Darius the Great Deserves Better - Adib Khorram Page 0,27
book, like she didn’t want to talk about it anymore.
I leaned over and kissed the crown of her head.
“Love you, Laleh,” I whispered into her hair.
* * *
It was nearly nine o’clock when the garage door finally rumbled. Everyone else was in bed, but I was sitting in the kitchen, icing myself again.
I dumped the ice in the sink and pulled out the leftover taco meat for Mom.
“Hey, sweetie.” I wrapped my mom in a hug, but her whole body was like a polarized hull plate, rigid and brittle. After a moment she finally relaxed against me. But then the microwave beeped.
“You don’t need to do that for me.”
“I want to.”
“All right. How was your day?”
“It was okay,” I said. Mom didn’t seem like she was in the mood to hear about my testicular trauma.
I wasn’t in the mood to talk about it anyway.
“How was yours?”
“Long.”
I pulled down a plate for her and grabbed the rest of the taco fixings out of the fridge while she checked something on her phone. She looked up and frowned at me. “I can make my own dinner, you know.”
“I don’t mind. Want some tea?”
Mom sighed and sat down. “I better not. Thanks.”
I grabbed my cup—a second steeping of Ti Kwan Yin, which had more mellow floral notes than the first steeping—and sat next to her.
“How did your test go?”
“I got a C.”
“Do you need some help? We can go over your problems together.”
“It’s okay. I went to Chip’s after practice and we worked on it together.”
“Oh. That’s nice.” Mom took a bite of taco and studied me as she chewed. “You’ve been spending a lot of time with him lately.”
I don’t know why it felt like such an accusation when she said that.
I don’t know why I felt like I had to defend myself.
“He’s been really helpful,” I said. “Oh. I left my bike at his house. Think you can drop me off in the morning?”
Mom frowned. “I can’t tomorrow. Early meeting. Oma or Grandma will have to.”
“Oh.”
“I wish I could, though.”
“It’s okay. Really.”
I let Mom eat in silence after that.
There was something she wasn’t saying out loud, something I was supposed to know but didn’t.
When she finished, she wiped her hands and mouth, careful to avoid her lipstick.
“I better go put Laleh to bed.”
“Oma already did. She even got her to take a bath.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Well then.” Mom glanced toward the stairs.
I sipped my tea.
“Want to watch something? Star Trek?”
“Um.”
Mom had never asked me to watch Star Trek before.
That was always me and Dad’s thing.
I didn’t know what to say.
I was trying to figure out if we should continue where Dad and I left off, or start a different series, but then Mom said, “Never mind. Sorry.”
She got up before I could say anything.
Before I could tell her I wanted to watch Star Trek with her.
Mom ran her fingers through my hair and kissed my forehead. “I’m going to go to bed.”
BROKEN FURNITURE
In the morning, Oma dropped me off at Chip’s to grab my bike.
“Hey.” Chip answered the door in a pair of soft gray sweatpants that looked really nice on him.
Like, not-wearing-any-underwear nice.
He wasn’t wearing a shirt either, and like I said, Cyprian Cusumano had a very nice stomach and chest. The kind I wished I had.
The kind guys like me were supposed to have.
“Sorry, I know I’m late. Evie’s been a handful.”
My ears felt like twin plasma fires.
“I’ve just gotta throw some clothes on. You want anything?”
I shook my head. I couldn’t speak.
How could Chip act so casual around me when he was half-naked like that?
And why couldn’t I look away?
I wondered what Landon looked like without his shirt on.
If he had hair on his chest, or if he was smooth.
I sucked on the tassels of my hoodie.
“Sorry,” Chip said when he ran down the stairs in black joggers and a white V-neck T-shirt that was just a bit too small for him.
It was only slightly less distracting.
He’d done his hair too, styling his fade into a soft brown quiff that was just a little messy.
Cyprian Cusumano really was a beautiful guy.
I hated myself for thinking so.
“Sorry. I’m ready.”
“It’s cool.”
* * *
Everyone at practice treated me like I was made of glass. Perhaps seeing me take a knee to the balls had brought the guys face-to-face with their own frail mortality.
That kind of thing could be deeply unsettling.
When Coach called a time-out, I grabbed my water bottle and wandered over to the bleachers to stretch my calves. Coach followed me.