She sat beside him in afternoon classes, too. Not a word passed between
them. For Alan, it felt like anything they could say to one another
would be less true than the silence, but that realization hurt. He'd
never been able to discuss his life and nature with anyone and it seemed
as though he never would.
But the next morning, in the school yard, she snagged him as he walked
past the climber made from a jumble of bolted-together logs and dragged
him into the middle. It smelled faintly of pee and was a rich source of
mysterious roaches and empty beer bottles on Monday mornings after the
teenagers had come and gone.
She was crouched down on her haunches in the snow there, her steaming
breath coming in short huffs. She grabbed him by the back of his knit
toque and pulled his face to hers, kissing him hard on the mouth,
shocking the hell out of him by forcing her tongue past his lips.
They kissed until the bell rang, and as Alan made his way to class, he
felt like his face was glowing like a lightbulb. His homeroom teacher
asked him if he was feeling well, and he stammered out some kind of
affirmative while Marci, sitting in the next row, stifled a giggle.
They ate their lunches together again, and she filled the silence with a
running commentary of the deficiencies of the sandwich her father had
packed her, the strange odors coming from the brown bag that Alan had
brought, filled with winter mushrooms and some soggy bread and cheese,
and the hairiness of the mole on the lunch lady's chin.
Pages:
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158