Chapter Twenty-Eight
Eli
It’s Wednesday night, and so far, spring break has been a steady mix of good and bad. Even the good stings, though, because I can’t share it with her.
The bad: first, rehab hurts like a sonofabitch. Second, Nora and I have totally fallen off each other’s radars. I didn’t prove shit about her theory. I only proved that I’m an idiot, and now she hates me. These last few days, I’ve been wondering if there’s anything I can do to salvage this wreck, and if there is, do I even have the balls to do it?
But the good? After I got the news about North Florida (go Ospreys!) Dad was suddenly feeling very generous. We went down to his mechanic, and the guy gave us a thousand bucks for Michael Jordan. It was a sad good-bye. I took off a strip of his duct tape and tucked it into my pocket so I’d remember him forever.
Then we went to another friend of Dad’s who said he’d sell us his mother-in-law’s old Civic for three thousand bucks, which my cheap-ass father actually paid him. The car’s only fifteen years old, with only a hundred thousand miles. It’s this dull-beige color and smells like old lady. It’s got some personality in it, somewhere, though, and I’ll bring it out eventually.
Good and bad, like I said.
I’m lying on the sofa downstairs, my face in a slice of pie, this time lemon meringue. Yeah, I made it. It’s not like it’s hard, although the bottom crust on this one got a little soggy. Didn’t blind bake it long enough. If you don’t know what blind baking is, don’t bother ever making a pie.
Ari and I are watching SpongeBob again. Little yellow dude is starting to show up in my dreams, which is probably better than my neighbor popping up in them.
All of a sudden, a bunch of headlights shine on our living room wall. I hear car doors opening and closing and music playing in the distance.
There’s banging on the front door, Mom runs in to answer. Ari jumps up, puts his hands on his ears. “What in the name of all that is good—” she shouts and there’s Koviak, fresh from the game. Somewhere behind him I hear the unmistakable sound of “You Can Call Me Al.”
I’m not in the mood for visitors, sitting like I am in my boxers with my slice of half-eaten pie, but what can I say? It’s my team.
Koviak, one of the only people who knows about UNF, comes in and drops a sheet cake on the coffee table in front of me. It says, in totally not professional frosting letters: WTF is an Osprey?
That’s pretty funny. The guys are loud, though, and I’m worried about Ari.
“I’ll get some plates,” Mom says, and takes Ari with her into the kitchen.
The guys take turns congratulating me, and there’s Tex, in my living room, saying good luck at UNF. I want to hate the dude, but I can’t seem to make myself do it, even if he does end up with her. It’s not his fault. Actually, if they end up together, it’s probably mine. Mom serves up the cake and passes around plastic forks. We won the game, the guys tell me. This is the third win in a row, and it’s about damn time. They’re in a good mood and celebrating, and they obviously heard about my spot on the UNF team. They don’t know that it’s not a done deal, and that I gotta somehow pull up my grades. I plan on trying hard. Hope that will be enough.
When they’ve all had their fill, they start filtering out, all of them except for Koviak. Mom and Ari go out to walk the dog. Dad’s at work.
Koviak reaches into his letter jacket pockets and pulls out two cans of beer.
I can only stare blankly. He’s a madman. “Seriously?”
He flips them open and glances toward the kitchen door. “Better drink ’em fast before the chief gets home.”
“Or my mom comes back.”
“I didn’t bring her one.” He smirks and lifts the can. “Cheers, brah.”
I snort and take the beer. “You’re such a dumbass,” I say, and since I’m off the painkillers and I did just have my knee cut open, I chug the whole thing in about ten seconds. He does the same. Burps come out of us that remind me of Mr. Chaffee’s barbarous yawps. I don’t share that with Koviak. This isn’t Walt Whitman World, this is Neanderthal time.
He takes the empty cans and sticks them back into the pockets they came from.
I lay my head back on the sofa cushion. “You’re nuts.”
Cue his wicked grin. “Had to do it. It’s a party, dude.” He sits back and puts his feet on the coffee table. “So, how’s it going KNEE-li?”
If that’s my new nickname I’m quitting school. “That’s hilarious, asshole.” I lift my leg up to the sofa cushion again, like I was doing before we were invaded.
“Yeah. I am. Hey, I heard you got into some sort of fight with your girl next door.”
This town is too damn small. I glare at him. “Jesus, give me a break. Where’d you hear that?”
He throws his arms along the back of the love seat. Cocky asshole. “I have my sources.”
The last thing I want is to talk about Nora. “Sources?”
“Yeah.”
I sneer. “What, like Veronica?”
He shakes his head. “Come on. This is someone reliable. Someone on the inside.”
I don’t know if it’s the chugged beer or what, but I feel nauseated. I snatch up the remote, about to press play again. “What do you care, anyway?” He can leave anytime. I’m more than ready to sink back into the stress-free world of Bikini Bottom. “You and your source should mind your own business.”
Kov laughs. “Oh, what? Now that you’re going to a real college, you think you’re above the rest of us? I see how it’s gonna play out.”
I press play and turn up the volume. “Dude, shut up, you’re going to Tampa.” Tampa is like the number one Division II team in the country.
“True. But you know, Highlanders lax, first, always. My boyz.” He beats his chest twice.
I chuckle. He’s such a dick. “Whatever you say, Kov.”
“Look,” he says. “I know you think you got this ‘love’ thing figured out.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees and touches his fingertips together, like a shrink.
“You’re wrong,” he continues. “You and her, dude, I mean, come on. That’s something that should happen. Everyone knows it.”
I wish I could tell him what I did to her. Maybe then he’d stop trying to get us together. “Everyone, who? Nothing’s going to happen. Less than zero chance. Not ever.”
“Because of this alleged fight?”
I don’t know why he’s not letting this go, but I’m getting annoyed. “No. Because she hates me.” I turn up the volume some more and adjust my leg, trying to get comfortable, which I don’t think is gonna happen if we keep talking about Nora.
Koviak sits up. “Dude, what if I told you she doesn’t hate you?”
“I’d say you’re full of shit.”
He lifts a hand to his heart. “No, I swear. My source confirms. Nora doesn’t hate you. You still have a chance.”
Apparently, he’s not ever going to stop talking. “Abby? Is that who you’re talking about?”
He says nothing but tips his head in confirmation.
“I didn’t know you even knew her,” I say.
Kov doesn’t respond right away, which is not like him. He’s actually thinking about this girl. “Only in a matchmaking capacity. It’s a goodwill effort. Although she is sexy as hell.”
“Hey, Koviak, a word of advice about females like them, Abby and Nora? They hear you talk like that and they’ll rip your nuts off.”
“Dude,” he says. “Don’t worry about me. All I know is that Nora will be at the bonfire tomorrow night, and you will be, too.”
“No. I won’t.” I watch the TV, hoping he’ll get the hint. “No way. We’re not a thing. We can’t be. I’m not going.”
There. Argument over. Shut the hell up.
He half shrugs. “Then you’re an idiot.”
“Oh yeah? Why am I an idiot, Kov?”
“You really want to know?”
That shit-eating grin of his is pissing me off. “Yeah, please enlighten me with your wisdom, oh Jedi of love.”
He leans forward, in my face. I’ve only ever seen him look this serious when we’re on the field.
“Dude. Life…is like lacrosse.”
It’s hard to keep a straight face. “Really?” I chuckle. “Didn’t realize that.”
“Then it’s about time you did, son,” he says. “In lacrosse, you defend your team, you play hard, you make some goals, miss some goals, but in the end, no matter what you do, how hard you play, how much you give, it all ends in sixty damn minutes. When the buzzer goes off, it’s game over.”
“Wow.” I raise an eyebrow. “What the hell have you been smoking?”
He leans back on the cushion. “I’m just saying. Come to the bonfire. Don’t let the buzzer go off, dude. You won’t always have another chance to score.”
I can’t listen to this. “You’re such a dick,” I say.
He lifts a finger. “Ah, but a wise dick I am,” he says, trying to sound like Yoda.
I don’t respond, I turn all my attention to SpongeBob. Or I try. Kov’s not right, I don’t have a chance. She’d never give me a chance.
He kicks his feet onto the coffee table. “Dude, it’s the iron butt episode! I fucking love this one.”
Ari comes back in after a while and Koviak sticks around to watch a bunch of episodes with us. I barely see the screen. I’m thinking about Nora the whole time.
Eventually he leaves and I make my way upstairs to go to bed, stopping at the landing window that looks out to her house. It’s dark over there, and my mind goes to places that it shouldn’t. Up the stairs in her house, into her room, where I haven’t been for years. That big, soft bed. I imagine her inviting me up there—I wouldn’t go uninvited, because she’d kick my ass if I did—but in this scenario, she’d ask, and I’d lay her back onto that bed, surrounded by fluffy pillows and posters of Albert Einstein and the periodic table. Then I’d kiss her. Hard. And there’d be lightning and thunder and torrential rain. Hell, together we’d make a whole category five hurricane. Catastrophic damage would occur in that bedroom.
Now it’s never gonna happen. I blew it. Didn’t I?
As I hobble up the rest of the stairs, somewhere in those same dark corners of my brain, I hear a timer counting down. I’m pretty sure the game is over. Maybe it should be. Or maybe the clock’s in overtime, and it’s worth one last Hail Mary play before the buzzer goes off and she’s gone forever.