He grinned. “I got you something.”
I started to sit up as he tossed something into my lap. A bagel with egg and bacon wrapped in paper.
“Damn, thanks,” I said. “You are by far the world’s best alarm clock.”
He laid down next to me and pulled a fucking protein shake out of his bag.
“Is that all you’re gonna eat?” I asked, tearing into my sandwich.
“Hey, hey, crumbs,” he said, handing me a napkin.
“Seriously, do you ever try real protein?”
He shrugged and took a sip. “I don’t eat that shit until afternoon, man.”
“You are so weird.”
“I can get weirder.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Then let’s get out of here.”
So we did. Connor had the keys to his uncle’s souped-up Jeep for the week, a prospect that absolutely amazed me. I’d learned to drive on Dad’s clunky old Kia, and not very well. We could go anywhere, do anything.
Connor looked good behind the wheel, looked so right wearing his designer black sunglasses, a black tank top, and a pair of board shorts. He steered with one hand, and I sat back and let the sunlight hit my face as we sped down the highway, Yeezy’s latest tracks blasting through the speakers. And man, they were sick speakers.
“One day I’m gonna have a car like this,” I said, watching Burro Hills fade away in the rearview mirror.
“You and me both.”
“As long as I don’t end up a total drunk deadbeat like my dad. Or fail out of school.” I laughed, but he didn’t say anything. It was hard to gauge his expression from behind those shades.
We were getting closer to the ocean, the air balmier and the breeze stronger.
“I know this place,” Connor said. “It’s a little cove. No one goes there.”
Hours later, we sat in the warm sand, reveling in the hot and salty breeze of the beach.
“You wanna go in?” Connor asked, smiling at me from behind his Ray Bans.
I said sure. I’d do anything he wanted to do.
The water was cold at first and jolted my nerves awake. We waded in deeper, past the breakers that pounded against our bodies as they smacked the shoreline. The ocean was navy blue against thin clouds suspended in the bright sky. I went under, letting the water fill my ears and drown my thoughts and senses, then surfaced and swallowed the fresh air, so much cleaner and easier to breathe than the dead, dull air of Burro Hills.
“Let’s never go back,” I said.
Connor laughed and splashed me. “What would we do?”
“Sleep under the stars, learn to eat sea grass.” I splashed him back, harder.
He pulled me in close and kissed me.
I leaned my head back and let the sun hit me full on, heat sliding across my face. “You know,” I said. “I always hated vacations.”
“Why?”
“Well, not the vacation itself. More the time in between that you spend thinking about going home, back to bland, dull real life.”
“Back to the grind,” Connor echoed. “Back to nothing.”
“Yup.”
We swam around for a while in silence, letting the cold water engulf us with each rolling wave until it felt as warm as the air to our skin.
Afterwards we dried off and spread out on one big towel, watching the sun begin its descent to the fringes of the sea. Connor sighed and laid his head on his hands, his face towards me. Even in the fading light, he was so beautiful, innocent even. I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Connor, why do you like me?” I asked. I’d been holding the question inside for so long the words nearly burst out.
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, why me? Of all the…people at school.”
I sat up and played with the sand, letting it fall through my fingers and breaking apart the little rocks of them that stuck together.
He was thoughtful for a moment and then said, “Because you’re beautiful.”
I felt my face get warm. “I’m not a model or anything.”
“No, no. That’s not what I meant.” He looked me in the eye. “I mean don’t get me wrong, you’re definitely easy on the eyes, cute, handsome…” I laughed bashfully and he laughed too, reaching his hand over to stroke mine. “But I mean you’re…I don’t know…you just get things. You have this energy; fuck, I can’t explain this very well. You see the world as it truly is and understand the pain of it, past the bullshit and the hype, behind the lies and forced smiles and fake laughs. You’re a real person Jack. You’re beautiful.”
The emotions I experienced then and there, on that beach, were so intense, so indescribably exciting and strange and blissful and scary as all hell that I kissed him. I wrapped my hands around his neck and pulled his hair, moving on top of him, our naked stomachs pressed together, his breathing growing hard and fast. I kissed his hot, wet skin tenderly, noting his surprise at my sudden aggressive maneuver, and we shed what remained of our clothes and made love right there on that empty beach, under a fiery setting sun.
36.
Mom was more restless than I’d ever seen her. That glazed look in her eyes had been replaced by a permanent scowl, her lips smashed together. She no longer wore any makeup, just sat at the kitchen table or in front of the TV in her bathrobe, chain-smoking, biting her nails. Pacing from room to room.
Dad was going out more and more and coming home less and less.
I tried to do little things for her. I brought her flowers, a bouquet of white lilies, and she lit up for a moment and touched my cheek. But just like that she was back to watching re-runs of Wheel of Fortune and Judge Judy from morning to night. She didn’t laugh like she used to or make comments about all the people on-screen. She barely spoke.
Gunther seemed to sense the change. When I got home he looked up at me expectantly, hungrily. Mom wasn’t feeding him anymore or buying
