“I’m thinking of going off road to take the most direct route so we don’t have to go through the continued agony of this conversation.”

She laughed.

“You laugh, but if I got some gnarled tires on here, jacked it up on hydraulic suspension, I would terrorize this place.”

“Consider me terrorized.”

Ben paused. “I wonder if Ahmed has a crush on you,” he said.

“What? Why?”

“You never know. You might want to start preparing to be royalty. Being the future sultaness has its privileges.”

“I am not cut out to be royalty.”

“No?”

“Too much waving. And his family is just rich, he’s not royalty. And that’s ridiculous.”

“Au contraire.”

“Ben, even students at St. James should not say ‘au contraire.’”

“Au contraire, mon frère.”

“I ain’t yer frikkin frère, bud.”

“I don’t know the French word for ‘sister.’ I’m taking Latin for some reason.”

“I’m taking Spanish, as though I were going to some plain old high school at home.”

“Hm.”

“College-consultant-Dale told me he wished I were taking Japanese. ‘Spanish doesn’t stand out,’ he says.”

“Japanese seems cool.”

“I agree. Japanese seems totally cool. And it’s not like I adore Spanish. But now I’d rather kill myself than take Japanese. The Japanese language does not need me speaking it badly just so I can seem more interesting.”

“Yeah, do I really have to want to make varsity soccer?”

Alice laughed. “Dude, exactly.” Ben almost closed his eyes with pleasure. “Can’t I just watch reruns of The Cosby Show for the rest of my life?”

They came up to the Two-Laner, and Ben wanted to take a right and drive out with her to somewhere he hadn’t been before. To show her the mundane litter in the long grass, to find out what was in the white barn. Alice considered him as he turned away to look for coming cars. He didn’t have the lacquer over him yet, but he seemed a little less like a nine-volt battery against the tongue.

Ben sped across the road and scritched to a stop in the sandy parking lot in front of the gym.

Alice turned to him and delivered a smile. He looked startled to be there with her; she felt reassured, and she wanted to give some of that reassurance back to him.

“Thanks, Ben.”

It was all Ben could do not to lean over now and try to breathe her in, and not to look at her chest as she stepped down.

“Sure. Cover a spotlight with a stencil of a crutch and aim it at the night sky, and I’ll come.”

She laughed and waved and turned, and even though her butt wasn’t anything in particular, he watched her walk away. He exhausted himself.