Chapter 28
Lucy
The Switch hookup takes Tyr nine minutes.
He’s on the floor in front of the entertainment center on his knees with three cables in one hand, and he is muttering at the back of the TV.
“Tyr, the HDMI is the one with the wide—”
“Bear. I know what an HDMI is.”
“You said port-three earlier and that was the wrong port.”
The TV blue-screens. Then the Nintendo logo. Then the Switch home screen. Bear shouts something at the ceiling that is not a word.
My mom is on the couch next to me with her legs tucked under her. She is in different jeans than the ones she wore earlier.
“Bear, I haven’t played this in years.”
“Doesn’t matter. Mom is on my team. Tyr is on yours.”
He tosses me a Joy-Con. I catch it. The Joy-Con is the blue one. It is sticky in a way that says Bear has been eating something while playing. Gross.
“Rabbids.”
“Rabbids,” Bear confirms. “I’m going to whoop all you.”
“Bear.”
“I am transparent, Lucy.”
He picks up the second Joy-Con and hands the third to my mother. She holds it the way you hold something you are not sure of the shape of.
“Diane, you’re horizontal.”
“What?”
“Horizontal. The Joy-Con. The shoulder button is on the side.”
Tyr sits down on the rug in front of the couch with his Joy-Con in his lap. He looks back at me over his shoulder and winks.
“We’ve got this, Lucy.”
We don’t.
My mom is, somehow, very good at Rabbids. She wins the cow-tipping minigame. She wins the carrot-juggling one. She wins the spinning-plate one. Bear is winning the ones she is not winning. By the third round, they are up four to one over Tyr and me. Tyr keeps looking at me over his shoulder.
“Lucy, we’re getting blown out.”
“I know.”
“By your thirteen-year-old brother and your mother.” He looks at her and smiles. “You are destroying us.”
Bear is laughing evilly. Now I know why he wanted Mom on his team. I lose another minigame. Bear shouts at the ceiling in triumph.
Two more rounds and Bear declares his team the winner.
My mom does the celebration he wants — both arms up, a small whoo from her chest, a high five with Bear that she does not quite line up but that he meets her halfway on.
Tyr falls backward onto the rug with a groan.
Bear takes the Switch off the dock and announces he is going to play Mario Kart in his room. He disappears upstairs.
My mom sets her Joy-Con on the coffee table. Tyr sits up from the rug with his hand at his lower back as if he has been working a job site and not playing Rabbids on the floor.
“You are a Rabbids prodigy,” Tyr says to her. His hand lands on her lower back.
She laughs once. Then she turns to me on the couch. “You can stay here as long as you want.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
Bear comes back down at nine-fifteen with the Switch on the TV again because he decided he’s going to play one more game of something I don’t recognize before bed. He pulls me off the couch and hands me a Joy-Con.
I am, this time, half-asleep. I play badly. I lose three rounds in a row. Bear grins at me with his Joy-Con in his lap.
“I’m going to sleep. Love you, honey.”
“Good night, Mom.”
I am drifting with the TV playing something Bear has put on and Bear curled up on the other end of the couch, when my phone buzzes against the wood of the coffee table.
I don’t move. It buzzes again — longer this time. It’s a phone call. I reach forward without sitting up and flip it over. The screen says Gianna.
“Who is that?” Bear says, looking at the screen. It’s a photo of her and I last year.
“Gianna.”
“Are you going to answer?”
“No.”
I put the phone face down. The ringing keeps going against the wood.
I can feel the buzz through the side of my arm.
Whatever Gianna is calling to say — an apology, more anger, a follow-up — I cannot hear it tonight.
I don’t have anything in me to absorb another version of her voice.
The ringing stops. The voicemail chime goes a beat later.
I wake up on Sunday because the house has started moving around me.
The radiator under the front window has clicked on.
Tyr is in the kitchen. Bear is somewhere upstairs being loud in the soft way Bear is loud, which is opening drawers harder than they need to be opened.
The blanket on top of me is the gray one.
The pillow under my head is the small one from my mother’s bed.
I stare at the ceiling and have no idea what I’m doing.
I run the list in my head. Go back to the apartment and pack the rest of my things.
Call the housing office on Monday and see if anything is available on three days’ notice.
Ask the tutoring center if anyone is looking for a roommate.
Call Mara. Call Penelope. Move home — really move home, give up the apartment, drive an hour each way.
Ask Benson — and I stop the thought there.
There’s no way in hell that I’m asking Benson.
It is Sunday. I have to plan my week. I have to finish the Real Analysis problem set. I have to grade twelve practice midterms for the Calc III group I tutor on Mondays. I have to review chapter six of Stats for Tuesday.
Plan my week. Plan my tutoring. Make sure my homework is done. Eat. Sleep.
Bear comes downstairs at nine. He is in jeans and a hoodie. His hair is wet from a shower. He has his backpack over one shoulder. “I’m meeting my friends at the park.”
I sit up the rest of the way. “You just — leave the house.”
He nods. “Mom doesn’t care.”
“She doesn’t?”
He shakes his head.
“What time do you have to be home?”
“Whenever.”
“Whenever?”
“Yeah.”
“See you when you get back, I guess.”
He pulls the front door open and pulls it closed behind him. The lock clicks. The screen door bangs once on the spring.
I sit on the couch and stare at the door.
I close my eyes for a beat.
I pick up my phone.
The screen lights up.
One missed call from Gianna last night. One voicemail. Three texts from Benson.
Benson: Talked to G. Just know I’m here when you’re ready to talk.Benson: Goodnight, Lucy.Benson: I’m sorry. I hope you’re okay.
I read them twice, and I don’t listen to the voicemail. I open the messages with Benson and start typing.
Me: Good morning.
The three dots come up within twenty seconds.
Benson: Hi.
My chest warms.
Me: Can I call you?
He calls me, and I answer.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
The line is quiet for a beat. A comforter shifts on his end. He might be in his bed.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
I mutter, “I don’t know.”
“Where are you?”
“My mom’s. I’m okay. I just don’t really know what I’m doing yet.”
“Yeah.”
A beat.
“Can I see you?”
Butterflies surface. “It’s Sunday. I have to plan my week.”
“You could plan it here.”
I laugh once. It is a small laugh, and it surprises me. “I need a day. Maybe two. I need to figure out what I’m doing.”
“Okay.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I’m good.”
I pause before asking, “Did you talk to Gianna?”
“Yeah. You should call her, Lucy. When you’re ready.”
I nod. “Okay.” Maybe it’s not so bad.
“Let me know if you change your mind about today. I’ll be around.”
I smile. “Okay.”
“If not — there’s tomorrow. Or the next day.”
I laugh the same small laugh. The line goes quiet for a moment, and I don’t want to hang up. I like having him on the phone.
“What are you doing today?” I ask.
He thinks about that. “Uh –– workout and probably do some homework later. Door’s open if you want to join.”
I smile at the ceiling. “I need to go.”
“Okay.”
“Talk later.”
“Yeah.”
He doesn’t want to hang up. I can tell. I don’t want to hang up either, so I hesitate.
He stays on the line, so I press the phone back to my ear.
“Hang up first,” he says.
I smile and hang up without saying anything. I put the phone face down on my chest and let my smile widen.
The house is empty by ten. My mom and Tyr leave at nine-forty for the farmers’ market in town, which is, apparently, a thing they do on Sundays now.
Tyr asks me if I want to come, and I say no without thinking about it.
Then I feel bad and add thank you for asking, and he nods and tells me to make myself at home, which is a sentence somebody is finally saying about this house.
The kitchen is clean. The dishes from last night are not in the sink.
The counter doesn’t have the layer of old food like it usually does.
Even the coffee maker has been wiped down.
I must be losing my mind. Then I open the fridge.
I gawk at what’s inside. First of all, it’s filled.
It’s busy in here. Eggs. Butter. Whole milk.
Oat milk? What the hell. There are vegetables in the bottom drawer that look like they’re not rotting.
I close it and sit at the kitchen table.
I let the tears fall. Just one quick, poor me cry. That’s all. Nothing more.
Even with all the fancy ingredients, I reach for the cereal and milk. And I don’t dare use the oat milk.
I take my laptop to the couch and plan my week when my phone starts buzzing. My pulse jumps at the thought of Gianna or Benson calling. Then I see it’s Penelope. Oh.
“Hey, Lucy.”
“Hi, Pen.”
“Mara texted me this morning. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.” My heart skips a beat just thinking about Gianna kicking me out. “I’m at my mom’s.”
“Okay. I’m not going to make this a long phone call.
I wanted to throw this out there in case you needed it.
My second bedroom is open. My roommate is studying abroad, and I was going to sublet it, and I told her I’d find someone, but I haven’t yet.
It’s open now. If you want it, it’s yours. Today. Tomorrow. Next week. Whenever.”
“Thank you,” I say automatically. It’s kind of her to think of me.
“No pressure. I’m just telling you it’s there.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m serious. The room is yours. Rent is six-fifty. I have the lease — we can write you onto it or you can pay me and keep it informal. Whatever’s easier.”
“Thank you, Pen.”
“Call me this afternoon if you need to talk.”
“Okay.”
She hangs up. I sit on the couch with the phone in my hand. The house falls back to being extremely quiet. It’s odd how silent it is in here. I feel a little better knowing that I have options.
My mom and Tyr come back a little before two. They come through the front door with two canvas bags from the farmers’ market and a small tray of pastries Tyr bought. He sets the pastries on the kitchen table and tells me to try one.
Bear comes home from the park a little after two with grass stains on his knees and his hood pulled up.
“Where were you, baby?”
“Park.”
“How was it?”
“Good.”
“Did you eat lunch?”
“Yeah.”
“What kind?”
“Turkey sandwich.”
He takes off his shoes and goes upstairs. I watch the two second interaction and am mildly confused.
My mom is in the kitchen at four, starting on dinner with Tyr. “Lucy, do you want to help with dinner?”
“Sure. Yeah.” I get up and go into the kitchen. I wash my hands at the sink. Within ninety seconds, I am at the counter chopping onions next to Tyr while my mother takes pictures of the farmers’ market apples on her phone. She stays on her phone the whole time.
Dinner is good. We made pasta with the pesto and the tomatoes from the market.
We plate it for the four of us at the table.
Bear eats two servings. My mom eats one slowly while looking at her phone between bites.
Tyr tells a story about a basement reno in Adrian that he is telling for the second time this week and that has gotten slightly more dramatic in the retelling.
Bear laughs. My mother laughs in the right places.
Bear pushes his plate away and gets up. “Going to my room.”
I watch him go and wonder if this is the new routine now that Tyr’s here.
I’m on the couch under the gray blanket by nine-thirty. Bear hasn’t come back downstairs. His door has been closed since dinner. I have not heard the Switch through the floor in twenty minutes, which probably means he is on his phone watching YouTube on his bed.
My mom goes upstairs around quarter to ten. Tyr stays in the living room with me for ten minutes.
“Goodnight, Lucy.”
“Goodnight, Tyr.”
He goes upstairs.
The voicemail from Gianna is still on my phone. I haven’t listened to it yet. I bet it’s just her hanging up the phone, so I don’t bother to look.
I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, but I know I can’t stay here.