Thirteen
The rain begins the following morning, steady and cold, and continues for a week. Dad spends hours each day on the phone with the insurance company.
Our front door is repaired, and neighbors and regulars stream into the shop, leaving with armfuls of pity purchases. Their kindness helps, but it only covers a fraction of what we lost.
Garrett’s stitches do their job, and he’s back to playing football sooner than any of us want him to be.
And I spend my days thinking about our shop and Garrett.
I don’t return to the Burton-Clark website or my naive dream of attending a composition program.
A new, mostly empty cash register sits on our front desk, serving as a tangible reminder of how someone supports a family.
It’s not by plunking out notes on a keyboard.
We have another required video call with Garrett’s parents a few hours before his final football game of the season.
Dad joins us for this one, all of us crammed around Garrett’s laptop.
Garrett made us swear not to tell them about the break-in, so after an awkward greeting, Brock and Gina target me for their first attempt at small talk.
“You’re a senior, Enzo?” Brock says genially. “Lots of big milestones there. You got a girlfriend you’re planning to take to the prom?” The question is heavy, as if he’s been waiting to ask it.
“No,” I say. “No girlfriend.”
“No?” Brock says. “A good-looking, smart guy like you? I’d have thought the girls would be all over you. Is there anyone you’re interested in?”
Garrett sits on my left, and I feel my eyes wanting to glance at him. I shake my head.
“You’re being weird, Dad,” Garrett says. “By the way, I got my grades up. I’m at all As now.”
“Nice,” Gina says. Then, “How many catches did you make last game?”
“Five.”
“And touchdowns?” Brock asks.
“Two.”
Gina smiles at Brock. “Remember Justin’s senior year? That streak he was on by the end of the season?”
Brock gives a nostalgic nod and addresses us.
“Justin is Garrett’s oldest brother. Justin and then Charlie and then Garrett.
You should have seen that kid. He was unstoppable.
Too fast and smart for any defensive line the other schools threw at him.
He carried the team to the state championship that year and started at Virginia Tech the following. ”
“Sounds like a talented kid,” Dad says.
“You have no idea,” Gina says. “And then he went and graduated near the top of his class and landed an internship with Rowland and Geller in downtown Atlanta, which means he works closely with Brock. We couldn’t be prouder.”
The conversation moves on, but Garrett dismisses himself, saying that he needs to head out for pre-game warm-ups.
I don’t see him again until that evening on the football field.
I watch the game from the stands, seated between Trevor and Katrina, all three of us wet and miserable from the drizzle that flickers through the stadium lights like falling glass.
They make futile attempts to keep their instruments dry, but I couldn’t care less if the school’s cymbals rust away in my hands.
On the field, Garrett is violently fierce, covered in mud, running reckless plays, chest-bumping his teammates and screaming encouragement in their faces.
The whole team plays like it’s the last game of the season—intense, tireless, committed—but there’s something different about Garrett.
He plays like he’s trying to forget himself.
In the final quarter, he gets tackled by a player from the other team a few yards from the end zone.
He springs up and gets in the other guy’s face, and before anyone realizes what’s happening, the two of them are on each other.
Garrett lands a punch to the other player’s stomach.
He receives one across his jaw. It takes several refs to break them apart, and then one yells in Garrett’s face and points at the bench.
He spends the rest of the game there.
“Is he okay?” Trevor asks, gazing down at the back of Garrett’s head, wet with sweat and rain.
I can’t tell if he means physically or emotionally, though I don’t know the answer to either.
They lose. It’s not even close.
Garrett doesn’t get home until after midnight.
He told Dad he was spending the night at Tyler’s, but I hear him shuffling up the staircase, his footsteps heavy and uneven.
I meet him in the hallway. He stands in the semidarkness in his mud-streaked football uniform, eyes bloodshot, a dark bruise forming at his jawline. He seems taller tonight, older.
“Are you okay?”
He ignores me and moves toward his room, but I step in front of him, fully aware that my body can do nothing to stop his. He halts, inches from me. He smells like rain and beer.
“Garrett—”
“Don’t,” he growls. “Just don’t. I know you want to help, but I’m so over this stupid fucking year.
I’m tired of living in this shitty town and playing on this shitty team.
” He examines me, eyes unfocused. “How do you live here? How do you live here and not feel stuck every second of every goddamn day?”
I take a step backward. “I love this town.”
He shakes his head. “You only love this place because you don’t know any different. You don’t know what’s out there.”
“I love it because I belong here,” I say softly. “And don’t make it sound like I’m a small-town nobody who’s never seen a city.”
He glances up at the ceiling, blinking. “I just feel so cut off from … everything. From real opportunities to make something of myself. From the life I’m supposed to be living. From my family.”
He stumbles past me into his room and falls face down onto his bed without taking off his dirty uniform. The springs groan under his sudden weight. I hover in the doorway for a minute, then go downstairs and grab him a glass of water.
“You should probably drink this,” I say when I return. I nudge his arm with the glass.
He rolls onto his back, then sits up. “Did your one experience with drinking make you an expert on how to avoid a hangover?”
“In health class, Mr. VanPelt mentioned that water helps,” I admit, settling on the edge of his bed.
He reaches for the water, draining it in one go. “You’ll leave this town someday,” he says, “and then you’ll get what I mean.”
“Maybe.”
“You need to get out of Irontown, Enzo,” he tells me, suddenly urgent, the words tumbling from his mouth in a slur. “You’re too big for this place.”
I look down, realizing that his hand has grabbed my wrist. His gaze follows mine, as if noticing it himself.
But he doesn’t release his grip, keeping his warm hand clasped around my own.
Our eyes lock, and his eyebrows pull together as if I confuse him.
He leans forward until we’re inches apart, the air between us heavy with the scent of warm beer.
His lips part and his gaze searches my face and neither of us move.
I don’t know how we got to this moment, but I know I want this. I want him.
I bring my lips toward his, and I can almost feel their softness, can almost taste the hot air of his breath. But before I make contact, something in him closes.
He shuts his eyes and releases a groan and leans back against his headboard. His hand leaves my wrist and runs through his hair. He flashes a casual grin.
“God,” he says, “I’m gonna be so fuckin’ hungover tomorrow.”
I’m left leaning into the space, head tilted, eyes half closed, waiting for the kiss that almost happened, a sunburst of shame spreading through my chest. I stand up.
Garrett watches me with an uninterested expression, as if I had only wandered in here to play him a solo on my oboe.
I can think of nothing to say, so I lift my hand in a stupid wave and leave.
He says nothing when I close the door behind me.
I’m working the front desk on Thursday after school when Dad thumps down the staircase carrying a rattling cardboard box.
“We’re done with Precious Moments figurines,” he announces, dropping the box near the door with an accompanying crash of shattering ceramics. “No one buys them, and they’re creepy as hell. Enzo, if anyone tries to sell us those teary-eyed demons, tell them we don’t buy them anymore.”
He’s been doing this. He’ll go into a room and clear out all the items he thinks won’t sell for a high enough profit, box them up, and donate them to the thrift store.
Dad’s always been lax about the inventory side of our business, taking on items whether or not he thinks he can sell them.
They often sit, untouched and dusty, for years.
But the break-in has shifted something inside him, creating an obsession with showcasing our marketable merchandise.
He’s also installed a security system, bought a safe, and placed cameras at our front and back doors.
It’s how he hides his stress. While Dad has undergone this purging and dealt with the insurance company, I’ve been working extra hours without logging them. I did nothing to stop the break-in, so I should work for free until our shop is back on its feet.
Garrett enters through the front door, sidestepping the box of figurines. “It’s chilly out there.”
Dad eyes his letterman jacket. “Is that your only coat?”
Garrett looks down at himself. “It’s warm enough.”
“Not for long.”
“How much colder could it possibly get?”
Dad and I glance at each other. It’s only early November, and while the temperature has settled below freezing, winter hasn’t really started yet.
“You need a warmer jacket,” Dad says, leaving no room for argument. “Enz can drive you to the city to get one.”
“There’s a city nearby?” Garrett asks.
Twenty minutes later, we’re driving down the main street of Blue Harbor.
“This isn’t a city,” Garrett says.
“It has stoplights,” I argue.