I punch him in the arm. “West!”
Krishna starts to laugh.
Bridget covers her face with her hands and buries her head in the couch cushion. I think she says something about Twilight Sparkle, but it’s hard to hear her with her mouth against the leather.
“Dude,” Krishna says. “That was epic.”
“Right?” West is smiling in this way only a guy could—70 percent ego, 30 percent swinging dick. “I should get a medal.”
“Do you guys want a ruler?” I ask. “You know, for measuring your penises?”
Krishna makes a dismissive noise. “He’d win.”
From the depths of the couch cushions, Bridget makes this noise that’s like a scream crossed with a squeak.
“Do you want some ice cream?” I ask. Because that’s all I’ve got to offer. I don’t have one of those laser-gun things that can erase memories with one bright white pulse of light.
“Yes,” she says. “But only if you have the kind with the pretzels with peanut butter in the middle and chocolate on the outside, in the vanilla ice cream with peanut butter stripes.”
“Chubby Hubby.”
“Yes. Or I guess I’d take mint chocolate chip. But not that terrible stuff you had before with the fruit in it, because you know how I feel about fruit in my ice cream.”
“Why don’t you come with me and see?”
She gets up. I expect her to climb over Krishna, whose leg is partially blocking the path between the coffee table and the kitchen, but instead she goes the long way around and doesn’t look at him.
“Twilight Sparkle, huh?” West says to Krishna. “Is that what’s got you two all hot and bothered?”
“No, it’s that picture your mom sent me of her in her panties.”
“Oh, yeah? Was it as good as the video I got from your grandma last week?”
“Dude. Leave off my grandma.”
“That’s what your sister said when she wanted her turn.”
“Oh my God,” Bridget says. “Make it stop.”
My head’s already in the freezer. I take it out to call, “Settle down, boys! You’re both pretty.”
I try to sound scornful, but it’s hard to pull off when you’re smiling so hard that your cheeks hurt.
The week after Sex-Picture Day is crazy.
Spring break is coming up. West and I both have mid-semester papers and projects due. I endure another meeting with Student Affairs because my dad has decided he wants to be part of everything, except once he’s in the meeting he doesn’t say a word. It’s this weird repeat of the first meeting but with more people in the room.
The Internet-Asshat emails keep flooding into my in-box. I guess they’ve found my phone number, because now I’m getting all these hang-up mouth-breather voice mails and ranting, insane threats. I have to screen all my calls, delete three-quarters of my texts. I decide to suspend my Facebook account and shut down my Twitter altogether.
All of it has to be documented, too. Everything needs to be tracked. I’m already tired of it. I wish I could just switch off the phone, turn off the computer, and ignore the whole river of garbage that my life has become.
And, as if that’s not bad enough, West can’t get his mom on the phone. Frankie hasn’t sent him any texts for a few days. He’s worrying.
There’s nothing I can do.
I’m overwhelmed, weary of being hated, worn out from so much hard work.
There’s nothing he can do.
We stick together like we’ve been glued to each other.
We’re at the bakery when his phone finally rings. I’m mixing up the dill, and he’s slitting open a bag of flour to dump into the bin. Since I’m closer to his phone, I look at the screen. “It’s Bo.”
He drops the blade on the floor. I meet him halfway with the phone. I know he’s been hoping Bo, his mom, someone, will call him back.
“Hey. What’s up?”
I turn my back to adjust the volume on the music, and the ten seconds the job requires is all the time it takes for the color to drain from West’s face.
“How long ago?”
He paces the length of the table as he listens.
“Did you try to talk her out of it? Or … No, I know.… No. All right. And what about Frankie, is she—”
His shoulders sag.
His fingers are white where they curl around the phone.
“All right. Thanks. It was decent of you to call. I’ll … I’ll take it from here.”
When he hangs up, he just stands there.
He stands there for so long, I’m afraid to touch him.
“West?”
“She took him back,” he says.
“Your dad?”
“She fucking took him back.”
This is the possibility he’s been afraid to name for the past few days.
The worst thing.
“How did it happen?”
“I don’t know. Bo didn’t even—he didn’t kick her out. He came home and all her stuff was gone, with a note saying she was sorry but she had to follow her heart.” He pounds his fist on the table. “Her heart.”
“Did they leave town, or … ?”
“They’re at the trailer park. Her and Frankie. They moved in with my dad.”
“Oh.”
I’m not sure what to say. There aren’t any words that will fix the defeat in his posture. The heavy dead sound of his voice, like someone has ripped all the fight out of him.
I know it’s bad because, when I stand in front of him and try to put my arms around him, he slumps against me hard enough that I have to lock my knees to hold him up.
Not for long. He gives himself ten seconds—surely no longer than that—and then pulls away.
He doesn’t look at me when he says, “I’m going to have to go home.”
“Sure.” He’ll have to make sure they’re safe. Talk to his mom. Check on his sister. “Tell me what I can do to help.”
“I have to fly. Pack up my stuff. Right after this shift’s over.”
“Will you stay for your exam?” He has a midterm at ten tomorrow morning.
“No, there’s no point. Listen, can you look up flights for me? See what’s the earliest I can get out of Des Moines.”
“I will, but maybe you should take the exam, at least. So when you come back—”
It’s how he glances away that stops me.
It’s the pain I see before he turns his face so I can’t see it at all.
“West?”
He grips the tabletop with both hands. I’m looking at him in profile, his braced arms, lowered head, the straight line of his spine.
I know before he tells me.
He’s not coming back.
“It was never going to work out, anyway,” he says quietly. “I never had any business thinking it would.”
“What wasn’t?”
“It’s not something I should have let myself think I could do.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters a lot. West?”
When he looks up at me, he’s so far away. He’s in a state I’ve never been to, a place I’ve seen pictures of but can’t imagine, can’t smell. A town by an ocean I’ve never seen.
Oregon. I can’t even pronounce it right. He had to teach me how to say it like a native.
“Come on. Talk to me.”
“I’m sorry,” he says. “But she’s my sister, and I have to watch out for her. Nobody else is going to do it, nobody ever has. It’s my fault for thinking … It’s my fault.”
The way he looks at me, it feels like goodbye, but it can’t be. We’re mixing up the bread. We’re going to be here for hours—firing the ovens, slicing into the loaves, venting the steam. After we get through tomorrow, it’s spring break, and I probably won’t see him much for the week, but then we have the rest of the semester. Junior year. Senior year.
We have all this time still.
This can’t possibly be happening.
“You can’t just leave. You have to at least go talk to your adviser, take a leave of absence, or—”
I’m just getting warmed up when there’s a sharp rap from the other side of the room. The alley door is open, like always, because the kitchen gets so hot. Standing there, framed in it, are two uniformed policemen.
“Mr. Leavitt,” the one in front says. He’s blond, middle-aged, nice-looking. “Officer Jason Morrow. We met in December.”
“I remember,” West says. “What do you want?”
“We have reason to believe you’ve been engaged in the illegal sale of marijuana from these premises. We’d like to have a look around.”
I move closer to West. He puts his arm around me and kisses the top of my head. Mumbles, “Keep quiet.”
To the policeman, he says, “This isn’t my property. I can’t consent to a search.”
“Is this young woman an employee?”
“No. She’s with me.”
“So you’re the only employee here, is that right?”
West steps away from me, toward the door, and blocks my view of the officers.
I’ve been here before, so many times, staring at his back as he puts himself between me and trouble. But this time the trouble’s come for him.
“Yes.”
“As the person in charge of the premises, you can consent.”
“You’re going to have to call Bob. He’s the owner. It’s up to him.”
“Mr. Leavitt, we have a team at your apartment right now with a trained dog. It’s in your best interest at this point to cooperate with our investigation.”
West takes the door in his hand and uses his boot to nudge away the wedge of wood Bob uses as a doorstop. “Until you come back with Bob or a warrant, I’m not opening this door.”
And then he shuts it and flips the lock.
“Call Bridget,” he says. “I’m calling Krish.”
“West, do you think—”
But he’s not even listening. He’s crouched down, rooting around in my bag. He finds my phone, puts it in my hand. “We have a god-awful mess and not much time to sort it out. If they’re in the apartment, I need to know what’s going on. Call her.”
My fingers do the work.
I feel as though I’m watching all of this happen from a few feet outside my body, like I can’t do anything but the task in front of me, and I don’t understand enough. It’s all swirling around in my head. West is leaving. The police are outside. He closed the door on them. They’re searching the apartment. He’s got to take care of Frankie. West is leaving. He could be arrested. So could I. I’m an accessory. I can’t do this.
It’s all so thoroughly, confusingly screwed.
The phone rings and rings, but no one picks up. West’s got his own phone by his ear, and he’s staring into the middle distance. “No answer?” he asks.
“No.”
Then my phone chimes with an incoming text. What’s going on???!!!
“It’s from Bridget.”
“Ask her where she is.”
I do, and she replies, At W & K’s. On fire escape. Police r here w/ drug dog!!!
West is right behind me, reading over my shoulder. “Shit. I was hoping they were lying about that. Find out where Krish is.”
The minute we have to wait feels like a lifetime.
In West’s room w/ cops & dog.
“Did you have anything there for them to find?” I ask West in a whisper.
“No. I haven’t sold all semester, you know that.”