Beast (14 page)

I am the bigger dog.

My fists bunch up, looking like two hairy medicine balls, and there is nothing I want to do more than break this kid's fucking nose. Hear that crack, get that adrenaline high, because I'm frustrated as shit. I want to hate JP, but I don't. I'm just sad. I want to hate Jamie, but I don't, because it's hard to hate someone you want to be with all the time.

“Hope you know I'm just humoring you.” Adam Michaels circles the yard, gets closer to me. He shouldn't do that. “Kinda want to hear you cry like when you broke that thing. Don't worry, I'll be quick. All it takes—”

I lunge, grab his shirt so fast all the threads pop, strike him up and in his gut, right on the solar plexus, and throw his sorry ass on the ground. Mud flies and hits me in the chin. I'll take it. It's better than blood. Adam Michaels lies there in one pathetic heaving pile because all the nerves in his celiac ganglia are spasming the fuck out.

“Do you know who I am?” I lean over him, pushing him hard on his gut so it burns. “They call me the Beast for a reason. Time to pay up.”

My fist reels back. His eyes snap wide.

Do it for Jamie. Do it for Jamie.

I can end this kid and he knows it.

But I can't.

My hands fall open. Adam Michaels takes his first actual breath. “Work out a payment plan,” I say. “Tell JP you'll pay him…what can you afford?”

“Um…m-maybe ten dollars a week?”

“Tell him you'll pay him thirty-two dollars and eight cents a month for a year. That's a ten percent interest rate, and don't borrow money until you know you can pay it back.”

“Whoa, you're really good at math.”

“I know. Now get out of here.”

He crawls through the door, doubled over and covered in mud. Back in the hallway, the bell screams over my head. If I were more social, I'd have Ethan or Bryce's number, but I don't because all these years I relied on JP for everything. If I didn't have the need to branch out, I didn't, and now I'm kicking myself. Instead I call Jamie. She doesn't pick up and I have to leave her a message: “I'm worried about you. I need to know you're okay, like right now this second.”

I hang up.

I realize that might've been a little overdramatic and call back.

“Maybe not quite that bad, but whatever. Call me as soon as you get this message.” I hang up, stand in the corner, and wait.

The closest midway point we have is the mall. I keep expecting all the teachers to call truancy officers, but nothing happens. We turn heads in the mall on a school day for only obvious reasons: I am an almost-seven-foot-tall hairy dude on crutches sitting in the food court next to a girl who makes everyone do a triple check. A pretzel lies half-mauled on a skimpy napkin in between us as I pull my hat down and Jamie takes another billion pictures.

“Jamie…”

“Don't worry, I'm not posting anything to the Internet. No one will know we're here right now,” she says. “It'll be a latergram.”

“No, you're not taking this seriously. Ethan and Bryce are transphobic idiots, and JP is really dangerous. I don't know what he's going to do anymore. He said some real scary shit.”

“I get it. I heard you the first sixty times,” she says sharply. “And you're starting to sound like my mom. No amount of expert opinion can convince her that I'm not going to be the target of some insane plot. So I'll tell you the same thing I tell her: I'll be fine.”

“I know, but I'm afraid they're going to come after you and hurt you, and you're brushing it off like they accidentally changed the red dye in their Froot Loops or something.”

“Are you done?”

“You're mad at me because I'm trying to look out for you?”

“Maybe I'm sick of hearing about my imminent demise. Despite everyone's well-intentioned concerns, it's quite nice being me,” she says. “Seriously, my own mother thinks I'm going to end up a prostitute and get murdered by a john, so I don't need to hear it from you too, okay?”

“She does?”

“No, not like really officially hooker, just ‘her biggest fear' for me and whatever.”

“I'm not saying you're gonna be a hooker. I'm trying to tell you I do not know what's going on and I'm afraid.” Because you mean so much to me.

“And I heard you; now please hear me. I'm done with everyone thinking that me being alive is an open invitation to bigots and weirdos who want to do awful things. I am way past over the lectures. It sucks, okay? I just want to live in peace.” Jamie tears a hunk off the pretzel and chomps down with an angry bite. “Don't worry. I can take care of myself.”

Her teeth roil and grind the doughy thing into soup. She's so pissed, but I can't help it.

Dad…Even if she's mad and can't stand me right now, give me a sign to reach out and hold her hand. Send the okay; send the all clear. Like someone dumping their tray in the trash in the next three seconds.

I wait.

Okay, five seconds.

Still nothing. Crap.

I glance over at Jamie and in spite of my best efforts, I smile.

“What?” she says.

A daub of yellow spots her cheek. “You got some mustard here.” I point to mine, locationwise.

Her tongue flares out but misses. “Did I get it?”

“Nope.” I reach out with my thumb and wipe it away. The napkin is a wreck, so I lick it off instead. She smirks and looks to her lap. Now I have to ask. “What?”

“Nothing,” she says. “I think it's adorable that you still want your prince fantasy.”

“My what?”

“Your bodyguard thing—how you want to be my prince in shining armor. It's sweet.”

I laugh so loud, everyone at the food court twists to see. “I would make a real shitty prince.” Let's just stick to the Beast, thanks. Much easier. “Besides, I don't think it's some massive gesture to warn you about stupid people. That's just normal friend stuff.”

“Maybe I watch too many stupid movies where the guy comes in and sweeps the girl off her feet. Carries her away and they kiss in the rain. You know the ones I'm talking about?” She waits for me but I shrug. “Anyway”—she ducks her eyes low and blushes—“I don't know. I love those movies. Have you ever wished you were in a movie like that?”

A slab of pretzel gets stuck deep in my molar because of course I have. With her.

“You think I'm being a cheesy dork, I can tell,” she says.

“Nah. You're a romantic.”

“I am.” She sighs. “What about you?”

The mall is packed. I try to make eye contact with a stranger. A lady over there waiting in line for a Venti peppermint pumpkin mocha white squall. The lady looks up, catches my eye, and shudders. She grabs her drink and runs.

“I'm a realist,” I say in a dull voice as that lady flees.

Even if I got the sign of all signs to pick Jamie up and sweep her off her feet
(Dad, how about someone tripping on that spilled strawberry shake right now? No? Dammit),
I don't know if I could be the type of boyfriend Jamie wants. I just don't look the part. She's into all those romance movie guys and their swoony gazing. I'm way more suited to standing in front of her and smashing the oncoming world to bits. Besides, I've already tried to be a movie-star guy with her, back in the rose garden, and she shot me down hard.

So I guess it's good to officially know Jamie will never go for me. I can stop worrying about us and me and her and all the rest of it and just be. Maybe we can be friends.

“Yeah, I suppose I'm a realist too. Everyone kinda has to be at least a little bit,” she says in a similar monotone. “Since you loved group therapy, with your whopping one session and all…”

“Two!” I laugh. “I showed up for the second one, I just didn't go, remember?”

“Semantics. Anyway, here it comes, ready? Pop psychology. You're a leading man in a movie, like action or horror or thriller. Which one are you and why?”

“A lead? What does that mean?”

“Like an actor. How about classic Hollywood? If I'm doing me, I'd kill to be Sophia Loren because oh my god, but since it's obvious I'm more of a Katharine Hepburn, that's not a bad deal either. You get to pick between James Dean, Paul Newman, and Marlon Brando. Spoiler alert, I'm bringing home Brando from
A Streetcar Named Desire.
Oooh, Stanley.”

“Jimmy Stewart,” I say. I'm the guy saving the town and coming home to my family on Christmas, my wife and four kids smothering me with hugs and kisses. Ill-fated suicide attempt and all.

“Oooh…I like it. The Everyman. Oh, hey!
Rear Window!
He has a broken leg in
Rear Window
! That's perfect.”

“I guess so.” He's also super paranoid and sacrifices his girlfriend to go head to head with a murderer, so there's that.

“Grace Kelly was so pretty in that movie. Her makeup was flawless.” She peers across the food court. “Can we stop in Sephora?”

“Out of pineapple lip gloss?”

“You remembered.”

Some things you can't forget. She gets up, I do too. We chuck the sad remains of our pretzel in the trash and there's nothing I can do but follow her into a store that smells like Play-Doh doused in rotting Sharpie markers. “We have to go to Sephora, huh?”

“You're my BFF. You of all people should understand.” I am despising the descriptive term “BFF” because it has one too many Fs. “Help me pick out some colors. I need a new nude palette,” she says.

“A what?”

“Eye shadow. Don't worry, we'll get you up to speed by the time Pride rolls around.”

“Why do I have to go to Pride now?”

“Well, I usually go. We make it a party—to me it's like a birthday almost. My day, I love it. But if you're not into it, that's okay.”

“It's in June, right?” Maybe I'll be ready by then.

“Uh-huh, June.” Jamie takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. Feels like she's made of fireflies and it lights me up. “I keep forgetting this is new for you, sorry.” She drops my hand and picks up a box with some girl's slick and shiny cheek on it. “Only if you want to. Pride's not going anywhere. What do you think of this moisturizer?”

“I don't,” I say. I drift into the aisle and glance at the wonderland. I don't even know what half this shit is. Lipstick? Okay, that's easily identified. But lip gloss, lip balm, lip tar, and lip stain? You only have two lips. How many boiled dinosaur bones do two lips need? I grip my disgusting crutches, the rubber all split and cracked with wear and tear. When I look up, I have a heart attack. It's my mom. Staring at her phone and ambling into Sephora. I duck down and almost crush Jamie. “Hide!” I tell her in a whisper.

“What?”

“My mom's at the mall, she's in the store, hide!”

Jamie jumps and turns and stops, waiting for me. “Aren't you coming?”

All I can do is shake my head. “I'm too big.” Hiding, like crouching into a ball or something, is stupid. The only thing I can do is stand next to a wall and hope my mom doesn't see me.

Mom is still staring, staring, staring at her phone. Please keep reading all those emails.

Jamie gives me a sad look and resigns me to my fate as she darts off behind a row of colors wedged in plastic containers. I lean against a post next to a bunch of tubes and tubs and wait, peeking from behind the brim of my hat. Mom comes in, finishes up a text, and looks around. Be small, I command my entire body, and it just goes, ha ha ha, sucker….

Mom sees me and gasps so loud everyone's head in Sephora snaps along for the ride. “Dylan Walter Ingvarsson, what are you doing here?”

“Hi, Mom.” I look across the store. Jamie is invisible. It's for the best.

“I want answers. Now.”

“I was…” I don't know crap-all about any of this. I grab the nearest thing. “Shopping. For Mother's Day. Here's some lip…stuff.”

She peers at the black plastic tube of goo. “It's November.”

“Christmas, then. But now you spoiled the surprise.” I put it back.

“Not buying it. Why aren't you in school?”

Struggling to come up with something, I've got nothing. I shut my mouth.

“That's what I thought.” She tugs at one of my crutches to get me moving. “You're going back right this second, mister.”

“Wait a minute. Why are you here?”

Her mouth pops open. “I…had a feeling this is where I needed to go.”

Dad! Dammit, how does he keep doing this for her? I don't get it. Why won't he talk to me?

“And I have a coworker who's retiring and I wanted to pick up her favorite perfume.” She reaches behind me and snares a box. It's all pink and loopy with little white birds on it. “So now I have it, let's pay and go.”

Mom marches me toward the cashier behind a counter and alternates between watching where she's going and shooting me
the look,
just so I know I'm still in a very large amount of trouble. Got it. “That lip gloss wasn't even my color, Dylan. I have more of a peach complexion.”

“Um, okay.” I sneak my head around. Jamie's still hiding better than a baby deer.

“It was a good choice for you, though. You've got your dad's pink cheeks. Wait.” She stops us both. “Were you shopping for yourself? Or Jamie?”

Now
the look
has shifted to
oh no, what does this REALLY mean?

“Honestly, I saw you coming and ducked into the nearest store.”

Relief smooths her edges round. “Thank god. For a second I thought we had our own Jamie situation on our hands. Not that this negates all the trouble you're in, mister.” She gets moving again and plunks the perfume on the counter. “Ma'am, do you have children?” she asks the woman behind the counter.

“I do,” she says brightly. “Two girls and a boy.”

“And what's your strictest punishment for a kid who skips school, like my son here?”

The woman behind the counter looks up and up at me. “That's your son?”

“Yup.”

“You poor woman,” she laughs. “You must've cracked open from the pressure.”

Mom smiles along. “Ten pounds, eight ounces, I demanded a C-section.”

They get their full jollies on and I stand there while they laugh at me. “Good lord, he's a beast,” the woman says. “When he came in with that girl, I was like—”

“What girl?” Mom demands.

I eye-yell at the woman behind the counter to say no more, but she's Team Mom. “She's young, tall, and pretty. Think she had a camera?” the woman says, and I'm instantly screwed.

Mom tears away from the counter and storms through the aisles one by one. I catch a glimpse of Jamie trying to make a break for it, but Mom spies her first. “Jamie!” she yells. “Young lady, you and I need to have a talk.”

“Mom,” I interrupt, throwing myself between the two of them. “It's not what you think! Don't take it out on her, take it out on me.” If there was any way to bargain, to plead, to steer her another way, I'd do it all, but once she saw Jamie, it was over.

Jamie holds on to a display and grips her heart. “I didn't mean—”

My mom bucks around me and gets too tight with Jamie. “I don't know what kind of agenda you have for my son, but you will leave him alone from now on,” she says in a low tone. “Understand me?”

“Mom, it was my idea, not Jamie's. She's innocent.”

“You.” She switches her sights to me. “We're leaving. Go.”

I look over my shoulder and see Jamie holding it in. “I'll call you,” I mouth.

Jamie nods and lays her head against her clinging hands holding on to the shelf, and that's the last I see of her as Mom drags me by the arm through the mall, like I'm some belligerent five-year-old. I don't want her to touch me and I yank my arm away.

“Ow!” she cries, and rubs her wrist.

My gut sinks. I've done this before, hurt her by accident. I'll move too fast or turn a corner too sharp and completely take her out. “I'm so sorry, Mom.”

She pushes back the sleeve of her coat, and underneath her whole forearm is red from where I wrenched her off me. “You've got to be more careful,” she mutters.