BEFORE
It was the summer before Year Eight and the weather seemed so much stickier than before. Three figures sat side by side on a patch of cool, green grass in the backyard of a small house, basking in the sunlight. Pippa Harlington's hair was the colour of gold corn today and she wore a red polka-dotted dress that came down to her brown thighs. Adam, next to her, was shirtless and flexing his arms, obviously trying to make an impression. Beside him was Matt who, unsurprisingly, had a book in his hands and big blue shades that covered his eyes.
"I just realized something," Pippa said as they dozed lazily under the sun. "Adam, your last name is Fernandes. Isn't that an Italian surname?"
"It's Portuguese," was Adam's response, "if that's what you mean. What's your point?"
Pippa looked at Adam's fair blonde hair and his blueberry eyes.
"You don't look Portuguese," she said.
"My mum's part Portuguese." Adam wrinkled his nose. "Or maybe she's three quarters. I don't remember. The surname comes from her side of the family is my point."
"That's weird," Pippa said. "Don't kids usually take the dad's surname?"
Matt looked up from his book and glanced at Adam. Pippa hadn't been friends with them for very long so she wouldn't know she was wading on dangerous waters here. Still, the small silence on Adam's part was clue enough and she quickly changed the subject.
"I don't want her to think I'm weird or anything," Adam told Matt later when Pippa had gone and Matt had inquired about his silence. "I don't want it getting around school that my dad...left."
"But loads of dads leave," Matt assured the other boy. "It's normal. And it isn't your fault. Wouldn't they all have guessed your dad's not around anyway?"
"I just tell them he died ages ago," Adam murmured back to him, his head hanging low. "I mean the dead bit isn't really a lie. Not anymore. You remember."
Matt did remember. He remembered coming over to Adam's one day, a year ago, and wondering why the whole house seemed so much stiller than usual. He remembered Mrs. Fernandes smiling at him weakly, her hands shaking as she told him Adam was in his room and if Matt could come another time, please, because now wasn't appropriate. He remembered nodding and turning away, and the sound of footsteps clattering down the stairs and Adam asking him to wait up. Then they walked around the park for awhile before Adam told him what had happened. Dad had died; they'd heard from someone in Barbados. He'd been living there for the last six months. Then Adam stopped talking, and this was the part Matt could remember the most. The other boy's shoulders began to shake and Matt watched quietly as tears started to trickle out of Adam's eyes. They seemed endless to him at that moment, like a river or something. Flowing on and on. Only now did he wish he'd done something instead of just standing there, gawping gormlessly.
But Adam was always the emotional one. The comforting friend. Matt was the one who left it alone until it was safe to be normal.
"When did your dad leave you guys?" Matt asked now, all of a sudden. He bit his lip then, apologetically, wondering if he'd jumped ahead into a question that would make Adam mad. But Adam was rarely ever mad or angry. Especially not with Matt.
"He left when I was born," Adam explained quietly. Then, he got up and dusted some grass off of his legs. "Be back in a sec," he said when Matt threw him a confused look. Matt watched the other boy run into the house quickly and he returned after two minutes, holding something in his hand. He sat back down next to Matt and passed a photograph that was curled around the edges.
Matt didn't need Adam to explain to him who the man – or rather, the boy – in the photograph was. It was Adam. Except older and rougher looking, with a defiant chin and an angular face that scowled at the camera. It was only a headshot but Matt could see from the collar of his shirt that it was a uniform. He was in the army.
"Your dad." Matt looked at Adam. "The resemblance is scary."
Adam managed a smile. "Mum used to say that alot."
"How did they meet?"
"University," Adam said, "before mum dropped out. They were in the same History class. Mum says it was Brian – that's my dad's name – who asked her out first but the story always changes." He grinned. "They loved each other a lot."
Matt passed the photo back to Adam and he could see the tenderness with which the boy held it in his hand, the softening of his features as he stroked it carefully. His heart almost broke looking at him.
"Mum dropped out after she found out she was going to have me." Adam's face grew dark. "And that scared him, I 'spose. He wouldn't talk to her for ages. Mum says he came to visit me when I was born but I don't believe her."
"He came back though," Matt replied encouragingly, "didn't he? He came back eventually."
"My 10th birthday," Adam whispered. "Before I met you. We were going to have a party that day. And he came."
Matt said nothing.
"My dad came that day," Adam repeated. "Before anyone else arrived. I knew it was him all along because mum talked about him so much. He came and told me he was sorry for not being there and that he wanted to be a proper dad to me now."
Matt took in a sharp breath. Adam had never told him this before. "What did you say?"
"I –" Adam's chin wobbled and Matt was afraid he might cry again. "I told him to – I told him to fuck off."
"But I thought you'd want—" Matt began.
"That's what I thought too," Adam cut him off angrily. "I thought everything would be okay when my dad came back. I thought I'd stop feeling so sad all the time about it. But it's different when it actually happens, you know. Nothing like how they show it in films."
Matt nodded. "Yeah I suppose."
"Mum was crying and asking me to apologise," the other boy continued glumly. "But I was just so angry. I really did mean it, I think, and my dad knew that. He didn't seem too surprised about it either. Mum asked him to stay but he wouldn't. He just...left again. But he stayed in touch with her this time. Sent her e-mails. Called her."
"But you never talked to him again?" Matt questioned. Adam shook his head.
"No."
The sun had begun to set finally and the sky looked as though it'd been splashed with an assortment of colours by a painter who hadn't put much thought into it. Orange and purple and blue, all at once, jumbled into one big mess, with a tinge of bright red here and a dash of pearly white there. Adam lied on his back and placed his hands beneath his head, watching as the shades of colour in the sky slowly melded into grey.
"I'm glad I met you," he whispered, shutting his eyes, but Matt didn't hear.
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