"Tangled Youth" Chapter 15
Tangled Youth
Chapter 15
Boone stood in the kitchen the next morning, not remembering why he was there. He and Shannon had only kissed for a few minutes, and he had woken up alone, but the few moments he had shared with her loomed over his head in a thick cloud that refused to disappear. And it was all he could think about.
“Good morning, sweetheart.” Sabrina looked up from her copy of the Wall Street Journal, smiling briefly at her son. “What are you doing?”
Boone looked at her, startled - he hadn’t noticed that she was there. “Uh,” he tried to think of why. He glanced at the clock, which read 7:23 AM. Of course. Breakfast. “I was just going to make myself some cereal.”
“Okay, I bought some granola yesterday,” Sabrina turned the page of her newspaper, taking a sip of coffee. “Where’s Shannon?” Boone thought he had heard her name in his head, so he tried to ignore it and took the box of granola out of a cupboard, grabbing an apple out of the fruit basket and trying to find a knife. “Boone? Where’s Shannon?”
“Huh?” Boone started, caught off guard. “I don’t know,” his voice sounded petulant.
“Why are you being rude to be, honey?” His mother asked him, her lips creating a thin, angry line.
“I’m not, I’m sorry, okay?” He began to slice his apple.
“Well you know how she sleeps through her alarm, and you usually wake her up, so I thought that - “ But Boone didn’t have to answer her, because just then, Shannon, dressed with her hair and makeup done perfectly, all signs of last night’s vulnerability completely gone.
“Sabrina,” Shannon sounded surprised to see her stepmother in the kitchen. “What are you doing here?”
“I live here, Shannon, so be civil for once and pretend you don’t hate me.” Shannon sighed, and got an orange from the fruit basket, looking at Boone for a moment. Boone didn’t look back, afraid that he wouldn’t be able to tear his eyes away. “If you two could sit down, I need to talk to you.” Boone dropped the knife he was using to cut the apple. Had Sabrina heard? Shannon rolled her eyes, sitting on a chair and putting her feet on the chair across from it. “Shannon, don’t put your feet on the furniture.” Shannon stomped her feet back to the ground begrudgingly. Boone put the apple slices into his granola, along with some milk, and took the bowl to the table, sitting next to Shannon. He glanced at her, and with the glance he remembered her crying eyes, her lips, the feel of her tongue. He remembered the story of her mother, wondering why she had insisted on keeping it to herself for so long.
“This summer, I have a big job in Sydney, Australia. It’ll be huge for the business, but it requires me to be there for a few weeks.”
“Great, we’ll be fine on our own.” Shannon said abruptly.
“Shannon,” Sabrina smiled dangerously. “I was actually thinking, that because it’ll be in the summer, that we could make it a family vacation. Of course, I wouldn’t be around all that much, andAdam is only going for a week because he has a case, but it would be fun to get a change of scenery. And I hear that Sydney’s beautiful.” Boone was extraordinarily relieved. She didn’t know.
“I’ve always wanted to go to Australia,” he said.
“Sure,” Shannon shrugged, but Boone could tell she was hiding her enthusiasm. “Whatever. When are we going?”
“June twentieth until July third,” Sabrina said.
“But that means I’ll be jet-lagged for all the July 4th parties!” Shannon argued.
“You’ll live,” Sabrina said, “We’re going, and I’m not asking your permission, Shannon.”
“Okay,” Shannon said, taken aback.
“Oh, it’s 7:30,” Sabrina looked at the clock, standing up. “I need to get to work.” Once Sabrina’s heels had clicked out of the kitchen, the silence between Shannon and Boone became tension-filled and palpable.
“So,” Boone started, “I thought that we should talk about what happened last night.” Shannon looked annoyed.
“We’re not making out again,” Shannon told him. “I don’t know howyou let it happen, but it’s not happening again,” she said decidedly.
“I… I know,” he told her. “But that actually wasn’t what I was talking about. About Camilla…”
“What about her?” Shannon asked suspiciously.
“I guess I’m just wondering why you haven’t told anyone about her. Or gone to someone or something.”
“I’m not going to any fucking shrink,” she yelled. “I’m not insane, I don’t need anyone!”
“Jesus, Shannon,” he took a bite of his granola. “Calm down.”
“You think I’m crazy?” Her voice cracked.
“No, Shannon, not just crazy people go to psychiatrists. I just thought you could use someone to talk to, or maybe your dad might have when you were younger. I mean, witnessing your mother committing suicide…”
“Don’t talk to me like you know everything about me,” she looked away, and Boone instantly felt guilty.
“I’m sorry,” he said, ashamed. “I’m sorry,” he turned her head towards his, forcing her to look him in the eyes. “I know that it’s a really sensitive issue for you, and I was wrong to mention it. I won’t do it again if you’re not comfortable about - “ Shannon shrugged away from his touch. “Sorry,” he said again, staring at his bowl of cereal.
“It’s okay,” she responded, finally after a few minutes. “You’re forgiven.” She attempted a smile.
A few minutes later, Shannon and Boone sat in Anna’s driveway, waiting for her to come out of her house so that they could drive to school.
“Just honk,” Shannon insisted from the back seat of his car.
“No, it’s rude,” he argued, his fingers creeping towards the honk button on the steering wheel. It was tempting, at 7:30 in the morning, to do so, but he had been raised for seventeen years as a polite and cautious child, so he opened the car door and got out, walking up to the van Camp’s door. He rang the bell, and after a few seconds, Anna emerged, her left shoe half on.
“Sorry,” she said breathlessly, “I was running late.” She pulled him towards her and kissed him deeply. She tasted like toothpaste, not cigarettes, this time. But it was strange, now that he and Shannon had kissed like this, Anna’s kisses didn’t feel as nice anymore. And when they walked back to the car, he noticed that she didn’t look as beautiful anymore either. “Look, Boone, I’m sorry about yesterday, too. I was being a bitch, and it won’t happen again. Smoking is stupid.” Boone agreed, but he wasn’t hearing her words. He knew now that he had to break up with her. He just didn’t know how he was going to do so.
“Anna?” Boone found her at lunch, surprisingly alone, and she looked delighted to see him. It just made him feel even worse.
“Yeah?” She answered, chipper. “You wanna go get lunch?”
“Actually,” he said. “I think we need to talk.”
Anna’s smile disappeared. “You’re really fucking clueless, aren’t you? You don’t break up with a girl during school!” She attempted a smile, but failed.
“Anna,” He said apologetically. “Let’s go somewhere more private to talk, okay?”
“Fine,” she followed him outside to the back of the school, and then stood across from him, arms crossed over her chest. “What did I do wrong?”
“N-nothing,” he stuttered.
“You’re bored of me?” She asked expectantly. Boone opened his mouth. “No? You cheating on me?”
“No,” he said, although what he and Shannon had done probably counted.
“Where were you that weekend? When your parents were gone? Why didn’t you call me to come over? I mean, most guys would be thrilled at the prospect of spending a weekend wildly fucking their girlfriends, you know?”
“Anna, I’m not cheating on you. I just think that this relationship isn’t - “
“Why didn’t you call me? What the hell, Boone? Why are you doing this to me? I love you!” She was close to tears now, and Boone had no idea what to do. “You’re such an idiot, breaking up with me at school. I mean, what kind of fucking heel does that? And why do you always push me away when I kiss you? Why don’t you want me?” She cried, randomly blabbering on, pushing Boone towards annoyance. “I know why,” she said determinately. “It’s her, and don’t you dare try to deny it. The other night, when we were in your car after the movie? You were taking off my clothes, Boone,” she reminded him, “And you want to know what you said? You said, ‘Shannon’! And I ignored you, I thought you might have just accidentally said it, but I was thinking about it yesterday when Danny gave me a ride home, and I realized that it really makes things make sense. Really fucking great, Boone!” She spat.
“Anna, stop!” He warned her. “You don’t know the first thing about me and Shannon, so -“
“I don’t know the first thing about you and Shannon,” she scoffed. “Yeah, right. I’ve been best friends with her since we were ten, and what do you know? I’ve been sleeping with you for three months, so don’t tell me I don’t know. Don’t tell me that I don’t notice that we’ll be acting perfectly normal, and then she’ll come in, and suddenly you don’t care about me anymore.” She sniffled. “What am I, some kind of lame substitute? Don’t answer that,” she held up her hand to stop him. “Where were you that weekend? What were you doing?”
“Look, Anna,” although he felt bad that he was letting her down, he also felt that Anna had crossed the line, and as anger welled up inside of him, he had no control over what came out of his mouth next. “Maybe I had more important things to do than fuck you!”
Anna choked, looking like she wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. “You did not just say that,” she gasped. “Oh my God, Boone, you just don’t know. You just don’t fucking know.” She turned around, starting to walk away.
“That didn’t come out right!” He yelled after her. “I’m sorry!”
Anna turned around, smiling slightly. “It’s okay, Boone,” she said. “We’ll be okay.”
After lunch, Boone had PE, and as he walked into the locker room, he got a few strange looks. Shit, he thought, did they know about what he had said to Anna? Boone nodded a hello to his fellow students in the locker room, opening his gym locker after spinning the combination 4-8-23. He pulled out his PE shirt, which, like all PE shirts, was oversized and ugly. But the boys in his class were still staring at him. “What?” he finally said.
“You have more important things to do than fuck Anna van Camp?” Jerry, a short stoner asked. “What teenage boy has more important things to do than fuck her? She’s so fucking hella hot, dude.”
Boone looked at Jerry, frowning. “Whatever,” he took off his shirt and unzipped his pants, sliding them over his shoes with difficulty.
“I take it you broke up,” said Perry, who was tall and had dark, short hair. “What happened?”
Jerry chuckled. “I wonder,” he rolled his eyes. Just then, Kevin, who was in his PE class, appeared.
“Dude!” Kevin greeted Boone. “You really fucked up, didn’t you? More important things to do than…” he trailed off, laughing. Boone was not amused. Humiliated might be a better word to describe how he felt. “If you don’t want to fuck her, I will,” Kevin continued. God, all they cared about was sex. One of Boone’s old babysitters had told Boone that he was an adult in a little kid’s body, and it was times like these when he most agreed with her. “I’ve always kinda had a thing for her.”
“Thanks, Kevin, that’s really comforting.” But that wasn’t the worst of Boone’s embarrassment for the day.
When he arrived in the gym after changing, all of the girls in the class gawked at him. As he walked by, he heard someone whisper to a friend, “Apparently, he has more important things to do than fuck Anna van Camp. Who the hell does he think he is?”
The ride home from school was liberating - just him and Shannon again, who sat in the front this time and put her legs on the dashboard. He brushed his hand over her bare thigh when he reached over to turn on the radio, and she didn't argue. “She slept with that guy Danny last night, you know,” Shannon told him, running her hand across his arm, somewhere between sexual foreplay and feeling bad for him. They didn’t say much else for the rest of the car ride.