thirty

Adam is in the student lounge, which is essentially a glass box, but he doesn’t see me. He’s wearing a sweater I’ve never seen before. He’s talking to Victor, probably about photographs, and his hands are drawing something monstrous in the air. I already feel like I’ve betrayed him. Victor notices me first and motions through the glass for me to join them. Adam smiles a brave, handsome smile and my fingers feel shaky down there, at the tip of my body.

Actually, it feels like every extremity could just drop off, starting with my fingers, then my hair, then all the teeth in my mouth. I’m losing to the floor. Adam’s face shifts from brave to scared, and he walks toward the door, toward me. The rest of the room fades, the kids and their laptops are all little dots in an impressionist painting. I back into a wall and lean while the room pirouettes giddily—my Adam, my fixed point.

“Hey,” he says.

His eyes are softer than they were yesterday, less determined.

“Does Victor know?” I say.

His face scrunches, betraying surprise and disgust in equal measure. I see how easily I can hurt him, how easily I can make him afraid.

“What do you mean?” he says.

“It looks like he knows. Does Victor know what happened yesterday?”

As the words come out, I suck all those lost pieces back into me. My body is whole in rage. Aggression glues it back together.

“No. Of course not.”

“Good. I don’t want him to know.”

Victor has stopped at the door. He can tell we are talking about something important. He waves and sits back down on the fake leather couches. Adam is probably telling the truth. Victor probably doesn’t know.

“Did you get my message?” Adam asks.

“Yes. My dad took me to school.”

He looks away to think for a second. “Oh. Cool.”

“It has nothing to do with you.”

“No, I know. It’s nice.”

My heart is like playdough left out overnight. Crusty. Someone should throw it out already. Adam is struggling.

“Why are you so far away, Miriam?”

He reaches out for my hand, in the middle of the hallway, in front of every hungry beast in the student lounge. I let him have it, but I don’t squeeze back. After a few seconds, he lets go, and I put it in my pocket, where I feel for Eva’s key. It’s not there. I can’t remember if I left it under the pillow last night. Or in my other pocket. Maybe yesterday’s jeans.

“Are you scared?” he asks.

I snicker. “You have no idea.”

“I’m scared too, Miriam, but we have to stick together. Like Robert Frank and Allen Ginsberg. Like James Agee and Walker Evans. Like Bogart and Bacall.”

I don’t tell him Bogart’s gone, or that I used his camera to take a picture of Elliot’s house last night. I try to sneak out of his gaze, away to join the other bodies dragging or bouncing to class. To look for my key. I just want to find the key, then I can talk to him.

“Can we just talk? Will you walk home with me? I think we need to talk and figure this out,” he says, sounding urgent.

That last part makes me squirm, because there’s nothing like a boy saying what he should be saying when you are trying to blame him for what’s making you sick. I need to go now.

“Okay,” I say quickly.

“Okay,” he says, not moving.

“I gotta go to class,” I say.

“Okay. I’ll see you after school.”

“Fine.”

“Main gate.”

“Okay.”

I walk to the bathroom and realize no one’s life has been altered by our exchange. Victor welcomes Adam back into their conversation. The hall is still full of smart boys and girls planning how to drink themselves dumb. To them, it’s just Miriam and Adam talking, the photo freaks, best friends since Torah school. But I remember last night and his face when he took off my shirt. I recognized those eyes. Hope and fear together make hunger. That’s it. That’s the one feeling in the world. Hunger. I was wanted, people. Wake up. I was loved.