“My phone’s dead.” Cath looked up at Levi’s crinkle-cut eyes and relieved smile, trying to take him all in.
He was holding two cups of coffee and had a banana shoved into the pocket of his flannel shirt. “Mr. Avery?” he said, holding out a cup of coffee. “This was for Jandro, but it looks like he’s covered.”
Her dad took the coffee. “Thanks. Levi.”
“Levi,” Cath repeated, and she knew she was close to crying. “You didn’t have to come.”
He made a loose fist and chucked her gently on the bottom of her chin, taking a half step toward her. “Yeah, I did.”
Cath tried not to smile—but ended up smiling so wide, her ears almost popped.
“They wouldn’t let me back,” he said. “Or Jandro. Only immediate family.”
Cath nodded.
“Is your sister okay?”
“Yeah. Hungover. Embarrassed … We’re going back to Omaha now, all three of us.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah.” She reached for his hand and squeezed it. “Thank you,” she said.
“You didn’t even know I was here.”
“I know now, and I’ll apply these feelings backwards. Thank you.… Did you miss your sister’s birthday party?”
“No, it’s tomorrow after church. I’ll take a nap and head back that way—unless you need anything.”
“Nope.”
“Are you hungry?”
Cath laughed. “Are you about to offer me a banana?”
“I’m about to offer you half a banana,” Levi said, letting go of her hand. He gave her the coffee and took the banana out of his pocket, peeling it. Cath glanced over at Wren. She was introducing their dad to Jandro. Wren looked like hell, but Jandro was looking at her like she was the Lady of the Lake. Levi handed Cath half a banana, and she took it. “Cheers,” he said, tapping his hand against hers.
Cath ate the banana and held on to his gaze. “I’d give you the moon right now,” she said.
Levi’s eyes flashed happily, and he hitched up an eyebrow. “Yeah, but would you slay it for me?”
* * *
Cath drove home. They drove through McDonald’s first, and her dad ordered two Filet-O-Fish sandwiches and said that neither of them could nag him about it.
Wren grimaced. “I don’t even care if it’s bad for your cholesterol. It’s the smell that’s making me sick.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have drunk yourself into a bilious stupor,” their dad said. And that’s when Cath realized that he wasn’t going to pretend that nothing was wrong. That he wasn’t just going to let Wren go about her business.
Cath smashed her cheeseburger against the steering wheel and was the only person on the interstate observing the speed limit.
When they got home, Wren went straight in to take a shower.
Her dad stood in the living room, looking lost. “You go next,” Cath told him. “I’m not that gross.”
“We have to talk about all this,” he said. “Tonight. I mean, not you. You don’t. Wren and I have to talk. I should have talked to her at Christmas, but there was so much else going on—”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t, Cath.”
“It’s my fault, too. I hid it from you.”
He took off his glasses and rubbed his forehead. “Not that well. I saw what she was doing.… I thought she’d, I don’t know, self-correct. That she’d get it out of her system.”
His necktie had worked its way almost completely out of his pocket. “You should sleep,” Cath said. “Take a shower, then sleep.”
Wren walked out of the bathroom wearing their dad’s robe and smiled feebly at them. Cath patted her dad’s arm, then followed Wren upstairs. When Cath got up to their room, Wren was standing at her dresser, impatiently riffling through a mostly empty drawer. “We don’t have any pajamas.”
“Calm down, Junie B. Jones,” Cath said, walking over to her own dresser. “Here.” She handed Wren a T-shirt and a pair of shorts left over from high school gym.
Wren changed and climbed into her bed. Cath crawled on top of the comforter beside her.
“You smell like puke,” Wren said.
“Yours,” Cath said. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired.” Wren closed her eyes.
Cath tapped softly on Wren’s forehead. “Was that your boyfriend?”
“Yes,” Wren whispered. “Alejandro.”
“Alejandro,” Cath said, breathing the j and rolling the r. “Have you been dating since last semester?”
“Yes.”
“Were you out with him last night?”
Wren shook her head. Tears were starting to pool between her eyelashes.
“Who’d you go out with?”
“Courtney.”
“How’d you bruise your face?”
“I don’t remember.”
“But it wasn’t Alejandro.”
Wren’s eyes flew open. “God, Cath. No.” She squeezed her eyes shut again and flinched. “He’s probably going to break up with me. He hates it when I get drunk. He says it’s unbecoming.”
“He didn’t look like he was going to break up with you this morning.”
Wren took a deep, shuddering breath. “I can’t think about it right now.”
“Don’t,” Cath said. “Sleep.”
Wren slept. Cath went downstairs. Her dad was already asleep. He’d skipped the shower.
Cath felt inexplicably peaceful. The last thing Levi had said to her, when they’d parted in the hospital lobby, was, “Plug in your phone.” So Cath did. Then she started some laundry.
“We can’t be friends,” Baz said, passing Simon the ball.
“Why not?” Simon asked, kicking the ball up and bouncing it on his knee.
“Because we’re already enemies.”
“It’s not like we have to stay that way. There isn’t a rule.”
“There is a rule,” Baz said. “I made it myself. Don’t be friends with Snow. He already has too many.” He shouldered Simon out of the way and caught the ball on his own knee.
“You’re infuriating,” Simon said.
“Good. I’m fulfilling my role as your nemesis.”
“You’re not my nemesis. The Humdrum is.”
“Hmmm,” Baz said, letting the ball drop and kicking it back to Simon. “We’ll see. The story’s not over yet.”
—from “Baz, You Like It,” posted September 2008 by FanFixx.net authors Magicath and Wrenegade
THIRTY
“We don’t need to talk about this,” Wren said.
“You were just hospitalized for alcohol poisoning,” their dad said. “We’re talking about it.”
Cath set a stack of foil-wrapped burritos on the table between them, then sat down at the head of the table.
“There’s nothing to say,” Wren insisted. She still looked terrible. There were circles under her eyes, and her skin was waxy and yellow. “You’re just going to say that I shouldn’t drink that much, and then I’m going to say that you’re right—”
“No,” their dad interrupted, “I’m going to say that you shouldn’t drink at all.”
“Well, that’s not very realistic.”
He smacked his fist on the table. “Why the hell not?”
Wren sat back in her chair and took a second to recover. He’d never cursed at either of them. “Everybody drinks,” she said calmly. The Only Rational One.
“Your sister doesn’t.”
Wren rolled her eyes. “Forgive me, but I’m not going to spend my college years sitting soberly in my dorm room, writing about gay magicians.“
“Objection,” Cath said, reaching for a burrito.
“Sustained,” their dad said. “Your sister has a four-point-oh, Wren. And a very polite boyfriend. She’s doing just fine with her college years.”
Wren’s head whipped around. “You have a boyfriend?”
“You haven’t met Levi?” Their dad sounded surprised—and sad. “Are you guys even talking?”
“You stole your roommate’s boyfriend?” Wren’s eyes were big.
“It’s a long story,” Cath said.
Wren kept staring at her. “Have you kissed him?”
“Wren,” their dad said. “I’m serious about this.”
“What do you want me to say? I drank too much.”
“You’re out of control,” he said.