Page 48 of On His Mind

I’m halfway through transferring a line, and I don’t look up. My laptop’s paired with my phone, so the message appears in the corner of the screen while I’m working, and my eyes flick to it out of curiosity.

Percy: Strawberries are $4.86. Thought you should know.

I grab my phone and look at the text for a long moment. I have no idea what it means. I don’t know why he’s mentioning strawberries, or why the boy who never texts first would text me on a Sunday afternoon, after I left him unanswered, about fruit.

Me: Are they organic?

Percy: I don’t know.

I put the phone face down and go back to my drawing. I work well for the rest of the afternoon, and every so often, I find myself listening for a sound the phone doesn’t make. It doesn’t buzz again. That’s fine. I get a great deal of work done.

On Tuesday, it’s ten-thirty at night. I’m in bed texting Taylor about the thing Oliver said at the office — I’ve typed it twice and deleted it twice, and I’m on the third attempt, which is not the version I mean — when his name comes up on the screen.

Percy: Are you up?

I pull my bottom lip in and hold it. He doesn’t do this. He doesn’t send are you up. He doesn’t send anything, in the ordinary sense.

Me: Yes.

The three dots appear. They disappear. They appear again. Something in my chest tightens, and I’m typing fast when they disappear again.

Me: Is everything okay?

Percy: Yeah.

Percy: I don’t sleep.

I read it twice.

Me: What do you mean you don’t sleep?

He takes a full minute. I watch the screen the whole time.

Percy: I haven’t slept much since I got here.

Me: To Camden?

Percy: Yeah.

We are halfway through the school year. That’s five months of a boy lying awake in the dark, and I sit with my back against the headboard, holding my phone in both hands.

Me: That’s a long time.

Me: So what do you do all night?

Percy: Read.

I sit up straighter. He reads. That boy — that enormous, silent boy with hands the size of dinner plates and blonde hair falling in his eyes, who says maybe four words if you’re lucky — sits up in a dark house reading books. I try to picture it, and I can’t. What would I do if I couldn’t sleep? I type back to him.

Me: I would draw.

Percy: I know.

I set the phone on my chest and stare at nothing for a second, and something in me goes warm and strange. He knows. I smile.

Me: Do you want to FaceTime?

He doesn’t text back.