Everything, Everything (13 page)

Olly watched the color fade in the glass and remembered the day his dad got fired and how he’d been too afraid to comfort him. What if he had, would things be different now? What if?

He remembered how his dad had said that one thing doesn’t always lead to another.

He remembered sitting at the breakfast bar and stirring the milk and chocolate together. How the chocolate turned white, and the milk turned brown, and how sometimes you can’t unmix things no matter how much you might want to.

A TALE OF TWO MADDYS

“YOUR MOTHER WANTS
to know if I’ve noticed anything different about you lately,” says Carla from across the living room.

I’m watching the first
Mission: Impossible
movie with Tom Cruise. He plays a superspy, Ethan Hunt, who leads a double, sometimes triple, and sometimes quadruple life. It’s toward the end and Ethan has just unmasked himself, literally, to catch the bad guys.

Carla repeats herself, louder this time.

“And have you?” I ask, pausing the movie just as Ethan is pulling off his incredibly realistic face mask to reveal his true face. I tilt my head to one side for a better perspective.

Carla grabs the remote from my hand and hits pause. She tosses the remote into the corner of the couch.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, feeling guilty for ignoring her.

“It’s you. And that boy.”

“What do you mean?”

She sighs and sits. “I knew it was a mistake letting you two see each other.”

She has my full attention now. “What did my mom say?”

“Did you cancel a movie night with her?”

I knew I shouldn’t have done it. She looked so hurt and disappointed, but I didn’t want to wait until after nine to IM with Olly. I can’t get enough of talking to him. I’m overflowing with words. I’ll never come to the end of all the things I want to say to him.

“And she says you’re distracted all the time. And you ordered a lot of clothes. And shoes. And she almost beat you at some game that you always win.”

Oh.

“Does she suspect?”

“That’s all you’re worrying about? Listen to what I’m telling you. Your mother is missing you. She’s lonely without you. You should’ve seen her face when she was asking me.”

“I just—”

“No,” she says, holding a hand up. “You can’t see him anymore.” She picks up the discarded remote and clutches it in her hands, looking anywhere but at me.

Panic sends my heart racing. “Carla, please. Please don’t take him away from me.”

“He’s not yours!”

“I know—”

“No, you don’t know. He’s not yours. Maybe he has time for you right now, but he’s going to go back to school soon. He’s going to meet some girl, and he’s going to be
her
Olly. You understand me?”

I know she’s just trying to protect me, just as I was trying to protect myself a few short weeks ago, but her words make me aware that the heart in my chest is a muscle like any other. It can hurt.

“I understand,” I say quietly.

“Spend some time with your mother. Boys come and go, but mothers are forever.”

I’m sure she’s said these very same words to her Rosa.

“All right.” She hands me back the remote. Together we watch the unmoving screen.

She pushes down on the tops of her knees with both hands and rises.

“Did you mean it?” I ask her when she’s halfway across the room.

“Mean what?”

“You said that love couldn’t kill me.”

“Yes, but it might kill your mother
.
” She manages a small smile.

I hold my breath, waiting.

“OK, fine. You can still see him, but you have to get some sense into you. You understand?”

I nod my agreement and turn the television off. Ethan Hunt vanishes.

I spend the rest of the day in the sunroom away from Carla. I’m not angry at Carla, but I’m not
not
angry either. All my doubts about keeping Olly a secret from my mom have vanished. I can’t believe that one canceled date with her almost led to my not being able to see Olly again. Before, I was worried about keeping secrets from her. Now, I’m worried about not being able to have any secrets at all. I know she’s not upset that I bought new clothes. She’s upset that I didn’t ask her opinion and bought them in colors that she didn’t expect. She’s upset with the change she didn’t see coming. I resent and understand it at the same time. She’s had to control so many things to keep me safe in my bubble.

And she’s not wrong. I
have
been distracted when I’m with her, my mind constantly tuning into Radio Olly. I know she’s not wrong. But still I resent it. Isn’t growing apart a part of growing up? Don’t I even get to have this bit of normalcy?

Even so, I feel guilty. She’s devoted her entire life to me. Who am I to throw that away at the first sign of love?

Carla eventually finds me for our 4
P.M.
checkup.

“Is there such a thing as sudden onset schizophrenia?” I ask.

“Why? You have it?”

“Maybe.”

“Am I talking to good Maddy or bad Maddy right now?”

“Unclear.”

She pats my hand. “Be good to your mama. You’re all she has.”

FREEDOM CARD

UPSIDE DOWN

NORMAL PEOPLE PACE
when they’re nervous. Olly stalks.

“Olly! It’s just a handstand. Against a wall. I’ll be fine.” It’s taken me an hour to convince him to show me how to do one.

“You don’t have enough wrist or upper body strength,” he grumbles.

“You used that one already. Besides, I’m strong,” I say, and flex a single bicep. “I can bench-press my weight in books.”

He smiles a little at that, then mercifully stops pacing. He flicks his rubber band as his eyes scan my body, mentally critiquing my lack of physical fortitude.

I roll my eyes as dramatically as possible.

“Fine,” he sighs, with equal drama. “Squat.” He demonstrates.

“I know what a—”

“Concentrate.”

I squat down.

From across the room he checks my form and instructs me to make adjustments—hands twelve inches apart, arms straight with elbows pressed against my knees, fingertips splayed—until I’m just right.

“Now,” he says, “shift your weight forward just slightly until your toes come off the ground.”

I shift too far and roll head over heels onto my back.

“Huh,” he says, and then presses his lips together. He’s trying not to laugh, but the telltale dimple gives it away. I get back in position.

“More shift, less tilt,” he says.

“I thought I was shifting.”

“Not so much. OK, now. Watch me.” He crouches down. “Hands twelve inches apart, elbows against your knees, fingertips splayed. Then slowly, slowly shift your weight forward onto your shoulders—get those toes off the ground—and then just push yourself up.” He pushes up into the handstand with his usual effortless grace. Again I’m struck by how peaceful he is in motion. This is like meditation for him. His body is his escape from the world, whereas I’m trapped in mine.

“Do you want to see it again?” he asks, flowing back to his feet.

“Nope.” Overeager, I push forward into my shoulder as instructed, but nothing happens. Nothing happens for about an hour. My lower half remains firmly anchored to the ground while my upper arms burn from the effort. I manage several more unintentional somersaults. By the end all I’ve gotten good at is not yelping as I roll over.

“Take a break?” he asks, still trying not to smile.

I growl at him, lower my head, and push forward again into another somersault. Now he’s definitely laughing.

I remain flat on my back, catching my breath, and then I’m laughing along with him. A few seconds later I crouch back into a squat.

He shakes his head. “Who knew you were this stubborn?”

Not me.
I
didn’t know I was this stubborn.

He claps his hands together. “OK, let’s try something new. Close your eyes.”

I close them.

“Good. Now, pretend you’re in outer space.”

With my eyes closed he feels closer, as if he’s right next to me instead of across the room. His voice slides up my neck, whispers into my ear. “See the stars? And that asteroid field? And that lonely satellite going by? There’s no gravity. You’re weightless. You can do anything you want with your body. You just have to think it.”

I tilt forward and suddenly I’m upside down. At first I’m not sure I’ve done it. I open and close my eyes a few times, but the world remains inverted. Blood rushes to my head, making me feel heavy and light-headed all at once. Gravity pulls my mouth into a smile and tugs my eyes open. I am wonderfully foreign in my own body. My upper arms begin to wobble. I overtilt from the vertical position and my feet touch the wall. I push off to reverse my direction and fall back into a crouch.

“Awesome,” Olly says, clapping. “You even held it for a few seconds. Pretty soon you won’t need the wall at all.”

“How about now?” I say, wanting more, wanting to see the world the way he does.

He hesitates, about to argue, but then his eyes meet mine. He nods and crouches down to watch.

I squat, shift, and push up. I’m unstable almost immediately and begin to fall backward. Olly’s suddenly right next to me, his hands on the bare skin of my ankles, holding me steady. Every nerve in my body migrates to where he touches. The skin under his hand sparks to life, every cell alight with feeling. I feel as if I’ve never been touched before.

“Down,” I say, and he gently lowers my legs until they’re back on the ground. I wait for him to move back to his corner, but he doesn’t. Before I can think better of it, I stand up and face him. We’re only three feet apart. I could reach out and touch him if I wanted to. I move my eyes slowly up to his.

“You OK?” he asks.

I mean to say yes, but I shake my head instead. I should move. He should move. He needs to go back to his side of the world, but he doesn’t and I can see in his eyes that he won’t. My heart beats so loudly that I’m certain he can hear it.

“Maddy?” My name is a question and my eyes move to his lips.

He reaches out his right hand and grabs my left index finger. His hand is rough, uneven with calluses, and so warm. He rubs his thumb once across my knuckle and then cocoons my finger in the palm of his hand.

I look back down at my hand.

Friends are allowed to touch, right?

I disentangle my finger so that I can entangle all the others until our palms are pressed against each other.

I look back up to his eyes and see my reflection there. “What do you see?” I ask.

“Well, the first thing is those freckles.”

“You’re obsessed.”

“Slightly. It looks like someone sprinkled chocolate across your nose and cheeks.” His eyes travel down to my lips and back up to my eyes. “Your lips are pink and they get pinker when you chew on them. You chew on them more when you’re about to disagree with me. You should do that less. The disagreeing, not the chewing. The chewing is adorable.”