Page 195 of Two Marlboros

“Sorry, I have to go. You know how it is, Jimmy found the berries.”

I sensed again that intimacy that seemed only ours and from which I never wanted to part, but the idea that I might never hear the sound of his voice again caused a pang in my heart.

“Don’t worry. I’ll see you at your party then.”

“Okay. And take care...”

“Yes, yes,” I teased him. “I’ll be there.”

We said our goodbyes and I hung up, put the phone down on the bedside table and threw myself dead weight on the bed, staring at the ceiling. He still wanted to leave, and perhaps had never thought, even for a moment, of staying. It was equally true that I had not given him much reason to do so, since I had thrown away all the opportunities I had had, on purpose.

Images of him and me, naked, returned in my mind, and a shiver ran down my entire back. We were making love, and the dam that held my feelings for him at bay cracked permanently. I lingered on those thoughts for a while and tried to imagine what it might be like to feel him under my fingers, or on my lips. With my feet I pushed off my shoes, which I slipped off completely and dropped to the floor, then closed my eyes and hoped, forone reason or another, that the day of Nathan’s departure would come as quickly as possible.

37

The first time

(?Backstreet Boys - Shape of my heart)

Jimmy was very quiet. We were both sitting on a small wall adjacent to a gate, him curled up on my legs, intent on swaying them without saying a word. It was late in the afternoon, and we were waiting for our mother to pick him up, to take him home after the time we had spent out together.

They had been a rather cheerful few days, which we had spent like two real brothers. The experience that Jimmy most enjoyed had been when we had gone to the frog pond, where, to the surprise of both of us, we had found a huge number of tadpoles with their heads still round and no sign of nascent legs. Jimmy had then picked up a twig found nearby, stirred up the water and was amused to see the group of tadpoles running away.

Without warning, he placed his hands on the low wall and with a push jumped down onto the sidewalk. He moved a few steps and stopped in front of the gate, intent on looking at something. I got off the small wall, too, and joined him.

Jimmy was watching a long chain of ants going back and forth up the wall on either side of the gate. I followed their path with my eyes, from top to bottom, until they disappeared into a crack in the wall and then came out of the same spot. I squatted down to the height of Jimmy, who was following the stream of ants with great interest.

“Hey, you want to see something?”

He turned to me and nodded. I raised a finger and stood waiting for a moment when the ant trail remained clear for a fewseconds. I quickly laid my finger on the identified portion of the wall and rubbed.

“What are you doing?”

I pointed to the wall with my chin. “Look.”

The stream of ants split in two at the very spot where I had rubbed. Those that reached the area came back, as if there had never been a connection between the two groups. It only took a few seconds, however, for one ant to attempt to cross the scrubbed area and rejoin the other group, then two, then three, until the flow of ants returned continuously, from top to bottom and back again.

Jimmy said nothing; he raised his finger, waited until he found a vacant spot on the ant-traveled wall and rubbed. The thing happened again, and Jimmy’s face broke into a smile. He turned to me to make sure I had seen everything.

“Look! They can’t find their way anymore!”

The idea of having power over the ant route seemed to excite him, so I watched him do it three or four more times until he was tired of it. I, meanwhile, had gotten back on my feet beside him.

“Why don’t the ants know where to go anymore?”

“Well, it’s kind of like Hansel and Gretel, you know?” Jimmy nodded. “They used to leave pebbles everywhere they went so they could find their way home, and ants sort of do the same thing, leaving pheromones on the wall.”

“What does pheromones mean?”

“They are like invisible tracks left by some animals and followed by others of the same species to find their way back. So, if you do that...” and I brought my finger closer to the wall, to rub shortly after, “...you erase the pheromone trail, and the ants don’t know where to go anymore. Kind of like someone stealing Hansel and Gretel’s pebbles.”

From the look on Jimmy’s face, I thought the explanation had fascinated him, so I watched him observe with an open mouth the trail of ants coming and going.

What distracted me was the roar of an engine that I thought was familiar; in fact, I only had to look up to notice my mother’s dark red Ford Focus. She parked in front of the small wall the best she could, without too much maneuvering and with her sidelong nose toward the curb. She got out of the car and something inside me moved. I shifted my gaze to Jimmy, who immediately ran toward our mother as soon as he turned around.

“Mom, look!” he exclaimed, and then pulled her by the arm toward the little wall. “Look, look!”

Jimmy still enjoyed rubbing his finger on the wall. I smiled and looked up at my mother, and she did likewise; in the background there was only the rustle of my brother’s finger sliding and a few excited giggles from her.

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