How to Repair a Mechanical Heart

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THEY ARE NOT PEOPLE THEY ARE HEARTLESS GOONS AND DESERVE ETERNAL FIERY TORMENT.

Another sign. Are you listening yet? says Father Mike.

“They took our picture,” says Abel. “Three feet away.”

What else will they do?

“This is hardcore. We have organized haters.” Abel clasps his hands. “You guys?”

“What.”

He sighs dreamily. “I’m so proud!”

I stand without knowing where I’m going. Dishes. Perfect. They stack up so fast. I go to the sink and fill it halfway with water, hot as I can stand it, and three pumps of Mom’s lemon dish soap. Then I grab a clean sponge and start scrubbing. Hard.

Abel stage-whispers, “What’s with him?”

“I don’t know,” Bec says softly.

“Brandon?”

I don’t answer. I plunge a plate in the little basin and Abel’s disgusting chili remnants dissolve in the white cloud of suds. He’s saying something to Bec. Something I don’t want to hear, about time alone with me or whatever. I try to clearly communicate my wishes to her with the side of my head, but our telepathy isn’t what it used to be, because she gets up from the table and slips out the door.

Abel comes over. I feel him watching me for a minute, leaning up against the counter.

“You’re really freaked out,” he says.

Eternal fiery torment.

“Just tired.” I start filling the basin again. Hot rinse.

“I’m sure it’s just a big joke.”

“I’m sure it is.”

He reaches over and shuts my water off. He lets his hand brush mine as he pulls it back and I get this stupid lightning-flash impulse to grab it and tell him the whole truth. Pull the plug from the drain. Tell him all about Father Mike. Fake Zander.

“I shouldn’t have done that before,” he says. “Sent Ian over.”

“It’s fine.” I don’t look at him. “I was a jerk too.”

“No, you want to know why I did it? Why I care or whatever?”

I stare into the sink, at the suds escaping down the drain. Abel picks up the silver Castaway Planet superball he bought from one of the vendors. He starts bouncing and catching in a slow clockwork rhythm: shthunk, twack, shthunk, twack.

“Jonathan,” he says.

“Who?”

Shthunk, twack.

“My Zander.”

I’m not sure I want to hear more, but that never stops Abel, and before I can make up some excuse he’s pulled me into his tenth-grade trauma and I’m there with him at this holy roller wedding, exchanging sultry looks with the pretty blond boy at the groom’s table. “I knew I was getting in trouble,” he says. “Everyone at the wedding had like fourteen kids with the same haircut and a Jesus fish on their car, and they all made this huge creepy deal about how the bride and groom hadn’t even kissed yet, like not even one single time. I mean, freako.”

Put on the Brakes!, Chapter 5: Avoid “friends” who would mock the idea of a close relationship with God.

“So anyway, Jonathan gave me a couple super-intense looks across the room and then he left, and I followed him outside and there he was all nervous and shy loosening his tie under a tree, and of course I got a total hard-on for the whole situation, like who wouldn’t want to deflower the sweet i

My stomach drops. Abel goes on and on about how they snuck around that whole summer, how he was so in love, how every time they kissed or whatever it was like some time-lapse film of flowers bursting open and sunrises sprawling across the sky.

“‌…‌And then all of a sudden, he just stopped. Stopped taking my calls, stopped meeting me. Defriended me on Facebook. So I got totally desperate, right, and I sent him this stupid ID bracelet with the date we met engraved on it, and that made him call me but instead of being like ‘oh, baby, I love you too,’ he was like, ‘I don’t identify myself with your lifestyle anymore.’ Your lifestyle. All cold and robotic, exactly like that. And he kept saying things like that, like you know he’d been brainwashed, and I started crying and yelling at him and stuff, and finally he told me his mom had read our emails and they had this huge family blowup and they were going to send him to one of those get-right-with-God lobotomy camps unless he turned his life around. So I told him they were a bunch of sick freaks, and he should lie through his teeth and do whatever he had to for now to keep a roof over his head, and he was like‌—‌are you ready for this?”

I nod.

“He was like, ‘But they’re right. God is more important than feeling good.’ And I said well, can’t you have both? And big surprise, he was like ‘No. I’m sorry. Not like this,’ and then bam, he hung up and that was the last time I ever talked to him.” He flings the superball across the room; it thwacks the moose pillow and rolls lamely off the couch. Abel rakes a hand through his hair. “So, but the point is‌—‌I was absolutely wrecked. I wasted six endless months brooding exclusively over this little piece-of-shit cult-member coward, Brandon. Do you believe it? Like, how many amazing people could I have met in six months? My brother had to literally kick my ass to get me over it.”

“I’m sorry,” I whisper.

“I didn’t tell you that so you’d be sorry! The point is, don’t be like me, okay? Because‌…‌” He sighs. “Because you’re pretty much too awesome for that, and I’m one hundred percent sure this Zander tool is not worth it.”

He lays this open, expectant look on me, like now I’m supposed to throw my arms around him and spill the contents of my heart and mind. I dump the dishes in the hot rinse basin and turn to the fridge.

There’s a ketchup stain by the handle where Abel tossed a French fry at Bec this morning. I scrub with my hands shaking. How much would Abel hate me if he knew what went on inside me all the time, what my brain rejected but my guts still half-believed? It would be the end for sure. No more Screw Your Sensors. No more silly photo shoots with our action figures. No long phone calls at 10 p.m. on Thursdays to pick apart the latest episode. I scrub harder, willing him to stay where he is. If he gets any closer, I feel like he’ll know‌—‌one look at me, one little touch, and my whole bad history will scrawl itself on my skin.

“What’s the matter?” he says.

I keep scrubbing. “I just‌—‌I think we should give each other some space this week.”

He gasps. “Are you breaking up with me?”

“I’m serious.” I thump my head on the fridge, right above the apple magnet holding the Castaway Ball tickets. “Just back off me for now. Okay?”

“Brandon, what is your problem?”

“No problems. Zero problems.”

“Are you that mad at me?”

“I’m not mad.”

“All I did was try to be your friend and help you out and you’re acting like I‌—‌”

“Will you shut up? For once? Everything’s not about you, all right? God!” I yank open the fridge and start rearranging. Juice boxes sorted by size, yogurts lined up straight. “I should be focusing on other stuff right now. College. I shouldn’t have said yes to this stupid trip.”

“Then why did you?”

“Because you steamrolled me.”

“Wha‌—‌I did not!”

“You steamroll everyone!” I slam the fridge. “All you care about is making people do what you want. It’s not even worth disagreeing with you because you just talk and talk until people give in and you think it’s because you’re so charming but really it’s to shut you up.” I swoop in for the kill. “The sad thing is, you think you’re Cadmus. When actually you’re just kind of a dick.”

Abel’s quiet for a long time, like he’s waiting for an aw, just kidding! When I don’t give him one, he stuffs his hands in his pockets and scuffs at the kitchen mat.