“That’s Joe,” Mark said, pushing through. “But I think you know that already.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Didn’t get his name. He was talking too much.”
Everyone looked at me again.
“I wasn’t talking too much,” Joe grumbled. “You talk too much. With your face.” But he didn’t leave my side. He kicked the dirt with his sneakers. One of his shoes was about to become untied. There was a ladybug on a dandelion, red and black and yellow. A breeze came and it flew away.
“Joe,” I said, trying out the name.
He grinned as he looked up at me. “Hi, Ox. Ox! There’s something I—” He cut himself off, sneaking a glance up at his father before he sighed again. “Fine,” he said, and I didn’t know who he was talking to.
“Those are his brothers,” Mark said. “Carter.” The one my age. He grinned at me and waved. “Kelly.” The younger of the two. Somewhere between Carter and Joe. He nodded at me, looking a little bored.
That left two others. They didn’t scare me, but it felt like they should. I waited for Mark, but he kept quiet. Eventually, the woman said, “You’re an odd one, Ox.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, because my mom taught me respect.
She laughed. I thought it beautiful. “I’m Elizabeth Bennett. This is my husband, Thomas. You already know his brother, Mark. It looks as if we’re to be neighbors.”
“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” I said, because my mom taught me manners.
“What about my acquaintance?” Joe asked me, pulling on my hand.
I looked down at him. “Yours too.”
That smile returned.
“Would you like to stay for dinner?” Thomas asked, watching me carefully.
I thought yes and no at the same time. It made my head hurt. “Mom’s coming home soon. We’re eating dinner together tonight because it’s my birthday.” I winced. I hadn’t meant to say that.
Joe gasped. “What? Why didn’t you tell me! Mom! It’s his birthday!”
She sounded amused when she said, “I’m standing right here, Joe. I heard. Happy birthday, Ox. How old are you now?”
“Sixteen.” They were all still staring at me. There was sweat on the back of my neck. The air was hot.
“Cool,” Carter said. “Me too.”
Joe glared at him, baring his teeth. “I found him first.” He stood in front of me, as if blocking Carter from me.
“That’s enough,” his father said, his voice a bit deeper.
“But… but—”
“Hey,” I said to Joe.
He looked up at me with frustrated eyes.
“It’s okay,” I said. “Listen to your dad.”
He sighed and nodded, squeezing my hand again. His shoelace came untied as he kicked the dandelion.
“I’m ten,” he muttered finally. “And I know you’re old, but I found you first so you have to be my friend first. Sorry, Dad.”
And then he said, “I just want to get you a present,” so I said, “You already did,” and I didn’t think I’d ever seen a smile as bright as his at that moment.
I said good-bye then and I knew they watched me as I walked away.
“PEOPLE MOVED in?” Mom asked me when she got home.
“Yeah. The Bennetts.”
“You met them?” She sounded surprised. She knew I didn’t talk to people if I could get away with it.
“Yeah.”
She waited. “Well?”
I looked up from my history book. Finals were next week and I had tests I wasn’t ready for. “Well?”
She rolled her eyes. “Are they nice?”
“I think so. They have….” I thought on what they had.
“What?”
“Kids. One’s my age. The others are younger.”
“What’s that smile for?”
“A tornado,” I said without meaning to.
She kissed my hair. “And here I thought you being older would mean you’d make more sense. Happy birthday, Ox.”
We ate dinner that night. Meatloaf. My favorite, just for me. We laughed together. It was something we hadn’t done in a while.
She gave me a present wrapped in Sunday comics from the newspaper. A 1940 Buick shop manual, old and worn. The cover was orange. It was musty and wonderful. She said she saw it at Goodwill and thought of me.
There were some new pants for work. My others were starting to fall apart.
There was a card too. A wolf on the front, howling at the moon. Inside, a joke. What do you call a lost wolf? A where-wolf! Underneath she’d written seven words: This year will be better. Love, Mom. She drew hearts around the word love, little wispy things that I thought could float away if they but caught on my breath.
We washed the dishes as her old radio played from the open window above the sink. She sang along quietly as she splashed me with water, and I wondered why I smelled like candy canes and pinecones. Of awesome and epic.
There was a soap bubble on her nose.
She said I had one on my ear.
I took her by the hand and spun her in a circle as the music picked up. Her eyes were bright and she said, “You’re going to make someone very happy someday. And I can’t wait to see it happen.”
I went to bed and saw the lights on in the house at the end of the lane through my window. I wondered about them. The Bennetts.
Someone, my mother had said. Make someone very happy.
Not a her. But someone.
I closed my eyes and slept. I dreamt of tornadoes.
wolf of stone/dinah shore
RICO SAID, “Looking good, papi,” when I came to work the next day. “What’s got you going with that spring in your step?”
It was Sunday, the Lord’s Day as I was taught, but I figured the Lord was okay with me coming to this house of worship instead of one of his. I’d learned my faith at Gordo’s.
“Must be some pretty girl,” Tanner called from where he was bent over some ridiculous SUV that could be turned on by the sound of your voice. “He’s a real man, now. You get some sixteen-year-old strange last night?”
I was used to the crude. They meant no harm. That didn’t stop me from flushing furiously. “No,” I said. “No, it’s not like that.”
“Oh,” Rico said, slinking over to me, hips rolling so obscenely. “Look at that blush.” He ran his hand through my hair, his thumb against my ear. “She pretty, papi?”
“There’s no girl.”
“Oh? A boy, then? We don’t discriminate here at the Casa de Gordo.”
I pushed him off and he laughed and laughed.
“Chris?” I asked.
“Seeing the moms,” Tanner said. “Stomach thing again.”
“She okay?”
Rico shrugged. “Maybe. Don’t know yet.”
“Ox!” Gordo shouted from the office. “Get your ass in here!”
“Oye,” Rico said with a small smile. “Careful there, papi. Someone’s in a mood today.”
And he sounded like it. Voice strained and harsh. I worried. Not for me. For him.