They came to his bedroom door. No girl outside his own family had ever been in there. It wasn’t any rule he had. It wasn’t religious or anything. It had just never happened. Never been right. He pushed open the door and stepped in.
E
Evie looked around, trying not to show her surprise. Réal’s bedroom was nothing like she’d expected. It was smaller than her attic room, but it was immaculate. Almost military-tidy. The double bed was neatly made, striped sheet folded stiffly down. A dresser, a bookshelf, a night table with a lamp. Besides the bed, that’s all there was. The closet doors were closed, everything else hidden away—if there even was anything else.
She didn’t have so much experience with boys’ bedrooms to have an opinion, but it was definitely a surprise.
He caught her eye as she looked around. “You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah, of course,” she said. “It’s just so clean.”
He laughed shyly and looked around too. “The rest of this house kinda drives me crazy,” he said. “I like things to be a little more…” He gestured vaguely with his hand.
“I can see that,” she said. Since the bed was the only place to sit, she sat there.
“I have music,” he said. “Wanna listen to something?”
“Sure.” She watched him with a little smile on her lips. He seemed nervous, so unlike the Ré Dufresne people saw at school—cocky, silent and aloof. Toughest guy in the world. This guy’s hands were shaking.
He went to the bookshelf, and she noticed a little black speaker nestled between the books. He flicked it on, then pulled his phone from his pocket and thumbed around, putting it down on the dresser as the speaker picked up the signal.
Ré liked heavy metal. He liked punk and thrash. He liked stoner rock. It was all that had ever played in his car, before Shaun died. Like Sunny had said, dinosaur music. But what came out of that little black speaker was another surprise—soft guitar, little drops of piano and a voice rasping quietly about the moon. “What is this?” she asked.
He sat next to her on the bed. He took her hand and pressed it between his, folding their fingers together, his leather watch pressing her wrist. “Nick Drake,” he said, tracing her skin.
“I didn’t know you liked stuff like this,” she admitted.
“You don’t really know anything about me,” he said, smiling a little.
She smiled too. It was sort of true.
She looked at the side of his face as he looked down at their clasped hands.
Big brown eyes hidden by his paintbrush lashes. Nose bent where it had been broken, angling down toward his lips…She closed her eyes and breathed. When she opened her eyes, those lips were just as nice as they’d always been. Plum-colored and perfect. She wanted to run her fingers over them, trace them into memory.
She felt like she could really see him now, finally. Past his camouflage. Past the tough armor. Under the hard shell that kept his softest parts safe from other people.
Underneath all of that, he was just a normal boy.
It almost hurt, looking at him. He was not like Shaun at all. Shaun didn’t have camouflage, he didn’t have layers to dig through and peel back and etch away into something better than what he seemed. Shaun was loud. He was obvious and full of needs. He wanted everything.
But Ré never asked for anything, even when he needed it. All he did was give. True, she didn’t know much about him, but she did know that.
And then she spoke very quietly, almost hoping he wouldn’t hear. “I could love you, you know. If you asked me to.”
He looked up, startled. Then his perfect, plum-colored lips curved into a sweet, surprised little smile, and he blinked at her like he was looking into the sun.
26
E
A picture of Shaun, standing in her driveway throwing stones. “Come down,” he’d yelled. “Come on!” Waving her into his car.
That night he’d driven her to the Grains, not talking, eyes brimming with hot sparks. She’d been half asleep when they’d climbed the fence. And when she’d slid through the boarded window into the dark, he was already long gone up the stairs.
She’d heard the trucks of his skateboard rattle as he threw it down, the wheels whiz as he shoved off. She’d climbed the stairs after him, resentful. Why was she there if he wasn’t going to wait for her, talk to her?
At the second floor, his shadow had arced around the farthest pillars. He’d been angry. It had made her angry—he’d got her out of bed just to ignore her. She’d stood there, thinking, Maybe if I close my eyes, I’ll wake up in my own bed, dreaming.
Then she’d turned and gone up to the third floor, listening to the wheels curving close, then away, at the bottom of the stairs, no intention of following her up. Let him skate all night for all I care.
She’d gone to the hole in the wall and looked out over the broken fire escape, the tracks, at the stars cutting through blue velvet sky, and she’d imagined she was nothing, that she wasn’t even there.
Evie stood in that broken doorway now, in bright daylight. In her pocket, she rolled a little silver bead between her fingers. She’d walked over the steps they’d taken that night, looking at the ground, the marks in the dust. They were almost clear. If you knew, you could see where he’d been, where she had been. All scuffs and scuffle, empty bottles, broken glass.
She sat down in the busted-out doorway, leaning against the frame. She’d written her last exam that afternoon. She should have been happy, but instead she was only jealous. After today, they’d all be free, Sunny, Ré and Alex. They could flee this town and never come
