Cameron chuckled. “I have to admit we were all surprised when you auditioned for Beauty and the Beast.”
“I only did that to get away from my mom.”
“Really? How come?”
Diego cocked an eyebrow at him. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Cameron made a face. “You’re not the only one with a messed-up homelife, you know.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Diego shrugged. “Okay. What’s wrong with yours?”
Cameron withered under his stare. “I don’t want to actually talk about it!”
“Good. Me neither.”
They stared at each other a moment before laughing.
“Maybe we should form a club,” Cameron suggested. “We’ll call ourselves the Broken Home Kids. Anyone who joins gets one of our special hats.”
“I have a feeling it’s just gonna be the two of us in that clubhouse.”
“Mindy would join,” Cameron said.
Diego didn’t get a chance to ask why she would qualify, because Mrs. Nishikawa had wandered over, her attention focused on him. “Do you have a moment?” she asked.
“Yeah, of course,” Diego said as he stood.
She led him outside to the backyard. He knew what was coming. She would ask him to do the right thing by staying away from her son. He waited in front of her patiently as she tried to find the right words, already having decided that he wouldn’t argue. Mostly because the decision wasn’t hers. Ricky was the only one who had the right to decide if he wanted to keep seeing him.
“Do you care about my son?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Diego replied.
“Do you love him?” She searched for the answer in his eyes, Diego willing to let her stare, in case she could find it for him. “Because I do,” she continued at last. “More than my husband. More than myself. I only want the best for him.”
He crossed his arms and braced himself for the inevitable. She would explain, in the nicest terms possible, why he wasn’t good for Ricky.
“I’d like to think that you want the best for him too.”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“Then help me.” Mrs. Nishikawa placed a hand on his forearm. “Please. I know you both feel like you’re invincible, but you’re not.”
“I realize that,” Diego replied. “I figured it out when my dad died.” Which had been like seeing God himself bleed out on the ground with a bullet in his head. Maybe that’s when he had stopped believing, because before then, his dad had seemed unstoppable. Like the king of the world.
“Oh!” Mrs. Nishikawa replied, her sympathetic expression reminding him way too much of her son. “I’m so sorry! I’m sure you can imagine then, how upsetting it was to nearly lose Ricky. Since that horrible day, I’ve felt like I can’t keep him safe. I keep trying, but it’s like he always slips through my grasp. So I’m asking you to think of his best interests. And I mean really think. Whenever you’re with him and about to do something, ask yourself if it’s good for him. The answer might be boring. You might have to walk away from a party where there is drinking or need to drive slower, but I want you to do that for him. He loves you, Diego. And if you want to prove that you love him back, please do everything you can to keep him safe.”
It wasn’t the lecture he’d been expecting. He glanced over his shoulder when he heard the sliding glass door open behind him. Ricky came out wearing a concerned expression. He walked to Diego’s side and took his hand.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Diego replied.
Ricky eyed his mom warily before turning to him again. “Come inside. I want to show you what I got.”
“Okay.”
He started to follow Ricky inside the house, not intending to respond to Mrs. Nishikawa, because he sure as hell didn’t answer to her or anyone else. Although the emotion behind her words resonated with him, so he paused in the doorway, letting Ricky go on ahead of him, before he turned around.
Mrs. Nishikawa’s forehead was crinkled with worry, but when she looked up, there was hope in her eyes.
“I’ll protect him,” Diego told her. “No matter what.”
— — —
Omar hammered the buttons of a Super Nintendo controller, slashing his enemies down. Ricky had received the new Zelda game, A Link to the Past, as a gift, and so far it was freaking epic! The birthday boy himself sat down next him to watch the screen.
Omar paused the game. “It’s your big day,” he said, trying to hand over the controller. “You should play.”
“That’s okay,” Ricky said. “I’m going to start again using a different save slot. I don’t want to miss any of the story. But it looks fun so far!”
“Yeah, watch this.” Omar unpaused the game and began attacking an innocent chicken until a whole flock of them swarmed the screen to tear him apart.
“That’s awesome!” Ricky said as they both laughed.
“And deadly. Too bad Anthony went home. This is animal rights activism taken to a whole new level.” He glanced around and noticed that they were alone. “Wait, am I the last one here?”
“Yup,” Ricky confirmed.
“Oh.” Omar had intentionally stayed late. Silvia had told him to stop by the record store if the party ended early enough. He would’ve been able to make it if he’d left with Anthony and Cameron. Except he hadn’t wanted to.
Ricky must have wished for psychic powers when blowing out his candles, because he commented on the very subject. “I’m surprised you aren’t out with your girlfriend.”
“I’m surprised you aren’t out with your boyfriend,” he retorted.
“I didn’t want to push my luck,” Ricky explained. “My mom seemed to warm up to him again the longer he was here. I didn’t want her to spend the rest of the night wondering if I was getting high or whatever.”
“Smooth move,” Omar said in approval.
“So you don’t have any plans with Silvia?”
“That’s right.”
Ricky perked up. “Wanna spend the night?”
“Hell yeah! I bet we can blow through most of this game if we try. And if not, we’ve got all of spring break to beat it. That’s gotta be the best present of all, huh?”
“It is nice,” Ricky confirmed with a smile as he watched the screen. “Wow! The graphics are amazing!”
“Wait until you see the shadows in the forest,” Omar replied. “Let’s start over, like you wanted. I didn’t make it that far anyway.”
He barely paid attention as Ricky worked his way through the intro level, except to share a tip here and there. Otherwise his mind returned to the same subject it had been stuck on for the past week: Silvia. Her name used to make his heart go pitter-patter, and it still did, but with anxiety instead of adoration. He’d felt weird ever since the day out on the raft. Her being bisexual wasn’t a big deal. That she had kissed Keisha didn’t trouble him too much. But it all added up to a big problem. Especially when he thought about her final confession.
Omar glanced over at Ricky, who was smiling as he played, his eyebrows perpetually raised like he was thrilled by everything he saw. As great as the graphics were, most of that joy came from inside. Ricky was a great guy. Omar hated the idea of him being alone at the urgent care center, just because Silvia was so damn secretive. He had asked her about that while they fished; why she had chosen to remain anonymous. She’d explained that she didn’t want to be in the newspaper in case it brought unwanted attention to her family and their legal status. All of that made sense…