See Dot Smile

The Moment

My brother proposed to Maren over dessert. It was adorable. She said yes before he finished stumbling over his prepared words. 

He cried. She cried. My parents cried. And Joshua cried.

I was out of tears.

On Sunday night I text Joshua that I have things to do after school the next day, and he should drive himself in. 

I don't have things to do. I just can't be alone with him. 

What would I say?

We can't even look at each other at lunch. My feet remain in my shoes, tucked under the bench to avoid contact. I'm not trying to punish him. I'm really only punishing myself.

"How did the cranberry sauce turn out?" Bud asks.

He sits down next to me and my heart drops. The Bud I saw at Gregory's--the taller, happier, more confident Bud--is gone. Replaced by his awkward, self-conscious, eager to please, pastel polo shirt wearing doppelganger. I can't bring myself to let him down.

"It was amazing," I say.

I let his satisfied smile cancel out the wrinkle my lie must be causing in Joshua's brow. He wants me to look at him. I can feel it. His eyes are pulling at my chin, trying to lift it. To give him something--anything to let him know where we stand.

I'm about to give in when Tom crashes down beside me, epically vexed.

"Oh my God, Tommy, what happened to you?" I gasp. There's a bandage covering two thirds of his right forearm.

"Oh, this?" he asks, agitated beyond belief. "This is what happens when you try to have consensual sex with your closet bound boyfriend in your freezing cold woodshed because he's too afraid your parents will walk in if you do it in your bedroom, like a fucking sane person."

Everyone's eyes are down except Bud's. He's watching Tom with genuine concern.

"I cut myself on a hacksaw that was hanging on the wall," Tom says. "Because that's the kind of shit that hangs on walls in a fucking woodshed. Which is why you don't try to fuck people in there."

So far, I'm most upset by how much Tom is swearing. He never swears. And he really hates the word fuck. Or maybe it's Marcus who hates it. Either way, Tom doesn't say it often.

He rips into his lunch bag and starts throwing items down, hard, against the table.

"Is Marcus okay?" Bud asks. Lilliana glares at him, but if he hadn't asked, I was going to.

"Oh, yeah," Tom fumes. "He's fine. I'm ready to murder him, but other than that, he's fucking amazing."

He's run out of things to unpack. Now he's just tearing things open with trembling hands.

"I'm done with this bullshit," Tom says, voice shaking. "I just told him, he's out by Christmas or we're done. I'm not kidding."

"Tom, come on. You don't mean that," Kendall says, returning the Powerade that started rolling down the table after being knocked over by Tom's angry unpacking.

"I had to get a fucking tetanus shot," Tom snaps, holding his arm up to Kendall to emphasize the point. "No guy is worth this."

"Tom," I say guiltily, convinced I failed him with my mediocre prayers, "I know it's-"

I stop talking.

Marcus takes his seat next to Tom and everyone goes silent. Only Tom's angered breathing is audible.

Marcus clears his throat and starts unpacking his lunch. He remembered it today.

Tom taps his index finger against the table, channeling his frustration into one half-inch of laminate covered particle board.

Marcus looks at Tom. Tom won't look back.

It's like watching the lead up to an execution.

The tapping stops as Marcus sets his hand on top of Tom's. Tom instinctively moves his hand, with Marcus's, under the table and out of sight.

"No," Marcus says, pulling Tom's hand up and setting it back on the table for everyone to see. He slides his hand into Tom's and laces their fingers together.

Tom inhales sharply and his eyes well up with tears.

"I'm sorry about what happened," Marcus says softly. "But I'm not sorry I love you."

Tom sniffs and wipes his nose with his bandaged hand.

"I know," Tom says, staring at their intertwined fingers. "I love you, too."

Everyone goes back to eating and eventually talking, like everything is normal.

As if the world didn't stop spinning and reverse direction the moment their hands met.

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