Dismantle the Sun - 1. Chapter 1

1.

Senior spring was one of those things that you were supposed to look to forward to starting from preschool. Four glorious months that would make up for twelve years of misery. That’s what everyone said, at least. Things have a way of not working out the way they should.

That Monday afternoon in the school parking lot, I was thinking about something else entirely. I was thinking about my mom’s birthday—which was today—and the fact that she was going to celebrate it with her boyfriend, Steve. I told myself I didn’t really care who she spent it with. She had every right to spend it with her boyfriend. But some things just take a lot of telling to make true.

Anyway, that was before I got distracted and stuck my nose in business that would make my last semester of high school pretty damn interesting.

“Hey, will you just fuck off and leave him alone?”

After twelve years of school, there are some things you learn not to do. For example: you don’t tell someone to fuck off who can turn around and beat you up. It’s stupid and gets you black eyes and a split lip. Granted, the person I’d just said it to wasn’t about to beat me up anytime soon. She was kind of on the anorexic side. But she was also the kind of girl who had a much bigger boyfriend a speed dial away.

In any case, the girl I’d just told to fuck off, who I later learned was really called Kate Landauer, stared at me with big, shocked eyes and said, “Excuse me?”

“You heard me,” I said. “Fuck off and leave him alone.”

Kate Landauer huffed, tossed her hair, jutted out her hips, and looked from me to the guy standing between us. “Weell,” she said, and you could just hear her mind clicking as she tried to think of something insulting that wouldn’t get her beaten up by me. Finally she made a scoffing sound. “I was only asking!”

“Yeah.” I’d already realized, by this point, that I was probably going to be in a shitload of trouble tomorrow, thanks to my big fat mouth. But I didn’t want her to think I was going to take my words back. So I just said, “Sure,” and waited for her to go, which she did after another fake smile and hair toss.

So far, I’ve been leaving something out. Something that’d explain a lot, including why I’d just told off Kate Landauer. I don’t usually say that sort of thing. Some things, though, get to me and make me snap. You probably wouldn’t be able to tell just from looking at me, but I’m gay. I don’t look gay—or I don’t think I do, at least. My clothes (except my work ones) are pretty ratty; I don’t manicure anything; and I wouldn’t be caught dead wagging my ass to Madonna. One thing I share with all other gays in the world, though, was a reaction to the word “faggot.” I don’t care who says it. There’s no better way of making me want to smash someone’s nose in.

“Was she bothering you a lot?” I asked.

The guy next to me kind of shook his head and tried to muster a smile. I think that’s when I really noticed him for the first time. The guy had a nice sort of smile. He had nice eyes, too, and a nice nose. But the main thing I saw was something cautious, almost scared, in that smile. I knew what it meant. Or I thought I did.

“Hey, chill,” I said. “I don’t care if you’re”—for a moment, I almost used the word Kate Laundauer had used—“like that or not. She was just being a bitch, that’s all.”

The guy didn’t meet my eyes. “Yeah… Thanks.”

There was a kind of awkward silence. The guy must’ve thought that I was considering beating him up too, even though I’d made myself pretty clear. I was a whole head taller than he was and looked like I could press him into the cement with my thumb. And you don’t recover too well after some girl’s been hounding you and asking if you were a faggot. “D’you have a ride home?”

He shook his head.

I thought it over. I kind of do that a lot—act or talk first, and then think it over. In any case, I had work later, and my mom’s birthday after that. But I didn’t have much homework, and it probably wouldn’t take long to drop this kid off. Plus, he was pretty cute. Blue eyes and curlyish hair halfway between brunette and blond. I also had some sort of feeling with him, the kind you get when you look at a bike or a game through a store window, but you see your own reflection in the glass.

“C’mon,” I said. “I’ll give you a ride.”

“No, it’s… I live pretty close.”

“Hey, it’s no problem,” I said, trying to sound as friendly as possible.

“You sure?”

“Positive,” I said.

Then he smiled at me, openly. He really did have a nice smile. “Thanks.”

“I’m Nick, by the way,” I said. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Alec,” he said.

We shook hands and got into my car. It was an ‘86 Toyota Corolla, nothing to write home about, although it had belonged to my dad. He hadn’t taken it with him when he left, just as he hadn’t taken a lot of other things. Neither my mom nor I even touched it before I needed a car of my own. I figured six years was enough time for memories of my dad’s presence to fade. Anyway, it was my car now.

“Where’d you live?”

“Um, kind of close to Long’s Drugs.”

“Yeah? I work at the pizzeria in the plaza.”

“Oh, cool.”

The plaza—which was really a bunch of shops and restaurants together in one spot—was a three minute drive or a ten minute walk from school. Fifteen if you wanted to stop at Joe’s for an ice cream.

“You a junior?”

Alec nodded.

“Cool.”

We didn’t say much after that. Partly because it was such a short drive, and partly because we were, after all, strangers. You don’t go chatting the day away with someone you’ve just met, particularly when it was under pretty inauspicious circumstances. And I didn’t know any juniors, so there wasn’t much we could talk about. Well, I knew maybe one or two who hung out with Melina. They were theatre people, and I really didn’t have much to say to them. It’s not that they were bad people. It was just that I’d rather take a run, or listen to some of my own music, than talk about Hair Spray.

A minute later, we’d gotten to Alec’s street. I’d actually never seen the houses around the plaza, but it didn’t look too different from my own. The concrete was spotted black because a bunch of olive trees grew from an island in the middle of the street. All the houses had squashed little yards with grass poking from the cracks in the pavement, and Alec’s was no exception.

“Thanks,” he said.

“No problem, man,” I said.

He got out of my car, adjusted his backpack on his shoulders, and kind of hesitated. “Uh, see you later,” he said at last, and flashed a last, nervous smile.

“Yeah, see you tomorrow, Alec!” I called, as he scampered off.

I pulled out of his driveway, making sure there weren’t any little old ladies waiting to get squashed behind me, I remember thinking that I probably wouldn’t be seeing him tomorrow. I mean, I was fairly certain I’d never seen him before, and there was no reason why I would see him again. We might bump into each other in the corridors, but there was no guarantee we’d even recognize each other then.

But, driving away, it struck me that I wanted to see him again. That was pretty unusual, because I usually didn’t like to be bothered. Put me alone in a room with some CD’s, dumbbells, and lots of junk food, and I’d be happy for a few months. I liked being around people I was friendly with, but I didn’t exactly yearn for their company while they were away. I was a pretty solitary guy. Have been ever since I was a kid. At least since I was nine.

But here I was, wondering, as I drove, if I would be seeing Alec’s timid smile again tomorrow, and also wondering if there was any truth in what Kate Landauer had said as she’d dogged him through the old school parking lot.

---

The house was empty when I got back. That wasn’t unusual, as my mom got off work at about eight, which was in the middle of my shift at the pizzeria. Most of the time, she brought something from McDonald’s with her, and that would be our dinner. Big Macs and fries. It wasn’t that we didn’t know how to cook—I was actually pretty good at it, if Melina wasn’t shitting me. It was just that neither of us did.

I was sitting there, wondering if today I should try making something special, when I got a call on my cell. It was Melina.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nick, are you busy?”

“Uh…” I wasn’t exactly doing anything at the moment, but if Melina asks you if you’re busy, the safest thing to do is to stall.

“I really need your help.”

“Yeah?”

“We’re recording Monday night’s performance, but Mrs. Kraft can’t get the speakers to work.”

I kind of let out a breath I’d been holding: recording business. That wasn’t too bad. I’d done it several times already, and not just for Melina. Ever since Mr. Ravenswood, the previous music teacher, left in my freshman year, I’d become the de-facto technician of Livingston High School’s drama and music department. It was really sort of an accident. Mr. Ravenswood had been the only one who knew how to figure out the equipment. But according to Melina, he flatly refused to come back to show how to use the stuff. I guess we were a pretty traumatic bunch of kids. Anyway, Melina had been desperate—I think they were doing Bluebeard’s Castle, or something—and I said that I’d fiddled a bit with my dad’s old recording stuff, and maybe I could help out. To cut the long story short, I did manage to help them make the recording, and I’ve been stuck with helping out ever since

“Yeah, I can take a look.”

“Can you do it today?”

“Uh… no, I’ve got work tonight. And it’s my mom’s birthday.”

“Oh, really! Tell her happy birthday for me!”

“Yeah, I will,” I said, sounding pretty dull. Melina didn’t catch it, though. She usually didn’t notice, which I thought was a good thing. I mean, it’d be pretty tiresome to have your feelings noticed all the time.

“So you’ll do something with your mom?”

“Yeah, I’m planning to.” Maybe bake her a cake, I thought. I could do it before I went to work if I started now.

“But you can come tomorrow?”

“Yeah.”

“Thanks so much!”

“Yeah, yeah…”

We hung up, and I went upstairs to the computer to find a good cake recipe. The last time I’d made one was a year ago, for Melina’s birthday, and that had been the first time I’d actually baked something. I was pretty sure I could pull it off now, too. I’m actually pretty good at this sort of thing—cooking, fiddling with electrical stuff. I guess that means I should be a handyman. “Nick the Handyman.” Had a pretty nice ring to it.

I ended up making carrot cake. It took a bit longer than I expected, because I didn’t have any “allspice.” I had to nip out and buy that, along with some pecans. In any case, by the time I had to go to work, I had the cake in the refrigerator, where it was supposed to sit for four hours. I put a note on the door, in case my mom wouldn’t notice. It took me a while to actually figure out what to put down. In the end I just wrote, in big letters, “CAKE IN FRIDGE.” I figured I would tell her “Happy Birthday” later. I also figured that adding “PS Steve can have some, too” would be a bit too obvious.

I don’t do much thinking at work. Usually I’m too busy kneading dough, sprinkling cheese, or clearing up the trash. I do a lot of my thinking while driving. It’s pretty relaxing, and I haven’t crashed yet.

I started off by wondering whether or not my mom would like my birthday present for her. I figured it would depend on Steve. If he thought it was weird for a seventeen-year-old guy to bake a cake for his mom—which, I guess, is pretty weird—she’d probably want to hide the cake in the closet until Steve was gone. My mom was like that. At least, she’s been that way since my dad left. Actually, I can hardly remember what she was like before it happened. I have a lot of memories about my dad, though—how he’d made me learn biking without training wheels, how he’d always give me the bigger ice cream cone when we stopped by Joe’s. I could remember lots of things. But not much about my mom.

It was nine when I got back. The first thing I noticed was that the driveway was empty. Now that was pretty unusual. My mom taught classes at the community college and came back pretty much the same time every day. I went inside and checked the fridge; the cake was untouched.

My mom was probably with Steve. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out. The only question was when she’d be back. I could imagine their dinner being about two hours long—three, max. So I’d wait till eleven before worrying.

It was a quarter to twelve when I finally called. I waited a total of five rings before she picked up.

“Nick?”

“Mom, where are you?”

I could hear another voice indistinctly. A man’s voice.

“I’m with… Steve.”

I frowned. There was more murmuring, and my mom was holding the phone away from her as she said something that I couldn’t make out.

It took me a full second before I realized what was really going on. When I did— Well, what can you say to your mom after figuring out that she was in the middle of having sex with her boyfriend?

Steve made some kind of comment. A moment later, my mom said, “I’ll be home… in the morning.”

“Yeah,” I said. The silence was just waiting to get awkward. “Uh, happy birthday, Mom.” Now that definitely was awkward. Oddly, I only felt a bit numb, as though I were watching someone drop an empty eggshell on the floor.

We hung up pretty quickly after that. I got up and walked around a bit just to calm down, even though I wasn’t really worked up. I opened the fridge and considered eating the cake myself. But no, it was still her birthday present. And Steve was still invited to have some.

It was well past twelve when my phone rang again. Nobody called that late, and at first I thought it was my mom, asking me to pick her up, even though she had her own car. But then I looked at the number. I don’t ever screen people—I get so few calls in the first place—but this was the one number that made me consider, every time, if I should just pretend I wasn’t there.

I picked up anyway.

“Nelson.”

“What’s up, Raimondi?”

“Nothing much,” I said carefully.

There was a long silence. After a while, I began to hear someone in the background. It sounded like a girl’s voice, but I couldn’t be sure.

“Hey, you wanna come over and try some of this? It’s the best shit I’ve had in a while, you don’t want to miss it.”

“No. Thanks.”

There was that sound again, louder. This time, I was sure that it was a girl, and she didn’t sound too happy.

“I haven’t seen you in forever, dude. What’re you doing?”

“Right now?”

“Yeah.”

“Getting ready for bed. I’ve school tomorrow.”

“School,” Nelson muttered. It was an old topic, though we never really talked about it. I might’ve tried a year ago, when Nelson’s dad had gotten himself jailed and Nelson had just dropped out, but he wouldn’t listen to me then. Now I was the one not listening.

The girl made another sound, and this time Nelson barked, “Shut up! I’m talking to my best friend Nick Raimondi here. Hey, Raimondi, I’m with Jessica right now. Do you know Jessica?”

“No.”

“Hey Jessica, you wanna talk to Raimondi?”

“Nelson,” I started, wanting to head him off, but I had the feeling he wasn’t listening at the moment, because the girl Jessica was saying something pretty loudly and Nelson was talking back. I just waited, getting impatient but knowing there was nothing I could do.

After a while, I could hear Nelson on the phone again, even though he wasn’t saying anything. I could hear his breathing—ragged, like he’d smoked too many cigarettes that day.

“Nelson?”

“Yeah?” And then, “I haven’t seen you in forever, man.”

“I know.”

“What’re you doing tomorrow?”

I thought fast. “Well, I’ve got work, and I’m also helping Melina with the sound equipment—”

“Melina, Melina,” Nelson snapped, “it’s her and her theatre shit again? Hey, are you finally fucking her?”

I got up. “I’m hanging up.”

“Dude, I was just messing around! I didn’t mean it, all right? And I know you don’t go screwing chicks like that. You’re, what, saving your virginity for marriage?”

“No.”

“No? Then you should get laid, dude.”

“Nelson—” I could think of nothing to say. “Are you stoned?”

“What are you, dumb? ‘course I’m stoned.”

There was that silence again. This time, though, I could hear Jessica getting louder in the background. It seemed as though she was getting pissy about Nelson being on the phone. Then I heard Nelson answering, his voice rising, and at some point the phone dropped on the ground or the bed, and I began to hear the sort of noises that you’d find on a porno track.

I hung up. I didn’t need to hear Nelson making out. I didn’t need to picture it either. Not the up-and-down movement of his pale white ass, nor the half-opened smirk of his lips.

I was looking at six hours of sleep before the morning. The house was quiet. Usually my mom would be watching TV, and every so often I’d hear, dimly, the fake laughter you get all the time in comedy shows. I didn’t expect to be missing it so much. I was tired, sleepy, but I couldn’t fall asleep.

Finally, I tried thinking of something totally different, something that would get my mind off my mom, who was with Steve, and Nelson, who was with Jessica. Eventually, I found myself thinking of olive trees—a line of them, all growing on a narrow island in the middle of the street. It was Alec’s street. I pictured myself in my car, driving over the patches of black, watching the trunks flash by like a silent black-and-white film. I was pulling into the driveway, and looking at the blue wood paneling and weeds poking up through the cracks.

That was when I fell asleep.