Chapter Twelve - Asher
CHAPTER TWELVE
Asher
WHEN I WALK into the soda joint, I already know nothing will be the same.
That’s what it feels like when I see him.
When I walk into that place with butterflies and hope.
It’s like he’s materialized into another world, just some character in a dream.
And sometimes, and really only a handful of times, he’s seemed exactly like that to me—a dream.
A mirage. I’ve heard about that, you know, how desires of the body can make you see what you most want and it isn’t real.
And what I most want has his back to me now.
I take a seat and notice his curly brown hair has been trimmed recently, and his shoulders are hunched over something in front of him with a seriousness and a focus that belongs in a lab and not a soda counter.
He says something, still turned away, but I don’t listen. Then he turns, curious at my non-response. There’s shock on his face and —to my great relief— a flicker of happiness.
He drops what was in his hand. There’s a crash of glass and a white puff. Neither of us move for a few moments as if that white puff might set off an earthquake.
Then I stand. “God, I’m sorry, pal.” I walk around the counter to see the powdery glassy mess I caused. “Let me get that.”
He pushes up his glasses. “I’ll get it.”
I look around. “Is there a broom?”
“I said I’ll get it.”
I stand at the end of the counter, awkwardly, as he cleans up. I didn’t picture it going this way. I’m not sure how I pictured it going at all, really.
When his aunt said he wasn’t home, I had a moment.
A moment where I imagined he was with someone else.
A guy. A girl. Hands clasped at a movie.
Lips pressed together in a dark Chrysler.
Legs entwined in a warm bed. I suppose I’d just expected him to be there, in her house, waiting.
Waiting for me. The horror of him with another was quickly replaced with shame.
Shame that I’d thought he’d just be there, expecting me, and ready when I arrived.
Of course not. Why would he be? What sort of hope, what sort of reason did I give him?
But I found him alone, after all.
I don’t speak, and he doesn’t speak until he’s got most of the powder off his shoes. Then, in a tone I can’t quite read, he says, “I need to close up and lock the doors.”
I sit down at the counter again and light a cigarette. I wait as he walks around, shutting off switches, the tinkling of a key ring as he goes to the front where there are lights and jingle bells.
It’s not the same. I can feel it between us each time he passes by me. It’s like a thread that isn’t broken but weak and tattered. The distance between us pulled it too tight, tested its strength, its resilience. And yet, it didn’t break.
I wonder how much more that weak and tattered thread can take.
When he’s done inside, we leave out of the back, and he’s got this huge key ring he flips through.
He locks up and then we just walk down the street together as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.
As if we’ve never been apart at all. I relax a little.
We walk in companionable silence for a bit.
There’s something about his presence, about him walking next to me, that’s definitely different.
I can’t put my finger on it. I look over at him, at the lock of curly dark hair that falls over his glasses and he brushes it away. My heart skips more than just a beat.
“What?” There’s a phantom of a smile on his lips.
“What’s what, pal?”
“You’re staring at me.”
I clear my throat. “Working at a soda fountain, huh?”
He nods. “It’s not too bad. Pretty easy work and my boss is nice.”
“Is he gonna dock your pay for that broken shaker?”
He shrugs. “I don’t think so. It was an accident.”
“If he does, let me know. I’ll cover it.”
He doesn’t reply. We walk on for a bit longer, the evening air brisk, and while the occasional pedestrian hurries past us, we’re not in a hurry at all. Just as leisurely as a walk on the beach.
Paul glances at me. “How long are you going to be back for?” His voice sounds stiff.
I hesitate before I reply. “Tonight. And tomorrow.” I fib just a little.
He slows his steps just a little.
I look ahead of us, suddenly realizing we’re pretty far from Eckert’s and where I parked. “Where are we going?”
“I don’t know.” He stops. “I was just walking. Following you.”
There’s an easiness between us right then, shy grins. So we go back, retrace our steps. I’d borrowed my brother’s truck, and I sense Paul’s hesitation behind me when he doesn’t see my bike. But it’s too cold for the bike, and I’d needed Glen’s truck.
After a quiet and not completely uncomfortable drive, I park in front of the apartment building.
I can tell from how he lingers he wants to come up, but he doesn’t want to ask.
So, I invite him up and he gets to see all the boxes and the few things still unpacked.
I’d meant to be further along than this, but I had to see him.
And maybe I’d subconsciously wanted him to see my place all boxed up. Let him figure it out on his own.
He sits on my crappy recliner, and I take the sofa. He looks around, trying to hide the obvious disappointment on his face.
I offer him a beer from the icebox, but he says no. I light up a cigarette. “I won’t need a lot of this stuff.” I touch the toe of my boot to the coffee table. “Probably just give most of it away.”
He nods, pushes up his glasses.
I almost ask him if he wants any of it, but that’s pointless, so I say, “I think I’ll keep renting the garage, though. For a little while longer. So, I’ll have to come into town.”
He nods again.
The difference in him I’d noticed before is gone now. Now he’s back to being the Paul I know. The Paul I knew. The one before he came looking for me, bringing a Jell-O mold, a pastel purple suitcase, and his heart.
“Hey.”
He looks over at me.
I don’t say what I want to say; the words get lodged somewhere in my throat and different ones come out. “You want to come by in the morning? I mean, if you don’t have to work? I could use some help.”
The look on his face nearly makes me crack and tell him right then.
It’s not so much a surprise as it is an admission, a way for me to make things right between us once and for all.
I’m not sure how he’ll react, though. What his answer will be.
I just know that there is nothing in this world that is worth having if you don’t have to risk something to get it.
“Yeah, okay,” he says after a minute.
I stare at him, the words on the tip of my tongue, but that’s going to have to wait. Later.
He stays for a while longer. We don’t talk about much, mostly about his new job, before he excuses himself and goes back over to his aunt’s.
I close the door behind him, knowing I can open it again.
See, I just didn’t think about it.
Didn’t even cross my mind.
But one day there was a cloud of red dirt behind this shiny green Ford coming up our drive.
By the time it got to the front of the house, it wasn’t so shiny and didn’t look so green.
The square that got out of it said he was a lawyer.
He had all these papers and an air of importance.
He shook mine and Glen’s hands, tipped his hat to our mother, and sat with us at our kitchen table.
It was the exact place I’d told my mother and Glen about Jimmy just a few days earlier.
And, if spirits are real, my father probably listened in.
Afterward, I felt as if all the blood and bones had left my body.
That secret gave me structure, held me up, it was something to lean on.
But once it was out of me, once it wasn’t mine anymore, I felt like a dried-up creek.
They sat at the kitchen table and mourned with me, the loss of Jimmy and what could have been, but there was no blame.
No accusations. I didn’t know how to process the relief I felt.
So, I’d just sort of reconciled it all in my own mind.
Came to a compromise with myself. As long as I was welcome, I’d stay.
And I was still welcome even after that.
After the three of us decided to go to Jimmy’s grave and just be there together for a time.
In the sunshine. In the middle of the day.
None of us spoke, but there were birds. My mother replaced the flowers with fresh ones.
Glen removed his hat. I stood to the side and thought about how it was a day Jimmy would never see.
More days had passed with him dead than with him alive.
And I had the faintest feeling that he was looking down on me from somewhere, shaking his head with a smirk, mumbling to himself as to why I’d let the cat out of the bag now.
Huh, Ash? But he’s smirking because he knows why, and he’s glad the three of us are together again. Even though we’re missing pieces.
And so the lawyer sat at the confession table with a confession of his own.
He explained it all in legal jargon none of us were familiar with, but it was the check he signed over to me and the one he signed over to Glen.
That was the thing that changed it all. My mother didn’t seem the least bit surprised.
She barely batted an eye at the five numbers being offered to me.
My eyes swam and my heart pounded. She probably saw my unasked question written all over my face.
“Don’t you see, Asher?” she’d said to me, her voice heartfelt, her eyes beaming. “He knew you’d find your way home again.”