cell phone vibrates. He reaches into his pocket and silences the buzzing.
“So what do you think? You’re being quiet.”
I know I’m being impatient, but this is bizarre.
“Come out to the front yard?” he asks, and the word “yard” kind of fades away. Crap.
His quiet voice is not a good sign. This is the same tone he took when Trish rode a motorized Barbie car over my rock polisher when we were twelve. The same tone he used to tell me his Nana Patrick died. He barely spoke for two weeks, except for Mathletes when he could recite equations. “Please,” he adds.
“Did you get a B on a final or something?” I ask.
He shakes his head.
Tucker should be asking me what coordinates I have, what constellations the comet’s trajectory passes through, and what phase of the moon is best to achieve optimal viewing conditions. What does he mean, follow him to the front of the house?
Tucker’s wearing his Summerhill Academy sweatpants and a blue T-shirt. He nudges at the grass with his toe. Someone should document this. Mr. I Always Bring My Day Planner Everywhere left the house without Converse sneakers? He’s wearing flip-flops. Tucker pushes his glasses to the bridge of his nose.
He takes a step away from the Mason jars for our iced tea and the fuzzy blanket he kissed me on three days ago until my jaw was sore.
“I don’t want to talk about this here,” he says.
“This?”
He sighs.
Now that I focus, his sandals are familiar. They’re the same kind all the guys on the Summerhill Academy baseball team wear. The jock guys that Tucker makes fun of at lunch.
He walks around the house to the front yard with his shoulders hunched to his ears.
“Can you just tell me what’s going on?” I say and follow behind.
Tucker stands in the street at the front of the house. He still has his hands in his pockets.
“I’m—” Tucker mumbles.
“What is going on with you?”
“I—I want to break up,” he finally gets out.
My stomach swoops just like when we drive twenty miles an hour over the huge hill on Overlook Drive. Me and Tucker. We do that in his Volvo all the time.
“Break up. Bean.”
I shake my head. Shake. Shake. Shake.
“I want to,” Tucker says again. It sounds like he’s pleading with me.
“I’m sorry,” he says and slides his glasses up to the top of his nose. “But I want to.”
“No, you don’t,” I say, but my voice isn’t strong anymore. It breaks.
I focus on Mom’s oak tree, where Tucker and I used to climb when we were little kids. I don’t care about his knobby knees or the messy strands of his blond hair. “No, you don’t,” I say again. “We have green grass, a starry night—hell, I can see Rasalgethi, even with the lights from the house. This is a romantic moment, Tucker, not a breakup. You’re supposed to check my coordinates.” My voice is squeaky. I hate when I sound like this.
“Please don’t yell at me, Sarah,” he says.
Oh my God. His tone; it’s not begging or pleading—it’s pity.
I make a fist and dig my nails into my palm. I release and repeat the motion.
Tucker won’t look up from the ground.
“What about last week? When you—” My cheeks warm. “When you touched me?” I ask. I don’t need to remind him of the play-by-play.
One hand caressed the small of my back. Tucker pressed his chest to mine. His tongue met mine and he ran his fingers over my breasts.
Tucker keeps his chin close to his chest and his hands are still deep in his pockets. The phone vibrates a second time, but he gets to it quick.
“I remember touching you,” he says. “But I stopped us from going any further. I didn’t want to push it until I was sure.”
“You hooked up with me and you were debating breaking up with me?”
I can’t help yelling again.
He takes a step toward me and holds out his hands. “No, that’s not what I mean.” When I don’t take them, he brings the heels of his palms to his eyes and sighs. “I’m not good at this. I don’t want to hurt—” His phone buzzes yet again. He silences it for the third time, but it fumbles from his fingers to the grass.
I snatch it and hand it over. Becky Winthrop’s name is on the screen.
“Tell her she’ll have to wait until you’re done breaking up with your girlfriend to plan your tutoring session tomorrow.”