That week at school, Joaquin had turned the corner down the hallway toward his English class and come face-to-face with Birdie and Colin Maller.
They were kissing, Birdie’s long arm wrapped around Colin’s neck the same way that she used to wrap it around Joaquin’s. If he thought about it too much, Joaquin could almost feel the warmth of her skin, the heat of her mouth, the way she always smelled good, like soap and shampoo.
Joaquin had thought that nothing would ever hurt as bad as breaking his arm, but he could have broken both arms and legs and it still would have been a drop in the bucket compared to how he felt when he saw Birdie in Colin’s arms.
He stumbled backward, not caring if he missed English class, or the rest of school, or even the rest of his life. He had to get out of there, and he was almost out the door when someone called him back.
It was Birdie’s friend Marjorie. “Joaquin, wait!” she yelled, chasing after him, and Joaquin stopped with his hand on the door, his chest heaving like it had after he’d pushed Adam against the wall, adrenaline flooding his system and overwhelming his senses.
“Wait,” Marjorie said again, even though Joaquin hadn’t moved. “Joaquin, she’s just trying to make you jealous. She doesn’t even like him.”
Joaquin laughed. He couldn’t help it. “Looks like she likes him a lot,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Tell the happy couple I said congratulations.”
And then he was gone, Marjorie calling after him, the school behind him as he started to run.
By Saturday morning, Joaquin was a mess. On the outside, he looked pretty good. He showered and washed his hair and wore the shirt that Birdie had bought for him when they’d first started dating because she said it made his eyes look good. Joaquin had dark brown eyes, so he wasn’t exactly sure how a blue-checkered, button-down shirt could make them pop (Birdie’s word, not his), but Birdie had always been smart about things like that, so he trusted her opinion.
Joaquin wondered if his mom had eyes like his. He wondered if she still knew his dad. He wondered if she even wanted to see Joaquin and his sisters, or talk to them, or if Joaquin would only be a reminder of the worst time of her life. Would she think that he was trying too hard, dressing up for her? The last time he had gone to see her, he had worn his favorite Spider-Man T-shirt (Spider-Man didn’t have parents either, just like Joaquin), but she had never shown up, so maybe it didn’t matter if he wore his best shirt or not.
Joaquin looked in the mirror, straightened his collar, and wondered if he was the biggest idiot on the planet for trying so hard to find the woman who had left him so easily.
Mark and Linda were in the kitchen downstairs, eating breakfast and reading the paper. (Joaquin suspected that theirs was the only house on their street that still actually got the newspaper delivered every day.) “Whoa, looking fancy on a Saturday,” Mark said when Joaquin walked into the room. “Is it Formal Wear Day at the arts center?”
Any other day, Joaquin could have taken Mark’s teasing tone without a problem. It wasn’t any other day, though. “Why?” Joaquin said. “Is it too much?”
“No, no, you look great,” Mark said. “You just never really dress up, that’s all.”
Things with Linda and Mark had been a little off ever since they had given Joaquin the car. Or, more accurately, things with Joaquin had been off ever since they had given him the car. He had only driven it twice in the past week, once to work and once to go to the grocery store for Linda, but otherwise, it just sat in the driveway, a huge, metal reminder of all the things that Joaquin would never be able to pay back to his foster parents.
The more they gave him, the bigger the world felt, and Joaquin needed a fence, an edge, something to keep him from falling off the face of the thing. Everyone had a breaking point, after all, and the fact that Joaquin had spent almost three years with Mark and Linda and he still hadn’t been able to find theirs made him nervous. He had thought turning down the adoption would do it, that they would put him back