Page 129 of Down Bad

I feel like, in his Diego way, he’s saying we’re okay. We’re not boyfriends, maybe. But we’re not nothing, either.

—26—

Diego

Leave it to me.

To not be able to tell Wyatt: I care about you.

To be fucking incapable of a sentence like: I want to be someone important to you.

Or even: I want this relationship.

Instead, I define my feelings as a job description.

I come when you need me.

I wonder if that’s what I was doing all those years ago at that birthday party I only half-remember: answering Wyatt’s SOS when I went out and joined him on that hanging bench, ignoring all the fun inside and basking in the peace and quiet.

I wonder if he remembers that.

It’s a windy fucking Monday at Whitaker Auto. Busy, too. It’s perfect for keeping my hands and mind occupied, though. Tons of oil changes. Tire rotations. Washer fluid and every other done-this-a-thousand-times routine.

I haven’t heard from Wyatt since yesterday. Figured he’d need time with his sis and thought I’d done my due diligence answering his SOS, so I let them be after the restaurant.

I didn’t want to. But I did.

Wyatt no longer needed his soul saved.

He just needed to be honest with his sister.

And whether that involved a heart-to-heart talk over coffee or just an actual game of chess, I don’t know.

I haven’t stopped thinking about him since. His last words at that restaurant. That look he gave me. Couldn’t tell for a sec if he was about to jump my bones right there in the middle of that busy place or ask me to run away with him before his sister got back.

Might’ve welcomed either outcome.

If only he wasn’t so fucking confusing.

That beige rental I thought belonged to another neighbor was still sitting in front of his house this morning when I left for work. I think his sister’s heading back today, wherever she lives, never found out. And just when it seemed like she and I were on the same page about Wyatt’s insistence on letting the world walk all over him …

Maybe it reminds me of my dad a bit. How he never asked for anything, yet everyone in his life just kept taking, taking, taking.

But I also think of my mom. How she always played the role of the loving, smiling, kind wife who threw the best parties. I wonder if any of that was real. Hard to tell when you’re a kid. Even as an adult, the memories are so fucking misleading. Remembering my mom and I laughing. Then her coldly staring out the window a few minutes later as I watched from the hallway, unable to recognize my own mother through her creased forehead and dead eyes, like something took over I couldn’t understand at that age.

No matter how many times I distrust nice people, I’m never gonna have the answer to why she left. I might go the rest of my days not even knowing what she’s doing with her life.

But that’s fine.

Closure isn’t what I need.

She doesn’t have to get some magic redemption arc in my life.

I need to learn how to separate her from everyone else. I want to be able to laugh with people again. I want to trust smiles. I want to see the world the way Wyatt does.

I want to see me the way Wyatt does.

“Still not gonna spill anything about you and Wyatt?”