I’ll Give You the Sun(36)
Author: Jandy Nelson

I stare at him, beseeching the aliens or Clark Gable or whoever’s in charge of soul abductions to bring back my brother. Because in addition to joining dangerous gangs and having parties, this Noah also goes out with girls, keeps his hair buzzed and tidy, hangs at The Spot, watches sports with Dad. For all other sixteen-year-old boys: fine. For Noah, it signifies one thing: death of the spirit. A book with the wrong story in it. My brother, the revolutionary weirdo, has covered himself in flame retardant, to use his terminology. Dad’s thrilled, of course, thinks Noah and Heather are a couple—they’re not. I’m the only one who seems to know how dire the situation is.

“Um, Jude, do you know there’s a lemon wrapped around your teeth?”

“Of course I know,” I say, though it sounds like garble for obvious reasons. Ah, lightbulb! Taking advantage of the sudden language barrier, I look right at him and add, “What have you done with my brother? If you see him, tell him I miss him. Tell him I’m—”

“Hello? Can’t understand you with the voodoo lemon in your mouth.” He shakes his head in a dismissive Dad kind of way and I can tell he’s about to get on my case. My interests disturb him, which I guess makes us even. “You know, I borrowed your laptop the other day to do a paper when Heather was using mine. I saw your search history.” Uh-oh. “Jesus, Jude. How many diseases can you think you have in one night? And all those freaking obituaries you read—like from every county in California.” Now seems like a good time to imagine the meadow. He points to the bible outspread on my lap. “And maybe you could give that totally lame book a rest for a while, and, I don’t know, get out. Talk to someone besides our dead grandmother. Think about things besides dying. It’s so—”

I take out the lemon. “What? Embarrassing?” I remember saying this to him once—how embarrassing he was—and cringe at the former me. Is it possible our personalities have swapped bodies? In third grade, Mrs. Michaels, the art teacher, told us we were to do self-portraits. We were across the room from each other and without so much as sharing a glance, I drew him, and he me. Sometimes, now, it feels like that.

“I wasn’t going to say embarrassing,” he says, brushing a hand through his bushel of hair, only to find that it’s no longer there. He touches the back of his neck instead.

“Yes you were.”

“Okay I was, because, it is totally embarrassing. I go to pay for my lunch today and pull out these.” He reaches in his pocket and shows me the assortment of extremely protective beans and seeds I stowed there.

“I’m just looking out for you, Noah, even if you’re a card-carrying artichoke.”

“Totally freaking mental, Jude.”

“You know what I think is mental? Having a party on the second anniversary of your mother’s death.”

His face cracks for a second, then just as quickly seals up. “I know you’re in there!” I want to scream. It’s true; I do know it. This is how:

1) His weird obsession with jumping Devil’s Drop and the sublime way he looked in the sky today.

2) There are times when he’s slumped in a chair, lying on his bed, curled up on the couch, and I wave my hand across his face and he doesn’t even blink. It’s as if he’s gone blind. Where is he during those times? What’s he doing in there? Because I suspect he’s painting. I suspect that inside the impenetrable fortress of conventionality he’s become, there’s one crazy-ass museum.

And most significantly: 3) I’ve discovered (search-history snooping is a two-way street) that Noah, who hardly ever goes online, who’s probably the only teenager in America indifferent to virtual reality and all social media, posts a message on a site called LostConnections.com, always the same one and pretty much every week.

I check—he’s never gotten a response. I’m certain the message is for Brian, who I haven’t seen since Mom’s funeral, and who, as far as I know, hasn’t been back to Lost Cove since his mother moved away.

For the record, I knew what was going on between Brian and Noah even if no one else did. All that summer when Noah came home at night from hanging out with him, he’d draw pictures of NoahandBrian until his fingers were so raw and swollen he’d have to take trips from his room to the freezer, where he’d bury his hand in the ice tray. He didn’t know I was watching him from the hallway, how he’d collapse against the refrigerator, his forehead pressed against the cold door, his eyes closed, his dreams outside of his body.

He didn’t know the moment he left in the morning, I’d go through the secret sketchpads he hid under his bed. It was like he’d discovered a whole new color spectrum. It was like he’d found another galaxy of imagery. It was like he’d replaced me.

To be clear: More than anything, I wish I hadn’t gone into that closet with Brian. But their story wasn’t over that night.

I wish I hadn’t done a lot of things I did back then.

I wish going into that closet with Brian was the worst of it.

The right-handed twin tells the truth, the left-handed twin tells lies

(Noah and I are both left-handed.)

He’s looking down at his feet. Intently. I don’t know what he’s thinking and it makes my bones feel hollow. He lifts his head. “We’re not going to have the party on the anniversary. It’ll be the day before,” he says quietly, his dark eyes soft, just like Mom’s.

Even though the last thing I want is a bunch of Hideaway Hill surfers like Zephyr Ravens anywhere near me, I say, “Have it.” I say this instead of what I’d say to him if I still had the voodoo lemon in: I’m sorry. For everything.

“Come for once?” He gestures toward the wall. “Wear one of those?” Unlike me, my room is one big blast of girl, with all the dresses I make—floating and not—hanging all over the walls. It’s like having friends.

I shrug. “Don’t do social events. Don’t wear the dresses.”

“You used to.”

I don’t say, “And you used to make art and like boys and talk to horses and pull the moon through the window for my birthday present.”

If Mom came back, she wouldn’t be able to pick either of us out of a police lineup.

Or Dad, for that matter, who’s just materialized in the doorway. Benjamin Sweetwine: The Sequel has skin the color and texture of gray earthenware clay. His pants are always too big and belted awkwardly so he looks like a scarecrow, like if someone pulled the belt he’d turn into a pile of straw. This might be my fault. Grandma and I have largely taken over the kitchen, using the bible as cookbook: