“He would have just gone about his life, avoiding me, or forgetting about me, or meaning to call me but not just yet—whatever he’s been doing since halfway through the New York trip.”
“Mm.” Doctor Z popped a piece of Nicorette out of its packaging and put it thoughtfully in her mouth. “What did you two talk about?”
I shrugged. “The movie we saw. Whether or not Christian Bale is deranged. Why there aren’t more female action heroes.”
“Ah.”
“Why did we have to go to a movie? For once in my life, I didn’t want to go to a movie.”
“No?”
“We didn’t talk that much, even.”
“Oh.”
Noel and I had kissed in the front seat of the Honda when I drove him home, and we had held hands in the theater—but whenever I spoke I had this sense that I was chattering at him. Like some part of his brain was elsewhere.
He wasn’t truly listening. So I didn’t tell him anything.
You have to have someone listening if you’re going to really talk.
1 Go ahead and laugh, but sometimes I listen to Dad’s Queen albums even when he and Hutch aren’t rocking out in the greenhouse. Okay, and sometimes Guns N’ Roses. And sometimes Aerosmith. And once AC/DC.
Retro metal is very good for diverting panic attacks.
The Waketastic Adventure!
a video clip:
Roo’s parents sit on their couch. Polka-dot is there too, his head on Elaine’s lap. Kevin has garden dirt on his T-shirt. Elaine is wearing black, her frizzy hair puffed out around her head.
A couple of days before school started, Meghan was with Finn per usual and I didn’t have to work at the zoo and Noel had to go shopping with his stepdad for school clothes and cross-country shoes, so I helped Dad in the greenhouse a bit and then went out on the dock to mess with the video camera.
I was trying to figure out how to shoot something dark with sunlight behind it, fiddling around with settings and playing snippets back to see how my shots turned out, when I heard the putt-putt of a motorboat.
“Did you run out of gas again?” I shouted when Gideon was twenty feet away.
“No,” he yelled. “I’m full.”
“Do you need a Band-Aid?”
“No.” He cut the engine and tied up.
“What do you need?”
“A driver.” He climbed out and bopped me on the arm, dude style.
“What?”
“You ever wakeboard?”
I rolled my eyes.
“But you water-ski.” He said it like a statement.
No. I didn’t. I mean, I had been out on the Van Deusens’ boat before while other people were waterskiing, the summer after freshman year, but the one time I tried to actually get up on water skis I had fallen flat on my butt within two seconds.
“Hasn’t Evergreen started yet?” I said, to change the subject.
Gideon wasn’t fooled. “Yeah, but it’s the weekend. Okay, so you don’t water-ski. But aren’t you some kind of awesome swimmer?”
“I’m on the team at Tate,” I said. “But I’m not taking home a lot of ribbons.”
“It’ll be easy for you,” he said. “And driving the boat’s really fun. No roads. Nothing but the wind on your face.”
Was I really going out on a boat with Gideon Van Deusen?
When I completely had a boyfriend?
“I’ll teach you,” said Gideon, smiling. “Wakeboarding is actually easier than waterskiing for a lot of people.”
“Um. I gotta ask my dad,” I said. “Will you wait here?”
“Sure.” Gideon immediately lay down on the dock. “I’ll just absorb some sun.”
