Pieces of Us (11 page)

Kyle

Y
ou could escape in video games for days. So when Alex asks you to come to Wild West City with him, Katie, and Julie, it’s a no-brainer. You know Alex really wants a double date or double fuck or whatever he’s thinking, but you pretend you don’t get that part. You never did ask her out like you told him you would.

But Wild West City will be a good, neutral spot either way. When you and Julie were kids, the two of you took pictures there. The kind where you put your head on top of a cowboy or cowgirl body. Maybe you can do this again with her. Just have fun like you used to, before her hands began creating detailed plans to touch yours.

By the time you get to the car, you’re feeling excited. You’re going to show the pinball machines who’s boss. Maybe even win something for Julie, like the good friend you are. But then Julie gets into the car, and she looks hopeful, and you feel like shit. “You look nice,” you say, and it’s true. She does. You’re just being honest, you tell yourself, ignoring the way the hope reaches her eyes. She swings her leg closer to yours, letting her toe touch yours. It takes a lot but you leave your foot where it is even though you want to jerk it away and run.

Then you’re at the arcade and you can breathe again. Alex and Katie tell you where to meet them and then leave to make out or play games or both. It’s just you and Julie, her standing so close you feel her breath on your neck. Warm girl’s breath. It brings back memories of Sarah, of Alex’s girls, of what you never wanted and what you can’t have, and you leave them and Julie behind. You search for air. You find Alex and bum a cigarette. He gives you four and punches you lightly in the arm like he’s proud of you or something, like the cigarettes mean something. You punch him back and laugh when Katie tells you to keep the cancer sticks away from Julie.

You walk away from the noise of the games, away from the crowds, away toward the highway and just stand behind the barricade, smoking your cancer sticks and watching the cars whizz by. It’s easier to breathe here, where exhaust fumes are safe smells.

“Can I bum one?” asks Julie, suddenly beside you.

Your eyes were closed, and you were content getting lost in the rush of traffic. You take a few seconds to open your eyes, another few seconds to answer. “Sure.”

“I’ve never done this before,” she says with a nervous giggle, her fingers brushing yours when you pass her the cig. “You’ll have to corrupt me.”

“It’s a bad habit.”

“I can just do it once in a while, like you. I think this is the first time I’ve seen you smoke.”

You think of talking her out of it, but who are you to do that? She wants to do it with you, and if you were a normal person, this would not be a huge deal—you might even be flattered that a girl wants you to teach her something, even something as vile as smoking, to get closer to you. You push that out of her head and just focus on Julie. Good ol’ Spit-playing Julie.

Her fingers are shaking as she brings the cigarette close to her shiny pink lips, mimicking your motions. You teach her to inhale and exhale, talk her through the coughing, tease her about the head rush. She smokes half of one, and shyly asks if you can help her finish. As you do, your mouth covering the little pink ring left by her lips, she asks if she can have another few puffs. You let her, and there’s something about the way her mouth covers that same spot yours was on that makes you feel light.

This feeling is familiar. It’s the Sarah feeling. It scares you, but when Julie says she wants to stay out here a little longer and look at the cars with you, you say okay. And when she moves closer to you, her bare arm touching yours, the part of you screaming to get away is silent.

Katie

S
he likes him,” I tell Sasha at Wild West City as we watch Kostya and Yulya from the hood of his car.

“No offense to your sister, but it’s pretty obvious.” He takes a drag of his cigarette and blows the smoke away from me. I don’t like when he smokes in front of me, but at least he doesn’t blow it in my face like Trina said her ex did.

“So Kyle knows?”

“My brother is socially retarded. I had to tell him.” He flicks the ashes into an empty soda can.

“Interesting,” I say, walking my fingers up Sasha’s arm to his collarbone. “Does he like her back?”

Sasha laughs. “You girls are funny. You could’ve just started the conversation that way—I would have told you.” He takes another drag. “I think he’ll give the idea a chance.”

The relief I feel when he says this surprises me. But it shouldn’t. “Good. He has to. I kind of owe her.”

“You, a cradle robber? Steal your baby sister’s boyfriend or something?” He laughs like this would never happen.

“Sort of. He was in my grade, and he tutored her. They hooked up and then suddenly broke up. He told me it was her idea. She didn’t want to see him anymore … ” I don’t know why I’m telling him this. Maybe I think he’ll tell me I did nothing wrong. He looks at me—at Katya—like she can do no wrong.

“So there you go,” Sasha says, clearly bored. “Whatever happened wasn’t your fault. What’s with girls and drama?” He takes a long drag and then throws the butt on the ground.

It’s so simple, the way he says it. But it’s hard to know what’s my fault anymore; what I wanted, what I didn’t.

My fault: Ignoring the way Derek looked at me. There was a want in his eyes.

My fault: Believing I could be silly and flirty Katie again, like she wasn’t gone.

My fault/not my fault?: Derek asking me to meet him after school. Saying he wanted to talk about Julie. I thought he wanted love advice or something. I should have known. He said they were over; he wanted me. He leaned in so close. I froze. He pushed his lips on mine and I didn’t fight back. Again. He finally pulled away. Asked what the hell was wrong with me. What was with the frigid act? He’d heard different, he said.

I stared at him, afraid to ask if he really had or if he was just talking trash. I didn’t even walk away. Just stood there like a mannequin. It was he who finally left, after calling me a tease. I don’t know how much longer I stood there before I remembered I could move. I almost told Julie, but what would I say? Her first kiss wanted
me
? I wonder if she could see it in my face, though, when my mask fell off. I wonder if that’s why she just turned cold.

“There’s a girl code,” I say now, focusing on the more clear-cut situation (more clear-cut to him, anyway). “We only kissed once, and then I told him it was wrong.”
In my head. That’s what I tell him each time I replay the scene. I move. I push him away.
“He was Yulya’s—”

“He wasn’t anybody’s.” Sasha pops a piece of gum in his mouth.

He can’t understand this.

“It should have never happened, so now I just hope she and Kostya work out.”

“You think too much,” Sasha says, moving his hand to my cheek. “Don’t worry about them. I’ll help make it work, okay?” He gently lifts my chin, moves it close to his mouth. It smells of minty gum. I like that gum. It leaves that sharp, cool taste in his mouth, taking away almost all traces of ash.

I kiss him, and he pushes me down on the hood of the car, pins my arms behind my head. Flash:
Ethan holds my arms above my head with one arm while he strokes my side with the other. It will be okay. Sshh.

But then Sasha’s breath is near my nose, and I breathe it in deep and I’m back at the car. Back under his weight. I let him take control. I melt into the car and escape.

Julie

~
The Chickens
~

I
t’s three days after Wild West City, and Wilbur’s truck squawks down the gravel path.

I put on my flip-flops and pull a pair of shorts over my bathing suit. “You coming?” I say to Katie. I know she won’t, but I like watching her reaction when I ask. Always a look of disgust. But today, she doesn’t answer no right away. She actually seems to consider it.

“Would it be weird if I came? Like, do you and Alex have a vibe going, doing some play-by-play or something?”

I shrug. “I don’t know if you’d call it a ‘vibe,’ but yeah, sometimes it’s a cool spectator sport.”

“Why?”

I hear the truck squeal to a stop. The squawking gets louder, and I know he’s taking the crates out. They’re going to start and I’m getting antsy. “I don’t know. It’s something to do.” I think about it more because I know she wants a better answer. “Sometimes I like to see which one fights the hardest.”

“Why? Does that make it taste better?”

“Geez, Katie. I don’t know. Why the sudden interest?” Cages rattle. They’re starting. “In or out?” I ask, almost at the door.

She sighs. “Tell Alex I said ‘hi.’ ” Then she opens the back door and heads to the swings.

“Sure,” I call out. “You do the same with Kyle.” Because I know he will be there, too. And for some reason, knowing that both of them hate Wilbur bugs me.

Alex

J
ulie runs to the bench just as Wilbur grabs the first chicken’s neck.

“What took you so long? Chickening out?” I crack myself up.

“That’s a good one,” she says, rolling her eyes and doing an exaggerated slap on her leg. “No, your girlfriend was actually thinking of getting in on the fun.”

Girlfriend. Does Katya call herself that? I don’t do girlfriends. But … “Oh yeah?”

“Looked like it was actually going to happen, and then she, uh, chickened out.” Julie laughs. She’s wearing that stupid green suit again. If it weren’t for that, she’d actually seem a little cool.

Wilbur slices the first chicken’s throat quickly. She barely squawks. Just falls right to the ground. He’s getting better.

“Impressive,” says Julie. She fiddles with her bow, and it draws attention to her tits right below it. The summer’s feeling her. She’s tan now, and some chunk has moved from her waist up to her boobs.

She takes her eyes off Wilbur and catches me looking. She raises her eyebrows. And something hits me then. She doesn’t believe in that same shit “code” that Katya does. I could hook up with her, and not only would she do it, but she wouldn’t tell Katya.

Not that I would. I save my player mojo for the Philly whores, not Katya. But I store the info anyway.

A chicken flies over our heads and I duck as blood sprays. “Fuck,” I say.

Julie doesn’t even squirm, just looks toward the swings. What the hell is wrong with Kyle? If I was his age and there was someone as willing as Julie—and I can tell she so is—I’d be all over that. Shit, I’d even be all over it now.

“What’s with your brother?” she asks, quietly, as another chicken falls to the ground. Wilbur curses as the blood squirts on his chin.

“He’s a pussy,” I say.

“Maybe, but he always has stuff to talk to Katie about.”

I laugh. The thought is just too stupid. Like Katya would ever go for Kyle. “Probably because she doesn’t put the moves on him.”

She looks at the swings again. “I guess.”

“Seriously, little girl. You have nothing to worry about.” I grab my dick. “No girl can pass up on this.”

Julie laughs and rolls her eyes. “Puh-leeze.”

I don’t tell her I’m fucking right about my dick. That’s why they all keep coming back. But we’re back to the chickens and done with the girl talk.

“Make you a bet,” I say. “Next chicken flies only as far Wilbur’s kneecap.”

“You’re on,” says Julie. “What are we betting?”

“I win, you buy me a pack of cigarettes. You win … ” I watch her fiddle with the stupid-ass bow again. “You win, I give you a few bucks for a hot swimsuit.”

“Done,” she says.

Wilbur grabs another chicken out of a cage. This one’s a fighter. It flies out of his hands twice before he captures it for good. I’m losing respect for good ol’ Wilbur. He can’t control that hen at all. He only gives her a small cut and she flies out of his hands again.

“He’s pathetic,” I say loudly. Wilbur gives me the finger and grabs the hen with new gusto. Yeah, asshole, you showed me. Tool. The next slice is clean and takes the head off. Another chicken would have dropped dead on the ground. This hen flies.

“C’mon,” whispers Julie. “Past the knee, past the knee.”

Fuck me. This hen is going to do it. I could have used a new pack of smokes. She flies to his chest and then collapses. “Yes!” Julie says. She starts yammering about the kind of suit she wants. She’s talking about something like Katya’s.

“Sure.” I
yes
her to death, but I know what she’s thinking. That the suit can make miracles. I mean it would be an improvement over the crappy one she’s wearing, and she’s getting hotter, but it will never make her look like Katya.

Wilbur points to his eyes, then to mine. Like he’s watching me. He raises his thumb in the air all proud of himself. What the fuck for? He barely kept her down. If it were me, that bitch would have never stood a chance.