"Have you been getting laid or something?"
"What? No!"
"It's cool, dude, I just want to know. I'd be pissed if Melissa and I had been dating for this long and suddenly you were getting some and I wasn't."
I made a face at Sean, silently surprised that he was willing to share such information about his relationship. He was lying on his bed with a Chemistry textbook in his lap while I sat in front of his computer and attempted to scrub off some malware he had accidentally downloaded. "Why do you ask?" I ventured finally, seeing as his question had come out of the blue.
"I don't know," he said with a shrug. "You just seem more normal lately. Like you used to."
"Oh."
I could have said a thousand things, but "oh" was all that seemed necessary. It had been almost a week since Quinn had taken me to the gate of Harmony Estates and left me there while she did, well, whatever it was she was doing in there under the cover of darkness. Many possibilities had flashed through my head as I had sat in the car waiting for her, each more unlikely than the last. After mulling it over for a few days I had finally decided that Quinn was doing what I now called "Quinn-stuff," which meant that it was impulsive and mysterious and I would probably never know the significance of it. Oddly enough, I was actually okay with that. Now that I knew that she seemed to be plagued by the same thing I was, it was good enough just to see her care about something enough to sneak around like that. In fact, it made me feel so good that I had backed off my anti-depressants to one pill every other day, and it didn't seem like my mom had even noticed.
"You should have gone to homecoming," Sean said after a lengthy silence. "It was actually a lot of fun."
"I don't do school dances," I said absentmindedly as I grimaced; Sean's virus seemed to have attached itself to several essential drivers, which I would have to erase and re-download. "You know, you're the smartest Kid I know, how the heck did you get this thing?"
"Pirating movies," He said with a sheepish grin and a shrug.
"Great," I replied, rolling my eyes. I began the laborious task of isolating the corrupted software and hunting down the appropriate replacements.
"It's really not my fault," He said defensively, closing his Chem textbook and dropping it on his bedside table with a clunk. "Melissa likes to watch all these foreign films that are impossible to find."
"Interesting," I said somewhat sarcastically.
"Small price to pay for some peace and quiet," Sean said dully and I glanced up to find him staring at the ceiling with a forlorn expression on his face. "I mean, I like her. A lot, actually, but she can be so freaking high-maintenance that it drives me up the wall."
"Ah," I said lamely, copping out on the feelings-sharing for a second time.
"Don't get a girlfriend, Samuel, my dear friend," He said suddenly, sitting up with a grin. "Your life will be a hell of alot easier if you just stay far away from the female species."
"Right," I said, thoughts flashing to Quinn. Was she my girlfriend? Definitely not, I thought. But I probably wasn't going to heed the warning either way; there was something exciting and alluring about the female species that I was just beginning to discover after seventeen years of strictly avoiding them, and it had me hooked like... like a good book,I realized, smiling to myself like an idiot. I looked down and my watch and my smile evaporated: It was Thursday, and five in the afternoon to boot. "I'm gonna have to finish this later, I've got somewhere to be."
"What, you got a date or something?" Sean waved his right hand in the air suggestively and laughed maniacally when I threw a little foam football at his head. His laugh faltered as I stood up and began shoving my things back into my backpack. "Seriously though, you always disappear on Thursday nights. Where do you go?"
"That's for me to know and you to wonder about for the rest of your life," I answered shortly, repeating Quinn's saying.
"Whatever, Socrates," Sean said with a huge eye-roll as I slung my bag over my shoulder. "If I find out you've been hiding some hot-looking honey from me I'm going to tell her all about the time you peed yourself at the zoo."
"Hey, I was five, asshole!" I felt my face grow warm but I couldn't help the stupid grin that captured my face. I missed the back-and-forth we had shared for years, the rapport that seemed to have disappeared when Melissa had invaded our friendship. Sean didn't bother walking me to the door and his mom smiled at me and told me to come back for dinner sometime as I excused myself through the front door. The walk home, which often seemed like a chore, felt refreshing. I almost didn't want it to end, but Mom wouldn't be happy if I was late to support group so I didn't take any detours.
"There you are, Sammy!" Mom said as I opened the front door. She was wearing shirt heels and a smart-looking business-suit-thing with her makeup and hair done up; I almost never saw her dressed up like this. "I have an office fundraiser thing I have to go to this evening, your dad will take you to your meeting, okay?" Before I had time to say anything she kissed me on the cheek and blazed right out the garage door to her SUV (probably late, as usual). Dad was sitting at the kitchen table tapping away on his work laptop; he barely glanced up as I walked by. I made my way up to my room to drop off my backpack and change my shirt, hoping to the powers that be that Dad would just continue to ignore me and not make our time alone together awkward or anything.
"Samuel, we'd better go!" My dad called up the stairs just as I finished throwing on a fresh grey T-shirt. I heard this laptop snap shut and then the sounds of him getting his car keys off of the hook by the garage door. Please don't let it be weird! I prayed silently and apathetically as I descended the stairs and followed him out the garage door.
"So, ahem how's school going?" We had almost made it to Superstition Freeway before Dad decided the silence had become stifling.
"Fine," I said. Fine was definitely becoming my signature adjective these days.
"Good to hear, bud." Out of the corner of my eye I saw him glance over at me with a tight smile. It had been a really long time since he had called me "bud." This, I found, did not actually annoy me at all. "How's the football team doing?" He asked, finally arriving at those one subject he felt comfortable with: sports.
"I have no clue," I said honestly. "Don't really care that much."
His jaw tightened ever so slightly. "Well, you should care about something, probably, Samuel." He said firmly, eyes locked on the road.
"I do care about stuff, just not football," I said defensively, hiding a scowl. This was exactly what I meant by my dad getting weird.
"Okay, Samuel," He said doubtfully, and we made it the rest of the way to the clinic in absence of any more discussion. I gave Dad a tiny "thanks" wave as I got out of his car and he dipped his head and immediately drove back out to the street. I made my way to the back room and found the usual hodge-podge of characters lounging in the crappy metal chairs; Frolland appeared to be out of the room for the moment. Even though I hated Support Group, I found myself oddly content see be in a room where all the faces were familiar.
"Nice of you to drop in, dear sir!" Quinn gracefully stepped up from her chair and made a show of curtsying in my direction. "May we entice you with a glass of sour sugar and a rock-hard biscuit?" She was, of course, referring to the lemonade and cookies. I felt my smile grow wide but my face flushed instantly at being the center of attention and some of the other kids laughed lightly. Quinn sat back down with a grin and patted the seat next to her which, for the first time, wasn't occupied by Caleb. It seemed as if everyone had shifted their usual seats so that we could be next to each other. I felt my face grow even hotter, wondering if maybe Quinn had orchestrated the whole thing, and took the seat.
"So, how was everyone's week? Quinn asked after a few moments of quiet, settling her hands on her knees and looking around expectantly at everyone. No one said anything. "Don't make me pull a Frolland on your asses," she threatened, pointing a finger around the room. "I will call on someone!" A few more laughs, but Quinn looked dead serious.
"I went to a Cardinals game on Sunday," Derek piped up finally with a shrug. "It was pretty cool."
"Good ol' Fitzgerald really tore it up out there didn't he?" Quinn nodded as if she had been there and I blinked at her, surprised. Derek laughed and shook his head.
"I went and saw Nine Inch Nails at the Desert Sky," Alice blurted out. "That was pretty legit." Soon everyone was talking about their week as if we were waiting for class to start, not Support Group. It was eye-opening, actually, seeing everyone act so... normal, considering all of the problems we had to discuss amongst ourselves. The volume in the room went from suffocating quiet to a steady stream of laughing and voices. Quinn even got up and fetched a few cups of lemonade and handed them out. She sat back in her chair and looked immensely satisfied with herself as she watch everyone interact; watching her seemed almost intrusive, as if I was some kind of voyeur to her private moment of victory. All things good, however, must come to an end, right?
"Well, aren't you a lively bunch tonight?" Frolland's voice cut like a knife across the soft chatter and everyone fell silent almost immediately. He clutched his briefcase tightly to his chest and took several steps into the room, looking around hawkishly. Quinn's expression darkened instantly, as if a shadow had suddenly crossed her face. "I apologize for my lateness, no need for the chaos," the counselor continued. "Let's get started, shall we?"
Never have I seen positive energy vacate a space so quickly. It was like our little ship of normalcy had been sunk and the crushing tidal wave of repressed issues came flooding back with full force. Frolland worked his way around the room and the air got thicker and thicker with each story told. He finally reached Quinn, but she flat out refused to share when Frolland asked her to.
"Quinn, you've missed quite a few weeks of group meetings," He admonished, tipping his glasses down at her. "You don't want to revert, do you?"
"Revert? Revert??" Quinn snapped up out of her slouch and turned to face him head-on. "Revert to what?"
"Calm down, Quinn, please." The counselor was trying to appear cool and collected but I caught a flash of alar in his eyes.
"No, I will not calm down!" She challenged. Her grey eye were pools of liquid fury. I felt chills run down my spine; I had never seen her this angry. "This is bullshit! All of it!"
"Quinn, please watch your language," Frolland began tapping his pen nervously on his clipboard. "Could you articulate your thoughts more clearly, please?"
I knew that would just piss her off even more, which it did.
"More clearly? Are you serious?" Quinn shot up out of her chair and threw up her arms. "You want to know what I really think? I think that this whole entire thing is just a freaking farse! I don't think you really want to help anybody!"
"Why do you say that?" Frolland was doing a decent job of keeping his voice even. All the other kids were looking around at each other, wide-eyed. I was a little bit mortified, but also fascinated, and a little bit amused. I know I should have been a little more concerned that Quinn had just flown off the handle, but it was incredibly satisfying hearing her voice my thoughts--all of our thoughts, probably--in such a flagrant manner.
"Gee, I don't know," she shot back nastily. "Maybe it's because you take every opportunity to remind us that we're freaks or something, instead of just treating us like what we actually are!"
"And what would that be?" Frolland was losing his patience, I could tell.
"People!" Quinn cried, waving her hands wildly. She dropped them and looked around, making a disgusted face face at the whole room. "I mean, come on guys! Why do we let this guy treat us like zoo specimens?" Nobody said anything. Quinn looked right at me, but I had to look away. Sure, I agreed with her, but part of my just felt a sympathetic embarrassment for her outburst. She grumbled something about "nobody getting it" and made a start for the door.
"Quinn Lanley!" Frolland was on his feet just as he hand touched the doorknob. "Come back and sit down. You know what I have to do if you leave, don't you?"
"Yes. Yes I do." Quinn turned one hundred and eighty degrees, gave Frolland the finger, and marched out of the room with her head held high.
"Well, shit." Caleb said loudly, voicing everyone's thoughts perfectly.
Frolland cut the meeting about half an hour short after that, which seemed great until I realized that I would just be waiting in the parking lot for half an hour longer than usual. I made my way outside to sit by the wall and watch all the other kids get picked up by their parents, planning to call Quinn when I got home and check to see if she was okay. To my surprise, she was sitting at our usual spot, legs crossed and playing with her shoelaces as if nothing had ever happened.
"They're getting shorter," she said as I approached, sticking out one foot so I could see that her bright green shoelace had broken past the top eyelet and was now tied lopsided. "Aren't you supposed to get me a lighter to fix this?"
"You never said I had to help you fix it, you just asked if I could," I remembered, sitting down next to her and choosing to look down at the shoe instead of her face. "Are you, um, feeling okay?"
"Never better!" She chirped, eyes crinkling up at the corners as she smiled at me. I wanted to believe her, but I just couldn't.
"You didn't really seem so back there," I said cautiously.
"Oh, back there I was not happy," she sighed, shaking her head and picking at her shoelace some more. "But, now that I've said what needed to be said, I'm doing great!" She smiled, but I could tell it was forced. It felt weird being so analytic of people's smiles. I nodded as if I understood but I mustn't have looked to convincing myself, because she just shook her head and looked at me sadly. "We don't have to take this crap, I'm serious."
"We kind of do," I pointed out. "I don't really feel like getting thrown in a padded cell just because I think Frolland is a jackass."
At this, Quinn laughed out loud and brushed into my shoulder with hers. "This is why I love you, Samuel."
"What?" My heart skipped, like, fifteen beats.
"This!" She said, gesturing to all of me. "You're funny as hell. You get it. And you're not afraid to tell it like it is. I love it!"
"Oh!" I was somewhat relieved, yet strangely disappointed. "Thanks, I guess." Just then, my Dad's sedan pulled up to the curb, even though Group wasn't even supposed to end for another ten minutes. That confirmed it: my mom was one hundred percent the reason we were always late to everything. "I gotta go," I said, getting down from the wall. To my surprise, Quinn grabbed my elbow and sterred me in for a quick hug.
"Thanks," she said as she let me go.
"For what?"
"Letting me vent. It helps."
"Of course." I shrugged, but secretly I was happy to be someone's confidant. "Call you later?"
"Unless the world ends," she said, grey eyes dancing with the return of her real smile, the smile that set something inside me aflame. I felt my face go a little warm as I grinned to myself and slid into the passenger seat of my dad's car.
"How was it?" he asked as we pulled away from the curb.
I didn't have the energy to make something up. "It sucked. At least it wasn't boring, though."
"Cool." Dad drummed on the steering wheel as we waited at the light. "So, who was that girl?" He asked finally. My stomach turned a little; I had completely forgotten he was there when Quinn hugged me.
"Just a, uh, friend of mine," I said carefully, avoiding gaze by concentrating on a lady walking her dog across the street.
"A friend." He repeated. I could hear the smile in his voice and turned further away so he couldn't see me I blush furiously. "Well, I'm really glad for you, Sam."
"Yeah?" I stole a glance back at him as the light turned green.
"At least you seem to care about something." It sounded like a compliment, as much of a compliment as my dad would offer me anyway, so I just nodded and we drove home in silence.
I hadn't wanted my dad to get weird with me, and compliments were definitely in that category for him. That's a kind of weird I could probably get used to, I said to myself, but further thoughts on the subject were drowned as my mind drifted back to the feel of Quinn's arms wrapped around my middle and the heat I had felt traveling from her body to mine. Was Quinn still just a friend? I was almost afraid of the answer, either way.
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