AllFreeNovel
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“Hi,” I say.
“Hey,” he says. “Come here, sit down.”
“Can I eat the food?” I ask when I sink onto the ground next to him.
“Yes,” he says.
I dig the Styrofoam container of biscuits and gravy from the bag and open the small plastic fork that came with it.
“I didn’t mean what I said yesterday,” he says. “Not like that, anyway. I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too.”
“I got you something. Close your eyes and hold out your hands.”
I set the nearly-empty box on the ground next to me and do as he asks. He sets something rectangular in my hands.
“Open them,” he says.
“You got me a phone?” I ask. “I can’t take this.”
“Yes, you can,” he says. “It’s on a month-to-month plan, it’s a shitty carrier, but the signal is okay, and it was actually really cheap, so please take it. It will make everything better, I promise. You can put it under your bed with your drug money and only turn it on when you are somewhere you can talk or text.”
“I don’t know, Devon…”
“Here,” he says, pulling his own phone out from his pocket. “I’ll send you a text. Let me know if you get it.”
The phone vibrates in my hand, and a little red ‘1’ pops up next to my inbox. I click on the message and open it.
I love you, Allyson.
I read it at least three times before I shoot him a puzzled look.
“That’s what I should have said,” he says. “I should have just told you that you looked pretty—because you did—and that I love you. I love you, and I miss you when you’re not around and I can’t talk to you, and it’s hard for me. When something funny or terrible happens, you’re the first person I want to tell, and I hate that I can’t. That’s all I meant by it. I’m not sick of you. I just love you, that’s all.”
“I love you, too,” I tell him. “It’s hard for me, too.”
“This will make it better. It’s cute that you get jealous, though,” Devon says.
“No, it’s not. It’s ugly, and I hate it. I never used to be like this; it’s just…the circumstances.”
“I know,” he says. “How are you? Are you okay? You look tired again.”
“Iamtired.”
“All right, come here,” he says. He pulls me into his chest, and we lie there on the ground.
“But I am better,” I tell him. “Mark left today. I think he’s going to be gone for at least a week. Grace will be back on the bottle, and it’ll be quieter. Hey, what are you doing tonight?”
He pulls a knife from his pocket and opens it with a flip of his wrist, then starts to carve into the wooden bleachers over our heads.
“I have something that I have to do while you’re at track practice, but that’s it. Why?”
“Well, maybe…we could see each other.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, maybe. If Grace drinks enough and goes to bed, then I could text you and…”
