You Look Different in Real Life

roads that run through town, there’s a sign for Hunter Farms. Olivia and I always refer to it as the Cannibal Apple. On it, an apple with a face and arms and legs is holding a smaller, apparently less evolved apple without a face or arms or legs, which has a big bite eaten out of it. “HUNTER FARMS! JUST ONE MORE MILE AHEAD!” says the Cannibal Apple ecstatically in a speech balloon, like this is where everyone on the planet is headed.
    There’s nothing too special about Hunter Farms. It’sone of several that dot the map around here, doing big fall business with the U-Pick crowds and quietly selling fresh things to locals the rest of the time. But every family seems to latch onto “their” farm, and Hunter has been ours for as long as I can remember. I’m guessing that originally, this was because of Nate and Felix, and our connection through the Five At films. In a small town like ours, that’s all it takes for lifelong produce loyalty.
    It’s Friday. Felix has agreed to accompany me to the art house theater one town over, which is something I like to do on weekends, usually by myself, when everyone else is lining up at the mall to see the newest craptacular blockbuster. The crew is meeting us there, which probably explains why Felix was so eager to see a film in Farsi he’s never heard of. I’m on my way to get him at the farm, where he still works part-time when his dad needs more hands, like right now during spring tree-pruning season.
    I used to feel weird about coming here. Because of Nate. Because he might be around. But Felix always assured me that Golden Boy was never on-site. When I saw the abandoned rabbit hutches behind the farm store, I started to believe it.
    What happened to the rabbits? I’m always wondering about this. When Nate traded 4-H for ab crunches, did the bunnies end up as collateral damage? Felix’s mom says they were “given away,” but that could be one of those euphemisms like “being sent to live on a farm inthe country.” When an animal is already living on a farm in the country, what lie do you use to pretend something horrible didn’t happen to it?
    I veer into the circular driveway of the farm store and stop the car on an intentionally random angle, just because I can. In summer, the big doors are open to the road and the ice cream window has a line ten deep and you can’t find a parking space, but until then, everything’s boarded up except for a small side door with a sign that says, a little too desperately, “Yes! We’re Open!”
    Suddenly, two people burst through the farm store door: Nate and his grandmother. I’ve always admired Mrs. Hunter. She dresses like she’s forever on her way to a yoga class, and is in the paper every other week as a member of some committee. By contrast, I think I’ve seen Nate’s mom two or three times in the last five years, even though they all live together in the big brick house on the hill above one of the orchards.
    Mrs. Hunter is talking to Nate and looks mad. Nate is not talking back and looks haggard. He checks out my car and sees who’s in it. But his gaze doesn’t ricochet off me the way it usually does. He holds it there. Just staring.
    Mrs. Hunter continues talking, her voice raised enough so I can hear a bit through the closed windows. I catch the words help and important . Nate’s still looking at me with an expression I can only describe as pleading . It’s the distantly familiar version of Nate Hunter, like when a songsamples an older one and you can’t name it, but you know you know it from somewhere.
    I find myself responding to him with a moronic, yet somehow appropriate, shrug. It’s enough to count as some kind of exchange. Something passes between us. Then he turns and starts up the gravel driveway toward the house with his grandmother on his heels. I watch him walk. It’s not the same walk he has at school.
    Not that I notice his walk, of course. I hate him, remember? But just so you know, this walk is the walk of a young boy being nagged by his grandmother about something. It’s as if he’s curling further into his inner eleven-year-old with every step.
    The passenger door of the car opens suddenly and Felix is sliding in. He looks freshly changed, into one of his signature polo shirts and a crisp pair of jeans.
    “How was it?” I ask.
    “I used to love apple trees,” he replies, a little dazed. “No more.”
    After I pull onto the road, I say, “I just saw Nate being bitched out by