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He finally looks up from the picture, and his smile is still there.
“Thanks for showing me this.” He hands it back.
“I always have it with me,” I say, taking one last look at the picture of Arti and me on top of the big black lion.
“I guess the way you carry it around is the way I carry around that book. I used to read to her. So, every time I open it, it’s like she’s there … you know?”
“I know. I want to go back to London one day. Mama won’t take me. She thinks the whole world outside of our apartment is dangerous.”
“Sounds like my stepfather,” he says and shakes his head.
“Adults are so strange.”
“Yeah, you can say that again.” He lies back down and opens his book.
My head falls back into the hammock, and I turn it to look at his topside clad feet that are resting beside my head. Like the rest of him, they’re big. The soles of his shoes are worn so badly that a hole is forming in the left one. I look at the rest of his shoes and see that they’re worn like that all over. Tante has told me that some people don’t have money for things like that. She’s always scolding me to be grateful for everything. And I am. I think about how he ate that cake, at the way his shoes look. I wonder if maybe Graham is poor.
I sit up to ask him what his parents do. I raise my torso off the hammock and grab the sides to steady myself and then sit up. But instead of holding steady, the hammock swings wildly.
I scream as I pitch to the side, then I grab hold of his legs and press my face into them.
“Whoa, whoa, it’s okay. Stop wiggling around, it’s not gonna tip over,” he says in a calm voice. But I’m sure if I let go, I’m going to fall out and land face-first on the ground.
Even though the hair on his legs is tickling my face, I hold on even tighter.
“Apollo,” he says more forcefully, but I can tell he’s trying not to laugh.
“Don’t laugh at me,” I say in a voice Papa described as petulant.
“Don’t be a scaredy-cat. It’s only a few feet to the ground. I don’t think you’d die if you fell out.” He doesn’t try to hide his laugh this time. He reaches down and pulls my
arms off his legs.
I sit up cross-legged and frown at him. “If I get hurt and Tante sees it, she won’t let me go out and play anymore,” I warn, and his smile fades a little.
“Well, I’m not gonna let you get hurt,” he says.
The sun cuts down across his face, and the blond in his hair glows like honey, and I forget all about the swaying hammock.
“Your hair’s a pretty color.”
“You shouldn’t call boys pretty,” he says, but I can see that he’s blushing and trying to hide his smile.
“Well, it’s true. You should grow it.”
“No, only sissy boys have long hair,” he says and lies back down.
“My papa had long hair. And he wasn’t a sissy,” I tell him.
“Okay.” He says it like he doesn’t believe me.
“It’s true. Ask your hairdresser next time you go get it cut. They’ll tell you that lots of men who aren’t sissies have long hair.”
His smile falls, and he glances up at the trees and says, “My stepdaddy cuts it.”
He says “daddy” the way I say “snakes.”
“Why does he cut it instead of your hairdresser?” I ask.
