Super Fake Love Song - David Yoon Page 0,70

knew or cared about Boo.com?

No one did, and that’s what made that shirt so safe to wear. It was a way to make a statement without risking ridicule.

I left Gray’s closet and went back to my room.

I chose normal jeans and a simple red tee bearing the ampersand from D&D, done with an ornamental dragon head. It was understated. It could be anything, a pretty letterform.

But it was me.

I really wanted to start being me.

I packed a bag with a blanket and food—adorable mini-gimbap rolls and sodas and cheese doodles and teeny-weeny probiotic yogurt drinks—and gave my Velociraptor® Elite a wistful caress before rolling out instead on the creaking ten-speed.

I would glide on elliptical platforms once again, soon.

Cirrus kissed me at her front door. Amazing how we could do that, right out in the beautiful sunlight. Only the sound of Cirrus’s mom’s voice made me leap back.

“Hello, Sunny,” said Cirrus’s mom.

“AAAaa-hi,” I said.

“I noticed the house is conspicuously clean,” said Cirrus’s dad, who had slid eerily into the door frame like a shooting gallery target. He held an eyebrow raised behind his transparent Bong Joon Hos, and it was not clear to me if his brow was playfully conspiratorial or accusatory.

Adults.

“Welcome back from . . . ?” I said.

“We’re not really here,” said Cirrus’s mom. She touched a necklace made of golden toothpicks. “Just a few days of meetings, then it’s off to the Middle Kingdom.”

“You mean Middle-earth?” I chirped.

“I mean China,” said Cirrus’s dad, as my attempted joke cleared the top of his head with meters to spare.

“I should put on my bike helmet,” said Cirrus, reaching for a hook.

Cirrus’s mom examined her daughter sideways. “This American obsession with helmets.”

The two went back inside.

Cirrus strapped on her helmet tight so she could slam her head safely into the steel doorjamb three, four times, more, had we not noticed her neighbor’s unsettling eye and fled.

We journeyed forth on wide, quiet roads filled with sparkling trees and jasmine and birds cheeping high and low. The sun warmed our skin without burning it. The air perfectly humid, never sticky. The sky with just the right amount of clouds.

Cirrus beamed at the road before her. “This right here is why you live in Southern California.”

“Who needs their daily thousand-IU vitamin D supplements when you have this?” I said.

“Sad old people who never venture outside,” said Cirrus.

“Ha ha ha,” I said, making a mental sticky to get rid of my collection of vitamin, cod liver oil, and gut flora supplements as soon as I returned home.

“Did I mention I’m starting track?” said Cirrus.

My mind boggled. “You run?”

“Oh my god no,” said Cirrus. “Artemis roped me into joining. I’m kind of weirdly looking forward to it. My uniform is very officially official. Go, Ravagers.”

“Welcome to the team,” I said, grinning like a fool on my bike in the sun with my beautiful girlfriend.

“Where are you taking me?” said Cirrus.

“You’ll see,” I said.

I remembered the way through pure muscle memory. Hop the curb at the horizontal fire hydrant. Take the wide drainage ditch down past the embankment of multicolored succulents. At the five-armed intersection, take the one marked Pyrite. Dismount at the fire road, walk around the chain barrier, and—

“We’re here,” I said.

Cirrus held on to her helmet and inhaled deeply. “What is that?”

“Eucalyptus,” I said.

The eucalyptus grove was the same but for a plastic hubcap that had found its way in from the road. I picked up the offensive garbage and placed it on the curb for street sweepers to later consume.

I hadn’t been here in years. Not since my last attempt at gaming in public, right before Gunner stole Gray the Paladin from my locker and rasped the figurine down to a nub.

I led her to a spot—a tree stump, where Jamal and Milo and I once sat—and spread the blanket. We ate. The wind picked up, but the surrounding thicket protected us from flying dust and leaves. It was like picnicking on the floor of a cathedral ruin sparkling with sunbeams.

“I haven’t been here in forever,” I said. I popped a gimbap into Cirrus’s mouth and watched her chew.

“Was this, like, your spot?” said Cirrus.

It could’ve been, if only they’d have let me be.

All that was too much to explain, so when I spotted movement in the distance, I was grateful for the distraction.

“Look,” I said.

Cirrus turned. Six children, each around age ten, ran about wielding tree branches, which they used to spray each other with imaginary elemental attacks.

i got you

no because mine