Page 29 of The Kiss Principle

Sorry again for leaving. I had a nice time, and I’d like to see you again.

I waited. My screen started to dim. I tapped it to keep it awake. Still nothing. I lay on the couch. I watched my phone. I tapped the screen. And eventually, I let it go dark.

The sound of a key in the door made me bolt upright, and I realized, in a disoriented heartbeat, that I’d fallen asleep. The lights were still on, and it was still dark outside, and it could have been minutes or hours. My phone said it was barely eleven. Still no message from Bea.

When Zé stepped inside, something was different about him. The way he held himself. His vibe, if I wanted to sound like Augustus. Solemn was the first word that came to mind, and I rejected it. Because Zé was quiet, but he was a goofy kind of quiet. Serious, maybe. Although that was only a few inches from solemn, so maybe I’d been right the first time.

“I thought you’d still be on your date,” he said, and then he smiled, and he was Zé again. “How’d it go?”

“Where were you?”

He turned his keys in his hand, and they jingled.

I rubbed my face and counted to ten. From behind my hands, I said, “Sorry. None of my business.”

He made a noise that could have meant anything.

I let my hands fall and said, “If it makes you feel better, that was ninety percent automatic. It kind of becomes a habit when one of your brothers is a shit-for-brains addict, and the other one is Augustus.”

He jingled the keys again, and I couldn’t make out his tone when he said, “Only ninety percent, huh?”

“It’s your night off. You’re free to do whatever you want, and you certainly don’t have to tell me. You’re an adult—”

Zé laughed, and after a moment, I made a face and flipped him off. Then I laughed too. I was still laughing until he came across the room and sat on the couch. His knee brushed mine. He was still in the surf bum clothes he’d been wearing when I’d left, and I wondered if that was what you wore to a gay hookup. Maybe. Some guys wouldn’t mind, I was sure. Not that it mattered with Zé. He could have been wearing a Barney-the-dinosaur costume and done fine for himself.

“Was that hard for you?” Zé asked. The words sounded like they were meant to be light, but he said them with that same unreadable tone.

“First time I’ve ever been able to say that. Chuy is most definitely not an adult, and neither is my mom, and God only knows with Augustus.”

Zé sat there for what felt like a long time. “I saw the calls from your mom.”

“Fuck her. She knew it was your night off.”

“I had my phone on silent. I wasn’t ignoring her. But when I called her back, she didn’t pick up, and she didn’t leave a message, and you didn’t call…”

“Zé, it’s fine. You’re allowed to have a life.” But I thought about that. About his phone being on silent. Why would his phone have been on silent? A movie, maybe. But people put their phones on vibrate in a movie, right? I had this picture in my head of his phone face down on a nightstand. He was young. He’d need to get it out of his system somehow, right? Drain the pipes and all that.

“Is everything okay?”

“Igz is fine.”

He shifted on the couch to look at me. “Fernando, what happened?”

For a moment, it was like a dam about to break: everything, all of it, building behind the wall I’d built, the pressure growing and growing. I shook my head and pushed up from the couch. “Long night, I guess. I’m going to hit the sack.”

Zé struggled to his feet; it looked harder for him than usual, and maybe that was only because he was tired. He followed me down the hall.

“She called you,” he said. “That’s why she didn’t pick up.”

“It’s fine.”

“She ruined your date.”

“Give me a break, Zé. It was dinner with some girl I’ve been texting.”

“That’s not fair. She shouldn’t have done that.”

I stopped in my bedroom doorway. The lights in the hall were off, and against the glow from the living room, Zé was a silhouette. I held up my phone as evidence. “It’s not a big deal. Apparently, I managed to fuck it up all by myself, since she didn’t respond to my text.”

---