Page 74 of How to Hide in Plain Sight
Then I pushed him over the edge and he splashed back into the lake.
24
FRESHMAN YEAR
IT’S FRIDAY NIGHT, THE ENDof our freshman year. Manuel’s parents are out, as usual. We take two Razor scooters and push ourselves to Jewel-Osco through the springtime slush, where we buy Red Vines and Busch Light with IDs made in China. The sky outside glows pink and grey. We stuff the beer cans into Manuel’s backpack and scooter home.
Waiting just down the block are Leo and Lisa, Manuel’s current fling. When Leo spots us scootering together, his face twists into a sour expression. I smile as wide as I can.
We usher them in the side door and down the steps to the basement. Once inside, I turn on just one lamp, as if the half darkness can protect us from being found out by Valentina. We make a loose circle on the ground. The nylon inhales our legs in a way that only basement carpets can.
Someone hands out the beer. We each crack one open.
One beer is enough for Manuel to stop worrying about Valentina’s presence upstairs.
“Lisa and I are going to my bedroom,” he announces. “Don’t waitup.” Then he sticks his tongue out and closes the door. I laugh louder than intended, an attempt to cover up the crack that widens in my heart every time I see him leave with another girl.
Without Manuel, the room feels too quiet.
There’s a beat of silence. Then Leo says, “It’s him, isn’t it?”
I look up. “What’s him?”
“The reason you won’t sleep with me.” He nods at the door. “It’s Manuel.”
“What?” I try to laugh.
Leo shakes his head. Slowly, at first, then with increasing intensity. “I knew it. I fucking knew it.” He stands up and throws his empty can in the garbage. “All my friends told me this would happen. ‘Never date a chick whose best friend is a dude.’ They all said it.”
“Leo, what are…?”
“No, Eliot. Just…no.”
“Leo.” I stand. I’ve only had one beer, but on an empty stomach, one is enough. The room tilts. “Leo, I don’t know what you’re talking about, but if I’ve done something wrong, I—”
“You haven’t done anything wrong. Not yet.” He shakes his head. “But I know how this ends.”
I try to collect my spinning head.Is this really happening?“Leo, you don’t—”
“I see the way you look at him.”
My jaw snaps shut.I see the way you look at him.I grasp for words. For excuses and explanations. But in the space where I normally find them, the soothing sentences that coax my boyfriend back from the ledge, there’s nothing. Just a whisper I’m not quite ready to hear.
Leo collects his backpack. “This is done. Okay? We’re done.” Then he turns and walks out the way we snuck him in.
—
WHEN MANUEL AND LISA RETURN,hanging on to each other and giggling quietly, I’m seated in exactly the same place I was when Leo left, staring at exactly the same doorway.
“Where’s the Almighty Lion Man?” asks Manuel. Lisa giggles again.
“He left.”
“Like…for the night?”
“No.” I fondle a loose thread of carpet. “Like forever.”
“Oh.” Manuel and I make eye contact. He seems, for the first time, to absorb my deflation. I see him start to move away from Lisa, as if to comfort me, then pause. Second-guess himself. A hazy confusion clouds his face.
