me. Stop. Stop thinking about it, damn it. Bad, bad, bad.

I sense a presence before I hear someone approaching on the grass, long before a shadow falls over

me. Pretending not to notice, I keep my eyes shut, hiding a smile. I know who it is. I know because my

skin starts to prickle and something inside starts to flutter like a flock of birds taking to the wind.

He sits down beside me and I can almost feel him smiling as he looks at my face. He rips out a blade

of grass and playfully brushes the soft tip across my nose. It tickles, and I can’t help grinning, but I still

don’t open my eyes. Maybe if I keep them closed I can pretend that things are different between us.

That he knows what I feel for him, and doesn’t mind. Casey traces my eyes, my eyebrows, runs it along

my cheek like a paintbrush. He stops for a moment before he traces my lips, very slowly. I hold my

breath. My heart is beating madly when I open my eyes. There is something thoughtful, tender in the

brilliant blue orbs that look down at me. This sense of closeness between us. Closeness and trust.

“Gotcha.” Casey smiles. “Don’t think you can hide from me, James Foley.”

“Far be it from me to even try.”

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” There’s a trace of reproach in the words the way he says

them, making me smile. It gives me warm feelings how he enjoys my company. That he misses me

when I’m not there. Hell, that he even notices is more than enough to give me sweet dreams for weeks.

“Yeah? Why?”

“Well…” Casey flops down beside me. “Because.”

“Okay then. If that’s so, all is clear to me.”

He turns his head to look at me with a charming smile. “You missed study group. Anna gave us quite

the lecture about how it doesn’t make sense to form a study group when nobody shows up.” He winks at

me. “Personally, I think she was just mad because without you being there, she actually had to do some

thinking for herself.”

I chuckle. He’s probably right. What can I say, I’m brilliant. I’m that pathetic smart kid that used to

get pushed around at school, until they realized that it was handy cribbing from someone who knew

what he was doing. But I’m not someone you can push around without having to pay eventually. In this

case, literally. I let them copy my homework, then blackmailed them for it. By senior year it had turned

into a profitable way to increase my non-existent allowance. I have a long history of making deals with

devils that has secured me a ticket to hell very early on. I never believed in salvation. But there’s

something about Casey that makes me want to be a better person. You look at him, you know: Here is

someone true. He has miraculously kept a trace of innocence, like only someone with a happy

childhood, a happy home can do. It makes me want to protect him. And it makes me scared that the

callous bastard in me might rub off on him somehow.

“James?” Casey asks softly.

“Yeah?”

“You know when you said that you thought Danny wouldn’t be good for me?”

I nod, hating to be reminded of Rizzo when I had just successfully banished him from my mind.

“The other day… Oh, I don’t know.” He trails off and stares up to the curtain of branches that hides

us from the world.

“The other day what?”

He sighs a little. “It’s weird. Sometimes I don’t feel like myself when I’m around him.” Lost in

thought, he chews on the blade of grass. It’s nodding in front of his face like a whip. I watch it

unblinkingly. “Go on.”

He glances at me. “It’s hard to describe. It’s like I change somehow. And I’m not sure I like what I

become.”

Oh my gosh. And eureka, and all that. Has he finally realized how manipulative that son of a bitch

can be?

He smiles to himself with a trace of melancholy. “There was this girl in junior high. Amy Lee

Wellman. She was my first big crush, you know.”

“Really? I thought Amber was.”

“No. No, she wasn’t.” He looks into the distance as if he can see his past there.

“Amy was… she was amazing. She was smart, and popular, and god, so beautiful. Everyone was a

little in love with her. I wanted to marry her.” He chuckles softly. “But I never worked up the nerve to

approach her.” He looks at me. “I wish I would have, you know. Sometimes I still wonder what would

have happened.”

“That was a long time ago, Case.”

“Yeah. I’m pretty sad, huh? Point is, I don’t want to make the same mistake again. What I feel for

him is… I just really want him to like me. I want to know.”

“To know what?”

“What it feels like. To be with someone who is so… To be with someone like him.”

I sit up abruptly, a dark frown on my face. “I’ll tell you what it feels like. People like that, they make

you feel like you’re not good enough. You try to please someone, it makes you feel like shit. It makes

you feel worthless.”

He looks at me with a confused smile. “Woah, hold on! Why are you so upset?”

“I’m not upset, I’m pissed off. Can’t you see what he’s like? What they are like? Damn it, Casey.

Why would you want to be with someone that superficial?”

“How can you be so sure that he is?”

“How can you be so sure that he isn’t?”

We stare at each other heatedly, and realize what we’re doing. I look away. “Look, I’m sorry. I just

don’t want for you to get hurt.”

His eyes soften. “Yeah, I know.”

An uncomfortable moment of silence passes. I can see him getting lost in his thoughts, and I have no

idea what’s on his mind.

“Have you ever thought about what it is you look for in a relationship?” he finally asks pensively.

I shrug. “Not really.”

“I mean, it’s easy to come up with a list of qualities you want your respective other to have. But

that’s not the same thing.”

“So what are you looking for?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe… someone who can see me. Who can see who I really am. And it’d have to be

someone kind.”

Right. Because Rizzo is kind, gentle Mary, Mother of God. I mean, seriously, the hell?

“And you?”

“I don’t have a lot of expectations, really.”

“That’s kinda sad.”

“I like to call it realistic.”

Casey smiles to himself, and slowly sits up. “You’re kinder than you know, James. You’re kind to

me.”

Kind. The word hovers in the air, can’t sink in, can’t connect with me. I don’t know what to think of

it, what to do. Do I dare hope…?

He pats my shoulder. “And you’re a great friend.”

Friend. Right. I’m inwardly screaming: For god’s sake, turn your head, look at me! I’m right here,

right beside you. Mere inches away. I’m someone, too. I see you. I don’t want to be your friend. I want

to be everything to you.

I keep a straight face and force myself to smile at him. “Why thanks.”

“De rien.” Casey looks over the green meadows, down to campus. “Before I forget, I’m going home

for the weekend. It’s my dad’s birthday this Saturday.”

The intimacy of the moment is broken, flies open wide like a web and gets blown away by the

breeze.

“Okay. Tell him happy birthday for me.”

“Will do.” He carelessly throws the blade of grass away. “Listen, I’d better get going. I gotta pack

some stuff for tomorrow. See you later?”

“Sure.”

I watch as he climbs to his feet and slowly descends the hill. Watch until he becomes one tiny spot

among all the other tiny spots in the distance. So much for hoping against hope. Unfortunately, the thing

with hope is that you can’t just switch it on or off. It’s not something you can decide to have. It decides

to have you.

We fall so easily for what we’d like to be. Catholics have their saints to admire. They made them up