Chapter 1
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“What is this so-called emergency?” I asked as I walked toward the van.
The gravel shoulder of the road crunched underfoot.
Ahead, Fox leaned out of the driver’s window of their van, watching me approach.
They were parked on the shoulder of a tree-lined road, engine idling, and the mixture of exhaust and Fox’s mysterious air freshener—was it Dragon Musk?
or Dragon Must?—had me on the brink of a sneeze.
It was a beautiful summer day, which on the coast meant a sky like a child’s drawing: Crayola Blue, with a few fluffy white clouds.
As I reached the window, I added, “And why can’t you call anybody else?
I’m getting married tomorrow, Fox. I’m on high alert; there’s still a chance Bobby could escape. ”
“I know you’re getting married.” Fox’s gaze was set somewhere between withering and disdainful.
“I currently have a van full of decorations. So, unless you’d like to get married in desolation and squalor like—like some sort of medieval peasant, but without the dancing—” And then they must have come up with something better because they paused and delivered in an even more devastating tone, “Unless you want to get married like a straight, you’ll help me figure this out. ”
To be fair, I did not want to get married like a straight. I got the impression there were a lot of daddy-daughter dances.
But Fox wasn’t done yet. “And for your information, I did call someone else. I called Mr. Del Real, and he’s out of town.”
“Oh, okay, well—”
“Then I called Mrs. Del Real, but she’s out of town too.”
“Right. I guess that makes sense.”
“Then I called Indira, but she didn’t pick up. I called Millie, but she’s busy with the flowers. I called Keme, but he was helping Millie.”
I crossed my arms. “I get the point—”
“Then I called Sergey, but he’s at work. I called that old goose Bruce, but he’s gone fishing.”
“I said I get—”
“I called the tourist bureau, and I called Bliss—she and Althea have a Suburban—and I even tried that lesbian bar I got thrown out of.”
“I said I get the—”
“And then I called Ryan and Paul, but they were busy playing video games with Keme.”
“I thought Keme was helping Millie!” And then the real horror set in: “You called Millie’s brothers before you called me?”
Fox gave a pointed sniff. “As you said, you’re busy.”
I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to argue about this, or if this was one of those things I should let go. I settled for saying, “Okay, well, I’m here now. Do you want a ride back, or…”
“No, Dashiell.” They started at a dither and were quickly ramping it up toward a full-blown tizzy. “I do not want a ride. I want you to change my tire.”
“What?”
With grating slowness: “My tire.”
I opened my mouth. Then I shut it again. I walked around to the passenger side, and sure enough, the back tire was flat.
“Why don’t you change it yourself?” I said.
“Because there are certain things that a person of refinement simply does not do,” Fox said.
“Because you don’t know how.”
Fox hissed at me. Then they snapped, “You don’t know how either.”
“No, but we’re pretty smart. I bet we could figure it out.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Fox said. “Get that hunk of a man you call a fiancé to come do it.”
“No way!”
“Why not?”
“Because—” The real answer was because Keme would inevitably find out and laugh at me. But I had the feeling it wouldn’t sound great if I said it out loud. Plus, I liked to call Bobby for favors when they benefitted me instead of Fox. “—we can do this.”
“Oh God,” Fox said and pinched the bridge of their nose.
“We can! We’re smart.”
“So you keep saying.”
“And we’re reasonably competent human beings.”
Fox scoffed.
“Well,” I said, “we’re functioning adults.”
“Do I spy the elastic waistband of Pokémon underwear?” Fox asked.
“Nope,” I said. “Catchimals. It’s a massive copyright infringement.”
“Why do you sound proud of that?”
“Come on,” I said. “We can do this. We can show all those high school bullies who made fun of us because one time in Driver’s Ed you were using the simulator and somehow you went off the road and into that crowd of anti-war protesters and it was, uh, graphic, and then the simulator started smoking, and Mr. Kennard had to send everyone out into the hall, and a couple of days later they replaced the simulator with a vending machine that only had healthy snacks. ”
The wind moved through the branches of the trees.
“Uh,” I said, “that’s a hypothetical example.”
“What comet or meteor or life-ending asteroid were you born under?” Fox muttered.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll do it myself.”
This turned out almost immediately to be false because first I needed Fox to show me where the van’s manual was (thank God it had somehow survived forty years in the glove box), and then, when I tried to get the spare off the back, Fox eventually got tired of hearing me say, “It won’t come off,” and got out of the van to point out that I was turning the, um, screws the wrong way.
(Bolts! Are they called bolts instead of screws?)
But once Fox was out of the van, they got into the spirit of things.
We blocked the front tires and found the jack, and after a couple of false starts, we raised the van until the rear tires cleared the ground.
I got the flat off (full disclosure: Fox had to help me loosen the bolts, but after that I did it myself).
Against all odds, the spare was actually still in decent condition, so we put it on, tightened down the bolts, and lowered the van.
(I’m ninety-nine percent sure they’re called bolts.)
Somehow in the process, I’d managed to blacken my hands, arms, and—according to my reflection in the window—face with tire grime.
But I didn’t care; I was grinning. And to my surprise, Fox was grinning too.
(They had somehow escaped all the grease and old oil and general muck.) They produced an old T-shirt from the back of the van, and I used it to wipe my hands.
And that was when a familiar truck rolled to a stop on the road. The passenger window buzzed down, and Bobby said, “You guys okay?”
“All good,” I said.
“Flat tire?”
“Yeah. No big deal.”
“Need some help?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but Fox beat me to it: “Why? Because we’re not as butch as you?”
“No—”
“Because we’re not as strong as you? Because compared to you, Dash’s arms are as thin and frail as those of a mummy? Not a pharaoh, but maybe some lesser pharaoh’s forgotten concubine?”
“I mean,” I said, “they’re not that thin. Also, weirdly specific mummy.”
“I didn’t say any of that,” Bobby said.
“We’re fine, Robert,” Fox announced. “We’re smart, competent, fully functioning adults. We can handle this all on our own.”
“I know,” Bobby said. But his eyes sought me out.
I flexed and did my manliest grunt.
Laughing, Bobby said, “I’ll see you at home.” As he buzzed up the window, he added, “Drive safe.”
Fox watched him go, hands on their hips. And then, once Bobby was out of sight, they turned and held up their hand, and I slapped them five.