Gone, Gone, Gone(53)

“I’m scared,” I say.

“Oh, shut up. You’re going to be awesome.”

“You’ve never heard me sing. I could be horrible.”

“You certainly give your voice plenty of rest.” He smiles at me.

It’s true, I’m still pretty quiet, even though I talk a lot more than I used to, especially to Jack and Craig. But I’m never going to be a chatterbox like them.

“I’m going to cheer for you when you’re done,” Jack says. “Like, really loudly and obnoxiously. I might actually stand up and do that really loud clap, with cupped hands? Purely to piss you off.”

“I might kill you.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“I might . . . castrate you or bring you to a gay bar.”

“I’ve experienced one of those already. You can probably figure out which one.”

“Hmm . . .”

He still has me in a headlock when the head auditioner, the sparkliest, shiniest boy imaginable, says, “Lio?”

Jack releases me and gives me a high five. Break a leg.

He smiles at me the whole time I’m onstage. I sing the best I can. I don’t forget the words. The sparkly boy smiles and thanks me. Jack jumps to his feet and cheers, and I love every minute of it.

I get the first spot in the program. Not too shabby. Plus, it’s f*cking first.





CRAIG

I’VE FOUND ALL THE ANIMALS EXCEPT FOR ONE. My guinea pig, Peggy.

I will still go out looking, and I’ll still wait for calls from the shelter, but I am not going to make it my whole world. I can’t. I have too many animals and too many things in my life to pour all of me into a lost guinea pig. I will imagine her in a warm new home with new owners. I will worry about her sometimes.

I will let her go.

It’s like a voice in my head has said, enough. Or, as Lio would say, “Let it be.”

Maybe the voice in my head is Lio.

Tuesday morning, before school, I tell all of this to Dad in this voice that doesn’t sound nearly as hopeful as I would like it to. Dad tells me Todd would tell me not to kill myself, and he takes me out for pancakes before Lio wakes up.

“I feel so bad,” I tell him. “I should have been looking out for them better. I was pretty much a pretty shitty . . . whatever I was to them, I was pretty shitty about it.”

He says, really softly, “Craig.”

“Peggy should have been in a cage.”

“You had a cage for her?”

I nod. “She should have been in it. I should have put her in.”

“Craig,” Dad says. And he takes a deep breath. “You had to let her out of the cage. I . . . kid, in a way, I’m glad this goddamn break-in happened.”

My chin shakes. “Why?”

He puts my hand on my shoulder. “To let you out of your cage.”

So that’s it, really. I will need to deal with this. I’ll still miss Peggy all the time, but I need to keep going where I’m going.

So here is what I have.

Four dogs.

Eight cats (but I think I am going to give the kittens away).

Two rabbits.

One mouse.

A koala.

I get out of the car to feed the animals who are here to be fed and Dad turns on the news. I hear Lio’s alarm go off upstairs. His alarm is so loud because that boy can sleep through anything. He says it’s a consequence of growing up with six girls.

A bus driver was shot, fifteen minutes ago. Close to here again. Standing on the steps of his bus. And the news decides this is the time to read a bit of the note that the sniper left on Saturday. Do not release to the press, it says and here they are, releasing it to us. This feels like the worst idea in the world. The note says:

Your children are not safe, anywhere, at any time.



My breathing hurts.

I say, “I’m not going to school today,” as Lio trudges down the stairs, rubbing his eyes. Mine feel like they’re catching fire. I don’t like this. I don’t like this and I really don’t like that note.

Dad is watching me and he says, “Okay.”

“What’s going on?” Mom says. She’s coming down the stairs behind Lio. She kisses the top of his head, and he gives her a sleepy smile before he turns his focus to the news.

He takes a second to process what’s going on, then he puts his hand on my shoulder.

“I’m scared,” I say. I blurt it out. Here it is. I don’t know why I’m scared now, surrounded by walls, with my parents and Lio right here. But I am. This should be the place where I’m safe. This should be it.

He gives me one of those small smiles he used to give me back when he didn’t talk. His eyes are so close to me that for a minute I think I’m looking in a mirror, even though his eyes are blue and I know mine aren’t. I realize how scary it would be if Theodore was still around. And how amazing. And I feel for a minute like I’m going to cry, but it passes, because Lio’s still looking at me.

He whispers, “Want to hear a secret?”

I nod.

“You’re safe with me anywhere, at all times.”

It turns out, our “anywhere” is the basement, and our “at all times” is the entire day. We don’t go to school. We play checkers and make out. My parents are upstairs watching the news. And even though it feels like the entire world is freaking out, and even though the entire world is really just our area, and no one else anywhere gives a shit, and they definitely don’t give a shit that there are two boys making out in a basement, that’s what we are, we keep doing it, and there is something sort of beautiful about the fact that we keep doing that even now that we know it’s not what the world is about.