Highly Illogical Behavior (14 page)

M
ost people her age wouldn't have been awake at eight thirty a.m. when Solomon called the next day, but Lisa wasn't like most people. She'd already showered, gotten dressed, straightened her hair,
and
had a bagel with cream cheese. Sleeping in was for the unmotivated.

“You're up early,” she answered.

“Guess where I am.”

“Very funny.”

“No, really. Guess.”

“Your bedroom?”

“I'm in the backyard, Lisa.”

“Shut your mouth.”

“I won't. I can't. I'm outside. It's nice out here, right?”

“Oh my God, Sol.”

“Listen to me. I'm okay. Why aren't you over here yet? Where's Clark?”

“Is there even any water in the pool?”

“They just started filling it up. Said we could swim at five or six. I'm not sure I can make it that long.”

“Wait, you're outside right now?”

“Yeah, sitting in the grass. I didn't realize I missed doing this.”

“Wow . . . this is . . .”

“It was weird. I couldn't sleep. At all. So in the middle of the night, I just opened the door and walked out here.”

“Amazing.”

“I fell asleep in the pool.”

“You what?”

“Dad found me before he left for work. I've never seen him so happy.”

“I can imagine,” she said. “I bet your mom cried.”

“She was already at work. But I'm sure she'll attack me when she gets home.”

“This is so great, Sol. How do you feel right now?”

“Like I passed the entrance exam for Starfleet Academy.”

“I'm going to guess that means good.”

“I feel awesome. Did you know you can hear the freeway from my backyard?”

“Mine too,” she said. “I'm going to call and wake Clark up and then head over. Don't get tired of being outside before we get there.”

“Yeah, right.”

Lisa couldn't get Clark on the phone, so she drove over to his mom's and banged on the door until someone answered. It was Drew and she was not happy to be awake.

“Lisa?” she said, sleepy-eyed.

“Hey, sorry. Is he here?” She stepped around her and walked down the hallway toward his room. She thought about knocking, but she didn't. She walked right in and found him asleep with one leg hanging over the side of
the bed and his face completely covered by a blanket.

“Clark?” she whispered loudly. He didn't move. “Clark!”

He shot up and out of the bed so fast that Lisa jumped back, afraid he'd start swinging his fists or something. Then she laughed and looked him up and down.

“Clark, you're naked.”

“Shit. Sorry.” He grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around himself. Then he sat down on the bed.

“
This
I did not know about you,” she said. “Must get cold.”

“What time is it?”

“Eight forty-five. I know it's early, but Sol went outside.”

“What?”

“Yeah. He just called me. We have to go see this.”

“Okay. Right. Umm . . . don't look.”

He quickly stood up and slid on a pair of boxers that was lying on the floor. Lisa pretended not to look, but it had been a while since she'd been alone with him and even longer since she'd seen this much of his body.

“I mean, we could wait fifteen minutes or so,” she said suggestively, reaching over to grab his wrist.

“Are you kidding me?” He pulled his arm away. “He's
outside
. We've gotta get over there.”

With a defeated look on her face, Lisa watched as he threw on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. Then, just as she stood up to follow him out, he turned back and gave her a huge smile.

“I need swim trunks, don't I?”

“Yeah,” she said. “And sunscreen.”

On the drive over, Clark couldn't stop talking about how proud he was of their friend. He used words like
pumped
and
psyched
and every time he said Solomon's name, Lisa felt a little pang of jealousy. He'd just had the chance to sleep with his girlfriend and instead he was going on and on about someone else. Lisa had created this monster, but she no longer had any control over it.

“I told you it would work,” she said.

“You're joking, right?” Clark asked, rolling his eyes.

“But, look what it's done,” she defended. “He's outside. It's only a matter of time before he goes even farther.”

“Okay, Dr. Praytor,” he said with sarcasm.

Lisa thought he was joking, but the second she went to speak again, she noticed the serious look on his face and stopped herself. The rest of the ride was silent, with Lisa staring straight ahead at the road and Clark looking down at his phone. When they pulled up in the driveway, she turned to him and didn't have to say anything for him to respond.

“Lisa, hear me out. If you write that essay, I'm telling him,” he said, never looking her way as he got out of the car.

When they stepped into the backyard, there he was, wearing a pair of sunglasses and lying back on a lounge chair, his arms up over his head. Lisa hadn't seen Solomon without a shirt on before and she could definitely tell he hadn't lied about all those crunches. Clark ran across the yard and started lifting Solomon up off the chair to give him a hug.

“Look what this guy's been hiding!” he yelled to Lisa, pointing at Solomon's pale, bare torso.

“You're going to be a lobster,” she said. “Do you have sunscreen on?”

“I do. I swear,” Solomon answered.

Clark lifted up one of Solomon's arms and smelled it.

“He's lying,” he said. “Here, we brought some.”

“Thanks.” Solomon rubbed the sunscreen on his arms and then Lisa walked over to help him get his back.

“If you die of skin cancer, we won't have anywhere to swim,” she said.

They sat outside watching the pool slowly fill with water. Solomon didn't seem to be tired of the sun yet, so they figured they'd stay out there for as long as he wanted. And every time he got up and walked to a new part of the yard, Lisa watched him like he was an astronaut walking around on some distant planet, his every step further proof that anything is possible.

“How much longer?” Solomon asked them, nearly shouting from the other side of the yard. It looked like he'd been inspecting the flowers under his parents' window, but Lisa wasn't sure.

“Well,” Clark said loudly, “with a hose that size, about five-eighths of an inch in diameter, you're delivering seventeen gallons of water per minute, which is one thousand twenty gallons an hour, so . . . with a five-thousand-gallon pool, it should take about five more hours.”

“What the hell?” Solomon asked, walking up to them.

“He read it off his phone,” Lisa said.

Clark held up his phone and gave Solomon a big smile. Then he hopped up onto his feet and told them to pose for a picture.

“We have to document this important day in history,” he said.

Solomon bent down and put one arm around Lisa's shoulders. This was the most he'd ever touched her and she couldn't help but flinch a little out of shock.

“Sorry,” he said, pulling away.

“No.” She grabbed his arm to keep it in place.

Clark had been taking pictures of the three of them for weeks, but he usually tried to keep it as subtle as possible, quickly snapping a shot of Lisa and Solomon as they looked down at their cards or watched TV. Lisa noticed every time, though, and now she wondered what she'd find on his phone from all the days she'd spent away. Surely he wouldn't have taken photos of Solomon all by himself. That would be strange, wouldn't it? But, even if he did, then so what? Friends take pictures of their friends all the time. It was perfectly normal. She didn't need to check his phone. That wouldn't help anything. It was all so stupid. Janis had really gotten to her, and she was starting to find it a bit more aggravating than it was amusing.

“Hey,” she said. “Let's go in and eat something, huh? Sol, can you sacrifice a few minutes of daylight. Don't want to get too tired of it on day one.”

“I guess,” he said, faking disappointment. “I'm starving anyway.”

“I want peanut butter and jelly,” Clark said. “All of it. All of it that's in the world.”

“My mom buys extra for him,” Solomon told Lisa.

Then Clark froze just outside of the door and turned to face them.

“You're not going to be stuck again if we go inside are you?”

“Dude,” Solomon said, stepping past him and through the doorway. “I've been doing this all day. Relax.”

Once inside, they made their way to the kitchen, where she listened to the two of them banter back and forth about how to make the perfect pb&j. They both had it all wrong. You've got to stir the peanut butter and jelly together before applying it to the bread. Then they sort of ventured off into their own little world and left Lisa sitting there to watch, unable to get a word in edgewise.

Maybe that was her fault, for all the time she'd spent quietly observing them and studying Solomon's tics and triggers. It was like they spoke a language she'd only just forgotten. She could pick up on some of their references, but mostly found herself completely lost in their jargon.

So, Lisa eventually stopped trying to understand them and let her mind drift back to her conversation with Clark. She knew he'd probably never forgive her if she wrote that essay. But, she also knew she had to. It was a surefire way to save herself and she was too close to give up now. Just as Solomon needed to leave the house, Lisa needed to leave Upland. He was better. She did that. She deserved to get out, too.

F
or Solomon, swimming was the opposite of a panic attack. Fluid and calm and quiet. The world was muffled just enough when he went under, and the way the wind felt on his wet skin when he came up for air made him forget he was closer to all the things that scared him so much and had for so long.

As he got into the pool for the first time, his family and friends looking on in silence, he felt like he could cry. And he did, but just a little, and to avoid it being a big deal, he fell face-first into the water and then came up smiling. After that, he wouldn't stop swimming long enough for anyone to ask if he was okay. But, of course he was. Nothing worked like the water.

When Solomon's dad cannonballed into the pool, he waded over to his son and made a big show out of trying to kiss him on the forehead. And all his mom could do was take pictures, this look in her eyes like she was documenting a miracle. Finally, after they'd been begging her for an hour, she got in the pool and joined them for Marco Polo.

“He'll never get him,” Solomon said to his mom and
Lisa. They were all sitting on the edge of the pool in the shallow end by the stairs, an area Solomon's dad had designated as the Loser Zone. He'd caught all three of them but hadn't even gotten close to Clark once.

He drifted slowly through the water like an alligator watching its prey, his nose above the surface just enough to breathe and the rest of him hidden underneath. He'd let Solomon's dad get close enough to touch him and he'd answer
Polo
in a whisper then sort of magically float right by him to one side. He was taunting him and every time he
did
hold his face out of the water, he'd shoot a huge grin over toward his audience.

Solomon, Clark, and Lisa stayed in the pool long enough to see the sun set and slowly watch the moon creep up to the center of the sky. They only got out to eat, pee, or when their fingers turned so pruney they started aching. Around ten, after Solomon's parents had gone to bed, the three of them lay side by side, Solomon in the middle, with their feet in the water and their backs resting on the cold, pebbly ground that surrounded the pool.

“If this were an indie movie, we'd start talking about the constellations,” Solomon said, looking up at the stars.

“I always thought
Ursa Major
would be a cool name,” Clark said. “Hi, I'm Ursa Major Robbins. Nice to meet you.”

“Ursa Major Reed, Attorney at Law,” Solomon added. “God, I missed this view.”

“It is pretty damn good, isn't it?” Lisa said.

At midnight, they finally said good-bye. He walked them to the front door, a towel around his waist and his half-wet hair sticking up and out in all directions. Lisa
kissed him on the cheek and whispered into his ear.
I'm so proud of you
, she said. Then Clark attacked him with a bear hug that raised him off his feet. And, despite it hurting his mildly sunburned arms, that was the best hug of his life.

Once they were gone, he walked back outside and sat by the pool. There were no lights on in the backyard except for the one that shone from the deep end and cast a whitish-blue glow all over Solomon's skin. He dipped his feet in the water, watching ripples as they moved out in tiny little glowing waves and he closed his eyes to listen to the only sound he could hear, water lapping against the side of the pool.

He thought about sleeping out there again, curling up on a lounge chair and letting the daylight wake him. He'd missed the sun, realizing now how stupid it had been to think he could live without it. He felt a pang of guilt as he looked around the backyard, tracing the top of the wooden fence with his eyes. Maybe he could've been coming out here this whole time. It felt so easy now. All it took was one step and it was like it had never been off limits, like he hadn't gone three years without touching the grass or feeling the sun on his skin or shivering in the night breeze. Is this what getting better felt like? And if all he had to do was close his eyes and take a step to make everything better, then why couldn't he just do it? Just rip it like a Band-Aid. Why did the thought of walking out that front door still make him feel like his heart was imploding?

“This is all I need,” he said aloud into the darkness of the yard. But even he wasn't sure he believed it anymore.

•   •   •

The next day, Solomon woke up to the sound of his grandma's voice echoing down the hall and into his bedroom. His parents were at work, so he knew she was on the phone with a client or something, probably being intentionally loud to wake him up.

When he walked into the kitchen a few minutes later, she was sitting at the counter with her reading glasses barely on the tip of her nose and a newspaper in her hands. For a minute she didn't see him, so she kept reading and humming to herself.

“Grandma?”

She threw the paper down, jumped up, and ran across the kitchen to hug him. She planted a big, loud kiss on the side of his face and then squeezed him again, so tight she took the wind out of his lungs.

“Okay, okay,” he said, backing up. “You're freaking me out.”

“Look at you! You've already got a tan!”

“It's a sunburn.”

“Sunburn schmunburn. You look alive, kid. Like somebody brought you back from the dead.”

“Thanks,” he said. “You bring your swimsuit? The pool's awesome.”

“No, no. I've got three houses to show by five. I just came to see it for myself.”

“The pool?”

“Are you kidding? I've seen thousands of pools, Solomon. I want to see you out there. Go on. Start walking. I'm very busy.”

When he stepped out into the backyard, she did the hug and loud kiss thing all over again. He thanked her for the pool, but she wouldn't hear it, choosing instead to take pictures of him standing in the grass and by the fence and sitting on the diving board. By the time she was done, his face was sore from all the smiling.

“I missed the mountains,” he said, pointing over into the distance.

“I never liked 'em,” she said. “Don't get it.”

“Really? I love them.”

“Yeah, well, I always wanted to live by the beach when I moved out here. I did, for a while, you know? Back when I was trying to be an actress some girlfriends and I got a place in Long Beach. It wasn't as nice back then, but we could afford it and it was close enough to the city to carpool to casting calls and our real jobs—waitressing.”

“So why'd you move out here then?”

“Your grandpa. This was his hometown and he wasn't going to live anywhere else. He made that very clear when we met, and despite my better judgment, I married him anyway.”

“You know you loved him,” he said. “Why're you always talking trash about Grandpa?”

“Tell you a secret?”

“Yeah.”

“Makes it easier. If I pretend all he did was drive me crazy, I don't miss him so much. It works. Maybe it's bad, but it works.”

“I wish I'd met him.”

“He would've loved you. You're . . . like he was. He kept
to himself, mostly, but when you caught him in the right mood, he'd talk for hours. He'd tell stories till he was blue in the face—
did you hear the one about
whatever. I see that in your dad sometimes, too.”

“Three generations of crazy.”

“A loony legacy” she said.

“A straight coat of arms.”

“You win.”

“Are you going to make me swim, too?” he asked. “I think my trunks are in the washer.”

“No,” she said. “Just promise me you won't drown in this nice expensive pool while no one's here all day, okay? Don't give me
that
to live with for the next twenty years.”

“I bet you've got more than twenty.”

“Shhh,” she snapped. “I'm a dinosaur. Give me a hug so I can go earn your inheritance back.”

Once he was alone, he didn't bother going to get his trunks. Instead he walked back to the pool, threw his pjs and T-shirt onto the ground, and jumped right in. He swam around for a while, sometimes breaking to float on his back and get warm from the sun before diving back down to the bottom and turning flips all the way back up. He hadn't heard the doorbell inside, so he had the absolute shit scared out of him when he popped up from the water to take a big breath and Clark Robbins was standing at the edge of the pool with a huge smile on his face.

“Holy shit!” Solomon yelled, quickly covering his privates with both hands and going back underwater.

He thought maybe it was all a hallucination, some weird effect of all this swimming after so many years without it. But he opened his eyes and looked up to see the cloudy image of his friend looking down at him. Then, just as he was about to come up for air, Clark jumped in.

When his head was above water, he saw Clark's clothes,
all
of his clothes, lying on the ground. He looked over where he'd jumped in and watched the shiny figure swim down toward the bottom. He was too embarrassed and paranoid to stick his head underwater and try for a better view, but he did consider it.

When Clark's head popped up by the diving board, he looked right at Solomon and smiled.

“Don't judge. It's effing cold in here.”

“I'm not
looking
,” Solomon said quickly. “How'd you get in?”

“Door was unlocked,” he said, starting to swim closer.

“Weird.”

It was the first time Solomon had ever forgotten to lock the front door. Ever. And if very naked Clark hadn't been swimming toward him, he would've had time to freak out about
that,
too.

“So this whole ploy . . . this swimming pool thing was just so you could skinny-dip, huh?”

“For sure,” Solomon said. “Caught me. I'll go get my trunks in a second.”

“Nobody here but us.”

“Lisa?”

“Said she wasn't feeling well. Told me to keep you company.”

Solomon, still naked, still covering his business with both hands, eyed his towel where it sat impossibly far away on a chair. Clark was just swimming around the pool behind him like everything was normal.

Solomon stayed in one spot for a while, unable to move, too embarrassed and confused and overwhelmed to do anything but try to seem like he wasn't watching Clark. But how could he not be watching him? He was naked and swimming all around him. It was like every gay dude's dream come true—a naked athlete floating around in the backyard. Or maybe it was just Solomon's dream with this particular athlete. Either way, it was happening and his eyes didn't know where to go.

“Hey,” Clark said, swimming up way too close to him. “You're blushing.”

“Sunburn,” he said, trying his best not to look down.

“I'll go get my shorts.”

Clark used both hands to pull himself out of the water and Solomon watched as he walked across the yard, his bare white butt right there for all the neighborhood to see. He took his swim trunks off the fence where he'd left them drying the night before.

And since Clark was looking the other way, Solomon quickly climbed out of the pool and wrapped a nearby towel around his waist.

“I'm going to go grab mine,” he said, walking across the yard and into the house.

When he returned, Clark was in the water doing a handstand. He waited for him to come up for air before jumping
back in and then he swam to the shallow end and took a seat on one of the steps.

“You okay, man?” Clark asked, wading toward him.

“Yeah,” he said unconvincingly. “Totally.”

“Hey, look, I'm used to the locker room and a house with three brothers. I shouldn't have done that.”

“It's not a big deal,” he said. “I just . . . I don't know. Sorry I'm being weird.”

“Sol,” Clark said, moving closer. “It's okay. You can look, just don't touch.”

“Jerk,” he said, a smile forcing its way onto his face.

“Really, though. I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable. You're like my brother or something, I just didn't even think twice about it.”

Solomon went underwater, opened his eyes, and let the words echo and sink in and swim all around in his head.
Like my brother
.

He shook it off and challenged Clark to a race. Clark won, of course, but Solomon came surprisingly close, especially for someone so out of practice. He also couldn't help being distracted by Clark, watching him as he moved through the water. He liked the way his hair looked when it was wet, slicked back like an old movie star. And he was fascinated by the little patch of dark hair Clark had growing in the center of his chest.

“I didn't see that in your water polo pictures. The ones Lisa showed me,” Solomon said.

“I shave it during the season. Don't make fun.”

“Hey, I can't even grow one hair on my chest. Respect.”

“My dad looks like a grizzly bear with his shirt off. I'm so jealous,” Clark said. “I want, like, caveman body hair, the kind that hovers all around you, you know? That's the manliest you can get.”

“And
why
do you need to be so manly?”

“Well, she won't tell you, but it's Lisa's thing. She likes a real scruffy sort of guy. Maybe I should grow a beard.”

“Lumbersexual,” Solomon said. “I think that's what they call it.”

“Nice,” Clark said. “I want a beard and to be covered in body hair and then I'll marry Lisa and we'll move to Portland or something and build a tiny house.”

“
That
'
s
your dream?”

“I think so,” Clark said, immediately following it with a backflip in the water.

Solomon got quiet after that, but he tried to talk just enough for Clark not to sense anything. He was so angry at himself for letting this happen, for feeling the way he felt about Clark. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't shake it, either. And, long after Clark had gone home, Solomon stayed up wondering if everyone falls in love with someone who can't love them back.