“Let’s see the pictures.” My voice came out low and husky, something wrong with my vocal cords.
“Yeah. Let’s do that.” Conrad seemed to have the same issue, voice rough as he inhaled and exhaled like we were at a yoga class.
I exited first, grabbing the strip as the machine spit it out.
“Oh, wow.” Conrad peered over my shoulder, still way too close. “Not silly at all.”
No, they weren’t funny pictures in the slightest. Instead, we looked…happy. Like my-oldest-sister’s-wedding-pictures happy—like a couple radiating the kind of affection that seemed to transcend paper and ink. It was…unsettling. Like seeing my deeply hidden private wishes exposed for public consumption, leaving me raw and vulnerable.
“Want me to snap a copy of it?” Conrad asked, still looking himself. I wondered what he saw, if I was hallucinating about the happiness in our eyes.
“We don’t need to bother the others with a picture right now.” I tried to sound decisive, but when I went to tuck the strip of pictures in my pocket, Conrad plucked it from me.
“I want to keep it anyway.”
Well, so did I, a private souvenir to obsess over later, and not inevitably lost to the laundry as it would be with Conrad, but I let him keep it, not wanting to give away too much by taking it back.
“What next?” I asked, my voice somewhat back to normal.
“Pinball.” Humming some tune under his breath, Conrad made his way to the row of shiny games along one of the side walls. “I wish our pizza place had had some of these instead of just kid games.”
Something he’d said earlier poked at my brain. “You’re going back to that job, right? Like they gave you vacation time?”
Conrad was silent while he fed tokens to the pinball machine, which made it light up and the music start. “Hang on.”
I almost forgot the question as I watched him play, the way his whole body seemed to vibrate with focus and energy, shoulders flexing, eyes narrowing, same hand that had been on me working the knobs and buttons. It was the weirdest thing in the world to get turned on from—right up there with my thing for the latest Captain Kirk and about as unrealistic.
Finally, the turn came to an end and I asked again, both as distraction from getting worked up watching him and because I couldn’t let it drop. “So about that job? They’re holding it for you?”
Conrad sighed. “Not exactly.”
“Not exactly how?” Tilting my head, I studied him carefully, noting the rare blush on his cheeks and his skittish gaze.
“Listen, if I tell you something, can you promise to not tell the others?”
“Yes.” Agreeing was easy. I hardly gossiped with the rest of our play group as it was, and being singled out for a secret—something that almost never happened—was too good to pass up.
“The grocery store let me go right before we left. And I…uh…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I might have quit the pizza place when they wouldn’t give me time off. They might rehire me once they have a chance to miss me. Or I’ll find something else. But it won’t matter. Because I’m going to win.”
No, I was going to win, but even I knew better than to point that out right then. “Well, at least you’ve got your place with Professor Jackson right? She won’t kick you out while you find something else.”
“Yeah. About that…”
“Not that either?” My mouth falling open, I gaped at him.
“She’s selling her house. Like I said, it won’t matter when I win. And I’ve got places to stay. Jasper’s mom said I’m welcome to their couch anytime.”
“Couch surfing is not the same thing as having a home.” It was on the tip of my tongue to volunteer my own couch, which didn’t see very many visitors but was acceptably long enough for overly tall persons like Conrad, but then his face shifted from sheepish to something closer to one of his old sneers.
“Says the guy who lives with his mothers.”
Fine. Let him be homeless. See if I cared. Except I did. Way more than I wanted to, and as he gave the machine more tokens, my gut churned. I didn’t like him operating without a safety net, didn’t like knowing he had literally everything riding on this tournament.
“Conrad—”
“In a second.” He waved me off as the game started, giving his all to managing the little bouncing balls, racking up points, and making me ridiculously frustrated that he could be more attentive to pinball than to his future. I wished that I knew him better—knew what to say to make him focus, to make him see the seriousness of the situation without pissing him off. But I didn’t, and the tension between us continued to simmer, a toxic stew.
But maybe there was something to staying quiet as slowly, his shoulders relaxed, his face softening, his eyes less angry. As the machine flashed with a new high score, he turned back to me, his voice calmer. “You said you wouldn’t tell. That means no trying to solve my problems either. I just need to win. It’s no biggie.”