cafeteria, and kids are looking at us.
Saul kicks up a conversation, and I realize he’s not the silent person he appears to be in Botany. It turns out he is a real talker. He tells me about everything: his dad’s father, a big homophobe who would probably disown him if he knew the things Saul did with me on my living room sofa; his addiction to protein shakes; his favorite TV shows. I like hearing him talk, and I’m interested in everything he says. When he mentions how hooked he was on Avatar: The Last Airbender as a little kid, my brain blazes with excitement.
“Man, that’s one of my favorite shows of all time,” I blurt out, interrupting him. “I must’ve watched every episode about a hundred times, and I still get totally geeked every time it comes on.”
“I’ve got the whole series downloaded on my iPad,” Saul says. “Why don’t we get together and watch it from the beginning?”
“Wow. That’d be so cool.”
He says we’ll hook up after school, drive to my place, and watch the first two episodes before he takes off to do his workout. I look around again as he talks. None of the other kids are paying much attention to us. Thank God for that.
A FTER SCHOOL , Saul drives me home. We go up to my apartment, and Mom is still at work, so Saul settles down on the sofa to get his iPad ready while I make peanut butter sandwiches. We eat our sandwiches, huddled together on the sofa over his iPad, watching Katara and her brother Sokka free Aang from his ice cocoon. By the time the episode gets to the first fight between Airbender Aang and Firebender Zuko, Saul and I are both cheering crazily for Aang like spectators at a boxing match.
We don’t make it to the second episode, however. We laugh at how stupid we sound, doing rah-rahs for a cartoon character. I watch Saul as we tease each other. He’s so good-looking and rippling it sucks the laughter right out of me. His laughter fades too. He turns off his iPad. Then he grabs me, and we spend the next hour or so trading gropes and peanut-butter-flavored kisses.
At six o’clock, he lets me go and stands up. He stares down at me for a while with this wild look in his eyes. “Man,” he gasps with a hot little grin. “I could so take those clothes off you right now and… and….”
I smile back at him. “And what?”
“You don’t want to know.” He makes a frustrated noise in his throat. I’ve already told him Mom’s shift was over an hour ago, and she could walk in at any minute. “You want to come work out with me?”
I want to. But Monday is the day Mom expects me to clean the bathroom and the kitchen. I have to make sure that’s done. “Maybe another time.”
I get up to walk him out. He works his hand under my shirt and massages the small of my back as he pastes a long good-bye kiss on me. After he leaves, I start doing the cleaning. Even scrubbing out the toilet doesn’t bring down my mood. This has been the first day at school in a long time that I haven’t felt like a complete freak.
T HE LAST thing I do in cleaning the kitchen is mop the floor. This evening, I mop my way toward the back door. It’s been a while since I talked to Cary, and I’m dying to tell him about Saul.
I take the fire escape down and knock at Cary’s back door. Through the window, I see him enter the kitchen. He gets a sort of pissed look on his face when he sees me. The second he opens the door, he says, “Where the hell have you been hiding?”
It’s freezing out, and I’m shivering. I hurry into the kitchen, rubbing my upper arms with my hands.
Cary closes the door. “I came up twice yesterday and nobody answered at your place,” he continues, chewing me out. “Hell, I started to wonder if you’d passed out in there or something. You never go anywhere on Sunday.” He’s wearing a tracksuit; his mom keeps the thermostat set low in cold months like my mom does. He takes off the jacket and hands it to me.
I pull the jacket on,
Saul kicks up a conversation, and I realize he’s not the silent person he appears to be in Botany. It turns out he is a real talker. He tells me about everything: his dad’s father, a big homophobe who would probably disown him if he knew the things Saul did with me on my living room sofa; his addiction to protein shakes; his favorite TV shows. I like hearing him talk, and I’m interested in everything he says. When he mentions how hooked he was on Avatar: The Last Airbender as a little kid, my brain blazes with excitement.
“Man, that’s one of my favorite shows of all time,” I blurt out, interrupting him. “I must’ve watched every episode about a hundred times, and I still get totally geeked every time it comes on.”
“I’ve got the whole series downloaded on my iPad,” Saul says. “Why don’t we get together and watch it from the beginning?”
“Wow. That’d be so cool.”
He says we’ll hook up after school, drive to my place, and watch the first two episodes before he takes off to do his workout. I look around again as he talks. None of the other kids are paying much attention to us. Thank God for that.
A FTER SCHOOL , Saul drives me home. We go up to my apartment, and Mom is still at work, so Saul settles down on the sofa to get his iPad ready while I make peanut butter sandwiches. We eat our sandwiches, huddled together on the sofa over his iPad, watching Katara and her brother Sokka free Aang from his ice cocoon. By the time the episode gets to the first fight between Airbender Aang and Firebender Zuko, Saul and I are both cheering crazily for Aang like spectators at a boxing match.
We don’t make it to the second episode, however. We laugh at how stupid we sound, doing rah-rahs for a cartoon character. I watch Saul as we tease each other. He’s so good-looking and rippling it sucks the laughter right out of me. His laughter fades too. He turns off his iPad. Then he grabs me, and we spend the next hour or so trading gropes and peanut-butter-flavored kisses.
At six o’clock, he lets me go and stands up. He stares down at me for a while with this wild look in his eyes. “Man,” he gasps with a hot little grin. “I could so take those clothes off you right now and… and….”
I smile back at him. “And what?”
“You don’t want to know.” He makes a frustrated noise in his throat. I’ve already told him Mom’s shift was over an hour ago, and she could walk in at any minute. “You want to come work out with me?”
I want to. But Monday is the day Mom expects me to clean the bathroom and the kitchen. I have to make sure that’s done. “Maybe another time.”
I get up to walk him out. He works his hand under my shirt and massages the small of my back as he pastes a long good-bye kiss on me. After he leaves, I start doing the cleaning. Even scrubbing out the toilet doesn’t bring down my mood. This has been the first day at school in a long time that I haven’t felt like a complete freak.
T HE LAST thing I do in cleaning the kitchen is mop the floor. This evening, I mop my way toward the back door. It’s been a while since I talked to Cary, and I’m dying to tell him about Saul.
I take the fire escape down and knock at Cary’s back door. Through the window, I see him enter the kitchen. He gets a sort of pissed look on his face when he sees me. The second he opens the door, he says, “Where the hell have you been hiding?”
It’s freezing out, and I’m shivering. I hurry into the kitchen, rubbing my upper arms with my hands.
Cary closes the door. “I came up twice yesterday and nobody answered at your place,” he continues, chewing me out. “Hell, I started to wonder if you’d passed out in there or something. You never go anywhere on Sunday.” He’s wearing a tracksuit; his mom keeps the thermostat set low in cold months like my mom does. He takes off the jacket and hands it to me.
I pull the jacket on,
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