dar
I got into Villanova?
It’s not a question but that’s how it sounded in my head. Not a fact yet.
The big envelope came this morning with brochures and pictures and stats about the school. It’s still close. Ish. And it’s got an amazing track program. It’s a great school. Truly. But it’s not Rutgers.
It’s not the big scarlet R that’s been hanging above my bed for over a year. It’s not what I’ve wanted for so long. So why do I keep reading the brochures? Why did I email the athletics department for more info?
Why the big question mark?
I was reading the brochures in bed when I started feeling my prayer bracelet. Thinking about Mom. Her gift. Those fucking seeds. DAR. I was beginning to suspect that the entire point of DAR was that there wasn’t a point. An anti-point. Some existential cop-out that seemed very far from my mom’s usual MO.
But then, while reading a Villanova pamphlet about student diversity and working on this crick in my foot, I remembered that, hey, I’m diverse. And it clicked.
“...Oh. OH. Oh, FUCK.”
I threw the brochures aside and grabbed the new Spanish word-a-day calendar off my nightstand. Mom’s calendar got me in the habit so I gave myself one for Christmas. I cheated and looked ahead, day by day, word by word, until I found it.
August 25. DAR.
DAR (basic verb)
Give
Yield
Show
I had to sit.
When I was really little, my mom would take me walking in the Sticks. It was a morning routine of ours, something we’d do after long winters to make sure the snow was really gone for good. She’d pick up a coffee at her spot and we’d walk the nature trail. I was too young for coffee but sometimes she’d pour a little splash into my cup of hot chocolate and we’d drink our morning drinks. I was so in love with the forest and, each time, I’d find a new favorite tree. But Mom’s was always the same.
Toward the end of the trail, there was a clearing. I’m pretty sure it’s a picnic area now but, back then, it was just an open clearing with one single tree. One lonely oak. That was her favorite. My mom told me that forests had their own magic but, in her eyes, there was nothing more beautiful than finding a solitary tree. She said it was like the forest letting you in on a secret.
The more walks we went on, the more I understood what she meant. What she felt. That lonely tree didn’t have a forest. It had to find its own space to grow. It became its own forest, deserving its own attention. Walking with my mother, I began to see the beauty of being alone.
That’s why she left me the seeds. Because she knew how lonely I could make myself. How much I could put between myself and the world. My mother knew how hard it was for me to show myself and she knew how desperately I wanted to be seen. To give. To yield. To show. All that want wrapped into a word. That’s all she ever hoped for me. For me to give myself to the world. To find my own place in the forest. She wanted me to see the beauty of being found.
I put the seeds back in the envelope and ran to Sandro’s.
When I got to his driveway, I noticed his mailbox was open. I considered drop-kicking the thing then and there but decided my revenge would have to come another day. I ran up his forty-three-mile driveway and knocked on the front door.
I guess I wanted him to answer. Or maybe I didn’t. I don’t know. Not his dad, for sure. Maybe his ma. But there in that giant Dragon Ball Z shirt was GJ.
“Hey. GJ.”
He was holding a wad of ground beef. I think it had a face. “Where have you been?”
“Oh. Uh... Around.”
“Are you here about Sandro?”
“Yeah. I am.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
I knew Sandro would be upset but he was always so sure to keep that shit from his family. He must’ve been real pissed if even they noticed. “Oh... Is he mad?”
GJ shook his head. Even with his giant shirts and big eyes, it was the first time he truly looked like a little kid to me. “He’s sad. He won’t tell me why.”
Damn. That was worse.
I didn’t know what to say. GJ nodded like he could smell my hesitance. Without another word, he left, leaving little drops of beef in his wake.
The house was surprisingly quiet. Mr. Miceli’s office door was closed and I could hear deep voices coming from the kitchen. It sounded like Raph and Gio. I poked my head into the living room and saw two little girls watching a movie. Saw IV, if I’m not mistaken. Seemed liked a problem but I had bigger fish.
“Sebastian?”
I turned to find Mrs. Miceli sitting at the dining room table. Alone. Like she’d been sitting there since our dinner.
It’s a funny thing with the Miceli men. GJ looks like Gio who looks like Gio Sr. Same with Raph and Sandro. Big hairy apples under a big hairy tree. It was all I could think when I finally saw them together. But I couldn’t find Sandro in Claudia’s face. Their connection wasn’t so clear.
Not until right then. Alone at that table. I knew that face.
“You okay, Mrs. Miceli?”
“Claudia, sweetheart.”
She didn’t try smiling at me. She looked like she’d just been gut punched. All winded and dazed. Her hand sat on the table and her fingers were doing this weird dance on the wood. Like she was playing a concerto from memory.
Her fingers stopped. “Are you Sandro’s friend?”
I nodded. I didn’t understand the question, but I nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
She nodded too. “He doesn’t have friends. I don’t know why, he’s such a nice boy. He’s always been nice. Raph and G had friends. Girlfriends, each other...” She shook her head. “But they’re not nice. Not like Dro.”
I didn’t know what to say. So, I went with the truth. “...Sandro deserves better.”
She nodded again. And I saw where Sandro got his thinking face from. When he’s close to solving some math problem that’s taken him all of study hall.
I think she solved it. “He never talks about you.” She smiled at me. It was a sad sort of smile. The kind you save for harder days. “I wish he could talk about you, Sebastian.”
I wanted to tell her what I wished for Sandro. Everything. But I didn’t want to say more than I should again. Words never came well to me at that dining room table.
She must’ve seen me holding my tongue. A Miceli specialty. She gave me a nod and looked at the ceiling. “He’s on the roof.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She smiled. Less sad. More tired. “Claudia, sweetheart. Claudia.”
And I left her.
I’d never been in Sandro’s room. It was never an option for us. I peeked my head inside, in case he was there, but the attic was empty. And small. Fine for an attic but small for a bedroom. To think I was worried what his impression would be of my room.
I took in Sandro’s world. The only decorations were the dozens of multicolored tank tops thrown around the room. A dirty shot put in the corner next to some cleats. A chunk of neon green cast proudly displayed on a shelf. I inspected the tiny desk by the window. Knickknacks and souvenirs from trips I’d heard about. An AC beach token. A picture of him as a boy with an older couple on a sailboat. A legal pad covered in possible logos for Bumpin’ Grinders. His copy of Daniel: Last Forever. That fucking book.
I thumbed through it. The margins were full of notes. I stopped on one.
B thinks lighthouse is meta4 4 self-sabotage. Steal 4 paper.
Fucker. I knew he stole that idea. I flipped to another page and found a bookmark. Not a bookmark. A picture.
My senior portrait.
I’m not afraid of heights but you’d be foolish not to get a little cagey on that roof. It’s a drop. I don’t know how Sandro survived it.
I found him lying on the shingles. His eyes were closed and he had a copy of His Garden open on his chest. A ballsy move to be sleeping on the roof again. Very carefully, I made my way up the slant and stood over him. Maybe it was my shadow hitting his face or maybe he could just sense a presence, but his eyes opened. He looked at me. Not that I’d been counting but it had been just shy of one hundred days. By six.
It’d been ninety-four days since Sandro looked at me.
I pointed to the book. “How far are you?”
I only had two books left to read on Ms. Morgan’s list and His Garden was low on my favorites. I did my best to follow along in class but it was just so ridiculous.
Sandro just looked at me. Gave me nothing.
I shrugged. “I didn’t get it. I mean, I got it. I just didn’t like it.”
Still nothing. He closed the book and started lowering himself down the roof.
Shit.
“Sandro, plea—”
I turned a little too quickly and fell on my ass. Hard. I heard a shingle fall somewhere and hit a tree branch. Sandro stopped and whipped around. I steadied myself from slipping further and breathed. We watched each other.
“...You can’t stand up here.”
“Okay.”
“And I wasn’t sleeping.”
“Okay.”
Sandro nodded. He crawled back up to my level and sat. Opened his book like he was planning on reading through whatever I had to say. I’d take it. He thumbed through and found his place. “I don’t get it either. This is like the eighth chapter in a row where Anna just screams at her family but no one ever does anything.”
“It makes sense at the end.”
“What, is she a ghost?”
I gave him a spoiler-free, wishy-washy shrug. Sandro rolled his eyes and Frisbee-tossed the book off the roof. That made me smile. He leaned back and rubbed his face. Probably pissed he’d be searching for his book all afternoon again. He did the same thing once with Daniel. Back then, we made a game of it. First to find the book got free Wawa that week. I found it within the first two minutes but he got me to love Wawa, so he won in the long run.
I wanted to help him find this book too. I wanted another bet.
I wanted my friend back.
“I’m sorry, Sandro. I’m so sorry. I should’ve just kept my fucking mouth shut. Or I shouldn’t have... I could’ve said something. I could’ve stood up for you. I was just nervous and got in my head and I don’t... I’m sorry.”
He took his hands off his face but kept his eyes on the sky. I felt like I was right back there on that trail. The morning after our kiss. Just trying to break through to him.
“Talk to me. Please. I need you to talk to me, man.”
He nodded. Sat back up and sniffed. “I’ve, uh...” He took his time with it. All of it. “I’ve been angry. Really angry. For a long time. At myself and my family. And how they treat me. And...my foot and the hair on my shoulders and...and I’m not good at dealing with it. I keep it all... So, it all... And sometimes I just get so fucking angry that my head feels like it’s cracking open. And when you... When we started hanging out, I wasn’t so angry.”
He was soft and calm and only stopped to wipe his eyes. “I thought you were gonna fix it. And that was stupid and it’s not your fault and... It’s something I need to fix myself. Moving and restarting and Northwestern won’t mean shit if I don’t. So, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed you. I shouldn’t have left you. I’m so...so fucking sorry.”
“Sandro, it’s okay.”
“No. It’s not.”
“I was an asshole. I told them you—”
“I fell asleep on the roof. It was a stupid thing to do. I deserved it. You didn’t.” He shook his head. He was trying to stay calm. “I hurt you. I pushed you into a mailbox, your face... I hurt you.”
“Dro. It was an accident, Sandro. You gotta know that.”
“But I left you there. Alone. That wasn’t an accident, I did that. That’s fucked-up. I’m... I’m fucked-up. I shouldn’t be around people. I deserve to be alone.”
I shook my head. Awed. And I thought of everything I wanted to say to his mother before. All the things I wished for her son. “You deserve so much better than this, Sandro. You deserve parents who care about you and brothers who care about you and Northwestern and the apartment and Bumpin’ Grinders. You deserve the fucking world, man. Look at me.”
And he did. I smiled. “I am so lucky I know you. I can be myself with you. I like who that is with you. You’re nice and good and you smile like... Fuck, I love your smile.” I got closer to him. Took his hand. “And people don’t treat you like they should. I haven’t treated you like I should. Like you deserve.”
Strong like Lucy. Honest like Del.
“And I want you to go to college and I want you to get the chance you deserve. I want these last months with you and I want to drive you when you go. I need you in my life, Sandro. You’re my best friend. You’re my fucking lighthouse, man.”
They were the easiest words that ever came out of me.
Sandro looked at me. Watched me and took me in. I knew what that meant now. He put his hand on my head and pulled me in gentle. Still so soft. He held me like we were still in the ditch. Like if he held me tight enough, we could fall back to summer and try it all again.
I smelled the salt on his skin and smiled. “You got into Northwestern?” Sandro nodded against my head. I sniffed. “I’m so proud of you, Dro.”
I felt his teardrop hit my T-shirt.
My face in his shoulder, I mumbled something like I love you.
I could feel him smile back.
“Me too, bud.”