Chapter 9
Ava
I was out in the world without my mother.
Tucker held my hand as we ran across the damp grass, dodging a sprinkler. The spray caught us, and we stifled our laughs as we leaped over a small line of flowers and onto the sidewalk.
My notes told me I had friends once, when I lived in a different house, before the duplex. We’d go to a neighborhood park and hang out on the swings. Sometimes they would bring beer and I didn’t like it, but I would take swigs to be as cool as them.
I scoured my references to that time of my life. Had I had a boyfriend before? Had anyone kissed me before Tucker? If they had, either I didn’t write about it, or Mother found those notes and destroyed them.
But I was free again, walking down the sidewalk, headed toward a low gray car farther down the block.
“Are your friends in there?” I asked.
“Yes. You’ll meet Bill and his girlfriend Sarah. One thing to know about Bill—if we run into anyone he’s known a long time, they might call him Jill. It’ll upset him, but it happens a lot.”
“Why would anyone do that?”
“He was born Jill.”
“He changed his name?”
“Bill knew he was a boy all along. Now that he’s turned eighteen, he’s living it.”
“Okay. I’ll make sure to call him Bill.”
“He’ll understand about not having a supportive family.”
Would he? So it happened to others, too. “That’s good.”
He grinned. “Even so, I hope we can go on a date alone sometime.”
“When you can drive?”
“Two weeks until I hit the magic three months.”
We stopped beside the back door of a gray car. Two figures filled the front seat, locked in an embrace.
Tucker banged on the window, then opened the door. A light popped on. Tucker slid into the back seat and held out a hand to lead me inside.
A girl with a head full of intricate braids turned around. Her skin was the color of the woman next door, dark and beautiful. “I’m Sarah. This knucklehead is Bill. He thinks he’s a comedian, but you’re mainly going to groan at his bad jokes.”
“Everyone’s a critic,” Bill said.
“We can’t help it around you, bro,” Tucker said.
“No respect, can’t get any respect,” Bill said, causing the others to laugh.
I could barely follow the conversation, new words coming at me fast. Knucklehead. Comedian. Critic.
Sarah waved her hand at me. “We’ll try not to overwhelm you on the first night.”
“No promises!” Bill called back. He moved the gearshift between him and Sarah, and the car shot forward.
I clutched Tucker’s arm. My mother didn’t drive like this, and I’d never been in a car with anyone else.
He turned the corner hard, a squealing sound coming from the tires.
“We should buckle you up,” Tucker said. “It’s by your shoulder.”
I found the harness and brought it down to click into the base.
“Red light incoming,” Sarah said.
Bill turned and gave her a big smile. “Thanks, hon.”
She leaned in for a quick kiss.
Bill roared up to the light, then slammed the brakes again. The motion of the car made me shift forward against the seatbelt.
Tucker took my hand. “I swear I won’t drive like a maniac.”
“It’s fine.” My heart hammered painfully, but sitting here with two strangers, my hand gripping Tucker’s, I felt electrically alive. Everything was new, the sights and colors, stores and cars and people on the sidewalks. I wanted to see it all.
As we crossed town, I got used to the crazy lurching of the car. Bill turned into a small parking lot and killed the engine in front of a tall statue of a boy in a green outfit.
“Peter Pan Mini Golf,” Bill said. “Tucker, I have the libations hidden in a bag behind my seat. Can you get them?”
Tucker unearthed the bag from a pile of jackets, and we scooted out of the car. Bill and Sarah were already halfway up a set of concrete stairs. “Nine holes or eighteen?” he called down.
“The way you suck, nine,” Tucker replied.
I clutched his arm and leaned in close. “What are libations? And what are we doing with holes?”
Tucker slid an arm around my waist. “Do you know what golf is?”
I shook my head.
“You swing a metal stick called a club to knock balls into holes. He was asking how many holes we wanted to aim at.”
“And libation?”
Tucker lifted the bag. “Drinks. But don’t worry. Alcohol doesn’t play nice with my meds or yours. We’ll get cokes. Or bottled water. Whatever you want.”
I was grateful to be with someone who understood. As we collected our golf clubs and chose different colored balls, the sheer number of people overwhelmed me.
Brightly painted statues were strewn around the outdoor space. A rabbit. A turtle. A huge blue whale.
Tucker squeezed my hand as we approached the first hole. It was surrounded with green ground and short walls.
I watched Bill, who passed a bottle to Sarah. He set his ball on the ground, then swung the club until it struck.
The ball rolled along the green and bounced off the wooden edge. It stopped a few inches from the hole.
“So close!” Sarah called. “I’m going to kick your butt.”
I waited for her silver shoe to smack the back of Bill’s jeans, but she didn’t do that, only lining up like Bill had done.
By the time Tucker finished his turn, I felt reasonably sure I knew what to do.
I stood as they did and gripped the handle of the club.
Tucker came up behind me, fitting his body against mine.
“Aww, yeah,” Bill called. “Bow chicka bow wow.”
I had no idea why he was saying that, but the feel of Tucker’s body behind mine was worth any terrible mistake I might make trying to get the ball in the hole.
“Hold it like this.” Tucker adjusted my hands on the handle. “When you swing, go about this high, and follow through with your body.”
We moved together like one person, our weight shifting, and the club arced down and connected with the ball.
Through sheer luck, it bounced off the back wall and angled straight into the hole. Tucker released me as we jumped in the air with a shout.
“You did it!” He wrapped his arms around my waist.
Bill and Sarah let out whoops as well, but the entire scene blurred around me as I focused only on Tucker. His dark eyes locked on me, his wild hair outlined against the light behind him. His arms held my body against his, trapping the metal club between us.
His face lowered to mine. We’d kissed before, in the hospital and at the store, but now there were no disapproving nurses, no mother. And all the time we wanted.
I wrapped my arms around his neck, relaxing into his embrace. A perfect stillness held us separate from the noise and movements of everyone else. We were here. He was mine. And I belonged to him. Our kiss sealed us together like we were merging into one.
The happy goodness in my belly expanded and grew. Before Tucker, I trusted no one and believed only the notes left to me in my own handwriting.
But Tucker understood how our bodies could fail. That pills kept us safe. He wanted me to understand the world, not hide from it.
With every message he sent, every song he told me to listen to, every website I read, he brought me more into his world. And it was a fun one, full of silly jokes and goofy videos, music that made my heart pound or sometimes made me cry.
He felt things deeply and when he shared all that he knew, I felt those emotions, too. I had no idea there was so much to understand and experience. My mother’s world was so small. Four movies. A shelf of books. And the stories she thought were safe to tell.
But now I had Tucker and a universe to explore. And he’d found a way for us to do it together.
“Get a room!” Bill called. “You’re holding up the line.”
Tucker released me, and we glanced behind us. Another group was waiting for our hole.
Sarah laughed and knocked all the colored balls into the hole with her shoe. “Two points for everyone but Ava! She’s in the lead!”
Bill scooped up the balls, and we headed to the next hole.
Tucker kept me close to him, and I matched his step. The night moved on, filled with laughter and cheers and the smell of beer and smoky air.
The fun wasn’t being the first to get your ball in the hole.
It was the conversations, the beautiful night, and Bill’s terrible jokes.
I laughed when the others laughed, and reveled in the cool spring night, the feeling of Tucker’s body close to mine, and the camaraderie of other happy people all doing the same thing.
Nobody upset Bill by calling him Jill. Nobody made fun of me for knowing nothing.
This was life outside of my mother’s house. A world with Tucker.
I wanted more. I wanted it all.
I wanted to be eighteen.