“Mates,” I repeated and snickered a little.
“Girlfriends, then,” he amended. “Future wife—whatever you want to call it.”
“I still don’t see the point.”
“Why not?”
“I’ll never get married.”
“Why in the world not?” Dad asked, sounding shocked.
“Seriously?” I replied with heavy disbelief in my voice. I could tell by the way he was gripping the steering wheel that he wasn’t happy with my response. “I can barely function in our family, Dad. What could I offer a prospective wife?”
“A lot.” He grumbled under his breath. It was one of the few times he had really gotten angry with me. “You have a lot to offer, Matthew—that’s what. You’re very smart. You are considerate, and you help out around the house and with your sister. You know how to figure things out, and you are organized and detailed. You are thoughtful, loving, and you have your dad’s good looks.”
His tone lightened as he chucked a bit.
“You never forget anything,” he added, “so you wouldn’t be in the kind of trouble I was in last month when I forgot our anniversary, and your mother just about had me castrated.”
We both laughed then but quickly fell into silence again. Just before we got to Talawanda High School, Dad looked over at me.
“You’d be a fine catch, Matthew,” he said. “Don’t let anyone, yourself included, try to tell you otherwise. You have a lot to offer, and any girl who is smart and kind enough to realize that is going to be very lucky indeed.”
I squeezed the bottle cap a little tighter.
Did I have something to offer Mayra? I did get straight A’s. I had a house that was paid for, and I had budgeted all of Dad’s death benefits from the military to keep up with the bills while going to school. I would need to have a scholarship to pay for advanced schooling, but both Miami and Ohio State University already indicated they would accept me. If I went to Miami, I would be able to live at home. OSU was farther, but I would still be close enough for Megan.
Was I considerate? I thought about the thank-you card I gave to Mayra, but I only had to do that because I had forgotten to say it in the first place, so it didn’t seem all that considerate. Thoughtful, maybe. The memory brought me back to that first day she was at my house and how she had given me a haircut, and I felt myself smile a little.
Mayra didn’t run away from me that day and even continued to come over again and again. She fit into my routine almost without me noticing, and I liked having her there.
She was definitely smart and kind.
If she was willing to accept me and like me the way I was, maybe her father would be able to accept me as well. If I told him all the things my dad said about me—all the ways I might actually be okay for Mayra—there was a chance he would listen and not just see me as a freak. If he didn’t believe me, I could even show him my report card or something.
I had proof, at least.
The bottle cap was cutting into my palm a little because I was holding it so tightly, but I didn’t want to let it go. It was probably from the last bottle of water Dad drank before he died. It had been in the center console of his car, sitting in its parking spot at the base while he had been out with his unit.
The rain got a little louder, and my back started to get wet. Wind whipped around the inside of the car, and the sounds from a radio found their way into my ears. My throat was sore and hurting as the cold night breeze covered me.
“I got him,” a deep voice said. “Go ahead and send an ambulance to Kehr Road just south of town, right before the road splits. The lights are on, so you’ll be able to see my truck easily enough.”
I didn’t hear a response, but I did feel a hand on my shoulder. As I was rolled over, I looked up at a large, burly man in a thick, camouflage hunting coat. As I stared into the mustached face of Mayra’s father, Henry Trevino, I tried to remember what I wanted to say, but his mustache was hanging below his nose like a dark, foreboding caterpillar, and my heart started to pound loudly.
“I get straight A’s,” I said.
I couldn’t think of what else I had wanted to tell him, so I passed out.
Lose.
~oOo~
I woke up in an ambulance.
It probably hadn’t been that long since I had lost consciousness because the ambulance was still moving, and McCullough-Hyde hospital wasn’t all that far from where I had been parked. I opened my eyes and looked around, and one of the two EMTs noticed me.
“Hey there,” he said with a smile. “Just hang on—we’ll be there soon.”