Part 33 (1/2)

”Not really.” I roll up so I'm facing him, crossing my legs and adjusting my dress to make sure everything that's supposed to be covered up is.

”What's your dad like?” I ask him.

Adam stretches his long legs out in the gra.s.s, resting back on his hands. ”My dad? He's okay. We get along okay- except when he's p.i.s.sed off.”

I pick a wildflower and start shredding it, wondering what it would be like to have Bob p.i.s.sed off at me. Not normal and almost natural, like it must be for Adam.

”Like the day we left for Victoria,” he adds.

I glance up. ”Why? What happened?”

”My brother was having a bad day, and my dad was heading out 227.

sixteenthings.indd 227 9/9/13 2:21 PM.

J a n e t G u r t l e r of town. My mom was fed up, so he wanted me to stay home and help her. But I knew Mom would settle down and be fine, because I've seen it a million times, but my dad was overreacting. That's when you guys showed up. I ran out in the middle of his rant, and I was afraid he was going to race out on the street and cause a big scene. Or drag me back inside.”

I laugh and then cover my mouth. ”Sorry. I'm not laughing at you. It's just that my mom did run out on the street. Remember?”

And then I frown. ”There I go again. Talking about myself. Ugh.”

I stick out my tongue and groan.

”You've got a lot going on.”

I frown and shake my head, focusing back on him. ”What's wrong with your brother?”

He pushes himself so he's sitting up straighter. ”He's autistic and he, you know, needs a lot of attention. But he's all right though.

He's a good kid. He's young. Only seven.”

I process that. I realize that the more I talk to people, the more I see everyone has something going on underneath the surface.

”My mom doesn't work anymore. Not since my brother was born. That's when my dad started driving a truck. Before that, he was home. He worked for the State Department, but he makes more money driving a truck and I think he really likes it. The only thing that bothered him was that he had to quit coaching my base- ball team. I quit too, a couple of years later. That's when I started working, to save money for college.”

”You played baseball?”

”Yeah.” He rips out a bunch of gra.s.s and throws it up in the 228.

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1 6 t h i n g s i t h o u g h t w e r e t r u e air and watches it blow away. ”Pitcher. Believe it or not, I was pretty good.”

”Why wouldn't I believe it? I suck at sports,” I tell him.

”So what's your thing then?”

”You mean besides Twitter?” I grin to show I'm kidding.

He rolls his eyes. ”Hardly. Like when you were growing up?

What'd you like to do?”

”Well. I was a Girl Guide. And later on I started hanging out at the YMCA. My brothers did sports there and I got suckered into volunteering, babysitting. Lexi thought it was lame, but I actually like working with kids.” I lower my eyes.

”Well, I can lend you my brother anytime. He'll teach you lots.”

”How come you didn't say anything about him before?” I ask.

”Well, it's not like I go around telling everyone my brother is autistic. I mean, I'm not ashamed of him. But people...they judge, you know.”

I press my lips tight and nod. ”I used to think everyone else had it so easy. Like if I had a dad, my whole life would have been perfect.”

Adam laughs. ”Perfect is not a real state of being, dad or not.”

”I'm getting that.”

He stares off into the distance. On the street across from the schoolyard, there's a group of kids playing, and every once in a while, a shout or a laugh blows over in the wind. ”Ever since my girlfriend, my ex- girlfriend, dumped me, I've been kind of, you know, steering clear of girls. Like I don't want to get involved. I'm going away to school at the end of high school, so I didn't really see the point.”

I hug my legs tight.

229.

sixteenthings.indd 229 9/9/13 2:21 PM.

J a n e t G u r t l e r ”And you know, I didn't even really like you at first. I'd heard things about you. I mean the video. You were a wild girl who danced around in her underwear. And all the guys talked about your b.u.t.t, how smoking hot it was.”

I open my mouth to protest but he keeps going. ”And you kind of have this thing, this air, that you don't need anyone. Like aloof or whatever. ”

I squish my face up. I do?

”And you're so pretty.”

My cheeks heat up, with pleasure and embarra.s.sment.

”But then, that day at the hospital, I saw who you really were.

Not a sn.o.b who thought she was better than everyone else, but a girl trying to be brave. And you were trying to be tough, and I knew then you were nothing like I thought. And I wanted to get to know you better.” He stares off at something not visible to others.

”I'm leaving Tadita after high school. And everyone at Tinkerpark hates me. I get moody sometimes.”

I look at him for a long moment and bite my lip. ”A year is pretty far away. I don't care what anyone at Tinkerpark thinks. And you should see me when I have PMS.”

He laughs and the tension between us lifts.

”People whisper behind my back wherever I go,” I tell him. ”I can never escape what I did, what got posted. Not in Tadita.”

He laughs. ”Are we really sitting here trying to convince each other why we shouldn't be together?”

I hold in a girly giggle- and an urge to shout Let's not!