Split by Swati Avasthi

hoping I’d come back. Maybe he was hoping I wouldn’t .
    Finally he says, “We didn’t give you much incentive to stay.”
    I’m too confused to answer. Does he want a brother, after all? I have a sneaking suspicion that I’ll wake up in the middle of the night, knowing how to respond.
    He sits down on the bed. “I had forgotten about painting the ceiling together.”
    He looks at the wall, but it seems like he’s looking beyond it, looking back. Maybe he’s seeing us again. Me up on the ladder, him on the counters.
    “In spite of Dad and everything, we had some good times,” I say, sitting down next to him.
    He looks me over, and I sit still and tall. After he makes his assessment, he pats my leg in a you’re-a-good-kid gesture. He gets up and walks to his bedroom.
    “Good night,” he calls over his shoulder.
    I kick off my shoes, realize that we forgot to buy pj’s, and strip off my jeans and shirt. I crawl under the covers. Much better than a lumpy couch—a lumpy mattress.
    When I’m lying there, I realize what I should have said to his “we didn’t give you much incentive to stay.”
    “You’re the incentive.”

chapter 10
    d uring my lunch period, I’m at a computer in the media center, trying to adjust my pictures in Photoshop, when I hear the door swing open. Mirriam is click-clacking over to me in her low, all-day-long teacher heels. She looks up and down the row of computers, as if she’s registering the total emptiness before she sits next to me. I glance at the seeds that fleck my sandwich.
    “What are you doing?” she asks, twisting a blue coffee cup in her hand.
    I recognize it from the morning tea ritual she and Christian have going: whoever has the blue cups makes the tea that morning and brings it over. Part of their whole so-together-in-our-separate-apartments thing.
    “Just compositing an image.”
    She smiles. “Do you eat here every day?”
    I shrug. “Like you said, I haven’t got a lot of time, and no one disturbs me here.”
    “Except me,” comes a voice.
    We both turn. Caitlyn walks in from the other side and asks if she’s interrupting.
    “No, no. I have to go, anyway,” Mirriam says, and goes clickity-clacking out. Before leaving the media center, she glances back, a little smile on her face, now that I’m less pathetic.
    I, Mr. Chatty, can’t think of anything to say.
    “You shoot pictures?” She opens a tub of hummus and unwraps a pita. She leans over to see what I’m working on. “Who’s that? Girlfriend?”
    “Coworker,” I say.
    “Good. Where do you work?” she asks, and then Mr. Chatty takes over.
    Blather, blather, “bookstore.” Blather, blather, “Dakota.” I hardly care what I’m saying. I’m talking to another kid. Someone who is listening to me.
    When the bell rings and the other kids file in, Eric spots us. He sets his jaw and drags Caitlyn off to work on some Bio thing they’re doing together. He keeps looking over at me the rest of the afternoon. At some point, I’m gonna get it.
    There should have been a loudspeaker announcement at practice: Today the part of Coach Davis will be played by Eric Beise. Since the coach has a teachers’ meeting on Wednesdays, Eric runs warmup and drills.
    We huddle up at Eric’s command, but Eric is looking beyond the circle, at the edge of the field behind me. I fol-low his gaze over to Caitlyn. Next to her stands her second, Heather, a girl who tries to mimic Caitlyn’s ponytail, but instead of bouncing up in a neat, organized curl, Heather’s hair rebels into frizz. Caitlyn is talking, and Heather is nodding.
    When Caitlyn sees me watching her, she yells out, “I never knew soccer shorts could be so hot!”
    I grin back.
    When it’s time to run the fields, Tom, the right forward I just busted to the bench, falls in line in front of me. He has to be at least half a foot taller than I am, so I can’t see the line over him. The elephant on my chest has started to lose weight, but I’m still at