I held up an “ok” symbol with my fingers, and he responded immediately with a swift combination of hand gestures that had me desperately trying to stifle my laughter. When I failed miserably, I shook my head at him. A massive grin broke out on his pretty mouth before he turned back to what he was doing.
When we’d been in the fifth grade, I hadn’t made the cut to get into Spanish class with the cool kids, so I’d been stuck in American Sign Language class instead. I’d struggled like crazy just trying to learn the basics until Bennett had finally gotten sick of me whining about it and had tried to help me study. We’d watched a video to learn how to sign “Hello, my name is Xander” and every time after that, anytime something was confusing or we just wanted to make someone think we were talking in code, we’d sign to each other, “Hello, my name is Xander.”
It had nearly gotten us in trouble on more than one occasion, like the time we’d almost earned ourselves a trip to the principal’s office when we’d been playing a softball game in gym class one day in middle school, and Bennett had been the pitcher. I’d signed parts of that sentence to him every time someone new had been at bat so it would look like I was making pitch suggestions like in the big leagues. He’d nodded his approval or shaken his head and asked for another until it had driven our classmates up the fucking wall. Bennett had finally started laughing so hard, it had set me off, and the coach had threatened to bring the principal, Mr. Titweiler, into the picture. And since neither of us had been able say the principal’s last name without laughing our asses off, we’d begged and pleaded with the coach to give us a second chance. We’d only managed to avoid a stint in detention by using our gloves to cover our faces whenever we’d looked at each other and started laughing all over again.
When I finally managed to get myself under control and turned back to check my maps, Lucky was coming back up from the lake with a noticeably wet Bear.
“Hey, you big oaf. I told you no morning swims,” I lectured the giant fuzzball. He just lolled out his tongue and grinned at me right alongside a smiling Lucky.
“Sorry, Xander. I told him not to, but he didn’t listen.”
“Sure, sure. That’s a likely excuse. At least you didn’t decide to go in too,” I teased, handing him a copy of the map. “Did you think about what you wanted to ask me?”
He ran a hand through his hair as he shoved the map into his pocket with the other. “Uh, yeah. I guess. It’s just… how do you know if it’s okay to like someone?”
“What do you mean?” I asked, even though I was pretty sure what he meant.
“Well, you see… There’s this guy, and I kind of like him. But he’s been an asshole to me in the past. Like really hurt my feelings, you know?”
“Yeah. Go on,” I said carefully.
“Well, how do you decide what kind of things are unforgivable? If, like, you like someone and want to be with them, but you can’t forget the things they’ve said that hurt you.”
“First of all, want to be with them how? Like as friends? Or more— like kissing?” I didn’t dare mention sex because I just wasn’t prepared to go there with a sixteen-year-old kid.
His face turned even redder. “The kissing one,” he said.
“Well, first of all, you’re still a kid so it’s not like you’re making a permanent decision. So, really, you’re wondering if it’s okay to enjoy being physical with someone, even though they may have said and done shitty things to you in the past. Right?”
“Yeah, exactly.”
I tried to think about what the right advice was before saying something that might steer him wrong. “I think that you have to consider how they feel about you now. Do they still have negative feelings toward you or have they changed? Plenty of people seem incapable of changing, but with kids your age, it’s different. There are people trying shit on and learning lessons from their mistakes, you know?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“So I’d hate to say that someone saying something bad to you at this age is unforgivable when I really think you should allow people to change as they grow up and mature. Plus, holding a grudge against someone sometimes does more harm to the holder of the grudge than the person they’re mad at.”
A sliver of recognition snaked through my gut at my stupid-ass words, but I did my best to ignore it.
“So, you think it’s okay?” Lucky asked.
“What’s okay?” I said, realizing my eyes had strayed back to Bennett, who was obviously stalling the kids to keep them from approaching me for their assignments. I knew Lucky and I didn’t have much time left before Bennett wouldn’t be able to hold them back any longer.