, and I think that’s a big source of trouble for me.

It’s five o’clock, and this is the last station we’re covering today. Our hands are sore from stapling up posters, and we’re still a little red because one of the guards at Shady Grove yelled at us and asked us if we had a permit or something. At every other station, we were left alone. It figures. I’ve never met a nice person at Shady Grove, ever.

We go up the escalator and into the outdoor area underneath the awning. “We could catch a bus,” Lio says, though I don’t know why, because I assume we’re going to get on the metro and go back to Forest Glen, where I live, and he already said his dad would pick him up, no problem. I would be excited about the idea that he’s coming home with me if it didn’t mean that he was going to see my house without animals, so I made up some lie about how my parents don’t let me invite friends in when they’re not there so we’ll just have to wait on the porch until his dad gets there, and I think maybe he knew I was lying and maybe he thinks I don’t want him there. But it’s just because of the animals. That’s all it is.

It’s just that I haven’t invited anyone in for a really long time, I guess.

Anyway, there’s no reason either of us should catch a bus.

Then he says, “We could get on a bus and go really far away.”

I put my hand on his back. “Like New York?”

“Like outer space.” He stiffens a little under my hand, so I take it away.

I try not to think about it, but I really don’t know what I’m doing with Lio. I guess we’re friends, sort of, except we don’t really talk. We’re the closest either one of us has to a friend, because I can’t stand most people anymore and Lio left all the people who were used to him in New York, and it’s pretty damn depressing until you consider that I really like being with Lio, and I hope he likes being with me. And we do spend a lot of time together. I don’t know if Lio’s into boys. It seems like a stupid question, because I don’t know what difference the answer will make. The question isn’t whether he’s into boys. The question is if he’s into me. I know lots of gay boys, after all—I’m in drama club—but here I am without a boyfriend.

It’s starting to get dark. If the clocks had changed already, it would be Todd-coffee black out here by now. I guess we’re lucky.

There are two guys, definitely older than us, slumming on the gate that separates the metro station from the church. Actually, they’re not slumming. One of them is sitting on the gate and the other is swinging it back and forth, like he’s rocking him to sleep. Except they’re laughing.

A part of me loves Glenmont. I love the water tower here so much more than the one back at Forest Glen, which is short and fat and always looks like it’s watching everything. Here, everything’s dirty in a beautiful way. Grimy, I guess, is the word I’m looking for. Everything’s covered and maybe protected by a layer of grime. I wish we went to school here instead of in Forest Glen, where all the houses and schools are tucked into little neighborhoods, like we have to hide. My school and my house are both in that one part of town, so it’s like I can’t ever get out of it.

“There’s no way the animals would have gotten this far,” I say. “They don’t even know how to ride the metro. We should just go home and look there.”

So we head back and get off the metro at Forest Glen and start walking toward my house. Todd’s car is in the driveway. There goes my home-alone excuse.

“My brother can drive you home,” I say.

He shakes his head. “Dad’s coming at five fifteen.”

“Oh.”

“And it’s, um, a little past five fifteen.”

I guess that’s good, because I don’t think either he or Todd would really enjoy being stuck in a car together. Lio isn’t known for responding well to normal social cues, never mind Todd’s neurotic ones.

I guess I should invite Lio inside while we’re waiting. That’s not a big deal. It’s just into the kitchen.

Lio says, “Craig.”

I look up as he scurries under a bush and comes out with a little white kitten. Sandwich.

She’s the newest of my animals. I was at the vet picking up antibiotics for Marigold, and she was there in a little box with four sisters, her eyes begging me, hold me hold me hold me, and I’ve never been able to resist that, ever, and now I take her from Lio and I have her. She’s home. She didn’t go far. She was just waiting for me.

She mews.

“Yours?” he asks.

I nod, because I’m not sure I can talk right now, or that I could say anything but Sandwich’s name if I did. She’s so dirty, and little bits of sticks cling to her. She looks up at me and mews again. I pet her cheek with my thumb, and then I give Lio a big smile.

He strokes her head for a minute, then says to me, very quietly, “Happy?”