T.J. Klune - Bear, Otter, and the Kid 1 - Bear, Otter, and the Kid (4 page)

“Maybe you just feel guilty about what you eat,” he deadpans, never raising his eyes to look at me.

“You little punk,” I growl, leaning down and tickling him right under his ribs where I know he gets it the worst. My mom and I are the same way. He tries not to laugh but is soon howling at me, “Bear, Bear!” trying to wiggle this way and that. I stop, and he looks up at me with such a look that for a moment I am blinded by my love for this kid, my Kid, that it feels like my breath gets knocked out of me. I kiss the top of his head, and he says, “Ah, gross!” but thats okay.

“You gonna be okay here with Creed for a little bit while Otter and I go get your ice cream?” I ask when Ive recovered myself a bit.
His eyes steal away from the TV and lock onto mine. “Youre going to come back, though, right?”

I smile reassuringly and ruffle his hair where I kissed him a moment ago. “You got it, Kid. I shouldnt be gone long at all. It should only take a little bit, but to be on the safe side, give me an hour, okay?” He looks at his watch and notes the time, then nods. I do, too, seeing its almost seven. “You have your cell phone with you?” I ask. He nods again and pulls it out of his pocket. “Alright, then. Ill be back in a little bit, but call me if you need to.” He nods again, already back into his show. I touch his head again and walk back toward the kitchen.

It may or may not be weird to you that he has a cell phone. It seems like a lot of kids his age do these days. Its not really something I can afford right now, but I make do. I learned early on after Mom left that if he had his own way to reach me, he felt better about being apart from me. He never uses the cell phone to call anyone else, and aside from Creed, Anna, Mrs. Paquinn (our next-door neighbor, more on her later), and occasionally Otter, no one else calls him on that phone. If someone needs to reach him, they do so through me.

Im about to reenter the kitchen when I hear hushed voices, and I pause, immediately feeling guilty for eavesdropping. But I listen anyway. Theyre talking about me, so I figure Ive got the right to hear what they say.

“What were you thinking, saying something like that to him?” Otter hissed.

“What the fuck are you talking about, Otter?” Creed sounds slightly amused and slightly pissed off all at the same time, which he has a great talent for. “He already knows. I told him a while ago. Its not a big deal. He doesnt care.”

“Im not talking about that! I dont care who the hell knows!” Otter sounds upset, and my breath catches in my chest, not wanting him to say anything further. But he does anyways. “Its not about
that
! Jesus, Creed! If you only knew….” Shut
up
, Otter!
Shut up!
“Besides, if I wanted him to know about
anything
, I would have said something myself. Stay out of it!”

But Creed pushes on: “So thats really why youre back, isnt it? It didnt work out between you and whats-his-name?”

“Creed, I swear to Christ, just drop it! I dont want to talk about this right now!” I hear someone slam their beer bottle onto the countertop, and I assume its Otter.

“Chill, big bro. Like I said, Bear doesnt give a damn one way or the other.”

 

Oh, Creed.

Silence falls in the kitchen, and I realize Im still holding my breath. I let it out slowly, hating the way it sounds ragged. But that was closer than I ever wanted to hear it said out loud.
It’s not about that… if you only knew!
His words ring in my ears, and I feel lightheaded. Okay. There
might
be something else that I should tell you—

“What are you doing, Bear?” the Kid says loudly from somewhere behind me. I jerk a little bit to the right, hitting my head against the wall. It hits a picture, and a second later I hear it shatter on the floor.
Goddammit, Kid!
I think angrily, knowing I am more upset with myself than with him. I look over at Ty, standing in the hallway, hands in his pockets, a big
O
expression on his lips. I mutter something incoherently and bend down to pick up the glass before he steps on it. Creed comes out of the kitchen, and I can feel his smirk on my hot skin.

“Im sorry,” I say through gritted teeth.

 

“What the fuck?” he says lightly. “No need to be all ghetto in my nice house.”

I bark out a harsh laugh. I look down at the picture and see its another one that Otter had taken. It shows Creed and his mom at our high school graduation. I am off to the side somewhere, out of sight, holding Tys hand and the sign he and Mrs. Thompson had made for me, saying “
Yay Bear!
” The picture captures Creed at a perfect moment of wild youth, diploma in one hand, his other around his mom. Theres a smile on his face so big you can almost count all of his perfect white teeth. Well, you could have before it had fallen on the ground, tearing right across his face.
Shit!
I think, feeling my face get redder. Before I can say anything further, Otter is hunkered down beside me, picking up shards of glass.

“Otter, I suck. Im sorry,” I whisper, wondering why I feel so goddamn bad.

I feel him shrug as his arm is touching mine. “Its just a picture,” he says. “And its not even very good. Anyone with a camera can take photos and say theyre a photographer.” He sighs, and I can feel the bitterness coming off him in waves, and I wonder if he is just saying those things for my benefit. I wonder if he is really as pissed off at me as I am at him. I wonder why hes really here.

I wonder a lot of things.

 

“Bear, just leave it,” Creed says, towering over me. “Me and the Kid can pick it up. His show is on, and Otter owes him ice cream.”

 

“
Soy
ice cream,” Ty says, making sure we havent forgotten.

“Thats right!” Creed says, stepping around me and picking up Ty to throw him over his shoulder. Ty laughs in the way that only kids can as Creed carries him back to the living room.

Otter puts the glass on top of the picture, causing Creed and his mom to look all distorted and broken. He holds out his hand to help me up. I look at it for a moment.

“You ready?” he asks.

 

What a loaded question.
W
E
RE
in his car, after stopping at three gas stations, none of which carry

soy ice cream. Big surprise, right? Otter suggests we go to the grocery store where I work, which is almost on the other side of town. It seems kind of weird because theres another store on the way that would probably have the gross stuff my brother eats, but I dont say anything. Its nice to get away for a little bit.

I know how that sounds, okay? I know that Im in a kind of fucked-up situation with Ty and all, and Im doing my best but sometimes I just want to get
away.
I feel guilty about it, kind of like how I am feeling now, but every now and then, the sheer joy of it outweighs the guilt. I wonder, not for the first time, if this is how my mom felt. Is this what she was thinking when she decided to sit down and write those letters? That undeniable sense of freedom that seems to loom up out of nowhere? I can see how easy it would be to fall to it, to just get in the car and drive and drive and drive until everything around you is unfamiliar and nobody knows who you are and what youve just done. To start over and become anyone you want to be. Whos going to know the difference?

But then, reality sets in.

Im nothing like her. Ive learned how to squash those thoughts quicker than they can take root. If I were to fall prey to it, like she did, then how am I any better than her? After she left, it took me a long time to be where I am at right now. I have a responsibility and not just to myself. What the hell would happen to Ty if he woke up one day and found me gone? I sometimes lay awake at night, these things floating around my head. I see him running from room to room, calling out my name, “
Bear, Bear, Bear!
” I see him picking up his cell phone with his little hands and calling me, only to find my number has been disconnected. What would he do then? I know for a
fact
he would never trust anybody ever again. He has a hard enough time doing it now. Thats about the time I always realize I could never do that, not to him, not to anyone. I am not my mom. I am not my mom. I have to be a good father—

Shit.
Brother.
I meant brother.
Fuck. Not again.
I stare out the window. Its still raining.

“
Y
OU
cool?” Otter asks me as he shuts his door. I feel my clothes getting wet again, clinging against my skin. My nipples get hard and I blush. I fold my arms over my chest and nod to Otter and start walking inside. I hear him rush to catch up with me, and then he falls into step beside me.

The automatic doors
whoosh
open and processed air washes over my skin, chilling it as goose flesh moves in. As soon as we get through the doorway, I hear my name. I look up and see Anna standing at a cash register, the magazine in her hand caught in mid-page turning. I smile weakly.
So Anna. And the grocery store.

Lets go with the grocery store first
Its where Ive been working since I was sixteen. As soon as I was old enough, my mom said I needed to get a job to help out with the bills. Being

sixteen and living in Seafare doesnt give you a whole lot of options. To be honest, being any age in Seafare doesnt give you a whole lot of options. It was either become a bagger or a busboy. Since my mom already worked at a restaurant at the time, I didnt want to take the chance of having to work with her all the time, so I chose bagger. Now Im a lead cashier. And before you all grow wide-eyed with amazement over my rags-to-riches story, its actually not that bad. I pretty much get to stand at the front desk and tell all the other cashiers what to do and when to go on break, stuff like that. Its kind of like being a manager without actually getting paid to be one. Oh, and the manager gets to sit in an office, not at the front desk. Okay, so its not really like being a manager at all, but it could be worse, right? I could be working McDonalds and hearing the Kid mumble each night I came home that I smelled like bovine genocide. And before you think Im being overly dramatic, I once worked the meat counter and thats exactly what he said to me. I requested never to be put there again.

So its not so bad, okay? Ive been here long enough that I get to work pretty much whenever I want, which is good, especially working days so I can be done by the time that Ty gets done with school. And they allowed me to put Ty on the health insurance they offer after youve been here three years. They didnt have to do that. I dont like to think about what Id do because the Kid gets a cold every other minute or so. So see? Things could be worse. A lot worse.

Now Anna.
I told you before how shes my sort-of girlfriend. Do you remember? Nows one of the times when she sort of is, and I feel guilty for a moment

because I told her that I was going to call her as soon as I got to Creeds house. But hey, I can say I wanted to just see her in person and everything works out. Shell see right through me, though, she always does.

“Hey,” she says, smiling at me as I walk up to her.
“Hey, yourself,” I say back, standing in front of her register like a customer. She leans over to kiss me, and I turn my face lightly, feeling her lips graze my cheek. She pulls back and looks at me funny.
I jerk my head to the side in a sort of nod. “Look whos here.”
She looks over my shoulder, and I see her face light up. “Otter!” She laughs and bounds around the register. I turn to watch her go and see Otter

still standing at the door where we walked in. Funny, I thought he was next to me. She jumps into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist, and I hear him say, “Oof.”

So, yeah. Anna. I think I told you that she was the second person I met after Creed. She was in the same second-grade class as us, so it was inevitable that we would at least become friends. But it turned out to be much more than that. Anna is the only girlfriend I have ever had, the only girl I have ever kissed. We had sex, the first time for both of us, the summer between eighth and ninth grade, in the guest house that sits behind Creeds house. Shes been my first everything, aside from having the honor of being my first best friend, as that goes to Creed. First love, first heartache, first (and only) proposal of marriage. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. But come on, we were ten! And she proposed to
me
, right after our first kiss. And it wasnt even really proposing, it was more of a “Derrick McKenna, I am only going to kiss you if you say that we are getting married when were adults!” Whats a ten-year-old boy to do? I said yes, and she kissed me lightly on the lips, the touch of a feather. I remember turning red enough to light the world on fire. That sealed the deal.

Except for the times when shes sort of not my girlfriend.

Were way too much alike to ever get along all the time. I swear to Christ when we fight, its about the stupidest shit. She thinks shes right. I
know
Im right, blah blah blah, and it always ends with her flipping her long brown hair, her dark eyes flashing, muttering under her breath and sounding so much like me that its hilarious. And thats always the worst time to laugh, so naturally thats when I laugh. Of course, this pisses her off even more—which pisses
me
off—and it always ends with one of us stalking away, licking our wounds. I love her too damn much, though, and I know she feels the same and a couple of days later one of us will pick up the phone and call the other, and things will be good for a while.

And I do mean that. I love her. Anna was there for me growing up, listening to me bitch about how my mom was fucked up. She was there for me, making me talk to new people, telling me that the worst thing a person can do is not make new friends She was there for me when I found out Ty was on the way (trust me, I wasnt very happy about that at the time). She was there for me when I stumbled into her house after reading my moms letter, tears of rage blinding me, clenching and unclenching my fists. She has seen the good, the bad, and everything in between that makes me who I am. Dont get me wrong: Creed was there through a lot of that, too, but Anna gets me in a way that he cant. Its not his fault or anyone elses. It just is.