Freefly (14 page)

“Damien,” Sammie says, stern this time. 

I meet her eyes.

“Why did you lie to me?” she asks gently.  Her expression does not contain anger, merely confusion. 

I don’t know how to explain to her that I am a friendless, worthless loser, just like Thorne said, and that I just wanted her to like me.  Not, not just like me.  I wanted her to look at me the way she does sometimes, like I’m someone great.  Now, without even a shot at GLOBE, I have literally nothing to offer. 

Sammie stares at me for another long moment, wide-eyed and expectant, before dropping her hands off my shoulders.  She walks to the bed, snatches the remote control, and switches on one of those cartoon superhero shows.  Then she sinks to the carpet and leans against the side of the bed.

“What are you doing?” I say.

She glances up at me.  “Watching this.”

“But
—
but I lied to you.”

“I know.”

“And I didn’t explain why.”

“Damien,” she says, “do you really expect me to be angry at you for not explaining yourself?  Me, the queen of not explaining?”

My mouth falls open.  She has a point.  But still.  “You did explain.  Today.”

“Not for a whole year.”  She smiles at me in an accepting way.  After finding out that all the stories I told
—
all those grand-slams I batted in order to lead my team to victory
—
were one gigantic lie, she actually
smiles
at me.  “I feel like all I do is take and take and take from you.  First your bed, then your future, next it’ll be...”  She trails off, her eyes going distant.  “So you don’t have to tell me why you lied, okay?  Be the selfish one for once.”

I stand there, stunned at Sammie’s assessment of our relationship.  Take and take and take?  Her?  I was looking at it the other way around.  No one talks to me at school, unless it’s Joe Butt or the Leslies taunting me, right before kicking my butt.  But she wanted to know me, asked me question after question about my life, listened to me like everything I said was massively interesting.  Does she know how much she has given to me, simply by doing that?

I slump down beside her, tuning in to the superhero cartoon.  A flying man in a bright red suit punches the crap out of a greasy-haired robber.  I glance at Sammie out of the corner of my eye, wondering which of the two she is identifying with.  A second later, she flips to the food channel, and we watch a woman smooth purple frosting onto tan cupcakes.

“There’s a bus station right by my school.” I say. 

Sammie turns to me, raising an eyebrow.  “Yeah?”

I nod.  From downstairs, my parents’ laughter rumbles.  “Michael Thorne wouldn’t expect you to travel by bus.”

She tilts her head, considering this.  “How would I get to the bus station, though?  I can’t leave your house without them seeing me.”

“I carry a very large backpack to school each morning.”

“Are you suggesting...”

“Yes, I am,” I say, laughing a little.  Then, apologetically, “It was all I could think of.  If it would make you, like, freak out or something, obviously we’ll have to think up another plan, but
—

“No, I’ll do it.”  She nods, looking suddenly determined.  “That’s a really good plan.”

The cupcake lady grins at the camera before setting the plate of desserts onto a table.  My stomach groans, and Sammie and I both giggle.  Then, unexpectedly, a deep sadness settles over the both of us, like dust being shaken from the ceiling.  Once Sammie boards a bus and rides out of Boorsville, when will we see each other again?  My house is under surveillance.  She can’t just come flying back here.

“I’ll go with you,” I say. 

“No,”  Sammie pulls her legs into her chest.  “That’s not a good idea.”

“Why?  I have nothing left here.  I’m not getting into college.”

“You can’t come with me,” she says.  “It’s too dangerous.”

“Because of the criminals?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t go back to them.”  I twist to face her, feeling suddenly desperate.  “You’re here, right now, away from them.  Just don’t go back.”

“I have to.”

“Why?”

“I just do.”

I grind my teeth as Sammie leaves it at that.  More secrets.  What did I expect?  We have both lied and kept secrets from one another.  Why should we start being perfectly open and honest now? 

I leap to my feet, suddenly angry.  “You can’t stop me from running away from home.  I can leave Boorsville if I want to.”

“Damien,
no.
”  She stands, too.  “You don’t get what you have here, do you?  A normal
life.  Whether you’re a baseball star or not, you have a house, and parents, and memories.  You can go to school.  Maybe your chances are shot at being a famous scientists, but heck, you can be something normal.  You know what I’d give to be
anything
normal?  A grocer?  A garbageman?”  She stomps away from me, then swings back, her face flushed.  “If you leave this behind, I don’t know if I can ever forgive you.”

I remain where I am, letting her words bounce around in my head.  “Alright,” I say.

Her face drains of tension, and she exhales audibly.  “Good.”

“Just, come back.  Somehow.”

“I’ll try.”

Even as she says it, though, the truth presses in, heavy and awful:  she can’t come back.  How could she keep returning to a place Michael Thorne has on lockdown?  Maybe once I graduate from high school I can move someplace else, but even then, how would she know where to find me?  It was pure luck the first time we crossed paths.  That sort of thing doesn’t happen twice.

As if we both sense the finality of our impending separation, we rush toward each other.  I wait for Sammie to throw her arms around me first, then pull her close to me.  I shut my eyes and can’t stop the following thought from wedging its way in:  What was the point?  I now know that she grew up in a science lab and works for criminals, and she now knows I’m a loser
—
but we’re never going to see each other again.  What was the point of finally, actually knowing each other?

She pulls away from me abruptly.  I turn away from her, certain my face reveals my complete devastation.  For some reason, I don’t want her to know how much I will suffer in her absence, how empty my nights will become without her.

She climbs onto my bed, turns onto her side, and shuts her eyes, though the rapid movements of her chest reveal she is not sleeping.  I drag out my Phillies blanket and flop down on top of it.  Though I’m positive I won’t get a wink of sleep, I manage to drift off after a few minutes.  Images of cold-faced scientists in white labcoats flash in my mind the entire night.

Sammie

I don’t sleep at all, which is actually a blessing, given the horrors of my last bout of sleep.  Instead, I float around Damien’s house and look at the pictures.  I think that’s my favorite thing about his house:  the fact that in every room, there are these pictures of Damien at every stage of life.  The growing-up process is most clear in the pictures in the stairwell, where there are a series of large shots of him, seemingly taken every year.  By starting at the bottom stair and floating to the top, you can watch Damien’s face chisel out, watch his chin grow more pronounced and his cheeks go from round to narrow.  Constant in all of the pictures are his large, brown eyes, always warm and good, but cautious, like he’s not sure if you actually want him around.  His dark hair is there, too, morphing through various styles, though I think I like it better longer.

On my way back to Damien’s room, I float past his parents’ door, and the sound of their breathing drifts into the hallway.  I hover into the bathroom, where I stop to take a drink of water from the sink.  My face in the mirror shocks me:  my eyes are hollow, my cheekbones jutting out.  I look awful.  It’s the boss’s fault, for keeping me awake for so long.  Doesn’t he realize I’m more likely to accomplish what he wants if he, like, lets me rest?

I drift back into Damien’s room and touch down on the carpet.  He breathes deeply, his long body stretched out.  I don’t know what I’m going to do without him.  I bite my lip as I remember the frantic look on his face as he confessed his feelings.  It’s not that I don’t love him back.  I don’t know how I feel.  I can’t afford to start thinking about things like that. 

I lay down on the bed and cross my arms over my chest, shivering.  The room is dark, but not completely.  Silvery light flows in around the edges of the blind.  The sun must be coming up.  As I think this, I fall asleep.

I awake to humidity in the room.  Damien stands in front of his dresser, tucking his pajamas into the drawer, his shaggy hair dripping water down the back of his T-shirt.  I wish I could freeze this moment, like one of Damien’s pictures.  I want to remember him this way.

“Hey,” I say.

He turns around and smiles.  “Hey.”

The heaviness of our last conversation seems to slam down all once, because his face hardens, his eyes going dark and his jaw tightening.  I sit up and press my fingers to my temples, which suddenly throb.  A remnant of the boss’s torture.  It happened all day yesterday.

“Do you want anything?” Damien says, stuffing his foot into his sneaker.  “Are you okay?”

Squeezing my eyes shut, I give my temples a good rub.  The pain thrashes across my forehead like a lightning bolt.  Then, as quickly as it came, the pain vanishes. 

I open my eyes and nod.  “Yeah.”

“Do you want some Pop Tarts or something?”

I shake my head.  “When do we leave?”

Damien glances at the digital clock.  “Now, actually.”

He walks to the doorway, where his backpack is slumped against the wall.  In one quick motion, he flips it upside-down, dumping his textbooks onto the carpet.  There really are a lot of them:  big, hardcover books with spines several inches thick. 

“What’ll you do at school without your books?” I ask.

He shrugs.  “Doesn’t really matter now, does it?”

My stomach twists.  Damien sets the empty bag on the floor and looks up at me, his expression tense.  “Uh, if you want to just...”

“Right.”  I swallow hard.  Small, dark, closed places are not my favorite thing, but it’s not like I’ve got any other choices.  I walk over to the backpack, step into the empty space, and crouch down, shoving my forehead into my knees.  “Am I going to fit?”

“Yeah, I think so.”  There’s a pause.  “Sammie.” 

I look up.  Damien’s forehead is scrunched with concern. 

“Are you sure you can do this?” he says.

I bite down on my lower lip and nod.  Clenching my eyes shut, I press my head into my knees again.  The sound of the zipper closing hums in the air.  Fabric presses against my back and holds my head down. 

“You okay?” Damien calls, his voice muffled. 

I breathe through my nose.  The air is hot and smells vaguely of plastic.  I open my eyes.  The fabric has tiny holes in it, so that I can see the outline of Damien’s head as he kneels in front of me.  It’s like looking at him through a shadow.  “I think so.  Are you going to be able to haul me around?”

Damien’s dark outline rises, then vanishes from sight.  The backpack lurches to one side.  There’s a fluttery feeling in my stomach as I’m lifted off the ground, then another lurch as Damien puts his arms through the straps and settles the backpack against his spine.  We are back to back.