Days Like This (10 page)

I didn’t think
Graham would really carry through his plan of doing something together—as
friends—but he called me first thing the next day, and within a few hours we
were packed in his truck listening to The Avett Brothers. They weren’t really
my choice, but they weren’t bad. There was this sound to them that reminded me
of Graham. An easy-going, folksy, high-energy vibe that shouldn’t go together,
but it did.

The best
things didn’t seem to go together at first.

I reached over
to turn down the air, just as he reached over to turn up the music and our
elbows bumped. “Sorry,” I fumbled.

“Hot?” he
asked.

I nodded, and
he changed the air, but I wasn’t so sure it was just the outside. Graham rested
one hand on the wheel and the other on the seat. I looked down at it. There was
only a little bit of space between us, and usually I’d sit in the space so
there was nothing, and he’d drive with one hand on the wheel and the other on
my thigh. But I couldn’t sit there now, so I sat with the few feet between us
where his hand rested on the seat, outstretched, and in my head he was waiting
for me take it.

When the song
ended, he moved his hand and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel as he
drove, and I wondered if he liked this song or if he was nervous. Maybe he was
both. I know I was.

I’d tried not
to think about it while I was getting dressed. Not to worry about being cute or
how my hair was or debate mascara, because mascara could mean something more
than a day with a friend. But I’d kept hearing his voice on the phone:
“
Do you want to hang out today?”
He was all jittery, a way I hadn’t seen
him since middle school, and two hours later I still hadn’t been dressed.
Graham was my
friend.
We were
friends.
That
was all I would get, so it had to be enough. I wanted it to be enough because I
knew how lucky I was to get that chance. How lucky I was to be sitting in his
truck listening to not-too-horrible music. That’s why I’d put on mascara.

“So, where are
we going?” I asked over the music.

Graham jumped a
little, almost like he forgotten I was sitting there. I hoped that wasn’t what
it was. “It’s actually a sur—”

“Don’t you
dare say, ‘surprise,’ Graham Tucker, or I will smack you.”

He chuckled,
and turned down the music. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me. Say
it.”

Graham stopped
at a red light. “I would never; I know you hate surprises.”
Right.
Graham knew everything I liked, and everything I didn’t. “I
was going to say: it’s actually a surpris
i
ng
story.” He exaggerated the ending and paused for dramatic
effect. I’d give him drama. I stuck my tongue out at him.

Graham shook
his head and started driving. “Fine. I won’t tell you.”

“What’s the
story?” I asked.

“Nope,” he
said, his eyes sparkling. When he let go he was more and more like that little
kid at Christmas. His eyes made him seem that way when he was really happy. It
allowed me to forget that I’d walked away from us. I felt like myself, and the
only reason was because of him. That was all he’d ever expected me to be. “Frankly,
darling, you’ve lost the privilege.”

I pressed a
hand to my chest, and grabbed Graham’s arm with the other. Touching him, even
my hand on his arm, felt natural. It was where I was supposed to be. With my
best Scarlett O’Hara voice—which I had perfected because our ninth grade
teacher made us read the book, watch the movie and then perform scenes from it in
front of the class the last week of school before summer and we hated it since it
was worth like 20 percent of our final grade—I said: “Tell me, Graham Tucker,
or I will just die!”

Graham was smiling
when he looked back at me and I felt myself smiling. I didn’t have to pretend
to be someone else or hide any part of myself. He looked at me with the sparkle
and some fire, and I felt like I was flying. He did that to me, made me drop
all the pretenses and the masks and just be his Cass. Where was he taking me? Maybe
it was a date-date place. Maybe it was a friend place, but it could be a
date-date place.

“I’m taking
you to Rinkydinks.”

Rinkydinks?
Nothing said “friends” like ugly, plastic bowling shoes. My heart sank, but I
tried to keep my smile up. I leaned back against the seat. What was I
expecting? We’d had a moment, but Graham made himself clear. We’re friends.
That was all this was supposed to be, anyway.
Get it together, Cassie.

 “Rinkydink
Ted’s Fun Plaza is still around?”

 “No, no,” he
said, shaking his head. “Not Ted’s anymore. It’s Barb’s,” he said. I laughed a
little. They finally divorced. Ted and Barb Dinkleman were the worst couple
ever. We used to go to their bowling alley in high school because they served
underage beer, let us use the gutter guards, and entertained us when Barb and
Ted would have fights on the floor. They used to yell across the alleys and
over the loudspeaker and once they even rolled balls at each other to see who
would trip or yell or walk away first. We had this friend named Lila who used
to find ways to make them start fighting.

“It’s just ‘Rinkydink’s’
now.”

“Why is this a
surprising story? They were destined for divorce.”

“That’s not
the surprising part. They got divorced because Ted fell in love with George.”

I gasped. “The
creepy maintenance guy?”

Graham nodded.
“Right? Anyway, Barb got ownership and rebuilt the whole thing. It has lasers
and black lights, a decent snack bar, an arcade—” Graham paused and he had this
sly side smile on his face and his eyes were wide. “—and Bobo the clown.”

“A clown?” I
asked. She always wanted a clown.

“No kidding,”
he said.

“That’s
crazy,” I said with a smile. This town was weird. I turned so I could see
Graham better and curled my legs up into the seat. His face was a little
scraggly today and I liked him with some scruff. It always made him look more
rugged. Not that I was thinking about that.

“What?” he asked,
voice rough.

“I can’t wait
to kick your ass in bowling,” I said instead.

“You won’t
kick my ass,” he said.

I shook my
head. “Do you remember the Summer of the Reckoning?” That was the summer before
junior year. We called it that because Lila and Adam broke up and we could only
be friends with one of them at a time. “I believe I won that competition
trophy.”

“Maybe I let
you win,” he said, his eyes wide and mischievous.

I stared at
him. “You didn’t.”

“Seriously?”
he raises an eyebrow at me. “You think I really didn’t see that sleeper pin in
the last frame?”

“The ball
wasn’t even near it.”

“Yeah, I
know,” he said with a half-cocked smile.

I slapped his
arm. “You let me win?”

“You were my
girlfriend.”

“So?”

“I wanted to
get laid,” he said. I slapped his arm again. “Hey! I was sixteen. You can’t
blame me for that.”

“I can’t
believe you,” I said as he put the car in park.

“I knew what I
wanted.”

I looked at
Graham and he was studying me too, his eyes burning into mine. I tried to look
away, but they captured me. I didn’t know what to say, and I tried to find the
right words but that only made me more nervous.

My head spun
as all the moments played back for me. Him kissing me for the first time near
that fence. The look on my mom’s face when he came over for dinner and kissed
me at the door. The first time we had sex in his bedroom. The night of the
bowling challenge, after I won that trophy and we spent the whole night in the
room above the garage.

 “We should go
in,” Graham said, finally breaking our gaze. I nodded and followed him out of
the truck, but I was pretty sure my heart was left on the floor.

The outside
was covered in some sort of metal, almost like a tin can, and there were bright
circles all over the walls, like polka dots. The old place was a boring shade
of brown, but this was fun. The building twisted and turned. It almost felt like
Wonderland.

“This place is
cool,” I said, getting out of the car.

“I know,”
Graham said. We walked side by side into Rinkydinks, and he bumped my hip as we
moved. My whole body flushed, but I knew it didn’t mean anything for him. I had
to get it together. My mind needed to be put on a leash.

“No letting me
win,” I said.

Graham opened
the door for me. “We’re friends now; no pretending this time for bonus points.”

Right.
No pretending. We were just friends now,
even though I was pretty sure people who were just friends didn’t have all
these sparks. All of these questions and feelings and thoughts. Friends didn’t
have to pretend they were just that.

“No worries,”
I said.

Except if I
didn’t pretend, I’d never be able to stand near him without wanting to kiss
him.

BARB DINKLEMAN COOED when I
walked up to the desk. Cassie waited beside me, oddly quiet. It didn’t matter.
Not talking was better. Bowling was a bad idea. I thought it was better than a
dark movie theater, but there was too much downtime in bowling, too much
talking. But in the car, it was easy. She was Cass and I was Graham and it was
fine. We could do this. We could hang out.

“Mikey, honey!
You’re here!”

“Yes, ma’am,”
I said. I hoped she wouldn’t make a scene, but she glanced between me and Cass,
flailing her bright bracelet-covered arms, and I could tell a scene was coming.
“We’re here to bowl, Mrs. Dinkleman.”

She waved me
off. “Call me, Barb, Mikey. You know you can do that.” She glanced past me to Cass.
I could tell she recognized her from the scrutinizing expression on her face—or
at least thought she did. I cleared my throat to get her attention.

“Barb, one
lane please, ma’am,” I said with a smile.

Mrs. Dinkleman
chomped some gum and smiled at me. “Of course, honey.” She pushed some buttons
on the computer, and printed me out a ticket. I really wanted to get out of her
way. “Lane Twelve. Need some shoes?”

“Size eleven,”
I said. I looked over my shoulder at Cassie.

“Eight
please,” Cass said. She stood beside me, shoulder-to-shoulder, and smiled. This
was normal for friends. Completely. Mrs. Dinkleman handed us the shoes and I
thanked her.

“Anything for
you, Mikey,” she said with a smile. Before the divorce, she never smiled. Cass’s
eyes bored into me as we walked to our lane. I could see the wheels turning.
How long would it take her to ask me about it?

We turned into
the lane, and put on our shoes. We didn’t really speak to each other, and I
kept thinking that this was the dumbest idea I could’ve had. I shouldn’t have
brought her here or even agreed to try this friend thing. Now what would we do?

“I’m going to
get a ball,” Cass said.

I nodded in her
direction, lost in my thoughts, and then put our names in the computer. We did
this once before, back when it was Rinkydink Ted’s, and our friends always gave
us couple names. Brad and Angelina. Bonnie and Clyde. Peanut Butter and Jelly.
Whatever they could think of. I stared at the blinking cursor. I wanted to do
that again, to be those famous couples, but we weren’t. Were there famous
friends? I typed her name instead, and it was wrong, so I backspaced.

 Cassie poked
me on the shoulder.

“Did you poke
me?”

She smiled and
shrugged. “What was up with Mrs. Dinkleman?”

Five minutes.
A record for sure. “I helped out around here when it was first renovated.”

“You worked
here?”

“Sort of.”

“What’d you
do?”

I took a
breath. “Designed it.”

Her eyes widened.
“You designed this?”

I nodded. “She
came to me after Mr. Mykiam—remember him? He taught art and was one of her
leaders for the Wednesday night bowling league—he wrote me a letter for school
and he got me involved with the designing and the building plans.”

“Wow! You did
all this?” She looked around the room, and I could see the pride in her face.
It was not what I expected to see. Cassie’s eyes were as bright as her smile.
It imprinted this moment into my brain. I never thought that I’d get to share
this with her, and to have her love it like this made me feel like I had a
purpose. Like my dream was something we could share again. I stood next to her.
It really was amazing looking at something I designed and watching other people
get joy from it. Especially her.

 I poked her
and she laughed. “I didn’t do the polka dots.”

“Too bad. That’s
the most inventive part,” she said before she turned around to put a silver
bowling ball on the return. I grinned because I knew she was kidding. She
always got this tone when she was kidding.

God, that
girl. Crazy how she still sent me spiraling, and after all that time, I thought
it would’ve passed. If I was sane I’d step away, put space between us but that
was the last thing I wanted.

“You ready to
lose, Tucker?” Cass called.

 “Ready if you
are,” I said. I clicked the scorecard on the computer console. “You’re first.”

Cass turned
toward the screen. Grabbing her ball, she stepped into position. The screen
flickered to life and her name popped up. She squealed. “Mr. Hyde?”

I raised an
eyebrow. “And Dr. Jekyll.”

“Those are
horrible nicknames.”

“We are a
horrible man,” I said. Cass shook her head. She hated that book. It was the
great rampage of sophomore year.

I watched Cass
as she put her feet on the little dots. One, two, three, and she let go of the
ball; it rolled straight down the middle and knocked down eight pins. She
smiled back at me. “It’s a good start, Doctor.”

I laugh. “This
is only the beginning, Mr. Hyde.”