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Then he started talking.
The argument lasted until dawn, and it ended, like most of his conversations with Emery, in a stalemate. When Theo finally stood, his back popping, Emery gave the pills a glance and then looked back at Theo.
“I think—” Theo had to stop and start again, his voice thick. “I think he’ll be ok.”
Emery nodded. “I think so too.”
31
The next day passed in a quiet that was almost lassitude. Theo slept some, trying to catch up on the night he’d lost, but knowing Auggie was awake drove him out of bed. But Auggie only sat on the couch, scrolling through his phone. When Theo asked, he didn’t want to eat. When Theo insisted, he complied. He made faint sounds of discomfort when Theo helped him change the bandage on his face. Theo tried to hurry, but Auggie warded him off, preventing him from placing the new bandage. He sat there, studying the stitched cut that ran from jaw to nose. His dark eyes looked bottomless.
“What did the plastic surgeon say?” Theo asked when Auggie finally let him place the bandage.
It took a while before Auggie spoke, and his voice had the barest hint of an edge, like the first sign of a weapon being drawn. “He said there’s a lot they can do.”
The hours accumulated, drifting around them as they sat on the couch, Theo pretending to read, Auggie pretending to look at his phone.
The knock at the door jolted Theo upright, and he hurried to answer it.
Jem and North stood on the porch.
“Come on,” North said. “We’re going to get dinner.”
“Dinner?” Theo said. He heard himself, heard how he said the word like he’d never heard of the idea before, but the endless summer day and the lack of sleep had made him lose track of time.
“Emery insists he’s smart,” North said to Jem. Jem gave a slanted grin. “Me, I don’t see it.” A little too loudly, he repeated, “Dinner, Gramps. Din-ner.”
Theo looked over his shoulder. Auggie lurked at the end of the hall, his dark eyes empty, his face white. We make our own ghosts, Theo thought to himself, and then we tie them down so they can’t get away.
“Jesus Christ,” North said and shouldered past Theo.
“North—” Theo said.
“Let’s go, pocket rocket,” North said as he reached Auggie. And then, in one easy movement, North scooped Auggie up onto his shoulder and carried him, fireman-style, toward the door.
“Are you crazy? He’s hurt, put him—”
Then Theo realized Auggie was laughing. Giggling, really. It must have hurt, judging by how his cheek creased and the bandage pulled, but if it bothered Auggie, it didn’t stop him.
North slapped Auggie’s butt and grunted. “What the fuck are you feeding him? All right, giddy up!”
And with that, he did this bizarre two-step that some distant, non-horrified part of Theo’s brain recognized as an imitation of a horse’s gallop, and charged toward the door. Auggie broke out in a laugh, a real one.
“North, stop, he’s—”
But North galloped toward the car in the driveway, and Auggie’s laughter floated back to them.
With a grin, Jem said, “I hope you’re not expecting the same treatment.”
Theo stared at him. Then part of his brain seemed to start up again, and he said, “I’ve got to—he can’t be so rough—”
But Jem caught his arm, the touch loose, but solid. “North’s a jackass, but he’s not a moron. He’s not going to hurt Auggie or let him get hurt.”
After a moment, Theo nodded.
“Maybe some shoes,” Jem suggested in a strangely kind voice, and Theo realized he must look like he was out of his mind. “For both of you. Also, I changed my mind: I can offer you a piggy-back ride, but that’s the best I can do.”
It was all unreal. It was beyond unreal, like Theo had stepped through the nightmare of his life into…what? Wonderland? But there was no sign that he was going to wake up, or that, if this were a stroke, his brain was about to go off-line completely. So, he grabbed his New Balance and Auggie’s Jordans.
