The Center of Everything - By Laura Moriarty Page 0,119

But he doesn’t.

“You think Deena’s dragging you down?” I ask.

He waits. “No. Maybe.” He glances at me again, lowering his voice. “This is going to sound weird, but, okay. I guess I keep thinking that this was how my dad felt when he left, you know? Like I’ve been so mad about it, my whole life, thinking he didn’t have to leave us just to stop drinking. But I don’t know. Maybe he did.”

I think back to Mr. Rowley, when he used to fall asleep on our doorstep, setting his own clothes on fire. “You didn’t make him drink, Travis. You were just a little kid.”

He nods, still picking at the seat cover. “I know. That’s exactly what I’m saying. Deena’s not a bad person, but it’s like, I don’t know. I want to get through school, maybe even go to college or something. But she’s mad because that’s not what I promised her six months ago. And now I can’t get it back. It’s like she’s locked that into her brain.” He has succeeded in pulling off an entire section of the seat in front of him.

I have to work to keep my face the same. “You might break up with her?”

“I’m just talking. Don’t say anything to her, okay? But whatever happens, it’s over when I graduate.” He looks up at me, and he doesn’t look away until I am embarrassed.

“Anyway, I miss getting to hang out with just you.”

Oh.

And now, coming from the inside of my own head, there is a small, electric hum, steady and pleasant, and I think about the terrible night in the McDonald’s, the night Travis met Deena and they wouldn’t stop looking at each other, the force field between them lighting up their eyes.

Perhaps this is how it feels to be inside of it.

Deena lies on my bed, Lord of the Flies open and resting on top of her face. She is only on page fifty-four, and the test is tomorrow. “I hate this book,” she says, her voice muffled under the pages. “I hate it so much.”

“It’s good,” I tell her. “And it’s fast, too. If you start reading now, you can finish.”

She shakes her head under the book. “There aren’t even any girls in it. And there’s no way I can finish it by tomorrow.”

I know in Deena language, this means she wants me to tell her what happens in the book so she can write her essay tomorrow. I am tired of doing this for her. I have done this for her with Billy Budd, Of Mice and Men, and “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” I am considering making something up this time, telling her that the book is about the boys on the island learning to be nice to one another, starting their own business selling seashells to people who stop by on their boats. But I look at her lying there underneath the book, her thin arms flailed out to her sides, and I know I won’t really do this.

Lately, I have been feeling sorry for Deena. Her eyes are still large, but instead of thinking of them as just beautiful, now I think of them as looking a little bewildered. Her irises are such a deep, dark brown that it is difficult to tell where the pupils in the center end, and so this makes her look as if her eyes are dilated all the time, like she is one of the cats, trying to see in the dark.

She takes the book off her face and sets it down on the floor. “Do you know why Travis is being such an ass lately?” She pouts, scooting the book farther away with her foot. “He’s always in a bad mood. He’s always busy.”

I say no without looking up from my book, trying to make the moment of my answer pass quickly. I’m not doing anything to her. It’s just that things are starting to shift. Travis tapped on my window last night, and I am still sleepy because we stayed up so late, sitting on the roof in our hats and mittens, the knee of his jeans grazing against the knee of my leggings, maybe accidentally, maybe not. Which one is that one? Polaris. Which one is that one? He did not mention Deena once.

She yawns, tracing her finger along the edges of one of my calendar posters, a blue-and-gold picture of the pyramids in Egypt against a cloudless sky. “He wouldn’t even help me with