Angel's Mark

Twenty-nine

Twenty minutes passed, maybe thirty, before the general store's bell dinged again, followed by rapid footsteps that could belong to no one else but Alan. I didn't look back at him, didn't move at all, not even when he strode up to me, pulled me into his arms.

It was a sudden embrace, as I was beginning to realize most of Alan's were. One moment I stood dazedly in front of an array of milk cartons, the next my face was buried in his shoulder, his scent all over me, hands clutching the fibers of my shirt.

"Vinny," he said into my ear, "tell me what's wrong."

He let me go. I didn't want him to. "Everything."

"That's not an answer."

I dragged my tongue over my chapped lips, pressed a fist into the glass door of the cooler, imagined it cracking and breaking, cracking and breaking, like I'd gotten used to doing. I could feel Alan watching me. I wished I knew what to say.

"Did you call me here just to be all...quiet and weird?" Alan said, half out of breath. His eyebrows twitched towards each other as if even he didn't understand his own words; he coughed and adjusted the denim jacket he was wearing. "Come on—this isn't like you."

"I know," I said.

"Then tell me what's wrong."

It took all my energy to meet his eyes. Today they were the perfect mix of both brown and green; one second one color, the next, the other one. I could watch them, watch him, for ages.

I might be in love with you.

I sighed, leaning forward, slumping into him again. He caught me, pressing a kiss to my cheek. "Vinny," he said again, "I..."

I felt his chest rise as he took in a long breath, perched his finger underneath my chin, tilted my lips up to meet his. For a moment, I let myself sink, savor the taste of him: mint, unspoken dreams.

Then I laughed, backing away. "Not in front of the milk."

He raised his eyebrows at me, a hint of mirth at his mouth. "Outside?"

"Outside," I repeated. "I'll tell you...outside."

We went outside, sat shoulder to shoulder on the curb and watched the cars drive slowly by. I sat in silence and he let me, and I held his hand and tapped his toe with my toe and I rested my face against his neck—until, finally, I was recharged, and I opened my mouth.

"My dad's a jackass."

I placed a hand to my lips, as if I could press away the sizzle the word caused. Alan looked at me a little funny, but then he just took a loose pebble from the gravel and skipped it across the ground. His sunshine-yellow Buick was a lick of flame at the edge of the gas station, faded and glorious.

"That sucks. So's mine," he muttered, and when I chuckled, his lips cracked into a smile. He threw another pebble, moving a strand of my hair behind my ear. "You first."

"He cheated on my mom," I said, "then told us we were all freaks. And now we find out he's a fraud and we can testify against him, and he's trying to be all nice to us again."

"Yeah," Alan murmured, rolling a pebble between his fingers. "That's...wow. Is that why you're here?"

His eyes slid away from mine for a moment, down the road. When he looked at me again, concern was written all over his face, eyebrows knitted, rose pink lips in a frown."Near the prison, you said. You were visiting him, weren't you?"

I drew my knees to my chest, draping myself over them. Gentle wind blew one or two strands of hair into my face, a tendril of silk caught in my eyelashes. I shut my eyes, not saying a word.