This apartment was so confusing my first time here that I walked in on her father comparing blueprints for a new mall he’s assisting with. Yeah, he has an office in his apartment, and meanwhile I share a living room with my brother and am limited to masturbating in my bathroom. Life sucks that way.

The scent of huckleberry grows stronger as I step inside her bedroom. I see the two candles sitting on top of her bureau, the only source of light in a room dark with unfinished paintings and two sixteen-year-olds about to grow up. Her bed is made with deep blue covers. Genevieve looks like she’s sitting in the middle of the ocean. I drop my bag and push the door closed behind me.

This is it.

“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” Genevieve says. Seems very role-reversal based on all the bad TV I’ve watched, but sweet of her to offer. Or not offer.

The last time we tried having sex I got sick from movie popcorn. It was some romantic comedy thing—we were on a double date with our classmates Collin and Nicole (who are expecting a kid now, crazy)—but I’m ready to do this. I’m not backing out.

“Are you sure you want to?”

“Get over here, Aaron Soto.”

I imagine myself tearing my shirt off and charging toward her for awesome sex, but I’m more likely to get tangled in my shirt, tripping over my feet, and making this everything but awesome. So I just walk over, managing not to trip, and sit down beside her, nice and simple. “So. You, uh, come around here often?”

“Yes, I come around my house often, dumb-idiot.”

She hugs my neck and squeezes. I choke for a second, collapse backward on her, and play dead. Genevieve smacks my chest, and between giggles says, “No one suffocates . . . that quickly! You suck . . . at dying! You are the . . . worst dead guy ever!”

Confidence floods through me in this little moment where I poorly played dead and she called me out on it, and it’s a joke that will remain between us because it happened in our personal space where we were about to do a very personal thing and I know I want this with her without a doubt. I break free from her not-quite-tight grip, slide up on her, and kiss her lips and neck, and everything else I instinctively feel is right. She pulls my shirt off and it sails over my shoulder.

“Remember that time you were half naked in my bed?” Genevieve asks, looking up at me.

I take off her shirt and leave her in a bra.

She unzips my jeans and I kick them off with much awkward difficulty while she laughs. If I thought there was any chance Genevieve would’ve laughed seeing me in my boxers, I would’ve faked a reason to get out of this. But I can’t recall a time where I felt more exposed and comfortable in my life. I care for her so hard, whether Dad would’ve advised that for my first time or not, and my happiness and her happiness will be one of my greatest hits.

4

MANHUNT ON FAMILY DAY

   It’s Family Day. While everyone’s setting up outside, I’m manning the counter at Good Food’s because the owner, Mohad, had to pick up his older brother from the airport. The work doesn’t bother me, especially after the night I had. I handled the morning shipment without bitching. I even upsold all the honeybuns that are expiring tomorrow so we wouldn’t have any waste. Throughout the morning, my friends popped in so I would spill all the details. It’s probably bad form to tell your boys all about your deeds the day after it happens, but there’s just no way you can’t not talk about it.

Brendan grilled me for very personal details about Genevieve—who isn’t due to show up until later—but eventually backed off after a line was forming behind him. Skinny-Dave wanted to know how many times we did it (twice!) and how long I lasted (not long but I lied). Baby Freddy wanted to compare first-time tales, except his sounds like bullshit, and to this day, Tiffany denies ever doing anything with him. Lastly, Nolan asked me if I actually went through with it. This, when he came in to buy baby wipes for his two girls; he always uses condoms, but he must be wearing them really wrong. That’s more than can be said for Collin, who didn’t bother using a condom with Nicole.

On our block, there are guys and girls in their late twenties who we’ve grown up calling “the Big Kids.” We’ve watched them kick each other’s asses, date, and hook up with each other’s exes. Some have even gone to college and stayed away. Others, like Devon Ortiz, are still around. Devon comes in to buy panty hose for his mother and congratulates me. This concerns me because it means word is getting around quickly, but also makes me feel kind of proud, like I’m finally one of the Big Kids myself.

By the time Mohad gets back, Brendan has also returned, crowding the counter with Nolan and Skinny-Dave. “When do you get off? We want to get a game of manhunt going.”

“Mohad asked me to stay until one,” I answer.

From across the store, Mohad shouts in his thick Arabic accent, “Soto! You’re good to go now if you and your smelly friends clear out of here.”

They all cheer. We bounce.

The energy out here is different from when I started work at 8:00. Nearby, my brother is shuffling cards with his gaming friends: there’s Ronny, who always talks shit online but hasn’t ever won a fight in real life; Stevie, who met his girlfriend, Tricia, on a dating website for video game fanatics (except he hasn’t actually met her-met her yet); and Chinese Simon, who is actually Japanese but didn’t speak up until a year too late.

My mom is handing out hot dogs to Fat-Dave and his younger healthy-sized brother. She made them on her neighbor Carrie’s grill and I hope they’re not waterlogged like they were on my twelfth birthday. Brendan and I spat them out behind her back and went to Joey’s to split a meatball sub.

Skinny-Dave’s mother, Kaci, pushes a shopping cart of blue shirts toward us. The shirts are all paid for months in advance, but I know Mom couldn’t afford them for us this year so we’ll look like oddballs in any pictures taken for our community center. Kaci hands Fat-Dave his extra-large shirt, which is great since there are now mustard stains on the white shirt he’s wearing. Kaci hands her own son his shirt before approaching Brendan and me. “You two are both mediums, right?”

“Yeah, but I don’t think my mom ordered one for me,” I say.

“I didn’t order one either,” Brendan says.

Kaci hands us shirts. “Your family has taken care of you, boys. Have fun today and let any of us know if you need anything.”

We thank her and slip our shirts over the ones we’re already wearing. The shirts are sort of lame. You’ll rarely see them worn after tonight except maybe when you’re doing laundry or when sleeping over at a friend’s house. But I do kind of, sort of, definitely like the sense of unity they bring. They really make this four-building complex feel less like a shitty place where we happen to live and more like a home.