I always feel like a zombie after therapy. It's exhausting to sit there, on Mrs. Evans' -sorry, Melissa's- couch for an hour and talk to her about all the ways I got fucked over by my brain this week, all while she nods and smiles and scribbles things down in her notepad and then smiles some more. I don't have anything against her. I just wish I could never see her again.
By the time I dump my bike on the front lawn, all I want is to be alone. Instead, I'm immediately greeted by my mom.
"Hey, mi amor!" she exclaims, smiling at me. She's standing in the front door like she was just waiting for me to come home and jumped up as soon as she heard me arrive, her dark curls spilling out of her ponytail and her hands fiddling with the bow at the back of her kitchen apron. "You came at just the right time! Dinner will be ready in two minutes."
I nod and force the corners of my mouth to lift as she ushers me inside. After the quiet of Melissa's office, coming home is always a shock. The house is so loud; in the hallway, my little sisters are fighting over who's allowed to use the iPad, Elena is listening to music at a volume that makes the floor vibrate beneath my feet, and the kitchen is filled with the banging of cupboards and dishes. The smell of garlic and herbs that's hanging in the air only gets stronger as I trudge through the kitchen door.
"Hola, abuela," I murmur.
My grandmother doesn't respond, too busy alternating between stirring in one of the large pots and frying something in another pan.
I push Frida Kahlo, the rugged red cat who's missing part of her ear, aside with my foot in order to get the plates from one of the cupboards. She hisses at me in response but slinks away when I only send her a blank stare.
"How was your appointment?" mom asks while we set the table together.
"Fine," I mumble.
She nods with a smile, like that isn't what I always say, and gently pushes me down on one of the chairs. A moment later, my sisters come storming into the kitchen, Andrea and Isabel still bickering while Elena is looking mildly annoyed.
"Sup," she says as she plops down next to me. "How was therapy?"
I try to suppress the flare of annoyance that runs through me at the question, but my voice still comes out sharper than intended when I say, "Fine. You don't always have to ask."
She rolls her eyes, raising her hands in surrender. "Gee, sorry for caring about my twin brother."
I snort. Even though we have the same curls and the same eyes and the same everything it's sometimes hard to believe that she's my twin and not my older sister. Elena has all her shit together; she's got a boyfriend, a huge group of friends, a driver's license, and a scholarship that got her into Georgetown. Most of all, she has a normally functioning brain. I could never imagine her having to sit in Melissa's office.
I'm ripped out of my thoughts when a wrinkled hand suddenly comes into view and sets a plate that's barely visible under the mountain of food on it down in front of me.
"I'm not eating all of that," I murmur and pass it on to Elena.
Abuela shakes her head and braces her hands on her hips. "Niño, you need to eat! You're a beanpole!"
"I'm really not hungry. Sorry."
"It's alright, cariño," mom says and pushes another plate my way, this one half as full.
I'm not sure why they still act so surprised every time. Ever since I started taking anti-depressants a few months ago, my appetite has been pretty much non-existent, but that concept seems to be hard to grasp for them.
While everyone around me begins to eat, their voices insufferably loud as they talk about Elena's summer job and Isabel's play date and a new recipe abuela got from one of the ladies at church, I push the food on my plate back and forth with my fork and stare at the wall. Below the old clock that, like everything else in this house, ticks way too loudly, hangs a wooden cross. They're all over the house; above the stairs, in the bedrooms, next to the front door. More are constantly popping up in random places. I think my room is the only one that doesn't have one.
"Feli," mom says, lightly touching my shoulder, "Your dad called while you were gone. He wanted to talk to you."
I frown. "Why? He knows I have therapy on Thursdays."
"He must've forgotten," she sighs. "Just give him a call back when you feel like it, okay?"
I nod, biting back a remark about the fact that he still can't remember the time of my appointments even though it's been the exact same for two years now. "I will."
Before she can say anything else, the ringing of the doorbell cuts through the chatter at the table. I quickly jump to my feet, sending the chair scraping across the tiles. "I'll get it."
My mother's eyes follow me as I cross the room and make my way into the hallway, where I quickly run a hand through my hair. Then, I open the door.
"Buenas noches," Aaron says. He's standing in the doorway with a toothy grin, twirling his car key around with one finger. "Are you ready to go?"
"Yeah. Just-"
"Ask Aaron if he wants some taquitos!" abuela shouts from the kitchen.
"I would love some," he laughs and steps past me into the hallway.
I hover by the kitchen door while he strolls inside. He talks to my mom and Elena for a moment before he walks back over to me, triumphantly clutching two greasy taquitos, which abuela wrapped in a napkin for him, in his hand.
"Thanks, Mrs. Rivera," Aaron says. Slinging an arm around my shoulders, he adds, "We're gonna be on our way then."
Mom looks like she wants to disagree as she shoots a look at my plate, still half full, but because it's Aaron she nods. "Be home before twelve, Feli, okay?"
"'Kay. Bye," I say.
Then, we're finally leaving. Aaron's arm knocks against mine as we make our way across the yard and to his car, a blue Subaru that has probably seen better days.
Getting into the passenger seat of his car is as familiar as breathing. There's a scent about it that I always associate with him; the smell of the old leather seats mixed with his shampoo and the Juicy Fruit chewing gum he always has in his glove box. It makes me relax right away, even as he gets in next to me and shoves the taquitos in my hands to hold while he drives.
Item number two hundred and thirty-six: with Aaron, my head is quiet. Most of the time, anyway.
"So," he says while he pulls away from the curb. "Do you want to talk about therapy?"
"It was okay," I say, leaning back in my seat. "We talked about those... bad thoughts I sometimes have. She wants me to start a thought log to keep track of them and assess whether they're rational or not."
"How do you feel about that?"
"Dunno. I'm not sure how writing all that bullshit down will help. But I guess I'll give it a try."
Aaron shrugs. "If our girl Melissa suggests it, there's probably something to it."
"Our girl," I echo with a chuckle.
Aaron started seeing her around the same time I did. She likes him better than me, I think.
And fuck, if that isn't exactly one of those dumb thoughts she wants me to note down. Melissa would smack me if I said that to her face. Not literally, but verbally, for sure. She doesn't hold back when it comes to these things.
"Hey, give me one of those," Aaron says, briefly taking his hand off the steering wheel to point at the taquitos.
Laughing, I unwrap one of them and hold it near his face for him to take a bite. He scowls when I pull it back before he can reach it.
"Okay, okay," I say and hold it closer to him, only to pull back again.
"Feli," he says, unable to hold back a laugh, "Do you want us to crash?"
Grinning, I stop playing and feed him both taquitos. At some point, his lips graze my fingers and my stomach does a weird thing, but he doesn't notice.
When he's done, I stuff the greasy napkin into his glovebox and look out the window again. The sun is setting by now, bleeding pink and orange into the sky as we drive down the same never-changing tree-lined streets we always do.
These evenings, when all we do is drive around without a destination, have become somewhat of a tradition by now. We usually do it after one of us had therapy; sometimes in silence, sometimes without ever shutting up, sometimes just pretending there's something to say when really all we do is talk shit. He says it's just to kill time. I think that maybe it makes falling asleep easier for him, too.
"My dad called earlier," I say. "He still can't remember when I have therapy."
Aaron briefly looks over at me. "I'm not surprised. Your dad's an asshole."
I snort. It makes sense for him to think that. After all, he was there when my parents still lived together, witnessed my dad hissing and screaming and slamming doors, only to leave my mom alone with five crying children after every argument. Sometimes I think that Aaron hates him even more than I do.
"Mom wants me to call him back, but I don't think I will."
"Maybe don't," Aaron says with a grimace. "He can call you again if it's urgent, right?"
"Yeah." I shake my head. "He doesn't even know which college I'll go to. Honestly, I don't get why he still bothers to call when he clearly doesn't care."
Aaron is quiet for a moment before he says, "I have a feeling your mom tells him to call you and Elena. Maybe she thinks you'll be sad if he doesn't."
As soon as he says it, I realize it makes perfect sense. "Fuck," I murmur. "Why didn't I think of that? She'd totally do that."
Item number two hundred and thirty-seven: Aaron sees people for who they really are.
I jump when he suddenly says, "Can we stop here? Wait, why am I asking, I'm the one driving. We're stopping here."
I look out the window as he pulls onto the parking lot of the little grocery store at the side of the road. "Do you want to come with or stay in the car?" he asks.
"I'll go with you," I immediately say.
Aaron smiles and takes off in the direction of the entrance, only glancing over his shoulder once more to make sure I'm behind him.
"What do you even want to buy?" I ask, rubbing my hands over my arms. The air-conditioned inside of the store is colder than any other place I've been today.
"Something to eat," he says, like the answer is obvious.
"You just had taquitos."
"And? I went running today." He reaches over to ruffle my hair with one hand. "I need much more calories than you, little guy."
Trying not to let him see how flustered the slight touch makes me, I mutter, "I'm an inch taller than you, jackass."
"I'm an inch taller than you, jackass," he parrots in an obnoxiously high-pitched voice and grabs a bag of chips from one of the shelves. "What do you want to eat?"
"Nothing. I don't even have money with me."
Aaron rolls his eyes. "I'll pay. And I'm not leaving until you've picked at least one item."
"Fine," I laugh. "I want orange juice."
"Orange jui- Jesus, you're weird," he mutters, shaking his head, but moves in the direction of the drinks aisle.
I follow him, unable to get the grin off my face as he grabs one of the biggest bottles. It's the same kind we used to drink an entire summer long as kids, lazing around on the porch in front of his house.
When we sit in the car again a few minutes later and I take the first sip, I'm immediately transported back to those days. "Here," I say, holding it in front of his face. "Taste it."
Aaron takes it out of my hand and takes one sip, then another. With a smile, he lets his head fall back against the headrest. "God. The golden times."
"I don't think they were that golden back then," I snort, thinking back to how my parents were already fighting every day and Aaron's mom had been on the lookout for a therapist for him. Two summers later, my parents got divorced and three summers later, I showed the first signs of a generalized anxiety disorder.
"Pshhh, let me unrealistically romanticize the past," Aaron laughs. "It was the summer that we first met, so that has to count for something."
In my memory, those ten weeks all blur together, but I still remember the ecstatic feeling of waking up early every morning knowing I had an entire day with Aaron, the new kid who had just moved in across the street, in front of me.
I wish I could remember if I felt this way about him then, too. Sometimes I think that loving Aaron is as much part of me as the color of my eyes or my peanut allergy. It's like a law of nature: the sun is warm. The sky is blue. Felipe loves Aaron. After all these years, I can't imagine it any other way.
While I think all this, Aaron takes another sip. Passing the bottle back to me, he says, "I haven't had orange juice in so long. I didn't think I'd still like it."
"I guess some things just never really change," I murmur.
He smiles at me, his eyes soft in the blinking lights on the dashboard. Then he glances at his watch and says, "It's almost eleven. We should probably drive back, right?"
I nod, only for my breath to catch in my throat when he puts the car in reverse and rests his hand on the back of my seat, a concentrated furrow between his brows as he pulls out of the parking spot. He's so close that I can smell the familiar scent of washing powder that clings to all of his clothes. It shouldn't be enough to make my heart kick into overdrive, but it does, to the point that I can't even string enough words together to form another item for my list.
Neither of us really talks much during the drive home. It's dark outside by now, the deserted roads only illuminated by the headlights of the car.
From the corner of my eyes, I watch Aaron; the wrist that's draped over the steering wheel, a friendship bracelet identical to the one on my arm around it; his lips, slightly parted; his ridiculously long lashes that flutter as he blinks repeatedly. I can tell that he's tired, probably has been even before he showed up at my house, but he still picked me up and takes me home again, every time.
I like you. In the silence of the car, I can almost taste the words on my tongue, tender and terrible.
I don't say them. Instead, I do the thing I've gotten so damn good at by now: I swallow each of them down and pretend they never existed.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Hey everyone, I hope you're doing well!!
This chapter is probably the one that's closest to the actual lyrics, so I'm interested to see if you guys pick up on the references! My goal here is really just to make you all obsess over Pure Heroine with me lmao.
400 Lux has been one of my favourite songs for years now and the reason I wanted to write this book in the first place, so I really hope I did it justice and you enjoyed!! Let me know your thoughts hehe :)
Also, I want to thank you all so much for the response to the first chapter last week! You're all so incredibly sweet and I'm so happy you guys seem to like this story so far. If I could, I would give all of you a little kiss on the forehead <33
See you all next Friday!
xoxo