My Kind of Crazy (20 page)

“Holy shit,” I say softly.

I steal a glance at her. Peyton's eyes are a million miles away, as if she's reliving the moment. “I couldn't stop watching it burn. My stepmother noticed it from the house and came outside, screaming and carrying on. She accused me of deliberately setting the fire and trying to harm her and the baby. She told my dad I was going to light the house on fire some night while they slept, and that I had to leave. I suppose I'm lucky because they could have sent me to some juvenile detention center, but instead they put me in the psych ward.” She wipes her nose with her fist and shakes her head. “I would never hurt anyone on purpose, Hank. You have to know that.”

“Except yourself, apparently.”

She stares down at her shoe and kicks at the dirt. “It wasn't like I meant to burn down the shed any more than you meant to light Amanda Carlisle's yard on fire. It just happened. In a way, it was the same kind of thing. We wanted to be noticed, to stop being invisible in plain sight for once.”

She steals a glance at me as I let that sink in for a minute. In a completely bizarre and messed-up way, I get what she means. And then I remember what she said that night she gave me the comic—about how we tell ourselves stories to survive, but that doesn't mean they're the truth. I wonder how many other things she's lied about.

“So what happened after that?”

“After I was released from the hospital, I was sent back to my mother. She wasn't too happy about it because I got in the way of partying with her steady stream of loser boyfriends. But then she realized it meant she'd be getting child support again, plus more welfare money until I'm eighteen, as long as I'm living with her. Suddenly she's more than willing to have me come home. Not because she gives a crap about me, but because for the first time, having me around actually holds value for her. But trust me when I say that's where it ends.”

I don't say anything. I don't even know where to start.

“You know what it is to have people care about you, Hank. To have a family who loves you. I never had that, not for a single day, until I met you. You became my family. And because of that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, my life was pretty amazing.” She breathes in deeply and then blows out. “You hate me.”

“I don't hate you,” I tell her.

“You're mad. You have every right to be.”

“I do. But weirdly enough, I'm not angry. I'm just unbelievably sad.” We reach a picnic table that is metal and covered in graffiti. She straddles the bench. I can't sit. My body and brain are too amped up so I stand. “Why didn't you tell me the truth, Peyton? Did you think I couldn't handle it? That I would think less of you? Is that what you think of me? Because I gotta say, that makes me feel like a giant load of crap.”

“No. I don't know.” She reaches for a rock on the ground and rubs it between her thumb and index finger.

“It's not like you asked for any of this,” I say. “You didn't pick your mother. Or your dad. Of all the people in the frickin' universe, Peyton, you should know that I understand shit happens to us that we don't ask for.”

“I'm sorry, Hank.” She screws up her face and starts crying again. “I'm so sorry. I know I've made a mess of everything.”

There's this pang in my chest when I look at her, this deep ache that radiates through me. I'm sad about what happened to her, sad about how she doesn't know me as well as I'd expected. “Funny thing is—I used to be the kind of guy who got scared and bailed when things got messy. But I'm not anymore, and you're the one that helped me be that way. I guess I thought you knew that.”

She opens her mouth to speak and then stops herself.

My brain is firing on all cylinders. “Look, can we talk later? I need to go.”

She nods. “I don't blame you for walking away from me.”

“I'm not walking away from you, Peyton. I just need space to clear my head. There's a difference.”

I turn and head back toward school. Despite the fact that we're outside, I suddenly can't get enough air in my lungs.

I should have listened to Monica. She told me to stay out of other people's shit. That the better you know someone, the more likely you are to create expectations, and life and people never live up to those. She was spot on.

I don't know what I expected from Peyton, really. I think the problem is that I started to expect anything at all.

With every step I take away from her, I can feel myself putting up a wall. I don't usually allow myself to get close to people, because it generally ends up biting me in the ass. I'm usually much more guarded than that, but I left myself wide open with Peyton. It's confusing as fuck because now I'm questioning everything, sifting through what I thought we had together and trying to figure what's real.

I feel for her and her craptastic life; I really do. I wish I could fix it. In fact, I was trying to, because I thought I knew who I was protecting her from. I feel like an idiot.

Despite everything, a part of me wants to go back and put my arms around her, to tell her I understand and that it's okay.

But the truth is, I don't.

And it isn't.

And I'm not sure if it ever can be.

It's not that I don't want to be with her anymore. The thing is, I do. But I just can't be around her right now. I know she needs help, more than I can give her.

I head back toward the school, but there's no way I'm staying. Instead, I grab my backpack from my locker and walk right out the front door of the school and get on my bike. Nobody even notices. I don't care if they call my dad. I'll deal with it. I just have to get out of here.

I don't want to go home. I can't. So I start pedaling, slowly at first and then faster until the muscles in my thighs and calves burn. I push through it. As long as I concentrate on the pain in my legs, I don't have to focus on the raw ache in my heart.

I cycle through town, out to the country roads that lead toward the woods and the organic farms with their roadside stands for freshly picked lettuce and squash. When I was younger, my mom would drive out here in the summers to get fresh sweet corn and blueberries. She said everything was fresher in the country. I'm hoping that applies to perspectives too, not merely the food and the air.

I ride through three neighboring towns, out past where the houses are spread so far apart you can't even see them from the road. Despite the fact that my legs are screaming, I feel like I could ride forever.

I must have ridden a good ten or fifteen miles when I hone in on what hurts so damn bad. When Peyton came along, it was like Monica said. She made me feel like I mattered. I haven't felt that way in a long time. It was as if somebody was finally on my side. She understood me and all my bullshit and liked me anyway. It felt honest and real, like the moments she captured in her photographs. So when she didn't think I could handle the truth,
her
truth, after everything we'd been through, it was as if I didn't matter at all.

I'm no stranger to feeling irrelevant. I've pretty much felt that way since Mom and Mickey died. I just didn't expect
she
would ever make me feel that way. Peyton made me believe that I was talented. Not just that I could be somebody special, but that I already was. I'm afraid if I let her go, I might never feel that again.

I guess that's the crap love does to you. It turns your brain to mush. It sneaks up on you and turns everything upside down and inside out. Honestly, it's kind of a pain in the ass.

Admittedly, when I first met Peyton, I thought she was a little crazy. Now that it turns out she might be, I'm not sure what the hell I'm supposed to do. Because only someone who is crazy would engage in self-destructive behaviors like setting fires and cutting off her hair, right? But she'd said it herself; those actions were sort of a release.

I understand feeling like no one gives a damn about you. Feeling alone, and in the way, and believing that maybe things would be easier if you weren't around. We simply have different ways of dealing with it. So maybe she
isn't
really
crazy
; maybe she's just lonely. She might not have acted that way if she'd thought someone genuinely cared about her. She didn't know how deeply I cared about her until after she showed up at my house that night, bruised and broken. And the truth is, neither did I.

Maybe when we're together, we help each other find a way out of the darkness and feel a little less alone.

I pass a box of matches tossed on the side of the road. It's a big box, for the kind you'd use to light a fire in a woodstove. It's smashed flat where a car has run over it and kicked it into the weeds. Slightly farther down the road is a Zippo lighter, dented and tarnished with its lid hanging open. I stop to look at it, resting my legs for a minute. It's engraved with “Love you like a house on fire.” It makes me smile. Monica would probably say it's a sign.

The sky is turning the color of a tangerine as the sun moves lower in the sky, and I figure I should probably head toward home since I have no idea how long it's going to take me to get there. My skin is taut and red, and my T-shirt is soaked through like I'm competing in the Tour de France.

By the time I get home, I feel a million times better even though I'm pretty positive I'm not going to be able to walk tomorrow. I take a long shower, enjoying the hot water pounding on my sore muscles and the sting on my face and neck where I got sunburned. Afterward, I lie back on my bed and let the weight of the day settle.

When I open my eyes, I'm staring at the envelope I'd tossed on my nightstand the day before, the one from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. I pick it up, ready to pitch it in the trash, but there's a giant red “Congratulations!” stamped on the outside. It looks all official, like I've won a contest or something.

I tear open the envelope and skim the enclosed letter. It says my application materials have been received and reviewed by their Graphic Arts program. The letter goes on to say that my work samples and recommendations have “convinced the faculty that I have the aptitude, talent, and imagination needed to make valuable contributions to their diverse community and thrive in their rich artistic environment.” And to top it all off, they would like to invite me to Boston to tour their state-of-the-art facilities and meet with faculty for an interview. I read it two more times until the words sink in.

Clearly, this is a mistake.

I never applied, so how could they have seen my stuff? I flip through the rest of the envelope's contents: financial aid forms and a few informational pamphlets, all of which seem pretty legit.

Suddenly everything clicks into place. Peyton keeping my drawings. Mr. Vaughn's comment the day of the fire alarm about how he was thinking good thoughts for me.

Peyton must have sent the application and asked Mr. Vaughn to write the recommendation. I swear, sometimes it seems like
Freeze Frame
means as much to her as it does to me. She knew I would never have the confidence to do it on my own, because honestly, going to college is a dream, kind of like winning the lottery or finding out that doughnuts are healthy. The odds of spending my life doing what I love rather than saying “Would you like ketchup or ranch?” or “Cat food is in aisle six” are not exactly stacked in my favor.

Until maybe now.

Not gonna lie: it's a little overwhelming to allow myself to think like that. When you're used to falling down over and over again, it's hard to believe life could ever be any different. In fact, I can come up with lots of reasons I shouldn't even consider going to this college, but it all boils down to this: I'm scared. Like crap-my-pants, what-if-I-go-for-it-and-find-out-I-completely-suck-ass-and-this-is-as-good-as-it-gets scared. I'm so convinced I'm gonna fail that I find a way to sabotage the situation before it can happen. Honestly, the biggest thing standing in my way is me.

I picture Peyton sitting in the park, scared and ashamed. I'm a total jerk for letting her feel that way. After all she's been through, even though she lied, she meant to protect me. In the end, the person she was trying to protect me from the most was herself.

Somehow, that makes me love her all the more.

I decide that tomorrow I'm going to tell her I'm sorry, that we'll figure it all out as we go.

I make it until about 2:00 a.m. Tomorrow, even if it is technically now today, is too far away. I have to tell her right now. So I grab the envelope and get on my bike, despite my legs' protests, and ride to her house. I'm not surprised to find her walking down the street, even though it's the middle of the night. It's like she was waiting for me, as if she knew I'd come.

Of course she knew I'd come.

I slow my bike and ride alongside her as she walks. She digs her hands in her pockets and steals a glance at me before returning her gaze to the full moon overhead.

“What do you want, Hank? I told you that you could walk away. I'd understand. And I meant it. You didn't need to come here to tell me I'm crazy and need help or that I'm some horrible person. Let me save you the trouble. I figured all that out on my own.”

“I wanted to talk to you,” I say.

“Seriously, I'll be fine. Things are looking up. My mother finally kicked Pete to the curb. Turns out he really had stolen money from her too. On the downside, the new wallpaper and pool are a no-go. But, I'll be eighteen in less than three weeks. Then I can get the hell out of here and none of this will matter anyway. So what I'm saying is, you don't have to worry about me. I can take care of myself. I always have.”

When she's done talking, I reach behind me to pull the envelope from the back pocket of my jeans and hand it to her. She stops walking, and I straddle my bike as she eyes it curiously. “What's this?”

“Open it.”

She does, and her eyes fly over the words. Then she half smiles. “Not a surprise. Congratulations.”

“I can't believe you did that.”

She hands me back the letter and her smile fades. “I'm sorry. I thought it would make you happy. I should have asked.” She takes off walking again, and I hop off my bike, holding the handlebars and keeping pace with her.

“Jesus, Peyton. I'm not mad. I'm about as opposite of mad as it gets. You probably know better than anybody how much I dream of this kind of opportunity—to write and illustrate comics. I didn't know what I was supposed to say or feel this afternoon. I was confused. I biked halfway across the state of Massachusetts, trying to make sense of what you told me. But when I opened that envelope, it was like everything crystallized. The first thing that went through my mind was I couldn't wait to show you. You're the one person in the whole damn universe who knows what this means to me.”

She smiles weakly and says, “I'm really proud of you, Hank. I never doubted you'd get in.”

“It's only an interview. I'm not in yet. And even then, I'm not sure if I could go.”

“Of course you're going to go. You
have
to go,” she says.

“I don't know. I haven't even talked to Dad yet.”

“He'll miss you.”

“Yeah, right.” I snort a laugh. “He'll miss my paycheck, microscopic as it may be.”

“Okay then,
I'll
miss you.”

“So come with me.”

She raises an eyebrow, clearly amused. “Yeah, right.”

“I'm serious.”

She smiles. I stop walking, reach for her arm, and pull her toward me. “I've never meant anything more, Peyton. The minute you came into my life, everything went batshit crazy. Good batshit crazy. It's like it went from black and white to color. I'm not just giving up and walking away because you're the best thing that ever happened to me.”

I move a little closer to her. “You may have a seriously messed-up family and some major issues with olives and tomatoes and who knows how many other foods I don't even know about yet. You may walk around at four o'clock in the frickin' morning, and you may burn Barbies and set shit on fire, and some people may not understand any of that. But I do. I
get
you. I get you
and
all your crazy. And I think you get me.”

She ponders what I've said for a minute, then holds my gaze steadily. “What would I do? If I went with you, I mean?”

“Anything you want.”

“Anything?”

“Anything. Maybe you could get a job at that gallery you told me about in Boston, the one where you saw those cool photos of the cities. It doesn't matter. It's a fresh start. Just come with me.” That makes her smile.

“That would be like a dream.”

“You can make it a reality.” She puts a finger thoughtfully to her lips. I lean over and kiss her. “So you'll think about it?”

She nods. That's good enough for now.

Peyton invites me back to her house. Her mother's out late and may not come home at all. She's on a date with a new guy. A mechanic. Peyton jokes that he's probably rotating her tires and giving her a lube job, so we're blissfully alone.

I'm ecstatic there will be no potential late-night reunion with Mrs. Breedlove. She's not exactly the president of my fan club, and I'm guessing that discovering me in their house wouldn't change that.

We go back to Peyton's room. Her forty-fives are still suspended from the ceiling and the posters are still intact, as they were when I was last here, but I don't want to focus on her lies.

Peyton lights a small candle and puts it on her bookshelf so the room is bathed in a gentle, warm light. I'll spare the details, but mood lighting and makeup sex really is “a thing.” It couldn't have been more perfect. Afterward, we're both so relaxed that we fall asleep.

When I begin to come to, I think I'm at home. The smell is reminiscent of Monica's cooking. I open my eyes and they burn in the haze. The room is filling with smoke, and there's a crackling noise like a campfire. I start to cough and shake Peyton awake. She winces as her eyes begin to water.