The Love That Split the World(13)

For a while I try not to look at him, and every time I give in and do, he’s got that shy-kid smile, which makes me smile like an idiot in turn. It’s so embarrassing I look away, but when I look back, it happens again, only worse. Eventually I give up and just let myself sit in the window well, staring at this complete stranger, smiling with all my teeth showing while my friends are talking behind a red curtain on the other side of the world.

The boy holds out his paper-bag-wrapped bottle, and I take it and sip, even though for all I know, he may have herpes or at least never brush his teeth. Whatever’s in the bottle, it’s syrupy and sour and makes me wince to swallow. When I open my eyes again, I see the boy’s big shoulders sort of shrug in a silent laugh. He takes the bottle back and holds it in his lap.

“Where do you think Natalie went?” The sound of Matt saying my name pulls me back to the conversation on the other side of the curtain.

“Natalie, Natalie, Natalie,” Rachel groans. “Seriously, Matty, don’t you know that ever since that girl got into Brown, she’s been waaaaay too good for all us little people in Union?”

“Oh, shut up,” Megan says. “Matt, she’s probably back out at her car by now.”

“Try calling her again,” Matt suggests.

My heart hammers in my chest as I dig through my purse. I manage to find my phone and set it to silent before Sheryl Crow and Stevie Nicks can give away my hideout by demanding to know, in sonorous volume, whether the whole world’s “strong enough to be my man.”

But my phone never lights up with a call alert, and Megan says, “Straight to voice mail.”

I look down at the screen, expecting to see that I don’t have service, but according to the little bar icons, I do. Piece of junk.

“Maybe rather than waste another minute with us, she just started walking to Rhode Island,” Rachel says. “Maybe she’s so smart she already built a hover car to take her.”

“Or she could’ve summoned a horse spirit,” Derek says.

“You guys suck,” Megan says. “Let’s go back to the parking lot, Matt.”

“Oh, we’re just kidding,” Derek says. “You know we love Natalie.”

They’re still talking, but the door has creaked open, and I hear it swinging shut again over their voices. I listen as their conversation recedes down the hall, and, for a long moment, the boy and I don’t move or speak. I have a hard time even looking up at him. I don’t really care what Rachel or Derek say about me, but I’m a little embarrassed that they said it in front of a stranger I now have to talk to.

Finally I meet his eyes again, and after a long moment of silence, he dips his chin and says, “Hi.”

I laugh, but it comes out a little quiet and a little strange. Maybe that’s just because it’s dark and we’re still sitting pretty close together. “Hi.”

He holds the bottle out to me again, and I take it even though whatever’s inside it tastes disgusting. I down another sip with difficulty that I try to hide but surely don’t. His thick eyebrows quirk, and the corner of his mouth shifts up, amused, and I pass the bottle back to him.

“Keep it,” he says, leaving his hands loose in his lap. “I think you like it more than I do.”

“Oh, I doubt that,” I wheeze.

He laughs again and takes the bottle, looking at it as though trying to read the label through the paper bag. “Yeah, it’s pretty bad.”

“That’s what Satan’s pee tastes like when he has a urinary tract infection. What is that?”

“I have no idea,” he says. His voice is low and kind of slow, but in a nice way. He sounds like July to me, and I wonder where his family’s from that his accent’s a little thicker than that of most people around here. “It was a gift.”

“Ah,” I say. “Thus the wrapping paper, I guess.”

“You like that? That’s my dad—he thinks of everything.”

“Your dad gave you Satan Pee as a present? Do you want me to call child services? I have the world’s worst cell phone with me.”

He does another one of those inward laughs, where his shoulders lift and his heavy eyelids dip but he doesn’t make any real sound, and then he takes another swig.

“That really was a beautiful song. What was it?”

“I dunno,” he says, staring down at his hands with a faint grin. “Think I heard it in a Gary’s Used Auto Parts commercial or something.”

“Oh, right,” I say. “That must be where I’ve heard it too. Their commercials always move me to tears.”

The left corner of his mouth inches up, and his eyes lift up to mine, and I ignore an inclination to look away. “What were you doin’ in here anyway?” he asks.

“I happen to go to school here,” I tell him. “Or I did until today. What were you doing here?”

“Haunting,” he says, holding his arms out to his sides. The Satan Pee sloshes over the mouth of the bottle, running down his hand onto the window bay, and we both laugh and reach for the puddle, our hands fighting and failing to mop it up. “I’m sorry,” he says, looking up at me through the strands of dark hair that have fallen around his face. “I spilled whiskey all over your school. That was rude of me.”