I couldn’t wait for Kevin to come over, but it was different from how I felt yesterday when I was waiting for him to arrive. I wasn’t riddled with fearful anxiety while I waited now. Today, I just wanted the clock to run a little faster.
“Matt, you’re wiggling around like when you were seven and didn’t want to stop playing to go to the bathroom.”
“Mom! For crying out loud. Don’t say things like that!”
My dad laughed, then took a sip of coffee. We were having a brunch at eleven-thirty because they’d got back late from the party they’d attended last night. I nibbled at the eggs and toast but the fried potatoes didn’t interest me. Nor did the doughnuts Mom had insisted Dad run out and get. I did eat a couple of pieces of melon.
“I’ll try to hold my tongue when Kevin arrives, but you know how we women can be, always managing to embarrass their teenage sons,” she said, laying it on thick.
I knew she was teasing, so didn’t rise to the bait. I simply scowled at her, then went back to reading the Sunday comics. I always looked forward to reading Frazz and Get Fuzzy. Frazz was on a walk out in the country, chatting with Caulfield. I loved the relationship those two had. I really liked Caulfield. I think he was only 10, but he acted older than I was. I wished I was as cool as he was, and had half his self-confidence. In Get Fuzzy, Satchel was plotting with the ferret.
“Evidently your talk with Kevin went okay yesterday, huh?” That was my dad. He was looking at me over the top of the sports section. I had barely spoken to either of them yesterday. Their party was a barbecue and an adult get-together and they’d left for it just after Kevin and Becky had gone, leaving me a $20 bill and instructions to call out for pizza when I was hungry.
Mom had raised her eyebrows at me and asked if everything was okay after knocking on my bedroom door before leaving. I’d answered it, hoping like crazy that I wasn’t flushed or that the room didn’t smell funky. She didn’t seem to notice anything. I at least interpreted the eyebrows as a question about how I’d got on with my guests, not why I was flushed, had a box of Kleenex in my hand and was breathing hard.
Actually, I wasn’t doing any of those things. I hadn’t gotten to that yet when she’d knocked. Just teasing. Hey, hang around with those two uncensored brainiacs all day and hear them going at it, I think a little of that had rubbed off on me.
I’d told her things had gone great, which she knew anyway because she’d seen us all playing in the pool together, then talking on the patio.
She’d looked me in the eyes, then smiled, a full, warm smile. She can read me like a book. She’d given me the twenty, told me she loved me and they’d probably be late. They’d left me to my own devices. Which was mainly lying on my bed and thinking, with an interruption for 16-year-old activities and then for eating.
Now Dad was asking me how things went.
“Better than okay, really. He’s coming over today just to hang out. I think we’re going to be friends. I went from having none to now having two. You know, I didn’t really need any friends. I just got these two to get Mom off my back.”
My dad grinned at me, and my mom sort of hrrrumphed like she does sometimes. I grinned back at Dad. Then he surprised me by saying, “I like Kevin.”
I didn’t know what he meant by that. Did he really like him, or was he being supportive of me in my choice of friends? I decided it was best just to change the subject, which I did by ignoring his comment. What do parents know about friends, anyway?
We ate in a mostly companionable silence. I laughed out loud at one of the strips, something I rarely did. Mom looked up from her section of the paper but then ignored me and told Dad something about the mayor not setting a very good example of morality in high offices if he was having affairs all over the place with reporters, but I didn’t pay any attention to that.
I was out sitting on the front steps, just enjoying the warm day and daydreaming when Kevin rode up on his bike.
“Hi,” he said after he’d parked his bike and walked over. He smiled sort of a half smile, half grin at me, but didn’t say anything else. I’d expected him to tease me for waiting for him outside in front, but he didn’t. I liked that. I hoped we wouldn’t just tease each other all the time. That’s not what I wanted.
He sat down next to me, glanced at me briefly, then looked out across the front lawn at the neighborhood, just like I’d been doing.
“What did your parents say about you coming over again?” I asked him, eventually.
“It’s just my mom, remember? Dad’s gone. She actually seemed happy. It was Dad not wanting me to waste my time—his words—with friends. She only wanted me home all the time so she wouldn’t be facing his sarcasm and ridicule alone. Now that she doesn’t have that to worry about, she doesn’t seem to mind if I leave. I told her I was coming over here, and we talked a little about you. She’s happy I have a friend other than just Chuck.”
“Have you told her . . . I mean . . . ” I stopped. It might be better to leave this alone.
He wasn’t flustered at all, however. “You mean that I’m gay?”
“Well, yeah.”
“No, there’s no reason to yet. When it comes time to tell her, I will.”
“How will you know it’s time? And do you think she’ll be okay with it?”
“I don’t know about when but I know it’s not now. As for her reaction? Will she be okay with it? I’d say probably. She’s so wrapped up in herself these days, worrying if she’s doing the right thing with the divorce. She’s going to a counselor now, too, and she’s—the counselor is a woman—got Mom thinking about things and working through things and so she’s focused on that. I don’t want to give her something like my being gay to distract her right now, and there’s no reason to.”
I thought about that, and thought maybe he was putting off something he didn’t want to do and making up reasons to support that, but then realized he knew his situation at home better than I ever could and it wasn’t very fair of me to be making unfounded judgments.
I decided to talk about something else. “How’s your wrist? We didn’t talk about that at all yesterday.”
“Good! It’s boring.”
“I know you saw the doctor. Did he tell you how long you’d have to wear the cast?”
“He’s not sure. He did say that because I’m young, my bones will heal much faster than an adult’s would. He gave me vitamins and supplements that are supposed to promote bone healing, too. I’ve been taking them. It was just a hairline fracture, and they had to look really hard at the X-rays to even find it. At first they just thought it was a sprain.”
“But how much longer? Didn’t he at least give you an estimate?”
“Yeah. I forced him to.” Kevin giggled. “He didn’t want to, but I kept after him. So he finally told me the best case would be the end of next week, but not to get too excited thinking it’ll be that fast. He said my age and the type of break it was, being relatively minor, were both combining to make the healing time pretty short.
He said the last X-ray he took, he couldn’t see the crack any longer. So I’m pretty sure this coming week is the last one I’ll be wearing the cast. I’m even going to try to come back to gym Monday. I might not be able to do everything, but I’m going to dress out.”
“Good. And I’m still sorry.”
“Don’t start that again!”
“I can’t help it. I never maimed anyone before.”
“It was my fault as much as yours, maybe more so. So forget about it. Talk about something else.”
“Okay. How about talking about something that’s worrying me?”
Kevin looked over at me then. “You worry about things a lot, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess I do.”
“I don’t really do that.”
“Well, this still bothers me some. So I worry about it. I’m not sure talking will really solve it. My problem is, I’m going to be hanging with you at school. All I can. That means lunch and gym for sure, and in the halls if we see each other. And after a while, after people have seen us together, some will think it funny that we hang together because of the age difference. I know I’m paranoid, and I know I worry too much about everything, but I don’t want people saying things, even thinking things. I had enough of that before. And then I worry about your reputation, too. They’ll think bad things about you, too.”
He was quiet, thinking about that. Then he said, “We don’t have to do that. Hang together, I mean. I want to be with you, but we can find time after school or on the weekends.”
I reacted immediately to that. “Screw that! No way. You need a friend at school, and besides, I’d rather be teased than let them scare me away from you. Mom always says I care too much about what other kids think, but I’m a teenager. It comes with the territory.
“And I do worry about this. I don’t react well to teasing like that. I don’t want to get caught up in something. But are you all right with it, if it happens?”
“Maybe we should just play it by ear, Matt. Maybe no one will say anything, and if they do, we’ll see what it’s like, and can reevaluate what we’re doing when it happens.”
“Yeah. Maybe. You’re right, I’m doing what I did before when I worried about you paging me. I’m letting my fears get ahead of reality. Okay. Let’s not worry about it till we have to.”
He looked over at me and smiled, then stood up. “Let’s ride over to Becky’s house and surprise her.”
“Okay. You don’t know where she lives, do you?” He shook his head. “Didn’t think so. Okay, I’ll lead the way. It’s not very far.”
I told my parents where we were going, and then we rode over to Becky’s house. We both laid our bikes on her lawn up by the house, and I rang the bell. Becky’s mother answered the door, and when she saw us, got a big smile on her face and let us in.
“She’s up in her room. Why don’t you guys just go up. You were all she’d talk about last night. Matt, I think I have my old Becky back because of you. Thanks for that.” She grasped my shoulder and gave me a motherly look. I smiled nervously back at her, afraid a hug was coming next, and she must have read my eyes because she chuckled and let me go.
We climbed the stairs, and when we were halfway up, Kevin suddenly put his index finger to his lips. And started tiptoeing. I looked at him and smiled. He still had some of the inclinations of a younger kid.
“Which room is hers?” he whispered.
“Second door on the right.”
He tiptoed down the hall. The door was closed. I grabbed his arm. I lowered my voice as low as I could and said, “You can’t just bust in. It isn’t polite. What would you think if your mother did that to you? Sometimes it would be embarrassing. You don’t want to embarrass her, do you?”
He grinned at me. “Watch,” he said.
Then he took the doorknob and very slowly twisted it so the door wasn’t latched. He waited a moment, then suddenly swung the door open and shouted, “Hah! Caught you!” He didn’t go in, however, and in fact had turned so he was looking back toward the hall. I, however, not knowing what was going on, was standing looking into her room, and could plainly see her, sitting on her bed in only her bra and panties.
Her mouth fell open, and then she shrieked. Kevin twisted so he could catch a quick peek, then dissolved into laughter, roaring so hard his knees gave out and he slumped to the floor in the doorway.
Becky’s face looked scared, then embarrassed, then mad. All the time she was fumbling with the bedspread which had been tangled at the bottom of the unmade bed. She finally got hold of the right part of it and pulled it up and across her body.
“Is everything all right up there?” we heard Becky’s
mother call from the bottom of the stairs.
Kevin was in no shape to respond, and Becky looked like the only thing running through her mind was her vocabulary of cuss words, so I called down, “It’s okay Mrs. Spargas. Becky just saw a spider. Kevin’s killing it.” And then, softer, “And I think he’s about to get killed himself.”
Because now Becky was standing up. The only thing preventing her from visiting mayhem on Kevin was the bedspread which was still tucked into the bottom of the bed. She couldn’t get at him without sacrificing more of her remaining modesty than she was willing to.
She switched her glare to me, and I quickly said, “Hey, I didn’t know he was going to do that. And really, Becky, we saw more of you yesterday in your bathing suit than we did just now. Or, I did just now, because I wasn’t really looking. And anyway, you saw me in a lot more of an embarrassing predicament than this was. This is nothing.”
“I’ll show him how nothing this is,” she said, but I could see most of the anger was gone. It’s pretty hard to stay mad when the object of your anger is rolling on the floor laughing his ass off.
She looked at him for a moment, then said, “You know, you have one coming, and I’m not one to forget. There’ll be an opportunity to catch you in an embarrassing moment sometime, and I’ll be waiting.” She said it with a smile on her face, but it was a menacing smile with some evil glee in it. I think she was relishing the opportunity to catch him with his pants down. Maybe literally. Becky did have this thing . . . .
And Kevin was awfully cute.
“Now you two get out of here while I put something on,” she said, and her tone of voice brooked no nonsense. I helped Kevin up and said, “We’ll be downstairs when you’re ready.”
We went down and found Mrs. Spargas in the kitchen. She got us each a can of Dr Pepper, and we took them out to their patio in back. We collapsed in a couple of chairs, Kevin still snorting.
A few minutes later, Becky joined us. Kevin’s eyes were sparkling. I could tell Becky wasn’t mad any longer, but I also knew she’d not forgotten.
“I owe you one, Kevin.”
“I know. I know.”
“Okay then. Tell me the most embarrassing thing about you, something you don’t want anyone to know.”
“Hey, I’m not going to do that. We all have secrets. I’m not giving mine up just like that.”
“You owe me. This is what I want. Tell me.”
I looked back and forth at them. They were looking at each other hard. Not mad, but intensely. These two seemed to mesh on a level that was much different than how I was in tune with either of them. They saw something in each other that aroused them, and they responded to it. There was a challenge in each of them. I realized they enjoyed the competition. I wasn’t like that at all. I wasn’t nearly as competitive as either of them. Then I thought about that and realized I was competitive, just not the way they were. With the clarinet, I was very competitive. They were more competitive with their personalities, each trying to get the upper hand over the other. I didn’t try to control people at all.
After staring at each other for a while, it was Kevin who spoke first. “Okay. I’ll tell you. But you have to understand, this is something that really bothers me, really embarrasses me. This isn’t funny. You got that?”
“All right, tell me.” Becky was very interested now, and leaning forward in her chair, her eyes bright with curiosity.
“Okay. No one else finds out, and you don’t use it to tease me. You agree with that?”
“Sure.”
“Not ‘sure’! Do you agree?”
“All right. Yes. I won’t tease you with it, or tell anyone. Can Matt hear it?”
“He already knows.”
She looked at me then, a question in her eyes. I just looked back.
Kevin continued. “It’s this. I haven’t really started puberty yet. The reason I didn’t shower when I was in gym class before my accident was I was embarrassed. I haven’t matured very much down there, and don’t have any hair yet, and I’m 14.”
I was shocked. “Kevin! Why did you tell her? You didn’t want anyone to know!”
Becky looked back and forth between us, and then said, in a softer voice than her usual aggressive one, “Yes, why did you tell me that?”
“Because I wanted you to know that I do trust you. Entirely. And I wanted Matt to know that, too. I didn’t like having told Matt that and not you. It made me uncomfortable. There will probably be things he and I will keep from you, but they should be things that are between us, that are private ‘us’ things, and this isn’t something like that. This is just personal with me, no one else, and that’s the sort of thing that, if Matt knows, you can, too.”
Becky thought about that, and a gleam came into her eye. “Damn!” she said. “All the great ways I could tease you with this, and I said I wouldn’t.”
“That was another reason,” laughed Kevin. “If you ever had found out, like by barging in on me some day, I’d have never heard the end of it. Now, you promised. I don’t have to worry about it.”
“You’re evil! And too smart by half. I’ve got this ammunition now, and can’t use it!”
I laughed, and the other two joined me. And while we were laughing, I wondered how I’d ever survived the past couple of years without friends.
◊ ◊
That night, after dinner, my mother was working on her patient charts in preparation for another week of clients and my dad was watching TV. I sat down next to him and told him I had a problem.
He looked at me for a moment, then turned off the TV. “Okay, go ahead. Let’s hear it.”
“Dad, I’m going to be spending some time with Kevin at school from now on. Becky, too, at lunch, so that shouldn’t be a problem, but in gym I’ll probably be with Kevin all the time. There are kids in there who don’t like me much, Scott and Gerry for sure, and I’m a little worried about what they might say if they see us together every day, him being younger and smaller. I’d like to say I’ll just be able to ignore it, but you know what happened before, and I’m really worried I might react like that again if someone is really on me a lot and then says the wrong thing at the wrong time, especially if it involves Kevin. I mean, let’s face it, Kevin is younger than I am, and it is very unusual for guys whose ages or grades are different to hang out together at school. Kids see that and start to say things.”
“I see your point. Matt, let me think about this. Since it is in gym class that this might become a big deal for you, and as I can control the environment in gym to some extent, I might be able to come up with something. You’re sure giving me a whole lot of time here, all the way until tomorrow morning, so thanks for that.” He grinned at me, and I tried to look sheepish, but was grinning back at him, so I’m not sure how well I did with that.
◊ ◊
Dad drove me to school the next day. I’d given some thought to getting up early and walking with Kevin, but an extra half hour’s sleep is an extra half hour’s sleep, and I was 16. You can guess how that ended up.
Anyway, Dad drove me to school. He was quiet on the drive, and when we were almost there, the suspense was too much. I broke down and asked him if he’d given any thought to what I’d talked to him about last night.
He looked over at me, and wrinkled his brow, frowning at the same time. “What was that?” he asked, puzzlement in his voice.
“Dad! About how people might react if I spent all my time in gym with Kevin!”
“Oh. Right. I was going to think about that, huh? Well, there’s always tonight.”
He pulled into his parking place, and I just glowered at him. Parents! Sometimes you wish you’d been an orphan!
-- [] --
In gym that morning, I dressed out, then found Kevin at his locker. I waited for him to finish changing, and then we walked outside. We were all told to sit on the grass where we always did when roll was being taken and the coaches were going to talk to us. My dad stopped me and Kevin as we walked by him and said to us, softly so as not to be overheard, “Matt, Kevin, don’t sit together for this meeting, okay? Don’t argue, just do it, please?” I was puzzled, but nodded okay. Kevin looked as confused as I was, but then walked away from me. I found a place and sat down.
“Guys,” he said to the group when everyone was seated on the grass and were quiet and his assistant had taken roll, “for the next few weeks we’re going to concentrate on racquet sports. These are sports you guys can play as you get older; you don’t need eighteen guys, like you do to play baseball, or twenty-two, like for football, and for the most part, you won’t tear up your body playing these sports. It’s good to learn them now, learn the rules, and some fundamentals about them. Hopefully, you’ll find them lots of fun, too. We’re going to be learning tennis, racquetball—well, since we don’t have any racquetball courts, really one wall paddleball—ping-pong and badminton. Because there are so many of you and not that many facilities for us to use, we’ll be doing all this as doubles teams, and all four activities will be going on at once, with you and your partner spending a couple of weeks on each one. You guys will all have a doubles partner, and you’ll keep the same partner as you rotate through the sports. I’ll let you choose your own partners because it’ll help you learn and be more fun if you’re friendly with your partner. That’s what most of you guys will do. I’m going to pick some partnerships myself.”
There was a commotion then as guys started looking around and pointing at each other, trying to get a jump on choosing a partner. My father quickly restored order. He was good at that.
My father’s next words stunned me. He was looking at me when he said, “One partnership that I’m assigning is Tucker with Ingram. Ingram’s wrist is still healing, so he’s not going to be able to participate in some things right away, and it’s only fair that the kid who broke it has to suffer, too.”
The rest of the boys were quiet, responding to the stern tone of voice he was using then. I didn’t know how to react, or what to think. But I’m not dumb. Almost as quickly as I was starting to feel defensive about what he’d said, I realized what was happening. Dad had figured out a way to allow Kevin and me to be together in gym, and not one person would think it was anything but a punishment!
And now, if they saw us at lunch, they’d just think that we’d worked out any problems we had together. It was perfect! Way to go, Dad!
Dad allowed time for guys to pick their partners. Ten minutes later, everyone was paired up. Dad had to assign a few pairs that hadn’t managed to get together on their own. Then the assignments were called out for the next two weeks. Kevin and I were playing ping-pong.
We ping-pongists—or is it ping-pongers?—were taken back to the gym by an assistant. There were a lot of tables set up there, and each had four paddles and a ball waiting. The coach had us all sit on the bleachers, close together, and told us the rules, all about how in doubles we had to alternate shots with our partners, how the serve was always from our right hand corner of the table into the right hand rectangle on the opponent’s side of the table, how the players rotated when it was their turn to serve, how the serve had to be made with the ball tossed up from the open palm of the hand, how the scoring worked. Most of the kids knew all this stuff, but a lot of them hadn’t played doubles before and the alternating shot part and the serve had to be explained again. Then we were assigned tables and a team to play against, and were told to go at it.
Kevin and I had a ball. It was great! He’d broken his left wrist but was right handed, so other than having his balance somewhat affected by the weight of his cast, the wrist didn’t bother him at all. He was amazing. He was short, and that can be a problem in ping–pong where table coverage is important. But he was amazingly quick on his feet and had great hand-eye coordination. He was really good.
I could hold my own, too. Dad is athletic. Duh! But because he was, we’d done all sorts of sports things at home all my life, stuff like croquet and ping-pong and swimming and lawn darts and horseshoes and badminton. I wasn’t great at ping-pong, but I was good, better than average for my age, I guess. I’m fairly quick on my feet too. The thing was, I’d always enjoyed playing a good defensive game and prided myself that I could get most any shot back. And I saw quickly that Kevin, even being as short as he was, was an offensive player. He loved to slam the ball, and could do so both from the forehand and backhand sides, and could put enough topspin on the ball to keep it on the table.
The guys we were playing were decent, but were no match for us. I learned how, when I returned a shot, to hit it to a part of the table where the guy returning it had a really awkward shot. This usually resulted in a weak shot coming to Kevin, and he was able to slam his return. He made most of them.
When it was time to shower, Kevin and I walked back to the locker room together. We were both exuberant, but I told him we should tone it down. My dad had gone to some lengths to provide us cover. I didn’t want to blow it by acting too friendly too quickly.
We parted at his locker. He would dry himself off with a towel as usual, and I’d shower. I told him I’d see him at lunch.
◊ ◊
For the first time that day, Kevin, Becky and I ate lunch together at her and my table. Kevin was already seated there when Becky and I came in, and we joined him. He smiled at both of us. I had such a good feeling, sitting with him, with her, the three of us now friends. We chatted easily. Kevin and Becky had a sort of competition going all the time to see who could gross the other out or embarrass the other or could score off the other. Becky could be really sarcastic, and nothing seemed to embarrass her, but Kevin was really sharp, and his comebacks were so witty and funny, we both had to laugh. We had a lot of laughter at our table.
One of the things that happened that day was Becky, after looking at Kevin’s cast, remarked that while it wasn’t sparkling clean any longer, it also was undecorated.
“What do you mean?” he asked her, puzzled, and I was wondering what she was up to now. She wasn’t up to anything. She was serious.
“Kids always get their casts signed. No one’s signed yours yet.”
Kevin looked a little chagrined at that. “I guess I don’t really have any friends who would do that.”
“You do now.” She took a pen out and signed her name, then put a heart under it and wrote in the heart, ‘My True Love.’
“Becky! You can’t write that,” he said, aghast. “Other kids’ll see it!”
“Yeah, it’ll do wonders for your rep.” She grinned at him.
“Hey, my turn,” I said as she was putting the pen away. She handed it to me. I had to think what to write, then signed it.
“Matt! That’s worse than what Becky wrote. You can’t write that. I’ll cross it out!”
“Let me see,” Becky said and pulled his arm towards her. She read it, and broke into gales of laughter. I started laughing too, while Kevin just got a little red. I’d written, ‘To Kevin: It was a stroke of good luck to break the left wrist. Stroke on, Righty! Matt.’
Kevin was trying to get the pen so he could obliterate my message, but Becky had it back and stuck it deep in her bag where he couldn’t get it. I hadn’t noticed, but evidently our laughing had attracted some attention, and other kids were now watching us. One boy in particular, a freshman, had stood up, and was tentatively approaching our table. He walked up and stopped next to Kevin. He looked a little nervous, but finally said, “Your name’s Kevin, isn’t it? Aren’t you in English with me? My name’s Timothy. I saw these guys signing your cast. Can I do it, too?”
Kevin threw me a quick glance, really quick, but then looked up at Timothy and said, “Sure. Sign it right here.” He reached out to point at a spot, in the process covering what I’d written with his hand.
“Uh, can I borrow your pen?” His voice was timid.
Becky reached into her bag, rummaging around for the pen, and while she did, I looked at Timothy. He was blond and about Kevin’s size, and attractive. But the thing I noticed most about him was that, as Becky fumbled for her pen and Kevin watched her do it, Timothy was watching Kevin, and from the expression on his face, I thought I saw someone who had a bad case of puppy love.
Timothy signed his name, then gave Kevin a shy smile, told him thanks, and walked off.
Becky watched him leave, and when we were all alone again, winked at Kevin and said, “Someone has an admirer.” I guess I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed.
He blushed, but then said, “Well, I don’t want one.”
“Tough shit. You got one.” She grinned.
Kevin looked at me. I looked back, trying hard to have no expression at all on my face.