I assumed his “what” was an invitation to enter, and I opened the door a crack to peek through.
Calvin was huddled in bed, his black comforter pulled up to his ears. The only part of him sticking out was his blond hair. I opened the door wider. He’d drawn the curtains closed and it was almost too dark. The air was still and stale, the way Warren’s bedroom had felt since he left for basic training, and it felt oppressively claustrophobic.
“You sleeping?”
“No,” he said, but didn’t sit up or throw back the covers. He was a lump on the bed, unmoving.
“Everything all right?”
“Yeah.” His voice, that one word, sounded like a long, exasperated sigh.
“I got my letter from Amherst,” I said. “I’m too afraid to open it.” I stood inside the doorway, waiting for Calvin to say something. To sit up and brush back his wild hair and smile while I opened the letter. “You don’t mind if I open it here, do you?” Nothing, not even a grunt. “All right then.”
My heart revved into overdrive again, and I forced myself to breathe slowly. It didn’t help.
I read the motto one last time. “Let them light up the world.” That’s what it translated to. Would I light up the world like Lua, or dim and fade away like the universe? Did I even want to know?
Yes. Yes, I wanted to know. I needed to know.
I flipped the envelope over and slipped my index finger under the flap. I tore it open slowly, neatly, afraid of ripping the letter inside. There was only one sheet of paper. I pulled it out and unfolded it.
“Dear Mr. Pinkerton: Thank you for your interest in Amherst College. After careful consideration of your application, I am sorry to inform you . . .” I read the rest silently, though those twenty-three words were the only ones that mattered.
The letter fell from my hand.
I looked up. Calvin had raised an arm and pulled back the comforter. I crawled into bed beside him and he wrapped his arm around my chest, and we lay there without a word between us until dark finally fell.
TOMMY
THE WALLS BREATHE. THE WINDOWS, hidden behind hastily hung plywood, creak and bow from the pressure. Beyond the walls, Hurricane Rita howls and spits, and she hasn’t even reached the apex of her fury.
“You think Big Apple will deliver?” Tommy asks.
I shake my head. “All signs point to no.”
We lie in my living room, under the sheets we hung like a tent over our heads. I wanted to sleep in my room, but Mom and Dad scuttled that plan. They were fine with Tommy spending the night, because his parents had to leave the trailer to stay with his aunt, who didn’t have enough room for him, but they sure as hell weren’t going to allow us to sleep unsupervised in my bedroom. We built a blanket fort instead, and had spent the early part of the evening repelling Renny’s attempts to destroy it.
“How long do you think this storm’s going to blow?”
I try to pull up the weather on my phone, but our Internet is dead and I can’t get a cell signal. “Most of the night, last I heard.”
“No way I’m getting any sleep.”
I wink at Tommy. “There’s lots of ways we can kill time in here.”
Tommy throws me this frown that reminds me of the faces his mother makes to tell us that whatever shit we’re selling, she ain’t buying. “Like I can think about that knowing Renny or your folks could pop in any second and catch us. You’re crazy, Ozzie.”
Kissing him, touching him, feeling his hands on my skin is all I can think about. I can’t be this near to him and not. When it comes to Tommy, I’m a junkie. “Well, if we’re not going to fool around, we have to do something. I’m bored.”
“We could play cards,” he says, though not enthusiastically.
“Strip poker?” I grin and nudge him with my shoulder.
“Is sex the only thing you think about?”
I pretend to ponder his question, then nod emphatically. “How can I not when you’re so damned irresistible?”
Tommy rolls his eyes, and we lie silently for a while, listening to the wind blow.
“Tommy?”
“Yeah?”
“How much do you love me?”
His stomach tenses. He skips a breath. “A lot.”
“You ever think about kissing anyone else?”
He hesitates, which scares me a little. “Do you?”
“I kissed Lua, does that count?”
“No,” he says. “Unless you liked it.”
“I didn’t.”
Tommy drums my chest with his fingers. “Why are you asking, Oz?”
“Bored,” I say. “Curious, I guess.”
“Truthfully,” Tommy says. “I have thought about it.”
It’s not the answer I want. I know he’s never been with anyone else, but it hurts that he’s considered it. And, as if he can read my thoughts, he says, “There are billions of folks in the world, and, yeah, sometimes I think about kissing some of them. But you’re the only one I do kiss.”
“I just thought . . . I guess if you loved me a lot like you said, you wouldn’t want to kiss anyone else. But I guess that’s dumb.”
Tommy doesn’t speak for the longest time. I know he didn’t fall asleep, because I can hear his jagged breathing and feel him flinch every time thunder cracks. All around us, Rita wails. She’s supposed to make landfall as a Category Two—these are just the feeder bands passing over us—but meteorologists had predicted she could stall off the coast to suck up some of our warm Atlantic water before crashing into us as a Cat. Three or Four. Mom wanted to evacuate, but Dad talked her out of it. She was sixteen and living in Homestead when Hurricane Andrew tore across Florida. I doubt she’s sleeping much tonight either.
Without warning, Tommy squirms out from under me and crawls toward the fort exit. I follow. I poke my head through the sheets, and he’s already pulled his shirt over his head and is working on his belt buckle.
“What the hell are you doing?” I ask.
But he doesn’t answer. He drops his jeans and then his boxers so he’s standing stark naked in the living room. The only light beams from the camping lantern inside the fort, and it’s barely bright enough to make out more than the dim outline of Tommy, but my imagination fills in the details.
“My parents!” I whisper, praying they don’t choose this moment to check on us or grab something to drink.
Tommy marches toward the front door, opens it, and dashes into the storm. I scramble after him. The wind blows the door in and I catch it before it slams into the wall. With no barriers between us, Rita’s yowls stab through me like forked lightning. If these are just the bands, I’m not sure the house will survive the eyewall.
“Get in here!” I holler. I shut the door behind me to keep from waking Renny or my parents, but I huddle under the awning where it’s dry. Palm fronds ripped from the trees pinwheel across the yard. An empty garbage can tumbles down the road until a nasty gust of wind catches it like a sail and lifts it into the air, tossing it a dozen feet. The driveway is already flooded; our street’s a river. And in the middle of it is Tommy, naked. Water past his ankles. His arms raised over his head. He sways like a reed as the wind blows.