“How come Dale didn’t recognize you right away?” she asks as I pull into my driveway. I shift into park and kill the engine, riffling through the faces I’ve seen join my grandpa’s games and give up.
“I avoid the man cave when they come over. I maybe would recognize one or two of his buddies. I can only imagine the stories my grandpa has told them about me!” I laugh at the thought as we get out of the car. I’m not the manly kind of grandson a war vet brags about to his friends, I’m sure. But I guess my dad wasn’t that stereotype either, and Grandpa Hank would never poke fun of my dad.
“Think they’d let us play sometime?”
I stop in my tracks a few paces ahead of her at her suggestion.
“Dear God!” It’s the only response that makes sense. It makes Eleanor laugh harder than she ever has in front of me.
“Jonah! Don’t be such a chicken. I’m actually pretty good, you know? I bet I could get you another free alternator from Dale.” She taps the box in my hands with her perfectly manicured fingernails.
My mouth curls, mostly because this feels flirtatious and I feel dumbstruck. “I kinda hope the alternator goes right on the first shot,” I say.
She waggles her head side to side then peers up at the dark sky, a thin screen of clouds covering most of the stars.
“You know what I mean. I’m gonna ask your grandpa if I can join in on the fun, next time I see him.”
My stomach tightens because I am pretty sure she’s not kidding. I can already hear the laugh he’s going to belt out until he realizes she’s serious. I run a palm over my face to regain feeling in it and eventually just shrug an okay.
I open my garage and set the new part on the bumper of the Bronco. The distant sounds from the football game break through the quiet air, and when I turn to face Eleanor, I catch a slight grin on her face as she tilts her head to listen more closely.
“Hey, I almost forgot something,” I say, not completely sure it’s the right time for this. I reach into the front of my sweatshirt and clutch the hair tie from Gemma. I hold it out in an open palm as I take a few timid steps closer to where Eleanor stands in the middle of my driveway. I’m guarded, prepared for her to sour at seeing a reminder of her earlier life. I’m thankful when she doesn’t.
Her lip ticks up and she takes the material from my hand, our palms grazing slightly on the exchange. I curl my fingers up the moment my hand is empty and stuff it into the depths of my front pocket.
“Gemma made these,” she explains. I pretend I don’t already know.
“She asked me to give it to you,” I say.
“It’s a stupid tradition, but she makes them every year before we get ready to compete for cheer.” She stretches the tie around her hand, flexing it with her fingers a few times before sliding the hood away from her head with her other hand.
The strangest grin spreads on her face as she backs away a few steps while twisting her hair up on top of her head with the new tie. She starts to clap with cupped palms and bends her knees before popping them into a locked position as she begins to cheer. It would seem weird if I didn’t understand exactly what it was all about. About a week after my dad was gone, I spent an entire night working my way through every difficult math problem in my SAT study guide. I’d already taken the test and scored fine, but in that moment, I was determined to sign up and take it again, to get a perfect math score just like he had. The feeling passed and I never took the test again.
“We’ll fight ’til the end! That’s what makes Badger pride! Let’s go! Fight! Win, win, win!” Her commands are loud and metered, marked by stiff arms in the air, regular claps and a jump at the end that brings both of her legs straight out to either side, a feat that I normally find amazing but am in near disbelief at seeing pulled off in jeans.
“Go Badgers!” I shout, probably the only time I have ever shown school spirit like that.
“Yeah!” She nods, clapping again. She goes through a few more various jumps then pulls her arms in close to her chest and bends her knees before launching herself backward into a full tuck, her arms never wavering and her feet sticking to the ground in the exact same spot they left.
She’s so good. This is her thing. Like math is my thing.
“You aren’t going back at all?” The question comes out before I have time to weigh the consequences of asking.
Eleanor doesn’t react immediately, and the smile from her one-woman cheer is still in place, but it’s rigid and locked there to keep the acid brewing beneath it inside.
“I don’t know,” she says, a tinge of sadness touching the corners of the smile.
She spins in place with her head tilted back, eyes to the sky. Her arms outstretched, her fingers flex wide then grip into fists before coming in and resting over her eyes. That’s when the maniacal laughter morphs into sobs. A seal has been broken, and I maybe broke it.
It would have done so eventually, but goddamn it, Jonah, did you have to be the one?
“El—”
Her hand jets toward me, an open palm begs me to stop. I snap my mouth shut accordingly and rock back on my feet, pushing my fists even deeper into my front pockets because I don’t know what to do. I want to help, but that’s exactly what she doesn’t want. And maybe this is why she spends time with me. I’m not a reminder
