“No, I mean, to not have to touch anybody. I hate being touched. Especially by strangers. You know, like when someone coughs and then they want to shake your hand afterward?” He pulls a face. “No, thank you. But you don’t have to deal with that.”
“Yeah, I guess not.”
He looks back down, like he said all he wanted to say and that’s the end of our conversation. I glance over his shoulder.
“Is that a comic book?”
“Yes,” he says, without taking his eyes off it.
“X-Men?”
“Of course.”
I wait a few beats, not wanting to bother him, but I don’t have any other work to do, and I’m curious. Not about the comic book, really. But about him. He’s different. So matter-of-fact. Always says what he’s thinking. I like that.
“What’s it about?”
But before he can answer, the door opens and Eric rushes in. “I’m here! I’m here,” he says. “I’m sorry I’m late.” Flushed pink from the cold, his cheeks have a ruddy, almost boyish quality.
I glance at the clock. It’s only 7:05.
“S’ok,” I say, still smiling from my conversation. “We were just”—I look back at Aja, but he’s reabsorbed in the comic book—“ah, talking.” I straighten up from where I’ve been leaning against a stack and start walking toward the break room to get my coat. I’m not sure if I’m imagining it or if I can actually feel Eric’s eyes on me. And if I’m warm because I’m self-conscious or because his gaze feels like the sun.
“Aja, you ready, bud?” he says as I reach the break room.
When I come out a few minutes later, they’re both standing by the front door. Aja’s got his coat on, his head hanging down, but Eric is looking at me.
I pick the keys up from the desk and walk toward them.
“Thank you,” he says. “For doing this.”
“It’s really no trouble.”
He nods. “Still.” He turns to the door and opens it, allowing a blast of cold air to rush in. I click off the lights, turn to make sure I haven’t missed any, and then scoot through the door that Eric is holding into the dark night. I step to the side while he lets it fall closed and then move to lock it under his watchful eye, while Aja heads to the car.
“So,” I say, trying to shake off the feeling that I’m under a spotlight. “Did we finish? With the Notebook discussion?”
He laughs. “I think I was done when you compared it to Shakespeare,” he says. “Seriously, though, people don’t really talk that way to each other.”
“It’s based on a true story,” I say lamely. His left eyebrow is an arrow pointing to his hairline.
He sighs as we walk to get my bike from the rack. “I guess I’m worried that Ellie loved it so much—that it sets up this crazy standard for love and relationships that doesn’t really exist.”
I consider this. I don’t know anything about love and relationships, but I do know that books and movies can create unrealistic expectations. After reading Pippi Longstocking as a child, I became convinced my dad would just show up at the front door one day with some plausible explanation of why he’d been gone my entire life—maybe marooned on a South Seas island like Captain Longstocking. And yes, it was depressing when I was old enough to accept the truth. But then I think what life would be like without these fantasies. These hopes.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Isn’t childhood the time to be idealistic? The time to dream? She’ll have plenty of time to be a cynic when she grows up.”
He lifts his chin. “How do you do that?”
“What?”
“Take everything I think and turn it on its ear.”
My throat tightens at the compliment—at least, I think it’s a compliment, because of the way he’s looking at me. And I realize it’s not just like I’m normal, the way he’s looking at me. It’s like I’m reciting five hundred decimal points of pi from memory. Like I’m a marvel. Just for saying what I think. My gut clenches and then flips, and I look down at the black tar of the parking lot. Specks of it twinkle like diamonds under the street lamp. And I wonder if this is what people mean when they say they’re falling for somebody. That it feels like your stomach is actually falling out of your body. I mean, not that I am. Falling for him.
The moon is bright tonight, like a perfectly round lightbulb framed by the car window. Aja notices it too, and because I’m still having trouble looking directly at Eric, I’m relieved when Aja and I fall into a conversation about space travel.
“Did you know the original tapes of the 1969 moon landing were accidentally erased by NASA?” I’m pleased when he says he didn’t, and then our discussion devolves into conspiracy theories, mostly about aliens and the Montauk Project, a purported government research project in Long Island similar to Area 51, which he seems to know a lot about for a ten-year-old.
When Eric pulls into the driveway, I finally garner the courage to turn to him. “What’s next?”
My question interrupts his thoughts and he looks at me blankly for a second before responding.
“Oh, um . . . some Stephen King book,” he says.
I pause. “Which one? I don’t do horror.”
He laughs. “Well, my daughter does. She’s read three of his—Carrie, Misery . . . and another one. I think it’s a woman’s name.”
“Dolores Claiborne?”
“Yeah, that sounds right.”
“Let’s do that one. It’s more of a psychological thriller.”
“There’s a difference?”
I laugh at his confused look. “Yes.”
“OK, do you have a copy at the library? I’ll check it out tomorrow.” We get out of the car at the same time, and he walks to the trunk to get my bike out.
“I’m sure we do,” I say. “And I think I’ve got a copy somewhere. I’ll look tonight.”
“In those massive piles in there?” he asks, nodding toward my house. “You’re actually going to attempt to move them? You’ll get buried alive.”
“Ha-ha,” I say. “Very funny.”
“I’m serious,” he calls over his shoulder as he walks my bike up to the gate. “Those stacks could topple over at any time.” He sets it down and walks back toward me. “If you’re not at work tomorrow, I’m calling a search party.”
I smile up at him, aware of the two feet of space between us and my conflicting feelings regarding it—how it feels like not nearly enough and entirely too much at the same time. “Thanks for the ride,” I say, and turn to walk up the path toward the front porch. My stomach flips again and I put my hand on it to steady it. And then I remind myself, as I’m fitting the key in the lock, that it’s the exact same way I felt when Donovan leaned in to kiss me so many years ago.
Right before I almost died.
seventeen
ERIC