Break (3 page)

“I know, I know.” She stands up, Will in the crook of her arm. “I’ll take him upstairs.”

“Thank you.”

Once she’s gone, and Will’s screams fade into her bedroom, I take Benadryl and steroids and inhalers and shit out of the cupboard and line them up by Jesse’s placemat. It’s not easy to open the pill bottles with one hand, but I get over it. I take two Cokes from the fridge and tromp down to the basement, palming them both in my one good hand.

Jesse is drenched and glued to the rowing machine. I toss his Coke to him and he catches it in his left hand. Coke’s about the only thing we can share.

“You’re a force, brother,” I say.

“Don’t I know it.” He scratches his neck, but stops before I can yell at him. He says, “You’re, uh, kind of slurring your words, there.”

“I know, I know.”

Jesse follows me upstairs, throws the pills down his throat and chases them with a mouthful of Coke. I pour a glass of orange juice for myself and fill a cup from the tap for Jesse. I really feel like an omelet, but you can’t fry eggs when Jesse is home. Airborne proteins and all that. Crazy stuff.

The whole kitchen smells like his sweat. Sixteen-year-old guys smell like deodorant and fast food. Then you turn seventeen and you get fresh.

“You making oatmeal?” he asks.

“Yep. I’m going to drink it through a
straw
.”

“Bad. Ass.”

“Don’t I know it, brother.”

I figure if I’ve got to eat stuff Jesse’s allergic to right in front of him—and if I didn’t, I’d never eat—I should make it something gross whenever possible. It’s hard to be jealous of oatmeal.

The water boils and I dump a packet of instant oatmeal in a bowl. Jesse watches me shave bananas and cinnamon while he makes his smoothie. Fake milk. Protein powder. Vitamins he needs to get and can’t otherwise. Applesauce. He blends and the concoction turns brown. Just like every day.

I suck out the thinner bits of the oatmeal through the straw. Jesse drinks and watches me, snickering.

“Shut up.” I wipe my lips. “Do you have practice today?”

He nods. “Hockey’s, like, our whole life right now. We’re totally falling behind in school and shit.”

Jesse always speaks about his teams like they’re standing right next to him.

“Are you working tonight?” he says.

“Mos def.”

“Despite the . . . decrepitude?”

I shove him off. “It’s not like I’m running marathons or anything. Scan, receipt, repeat.”

“I know. I know.”

“Max and Antonia will be impressed with the injuries anyway. It’s so fun to come in after a disaster. You’re the battered war hero. You’re famous.”

“Brother, you think I don’t know?” Jess raises his hands. “I can’t eat. I’m famous already.”

Will shrieks. We exchange looks.

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger,” Jesse deadpans.

“Exactly. Exactly.”

Self-improvement through adversity . . . it isn’t bullshit. Exhibit A: my little brother. I can see every muscle in his stomach and shoulders.

He checks his watch. “I’m going to shower. Am I driving?”

I hold up my arm. “Well, I can’t exactly, can I?”

Jesse laughs. “At least I get something out of this.”

Jesse. This is not about you.

But I love the damn boy. So I let him go shower, then dump the rest of my oatmeal in the sink.

“JO-NAH,” NAOMI SING-SONGS.

I wave her away, pulling up my feet so I’m cross-legged on the hood of her station wagon. Jess clambers up next to me.

I point to the page in my hand. “Bleachers here?”

“Yeah. But make it cool and architectural.”

I sketch in a bunch of triangles, I. M. Pei style. Good thing I’m left-handed.

Naomi says, “Smile for the camera, Jonah.”

I look up and give her camera my biggest wired-shut smile.

She says, “Jesse.”

He flips her off and she sticks out her tongue.

“Come on, Jess.” She hits her zoom button. “Be cute.”

He laughs, and she says, “There we go.” She switches the camera to me. “What are you doing, Jonah?”

I draw a hard line. “I’m designing an ice rink for Jesse.”

“My little future architect.” She zooms in close to me, and I duck. “When are you gonna be famous, Jonah?”

“When my physics grades come up.”

Jess says, “Add a supply closet there. But don’t make it ugly.”

“I never make anything ugly.”

Naomi jumps out of the way to avoid being hit by an incoming car. It’s heading for the space next to us. I catch sight of the driver and smile.

“I’m jumping,” I say.

Jess says, “Don’t.”

“No, I am. Nom, get this filmed.”

As soon as the car starts to brake, I leap from Naomi’s hood and land squarely on the trunk of the other car with a huge thump. Charlotte shrieks inside and whips the door open. “What are you doing?”

Jesse is laughing so hard he’s got his arms around his stomach to keep from splitting in half. Naomi giggles, and the camera shakes.

Charlotte runs over and shoves me in the chest. “You could have broken my car, you psychopath!”

I smile and tweak her on the nose. “Frankly, Charlotte, I don’t give a—”

“Ugh, I hate it when you do that.” She waves at the camera. “Hey, Naomi. Jesse.”

His cheeks blush pink. Even my celibate brother isn’t resistant to Charlotte’s charms. Nobody is.

She leans over and kisses me on the cheek. “I’m late for Bio, and you’re late for Calculus.”

“All the more reason to hang out here with me.”

She squints, examining me. “Naomi was right. You do look pretty awful.”

“Thanks, babe.”

She’s not my girlfriend. I call everyone babe.

Seriously. Charlotte is not my girlfriend.

She touches my face. “You’ve got a black eye.”

Naomi shuts off her camera in disgust. She likes me, and likes Charlotte, but isn’t a fan of the two of us together.

I say, “Yeah, I painted it on this morning. Thought it made me look kind of badass.”

Charlotte says, “Mission accomplished. What’d you use, makeup?”

“Yeah. Jesse’s.”

Jesse squawks, and Charlotte laughs. Naomi pulls her baseball cap down farther and rolls her eyes.

I continue. “He’s a cross-dresser on Saturday nights. You didn’t know? He goes to karaoke bars and struts around to ABBA. He’s like six foot five in high heels.”

Jesse shrugs and pulls his feet up on Naomi’s fender. “It’s true.”

Charlotte lifts her finger toward my cheek. “So I could just rub this off—?”

I jerk away. “It’s actually this kind of makeup that hurts when you touch it.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Jesse’s into the S and M.”

She winks at him. “I knew that kid was twisted.”

“Yep. He’s got a freaky soul under that allergic exterior.”

She turns to him. “You don’t really—”

He shakes his head apologetically.

I say, “Ha-ha, no. Although I should start telling people he does. He’d probably appreciate people recog-nizing him for something other than his immune system.” I hand him what I’ve finished of his ice rink, and he looks it over, his smile widening.

Charlotte leans over and whispers in my ear. “My sister thinks he’s cute.”

“That’s adorable. We’ll have to do something about that.”

Naomi stands on her tiptoes to be seen. “As precious as this is, looks like I’m going to have to bail before I vomit.”

Jess hops off Naomi’s car and walks with her toward the building. “You’re both going to be late,” he calls to Charlotte and me.

I look at Charlotte and shrug one shoulder. “You want to be late?”

She rolls her eyes at me and hurries to catch up to Jesse and Naomi. I smile and follow her.

“WHAT ABOUT YOUR NECK?” NAOMI SAYS, FLIPPING
through her Google printouts.

I spin my combination. “I know. The plan still has a few kinks to work out.”

“And skull?”

“Okay. So yeah, there are a couple I’m not real anxious to break.” I open my locker and stuff eight pounds of physics homework into my backpack. My binder explodes and papers pour to the ground. “Shit. You want to help with this, Nom?”

She fixes her cap and doesn’t bend down. “Look. I’m fine with taking some film of you fracturing a few fingers and toes, all right? Not so anxious to watch my best friend die for a prank.”

Great. For Naomi it’s a prank. For Jess it’s an attention ploy. They really know how to personalize my actions. For themselves.

Marten Conway stops and touches my shoulder. “Jesus Christ, McNab. What the hell happened to you?”

I scoop the papers up in my good hand. “Tripped off Mount Everest.”

“Yeah, clearly. You’re just a little mess nowadays, aren’t you?”

“I’m clumsy.” I smile politely, hoping this will be enough to eschew him. I’ve got nothing against Marten, but this whole tragic hero thing can get tiring. Especially when it comes from everyone you know. All day.

“I’ve got to get to work,” I tell Naomi as Marten saunters off, shaking his head at my state. “Can you drive me?”

She smiles and looks over my shoulder. “Ask your girlfriend.”

I know who it is without turning around. I hear the clack of her red flats, and my jaw hurts from trying not to smile.

But ritual is ritual. I raise my voice and say, “Charlotte is not my girlfriend.”

“That is so mean.” Charlotte elbows me in the back. “I would never say you weren’t my girlfriend.”

I turn around. “Hello, not-girlfriend.”

“Hey, not-boyfriend. Need help?” She scoops my papers off the ground. What an angel.

“Thanks, babe.”

She hands me a pile of shit and I cram it in my backpack. I turn to Naomi. “I still need that ride.”

“Get Jesse.”

“He’s in practice until three thirty. And I’ve got a shift at three.”

“Call your mom.”

“Busy with Will.”

“Then ask your girlfriend.”

I shrug my shoulders to Charlotte, wearing my hopeful face.

She smiles and tips her ponytail over her shoulder. “Yeah, I can take you. Meetcha at my car?”

“Okay.”

Charlotte walks away, and I laugh at Naomi. “You thought she’d say no.”

“Fuck yeah, I did. Watch, she’s going to come in pregnant tomorrow. And you’re gonna be sweaty, and saying, ‘Oh, man,’ over and over again.”

“Relax, you. It’s a ride home, not a naked romp. You’re like a fucking Desperate Housewife sometimes.”

She scrunches her mousy little face. “That ‘fucking’ was so out of place.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got fucking-rollover minutes. I’m full to burst, here. I can’t cuss at home, and I can’t cuss in front of Charlotte.”

“Sure. You won’t cuss in front of her, but you’ll bone her till she bleeds.”

“She’s a virgin. They bleed, Nom. Not that you’d know.”

“Fuck off.”

“We don’t bone.”

“You think about it.”

“Of course I think about it.” I blow air inside my wrist cast to quell an itch. “If I didn’t think about it, I’d need to be taken in for hormone testing.”

“You disgust me,” she says, and stomps away in those ugly-ass combat boots.

My Jesse-sense is tingling. Half the time it’s bullshit—okay, more than half the time—but I still don’t like to take chances. I take out my cell phone and hit 2 to speed dial him.

He doesn’t answer. I call back and he gets it on the second ring. “Hello?”

He’s out of breath, and his voice is muffled through half his hockey gear.

“What up, brother?” I say.

“I’m in practice, Jo.”

“Oh, right.” And I hang up. He’s fine.

Charlotte leans against her car. The iris she’s stuck into the base of her ponytail droops a little to the side.

Every day, she puts a fresh real flower in her hair. She wears her beauty like I wear my casts.

“Pop in,” she says, sliding into the driver’s seat.

I sit down beside her and prop my backpack on my lap. Some of the Tweety Bird trinkets and sheets of balled-up paper shower down from her dashboard onto me, but I don’t mind. “Thanks for this, babe.”

“No problem. Consider it thanks for not actually destroying my car this morning.”

I smile. “That was hilarious.”

“Hilariously scary. I thought I’d been hit by a meteor.” She starts the car. “Guess you can’t drive with the cast, yeah?”

“Well, I can. I just can’t steer so well.”

“Oh.”

“But I can drive, you know. On sidewalks and over pedestrians and stuff.”

She giggles, her dark pink lips drawing together over her teeth. We’ve bantered like this since sophomore year and she still always breaks.

But every time she holds out for longer and longer.

We didn’t start bantering exclusively until this September.

“So,” she says, and brushes a curl behind her ear. “So what really happened?”

“Oh, you mean—” I gesture over my wrecked body.

“Yeah.”

“Skateboard. Trying out this tricky jump with Naomi and—bam.”

Technically, none of this is a lie.

“Ouch.”

“Uh-huh.”

“How many bones have you broken now?”

“Oh, I don’t know.”

Ha, ha.

“It’s got to be, like, ten,” she says.

Puh.

“Man.” She flicks her eyes to me behind her fancy glasses. “You and your brother are just little medical disasters, aren’t you?” She frowns. “Or was that a faux pas?”

I smile to show her it’s okay and sit back in the car seat. “Nah. He’s way more disastrous than I am.”

“You think?”

“But, I mean . . . he’s been okay. He hasn’t had an ER visit this whole month.”

“And you’re going on how long?”

“Okay, like twenty hours. Point taken. But it’s not the same.”

“My sister thinks he’s amazing.” Charlotte glides into the left lane.

“You know his middle name’s James,” I say.

“Seriously?”

“Uh-huh. Jesse James McNab.”

“That’s wicked.”

“Yeah. My parents used to like outlaws. Now they’re just middle Americans,” I stretch. “How old’s your sister?”

“Fourteen. Freshman.”

“Jess is sixteen.”

“I know. But he’s . . . relatively innocent, isn’t he?”

Well, sure. He can’t exactly go mouth-to-mouth. At least not with girls who eat. I should set him up with a nice anorexic.