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The three of us laugh softly. I work to maintain eye contact with Laney, trying desperately not to show my discomfort with being here. She smiles at me. “Callie, why don’t you go upstairs and grab Lilly,” she says. “She’s started being pretty picky with her clothes, and I bet she’s still looking for an outfit. I think she’d like your advice.”
Confused by Laney seemingly trying to get me alone, I look at Callie. She blinks back at me, similarly stumped. Then she snaps out of it and stands up. “Okay,” she says easily, leaning over to give Laney a hug. She looks at me over Laney’s shoulder and gives a slight shrug. “See you later.”
“Tell your mom thanks again for the meals.”
“I will!”
Callie leaves the living room, and I look at Laney expectantly. With another kind smile, she adjusts her headscarf. “Is Maverick in the hallway?” she asks quietly.
“He went out on the porch.”
“How do you think he’s doing?”
“Oh,” I say. “Um—”
“This has been so awful for him. Having to leave school, missing his junior baseball season.” She sighs. “I know this will hurt him in the draft. And no matter how much he thinks I don’t want him to play baseball, I do. I want him to get everything he’s ever wanted.” Her eyes lose focus as she stares at a random point above my head. “All the sacrifices he’s making…it’s not fair to him.”
I feel strange discussing Maverick with his mother like this, but I go along with it. “He’s here because he wants to be, though. It wasn’t really that tough of a choice for him.”
Laney shifts her gaze back to my face, her blue eyes—Maverick’s eyes—focusing on mine. “I know,” she says, and lowers her voice, as if trying to keep her next words between the two of us. “And I’m proud of him for that. But I’m also worried. He’s a bit lost, and it’s not because I’m sick. He has been for a while.”
I’m not sure that I agree, and I feel oddly defensive over Maverick and his choices. “He—” I stop, trying to find a way to voice my thoughts without being too contrary. “I think he’s just really, really focused. I’ve always admired that about him, actually. The way he’s so sure about what he wants and goes after it.”
“Well, he doesn’t go aftereverythinghe wants,” Laney says.
She’s looking at me meaningfully, like she’s trying to get me to infer some subtext from her words. I wait for something to connect in my brain, but it never does. “I’m sorry,” I say finally. “I don’t understand.”
Laney laughs a little, just a short puff of air under her breath. She tilts her head from side to side, seeming to think carefully about her next words. “I want Maverick to be happy,” she says after a minute. “But you’re not responsible for that, Azalea, so please don’t feel like I’m putting you on the spot here. God knows I wouldn’t want Lilly to be a man’s crutch. I’m just going to ask you one favor, and then I’ll take my nose out from where it doesn’t belong.”
“Sure,” I say, completely bewildered by this conversation. “Of course.”
“Pay attention to the way he looks at you.”
My brow furrows.The way he looks at me?Maverick’s face flashes through my mind like a slideshow: joyous after a team win, mischievous as he shoots me with a water gun, devastated in the hallway just a few minutes ago.
Soft, as he touches my face and tells me I’ll always be loved.
I clear my throat. “What—”
“All I’m asking is that you notice it, like I’ve noticed it every time I’ve seen you two together. Once you figure out what I’m talking about, what you do about it is completely your choice.”
I’m still confused, and my mouth is open—to say what, I don’t know—when Callie pokes her head back into the room. “Zale, Lilly and I are ready to go.”
“Okay.” I look to Laney for permission.
She smiles. “Go. Take care, Azalea.”
“You too,” I say mechanically, feeling untethered. She reaches out to squeeze my hand, I squeeze back, and then I walk, slightly dazed, out of the house.
Callieisupsetafterwe drop Lilly off and head back to our apartment. “I’ve never known anyone who died who was younger than, like, eighty,” she tells me tearfully as we merge onto the highway. Callie isn’t an easy crier like I am, and it’s disconcerting to see her so upset. She doesn’t ask about my conversation with Laney, and I don’t bring it up. Compared to the enormous impending loss of Laney, however Maverick may or may not be looking at me seems shallow and inconsequential.
But when I wake up the next morning, in my bed at my dad’s house like I promised Maverick, I’m selfishly stuck on those nine words:pay attention to the way he looks at you.
I get ready for the day while running through a mental catalog of every interaction I’ve ever had with him, trying to see what Laney sees. I’m growing frustrated with the memory game by the time he texts that he wants to come over and study.
Dad isn’t home from work yet when the doorbell rings, so I head downstairs to answer it. Through the glass, I can see Maverick standing on the porch with his backpack hanging off one shoulder. He doesn’t look quite as haggard as he did a few days ago, which I’m relieved to see. Still, the bags are heavy beneath his eyes, and he does look a bit too skinny.
I push open the screen door and poke my head out. “Hey.”
