Say What You Will (4 page)

M
ATTHEW WAS NEVER SURE
if anyone noticed his rituals. He hoped not, of course. Occasionally people asked questions that made him wonder.
Why do you wash your hands up to your elbows? Why do you avoid the blue tiles on the floor? Why do you tap lockers?
He always gave short, panicky answers. “I’m not!” he’d say. Or: “I got something on my arms in bio lab.”

Amy was the first person he gave a real answer to.

A week after his revelation about their birthdays, they were on their way to lunch.

“WHY DO YOU SOMETIMES WALK ON YOUR TOES?” Amy asked.

Matthew blushed. He hadn’t realized he was doing it in public. “I do things like that sometimes.”

“WHY?”

He told her the truth. “Usually I walk on my toes when I’m happy.”

She laughed, then typed: “YOU’RE HAPPY WITH ME?”

Because this wasn’t about his rituals, it seemed safe to clarify. “Yes, I am. Most of the time. Except when you ask me embarrassing questions.”

“WHY IS THIS EMBARRASSING?”

“Because people aren’t supposed to walk on their toes after a certain age. I know that. I just like it. It’s not the weirdest thing I do.”

“WHAT’S THE WEIRDEST THING YOU DO?”

By then he couldn’t remember: Had
he
brought this up? “There’s just things I do sometimes.”

They walked into the resource room where they’d started eating their lunch after Amy pointed out that neither one of them bought any food and technically they didn’t need to eat in the cafeteria. She’d had enough of the cafeteria.

“The truth is I have problems like you do, only mine don’t show,” he said as he unwrapped the sandwich he’d packed for himself, wrapped once in wax paper, then plastic, then tinfoil. “I worry too much. Logically I understand that my fears aren’t rational, but I can’t stop myself from thinking about them. I go over them in my mind. All the time.”

“FEARS ABOUT WHAT?”

“Mostly I worry that I’ve hurt people unintentionally. Or ruined someone’s life without meaning to.” It felt strange to say this out loud. He wasn’t sure why he was telling her except that yesterday, at their monthly peer-helper meeting, Nicole had told them a story about Amy being a preemie. “She was such a tiny thing. Less than three pounds. Nobody expected her to live. If she did, they said, she’d be a vegetable. Now I send those doctors a copy of her report card every year!”

Matthew raised his hand. “Does that mean Amy was in an incubator by herself?” As soon as he asked it, he knew it was a strange question.

“Oh my, yes,” Nicole said, unfazed. “She was in intensive care for close to two months. There weren’t many other babies around. One or two others who weren’t so lucky.”

Matthew was euphoric. Proof he hadn’t caused Amy’s problems! It made him chattier now.

“HOW WOULD YOU HAVE HURT OTHER PEOPLE?”

“It’s easier than you think. Like the other day a can of Sprite spilled in my locker. It made a mess in there, but I kept worrying, what if it leaked into someone else’s locker? What if I ruined some project they’ve been working on all semester? Or all their class notes for the year?”

“DID THAT HAPPEN?”

“I don’t think so, but how can I be sure?”

“HOW MUCH SPRITE?”

“A quarter of a can.” He waited. Now he understood why he’d told her all this. He wanted her to reassure him.

“IT’S PROBABLY FINE.”

“But I can’t be absolutely sure.”

“YOU CAN BE PRETTY SURE.”

“That’s just it, though. Pretty sure isn’t good enough. Pretty sure can keep me awake all night.” He was surprised at what a relief it was to tell someone about the Sprite. “I give myself tasks—hard ones—to complete, and then hopefully nothing bad will happen because of what I’ve done. It’s sort of a game I play in my mind. Except that it’s not any fun and not really a game. It feels like terrible things will happen if I don’t do everything right.”

“WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO DO?”

“Walk certain ways. Touch objects. Wash my hands. Different things. It varies.”

“LIKE OCD?”

He didn’t know what that was. “I don’t think so.”

Four days later, Amy met him in the morning with something she wanted to say already typed out.

“I’VE DONE A LITTLE RESEARCH. YOU SHOULD READ THIS BOOK CALLED
THE BOY WHO COULDN’T STOP WASHING
. IT’S ALL ABOUT OCD AND IT’S JUST LIKE WHAT YOU DESCRIBED.”

“I used to wash my hands a lot.” He felt a little self-conscious now. He didn’t want to tell her he still did.

“WHAT’S A LOT?”

He wasn’t sure if he should say. He didn’t want to spend all day discussing it. “Twelve times a day. I liked that number. It wasn’t about the washing so much as the number.” Did that make it better?

“YEAH, YOU’VE GOT IT.”

“I don’t think so.”

“TRUST ME.”

They walked in silence for a while as he thought about things he’d like to say to her:
Look, who made you a doctor anyway? What medical school did you go to? How would you like it if I started reading up on all your problems?
The trouble with this argument was that he already
had
read up on all her problems. He’d looked up cerebral palsy and had even rented
My Left Foot
and watched it twice. His favorite part was when the woman Daniel Day-Lewis loves tells him she’s engaged to someone else, and he spastically screams, “CUNT!” Everyone standing around them gasps, but he keeps going: “CUNT-GRAT-U-LATIONS!” He wanted to ask Amy if she’d liked that part of the movie, too, but didn’t know if he should.

“MAYBE I’M WRONG,” she finally said, outside her classroom door. When he came to pick her up, she kept talking as if an hour hadn’t elapsed. “I THINK YOU SHOULD READ THE BOOK, THAT’S ALL.”

He couldn’t take it anymore. “Fine. I think you should watch
My Left Foot
.”

“WHY?”

“Because it’s fun to be told what all your problems are named, so you should try it, too.”

“I ALREADY KNOW THE NAME OF MY PROBLEM. IT’S NOT A BIG SECRET.”

Later that afternoon, he went to the public town library and found the book. Then he had to wait an hour for a librarian he didn’t recognize to be behind the checkout desk. By the time that happened his throat felt too tight for him to speak. When the librarian asked how he was doing, he nodded vaguely like a deaf person. That night, he had to read slowly but he got through most of the book. The people in it all seemed much worse than him. They were in hospitals spending twenty-four hours a day trying not to wash their hands.

The next day before school he went looking for Amy. She was waiting for Chloe, who was usually late.

“Those people were
crazy
,” he told her. “I’m not crazy.”

“NO. BUT SOME THINGS ARE THE SAME. LIKE BLAMING YOURSELF FOR STUFF THAT ISN’T YOUR FAULT. THAT’S THE SAME.”

Did she know that he’d spent a week blaming himself for her condition? Was she saying all this because it probably
was
his fault? “Look, I’ll admit the book was interesting and it had some things I recognized, but I’m not anything like those people. I’m not about to start taking medication or go to some doctor and tell him all this stuff.”

“IF YOU DON’T WANT HELP, WHY DID YOU TELL ME?”

“Because I know you. And I like you.” He didn’t say:
And I thought I was responsible for all your problems.

“WHY DID YOU APPLY FOR THIS JOB?”

“Because I wanted it. I thought helping someone else might take me out of my own head for a while.”

Amy’s head bent down as she typed for a minute. Then she rethought what she’d written, pushed delete, and typed something else. “THAT’S EXACTLY HOW I FEEL.”

F
OR
A
MY, BEING FRIENDS
with Matthew felt like being on a roller coaster. He was so many things: handsome (far handsomer than he had any idea of, with beautiful blue eyes and a wonderful smile), smart, funny, and surprisingly gallant. He was her only peer helper who stayed with her after school to wait for her mother’s car to pull up. The only one who carried her backpack to the trunk and knew how to fold her walker flat with two moves. More often than not, he held open the car door, and recently he had begun a heart-stopping new flourish: buckling her seat belt around her. He’d done it twice now, which meant twice his curly hair was bent over her waist while one hand touched her hip in search of the buckle.

“There we go!” he’d said last time, smiling and a little breathless when the job was done.

He had no idea how wonderful he was. How his hands were so beautiful she could hardly look at them. How his truest smile was crooked and lifted higher on the left side than the right, which made her feel like he might understand her better, her hemiplegic face that was all crooked half smiles, too.

But it couldn’t be denied. He was also slightly crazy.

Maybe more than slightly.

Reading the book she’d found at the library convinced her of two things: (1) It was a pretty serious disorder, and (2) Matthew definitely had it.

The case studies in that book had people whose whole lives got destroyed by compulsive obsessions. Lawyers who lost their jobs because they couldn’t stop taking showers. Teachers who left classrooms unattended to run home and check their stoves. On one level, Amy was grateful for this side of Matthew. Without it, she knew he never would have been her peer helper. He’d been normal once, with friends in the smart crowd who went to dances and after-school activities planned by committees. She’d never done any of that, but she remembered seeing Matthew at tables in middle school, selling raffle tickets and carnations. Now she’d learned he wasn’t kidding that first day he worked with her. He said hello to no one. He spent passing periods in the hallway too busy tapping lockers and whispering to himself to notice the people who tried to say hi or catch his eye.

Except the days he was with her.

It was electrifying the way he watched her so carefully that he forgot himself. He didn’t mumble or tap. Mostly he didn’t do anything strange; instead, he focused on details. He fixed a loose screw on the handle of her walker. He found better straws in the cafeteria for drinking her Boost shake. He thought about her and a million tiny ways he might make her life easier. How could she
not
love him?

Because she did, she saw: he didn’t want to talk about OCD.

It made his fingers twitch and his eyes flick nervously around the room. It made sweat break out on his upper lip. Instead of talking about it, she asked him if he would mind joining an after-school club with her that met twice a week. The others couldn’t stay after school, but Matthew, with no sports, no other jobs, and no place he had to be, could.

The day of the first meeting, they walked together to the yearbook room.

“You’re really interested in
yearbook
?” he asked.

“YES. I LOVE DESIGN AND LAYOUT. THAT’S MY THING.”

“Wow,” he said. “I thought Simon and Garfunkel was your thing.” Ever since he’d told her about the list, he brought it up every chance he could.

She pressed the Pathway button with her fake laugh. “HA-HA.”

Yearbook was filled with mostly younger kids who already knew one another. No one looked up or acknowledged them when they walked in. “I have to be honest with you,” Matthew whispered as they moved to a table in the back. “It’s been years since I even bought a yearbook.”

“WELL, THAT’S WHERE YOUR PROBLEM IS.” Amy turned her computer down to a whisper. “YEARBOOKS ARE CRUCIAL TO POPULARITY.”

“Right,” he said. “I once had two girls write on the same page that I had a really sweat personality.”

She laughed. She liked the way he said
sweat.
“GREAT MINDS THINK ALIKE, I GUESS.”

“Sweat ones, too.”

They weren’t put on layout because apparently everyone wanted layout and only people who’d been working for a year on yearbook got to do layout. They were welcome to do ad sales, the faculty advisor said, handing them a packet.

“You call the businesses listed there and see if they’re willing to sponsor again.” Too late, the teacher realized “calling businesses” might be a mistake for them. “Maybe one of you could do the talking,” he said, and awkwardly began to shuffle through some papers.

They returned to the back table, where they sat—again—by themselves. Around them everyone else worked busily. Finally Amy whispered, “WELL, I’M PRETTY SURE HE MEANT I SHOULD DO THE TALKING, DON’T YOU?”

Two days later, they went back again. They sat at the same table and again, no one acknowledged them.

“I think you’re definitely right about the popularity thing,” Matthew whispered. “I already feel it working wonders.”

“ME TOO.”

If Matthew hadn’t been there, making his jokes and their calls to businesses, she wouldn’t have lasted. But with him, it didn’t matter that no one talked to them, including the advisor. They had each other. Matthew made up voices to use on their calls. She typed up scripts for him to say. Instead of focusing on ad sales, they tried to get people to stay on the phone as long as possible. He talked to hair salons at great length about their whimsical names. (“Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow is so bold,” he said. “The implication that everyone walks out bald isn’t a problem, I guess?”)

Soon they made fewer calls and spent the rest of the time talking. No one seemed to notice or, if they did, care. It gave them what Amy really wanted, more time to talk. To tell each other stories, even if it took a while because Matthew was shy and Amy had only one hand to type with.

They talked about the other peer helpers some. Matthew told her he’d been friends once with Sanjay, a long time ago. “It was in preschool, actually. He was the person who told me there was no such thing as a nap fairy who came in and put stickers on children who were asleep. He said it was the teachers wanting the kids to sleep so they could get a break.”

He also told her he didn’t know Sanjay anymore. Even during the training week in August, neither one of them mentioned preschool.

“SANJAY’S A LITTLE FOCUSED ON OTHER THINGS NOW.”

“Like what?”

“HE CARES ABOUT GIRLS AND POPULARITY. A LOT.” Out of all her peer helpers, Sanjay was the hardest for her to spend all day with. No matter who he was with, he looked over their shoulder to see if someone better was in the vicinity. He talked a lot about the popular crowd—ostensibly making jokes, but they were the kind of jokes that made it clear he was desperate to be one of them. Sometimes it sounded like maybe he was. “That’s
so
Lisa,” he’d say after talking to one of the cheerleaders for two minutes. “She can’t do Spanish at all. I mean
nada.
”
Occasionally pretty girls sat next to him in the cafeteria and said, “Hey, Sanj.” Sometimes they ate his French fries for a few minutes while they talked to him.

“And Sarah?” Matthew said. “What about her? What’s she like?” As he said this, he peeked up at her, a little nervous.

“WHY?”

“No reason. Just curious.”

“DO YOU LIKE HER?” Amy tried not to ask questions like this but she couldn’t help it. Her hand moved faster than her brain could stop it.

“No. I mean I
used
to have a crush on her, okay. Sort of. A little.” His face was bright red. He couldn’t stop smiling.

“WHEN?”

“A long time ago. Like ninth grade. It was dumb.”

Amy liked Sarah, but knew her the least of all her peer helpers. She knew her dad was Mr. Heffernan, their seventh-grade science teacher, and she knew her mother died of cancer because it happened when they were all in seventh grade and Mr. Heffernan left school for almost two weeks. Beyond that, she couldn’t say much. Sarah seemed serious about getting into a good college. She was pretty in a way that Amy didn’t think got noticed much in high school, but maybe she was wrong. Maybe Matthew had noticed.

He finally stopped blushing long enough to explain, “Her mother died around the same time my dad moved out of the house, saying he had fallen in love with someone else. I guess I got it in my mind that we had a lot in common.”

“DYING ISN’T THE SAME AS GETTING DIVORCED.”

“No, I know. I just used to watch her. To see if she was holding up. If she looked like she’d been crying. Stuff like that. It was stupid.”

“DO YOU STILL DO THAT?”

“No. I mean, a little. I don’t even know her, really. You know her better than I do at this point.”

Amy knew this shouldn’t bother her as much as it did.
We’re friends,
she told herself.
This is what friends do. They have crushes on other people and they tell their friends about it.
That didn’t mean he was going to start dating Sarah. It didn’t mean he’d signed up to be a peer helper so he could meet Sarah. The minute she thought of this, though, she couldn’t stop her hand from typing: “DID YOU SIGN UP FOR THIS SO YOU COULD MEET HER?”

“
No.
God, Amy. I didn’t even know she was doing it.”

“BUT YOU SAW HER AT THE TRAINING SESSION AND THOUGHT,
I CAN’T BELIEVE HOW LUCKY I GOT
?”

He laughed and blushed again.
“No.”
But it was obvious. He did think that. She could tell.

She dropped the subject completely and went home that night to think it over. Yes, she was jealous. It was infuriating that someone as sweet as Matthew, with such a good heart and so many problems to wrestle with, would waste his time having a crush on Sarah. Not that anything was
wrong
with Sarah—she just wasn’t worthy of him. She wasn’t as sweet as Matthew or as considerate. Once Sarah told Amy she didn’t expect to keep in touch with anyone from high school after they graduated. “I feel like I’m kind of biding my time, waiting for better things,” she told Amy. Amy knew what she meant: better classes, better friends, better boys. She didn’t want Matthew to have a crush on Sarah, because Sarah would probably brush him away without thinking twice. “I’m kind of busy these days,” she’d probably say, or even worse: “I’m not really into high-school guys.”

There was also, growing within Amy, a feeling so foreign she almost didn’t recognize it.
Why doesn’t he notice
me
that way?

She wasn’t sure exactly what she wanted or could reasonably expect. Kissing was probably too much, of course. But sometimes Matthew would look at her, or put his hand somewhere surprising—the small of her back, or the inside of her wrist—and she’d feel an electric thrill. Once there was even a spark and they looked at each other. She wanted to say,
There. Didn’t you feel that?

But those moments always passed. He’d shake his head and change the subject.

At their next yearbook meeting, they talked about therapists she’d had in the past: “MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE WAS AN OCCUPATIONAL THERAPIST NAMED CONNIE. SHE WAS THE FIRST PERSON WHO TOLD ME ABOUT SEX.”

This time Matthew didn’t blush so much as break out in a cold sweat. “What did she
say
?”

“NOT THE GRAPHIC DETAILS. SHE SAID GIRLS ARE TOLD THEY’RE SUPPOSED TO SAY NO, BUT IT GETS CONFUSING BECAUSE THEY WANT IT, TOO. SHE MADE IT PRETTY CLEAR: IT’S OKAY FOR GIRLS TO BE INTERESTED IN SEX.”

“How old were you?”

“FIFTEEN, I GUESS. OLD ENOUGH. SHE SAID I SHOULD WAIT UNTIL I LOVED THE PERSON OR ELSE UNTIL I WAS REALLY, REALLY SURE I WANTED TO HAVE SEX.”

“She
said
that?” He laughed nervously as if maybe she was joking.

“YES. WHY SHOULDN’T SHE? DO I LOOK LIKE SOMEONE WHO SHOULD NEVER TALK ABOUT SEX?”

“
No.
God, Amy. You don’t have to keep saying that word.”

“WHY NOT?”

“Because.”
He looked around. “We’re supposed to be selling ads, right?”

“RIGHT,” she typed. “SORRY.”

Matthew didn’t understand what Amy was saying or why some therapist was telling her to have sex when she was fifteen. It made no
sense
. He was grateful that Thanksgiving came the following week and meant all after-school clubs were canceled.

He spent Thanksgiving with his grandmother, who grew up on a cattle ranch and understood cows better than she understood people. They might be stupid, she said, but at least cows behaved in predictable ways. People, not so much. His grandmother once told him that she was lucky that her husband drank himself to death. Now she was free to do as she pleased and say what she thought. Which she did. Before dinner, Matthew overheard his grandmother ask his mother: “Are things better? Has he got
any
friends this year?”

He was supposed to be watching a parade on TV, but he turned the volume down to hear his mother’s answer. “Yes, Mother, he does. He was chosen to work with a disabled girl, and he’s been doing that mostly. I think it was an honor, actually. She asked for him specifically.”

Amy did ask for him specifically—it was true—but he had no idea how his mother knew this. It made him nervous. Like maybe people knew more things than he realized. He couldn’t hear what his grandmother said.

“We haven’t talked about that,” his mother said. “I’m trying not to put pressure on him.”

Mumble mumble mumble.

“That’s
your
opinion, Mother. Not everyone is ready for college the minute they graduate from high school.”

This was a surprise. His mother had been worrying about what he’d do next year?

“We’ve talked about him taking a year off, maybe.” (No, they hadn’t.)

“Maybe he’ll get a job and save some money.” (He would? What job?)

He strained to hear what his grandmother was saying, but he couldn’t.

“All I know is that working with this girl has been
good
for him. It’s made him think about someone else’s problems. He’s
good
at it, Mother. I wish you could hear him talk about her.”