“Throw it,” Finny says when I come back. He holds out his hands.
“Do you have a death wish or something?” I say. I cross the room and place the can in his hands.
“Nah. Even if you hit my head, you couldn’t throw it hard enough to do any real damage.” I sit down on my side of the couch and open my can. He’s probably right. I’m taking my first sip when he speaks, and he’s too quiet for me to hear.
“What was that?”
Finny clears his throat. “I’m going to miss gym class with you,” he says.
“You mean you’re going to miss laughing at me in gym class?”
“No. I mean I’m going to miss hanging out with you.”
A lump forms in my throat. I shrug, smile, and try to speak around it. “We see each other all the time. We have dinner with The Mothers, like, twice a week.”
“I know,” Finny says. He looks down at his can. “But I dunno. We should hang out sometime when we don’t have to. Go see a movie or something.”
“Um,” I say. I’m looking away again now. I feel warm and fluttery inside. I cannot say anything. Perhaps it is possible for us to have come full circle, from as close as two people can be to awkward strangers to nearly friends to—
To what?
What could we, would we, be now? It’s possible to love two people at once, but could it be possible to stay loyal to one?
I look up at his face, his flushed cheeks and nervous blue eyes, and I want to say “Sure.” I want it too much.
“I’m not sure, Finny,” I say. Even allowing myself to say his name hurts. “I don’t know if Jamie would like it. It might be kinda weird.”
“But I thought Jamie and Sasha hung out all the time?”
“Yeah, they do,” I say. “But they’re friends—”
I flinch, and I can’t speak anymore. I stare straight ahead and try to breathe without trembling.
“I see,” Finny says. I hear my mother’s cell phone ring in the kitchen. I take a deep breath and stand up.
“It’s probably almost time for dinner,” I say. Finny watches the TV and says nothing. I step around the coffee table and walk as quickly as I can out of the room.
In the bathroom, I sit on the edge of the tub and press the heels of my hands into my eyes until I see strange shapes in the darkness. My fingers tremble in my hair.
“Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t,” I whisper.
“Finny! Autumn!” Aunt Angelina calls.
Finny and I meet in the hall and say nothing. We walk into the dining room together and stop at the threshold. An hour ago, Finny and I set the table for five. Aunt Angelina is taking off the china and silverware from one seat. She carries them into the kitchen. My mother sets the rack of lamb on the table and sits down with her hands in her lap.
“Mom?” I ask. “Where’d Dad go?”
“I don’t know, honey,” she says. “But he just called to say he won’t be coming back tonight.”
“Oh,” I say.
Aunt Angelina comes back into the room and puts her hand on my mother’s shoulder.
“Come on and sit down, kids,” she says. Her voice and face plead with us. Finny takes a step forward but I don’t. He turns and looks at me. Our eyes meet. He reaches out and lays his hand on my arm.
“Come on, Autumn,” he says. He squeezes gently and kind of smiles.
“Okay,” I say.
Aunt Angelina and Finny talk for us while we eat. Afterward, The Mothers close themselves in the kitchen and Finny and I watch TV until midnight. We don’t say anything else to each other.
58
Jamie answers on the last ring, just before his funny and clever voice mail message would have played. His voice is blurry with sleep. It’s eight o’clock in the morning, the first Saturday since we started school again. It’s the year we graduate now, the year we’re supposed to be grown up.
“Jamie?”
“What? I was sleeping.”
“Jamie, my parents are getting a divorce.” There is a silence. I imagine him sitting up, rubbing his face with one hand.
“God, pretty girl, I’m sorry.”
“I’m not even sure why I’m upset,” I say. I’m in my room curled in my desk chair. It’s raining outside, dark and cold. I have a quilt over my shoulders and my cheek resting on my knee. “Hardly anything is going to change. Apparently Dad moved into an apartment downtown a week ago and I didn’t even notice.”
“When did you find out?”
“They told me last night, over dinner. And they said all that bullshit about how it wasn’t my fault and they both still loved me etc., etc., like I was six or something.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“I did. You didn’t answer.”
“Oh shit. I remember. I was at the movie with Sasha—”
“I know. It’s fine.”
“I meant to call you back.”
“It’s fine,” I say. My words sound harsh in my ears but Jamie does not say anything about it. I swallow. “Do you think you could come over?”
“Yeah,” Jamie says. “Just let me shower first—hey, want me to take you out to breakfast?”
“I don’t think I can eat.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” I say. I pull the quilt tighter around me. “Just come over and hold me.”
“Will do, pretty girl. I’ll see you in a minute.”
“Wait! Jamie?”
“What?”
“Will you ever leave me?”
“Nope.”
“Promise?”
“Yup.”
“Okay. Bye.”
“Bye. Love you.”
“I love you too, Jamie.”
I lay my phone on the desk and watch the rain outside my window.
59
At school, Angie lets me feel her stomach. It’s still not very big, but it’s taut like a drum. Everyone at school knows about her now, and all my friends know about my parents. At lunch one day, Alex asks if it means that my mother and Aunt Angelina are finally getting together. Sasha punches his shoulder and calls him an idiot.