“ I said she reminds me of her, not she is her. I know what my girl looks like, and unless the scientists have finally built some reverse-aging machine, that girl’ s too young to be my Laurie, who’ s in her thirties now. Probably has a family. Babies.” A familiar feeling of decay sinks in his chest, like a tree’ s leaves changing yellow and brown on a simultaneous dime and dropping together into a suffocating heap.“ If you were actually listening to the shit I said you’ d have realized how stupid that sounds. Learn to keep your fuckin’ paranoid ideas to yourself,” Johnny barks at Cindy.
She flinches from him, eyes cast down to her hands, now wringing above her faded purple track pants, her body folding into itself. The flash of anger immediately dissipated after his mouth gave the dark emotions an outlet, and Johnny immediately fills with guilt for lashing out at his friend. Cindy doesn’ t respond well to meanness, Johnny knows. Especially not mean men.
“ I’ m real sorry for raising my voice, Little Bird. Talking about Laurie just gets me in a way. You’ re not stupid. You’ re paranoid,” he tries to joke, smiling as she peers at him.“ But you sure as hell ain’ t stupid. I’ m sorry.”
The tension in Cindy’ s shoulders eases and she chuckles, patting his shoulder.“ It’ s okay, Johnny, I ain’ t taking it personal. I didn’ t think much before I said what I did. Sounded super silly as soon as it came out of my mouth.”
The brief rise in volume caught the attention of the young woman enjoying her book. She made eye contact with Johnny and her spine straightened, head raised from the book. There was wary concern in her expression, like she was trying to decide if he was one of the homeless folks who shout for no apparent reason. Or if a domestic dispute was in progress.
“ Sorry for disturbing your reading. Just, uh, got caught up in a moment,” he says to her, hoping his mental projection of sincerity gets through.“ Mind if I ask what you’ re readin’?”
The woman leans back into the bench, which Johnny takes as a sign that she doesn’ t find him threatening. If it’ s not the case, he lets himself imagine it.
“ Oh, it’ s okay, you’ re fine.” She dog-ears her current page and shuts the book, and continues to look Johnny in the eye.“ I’ m reading Sense and Sensibility. It was assigned for my summer reading club and it’ s really good so far.”
“ Hey!” Cindy interjects.“ You should take a look at the drawing Johnny here did of ya’.” She reaches again for the notebook but Johnny is quick to hold it out of her reach this time.
“ Aw come on now, Cindy. This nice girl doesn’ t want to see my scrawlings.” He looks back at the young woman, whose head is now cocked in curiosity.“ But now,‘ cause she mentioned it, I should probably show you.” If I hide it now, she’ ll probably think I was drawing her in a pervy way, he thinks.
He rises slowly from the bench, stuffing his pencils and eraser into one of the front pockets of his jeans so they don’ t fall to the ground and risk rolling away. Johnny, all seven feet of him, towers over the seated girl as he presents the notebook to her. She takes it gingerly.
“ I hope you don’ t mind. Sketching buses and pigeons gets mighty boring after a while, and I’ m trying to get better at people,” he says, watching her examine the paper in silence.“ Drawing people has always been hard.”
“ Oh wow,” she says after a few moments.“ You came up with this just in the 15, 20 minutes that I’ ve been sitting here? This is lovely!” The stranger’ s compliment fills Johnny with pride.“ Yes indeed, miss.”“ How much for it?”“ What?” Johnny heard the question but figured he must have missed some part of her words.“ Can I buy it from you? You’ re very talented, sir, and I’ d love to hang onto it.” She reaches into a small brown leather purse next to her and begins fishing her hand around.
Maybe it’ s the“ sir,” maybe it’ s the genuine pleasure he can tell that she’ s getting from the picture, or maybe it’ s the resemblance to his daughter that causes him to instantly shake his head.“ No charge, miss. If you really like it, you can have it.”
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