“What are we, girlfriends now?”
“All right, whatever. Don’t tell me.” Lucas headed toward the bedroom section to see what was there.
“Hold up,” Ryan said. “Sorry. I’m just not much of a, you know, talker. About stuff like that.”
Ryan sat down at the small kitchen table. Lucas came back and sat across from him. Their knees hit. The table was barely visible under piles of magazines and notes.
“She came into work one night about a month ago.”
“You have a job?”
“Part-time valet at the Tiki Tower.”
“That crazy-looking hotel?”
Ryan nodded. “I parked her car. We flirted. She was still at the bar with her friends when I got off, so we hung out and that was pretty much it. Dad was getting sick of her hanging around, I think. But she has roommates she can’t stand, so we never go there.”
Lucas tried to picture his brother wearing a lei, exchanging pleasantries with strangers. It was not an easy scene to imagine. “Shouldn’t you be in college?”
“I am. Also part-time,” Ryan said.
“Her, too?” It dawned on Lucas that he might actually have to go to . . . high school?
“She’s taking a year off. She has this business that’s actually doing okay. She sells these retro/vintage-type iron-on T-shirts on the Internet. Mr. Magoo and Betty Boop and all that stuff.” He gestured to Lucas’s shirt. “The Wonder Twins.”
Lucas looked down. “Never heard of any of them.”
Ryan shrugged and got up. “Anyway, I was thinking about seeing if she wanted to move in and start paying rent. Then hopefully you can start pulling your weight, too.”
“How am I going to do that?” Lucas asked.
“I don’t know. You can flip burgers, can’t you? Mop floors? Whoever had you obviously taught you some basic skills. Or go on TV or something. Make some cash off your sad tale.”
“Why are you so mad at me?” Lucas himself lit with anger, could almost hear the swoosh of it igniting. “Like one minute you’re not, then the next second, bam. This rage of yours—directed at me—is just out of line.”
Ryan started crying.
Full-body sob.
That was unexpected.
Lucas waited it out, didn’t know what else to do.
Avery had looked like she was about to cry, too.
Then Ryan said, “I don’t know, man. You’re my brother and I want to believe you and be normal.” Wiped his nose with his bare arm. “But how do I know? How do I know you didn’t kill him? How do I know how to even act around you?”
“I’m as confused as you are.” Lucas moved to a small sofa.
First her—Avery—not trusting him.
Now this.
“What do you want me to say, Ryan? That I’m sorry?” He looked up at his brother. “I’m sorry I came back?”
I’m sorry I don’t remember your brother.
Ryan shook his head, the tears having gone as quickly as they’d come. “Everyone’s like, ‘What do they remember? Do they remember anything?’ ‘Oooh, it’s so awful they don’t remember anything.’ Want to know what I remember?”
“I have a feeling you’re going to tell me.”
“I remember the day Billy Harrington spat in my face on the bus when I was in fourth grade. I remember Dad trying to read Harry Potter to me, and he was so drunk that pretty much every word sounded like ‘Dumbledore.’ I remember counting to like a thousand or singing ‘Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall’ in my head to survive bus rides with bullies in middle school, and then using those same strategies to deal with Dad and Opus 6 and his having me work with him on it for hours. I remember this guy John Deniro, who was always so mean to me and then one day I was a jerk back and then he ended up getting hit by a car and I felt awful about it for years, even though he’d been this awful, awful person. I remember being made to eat food I didn’t like, and night after night of going to bed early just to get away from Dad, even though I wasn’t tired, and I’d just lie there wondering when my life was, you know, going to get better. When things were going to change. I remember sirens and blood and dead bodies being dragged out of the school after the shooting. My friend Liam was dead. Everybody crying and screaming. That’s what I remember. I remember being here.”
Headspins:
BLOODY BACKPACK GUN CAROUSEL.
Lucas worked to still his mind, then tried to imagine his brother—younger, bored, miserable, picked on, grieving, everything—then half smiled. “Thought you weren’t much of a talker.”
Ryan gave him the finger, shook his head, sort of smiled, too.
“I didn’t know,” Lucas said. “I’m sorry you went through that.”
“You were there, too. There was like an open house for families who were starting kindergarten the next year.”
“I don’t remember.”
“Shocker.” Another half smile.
“Did they at least catch the shooter?” Because justice helped. It had to, right?