Chapter 6
“Papi, saca la basura. Por favor.”
I grumble but get up from where I was gaming on the couch to take out the trash like my mom asked.
“Claro,” I sigh as I tie the bag and pull it from the bin.
My stomach drops when I turn around and see Scott standing in the doorway leading to the basement.
When he’s in an extra shitty mood, he’ll stay down in the basement, drinking and being angry. Sounds grim as fuck, but it’s actually a nice break for me and Mom.
I thought that’s what he was doing tonight.
I stand there a few moments, waiting to see what he’ll say, because if he heard any of our interaction, I know he’ll be pissed.
“Fucking speak English in the house,” he grunts, addressing me and my mom as he moves to the fridge, grabbing another beer.
My mom mutters a quiet “okay” as she continues cutting veggies. I don’t say anything, turning around and hauling the trash bag behind me.
“Hello? Do you understand me?”
He’s talking to me now. I stay quiet a second longer—trying to think of the right thing to say. I’m pissed off inside and it’s clouding my thoughts
He’s such a dick.
A mean fucking asshole.
I hate him.
I can’t say any of that. He’ll only end up coming back at me a thousand times worse. And my mom.
I keep trying to think, but I don’t know what I can say to turn around the course of this conversation.
To be honest, I usually don’t know anyway.
Most of the time, I don’t think there’s anything I can actually do.
He’s just a runaway train headed for the side of a fucking mountain. The explosion is inevitable.
“I’m fucking asking you a question. You both are always trying to speak so I can’t understand. I’m fucking tired of it. While I’m around you need to speak so I know what the hell you’re talking about.”
His voice has that dangerous edge to it.
I don’t know if dangerous is the right word. He never physically hurts us. But he can get… scary. And yell. And hit things. Not us though. Walls. Desks. Tables.
It has that edge to it.
He won’t like me trying to defend myself or my mom, but I can’t seem to help myself. “She asked me to take the trash out, we weren’t talking about you.”
He’s so fucking full of himself. Like I ever want to talk about him if I don’t have to.
He lets out a humorless laugh. “I’m the one who pays for this house. I’m the one who brought both of your asses here. If I want you to speak English around me then you’ll do it. Now, do you understand?”
“But—”
My mom’s sad, shaky voice cuts me off. Her desperate eyes turned away from her task to look at me. “Javier. Please, papi.”
I bite my tongue and try to make my voice sound even. “I understand.”
He shakes his head, grabs one more beer so he doesn’t have to come back up any time soon, and shuffles back down the basement steps.
Mom quietly turns back to the cutting board, whispering, “Lo siento, papi.”
“Lo sé, Ma.”
Even though I say that, I wonder for the millionth time why the fuck we can’t just leave. Why do we have to deal with him?
A tiny bit of anger burns in my chest. That she keeps us here. I’m not sure if that’s fair for me to feel, but I can’t help it.
She’s come close to leaving before. When I was seven, after a particularly angry outburst from Scott where he punched a hole in the wall. She scooped me up, threw me in the car, and drove to a nearby hotel where she ordered pizza and cried when she thought I was asleep.
Somehow, he knew what to say to drag us back. Made promises to be different. Said he’d drink less. Yell less. And he did for a few weeks. But it all came back. It always does.
I exit the front door and walk to the edge of the driveway where the trash cans are, opening it up and throwing the bag inside.
I tilt my head up, looking at the neighbor’s house—locking eyes on what’s been distracting me recently.
I’ve been noticing Declan around school, and if I’m being honest, in his room too.
I don’t know how it started happening. He just draws my attention. His balcony is practically right across from my window. I literally just have to lift my eyes and see right inside his room. He never seems to have his curtains closed, so… I can’t really stop it.
I’ve tried to say hi to him a few times at school, but the most I get is a tiny up-nod in my direction and then he keeps on walking.
He seems to mostly keep to himself, never attempting to talk to anyone else. And no one tries to disturb that. Probably because he’s so different. Unlike anyone else at school.
Feminine. Soft. Pretty.
And yet, his personality is anything but. He’s angry, sarcastic, skeptical of everything and everyone. Or that’s what it feels like—I haven’t got another chance to talk to him, despite that I’ve tried.
The guys on the football team don’t take well to his uniqueness.
I hear what they say. What they call him—despite the fact that practically everyone is hooking up with each other at this all-boys school.
Carter Hayes, another guy on the team who’s a year older than me, seems to have a particular obsession with talking about how weird the new kid is.
But when I watch Carter really closely, every time he’s looking at Declan’s face, I see something else there.
I think.
I’m not sure what it is, but it doesn’t look like pure hate.
I focus back on the doors leading to his balcony. It often glows different colors—today it’s neon green.
I can barely see him from this angle. Just enough to pique my interest. I think he’s sitting at his desk, drawing.
He’s always drawing at lunch too—at his table by himself.
Sometimes on a notepad. Sometimes on his shoes.
I often get the urge to see what he draws.
I have this feeling that it would be great.
I drift closer to his balcony, walking around the hedges that separate our houses even though it ends up blocking my view inside the window. I’m not even sure why I do it. But then I’m standing right underneath, looking up like a sad Romeo.
The balcony doors are thrown open as he stomps out, resting his elbows on the railing and glaring down in my direction.
His purple hair hangs over his eyes. The top is a little longer than when we talked, but he keeps the sides tidy and short.
He tries to put it behind his ear but it just falls right back into place.
He interrupts my staring. “Do you need something, pervert?”
I cock my head at his comment, but I’m also kind of smiling. “Pervert?”
“What else would you call someone who fucking stares into my bedroom all the time?”
I can feel my cheeks flush. Fuck. What do I say?
“I wasn’t staring at you just now.”
“Then what’re you staring at over here?”
I can’t seem to come up with an answer.
At my silence, he gives me a really look and shakes his head. “Stop being a fucking pervert.”
He goes to turn away and I panic.
I don’t want to go back inside my house.
I don’t want to see Scott.
I don’t want to see my mom’s sad face.
“Can I show you something?” I blurt as he’s about to walk inside.
He turns slowly, then walks back to the edge, hanging over to look at me again. “Is it a pervert something or a regular something?”
I sputter a laugh. “What?”
“Well, as you are a pervert, if it’s a pervert something, then you’re probably going to flash me your dick, and I’m not interested in being accosted by dicks I didn’t ask to see.”
I smile. “I’m not going to show you my dick.”
He tilts his head, thinking. “Your ass?”
“No.”
“Okay. I think that’s everything you could—wait! Your balls?”
I laugh again. “No.”
“Okay, fine.” He straightens and eyes me a bit distrustingly before heading inside.
I go to the back edge of his house, waiting a few minutes before I see him coming out the back door.
He’s thrown on an oversized hoodie against the chill in the air. It swallows up his petite frame, making him look even smaller. I kind of like it.
Once he reaches me, we stand awkwardly for a moment or two before I nod my head toward the woods behind our houses. “Uh, it’s this way.”
I start walking, and then I get the urge to look over at him, finding that he’s not there. I turn around and see him standing back by the house, his arms crossed over his chest. “Are you insane?” he yells.
“I don’t think so?” I say unsurely as I walk back to him.
“Really?” He gestures his arm toward the thick trees behind us once I’ve reached him.
“The woods? I barely know you. You practically stalk me by looking in my room like a creep. But you think I should just”—he mimes walking in place with a huge smile on his face—“walk happily with you into some woods all alone.”
I take his hand. Again, I don’t know why. I never seem to know why with this guy.
He narrows his eyes at the action but doesn’t pull away.
His hand is so soft, unlike mine that’s calloused from football and lifting weights at practice. Such a stark contrast. I kind of like this too.
I look into his eyes. The gray color looking more interesting with the sunlight streaming through it. “I’m not going to murder you,” I tell him.
He raises an eyebrow at me.
I amend, “Or be a pervert.”
“Okay.” He nods. “Just so you know, I may look small, but I’m very scrappy. I’ll do some damage.”
“Noted.”
I drop his hand and turn around to lead him toward the woods.
His feet crunch softly behind me on the fallen leaves and pine needles.
It’s not very far into them that I start to hear the water.
And then the trees open up to the small clearing.
The sun shines through the opening above, reflecting off the running water.
I walk a little ahead, standing next to the fallen tree that I often sit on.
“Wow.”
I turn back to look at him. He has a genuine look of awe on his face as he stares around the space. No sarcasm. No mocking.
The sun bounces off the glitter on his cheeks.
Pretty.
I clear my throat and look away, digging my toe into the dirt underneath all of the brush. “I come here when I want to be alone or think. Get away from… whatever.”
“Then why are you sharing it with me?” he asks absently, still walking around and observing the space.
I open my mouth, but then quickly close it. Because I don’t really know what the answer is. Why am I?
This is my place of solitude. It’s where I go when Scott is being even more of a dick than usual. It’s separated enough to feel peace but close enough to not completely leave my mom behind.
I decide to just ignore his question and point to the grass-like plant by the creek’s edge.
“I was just walking around one time and I stopped because of these flowers.” I look up at him as he stares at the plant.
“They were really pretty. They had all these butterflies around them. I forget the name, but they’re like dark purple with a little yellow on them. ”
“Iris,” he says without looking at me.
I smile. “Yeah, that’s it. They only bloom or whatever in the spring.” I walk over to the tree log and sit down. “Anyway, the sound of the water, the sun, the flowers. It all felt really peaceful.”
He hums thoughtfully and tips his head up to the sun. “You still didn’t answer me,” he says to the sky.
“Huh?”
“Why are you sharing it with me?”
Goddamn it.
“Um, you don’t seem to like a lot of people.”
He looks back at me and nods. “True. I would argue that I don’t like any people, but what’s your point?”
I look down at the ground, digging my toe into the earth again. Just because it gives me something to do. And I don’t want to look at his face. “This is where I go to get away from people. I thought maybe… sometimes… we could come here together.”
I chance a glance up at him. That eyebrow is raised again. “Like, as friends,” I add.
“Aren’t you also ‘people’? Shouldn’t I not like you too?”
I shrug, because I guess that makes sense. But I don’t think he hates me like everyone else.
I look back down and hear him let out a big sigh before he sits next to me on the log.
“So, why did you want to come here today?” he asks, clasping his hands in front of his spread legs. I watch the action, noticing how his nails are painted a bright red, and his pants are really tight. But it’s not weird. It fits him.
Surprisingly, I tell him everything. How Scott is. How my mom is. How being at home can sometimes suck so fucking much.
And he just listens.
I’ve never told anyone what it’s like inside my house. Grant can kind of tell some things, I’m sure. But he doesn’t know the extent.
It’s weird. I barely know this person and I’m just vomiting out all my problems.
I can feel his eyes on the side of my face as I talk, but it’s not too much. It feels comforting. And when I’m done, I feel lighter.
It’s late by that time, so we walk back and give some awkward goodbye waves.
I watch him walk back inside, and shortly after, I see the green glow light his room back up.
When I go to turn away, my eyes catch across the street.
Carter Hayes is standing there. He was in the middle of washing his car. But now, he’s looking at me. His head is tilted, like maybe he’s trying to figure something out.
I give him the same little wave I gave Declan and quickly walk back inside.
I didn’t do anything wrong, but I can’t shake the feeling that Carter thinks I did.