The little girl caught my eye and smiled back, then buried her face in her dad’s pant leg. You go, sister, I thought. I turned to watch Adam.
But like fingers to an itch, my mind returned to the song, changing girl to boy like it did in all love songs now.
Sometimes I wondered, though, at his complete willingness to believe whatever I threw out there. I’ll be fine. I want you to go. I don’t know who I am without you anymore. I need to find out. Did he believe the lies because he wanted them to be true? My stomach clutched at that thought, and I fought the urge to heave right there on the scuffed tile floor.
“Mom wants you to come to dinner one night soon,” Adam said when he’d finished checking in. He tucked his boarding pass into a side pocket in his backpack and hitched the strap back on his shoulder.
“Do you have any gum?”
He stuck the piece he was chewing between his teeth. I took it and stuck it in my mouth. He grinned. “Come on, I’ll buy you a pack.”
He checked the time on his phone as the newsstand clerk made change.
“Who’s picking you up?” I asked.
“Justin, I think.” He slid the change into his jeans pocket and the gum into mine, letting his fingers linger on my hip for just a moment, and looked at me with those deep blue eyes.
I looked off toward the crowds making their way from check-in to security and blinked a few times.
“Oh, Nate. If you cry, I’m gonna cry too.”
Would you, Adam? Would you still cry for me? Does this come anywhere near doing to you what it’s doing to me? “I’m fine,” I said.
He shouldered his backpack again and hooked a finger through my belt loop. “Come on. I have something for you.”
We found a spot just outside the newsstand. He slipped his hand into his backpack and brought out a black Sharpie. “If Juliet gets to write on you, then so do I.”
“That was a long time ago.” A lifetime it seemed, before there was a Nate and Adam. A time when his best friend had hoped her name would soon be linked to mine.
“Not so long,” he said.
I rolled my eyes. “I already know your cell number.”
“I’m not writing my cell number.” He held the Sharpie poised in the air, and waggled his fingers at me in a come-on gesture. I held my arm out and he pulled it under his own, blocking my view with his back. “No peeking until I’m done.”
The Sharpie tickled, but I held still until I heard him snap the cap back on the pen. He released my arm and turned back to me and smiled. He had drawn a big heart on the inside of my arm. Printed inside in neat block letters: AJ + NS 4Ever.
I looked at him, then at the security agents clearing passengers about fifty feet farther down, then at my arm again, then at Adam. My chin started that awful quivering again.
“It’s just a month, Nate. I wouldn’t miss your birthday for anything. It’ll be here before you know it. I’ll feed you cake and then we’ll get you all tatted up.”
I nodded and blinked.
He cleared his throat and stepped in a little closer. When he spoke, his voice was low, conspiratorial, his breath warm against my ear. “And then I’ll let you do nasty things to me.”
“Promise?”
“Mr. Schaper. I. Am. Shocked,” he said with mock horror.
“You are not.”
He laughed, then pressed his mouth to mine. When he pulled away, I scanned the check-in area—a simple knee-jerk reaction I still couldn’t shake.
“Are we being watched?” he asked.
“Always the freak show.”
“Consider it a public service.”
I studied his face for a moment. “Is that what we are now? A flesh and blood PSA?”
He frowned, and a crease formed between his brows the way it did anytime he was worried or confused.
Adam glanced at the monitors hanging from the ceiling—Continental 1079, Houston to New York LaGuardia Airport, On Time—then at the passengers lining up at security. My stomach turned over, and again I thought I might throw up. My nose burned. I stared down at my feet.
Adam pressed his forehead to mine. “Don’t let that tramp Juliet steal you away from me.”
I laughed a little and blinked back tears, but one rolled down my cheek anyway.
“Oh, Nate.” Adam let his backpack slip to the floor and pulled me to him. I planted my face in his neck. “I’ll call and text and Skype every day,” he said. “You’re going to be sick of me before the month’s over. It’ll go fast. You’ll see.”
I sniffed, then he sniffed, and that made me sniff even harder, especially when he drew little circles on the base of my neck with his finger. “I don’t have to go, Nate,” he whispered. “Maybe it’s just too soon. If you need me to stay, I’ll stay. I can work at one of the community theaters and take classes at U of H and—”
“No.” I shook my head. “No. This is your dream. Broadway.”
“Off Broadway. Off off Broadway.”
“You’re going. And you’re going to be fabulous and amazing.” I swallowed hard. “I’ll be okay. I’ll start that blog or something.”
“Save the world for the queers?”
“Yeah, something like that. Maybe I’ll sleep with Juliet.”
“You’d never.”
I smiled weakly and blinked away fresh tears.
“I’ll stay, Nate.”
I shook my head, and when he asked if I was sure, I lied and said I was. He made me promise to write more songs for him. And then he pulled me to him one last time, kissed me, and let me go.
He held on to my fingers until he couldn’t anymore and took his place in line. I stayed there and watched him until he was lost in the crowd and the distance.
In the parking garage I turned the ignition key, ejected the CD, leaned it on a pencil behind my left back tire, and backed over it.
My hero was gone.
Chapter 4
Last March 14
Things that scared us
| ADAM: | Where r u? |
| ADAM: | Answer ur phone, dammit! Ur mom is worried sick. |
| ADAM: | Nate, pls call me. |
| ADAM: | Im coming to look for u. |
| NATE: | Im fine ok |
