14. CODY

CODY

I knew that knocking on the front door was a bad idea, but I couldn’t help myself. She hadn’t been at school again on Monday, and on the drive over, I had debated with myself about the possibility that her parents had locked her in the tower of their palace.

I was worried about her, and I was going to be polite and tell her parents to their faces that I was. So I knocked again when no one answered.

After I had left on Saturday, my brain never stopped. I had gone straight to the public library to look through any medical books I could get my hands on, but there wasn’t much about leukemia in any of them. There was, however, a ton of medical jargon that I didn’t understand and, frankly, only scared the shit out of me and my limited IQ.

When she told me, the first thing I wanted to do was cry.

But I wasn’t going to do that in front of her, so I’d waited until their front door shut and cried all the way to the highway. There were far more painful moments in life than my father kicking the shit out of me over skipping school. I just hadn’t been aware that I would be subject to such agony so soon after meeting the one person in my life that didn’t make me feel like a disaster all the time.

I couldn’t believe that whatever God existed could inflict such harm on someone as sweet and smart as Lorraine. My heart throbbed in my chest as if someone had shoved a hundred tiny shards of glass into it. It was dramatic, and for about three steps off her porch, it had felt like the world was ending.

But she was in remission. She was healthy, for now , and that’s what mattered. But why couldn’t I stop dwelling on every little detail, all the small things that could contribute to her getting sick again? Did it even work that way, or was I spinning up issues to make the possibility more tangible?

I just wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.

Stupid, foolish thoughts of a seventeen-year-old in love.

I didn’t even know if she wanted the same or if I could give her the life she wanted, but I knew that I would try. I would be whatever she wanted or needed me to be, as long as she allowed me to love her, healthy or sick, every day.

So I sat up in my room and finished what bits of my papers I could do without her help and I cried some more, so hard that by the time I was finished, I’d given myself the worst headache I've ever had. So I crawled into the bed and vowed to myself as I pressed my face into the shabby pillow that I would protect her from everything until the end of my days.

And then I woke up, went to school, and searched for her in the halls and the library only to panic when she wasn’t there again. I skipped the last period to make sure she was okay, but now after two knocks no one was answering the door, and my mind was spinning out of control again.

Maybe they took her out of town, swept her away, and I wouldn't see her for months again? I slammed my head on the door again, and this time, it swung open to Mrs. Field in a dark blazer and a nasty look on her face. Somewhere underneath the scowl line and the exhausted plastic surgery, she sort of looked like Lorraine. They shared the same vast blue eyes, but Mrs. Field’s were darkened by her disdain for life and my presence.

“Ma’am, is Lorraine home?” I asked politely.

“No, she’s at school. Where you should be, " she said and started to close the door in my face, but I put my hand up to stop her.

“See, there’s the thing, she’s not at school. I searched everywhere for her, and you and I both know that Rae would never skip,” I said, my fingers pressing into the expensive wood as Mrs. Field’s eyes raked over them angrily.

“It’s none of your business where my daughter is, Mr. Cody. I see she didn’t inform you that you weren’t allowed back on our property,” She sneered, the harsh lines around her mouth deepening.

“She couldn’t, because she wasn’t at school and I probably wouldn’t have listened even if she had,” I said honestly, “you see I have this condition called persistent shithead, my Mom screams that fact at me regularly, so you’re going to have to do a lot better than ‘ you’re not allowed on our property ’ to keep me from Rae.”

“Her name is Lorraine.” She corrected me with a snarl. “And if you don’t leave my porch Mr. Cody, I’ll call the cops, and your mother can scream it at the sheriff in town.”

“Tomato, tomatoe.” I shrugged. “Usually, I’d fight you on it and my mom yells at my Uncle at least three times a week. Combined with how politely you asked me, I’ll go. But can you tell Rae I came to see her? Just because you hate me doesn’t mean she does and I don’t want her to think I abandoned her.”

Mrs. Field’s eyes narrowed on me at the last confession, her features softening just for a moment before returning to the usual hardened expression as she shut the door in my face.

“That was easy,” I said with a chuckle and walked toward the edge of the porch. I walked down the driveway over to Landry’s, popped the latch on the fence, and wandered into the backyard. There were three loose boards connecting their yards, and with Mrs. Field thinking that she had won our little interaction, I was free to slip into their yard, and she’d be none the wiser.

“Cody?” Landry was chucking balls at the back wall of his two-story house and cocked his eyebrow at me. “Why aren’t you at school?”

“Why aren’t you?” I asked him back.

“Touche,” he sighed and chucked the ball again. Are you going to see Lon—” he stopped himself and looked over his shoulder at me. “Lorraine?”

“Yes, I’ve been banished from their step.”

“That’s never stopped you before,” Landry said.

“Exactly.” I kicked the board loose, and he laughed.

“Hey, there’s a party at the beach for Coop. You should get her out of her room.” Landry suggested unexpectedly, and it caused me to pause halfway through the small break in the fence.

“Why?” I asked, cautious about his sudden change in tone.

“Listen, man, just because I don’t understand it doesn’t mean I don’t see it. You like her. You have since you wandered into my house asking about her. I’ve lived next to them my entire life and have never spoken more than a sentence to Lorraine. She deserves some fun, and I mean, I guess she’s kinda pretty when she’s not squirreled away up there with her nose in a book.”

“I’m going to forget you said the last part.” I smiled at him, “But thanks, man.”

He turned his back to me and left me to my business as the rhythmic thump of the baseball hitting the back of the house returned. I crept along the yard, keeping to the tree line close to the side of the house, scooping a handful of white rocks from their perfect garden bed. It took me a few seconds to pause and watch the kitchen window, but I managed to get to Lorraine’s window without being noticed.

I chucked one rock at a time to the window pane above me, knowing full well that she was in her room. There was not a single other place she would be. She didn’t answer after the first rock, so I threw another and waited.

“Come on, Rae,” I swore under my breath and chucked another.

As I arched my arm back to throw another, the window latch clicked, and the pane slid up with the shove of two perfect hands.

“There you are,” I whispered up at her, “took you long enough.”

“What are you doing?” Lorraine hissed. She was wearing one of her wigs, and now that I knew what they were, they bothered me more than before.

“Counting the hours I spent loving you,” I smiled when she scowled at my cheesy behavior. I loved how her nose scrunched up and her soft lips were pursed together. “I’ve come to break you out of your tower.”

“You know, when I imagined this moment, I expected a lot more Shakespere…” her brows scrunched together.

“I could sing you the lyrics to Change the World ? But after we revisit that part about imagining this…” I teased her, and she just shook her head.

“I can’t sneak out, Ryan,” she said quietly.

“You can’t, or you won’t?” I asked her, and her fingers flexed around the window, giving away her answer. “Rae…we both know they won’t even notice.” I didn’t want to be mean about it. Being a trophy on a shelf in her own home had to be exhausting. It wasn’t a joke or a punchline. It was heartbreaking.

“I’ll get in so much trouble…” Lorraine sighed.

“You’re already locked in your room. What’s the worst that could happen?” I asked her.

She thought about it for a moment, really thought about it . Her lips pressed into a thin line, and she looked around at her room behind her.

“Rae, look at me,” I said to her. When our eyes connected, the world slowed down around us, the birds grew quiet, and the clouds stopped spinning. At that moment I figured out that it was possible for love to move heaven and earth because every time she looked at me with those ocean eyes, it did. Heaven spun in different directions, and the world stopped to watch her with me. “They don’t deserve your obedience, so get dressed and climb down here because we have things to do.”

“Climb down?” She panicked instantly and looked at the distance between us. “Absolutely not!”

“Well, you can’t walk out the front door…” I laughed at her.

“Yes, I can,” she said with a huff, pulling back from the window and gently shutting it. The next ten minutes of waiting for her felt like an eternity, and I almost chucked the few rocks I had left up at the window to check in on her.

“Stop it,” she chuffed as she rounded the corner of her house into the confined space between the siding and the fence.

“I was getting worried,” I tossed the rocks aside.

“What was so important that you just had to plan a prison break?” She asked me as I reached out and felt the long wig between my fingers. I hated that thing. When I didn’t answer she wrapped her hand around my wrist and smiled up at me. “Ryan, focus.”

“There’s a beach party. They’re throwing it for Coop’s birthday.”

“Mark Cooper?” She scoffed.

“...Yes,” I laughed at the way she had reacted to it.

“You realize all of those people hate me or pretend I don’t exist?” She said as I linked our fingers and quietly led her back around the fence.

“Dinner first, and then the party.” I ignored the worry in her voice. “Mary will probably be there. You like her, don’t you?” I asked her. I had seen them together occasionally at school. Mary considered them friends, but I wasn’t sure Lorraine even knew that.

“I… yeah, I guess so. This is still a bad idea,” She said.

“Yeah, but there’s no fun in playing it safe, and I won’t let anyone say anything to you.” I turned on her before we broke out onto the street and dropped to her eye level. I won’t let anyone ever make you feel small again. Okay?” I said to her. She paused for a moment before nodding. Still unsure, the trust was slowly bridging the gap between her nervous concern and my reckless abandon.

“Okay.”