Bound Together (20 page)

“
Zoey
, I can’t find Cora’s immunization records.” She acted like she didn’t even notice Matt sitting there with us. He sat up straighter, like he wanted to stand up and introduce himself. I put my hand on his arm as a warning.

“
D
o you really need them
now
?”

“It’s just
that
I had them, and I
then
I remember putting them somewhere
because I knew I couldn’t lose them, and now I can’t find them.”

“I’m sure they’ll turn up.” I went back to coloring, hoping Matt wouldn’t read too much into this.

She shuffled back into the kitchen and began pulling drawers open, slamming the cupboard doors.

“Hold on, I’ll be right back.” I got up and went into the kitchen. My mom was digging through the papers in the trash. I went to her and took her hands in mine. “Mom, stop. Why are you looking for this right now?”

She didn’t answer.

“I bet Dad knows where they are, we’ll ask him when he gets home.
”

“No,
Zoey
, no!” She turned away from me and pulled open another drawer. “I’m her mom, I’m supposed to know this stuff.”

“Mom,” I said, getting her attention again. I turned her shoulders towards me and held onto her. She crumpled in my arms, and I knew she was
going
to cry before I even saw the tears welling up in her eyes. “Come on, Mom, we’ll get you to your room. We’ll find everything when Dad gets home,” I said, even though I knew this would be long forgotten by tomorrow. I turned her shoulders towards the door and stopped. Matt was standing in the kitchen doorway looking at us. “Come on.” I guided her forward, hoping to get us all out of this awkward moment as quickly as possible.

He
stepped aside and
watched me lead her out to the living room. “I want to read with Cora,” she said
in a small voice
when she spotted Cora on the living room floor and wouldn’t go any further. The tears were fully flowing now and she wiped them away
with the backs of her hands
. Cora hopped up and took Mom by the hand and guided her upstairs.

“Come on, Momma
—
I’ll read you a story,” Cora’s soft voice rang out from the stairs.

I turned to Matt, who was still standing in the doorway. “Sorry about that.”

“No, no problem.” He took a step closer to me. “Is your mom okay?”

“Yeah. She’ll be fine.
She just goes through stuff like this sometimes. It’s no big deal,” I heard myself saying. I could tell my cheeks were turning pink.

“Are you sure everything’s all right?”
He took another step closer to me.
I looked down,
and
nodded.
“So, I guess we’re done coloring?”

“Yeah, if that’s cool with you.” I sat down on the couch and put my head in my hands. Today had exhausted me, cooking dinner, cleaning, and it was all for nothing, Matt had still seen what a freak
show
I was.

He came and sat down next to me. “So maybe we could work on our paper then?”
he asked, scooting closer to me.

“Yeah, my stuff’s in my room
—
I’ll grab it,” I said, standing up suddenly.

“Can I see it?” he asked.

I turned back around to face him.
“My room?”

He nodded.

He’d already seen everything else, so I didn’t see the point in trying to hide my room from him too. “It’s
kinda
messy.”

“I don’t care,” he said.

“All right.” I turned and headed up the stairs, with Matt trailing behind me.

We reached the top of the stairs, and I was all too aware of my brothers playing video games in Charlie and Pete’s room, and Cora and my mom lying across her bed. I knew my mom wouldn’t say anything about me having a boy up here, it was such a rare occurrence that no one knew how to act. I led him into my room
and closed the door behind us, shutting us in my dimly light room.

He stopped just inside the doorway and looked around.

Chapter Twenty
-
four

Matt

Zoey
’s
room wasn’t at all what I expected. Nothing about
Zoey
was like I expected. She put off this tough
-
persona, but seeing her with her little sister, and her mom tonight, I was starting to realize she was anything but. She was
the one who took care of everyone
. I looked around her room, taking it all in. She had a twin bed with purple covers that was left unmade, the room was cramped with the small dresser and desk, but the main feature of the room were the pictures of elephants large and small, covering most of the open wall space.

“What’s with the elephants?” I asked, walking around the perimeter of the room to get a better look at the pictures.

“I used to be really into elephants. My mom and I used to hunt for pictures of them in magazines, books, anywhere we could.
” She ran a finger across a black and white circus photo with a lady seated on
an
elephant’s back. “
I should probably just take them down,”
she said, dropping her hand.

“I don’t know, I like them.
Did Cora do this one?” I point
ed
to a roughly sketched out elephant in pink marker.
It’s trunk was bigger than its body.

“Yeah. When she was three.”
Zoey
went to the desk and took out her Global Studies book.
“So should we do this?”
She pulled out the desk chair for me, but I sat on the bed instead.
I sunk down into her pale purple sheets and noticed they had
tiny
yellow stars on them.
Zoey
seemed flustered, but sat down on the chair.

We spent the next hour alternating between focusing on the sections of our paper and stealing sideways glances at each other.
I kept wondering what she was thinking.
It was strange
being alone in a bedroom with
Zoey
and not
grinding up against each other, but also kind of
interesting at the same time
.

Her mom stuck her head in to say goodnight, and seemed to actually notice me for the first time, smili
ng
and telling us not to work too hard. She said nothing about us being
alone
with the door closed, or staying up too late on a school night
, like my mom would have
done
. She
just smiled and
shut the door behind her.

Zoey
closed her book and stretched her arms above her head. I wondered if
she
was signaling me that she was tired and wanted me to leave.

“So I guess once our paper’s turned in on Friday, you’ll be done with me,” I asked, looking over at her.

She didn’t answer, but instead concentrated on shoving her books back into her bag.
“I’ll
type up
my half of the paper tomorrow night and
send it to you
.”

“That’ll work.”

“Would you mind printing it off too? We’re out of ink cartridges,” she said.

I nodded, then laid back on her bed, resting my head on her pillow.

“What
do you think
you
’re
doing?” she asked.

“G
etting comfortable.” I smiled up at her, knowing this was bugging her.
She got up and thrust my backpack at my chest. “Ouch, what was that for?”

“It’s getting late,” she said, standing over me.

I took
her wrist, and tugged her down to the bed
, knowing she
’d act like she wasn’t happy about it, but
wouldn’t argue.
She collapsed
down
beside me,
and after hesitating for a second, laid down and let
me wrap my body around hers. And even though she was facing away from me, I could still tell she was trying not to smile.
I turned her head gently towards mine and kissed her jaw.
She laid perfectly still, letting me
work my way down her neck,
then
she
s
cooted closer
and turned towards me so I could reach her mouth. We kissed slowly, gently for a few minutes.

I pulled back to look at her, and she opened her eyes slowly, sleepily. “Why’d you stop?” she whispered against my lips.

I pushed
her hair back from her
face. She looked beautiful
right then, completely relaxed and happy.
“You didn’t answer my question from before.” I hesitated. “What happens when our paper’s turned in? Is all this done?”

She rolled over and looked straight up at the ceiling.
She was quiet for so long, I
didn’t think she was going to answer
.
“What if we made some type of
arra
n
g
e
ment?
”  I waited
again
for her to continue. “Say we each get one more free pass. You can call me once
more
and I can call you once
too
. Then that’s it. No more secret hookups. I mean, we’re probably tempting fate already. I’m surprised no one’s found out.”
She climbed onto me and straddled me. “What do you think?”

Her thighs pressed me to the bed and I loved the way she trapped me under her.
“Ah. Yeah, that works.” I kissed her. I hoped that after a couple more meet ups like this and she wouldn’t be able to stay away from me. But somehow I knew whatever
Zoey
set her mind to, she would achieve.

We heard her brothers laughing from dow
n the hall, and sat up
on the bed,
suddenly
remembering we didn’t have complete privacy.

“You’re lucky you have so many siblings. With John gone, my parents only have me to focus on. I mean, didn’t you notice I was the only one in class that had both parents come to that trip meeting?”

“Yeah, I don’t have that problem. I hardly see my dad, with him working nights and well my mom, yeah, not so much.”

I could tell she didn’t want to talk about her mom, but that only made me more curious.
I dropped it for the time being.
“So will you come to my game this Friday, and bring your brothers?”

She cocked one eyebrow up. “And why
on earth
would I do that?”

“You’ve never been to a game before, have you?”

“Nope,” she admitted, proudly.

“Don’t you think you should at least go to one high school football game before you graduate?”

She stared at me blankly.

“Once in a lifetime opportunity to see yours truly kick some ass on the field,” I said.

“Didn’t
you lo
se your last game?” she asked.

“So you have been paying attention. Maybe if I had a better cheering section that wouldn’t have happened.” Actually, up against
Timsley
, I
’m sure it wouldn’t have made a difference. I
was just glad I
’d
walk
ed
away in one piece
. But I just
wanted to see if I could actually get
Zoey
to go.

“I’m sure cheering f
ans are not what you’re missing
—
I’ve seen the way girls and guys
, for that matter
look at you with complete worship.”

“I told you, I don’t really care about all that.”

She pulled back and scrutinized me, checking for signs of dishonesty.

“You’ve probably never been to a high school dance, either?”
I guessed, thinking
about the semi
-
formal we had coming up.

She shifted and sat up, scooting away from me on the bed.
“That’d be a safe assumption.”
She swung her legs over the side of the bed. “Come on, I’m tired.” She handed me my backpack
.
I got up and followed her
into the hall. She headed towards the stairs, but I ducked around the cor
ner.

I
looked inside the boys’ room, and saw them huddled side by side on the bottom bunk, looking at a video game.
“Goodnight
—
nice meeting you.”