I had an ocean of words to say to you /

but they’ve drained away / and now I’m through

 

I’m neither lazy nor a coward.

Okay, fine, that’s not entirely true. I’m still a bit of both, although now I’d say they have much smaller roles in the clown orchestra that is Austin Methune. The third bassoon and, I don’t know, the triangle, for example.

I will, however, still do pretty much anything if a girl is watching.

But that’s not why I’m doing what I’m doing now, riding my motorcycle with a mandolin strapped to my back, a mandolin that technically belongs to Rick the Lawyer. There are no girls watching. Although I am on my way to another encounter with Todd Malloy.

I graduated today. Another squeaker, but I did it, stood up there and got my hand shaken by the principal, and I waved at the crowd, my mom going nuts and embarrassing me. Also, I got into a real college, the University of Minnesota, with a music scholarship, a recommendation written for me by well-respected music producer Ed Verna.

After the graduation ceremony, when everyone was milling about, I saw Josephine with her family, including first-term state senator Gerald Lindahl. Josephine got into Yale, and I heard she was leaving in a few days for a summer program in Paris, and I’d never see her again.

When we spotted each other, she came running over and gave me a big hug.

“I knew you could do it,” she said.

And I said, “I still love you and I’ll always love you and this makes me so sad.”

And she said, “Oh,” in the way you say that about something that is adorable but painful, and she gave me another hug. Then she squeezed my arm and smiled at me, the heartbreak smile, the smile you give someone when you’re okay and they’re not, and said, “Will you promise to keep in touch?”

I murmured something​—​yes, sure, of course​—​and she said, “Great,” and gave me a third hug, and then she was gone, her receding figure getting blurrier as my eyes welled up.

I saw Mrs. Jensen. She gave me a literal pat on the head and said, “Good job, SmartTard.”

There was Alex, with his parents​—​“We’re so proud of you, Austin!”​—​and Devon with his​—​“We’re so proud of you, Austin!”​—​who were chatting with my mom and Rick​—​“We’re so proud of you, Austin!”​—​and yes, okay, I get it, no one expected this particular special-needs student to graduate please stop already.

And there was Todd, with . . . no one.

I don’t know exactly what had been going on at Todd’s place, but I do know that he was coming over more and more frequently to beat the hell out of the drums. And after a school year full of increasingly horrible crap, his dad finally left, or got kicked out. Yesterday. The day before graduation. And who knows why, but his mom didn’t come to the ceremony either. So there he was, everyone hugging and celebrating, and he was glum and alone, and before I could ask him if he was coming to the big party at Devon’s tonight, he had disappeared.

I called and texted him a few times and got nothing. So after dinner, when I should have been heading over to Devon’s, I instead found myself grabbing the mandolin and heading over to Todd’s, and here I am.

No one answers the door until the third ring. It opens, and I see Todd’s mom for the first time. She looks haunted. Like she’s been crying, maybe for years.

“Hi there. I’m Austin Methune. Todd’s friend. Is Todd home?”

She stares at me a moment. “He’s in his room.” She steps back and I enter, and as she walks away she listlessly points down the hallway.

I take a gamble that his door is the one with the giant Wayne Gretzky poster on it. I knock.

“Todd? It’s Austin.”

Nothing.

“Todd?”

“What do you want?”

“You all right?”

“Yep.”

“Want to talk or something?”

“Nope.”

“You sure?”

“Yep.”

Mr. Gretzky and I regard each other. I take the mandolin out of the case.

“Come on, Todd, come on out, don’t sit in your room and pout,” I sing.

Neither Wayne nor Todd responds.

“The evening’s warm, the sky is clear, come on out of your room already and let’s you and me go drink a nonalcoholic beeeeeeer. . . .”

“Methune, get the hell out of here.”

“Don’t be mad, don’t be sad, come hang out and you’ll be glad.”

Stomping footsteps. Todd violently jerks the door open and glares at me.

“Methune, if you don’t get out of here with your frigging mandolin, I’ll . . .”

“What?”

Todd hesitates. Then the legendary bully and one-time scourge of the Edina public school system sighs, shoulders sagging. He shakes his head. “Screw it. Nothing.” He looks like he’s been doing some crying of his own.

“Come on. Let’s go to the party.”

“I don’t want to.”

“You can’t just sit in your room.”

“Why not?”

“Because we graduated, and there’s a party, and there’s girls and all that.”

“I told you​—​I don’t want to go to the party.”

He starts to close the door.

“Wait.”

“What.”

“Don’t just sit here alone. Come hang out.”

“And do what.”

“I don’t know. I’ve got, like, five really bad new songs we can work on.”

He considers that.

“Yeah?” he says.

“Yeah,” I say. “Come on, Todd. Let’s go play some music.”