Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan Read Free Book Online

in comparison."

    "We all do," I assure him. "This is the kind of stuff I was dealing with yesterday when I should've been here."

    "Does this happen often?"

    "Not this specific thing, but there's usually something like it."

    "Do you think you could escape the crisis for a few hours this afternoon?"

    Since Infinite Darlene blew my cover so thoroughly, I decide to take a risk.

    "You're not asking me just because I like you?"

    He smiles. "The thought never crossed my mind."

    We don't say any more than that. I mean, we say things--we make plans and all. But the subject of us is dropped back into signals and longing.

    We make plans for after school.

    I'm going to help him paint some music.

    Painting Music

    Noah's house is in a different part of town than mine, but the neighborhood looks just the same. Each house has a huge welcome mat of lawn sitting in front of it, bordered by a driveway on one side and a hedge on the other. It should be boringly predictable, but it's not really. The houses are personalized-- a blush of geraniums around the front stoop, a pair of shutters painted to echo the blue sky. In Noah's yard, the hedges have been made into the shape of lightbulbs--the legacy of the former owner, Noah tells me.

    He lives close to the high school, so we walk the bendily cross-hatched roads together. He asks me how long I've lived in town, and I tell him I've lived here my whole life.

    "What's that like?" he asks.

    "I don't really have anything to compare it to," I say after a moment's thought. "This is all I know."

    Noah explains that his family has moved four times in the last ten years. This is meant to be the final stop--now his parents travel everywhere for business instead of making the family move to the nearest headquarter city.

    "I'm so dislocated," Noah confesses.

    "You're here now," I tell him.

    If my family were to move (honestly, I can't imagine it, but I'm stating it here for the sake of argument), I think it would take us about three years to unpack all of our boxes. Noah's family, however, has put everything in its place. We walk through the front door and I'm amazed at how immaculate everything is. The furniture has settled into its new home; the only thing the house lacks is clutter. We walk into the living room--and it's one of those living rooms that look like nobody ever lives in them.

    We head to the kitchen for a snack. Noah's sister is sitting alert at the corner table, like a parent waiting up late at night for a kid to come home.

    "You're late," she says. "You missed Mom's call."

    She must be in eighth grade -- maybe seventh. She's old enough to wear make-up, but she hasn't figured out yet how to wear it well.

    "Is she going to call back?" Noah asks.

    "Maybe." End of conversation.

    Noah reaches out for the mail on the table, sifting through the catalogs and bulk mail for something worthwhile.

    "Paul, this is my sister, Claudia," he says as he separates the recyclable from the nonrecyclable. "Claudia, this is Paul."

    "Nice to meet you," I say.

    "Nice to meet you, too. Don't hurt him like Pitt did, okay?"

    Noah's annoyed now. "Claudia, go to your room," he says, giving up on the mail.

    "You're not the boss of me."

    "I can't believe you just said that. What are you, six years old?"

    "Excuse me, but aren't you the one who just said 'Go to your room'? And by the way, Pitt wrecked you. Or have you forgotten?"

    It's clear Noah hasn't forgotten. And neither, to her credit, has Claudia.

    Satisfied by this turn of conversation, Claudia drops the subject.

    "I just made a smoothie pitcher," she tells us as she gets up from the table. "You can have some, but leave at least half."

    Once she's out of the room, Noah asks me if I have a little sister. I tell him I have an older brother, which isn't really the same thing.

    "Different methods of beating you up," Noah says.

    I nod.

    After drinking some of Claudia's mango-cherry-vanilla concoction, Noah leads me up the back stairs to