If You Really Love Me (8 page)

I cringe, shrinking down in my seat. “Why didn’t you tell me she was home?” I whisper at Cary.

“Mom, stop eavesdropping,” Cary shouts at her.

“Who’s eavesdropping? You’re talking so goddamned loud I can’t hear the television. Keep it down. Hello, Ellis.”

“Hi, Auntie Jeanne,” I call back, feeling the burn in my face and neck.

Cary waves her off. “So was the sex really good?”

“We didn’t actually have sex.” I say that loudly so Auntie Jeanne (she was never Ms. Baker to me) will know it. When she mentions to Mom that I was making out with a guy in the apartment—and she
will
mention it—she can pass on the no-sex bit too.

Cary looks disappointed. “Why the hell not? You had the dude right there, and it sounds like he was ready.”

I lower my voice. “Mom was out on a date, and there was no telling when she would get back. You know what she would have done if she walked in and saw—”

“Ohhh,” Cary says, getting it. He shivers himself, apparently imagining Mom’s reaction. Mom has never hit me in front of him, but he’s seen how angry she gets.

“But Saul is amazing, man. Today, at school, he cut class to sit with me on my lunch period. He went out of his way to walk me to a couple of my classes. And in Botany, he sat right next to me. He likes
Avatar.
I’m talking about the cartoon series, not the movie. Can you believe all that? After school, he came home, and we watched the first episode together. And we kissed some more before he had to go. This guy
likes
me, man. I still can’t believe it.”

“Sounds like you’re on your way to having your first boyfriend. I’m impressed. You finally grew a pair and went for it.”

I give him a little sneer, just a bit miffed. “That’s something for you to say, an eighteen-year-old straight dude who’s never had a girlfriend.”

“Hey, there’s a difference. You never tried to hook up with a guy before. I’ve been hitting on girls since I was thirteen. It’s not my fault they couldn’t see what a great guy I am.”

“Whatever. Any luck with the job search?”

Cary’s face seems to fall, and that makes me sorry for bringing up the subject. “No. Even with the Christmas shopping season opening up, there just isn’t anything out there for me. I’m giving up the search.”

“Come on, Cary. You can’t do that.”

“Ellis….” He pauses and then looks away. “Got something I’ve been meaning to tell you.” He sighs and looks at me again. “I’m moving out.”

It feels as if he suddenly switched to a foreign language. “What? What did you say?”

“Mom and I talked it over with my gramps. He says he can get me a job working at this movie theater in his neighborhood. He knows the manager. When Grampa leaves for home after Christmas, I’m going with him.”

“All the way to Phoenix?” Just saying the name of the city makes my head hurt. “For how long?”

He lifts his shoulders in a little shrug. “For good, I guess.”

A
REAL
friend, a decent human being, would be happy and supportive. I guess that’s not me. I left Cary’s apartment without offering him one word of encouragement. I’m sitting on the fire escape, staring into the darkness, fear stinging in my chest like heartburn. I’m not afraid for Cary, moving hundreds of miles away to a new city. All I can think about is what my life will be like without him. We’re as close as brothers. We’ve always been there for each other. We’ve never said it aloud, but we love each other. I know
he loves me as much as I love him. For the past two years, he has been the
only
friend in my life, the only friend who stuck with me, the only person I can really talk to.

What am I going to do without him?

The cold air is freezing me. I get up, climb the rest of the stairs, and let myself into the kitchen. Mom is at the sink, filling a vase with water. She looks happy.

“Hi.” I rub at my arms, trying to generate warmth.

“Come here,” she says quietly.

I walk over to her, and she gives me a little swat in the back of my head. “Stop going outside in the cold without your jacket on,” she says, smiling. She unwraps a huge bunch of flowers from a green paper sleeve and puts them into the vase. “See what Breeze gave me?”

“They’re pretty.”

She looks at me. “What’re you so down in the mouth about?”

“Cary’s moving to Phoenix.”

“Yes, I know. Jeanne told me.”

I want to ask why she didn’t tell me, but I don’t.

“Ellis, for God’s sake, don’t cry.” She takes me firmly by the chin. I swallow hard a couple of times, sniff, and look down at the floor until the burning in my throat goes away. Mom lets me go. “People move on,” she says. “That’s life. Cary’s a young man now. He’s doing what a young man should, leaving the nest. You want him to do what’s best for him, don’t you?”

I nod because I don’t trust my voice right now.

She gives me a one-arm hug and then pats the side of my face. I can’t keep thinking about Cary and Phoenix. I have to get my mind on something else. “How’d you wind up with the flowers?” I ask.

“Breeze sent them to my job. The girls were shocked. So was I.” Mom starts rearranging the flowers in the vase. Her cheeks get red, and her face gets that swept-off-my-feet look some of the girls at school get when a guy does something romantic for them. “No one’s ever sent me flowers before.”

“Breeze must really be something.” My voice is a little shaky. I clear my throat. Hunger has been gnawing at me for a while now. Since there are no grocery bags in sight, it’s obvious Mom didn’t do any shopping on her way home from work. I cross to the fridge and look in. It’s just as bare as it was yesterday. And the day before. And the day before that.

“You’re on your own for dinner tonight. Breeze is taking me out.” She picks up the vase of flowers as if she’s going to hug it. “Don’t wait up.”

She heads for her room to get ready for her date. I make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

T
HE
ALARM
goes off at six thirty. I reach over and slap the off button. I slide out of bed in my underwear, my head still foggy with sleep, and take a leak in the bathroom. After washing my hands, I walk down the hall to Mom’s room.

Her room is empty, and her bed hasn’t been slept in.

S
AUL
IS
waiting right next to my locker. He grins at me as I walk up. His grin slowly fades.

“Hey. You okay?” he asks.

“Yeah.” Even though I’m so glad he’s here, I have to make myself smile. I dial in the combination on my lock.

“What’s wrong, El?”

“Nothing.” I open the locker, slip the backpack off my shoulder, and put it on the floor.

He keeps looking at me.

“It’s just… my best friend is moving out of town for good after Christmas.”

His face softens from worry to sympathy. “Man. That’s a big bummer.” He grabs my shoulder with his hand and gives me a little reassuring squeeze right there in the hall with other kids around.

“I’m being a big baby, I know. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what? If one of my best friends moved away, I’d be down too.”

“We’ve been friends practically since we were born. Cary’s always been there for me.” I start to take off my jacket but a sudden wave of sadness hits me and I slump forward, resting my forehead against the locker’s door.

Saul slides his arm around my shoulders. “Well, I know I can’t take the place of your best friend. But I’ll be there for you, man.”

A
PATTERN
develops. Mom goes to work, and she goes out with Breeze. Between her job and her dating, I hardly see her. In a few days, I use up all of the groceries I bought. Saturday, I go back to Southern Market, but Mr. Luigi isn’t there. Two of his sons are running his booth. They say he went out of town for an old friend’s funeral. They don’t offer me any work and seem annoyed that I’m distracting them from their customers, so I leave.

I spend the last of my money on a box of limited edition pumpkin pie flavored Pop-Tarts. There are six packets of two pastries each in the box. Opening one packet for breakfast and one packet for dinner, the Pop-Tarts take me three more days. Mom keeps forgetting to go to the supermarket, and I know that’s because when she gets off work, the only thing she can think about is seeing Breeze. The few times I do see her, I don’t say anything about groceries because she’s so happy, and I don’t want to ruin that for her. I stop by a few fast-food joints where I have already applied for a job and been turned down. The managers tell me they still don’t have any work for me.

Usually, in a situation like this, I would go down to Cary’s for a meal, but I’ve kind of been avoiding him. I’m not avoiding him out of anger; I’m not mad at him, I swear. I’m staying away from him because I have to get myself used to not having him around. Otherwise, I think it would be too much of a brain shock to go suddenly from him being right downstairs to him being completely gone. I might have a stroke or something.

But there’s Saul. At school, he manages to spend time with me between our classes, even if it’s only for a few seconds to exchange smiles. Kids at school are beginning to talk. I see them looking as if they don’t quite know what to make of us—like we’re a couple of extraterrestrials and they’re trying to figure out what planet we’re from—and then they whisper among themselves. I don’t care what they say about me, but I do worry over what they think of Saul now that he has so openly shown that he likes me.

He drives me home every day, and we watch an episode of
Avatar
together. We do homework together. We make out. We make each other laugh. In just a little under two weeks, he’s become the brightest spot in my life.

He comes to the rescue. On the Monday before Thanksgiving, we’re sitting on the sofa in my living room while he’s working on his iPad to pull up the next episode of
Avatar.
“I’m starved,” he says. “How’s about a peanut butter sandwich?”

One thing I’ve noticed about Saul is that he doesn’t eat a whole lot of “regular” food, at least when he’s around me. Most times when we have a snack, he pulls out one of the protein bars he keeps stashed in his jacket. He does seem to like peanut butter, however, and I feel bad having to turn him down. “Sorry, man. I don’t have any peanut butter.”

“No problem. You got an apple or banana or something?”

I shake my head. “Mom hasn’t had a chance to do the grocery shopping.”

He gives me a long, silent look that is almost suspicious. “Come on.”

He takes me to the supermarket and hands me forty bucks and tells me to get what I need. Looking at him holding out that money to me fills me with so many different feelings. I want to laugh and cry and kiss him and shout. But I’m also ashamed because I suspect he thinks Mom and I are just too poor to buy food right now. Finally, I take the money and say, “Thanks. I’ll pay you back.” Even though I have no idea how I’ll do that.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says. “Let’s just hurry up and get done so we can go back to your place.” He winks at me. “I’m ready to cuddle.”

That makes me feel so warm inside that I sigh. There’s sort of a pain in my chest as I look at him, but it’s a good pain. Saul is such a great guy. And I begin to wonder, am I falling in love?

L
ATE
T
UESDAY
night, I’m sitting at the kitchen table finishing up my homework when Mom puts in a rare appearance. Her key rattles in the lock, the front door opens, and she calls out, “Ellis?”

“In the kitchen, Mom.”

She walks into the kitchen a few moments later, having taken off her jacket, hat, and gloves. “Hi, there. How’s it going?”

“Everything’s okay.”

She opens the fridge, probably ready for a glass of wine, and freezes. “Where’d this food come from?”

“I bought it.”

She puts a hand to her face and turns to me. “Oh my God. I forgot to get groceries. Ellis, I’m so sorry. Why didn’t you remind me?”

I shrug. “I didn’t want to bother you.”

“Where’d you get money to buy this?”

“My friend Saul gave it to me.”

For the first time in a long while, she gets a glimmer of anger in her eyes. “You shouldn’t go around asking your friend for money to buy food. I would have bought groceries. All you had to do was remind me.”

“I’m sorry, Mom. But I didn’t ask. Saul just gave the money to me. I swear.”

“Okay. All right. Don’t get so panicky. How much did he give you?”

I tell her.

“Well, I’ll give you the cash, and you make sure you give it back to him. You hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am. I will.”

She gets the wine bottle from the door of the fridge and a glass from the cabinet. Her face looks peaceful again as she pours the wine and takes a sip. “Saul. That’s the guy you’ve been dating, isn’t it? How’s that going?”

“Great. I like him.”

“Enough that you want to have sex with him? Jeanne told me you’ve been bringing him up here when I’m out.”

Warning signals are going off in my head.
Be careful what you say and how you say it.
“I bring him over, Mom, but I promise you we don’t have sex. We watch TV shows and do homework.”

“And the two of you fool around too. Don’t deny it. Jeanne heard you talking to Cary.”

Now I shut up and just sit there, hunched over a little, my hands under the table. And I wait for whatever comes next.

Mom sits down across from me at the table, which surprises me. She takes another sip of wine. “I’m not stupid, Ellis. You and this Saul guy obviously like each other, and your hormones are on fire. Jeanne’s worried about what you could be getting yourself into, and so am I. You and I have had that talk about all the things sex can lead to. You have sex with this guy, you damn sure better be careful. Otherwise, five minutes of fun can ruin your whole life.”

“I know, Mom. But really, Saul and I are not having sex.”