Who Do You Love(51)
Author: Jennifer Weiner

“Do you want anything to drink?”

I wasn’t thirsty, but I was nervous and curious. The kitchen smelled like bacon grease, even though every surface was scrupulously neat, the white and gold-flecked Formica counters wiped down spotlessly, the stainless-steel sink empty, and the drainboard filled with bowls and silverware. Andy reached into the cupboard, took down two plastic glasses, then looked at me.

“Just some water,” I said, and he filled both glasses from the tap. I sipped, and he drank deeply, his throat moving as he swallowed. I was overwhelmed with an urge to kiss him there, where I knew the skin would be so soft.

“Philadelphia’s so pretty,” I said, and then immediately realized how stupid that sounded, given what I’d seen on our walk to his house. “Do you go there a lot? To the Reading Terminal?”

He nodded, with a look of amusement on his face. The kitchen was so small that I felt especially aware of him, as if every time he moved he disrupted the atmosphere and I could feel the air moving against me.

“Are there parks around here?”

The expression on his face was hard to read, amused and a little exasperated. “They sell drugs in the parks around here.”

I didn’t know what to say about that. I’d tried pot, and more than once, at parties I’d seen cocaine, laid out in lines on a mirror. A boy in my class named Seth Riccardi was the one who seemed to have it. Marissa had told me that Seth’s dad used it, and had so much that he didn’t notice when Seth borrowed from his stash. I’d seen it, but I’d never tried it—pot and beer were one thing, but cocaine was something else.

“Have you ever?” I asked. “Tried anything?”

“Just beer,” he said. “And not much. I’ve got to be careful. If Coach finds out you’ve been drinking or anything else, you’re off the team.” He picked up his glass again, and I watched him drink.

“Where’s your room?” I asked.

“Upstairs,” he said, pointing to a staircase so narrow that I imagined his shoulders brushing the wall as he walked up or down.

“Can I see it?” My throat was dry, and there was an upswelling of feelings surging through me, fear and nervousness that I’d say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing, a feeling that if I could just hold him everything would be all right.

His room calmed me a little, maybe because it felt like Jonah’s room, like the rooms of the boys that I’d dated before, although it was by far the neatest boy’s room I’d ever seen. Books were piled against the wall in a careful stack, some schoolbooks, books about running or about runners or by them. Posters covered the wall, one from Scarface and one from The Godfather, one of the rapper Tupac Shakur, with his bandana and his old-looking eyes. There were also half a dozen different runners. I recognized Steve Prefontaine from his long hair, and Bruce Jenner from the Wheaties box. His room smelled like he did, a little bit like sweat and the inside of sneakers, like soap and clean clothes and cologne. On the dresser I saw a bottle of Old Spice and a stick of Mennen deodorant, next to a bowl full of loose change and a rolled-up necktie, red and blue, and a picture in a wooden frame. I stepped up close. A black man in profile held a baby in his arms, gazing down into the baby’s face with a delighted smile.

“Your dad,” I said.

“My dad,” said Andy. Beside the picture were a candle, a short, fat white one, and in a frame, a picture of the two of us in Atlanta that Marissa had taken. He was standing behind me, with his chin resting on my head, and I was giving the camera a goofy smile. “Oh, you kept it!” I said, and clapped my hands, imagining that I could feel my heart swell.

“I just moved the one of Heather Locklear,” he said, so I punched his arm, like he probably expected. One wall was filled with newspaper clippings, stuck up with plain silver tacks. Andy had sent me copies of a few of these, the ones that featured pictures of him breaking through a finish-line tape, his arms lifted in triumph, mouth open in a shout. His acceptance letter from Oregon and a typed note from the coach were both on the wall. I walked over to look at them, and Andy walked with me, his hands on my shoulders as I read out loud.

“Congratulations. I am looking forward to welcoming you to Oregon in September.”

The bed was just a mattress on the floor, but it was a big one, queen-size, I thought, the same as my bed at home. It was covered with a plain dark-blue comforter, and there were two pillows on top, in light-blue pillowcases. I wondered if he’d cleaned his room for me, if he’d changed the sheets and pillowcases, and the thought sent blood rushing to my face and between my legs. There was just one window, and I could hear street noises through it, radios and cars and conversation and the rumble of the train. I thought about my bedroom, the flowered wallpaper, the canopied bed and the corkboard covered with pictures of my friends, the full-length mirror beside my dresser. I would lie on the bed with the windows open, hearing the ocean, but nothing else—no cars, no people, sometimes not even a lawn mower. It was a lonely feeling, and I thought that living in a city, even if you were all by yourself you would never be lonely; you’d always be reminded of how close you were to other people.