Saving His Smile

chapter: ii

When the Duncan family returned in early August, Grace felt the knot that had been growing in her stomach all summer tighten. The guilt she felt for murdering Zach's ever-present smile had been a heavy burden on her shoulders all summer and now that he had returned the weight of it threatened to crush her.

All she wanted was to go over to the Duncan house, apologize, get that stupid smile back on his face, and maybe then life would go back to the way that it was supposed to be.

It took three days for her to build up the courage to walk across the street and actually ring the doorbell. She had started across a few times, but always chickened out at the last possible moment and went back into her house. The day before she succeeded in her quest she had gone up to the door, raised her hand to the bell a few times, then, her courage failing her, scurried back home hoping that no one had seen her.

When Zachary opened the door the sight of his humorless face caused her stomach to twist itself up like a master contortionist.

"Hi," she said lamely.

"Hi."

"I, uh, I came here to--to, um..." The words were not coming to her easily and felt like they were getting stuck in her overly dry throat. She swallowed heavily, hoping that would help. It didn't.

"Who's at the door, Skoosh?" asked a very small voice somewhere from inside the Duncan house.

Zach twisted a little to look over his shoulder. "Grace Fletcher."

"Is she going to play with us?" The speaker was closer now and through the gap between Zach's arm and the door frame Grace could see a very small, delightfully chubby blond boy in a Spider-Man costume standing in the entry way.

Zach looked at Grace questioningly. "Well?"

It took her a moment to realize that he was asking her if she was going to play with the adorable munchkin before her.

She shrugged, mildly confused. Was he really inviting her into his house? "Sure."

Zachary moved aside and Grace stepped tentatively over the threshold. Despite having never met her before Spider-Boy grabbed her hand and tugged her excitedly into a large living room where a game of life was set up on the round brown coffee table in the middle of the room.

"You be the pink car," Spider-Boy ordered, pulling down hard on Grace's arm until she sat down.

He picked up the bubblegum pink car and stuck an equally as pink plastic pin in what would be the driver's side...if they were in, say, England. Zachary saw this and his dark blonde eyebrows joined momentarily.

"Matty," he said slowly. "That's the wrong side."

"Grace is British," the boy, Matty, said with authority. "They drive like this over in Britishland."

Grace found her voice. "You mean Britain?"

"No. I mean Britishland." When Matty spoke his voice was heavy with exasperation far beyond what Grace assumed was his five years. "If you're gonna be stupid you can go away."

Zachary appeared scandalized. "Matthew Joshua Duncan you can't just go around calling my friends stupid."

Grace blinked several times, trying to wrap her mind around what Zachary had just said. His friend? They hadn't been friends before, and if she wasn't mistaken they most certainly weren't now.

"I'm sorry," said a genuinely unapologetic Matthew.

Zach looked at Grace, still smile-less and gave her a shrug that clearly said 'I'm sorry for my adorable munchkin brother's shenanigans'.

Not knowing what else to do, she shrugged back, a ghost of a smile playing with the right corner of her mouth.

There was no change in Zachary's facial expression. She didn't really expect there to be.

"We both already went, so go ahead and spin," the blond boy told her, sitting across the coffee table from her with his legs crossed beneath him.

"Okay." Grace reached her hand out and gave the colorful dial a quick twist. It clacked pleasantly for a few moments before landing on the blue eight. "Honor roll," she read out in monotone. "Collect a life tile."

Zachary's turn was next. Because both he and Matthew had started before he was a little further along the path and his spun three landed him a pink plastic pin to call his wife.

"What's her name?" Matty demanded upon Zach's less-than-overjoyed declaration of his matrimony.

"Bob," was Zach's bored reply.

"A girl can't be named Bob, Skoosh."

"Bobbette."

Matty was not amused. "I'm gonna call her... Grace."

The namesake's face flamed. "She can't be named Grace, that's my name."

Zach nodded his agreement. "Choose a different name, buddy."

Spider-Boy's chubby arms crossed over his small chest and he jutted his rounded chin out defiantly. "No."

"Fine, I will then. Her name is Diana." Zachary plunked his newly-wedded wife into his orange plastic car before spinning again for wedding presents.

Grace may have been imagining things, but she could have sworn she heard Matty mumble, "Skoosh married Grace, not Diana," under his breath.

The three of them proceeded quickly down the path of Life. Several turns in, Matty had managed to accumulate a small fortune despite landing on lots of payment tiles. When confronted about this, he merely shrugged his tiny shoulders and bothered Grace about it being her turn. Upon closer examination it was discovered that the little boy was "borrowing" money from the bank that sat between he and Zachary and was not only using it to pay his debts but to bolster his paycheck as well. Needless to say, Grace and Zach agreed to put the stash of money between them and as far away from Matty as possible.

By the time she was nearing the retirement portion of the game board, Grace had enough children to warrant a second car.

"You just keep popping 'em right out," Zach commented, something between a smirk and a grimace surfacing on his face.

Grace, still uncomfortable around the still-unsmiling-Zachary, only managed to stutter out something along the lines of "It's not my fault! I just keep landing on the stupid childbirth spaces."

And so the game dragged on.

It was Zachary that ultimately won with Matthew in close second and Grace trailing behind by a couple hundred thousand.

With the game over, and her apology still not said, she felt something that seemed suspiciously like bile rising up into her throat. Grace tried not to choke.

As she rose to leave, Zachary followed suit and walked her to the door.

She paused just as she stepped over the threshold, her hand still on the doorknob. "Zach, I..." She trailed off, then, in one big breath rattled off, "I'mreallysorryaboutwhatIsaidearlierthissummer,IswearIdidn'tmeanit,butifyouhatemygutsIdon'tblameyouandyeahthat'sit." She wanted to slam the door shut and sprint across the street and back into the safety of her own home but her feet felt glued to the Duncan's front porch.

Zach seemed slightly taken aback and his brown eyes were wider than usual.

Awkward silence, Grace decided, was the worst thing in the world.

Finally, Zach spoke, "I don't hate you." After he said those four simple words, he evidently felt his work there was done. He closed the front door softly and was gone.