Chapter 11: Resolution

Jaime and Mex

JAIME SENT A TEXT to Mex asking him to meet after practice. It was too cold to wait at his tree, so he selected a bench near the locker rooms as the meeting place. He was still tired from his weekend adventure. The added stress from his friends’ crisis was more than he wanted to deal with. He should have talked to Keira after school and reached out to her from his bench. She was a long way away and then disappeared altogether.

Jaime didn’t worry about it. They were both new at this boyfriend/girlfriend thing and needed to work out when they’d communicate. He hadn’t made a plan with Keira, so she might be anywhere or with anyone. She was really good at hanging out a mental ‘Do not disturb’ sign. It was something Jaime needed to practice and he set his mind to blanking out everything. As soon as the peace settled in on him, so did sleep.

That was where Mex found him after football practice.

“Hey, Zip! Your text sounded urgent. You going to make me watch you sleep?” Juan said.

Jaime’s eyes popped open and he looked at his friend. That had been a deep sleep! He hadn’t even sensed Mex approaching.

“Hey. Busy weekend,” Jaime signed. “Didn’t hear you come up.”

“I want to get over to Lettie’s house as soon as I can,” Juan said. “We’ll have an hour to ourselves before her momma gets home.”

“That’s what I want to talk about,” Jaime signed. “I talked to Cheery. She thinks you’re pressuring her to have sex.”

“And she doesn’t want to,” Juan sighed. “Damn. I didn’t think she’d bring you into it.”

“That’s the problem,” Jaime signed. “She does want to. She’s scared.”

“Man! What’s she scared of? I love her!”

Jaime could see the truth in that statement. He thought Mex was as much in love as Cheery was. At least they had that going for them.

“How important is the church to you?” Jaime asked.

“I go to mass every week. We go together. The priest kind of got after me for having touched Lettie. I don’t tell him about that in confession anymore.”

“That’s one thing that’s bothering Cheery. I mean, what you say in confession is between you and the priest, but she’s afraid she’s sinning.”

“I don’t think either of us really believe that,” he said. “We talk, you know.”

“Good. Has she told you she’s afraid she’ll get pregnant and end up like her mother—a single mom trying to scrape together enough to survive on?”

“No! She’d never have to deal with that! Man, I love her. I would never abandon her. We can use a condom. I don’t mind.”

“Well, you need to deal with those two big issues before you push her into something she isn’t ready for. You’re only seventeen. Try to keep it zipped a little longer until you’re both on the same page,” Jaime signed.

“It’s so difficult! She’s the absolute sexiest girl I’ve ever met. We grew up together. I get crazy if she even looks at another guy and I don’t look at other girls. I know you don’t understand all that about love and stuff, but this is the real deal.”

Jaime’s mind was flooded with images from Mex that featured every sexy thing he’d ever done with Cheery. Jaime had to catch his breath.

“I do understand. I’ve got a girlfriend, you know?” he signed.

“You what?” Mex was taken completely off-guard. “When did you get a girlfriend? You’ve never even been on a date!”

“Keira,” Jaime fingerspelled. Then he used her name sign. “We were out this weekend.”

Juan contemplated the name and the sign and came to a resolution.

“The red-haired girl in our class? We were all in physics together last year? Wow! That’s unreal. Still, you’ve only dated this weekend. You can’t possibly know what’s inside her. I tell you, man, love is like every waking thought and most of your sleeping thoughts are about that person. It’s hard to concentrate in class. I even messed up a play in football practice because she flashed across my mind. I’m just...”

Mex cut himself off in mid-sentence as he thought of something else.

“Geez! A baby! We need to be really careful, don’t we? The Ducks are recruiting me. You know what that means? Full ride to the university. I need to do something quick. I need to make sure Lettie is with me. Shoot, man. I need to get moving. I’ll talk to you later. Good luck with Keira.”

Juan turned and bolted from the school, but Jaime saw that he was headed toward the mall, not toward home. He planned to get an engagement ring for Letitia!

Keira and Rose

Across town, another conversation was taking place.

“Okay. So, you had a great weekend date with this guy. Zip, right? You had a big adventure. I should have known when I saw the news about that guy the police arrested that you were involved somehow. So, you had an intense weekend with this guy. Scare you?” Aunt Rose asked after Keira had told her story.

“A little. It was really overwhelming. Almost like we were sharing the same ... um ... body, I guess. I mean, we didn’t do anything, you know? Well, we held hands for a couple of minutes. I felt so connected to him. And then seeing him put his arm around that girl after school ... I thought he really liked me!” Keira had been sniffling ever since she got to Rose’s house and the tears threatened to break free again.

“And without talking to him or trying to connect like you say you did at the movie, you jumped to the conclusion he was involved with someone else and you ran away,” Rose said.

“I guess.”

“Keira, we’ve talked about jumping to conclusions based on things no one else can see. You’re lucky the adventure with that kidnapper turned out well. I’m sure you’ll be called on to identify him and testify about how you knew he was going to try to snatch that girl. You can’t count on every intuition being spot on. Sometimes, just seeing something isn’t enough. You don’t know what this Zip and the girl were talking about. You don’t know what their relationship is. For all you know, he was comforting her because he’d just told her about you and she was heartbroken. Honey, you have to investigate.”

“It’s ... We were so connected. I was happy when I saw him and I know he’s happy when he sees me.» Keira sobbed. “But it was so hard to see him with her and I just knew there was something really ... um ... sexy passing between them.” She’d been too far away to really hear what was going on, but she had felt the sexual tension being communicated.

“So, are you going to just be miserable and avoid him for the rest of your life? Or are you going to use that joy you have in each other to confront him and find out what’s really going on?”

“I ... I’ll talk to him. Do you think I can believe him? I never experienced anything like this before.”

“Only you can answer that. You won’t have anything to believe or disbelieve if you don’t talk,” Rose admonished her.

Keira sniffled as she finished her tea. She hugged Aunt Rose and went home.

Jaime and Keira

In fact, her contact with Jaime was destined to come sooner than expected. When she got home, her parents said a detective from the police department had been by to see her and would come back soon. They wanted to compare her story to Jaime’s.

«Calling Jaime, » she said using as much volume as her inner voice could manage.

«Wow! You got me loud and clear, » Jaime responded. «I wanted to see you after school, but something came up.»

«I could see that, » Keira snapped. «It looked like you and that girl needed some private time.»

«That girl? Oh! Cheery. After I talked to her, I had to hang around school until football practice was over so I could talk to her boyfriend for her.»

«She wanted you to tell him she was breaking up?»

«What? No. She wanted me to talk to him about why she was scared to go all the way. It was kind of funny. Mex was torturing himself and ran off to buy an engagement ring for her. He was knocked off his feet to find out I had a girlfriend!»

«Who?» The response was curt.

«You! ... Keira, is something wrong?»

«I saw you hugging her! We can’t even do more than hold hands for a minute and you had your arm around her!»

«I was trying to get a clearer picture of what she was going through! Her thoughts were pretty muddled and I thought the contact would help me sort them out.»

«Can I believe you, Jaime?»

«Believe me? I ... I don’t think it would even be possible for me to lie to you about something. You’d know in an instant. You can look inside right now. I’ll come over and you can hold my hand and probe everything I’ve ever thought.»

«No! ... Tomorrow. We can hold hands for a minute and you can tell me all about it.»

«It’s pretty intense. She and Mex both had really graphic thoughts about each other.»

«We’ve got other problems tonight. A police detective is on his way to compare my story with yours about how we knew the kidnapper was going to grab that girl.»

«Wow! I just got home and have to get dinner ready. Uh-oh. There’s someone at the door. He’s broadcasting ‘police.’ I need to concentrate on what he wants.»

«Contact me as soon as he’s gone. I want to be sure our stories match.»

«Will do.»

Jaime and the Detective

Jaime had his laptop out and was using his text-to-speech app to talk to the detective. It had taken a few minutes to figure out how to communicate, but the detective was surprisingly patient. His thoughts said he dealt with teens all the time.

“So, you don’t speak at all?” he asked.

“Never have,” Jaime typed.

“So how did you and your girlfriend make a plan to follow the alleged kidnapper so quickly?”

“We both heard him muttering about how he was going to make her scream. I signed to Keira and she went to follow the girl while I followed the guy.”

“You’re pretty good at sign language, huh?”

“I’ve been using it since kindergarten. Keira is newer, but she does pretty good. It’s amazing how much of a conversation we can have without anyone realizing we’re talking to each other.”