“If they’re fucking with you for some reason, I’ll fucking kill them.”
“That’s illegal,” I reminded him.
“Well, I’ll go tell on them!” he yelled. “I know most of their parents! She’s Henry Trevino’s daughter, isn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe I’ll go talk to him.”
I had an image of Travis walking up to Mayra’s front porch—a place I couldn’t even manage to approach—and talking to her dad, maybe even yelling at him. I wondered if Mr. Trevino would get mad and then tell Mayra she wasn’t allowed to come and work on our project again.
“No!” I suddenly yelled. “Don’t do that!”
“Why not?”
“She’s not like that!” I said insistently.
“How do you know?” Travis said with a growl. “Matthew, you don’t read people well. You know that. Remember the guy who came over and trimmed the trees last fall? He took you for two grand, and you couldn’t afford that. He took advantage of you, dude. I don’t want that to happen again.”
“She’s not like that,” I repeated.
“Then why was she trying to make out with you on the couch?”
“She wasn’t,” I responded. “She was…was…just holding me.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” Travis moaned, exasperated now.
“I told her everything,” I said. “I told her about the doctors and how they don’t know what I have. I told her about Dad and about Mom. I told her everything, and she held me, and I cried.”
Silence.
Another bead of condensation worked its way to the bottom of the glass and onto the absorbent stone coaster.
“You told her about it all?” Travis finally asked quietly.
“Yes.”
“You really cried?”
“Yes.” My voice had dropped to a whisper again.
“Matthew—you haven’t cried since they took Megan away. You didn’t cry at the funerals or anything.”
“I know.”
Travis got up and walked over to the couch to sit beside me. He put one arm over the back of the couch and held the other one out.
“Come here,” he said.
I leaned into him and he gave me a brief hug.
“Maybe I am an ass,” he muttered as he let go. “And maybe I’m wrong. I worry about you, dude. I do.”
“I know.”
“You like her?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I replied. I thought about it for a minute. “She smells good.”