Edward Adrift

been very helpful since I got hurt.”
    “That’s also true. Do you like anything else?”
    “You’re pretty.” My cheeks flush with warmth, and I’m embarrassed.
    “Thank you. Anything else?”
    “You smell good.”
    “Thank you again.”
    “That’s about it,” I say. That’s not even close to it. I don’t like to lie, but I’m too embarrassed to say anything more.
    Sheila Renfro takes my left hand in her right hand. She is wearing gloves. I am not.
    “I want to tell you something,” she says.
    “OK.”
    “Do you remember last night when I said that you and I are more alike than your mother knows?”
    “Yes.”
    “I want to tell you what I meant.”
    “OK.”
    “When I was in school, a lot of the other kids didn’t like me. They called me names like ‘tard.’ Do you know what that means?”
    “Retard.”
    “Yes.”
    “You’re not a retard, Sheila Renfro.”
    “No, I’m not. And neither are you.”
    “No one has ever called me a tard. I got called a spaz a lot.”
    “Well,” she says, “you’re not one of those, either. What I’m trying to say is that I didn’t have any friends, and that was hard when I was a kid. My daddy used to tell me all the time that I was a special girl, and it would take a special person to see me for who I am.”
    I like Sheila Renfro’s daddy, even if he is in the ground. “That’s nice,” I say.
    “Yes. But I’ve been waiting a long time, and I haven’t found that person. I don’t like to think that my daddy was wrong about something, but so far, he is.”
    “Yes. I understand.” I keep looking down at my hand in Sheila Renfro’s. She notices this.
    “Does this bother you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Do you want me to stop?”
    I have an answer that flummoxes us both. “No.”
    I don’t make sense anymore.
    “I’m sorry about fighting with your mother,” Sheila Renfro says, and she grips my hand tight. “I know she loves you, like my daddy loved me. I know she’s worried about my intentions. I like you, Edward. I want to learn more about you. I want to see where this goes.”
    My mind is scattered. I put my other hand over the top of hers and squeeze, and when she looks at me, I smile and look away.
    “Why do you like me?” I ask.
    “Because you have good taste in football teams.” She laughs, but when I don’t, she stops.
    “You’re kind,” she says. “You give to other people. You were so good with Kyle, and he worships you. I think you can tell a lot about a person from how he treats children. You’re a special man, Edward. That’s why I like you.”
    I like her, too, and it makes me feel warm inside to hear her say these things. But I’m flummoxed by the idea of this going somewhere. In a few days, I will have to go back to Billings, where my life is. This isn’t going somewhere. I’m going somewhere.
    And I’m not ready to do that yet.

    Sheila Renfro asks me to keep holding her hand as we walk back to the motel. I do as she requests.
    “Have you ever had a girlfriend?” she asks.
    “No.”
    “Never?”
    “No.”
    “Why not?”
    That’s an unanswerable question. I tell her about my one disastrous venture into online dating, when Joy Annette wigged out (I love the slang phrase “wigged out”) on me after I told her we couldn’t have sex on our first date. She ended up writing me a series of increasingly bizarre e-mails, until I unplugged my account. Since then, I’ve been fearful of trying to date someone again.
    “Have you ever had sex?” Sheila Renfro asks. I’m taken aback by this.
    “No.”
    “Really?”
    “How could I have sex if I didn’t have a girlfriend?”
    Sheila Renfro laughs. “There are people in the world who don’t consider a boyfriend or a girlfriend a necessity for sex, Edward.”
    This perplexes me, until I remember Kyle and
Jersey Shore
. Those guidos would have sex at the drop of their pants.
    I just made a joke where I take a common phrase—“the drop of a hat”—and turn it into something fresh and new by referencing the droopy trousers of the guidos on
Jersey Shore
.
    I’m pretty funny sometimes.

    We have a lunch of spaghetti—my favorite—in Sheila Renfro’s cottage.
    After her interrogation of me earlier, I feel bold enough to ask my own questions.
    “Have you ever had a boyfriend?”
    “Yes.”
    “You have?”
    “Why are you surprised?”
    “I’m not, I guess. Did he live around here?”
    Sheila Renfro goes to the refrigerator to pour some more cold water into