Speechless (16 page)

That is so not what he meant and I know it. I’m not an idiot. Sometimes.

Hot tears well up in my eyes and trace tracks down my cheeks before I can stop them. I’m so tired of feeling like this, sick with guilt and constantly on the verge of panic attacks. And it’s like every time I start to feel remotely good about something, life says, “Oh, wait a minute, that’s not right,” and drop-kicks me back into You Are Made Of Epic Fail territory. It’s exhausting. I’m
exhausted
.

“Hey.” Sam steps forward, holds my wrist and pulls me off the wall, wraps his arms all the way around me. “Hey, come here. It’s okay. Shh. You’re okay.”

I bury my face in his chest, rubbing my wet cheeks against the worn fabric of his shirt. I can’t remember the last time anyone hugged me like this. Like they’d hold me as long as I needed. And I need it right now. I don’t try to pretend that I don’t. I dig my fingers into the back of his shoulders and cling to him, letting out choked sobs.

I cry and cry and cry until I can’t muster up the energy to cry anymore. Even then, I keep my face hidden in Sam’s shirtfront, sniffling and taking deep, hiccupy breaths as he strokes the top of my snow-covered hair. My throat is all thick and gross, every breath of freezing air like tiny needles piercing my lungs, and my hands are totally numb to the point where they could snap off like twigs at the wrist.

None of that changes the fact I’d still rather be here than anywhere else in the world.

* * *

Once the crying has stopped, Sam offers to go back into the school and retrieve my messenger bag and jacket for me. Thank God. No way can I set foot in there again—at least not today. He lets me warm up in his car, a white Olds Cutlass with torn red leather interior. A few books rest on the passenger’s seat, and while he’s inside, I take a brief look at the book sleeves. I haven’t read any of them—they’re by authors I haven’t heard of, like Chuck Palahniuk (whose last name I’m sure I mangle trying to pronounce in my head) and David Sedaris—with some comic books stuck in between. After a minute, I put them down on the floor next to my feet and turn up the radio instead. The station is set to NPR; two people are arguing over the estate tax.

If a car says something about the person it belongs to, this means Sam is really into talk radio. And reading books written by dudes. And, if the wrappers on the floor and the half-a-pack in the glove compartment are any indication, eating Twizzlers. Which just so happen to be a guilty pleasure of mine.

Unfortunately Sam does not have any tissues anywhere in his car. I try to make do with some leftover fast-food napkins I find. Even then my eyes are still all puffy and red. I look awful, but at least I feel a little better. More calm. Kind of embarrassed, though, for slobbering all over Sam like that.

Eventually Sam comes back and tosses my coat and bag into my lap. I make an
oomph
sound in surprise and nearly choke on the piece of licorice I’m chewing.

He laughs as he buckles his seat belt. “You know, I think that’s the most sound I’ve ever heard from you.”

It’s more than a little bizarre that we have never had a real, two-way conversation. With both of us using our voices. I mean, I knew of him before the party, and I’m sure he knew of me. Most people do; it’s one of the benefits of being friends with people like Kristen Courteau, if you could call it that. People know who you are. So we knew
of
each other, but we never talked.

Usually there are narcs monitoring the student parking lot to stop delinquents from cutting class, but somehow, thankfully, not today. Sam turns the car out of the lot and drives toward the center of town. He hasn’t indicated where we’re going. After he let me go, all he said was, “I’ll get your stuff, we’re getting out of here,” and that’s all I wanted, to leave, so I wasn’t about to object.

“I’ll call Asha and let her know we took off,” he says now. “She can walk, and after we’re done, I’ll drive you back so you can pick up your car.”

Asha. Shit. I didn’t even think about her. But Sam doesn’t seem worried, and it isn’t a far walk, really. Fifteen minutes, tops. I’ll make it up to her later. Somehow.

I notice the cell phone in his hand. It reminds me how I’ve barely used mine at all since the vow. I take it from him, and he watches bemusedly as I program my number into his contacts list, and then his into mine.

“What’s the point of having my number?” he asks. “It’s not like I can call you.”

I open up a new text message screen on my phone and type in,

it’s called texting LOSER.

He grins. “Point duly noted.”

He eases around a bend that takes us to the long stretch of road along the lake. I squint out the window at a few figures in the distance. Ice fishers. In the summer, Dad likes to take me fishing at the docks by the yacht club. You can’t eat anything you get—they’re mostly skinny rainbow trout anyway—so all we do is catch and release, but he likes the sport of it, I guess. I like to sit on the planks, the warm wood digging into the backs of my knees, legs dangling, and cast my line over and over lazily, enjoying the sun.

Snowflakes hit the window and melt, trailing down in tiny rivulets. Summer feels so far away. All there is now is cold and snow, snow and cold.

We end up at Rosie’s. Not such a surprise. Sam turns off the engine and says, “Tuna melts.”

I raise my eyebrows at him.

“I said I’d teach you how to make them,” he continues. “So let’s do it.”

No one’s around when we walk in, except for Dex and Lou, mopping floors and cleaning off tables.

As soon as Lou sees me, she drops her rag. “Oh, sweetie, what happened?”

I must really look like a mess. I shrug and swipe self-consciously at my eyes.

“Do I need to kick someone’s ass?” Dex asks. He points the mop handle straight out, wielding it like a weapon. I crack a small, teary smile.

“Just a rough day,” Sam says. “You know how it goes.”

Lou drags me into the bathroom and helps me clean up, dabbing under my eyes with a damp paper towel, her fingers lightly guiding my chin. When I’m this close, I can see how clear and smooth her skin is. Like a model’s. I should ask what product she uses.

“You know, you have killer eyes. Very expressive,” she says.

She’s only saying that to cheer me up, I know, but I’m still flattered. Lou has wide-set violet eyes, so light they’re almost translucent. Not like mine, which are a muddy-green, or maybe brown, never settling on one shade.

“You get away with this no-talking thing. All you have to do is look at someone, and it’s all right there.” She waves a hand in the general vicinity of my eye area.

I don’t know if I like the idea of that. Having everything I’m feeling written right on my face. It makes me feel too exposed.

“So Dex wants to repaint,” she goes on, like it’s the natural flow of the conversation. “He gets like this sometimes. Last summer he did a surfer theme—he put surfboards up on the wall, and these glass bowls with shells on every table, like this is Southern California or something. Tacky as all get-out.”

I laugh at the thought of it, and she smiles a little, surprised, maybe. I haven’t really laughed around her. Or anyone. It hasn’t been intentional; I just haven’t had any reason. Laughing isn’t the same as talking, really, so I’m safe. It’s not like anyone’s going to call foul. I make up the rules here.

“Now he wants purple,” she scoffs. “Jesus Christ, I mean,
purple?
Ugh. I’m trying to talk him out of it. I’d ask you to help, but that wouldn’t really work, huh?” She quirks a grin at me and tosses the paper towel wad into the trash can.

I’m feeling a lot better when I join Sam at the grill. He’s already laid out all the ingredients. He shows me how to drain the tuna using a colander (which, thanks to yesterday, I now know the location of), then mix it with other ingredients, sprinkle on cheese and pepper and green onions and this stuff he explains is called crème fraîche, which is sort of like mayonnaise but, he claims, tastes better. After that’s done, he stuffs the pita bread with the tuna and some avocado slices, butters the bread and slaps it on the grill.

He lays out the whole process as he goes. It sounds more complicated than it looks. When he’s finished his, I do one of my own. Even under his instruction, it ends up less than perfect—one side is a little burned, and the other a little undercooked, and I used too much crème fraîche.

“Still, not bad for a first try,” Sam tells me after he’s tried some of mine. “Next time it’ll be better.”

I smile around a bite of tuna melt, more than a little pleased to hear there will, in fact, be a next time.

* * *

The good news is that when Asha rolls in two hours later, she doesn’t seem to mind that we ditched her. Well, not ditched.
Ditched
makes it sound like it was purposeful.
Bailed
is the more appropriate word choice.

Either way, she’s as bubbly as ever, humming along to the corner jukebox that blasts Otis Redding while she rolls the silverware. I help her sort the forks and salad forks and spoons and teaspoons and knives, and she shows me how to wrap them neatly into cloth napkin bundles.

“My family inherited a set of antique silverware from my grandmother,” she tells me. Like most things with Asha, it comes out of the blue. “It’s all from India. And there’s this teapot—it’s really ancient and beautiful. I love it. My mom used to make tea with it all the time.”

I stop sorting the forks and give her a questioning look.

“Oh, she’s not dead or anything,” she explains hastily. “She just…” Asha shrugs a little, looking down. “She’s sick a lot. She doesn’t do much these days.”

I’m glad I have an excuse not to speak, because I don’t know what to say to that. I don’t think Asha expects anything, though, because the next thing I know she’s chattering away about her knitting projects.

Once we’re done with the silverware, I join Sam and Dex in the kitchen so I can sweep the floor. Apparently Andy has the night off. I feel kind of bad for being so relieved—but I’ve had a really, really bad day, and it’s like God is cutting me a break for once. Maybe I should start going to church. Earn some points from the Big Man.

“I’d rather have a new milkshake machine than a new coffeemaker,” Sam says to Dex. They’re in the middle of a discussion about kitchen renovations. “If people want fancy frou-frou coffee, there are other places in town. No one else does milkshakes.”

“Hmm.” Dex rubs his chin with one hand. “I don’t know. What do you think, Chelsea?”

Sam has a point; Rosie’s isn’t a Starbucks. People don’t come here for the gourmet coffee. I point the mop handle toward Sam and nod at Dex.

“Yes!” Sam exclaims. “Team Milkshake Machine for the win.” He gives me an enthusiastic high five and we both dissolve into laughter.

“Yeah, yeah, we’ll see,” Dex says with a grin. “I’ll have to shop around.” He wanders over to the register and pops it open, counting the money inside.

“That’s not going to make you any richer,” Lou says as she passes by with a pot of coffee.

“It’s not about being rich,” he says. “I just like the feel of it. Besides, I’m rich anyway. Spiritually. After all, I have you, darling.” He says
darling
with an exaggerated accent, so it sounds more like “dah-link.”

She rolls her eyes. “And
that’s
not going to get you laid,” she retorts, but when he snatches her around the waist and pecks her on the mouth, she kisses him back before shoving him off.

It’s quiet tonight, so in between dish duty and busing I finish the sweeping, mop the floor and spend a lot of time lingering around the grill, watching Sam and Dex cook. By the end of the shift, my feet ache and my hands are all wrinkled from dirty dishwater.

“Ready to go?” asks Sam after we’ve both punched out.

I nod and collect my things, waving goodbye to Dex and Lou before piling into the Cutlass with Sam and Asha. He drops Asha at home, closer to the suburban east end of town; her house is nice, two stories, all beige paint and stone, with a dark green SUV parked in the driveway. I think she told me once that her dad is a doctor.

Sam doesn’t say anything as he drives me to the student lot and pulls into the space next to my car. We sit with the engine running for a long time. I don’t know what he’s waiting for. I should go, but when I unbuckle and reach for the door handle, I think about Mom at the sink and Dad’s face and it’s suddenly the last thing I want to do.

“Well,” he says after a while, like the beginning of a thought, except then he just stops. We look at each other, each waiting for something. Finally I take out my whiteboard.

What is the deal with Asha’s mother? She told me she was sick.

Sam looks at the board and then at me. “I think you should ask her if you want to know,” he says.

So you know?

“Asha talks to me,” he says. “We’re friends. If she wants you to know, she’ll tell you herself.” He shoots me a pointed look. “You really don’t understand the concept of secrets, do you?”

Old habits die hard.

He snorts. “Apparently.”

Don’t look at me like that. I was just curious.

“There’s a difference between curiosity and nosiness,” he says. “Don’t you have any secrets? Something private you wouldn’t share with just anyone?”

I write,
My dad lost his job yesterday
, in tiny cramped letters.

Sam stares at it for a minute, and then at me. “Man. That’s really… I’d ask if you’re okay, but that sounds like a really stupid question.”

I smile a little, because he’s right, it would be kind of stupid.

“What did he do?” he asks.

Sales.

Sam nods. “My stepdad owns a car dealership in Westfield,” he says. Westfield is the next town over. “He might need a sales guy. Do you want me to talk to him?”

Okay, this is bordering on unreal. There is no way Sam is just that good of a guy. No one is. Not without strings attached.