Authors: Michael Barakiva
Alek started running down the steps to the basement.
“I’ll meet you downstairs in a sec, okay?” Becky called out. Alek grabbed and popped open two Diet Dr Peppers from the little basement refrigerator. Becky loved Diet Dr Pepper so much, Alek sometimes saw her drinking it on the way to school in the morning. Her parents had tried to limit her intake, so Becky had taken to hiding cans in her room to make sure she could get her fix when she needed to. To Alek, Diet Dr Pepper tasted like Becky’s basement.
Alek took his usual position on the sofa: on the right, with his feet up on the table. A few minutes later, Becky came down and sat next to him in her usual position: feet crossed on the sofa, snuggled into the corner between the back cushion and the armrest. Alek noticed she’d swept her hair back and taken her socks off.
“So, tell me what’s going on,” Becky said cautiously, as if Alek were the one who’d acted crazy the last time they hung out.
Alek recounted the entire Algebra class story, from the moment he noticed the mistake on the chalkboard to the way the bell rang the moment the incident was over. He took his time in the telling, hoping that by pretending that things were normal between them, things would become normal between them. He even impersonated Mr. Weedin’s British accent, knowing that Becky would get a kick out of it.
“He sounds just like Henry Higgins from
My Fair Lady
!” Becky said.
“That’s exactly what I thought!”
“And this just happened today?” Becky asked.
“Yeah. I was walking home, and I passed your street, and I thought that there was no one in the world that I wanted to tell this to more than you.”
Becky’s eyes widened. “Really?”
“Of course, Becky. I don’t think something counts until I’ve told you. These last few days made me realize how much I miss you, and how much you mean to me.”
And she leaned over and kissed him.
Not a friendly, peck-on-the-cheek-because-we-got-into-a-fight-and-now-we’re-making-up kiss. A full mouth-on-mouth kiss. The kiss lasted for a few seconds before Becky disengaged. Her face was still alarmingly close to Alek’s, and he had to go cross-eyed to see her. Her eyes were wide. Alek had never seen them so wild.
Alek didn’t know what to do, so he just sat there. He didn’t mean to be encouraging, but that’s how Becky must’ve taken it, because she leaned in again. Before her mouth could land on his, Alek put up his hands. He knew he couldn’t kiss her again. “Don’t.”
Becky pulled back immediately, as if he’d shoved her. The excitement drained from her eyes, and her body went rigid. “I thought you wanted…”
Alek tried to choose his words carefully. “I don’t know. If this. Is a good idea.”
Becky’s expression hardened. “Look, Alek, I think you really have to figure out what’s going on here. Last week, you asked me if I’ve ever done something that scared the shit out of me. Then you blow me off for a week, and now you show up and tell me how much I mean to you, and how important I am…” Becky’s eyes welled with tears. “Why are you messing with me like this?” she asked him.
“I’m not! I swear!” Alek couldn’t understand what was going on. “I thought we were going to make up, not make out!” He could taste Becky’s peppermint lip gloss on his lips. He couldn’t believe that a few seconds ago her mouth had been on his. “You
are
my best friend, and you
are
that important to me—”
“I think you should go,” Becky said, looking away from him. He could see she was exerting all of her willpower to keep the tears from spilling out of her eyes.
“But—”
“Alek. Go.”
He had never heard such finality in her voice. Even last winter, when her grandfather died, she hadn’t seemed this upset. Becky stood and ran up and out of the basement. He could hear her on the floor above him, then climbing the steps to the second floor of the house. Alek sat for a moment, unsure of what to do. He poured the rest of his Diet Dr Pepper down the basement sink, then tossed the can in the Boyces’ recycling bin. He climbed up to the main floor of the house intending to continue up to Becky’s room to bang on her door until she let him in. But then he saw she’d hung his book bag on the front doorknob. He got the message.
Alek made sure the door locked behind him.
* * *
The next day at lunch, Alek decided the cafeteria was the room he hated most in the world. The relentless fluorescent lighting gave everything a flat greenish hue, and even without the terrible school food being served, the place still smelled like wet socks. At least during the school year he had Becky to sit with and discuss the minutiae of their lives. But that kiss had changed everything.
Alek didn’t know why it had unnerved him so much. He had kissed girls before. Maybe not recently, but that’s because all of the freshman girls wanted to date upperclassmen boys, and the upperclassmen girls wouldn’t even look at a freshman. In middle school, he’d had two girlfriends—Gail in seventh grade and Linsay in eighth. He had kissed Gail a few times and had made out with Linsay pretty seriously after Spring Fling. He still remembered the way she smelled that night, like flowers and sweat.
When his parents decided he couldn’t try out for the tennis team, Alek promised to practice every day anyway. He hadn’t kept his promise as religiously as he had wanted to, but more often than not, he’d made the time to hit against the wall in the basketball courts, run through his drills, or even get Jason or Matthew to volley with him. He missed tennis so much that he created the opportunity to have it in his life.
But that’s not how he felt about kissing girls. It just wasn’t something that he’d spent any time thinking about in high school. And when he asked himself why, he couldn’t come up with a good reason. Probably, like everything else, it was another side effect of the misery that the last year had been. When high school stopped being a living hell, Alek figured, he’d get back to dating.
“What’re you eating, dude? That shit smells funky.”
Alek looked up and saw Ethan leaning on the other side of the cafeteria table, his blue eyes staring at him intensely. Alek’s heart started racing.
“What?” He choked.
“I said, what’re you eating? That’s no hoagie.”
Alek wanted to die. Finally, Ethan was talking to him, and the first thing they were going to discuss was the weird food his parents packed him.
“This is Armenian string cheese,” Alek said, holding up a long braid of white cheese flecked with black spots.
“Like Polly-O?”
“Um, sorta. You unwrap it like this.” Alek demonstrated by unpeeling a strip of the cheese down the length of its spiral braid. He was grateful to have something to do.
“What’s that black shit?”
“The specks? They’re spices. They give it a little kick.”
“Lemme see.” Ethan shone a miniature LED bulb attached to one of the chains looped around his low-hanging cargo shorts and used it to examine the cheese.
“You come prepared, don’t you?” Alek observed.
“Jewelers use these lights to inspect diamonds. They’re perfect for when you’re clubbing, and it’s dark and the music’s blasting, but you need to see. You know?”
Alek nodded his head knowingly, although he’d never actually been clubbing.
“And more importantly,” Ethan continued, “they’re perfect for investigating unidentified speckled cheese. Can I try it?” he asked solemnly.
“Go for it,” Alek answered with an equal amount of solemnity.
After a few attempts, Ethan got the hang of unraveling the cheese. “This tastes pretty awesome, man. Definitely better than the shitty slices of American my dad picks up at the supermarket.”
Alek felt a wave of gratitude wash over him, for everyone from his father, who packed today’s lunch, to the Armenian who first invented string cheese.
“Anyway, dude, I just wanted to thank you for doing me that solid.”
“That what?”
“You know, a solid. It means…” Ethan searched for the definition. “Basically, it means you did me a favor, and I wanted to give you props for that. Like if I said, ‘I wanna give my boy Alek a shout-out for doing me a solid in Mr. W’s Alge class.’ It means ‘thank you.’
Capisce
?”
“Cap what?”
“
Capisce.
It’s how mobsters say ‘understand?’” Ethan looked at Alek with surprise. “Don’t you watch TV?”
“My parents only let me watch half an hour a day.”
“What!”
“Yeah. They think television is rotting the minds of the people in this country.”
“So what do you do?”
“Well, I used to play tennis. And I go to the movies.”
“Your parents don’t think that movies are rotting the minds of the people in this country?”
“They probably do, but at least this way they get me out of the house.”
Ethan laughed. Alek couldn’t believe how quickly Ethan morphed from being an unapproachable D.O. to someone he could talk to.
“Anyway, dude, thanks. If I don’t pass Alge they’ll make me repeat, and that wouldn’t fly well with Father, ya hear?”
“I hear,” Alek responded, playing along.
“And thanks for the cheese, Polly-O.”
“It’s not Polly-O. My parents would never buy Polly-O.”
“No, fool. That’s gonna be my name for you from now on. ’Cause like string cheese, you’re wound up tight.”
Alek’s heart sank at the description.
“But you also got flecks that give you flavor.” Ethan winked.
And his heart soared again.
“Peace out, Polly-O.”
Ethan made his way back to his cafeteria table. Alek could see the elastic band of Ethan’s underwear peeking out of his shorts, almost as if the purple 2(X)IST label were winking at Alek and anyone else bold enough to witness it. Looking down at his own boring denim shorts, Alek could never imagine wearing pants that low, especially since Principal Saunder’s dress code prohibited them. During the school year, it might even earn Ethan a suspension, but in the summer, everything was looser.
* * *
Walking to school five days later, Alek braced himself as he passed Becky’s street. It’s not like he thought she was going to be waiting for him or anything, but seeing Orchard Street reminded him of how he and Becky still hadn’t talked, and he knew that the more time that passed, the harder it would be. He supposed he could’ve reached out to her, but since she’d been the one who kicked him out of her house, he thought it wouldn’t kill her to make the first move.
Alek reached the train station and decided to risk being a few minutes late to English so he could witness the 8:17 on its way up to the city. He ran up the stairs to the platform.
“Check it, Polly-O!” he heard a familiar voice call out from the other side.
Ethan! Looking across, he saw him hanging off the railing on the opposite side of the station, his book bag casually slung over his shoulders.
“Hey, Ethan!” Alek called back. Seeing him made Alek smile.
Ethan looked around conspiratorially, and then beckoned to Alek to come to him. Alek ran up the overpass and found Ethan examining a New York City subway map.
“Have fun in Alge today. And don’t mention the running-into-me thing, okay?”
“What do you mean?”
“Figure it out, Polly-O. I’m at a train station. When school starts in fifteen minutes, you’re going to be sitting in some lame-ass classroom, and I’ll be on my way to the Big Apple.”
“You’re cutting?” Alek asked incredulously.
“Hell yeah.”
“So why are you going into the city?” Alek said, trying to sound nonchalant. He might not be able to go there on his own, but he knew it would be way uncool to refer to it as “New York City.” Everyone just called it “the city,” as if to imply that the rest of the so-called cities, like Chicago or Los Angeles or Boston, didn’t really count.
“There’s this concert series in the park. Rufus Wainwright was supposed to play last Monday, but he got sick and had to bail. He felt so bad for his loyal fans like me, though, that he decided to do an impromptu thing today instead.”
Alek wouldn’t admit he didn’t know who Rufus Wainwright was, so he just said, “Cool.” He searched his memory quickly and came up with the first thing about New York that popped into his head. “You know, I hear there’s a great Rodin exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum.”
Ethan looked impressed. “Really?”
Encouraged, Alek went on. “Sure. I’m dying to check it out.”
A mischievous glint entered Ethan’s eyes. “Why don’t you come with me?”
“What?”
“Come with me. The Met’s right off Central Park. We can hit the concert, check out the exhibit, and be back before the bell rings.”
“No way.” Alek didn’t even have to think about it. As alluring as the idea of spending that Tuesday with Ethan in New York was, he would never cut school.
“Why not?”
“For one thing, I don’t have enough money.”
“Bullshit. You got ten bucks?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s all you’ll need.”
“But what about the ticket for the concert, or the train ride, or—”
“Shut up. I said you could do it on ten bucks, so you can do it on ten bucks. Or don’t you trust me?”
“I trust you.”
“So what’s the problem?”
Alek’s mind raced, but the sound of the train approaching in the distance was making thinking difficult.
“Polly-O, don’t be such a pussy.” Ethan raised his voice over the sound of the approaching train. “Have some fun.”
For a second, Alek actually found himself thinking about what it would be like to forget about school and his teachers and parents, even for just a day, and go on this adventure. But he just wasn’t that kind of guy.
The train pulled into the station. Ethan waited for everyone else to board, then got on. “Any chance I can persuade you?” he asked Alek from across the portal.
“Sorry, man.”
“No prob, dude. Maybe next time.” Ethan held out his hand to snap Alek’s fingers goodbye. But when their hands met, Ethan interlocked his fingers around Alek’s wrist. Ethan pulled back with all of his strength, yanking Alek onto the train. Alek, stunned, didn’t even try to break Ethan’s hold as he heard the doors
beep-beep
close behind him. Alek turned around and saw South Windsor move away as the train started speeding to New York.