Free Personal Effects by E. M. Kokie Page B

DVD, but I dig through the drawer in the bathroom until I find a stray Band-Aid in the back. I scrub my knuckles with soap, then put the Band-Aid on the one that kept bleeding. It doesn’t want to stick, but I hold it on with the finger next to it.
    When I come back in, she smiles her approval, maybe like the future nurse she wants to be. It kind of makes me want to rip the Band-Aid off for spite. But I don’t.
    Shauna pulls her sweatshirt over her head. Her T-shirt rides up. I busy myself with the remote. Some of my favorite fantasies start with her shirt pulling up to reveal smooth, pale skin.
    Between her being in my room, the weirdness from upstairs, and the general weirdness between us lately, I don’t know where to sit. But she sits on the floor, steals my pillow, and leans against my bed. Makes it easy to do the same.
    Once the movie starts, one we’ve seen a dozen times, things get normal between us again, at least what’s been passing for normal since November. The crinkling wrappers and flood of grape smell from Shauna’s candy feels exactly like a hundred other times we’ve sat right here, her oblivious, and me trying not to let on what having her here, in my room, does to me.
    And it feels good, just us, and little talking except to mock the movie.
    After, neither of us moves to put in another right away. But when the quiet gets too heavy, I try to get up fast to change the DVD. Big mistake. My muscles have tightened up and hurt like hell. I can’t help wincing and hissing.
    “Geez, Matt.”
    “I’m fine.” I smile down at her, trying to convince her. To break the tension, I try for a laugh. “You shoulda seen the other guys.”
    She doesn’t laugh. “I did.” She hesitates, then looks away, undoing her messy hair from its band, and then taking her time gathering all the stray hair in again. It’s a habit, when she doesn’t know what else to do. “The side of Michael’s face is turning purple. He had a concussion.”
    Great, just what I need — Michael using the fight as a way to get back in with Shauna. With my luck, she’ll be so impressed with his maturity and concern she’ll let him below the equator this time. Just freaking great.
    “You really messed Pinscher up.” It isn’t quite an accusation.
    “I know.” I close my eyes and shift my weight from one foot to the other. I can’t stand her looking at me like that. “Shauna, I . . .” I almost say I’m sorry, but it would be stupid to apologize to her for beating up Pinscher. I try to figure out what she wants to hear.
    She takes three steps over to my bed and sits down. “What happened? I mean, why . . . ?”
    I can’t say it again. If I say it again, I’m gonna go insane.
    “OK, not why,” she says. “I get
why.
”
    Great. “Does everyone know?”
    “Pretty much.” She nods, picking at the edge of the bedspread with her nail.
    Terrific. Every time I think it can’t get worse, it does. Screw it. I’m not going back. They can fail me.
    “Matt, even the kids who usually suck up to Pinscher and sign his petitions and stuff get that he went too far.”
    My head’s gonna explode. “Went too far?” Pounding in my ears. It’s not a fucking matter of degrees. “Went too . . . Is that what
Michael
said, that the asshole
‘went too far’
? Do you think that there is any fucking —?”
    “Calm down.” Her hands fly up in front of her. “I get it. I do. It’s just . . .” She trails off, shrugging a little.
    Whatever Michael said to her, I know he doesn’t get it, so maybe she doesn’t, either. “Went too far,” like just the shirt would have been OK? Or maybe a shirt with all the names but T.J.’s? It wasn’t about “too far.” It was about right and wrong. I wasn’t wrong.
    That first punch, the moment of impact, the crunch and the flood of blood. I feel sick.
    “I’m just so tired,” I say, “of everything.”
    “I know,” she says, smoothing the spot next to her.
    I can’t. I can’t talk