Crush

4

After dinner—another gagfest microwave nightmare from the freezer—Jonathan sat in his room, leaning over the keyboard of his computer, waiting for an MP3 file to download. His computer only had a dial-up connection, so it took forever.

Mr. Weaver’s death was on his mind. He’d seen the teacher’s pudgy face smiling out at him from the newspaper next to an article that said almost nothing about the guy’s death. He was smothered and left in a tree. No suspects. No motive. No new information.

Jonathan’s bedroom door cracked open, and his mother, looking exhausted and really old, poked her head in. He hadn’t seen her since she dropped the small plastic tray holding his dinner on a plate and handed it across the kitchen counter to him. He’d retreated to his room with the meal.

Now his mother cast an annoyed look at him, as if she’d just caught him tracking mud through the house.

“I need the phone,” she said.

“I’ll be done in a minute,” he said. “I’m downloading a file.”

“Well, I need to speak to your aunt.”

“Just one more minute.”

“Now,” she said, sounding really pissed off. “This house doesn’t revolve around you, you know?”

“Mom, it’s like one more minute.”

“Right now!”

The progress bar on his computer still showed a quarter of an inch before the song finished downloading. That could mean another thirty seconds or another three minutes the way his machine worked. It was like in the movies where a guy was waiting for a code, and if he didn’t get it in time something would explode.

In this case the something was his mother. He just didn’t feel strong enough to deal with it.

“Okay,” he said, grabbing his mouse and dragging the cursor over the box to close the connection. He jabbed the mouse button and the window vanished. “I’m done.”

His mother threw a final furious look at him. She backed out of the room and slammed the door.

Jonathan hit the desk with his palm, sending a bolt of pain up to his elbow.

Enough of this crap.

He rose from the chair and stomped across the room, threw open the door. In the hallway, he saw his mother’s shadow shrinking on the far wall. He charged forward, chasing the ever-smaller stain on the wall, following it into the kitchen and the television room, where he found his mother lifting the phone from its cradle.

Before she could even look up he started shouting.

“What is your problem?” he said. His mother stared at him, total deer-in-the-headlights startled. “Your life sucks, so you figure mine should suck too? Well, forget it. You’re miserable because you let yourself be miserable. You let Dad treat you like crap. You let your boss walk all over you. You let Aunt Judy tell you what a loser you are. You take it all because you like it. If you weren’t pissed off about the world, you wouldn’t have a damned thing to talk about. So go ahead and bitch about how crappy everything is, and guzzle your gallons of Chianti, but keep me out of it. I didn’t do anything but be born. And that’s your fault too. So you stay out of my room and stay out of my life until I can bail this crap shack. Then you can have the phone whenever the hell you want, as long as you aren’t using it to call me.”

His mother broke into tears and dropped the phone.

Jonathan smiled.

But none of that happened. He didn’t even get up from his desk. He remained in front of the computer screen, staring at the icon for the song he wanted, knowing it had not had time to finish downloading. His palm still ached from the slap he’d given the desk. His stomach roiled with acid, and his head throbbed.

Screw this, he thought. Screw it all.

Bitter night air cut through the collar of his jacket as Jonathan wandered the streets of Warren. He walked past the new housing development they were building next to his apartment complex. More rich people. More kids with high-tech gadgets and high-brow attitudes. Another wave of jerks to shove him or kids like him into lockers. It didn’t really matter. Pretty soon Jonathan’s family would have to move. The rents would go up like they had in Pierce Valley, and his dad would make them pack up and relocate, this time probably to a smaller apartment. They already lived in Crossroads, the total low-rent section of town. They weren’t likely to find anything cheaper unless they moved way out into the sticks. Great. Then he’d never see David. He wouldn’t be able to get to work, either. He might have to change schools.

Then he wouldn’t even have Emma’s smile to get him through the days.

Jonathan turned up the volume on his cheap MP3 player so that music overpowered the depressing voice in his head. Cars raced by. He felt the wind of their passing but couldn’t hear them. He didn’t want to hear anything but feral singing and brutal guitars: a soundtrack for his anger.

He walked through the intersection of Crossroads Boulevard and Periwinkle Street. Five blocks down on the right was his school, a nest for idiots like Toby Skabich and Ox and Cade. Burn it down, he thought. Break it apart with an earthquake and grind the rubble under with bulldozers. He didn’t know of whom he made this request. It didn’t matter. Nothing would change. The school would be there tomorrow and the next day and the next. It was like a temple to evil. Even if it fell, the world was full of them.

And evil tastes like candy. Everyone wants a lick.

Twenty minutes later, Jonathan stepped onto the brightly lit sidewalk of the Northside Mall. It wasn’t one of those big multi-layered malls like they had in Bellevue or Seattle, subterranean bunkers for the generals of retail. It was flat and quaint with covered walkways lined with shrubs. The mall had a DVD rental shop, a bunch of clothing stores he could never afford, an ice cream parlor where a single scoop cost three-fifty, and a coffee shop, Perky’s, the upstanding suburban equivalent of a crack house.

Jonathan peered through the window of Perky’s, knowing he didn’t have enough change in his pockets for even a small coffee, and he wasn’t touching his college-escape money for such a minor pleasure. If he wanted some bean, he’d have to buy it at the Super Stop convenience store down the street.

Inside, Emma O’Neil sat at a table with three other girls. They were in the middle of a really serious conversation, probably about Mr. Weaver. Jonathan imagined walking in and having Emma call him over to the table, but the thought made him suddenly angry.

Why am I wasting my time? She hardly knows I exist. I’m like an extra on a CW drama, and she’s the star, and no way are they calling me back for a second episode. It’s a stupid crush. Pointless. God, why can’t I obsess on a teen pop diva or something? That way, I wouldn’t have to see her every day, in the flesh, in the now, in the ridiculous fantasy my stupid head keeps building.

He grew angrier with himself. He couldn’t be angry with Emma. She wasn’t doing anything wrong. She wasn’t mean to him. It wasn’t her fault she was perfect and Jonathan was nothing. It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Life just worked out that way.

Jonathan looked away from her. The next face he saw made him feel no better.

Toby Skabich sat at a small table on the left with Tia Graves. Naturally, she was beautiful in the most predictable of ways, and a cheerleader. They held hands around their massive coffee mugs. Tia was all dreamy eyed, and Toby just kept talking. The perfect teen couple, living the American dream.

Toby never had to worry about his grades, because no teacher would let a star of the football team fail, plus every girl in the school was willing to do his homework if he just flexed his arms or flashed a smile. The tool already had everything—a nice house, a cool Mustang his dad had given him, the best-looking girl in school—but that wasn’t enough. Toby wanted more and more. He figured he deserved everything and didn’t have to do anything for it.

Must be nice.

Unable to deal with any more bad feelings, Jonathan turned away from the window.

She sat on a bench in front of the ice-cream parlor. A neon sugar cone glowed above her head, casting her face in shadow. But even with the veil of darkness covering her features, Jonathan recognized Kirsty Sabine.

She wore a long beige trench coat and distressed jeans, nearly white on the thighs. Her head was lowered, chin on her chest, so that her hair draped down either side of her face like frayed curtains.

Had she been there the whole time? Had he somehow missed her when he walked by the shop?

The chill on his neck fanned out over his shoulder blades, and he began to seriously shake. A gust of wind raced down the mall, chasing the sensation, adding to it.

“I couldn’t go in either,” Kirsty said, not raising her head. She sat thirty feet away, and her voice came to him like a whisper.

A bit creeped out, Jonathan smiled nervously and tried to think of an excuse for why he didn’t go into the coffee shop. He didn’t want to sound totally low rent by saying something like, “It’s too expensive,” but he also didn’t want to admit his cowardice over entering territory already claimed by Toby Skabich.

“I was just seeing if some friends were inside,” he said.

Kirsty nodded her head, a slow movement that lifted her chin only an inch from her chest before again resting against it.

“I looked in too,” she said. “I didn’t really like anyone I saw.”

“Yeah,” Jonathan said. Even though he’d seen Emma, he knew what Kirsty meant.

Kirsty stood, the shadow on her face growing longer as her slight body eclipsed the purple tubes of the neon ice-cream cone. Her beige coat fell neatly on either side of her body, and she brushed the fabric with her hands, smoothing it further. She took a step toward Jonathan and paused. Kirsty looked over her shoulder, into the ice-cream shop, then down the long walk beside it.

Jonathan stepped forward to cover the distance between them.

“Hey,” he said, as if they’d just walked into each other a second ago.

“Hi,” Kirsty said, smiling and quickly looking away.

Something about her face seemed different tonight, Jonathan thought. Maybe it was the light or lack of it, but her features seemed more finished, seemed almost pretty, something he never would have thought when he saw her in daylight.

“What’s up?” he asked, the chill now centered in his stomach. He wasn’t used to talking to girls, and it had to be totally obvious to Kirsty. Knowing this only made him more nervous.

“Just out for a walk.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“My mom’s on one of her let’s-spend-every-minute-together kicks,” Kirsty said. “I couldn’t deal, so I bailed.”

Jonathan had no idea what it must be like to have a parent insist on spending time with him, but he laughed and nodded his head. “Parents are a pain.”

“Total water torture,” Kirsty replied. “Every word another drop on my forehead.”

They stood quietly for a moment. Jonathan didn’t know what else to say to the girl. He was full-on nervous, and the chilled anxiety in his stomach was making him uncomfortable. Maybe he should just say good-bye.

“It’s strange so many people are out,” Kirsty said.

“Strange?” he asked, grateful she’d broken the silence.

“After Mr. Weaver. I figured most people would stay home for a while.”

“I didn’t even think about that. You don’t seem too worried. I mean, you’re out.”

“I shouldn’t be,” she said. “But since Dad left, Mom’s been really needy. I figured once we moved, she’d lighten up, but that didn’t really happen.”

“Sorry to hear about your dad,” Jonathan said. The words felt awkward on his tongue. He didn’t know Kirsty at all, so his condolence felt insincere. Fortunately she didn’t seem to notice.

“Thanks,” Kirsty said. “That’s nice of you.”

“When did he leave?”

“About a year ago. A lot of drama.”

“That blows. Do you still see him?”

Kirsty didn’t answer immediately. She looked up at the ceiling covering the walkway, stared at it as if searching for the answer there. “Not much,” she said, finally. “Like I said, a lot of drama.”

Another uncomfortable silence fell over them. Jonathan was about to say “that blows” again, but knew it would sound lame. Instead, he decided to change the subject because it didn’t seem like either of them wanted to discuss Kirsty’s father any more.

“How do you like it here?” he asked.

Kirsty’s response surprised him because she didn’t answer his question. Instead, she said, “Do you want to walk? I’m getting kind of cold just standing here.”

“I guess,” Jonathan said. “Where do you want to go?”

“Would you mind walking me home?” Kirsty said. “It’s not far.”

“Sure,” Jonathan said. It wasn’t like he had anything better to do.

Kirsty lived in the Briar Gate development, which was half a mile down Horace Road, the street running parallel to Crossroads Boulevard on the other side of the mall. As they walked, Jonathan found himself unable to relax around Kirsty. Yeah, she was nice, and she was even kind of interesting, but she also seemed distant, sort of cold. Jonathan understood. It wasn’t exactly like he was Mr. Personality tonight either. They were simply two school outcasts who bumped into each other and decided to take a walk.

“So, do you miss your friends?”

“Didn’t really have friends,” Kirsty said. “My dad scared people off. He’d get up in their faces and drill them like an army sergeant. He was totally paranoid. It freaked people out. I learned pretty young to keep other kids away from the house. And since he was really strict, I didn’t get to spend much time away from home, except to go to school and…”

“And?” Jonathan asked.

“Church,” Kirsty whispered, as if embarrassed. “My folks were both hyper about the church back in Spokane. My mom has totally lightened up about it now, but…Ugh! It sucked. What about you?”

“We don’t go to church,” he said. In fact, he’d probably only been in a church five or six times in his entire life. He attended two Sunday-school classes when he was like six years old, and after that it was just weddings.

“What about friends? I don’t see you hanging out with anyone at school.”

“My best friend…” Only friend. “…goes to Melling.” And he thinks you’re hot, Jonathan added to himself.

Jeez, what would David say if he found out he was walking Kirsty home? David had played it totally cool at the bookstore, like he was just goofing about Kirsty, but what if he really liked her? Would he be pissed or something?

“Was he the guy I saw you with on Saturday?” Kirsty asked.

“I didn’t think you even noticed us. But yeah, that’s David.”

“Have you guys been friends a long time?”

“About three years,” Jonathan said. “This is the longest my family has lived anywhere, so it seems like a long time, but I guess it’s not.”

Kirsty didn’t reply. Instead, she looked upward, just like she did at the mall. She kept walking, her eyes directed at the sky.

Again Jonathan noticed she looked almost pretty, her face bathed in night, certainly not the eight David suggested but a good, solid seven. And again he noticed the odd feeling that came to him when he looked at her. It was almost like he had forgotten something but was on the verge of remembering it, a kind of vague recognition.

A gust of wind startled him out of his reverie, and he returned his attention to the sidewalk.

“What are you looking at?” he asked, because the silence was getting to him. It was a stupid question, but he had to say something.

Kirsty lowered her chin and turned to face him. She wore a shy smile. “I’m just looking at the night,” she said quietly.

“Oh, okay.”

At Kirsty’s house, a two-story brick place with big windows in front, they paused on the sidewalk.

“Thanks for walking me home,” Kirsty said, sticking out her hand.

Jonathan was relieved to see the gesture. For a couple of heart-stopping seconds, he’d wondered if Kirsty considered this chance meeting a kind of date, wondered if she might expect a kiss or something. He knew that was just his imagination going into hyperdrive during the quiet stretches of their walk, but still, he felt relief knowing nothing was expected of him but a quick joining of the hands.

He took her hand, squeezed lightly, and a shock, like static electricity, crackled along his palm.

Kirsty jumped a little and laughed again. “Magic,” she said with a smile.

“Yeah,” Jonathan replied, feeling more uncomfortable than he had all night.

“So, you want to get together again sometime?” Kirsty asked. “For just like coffee or something. Not a date, I mean. It’s just good to talk to somebody my own age.”

“Sure,” Jonathan said, though what he was thinking came closer to I don’t think so.

“Cool,” Kirsty said. “Thanks again for walking me home.”

Then she turned away and walked toward her house.

In a second-floor window, Jonathan noticed a silhouette, the dark form of a woman peering out between two white curtains. Kirsty’s mother, he assumed.

Still, the shadowy shape unnerved him, just as Kirsty herself had done. He took a step back on the sidewalk. At the end of the path, Kirsty opened her front door and stepped into the dark foyer.

Jonathan turned to walk home. He was already wondering how he would explain this encounter to David.