With or Without You (26 page)

I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. I’ll call when I’m back in town.

I love you.

Evan

TITLE:
Squiggles

IMAGE:
Three blue squiggles and two yellow
circles on a white background

INSPIRATION:
Jackson Pollock

PALETTE:
Squiggles = aqua
Circles = sunrise
Background = milk

The blue squiggles are jagged, rough-hewn, like surgical lacerations performed by a madman. The circles are misshapen, barely circles. There is at once chaos and order, symmetry and spontaneity.

Davis was sitting next to me in art class the day our teacher, Ms. Blake, raved about the
Mona Lisa
replica I’d painted. “You’d make a killing selling forgeries,” she said with a wink. Ms. Blake was pretty and young and probably exactly the kind of teacher most other ninth graders had crushes on. Me, I was just glad for the attention.

“What you should do,” Davis said as the bell rang and we filed from class, “is take your paints down to State Street this summer and do portraits of people. Charcoal artists do it all the time. If you’re as good as Ms. Blake says, you could make a bundle.”

“I don’t think I can work that fast,” I explained. “That
Mona Lisa
took me almost two weeks of nonstop painting.”

But Davis was already gone, lost in a Boing that he was convinced would solve all our problems. Until that point, my painting had been a weird hobby to him. Suddenly, he saw it as a source of limitless revenue. Exactly what we’d been looking for so our plan could succeed.

That was the year we’d decided to disappear: leave Madison and never look back. It was one of the worst years with Pete and the trogs. Everywhere we went, they were there to dole out some new humiliation: atomic wedgies, cherry ICEE showers, or just random pummelings. And every time we’d sit down for a late-night dinner of Chinese leftovers in my room, our discussion would always storm toward escape. San Francisco came up. New York. Miami. Toronto. And each daydream dissipated when we realized that we weren’t going anywhere without money.

We tried to raise the money. But double shifts at our jobs and the occasional lawn-mowing gig wasn’t cutting it. So when Ms. Blake suggested that my work was on par with a great painter, it was only natural that Davis would see this as our next great venture. I was skeptical.

Like most Boings, I assumed the steam would run out of this one pretty quickly. Or so I’d thought.

One Saturday afternoon I trekked across town to the Phillson Art Gallery, maybe my favorite place in all of Madison. They offer free monthly art history classes; I haven’t missed one in years. That’s where I get my inspiration to study certain painters. Mr. Phillson, the curator, admires all artists. I don’t think there’s anyone he doesn’t like.

I was sitting on a bench in front of a sculpture of a silo when I heard the door to the gallery open behind me and Mr. Phillson say, “May I help you, young man?”

A squeaky voice answered. “Yeah … I, uh, wanted to sell some art.”

I froze for a moment and when I glanced over my shoulder, sure enough, there was Davis, leaning up against the counter near the front of the gallery. He was holding a small square window—a painting I had given him for Christmas the previous year. Squatting down, I ducked behind a nearby wall.

Mr. Phillson regarded the painting and then looked around, perhaps looking for a hidden camera. But then he smiled broadly and said, “I see. Is it something you’re sure you can part with?”

Davis’s eyes traced each line of the painting. “Well, it’s kind of important to me. But it’s more important that I get it sold.”

That was the first time I ever doubted Davis. Watching
him shift from foot to foot, like he does when he lies to his father, I thought the unthinkable: He was going to sell my gift to skip town without me.

Mr. Phillson studied the painting for a few seconds. “A touch of … Jackson Pollock about it?”

Davis nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah. Yeah, Pollock.” I was just glad Davis wasn’t trying to pass it off as an actual Pollock.

Mr. Phillson picked it up and held it to the light. “It’s very interesting. By a local artist?”

Davis crossed his arms and leaned in, obviously thinking Phillson was falling for it. “Yeah. Friend of mine. One of the best. Our teacher said he’s a prodigy. There’s more where this came from. He paints a lot. I can bring more in if you’re interested.”

Phillson’s face fell a bit. It was clear he now felt he was leading Davis on and that it was time to stop. “Yes, your friend is very talented. I’m just not sure it’s … a good fit for our gallery.”

Shock lit Davis’s eyes. “But I really need to sell it. Couldn’t you at least display it? You know, hang it up somewhere so that maybe somebody else could buy it?”

“Why is it so important to you?”

Davis shoved his hands in his pockets and I thought he just might shuffle out without another word. Instead, he mumbled, “My friend is really good. I want other people to know that. I
think his art will help him get out of this town. I figure if one of us can get famous or something and get out of here, it should be him.”

I never heard what Mr. Phillson said in response. My mind reeled to hear Davis tell somebody that he thought I was good enough to be famous. And that fame would get me away from Madison, from the trogs … even from him. He was willing to walk away from our friendship if he thought it would make things better for me. I had never considered that an option. Somehow, it just seemed that the only way for things to get better was to stick together.

That was how things were supposed to work.

I was torn. Part of me was touched: He was ready to end our friendship if it meant one of us—me—could be saved. But another part of me had to wonder: Was he capable of the same thing? Would he move on if he thought he’d do better without me?

Here and now, I have the answer.

The Dane County Airport isn’t exactly a major Midwest hub, so I can only score a ticket on a puddle-jumper to O’Hare where I’ll connect with the flight to LaGuardia. I’ve never actually flown before. The tiny windows look like mini canvasses. I’d love to get my paints and sketch the skies on the glass. I have a feeling the airline people would disapprove.

Waiting on the tarmac, I count six of us on the flight to O’Hare and I start to worry when the robust flight attendant—magna cum laude of the
Lord of the Flies
Charm School—begins eyeing us up to determine our weight and rearranging us in our seats. How safe is this if sitting in the wrong seat can send us spiraling to our deaths?

I shove my backpack—the one piece of luggage quickly packed for the trip—under the seat and buckle up. I lean back and close my eyes, hoping that I’ll figure out how to
find Davis once I’m in New York. I only have one clue as to where to begin and it’s a long shot.

The light through my eyelids dims and I open my eyes, expecting the flight attendant to harass me again because my inconceivably low body weight will place us in jeopardy unless I scoot a millimeter to starboard.

It’s Erik. He has a battered camouflage duffel bag slung over his shoulder. My throat closes just when I need oxygen the most. I might not survive this much happy.

He stares down at me for a long time, unreadable. I miss my DictionErik. Since I last saw him, all definitions are defunct. Time to recatalog, redefine.

He glances at the empty seat next to me.

“You’ll have to ask der Führer,” I whisper, nodding at the flight attendant. “Sitting in the wrong seat could make us all die a lot.”

I can’t believe I’m fucking making jokes. I can’t believe he’s here.

Believing is something I need to do more of.

He shoves his bag under the seat next to me as a mechanical buzz shakes the plane. The propellers rev and I catch a pungent whiff of jet fuel. Erik slides into the seat, soundlessly but bursting with color.

“Mr. Benton says you’ve made some … interesting friends.”

Once he’s strapped in, I position my hand atop my
knee, like a lure. It takes a decade, or maybe it’s a moment, but he entwines our fingers and gives me an encouraging squeeze.

We say nothing on the flight to Chicago; we just draw energy from being together again. Once we’re on the 737 to New York, I rechannel that energy and break down. I cry. I sob. And I tell him everything. My parents. Davis. Pete. Sable. Chasers. And how much I love and don’t want to lose him.

He lets me get all that off my chest and it takes almost the entire flight to paint the full picture of how terrible I am and how rotten I feel for treating him the way that I have. I’m sure once we touch ground, he’ll want to turn around and go back to Madison and that will be the last time I ever lay eyes on him again.

The only sign I get of what’s going on in his mind is when he says, “You might not have been talking about us when you asked about situations where you’re forced to hurt someone you love. But I was definitely talking about us when I said that sometimes you have to cut your losses. You need to decide if you can be honest with me. Because it doesn’t seem like there’s been a lot of that. Otherwise, I’m going to have to take my own advice about moving on.”

I don’t speak as we descend. I don’t have to. Because now he knows it all.

I always ignored Shan when she complained about how expensive it is to live in New York City.

My bad.

The price of everything is obscene and I didn’t plan well, grabbing just a handful of cash for what I assumed would be a quick trip. The cab from the airport to Shan’s apartment building in Hell’s Kitchen nearly wipes out my entire budget. Hopefully she can suggest a cheaper way back to the airport. That is, if she doesn’t mind seeing us. I sort of forgot to mention we were coming.

So when we buzz her apartment and she comes down to greet us, it’s with a mixture of happiness and confusion. I get a hug; Erik gets a nod that he returns with an equal amount of discomfort. She escorts us to the elevator and eyes our luggage. I give her the fifty-cent version of why we’re here.

She rolls her eyes. “And M and D are … ?”

“I’m off work the next couple days,” I explain. “We’ll be back in Madison before they realize I’m gone. I hope.”

Shan sighs heavily. “Let’s catch this on the replay. You hopped on a plane to New York, didn’t tell M and D you were leaving, didn’t think about how you’d get around, didn’t plan on a place to stay, and you’re looking for Davis but have no clue where he is.” She shoots Erik a blame-filled look.

He narrows his eyes and lowers his voice. “Hey, doll,
I’m just da musk-ell. Skeezix over dere, he’s da brainz.”

God, he’s sexy when he’s weird.

“You
should know better,” she snaps, again at Erik.

“Okay, the mad needs to stay over here,” I pipe in, pointing both thumbs at my own chest. “Erik was—” I stop myself from saying, “Not supposed to come,” and finish with “—a last-minute angel.”

“And there’s sort of a plan,” Erik says. “We just need a base of operations—”

“Chez Big Sis.” I smile.

“And someone who can tell us where to find …”

He jerks his thumb at me and I produce the slip of paper on which I’ve written Mrs. Sable’s address. Shan takes it and whistles.

“Seriously? This guy lives on the Upper East Side?”

I retrieve the address. “Used to.”

“Wow,” she says. “Major dough in the family.”

I’m still reeling an hour later after we’ve dropped our stuff off at Shan’s and she’s given us a subway map and instructions on how to get to Sable’s address. Given his ratty clothes, I’d imagined Sable as a bum, living out of a cardboard box in an abandoned warehouse in Harlem. Not the beautifully manicured historic brownstone that matches up with the address Mrs. Sable gave me on the phone.

We ring the bell and I almost laugh when the door
opens. Mrs. Sable has the same long face as her son, sharp cheekbones but rosier cheeks. Her curly hair spills down to her shoulders. Her gold necklace shimmers in the sun. She’s wearing a burgundy dress that stops just below the knees.

“Mrs. Sable?” I ask, even though I know there’s no mistaking her. “We spoke on the phone. I’m Evan. This is Erik.” I want to say “my boyfriend” but I take nothing for granted. “We were hoping to talk to you about Todd. Maybe get a look around his room? See if there’s something that might tell us where he is?”

She smiles in a way that’s more sincere than anything I ever saw from her son. “Of course, Evan. Won’t you come in?”

She leads us into the house and up a winding staircase. The forest green wallpaper is laced with gold flecks. A bright silver chandelier twinkles like a fallen star over the entryway. She takes us down a short hall and into a bedroom. It’s not quite the cardboard box I’d imagined but I can easily see Sable—Todd—living here.

Heavy-metal posters hang lopsided on the walls. Heaps of clothes litter the floor. A series of shelves near the window holds a ragtag collection of antiquated cameras. The bed, of course, is unmade. On a small desk in the corner sits a small pyramid made from translucent brown prescription bottles.

“I appreciated your phone call,” Mrs. Sable says, her voice heavy and soft. “I’ve been desperate for news about Todd. I can’t imagine how he ended up in Madison, but you think he’s back in Manhattan?”

“Pretty sure,” I say.

“And you came all this way to find him?” She’s a little suspicious now, probably wondering if he’s in trouble. She has no idea.