In the Middle of Somewhere (43 page)

“No, no, it’s fine. Please,” Ginger says, raising her eyebrows at me as Rex gleefully sets his attention back on the box.

After five minutes he has it open and casually starts to put it back together again.

“Wait!” Ginger yells. She reaches into the center of the box and pulls out a piece of paper. In cramped handwriting, it just says,
I’m impressed
.

“Oh my god,” I say.

“What?” Rex asks, sounding nervous. He looks between me and Ginger. She’s gaping at him.

“No one’s ever opened that thing before,” I tell Rex. “Not even Ginger. We had no idea there was something inside either.”

“Holy mother love bone,” Ginger says, a grunge oath she reserves only for things that truly delight her. “Dandelion, you hooked a genius.”

“I know, right?” I link my arm with Rex’s. He’s actually blushing and he looks quite pleased. “Except, now, all I can think of is what happens to the idiots who open the puzzle box in the
Hellraiser
movies.”

Ginger laughs—she loves
Hellraiser
—but stops abruptly.

“Um, so your dad?”

It comes rushing back so suddenly that I can’t believe I ever forgot. I sink down onto the couch and Rex sits next to me, looking ridiculously beefy reclining against purple velvet. I tell Ginger about my dad. About getting the call and how the guys waited a whole day to bother telling me. When I get to Colin’s accusation that I didn’t care that Dad was dead, Rex is vibrating with anger.

“Rex might have had to pull me off Colin,” I say.

“Had he called you that before?” Rex asks hesitantly, and it takes me a minute to remember which of Colin’s vile comments he might be referring to.

“What, Danielle?” Ginger asks.

“Or the girl? Not,” I add quickly, “that being called a girl is an insult. Just, you know Colin.”

“Oh, I know,” Ginger says. “That little asshole.
Not
,” she adds, looking at me and drawling suggestively, “that there’s anything wrong with assholes.”

“Oh fuck, I’ve missed you,” I say. “Got a drink?”

Ginger nods and grabs a bottle of whiskey from the kitchen. I take a sip and feel the heat feather down my throat and spread through my breastbone.

“How is it, then?” Ginger asks seriously, finally raising the question I’ve been dreading.

“Oh, fine; a little harsh for my taste,” I say, raising the bottle at her.

“Ha-ha,” she says. Then she just waits. I close my eyes and lean back against Rex’s shoulder. His arm automatically comes around me and all I want to do is turn my face into his neck and never come out.

“I’m not sure,” I say finally. “I’m… I feel all messed up, but… not precisely sad. More like—fuck, I don’t know.”

“Finish your sentence,” Ginger says. Jesus, she’s pushy. I can practically feel Rex taking notes.

“I don’t know if I’ll miss him. But, I guess a part of me always thought maybe the way things were was temporary. That, eventually, we’d be closer? Understand each other better. So now I feel like the… like that potential future has been… interrupted. Stolen from me.”

“More please,” Ginger says. I close my eyes again. I hate when she does this. I love when she does this. It’s like I don’t know what I’m thinking or feeling until I say it out loud.

“I was thinking, over Thanksgiving, that I don’t really know him. I don’t know what makes him tick—made him tick. Like, if he were the main character in the book I was reading, it’d only be chapter two. I’d know his name and who was in his daily life, but I’d be waiting to find out that thing that would make me care about his story. At least, that’s how I felt before. There was a whole book left. The promise that maybe if I kept reading I’d learn enough to make me like him—care about him. Only now, it’s like he was just a secondary character—a tertiary character. And the author hadn’t even thought about any more of a story for him. There just
isn’t
any more of him. And, I don’t know. That makes me fucking sad because I think probably he felt the same way about me. I know he cared about me, at least a little. I mean, I think so. And Colin and the guys, they knew him. And they’re fucking devastated he’s dead. And I’m jealous because….”

“Because?” Ginger prods.

“Because they were a family and I wasn’t part of it,” I say, and though I’ve never had the thought before, I know it’s what I really mean the second it comes out of my mouth. I swallow hard and my mouth tastes like blood. I take another gulp of whiskey and let my head fall back on Rex’s shoulder. I look up at him and see moisture gathering in the corners of his eyes. When he looks at me his eyes are so soft.

“I guess now we’re both orphans,” he says, and even though his voice is a masculine growl, it’s such a little kid thing to say that it breaks my heart.

“I guess so.”

I clear my throat.

“So, how was the family for Thanksgiving,” I ask Ginger, desperate to change the subject before Rex and I end up bawling all over each other.

“It’s been worse,” she says slowly.

“Just because we’re both orphans now doesn’t mean you can’t feel free to rain shit down on your family,” I say. Ginger smirks.

“The mother was a passive-aggressive ice queen from hell who told me I needed to lose ten pounds and then maybe my tattoos would look like an avant garde fashion statement instead of a desperate attempt to thumb my nose at society’s standards of beauty before men could reject me for being unconventional-looking.”

Rex’s mouth drops open.

“No, that’s seriously how she talks,” I say.

“I think you’re beautiful,” Rex says. Then a look of panic crosses his face. “I mean, I know that’s the opposite of your point. Shit, I’m sorry.” He looks at me, as if I can smooth it over.

“I love you,” Ginger says to Rex. “I love him,” she says to me.

Me too
, I think, before I can even process the thought. Fuck me.

“The father was a black hole of spinelessness except when he was kissing the mother’s ass in the hopes of some small crumb of encouragement, approval, or affection. It was nearly vomit-inducing, except that I couldn’t possibly give the mother the grim satisfaction of thinking she’d turned me bulimic.”

Rex’s hand has found its way onto my thigh and its warm weight is comforting. I hand him the whiskey and he takes a few swallows.

“The sister attempted to break down all known laws of physics by simultaneously being completely self-centered and totally obsessed with what everyone else thought about her. It boggles the mind how one human being can possibly speak so many sentences about herself in a row and still have it seem like she’s saying mean things about you. Truly, she has apprenticed at the feet of the master. In related news, she and the mother got matching haircuts, so the sister now also looks like the fifty-year-old president of a Chabad house. The end.”

I pass Ginger the bottle silently.

“I know what we need,” she says. She walks over to the record player.

“Tom Waits,” I whisper to Rex so Ginger can’t hear.

After that perfect static smear, Tom Waits counts off, “1, 2, 3, 4,” and the opening strains of “Ol’ ’55” start.

“Called it,” I say, and Ginger raises the bottle to me in a mocking toast.

Then Rex’s stomach growls so loudly that I can hear it over the music.

“Sorry,” he says. “Are you guys hungry?”

It’s after ten and poor Rex hasn’t eaten anything since we stopped at a rest stop outside Pittsburgh. I shrug.

“I could eat,” Ginger says. “Here, I’ll order something. Or, do you want the tots?” she asks me.

“Ugh, no, not tonight, sorry,” I say. There’s this bar a few blocks away that makes these diabolical tater tots that they kind of treat like nachos, with Cheez Whiz, some meat that I probably don’t want to know about, and horseradish ketchup.

“I can make us something,” Rex offers.

“Good luck,” I say. Ginger waves him into the kitchen, winking at me.

“Jesus,” Rex says from the kitchen. “You’re as bad as Daniel.”

“I’ll get the menus.” Ginger has a folder of menus from every restaurant within a thirty-block radius, organized by current level of favor.

A
FTER
WE
eat, I’m sleepy and a bit drunk. I feel a little raw from all the talking about feelings and shit, and also a little shy with Rex, like maybe he’s mad I didn’t tell him what I told them in response to Ginger’s prodding.

“Tell me something happy,” I tell Ginger. Whenever we talk about heavy shit, we always end with something happy, like conversational dessert. “Tell me about Christopher. The burrito holder,” I say to Rex.

“He smells really good, but like a grown-up,” Ginger says.

“That’s important,” I say, nodding.

“He holds eye contact for the exact right amount of time, so you can tell he’s focused on you but it doesn’t feel creepy.”

“Mmm.”

“He called me Gingerbread once and I only hated it, like, 65 percent.”

“Whoa.”

“Yeah. You can meet him, maybe. Tomorrow?”

“Maybe. Tomorrow’s the funeral. Tomorrow night?” She nods. Rex’s arm tightens around me when I say the word “funeral,” like it’s an emotional bomb against which I need to be supported.

“Tell me how you guys met, Rex.”

“You didn’t tell her?” Rex asks, and he sounds a little hurt.

“No, I did,” I say. “She wants to hear how you tell it.”

“Well,” Rex says, “I was out walking in the woods around my house. I’d heard wolf howls the night before, so I wanted to check it out.”

“You said you were hunting!” I accuse.

“No, you asked what the gun was for. I’ve only been hunting once. You just thought everyone in the country goes out to shoot their dinner every night. Besides, sweetheart, it was dark.”

Oh yeah. It was dark. I grumble and gesture at him to get on with it.

“Point is, I was worried about running into a wolf or something, when I heard this awful sound. Couldn’t tell what it was, but a while later I heard this guy talking to himself. I shined my light toward the sound and there’s this man holding an animal. When the light hit his face, I froze because I’d never seen someone so beautiful.”

My heart beats faster and I look up at Rex. He looks a little embarrassed.

“Clearly a city guy, wearing a suit and all, but he looked so out of place or something. Not just in the woods, but in the suit. And he looked terrified. At first I thought he was just really worried about the dog, but then he was looking at me like I was something out of a horror movie.”

“You had a gun,” I say weakly.

“When I got close to him to take the dog, he started babbling about whether the dog was a boy or a girl. It was adorable. I liked how he talked. Like I was smart and could understand whatever he was on about. He was just… different. I thought, if I can help that dog, maybe this guy will give me the time of day. So I brought them back to my house even though I never bring people there. I was trying so hard not to check him out that I took about twice as long to fix the dog’s leg as I needed to.

“When I ran a shower for him, I felt like a total pervert because here was this beautiful kid who’d gotten in a car accident and all I could think about was how to get him out of that ugly suit. When he took his shirt off and I saw those tattoos, I was done for.”

Now I can tell Rex is really talking to me.

“You took my shirt off.”

“Whatever,” Rex says, smiling at me. “He got drunk on a couple shots of whiskey, and then paraded into the kitchen with my pants so close to falling off that I almost swallowed my tongue.”

“They were too big,” I say, elbowing him.

“I made him a sandwich and he told me a bunch of stuff about the job he was interviewing for. I thought, shit, this guy is smart and gorgeous. And, from what I saw with the dog, a sweetheart. But he clearly thought we were in the middle of nowhere, so I knew there was no way he’d ever be back.

“He let it slip that he was gay and I thought he was going to pass out. I could see how scared he was, but he just stared me down like he was daring me to have a problem with him being gay. It was… hot. So when he started freaking out, I couldn’t help myself. I kissed him. I knew I’d only get one chance, so I figured I may as well go for it when he was incapacitated with fear.”

He winks at me and I roll my eyes, but my memory of that kiss is still vivid.

“Then we were on the couch and he was all drunk and warm and adorable.”

Rex shakes his head.

“When he kissed me it was all I could do not to rip those damned sweatpants off and—um, you know. But he was drunk and he’d been in an accident and it wouldn’t’ve been right. It killed me to do it, since I knew I’d never see him again, but I went to bed and left him on the couch.

“The next morning, he was dead to the world, sacked out on the couch with my sweatpants practically falling off. Like he’d been put on that couch specifically to show me what I could never have. I banged around in the kitchen for a while, hoping he might wake up, but he was out.

“I had to take the dog to the vet before I went to work, so I left him there. I wanted to program my number into his phone. Get his number and put it into mine. Leave him a note saying if he ever came back through Michigan he should look me up. But it felt pathetic. In a day or two, the guy would be gone, back to Philadelphia or New York City or wherever, and he’d never be back.”

I can’t help but notice that Rex mentions New York, where Will moved, as well as Philly.

“And anyway, I didn’t want to leave a note—even one to say
Take care
, because I didn’t want him to think I was stupid and spelled everything wrong. Which I do.”

Rex trails off.

“Got home that night and he was gone. Spent the next few months cursing myself for not leaving my phone number. Or something. But then, just when I’d convinced myself I’d never see him again, there he was.”

“There you were,” I murmur, my eyes closing.

“Come on, you narcoleptic,” Ginger says, shaking me. “He always does this,” she says to Rex. “We’ll be listening to a record or something and he just conks out like a baby in a fucking car seat.”