“I don’t know,” Erin says. She can’t remember the last time she had them. “Do Honey Nut Cheerios have anything to do with why your face got smashed?”
“We were out,” Otis says. “So I decided to walk to the Quick Stop to get a box.”
“At ten o’clock at night.”
“Yes. Like I said, I needed them. Desperately. You don’t understand my relationship with Honey Nut Cheerios.”
“That’s weird.”
“So I walk through the door, but I guess the doorbell dinger thing was broken, because no one noticed I was there. The place was empty except for Spencer Klimpt behind the counter. And guess who else was there? Eric Jordan. And they were talking all serious, so my detective instincts took over and I knew I had to listen to what they were saying.”
“Why do you have detective instincts?” Erin says.
“I’m going to be a journalist when I grow up. I like asking questions and making people uncomfortable.”
“Oh.”
“They were talking about a girl named Cheyenne who lives over in Fir City, and it sounds like—” Otis pauses. He looks Erin in the eye. She does not look away. “It sounds like they did the exact same thing to her that they did to Lucy.” Otis looks away before Erin does. “I don’t know if I can say it out loud.”
“You have to,” Erin says.
Otis takes a deep breath, looks up. Spot licks his wrist. “I remember Spencer’s exact words,” he says. “He said she should feel lucky they even wanted her. Then Eric said she just laid there.” Otis looks like he’s going to be sick. “Eric said he likes it better when they fight a little.”
Erin realizes she’s holding Otis’s hand.
“Then Eric started complaining about how Spencer always gets to go first, how he wants to go first next time. Like they’re planning a next time. And then Eric started talking about Ennis and asking Spencer if he thought Ennis was going to tell, how he never should have been a part of it, how he’s a pussy and they can’t trust him. But that’s when I fell over where I was sort of crouching in the cereal aisle, and I knocked some boxes off the shelves.”
“Oh no,” Erin says.
“Oh yes.”
“Then what happened?”
“Spencer said something like, ‘What do you want?’ and Eric said, ‘Oh, shit, do you think he heard us?’ and then I just sort of ran away.”
“You sort of ran away?”
“I ran away.”
“But they caught you.”
“Eric did. I was running, but I’m not a very fast runner, and he’s, like, a football player. I heard him coming and then I just felt myself getting pulled back by my jacket. And then I was on the ground and he was punching me. He kicked me in the stomach. I didn’t even fight back.”
Erin dabs Otis’s tears with a cotton ball.
“I begged him to stop and he just laughed at me. And in that moment I think I knew, just a little, what it felt like to be Lucy. To be Cheyenne.”
And me, Erin thinks. And then she’s crying too. And Spot is frantic, his face snapping back and forth as he tries to lick them both.
“Then Eric stood up, like totally calm,” Otis says, wiping his nose with his sleeve. “He said I’d get worse if I told anyone what I heard. And then he spit on me and walked away.”
“You need to tell the police,” Erin says.
“Yeah, right,” Otis says. “Like they’ll believe me. We both know they’re not going to do anything. Eric’s dad plays poker with the police chief. And weren’t they, like, in Desert Storm together or something?”
“Why’d you come here?”
“I don’t know. I feel safe here. With you.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“I’m okay with that.”
“Why are you looking at me?” Erin says. “Do I have snot coming out of my nose? I’m not good at crying.”
“I just like looking at you.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“I know.”
“I can’t breathe,” Erin says. “I think I’m having a heart attack.”
“You’re too young to have a heart attack.”
“But it hurts,” Erin says. “Here.” She puts her hand over her heart.
Otis puts his hand on top of hers.
“It’s my fault you got hurt,” Erin cries. “Because of the Nowhere Girls. Because I’m one of the people who started it. If we hadn’t started it, you wouldn’t have gotten hurt.”
Otis smiles. “Just when I thought I couldn’t like you any more.”
“What?”
“I do.”
Erin’s trickle of tears turns into real sobs. She covers her face with her hands. “But you’re so ugly!” she cries. “I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant. You’re not ugly. Your face is. No, wait—”
“I think you’re beautiful,” says Otis.
Erin stands up and starts pacing the room, Spot following close behind. She needs an anchor, something familiar and soothing to counter all this weirdness. “Have you ever thought about how deep-space travel like on Star Trek is similar to deep-ocean exploration?” she says. “It’s all about going where no one’s gone before, finding new life-forms, and expanding our knowledge. Did you know that less than five percent of the ocean floor has been explored? Did you know that we know more about the surface of the moon than we do about the seafloor? Did you know that there are whole ecosystems down there that don’t rely on the sun, like all the energy comes from chemicals that come through hydrothermal vents, and there are six-foot-tall tube worms that live around them, where the water’s like eighty degrees Celsius, and there are copepods that eat chemosynthetic bacteria, and eels and crabs that eat them, and what this all means is there could be life on other planets, maybe even intelligent life, that isn’t based on photosynthesis.” Erin stops pacing. Otis and the weirdness are still here. “Wait, what are you going to tell your parents?”
“I’ll say I fell off my bike riding to the store.”
“They’ll believe that?”
“Sure.”
“Your parents must not be very smart people.”
“Erin?”
“What?”
“Did you hear me say you’re beautiful?”
She starts pacing again. “You only have one eye right now,” she says. It is a shiny brown rock sprinkled with light.
“What do you think about that?” Otis says.
Erin’s hands flap wildly. “This is who I am. You think this is beautiful?”
“Don’t you?”
Erin stops. She looks Otis straight in the eye. “You’re delusional.”
“That’s entirely possible.” Otis stands up, facing her.
“Why are you standing up? You’re hurt. You’re supposed to be sitting.”
He doesn’t say anything. He just looks at her that way he does, his face so open, so not afraid of any of the things Erin finds so terrifying.
“I’m not a project,” Erin says. “You’re never going to change me. I’m never going to be normal. I’m autistic. I want to stay autistic.”
“I don’t want to change you.”