How to Repair a Mechanical Heart (12 page)

“You’re the guy from the Q&A!” she says.

Abel lights up.
“C’est moi.”

“I think it’s really cool what you said to Tom Shandley. He was being a creep.”

“Aww, thanks!”

“Everyone was talking about it. You’re like, convention-famous.”

“Really?”

“Yep. Thanks for defending Cadsim.”

“Oh no, I wasn’t really‌—‌”

“Can I get a picture with you?”

“Uh‌—‌yeah. Of course!”

This is so dumb, but I figure I’ll let Abel have his moment. “Want me to take it?” I ask Pink Glasses.

“Who are you? Are you his boyfriend?”

“We’re just friends right now.” Right now?

“Oh, you get in too! Here, my friend’ll‌—‌ANNIE! Take our picture, okay?”

This stringy blonde comes skulking over. She’s got on Cleopatra eyeliner and a black tank top with a small silver
Castaway Planet
logo, and she looks vaguely embarrassed that she’s required to exist, let alone document the evening. Pink Glasses perches on the edge of the couch and leans into us while Annie snaps photos. Then she grabs the camera back and takes a few more herself, framing the shots and barking orders like a fashion photographer: “Smile for my CastieCon scrapbook!” “Look super-sexy, guys!”

Abel blows kisses and aims a silly grin at the camera. It’s good to see him do that, even if he’s playing it up. There’s something about his face when he smiles, like he’s a stained-glass window with sun beaming through. I have to smile too.

“Captain‌…‌I notice you are still awake.”

Onscreen, it’s time for the big Cadsim scene. The girls abandon picture-taking; clasp hands and dart off with a squeal. Abel nudges me.

“Pink Glasses and Annie,” he whispers. “I kind of ship it.”

All the girls find their seats and the room gets so church-quiet you can practically smell holy water. Abel shifts closer‌—‌not to touch me or anything, just to draw a clear line between us and them. Warmth glows in the sliver of space between us. We each train our eyes on half the TV screen: his boy on the left and mine on the right, murmuring to each other in the dark.

“I’m so tired of running. Tired of the fight.”
The girls in front recite it reverently, in perfect sync with Cadmus.
“You know, I’m almost glad I’m stuck here with you. I’m free here. I don’t have to hold it together.”

“Perhaps you underestimate yourself, Captain. You are always free.”

“Not like this. I only feel this way when you’re around. Maybe we should just stay here forever, huh?”

“The notion is highly impractical, though you would be an agreeable companion.”

“It’s so quiet in here, Sim.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Like it could swallow up all your secrets.”

“Quite‌…‌”

Meaningful look. Another lingering arm touch. Fade to black.

Abel pokes me and I gulp in some air.

For crap’s sake: the holy-grail scene of the world’s most ridiculous, implausible ship, and I was holding my breath with the rest of the room.

“Wanna go somewhere else?” he says.

I close my eyes and shudder. “Definitely.”

***

Across the street from the Superion Inn, within sight of the Sunseeker’s parking spot, St. Agnes is having a summer fair in its freshly blacktopped lot. The second he spots the plaster clown head from the cab, Abel wigs out and I know I’m getting dragged over no matter what.

We buy a roll of red tickets from a standard-issue church lady‌—‌billowy flowered blouse, little gold cross, glasses dangling from a beaded chain‌—‌and roam around the crowded fair. It’s pretty much like every other church fair I’ve been to. The basketball toss has the same sad shredded net, kids shriek in a red and blue bouncy castle and chuck dented ping-pong balls at goldfish bowls, and the snack stands sell sausages and roasted corncobs and cones of hot popcorn in that radioactive yellow. Everything’s familiar. Except now I’m here with a boy.

It’s weird. No one’s giving us a second glance now, but it would be so easy to attract bad attention. All I’d have to do is slip my hand in Abel’s and walk around like that, like all the other teenage couples linking arms and holding hands and kissing in line for the dunking booth. I can see the expressions now. Guys who look like my dad, chewing their tongues and hunching their shoulders up. Women who look like my mom, sighing a little and glancing away but thinking so loud I can hear every word.

And they would be right.

“What’s up, Tin Man?” Abel pokes me.

“Hm?”

“You all right? Your bolts too tight?”

“I’m fine.”

This shivery energy thrums between us. I tell myself it’s sugar and caffeine. Keep my arms folded in front of me.

We try a few rounds at the ring-toss stand and Abel just misses our shot to win a giant stuffed penguin with a half-unraveled scarf. To make up for it, he runs over to a stand and buys me a puff of blue cotton candy. Like we’re dating or something. I can’t look him in the eye when he hands me the white paper cone, so I glance past the rides and snack stands to where the blond stone wall of the church is, but I can’t let my eyes linger there either. It’s like looking at a house you don’t live in anymore. You wish you could go in again, but strangers live there now and you aren’t welcome, and it wouldn’t be the same anyway.

“So what were we talking about?” says Abel. “Back in the cab?”

I tug off a small neat piece of cotton candy, the color of Sim’s hair. “If they were on Earth. Their jobs.”

“Right, right.” Abel helps himself to a big bite of fluff; a fleck of it melts on his nose. “Sim would make a perfect priest.”

“Nooo. No no no. Absolutely not.”

“How come? The self-denial thing would be cake.”

“I don’t see him like that.”

“So what do you see?”

“Cadmus. As a bartender.”

“Pardon me.”

“Mmm, like some super-cheesy creeper from the seventies. He’d unbutton his shirt and make‌—‌you know. What’s like, an old drink no one drinks anymore?”

“Harvey Wallbangers.”

“You made that up.”

“I did not. You need to come to my theme parties.”

“No thanks.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to wake up in your bathtub with my eyebrow shaved off.”

“That only happened once, and Alex deserved it.”

We stop in front of the Tilt-a-Whirl. A light summer breeze unsettles our t-shirts and lifts all the hair on my arms. The cotton candy’s left this cute little blue spot on his nose. I can’t help myself. I lick the tip of my index finger and rub at it: gently, like he’ll crumble if I touch him too hard.

He giggles. “What’re you doing, freako?”

“Sorry, it’s driving me nuts.”

Be careful
, says Father Mike.

Abel catches my hand and twirls me around. “Let’s get on.”

“What?”

“The Tilt-a-Whirl.”

“Nah.”

“Why?” He cocks his head at me. “You’re not scared, are you?”

“No! No, I love rides,” I lie. “It’s just‌—‌I just ate, you know?”

“Oh, come on. Pretend it’s the Starsetter. We can write our very own horrible Cadsim fic.” He’s edging us close to the Tilt-a-Whirl line. “I’m a rogue captain on the run‌…‌I steal a starship and kidnap you, the hot navigation android programmed to do the right thing‌…‌or
are
you?” Couples step up on the creaky platform, settle into identical half-shell cars. “How should our fic start? We get stuck in an elevator‌—‌”

“No no. We meet in your bar,” I break in, ducking away from the line. “It’s an alternate-universe earthfic.”

“Bold choice,” Abel follows me, grinning. “Okay. You be Cadmus.”

“Noooo.”

“Why not? Stretch yourself.”

“No way.”

“Okay, fine.” Abel slips on his Cadmus shades and makes wiping motions above a picnic table. “Hey there, customer. What can I pour you this fine evening?”

“Oh, ah, I am unsure.” My ears get hot. Why did I start this? “I am an android, and as such I have no need to imbibe.”

“So how come you’re at my bar?”

“I cannot say. Perhaps a malfunction in my compass application.”

Abel narrows his eyes, like Cadmus does when he’s negotiating with Xaarg. “I smell a lie,” he says. “You came to get laid, didn’t you?”

Two nuns stroll by. My face burns. “Negative,” I murmur.

“Aw, why not? Makes you feel like a real boy.”

“I am uninterested.”

“Uninterested? You smooth like a Ken doll down there?”

“On the contrary. While I have had many, ah, high-quality partners, the simple fact is‌—‌”

Flirting can seem like harmless fun‌—‌
Chapter 8,
Put on the Brakes!‌—‌
But that person you’re teasing is a vessel of the Holy Spirit. Should you really be treating them like a carnival ride?

“Ye-es?” Abel’s grinning. Waiting.

I clear my throat, scramble for Sim words.

They’re gone.

“I can’t do this.”

“Why not? You’re good.”

“No, it’s just‌—‌you know.”

“What?”

I gallop my fingers on the picnic bench. Think. Think.
Lie.
“Um, well, Zander and I used to joke around like this all the time, so‌—‌”

“Oh my God!” Abel slams his hand on the picnic table. An abandoned paper boat of French fries tips off the edge, splatters ketchup in the grass. “Will you shut it about Zander already!”

“But it’s true.”

“I don’t care!”

“It’s just part of who I am. I can’t change it.”

“Christ.” He shoves both hands in his hair. “You know what, Brandon? You know what? That is IT!”

His hot hand locks around my wrist and before I can open my mouth again he’s yanking me through the crowd, past the Tilt-a-Whirl and the candy-striped tents and a bunch of kids playing that balloon-dart game that rattled my nerves as a kid.
Pop pop pop.
My insides crackle. He could do anything with me now, take me anywhere.

We stop behind the funhouse.

He slams me up against it.

I turn my face fast, fix my eyes on the funhouse mural. Creepy clowns, sword-swallowers, Mardi Gras masks.

“Look at me,”
he hisses.

“Why?”

He grabs my face and turns my head slowly. My eyes press shut.

“Look at me,” he says.

I hear my dad:
Never ever stare directly at the sun
.

“Fine, then. Don’t. Just listen. Listen to every single word, okay?” He grips my shoulders. “Zander. Is. Gone. G-O-N-E. No more!‌—‌I’m serious, Brandon!” He shakes me. “This is total insanity and I want you to repeat after me: I. Am. Damaged.” Screams from the funhouse. “Say it!”

I whisper, “I am damaged.”

“I am acting like a pathetic irrational loonytunes in direct opposition to my actual awesomeness.”

“I’m pathetic,” I admit.

“I need to be punched in the face repeatedly and then kissed until my lips hurt.”

I open my eyes. Across from the funhouse, a mini-freefall jerks a carful of kids off the ground. They shudder to the top, right under a clown’s gruesome red mouth. The car stops a second, just for torture, and then drops them down with a mechanical
whoosh
like when Cadmus stole Sim, the door of his charging dock sighing open in a white breath of steam.

“Go ahead!” Abel prods. “Say it.”

“I need to be‌…‌”

“Say it! You know it’s true.”

“Punched‌…‌”

“In the face.”

“In the face.”

“Repeatedly.”

“And then‌—‌”

He kisses me.

It’s not gentle, the way I picture it with Sim. It’s rough and hard but in a funny way, like in old movies when their faces desperately smash together and then they break apart and breathe their poetic devotion. Abel’s hands are firm and warm around my face. The rest of the fair dissolves; I’m on another planet that’s spinning so fast I can feel it. The three silver moons of Castaway Planet dazzle in the hot black sky and his lips are Sim-blue and he smells sweet and dangerous, like liquor and cotton candy.

Status: All systems suspended.

Then it starts again. The thing that happened after Ryan Dervitz, in the Dairy Queen bathroom with my head between my knees. A rush of memories‌—‌Mom’s eyes welling up when I told her, Dad alone in the backyard staring up at my old treehouse, his hands stuffed in his pockets. And then Father Mike calmly crashing through my consciousness, like some movie hero busting down the door to a burning house. His face fills up the whole screen in my head. It isn’t an angry face. He never needs to be angry, not really, because he’s so sure he’s right.

Stop. Stop. Stop.

I shove Abel away.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing‌—‌just‌—‌”

I have to walk. Which way is the hotel parking lot? I don’t even know. I just start moving my feet. I dart across the street on a green light; a red car swerves and honks. My eyes flick over a sea of cars and lock onto the Sunseeker’s roof in the near distance. I pick up the pace. Abel’s big boots clap the blacktop behind me.

“What, you’re mad again?”

“No.”

“You are!”

“Stop talking, okay?”

“Brandon, look.” He swings in front of me. “I just‌—‌I was trying to help. I thought I could snap you out of it. Hey!”

He grabs my arm. The Sunseeker’s three rows away. His breath warms the side of my face.

“It’s not a big deal,” he whispers. “Okay?”

It’s not such a great exchange, is it? A few moments of pleasure, in exchange for‌—‌

“So is this how you act?” I shove his hands away. “Like, the day someone dumps you?”

“What?”

“You know.” I have no clue what I’m doing, but it’s too late now. “It’s kind of gross, that’s all.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Your ‘relationship.’”

“I’m not in one.”

“You were this morning.”

“I don’t live in the past.”

“I’ll say. You trying to get back at him?”

“No! No. That’s not what‌—‌”