Chapter Eleven The Weight Of A Secret.

Our mothers thought we were all at the beach that afternoon. They didn't know that Amir and I had gotten bored and decided to come back to the house for a snack. As we walked up the porch steps, heard them talking through the window screen.

Malik stopped when he heard Leila say, "Freyah, I hate myself for even thinking this, but I almost think I'd rather die than lose my breast." Malik stopped breathing as he stood there, listening. Then he sat down, and I did too.

My mother said, I know you don't mean that."I hated it when my mother said that, and I guessed Leila did too because she said, "Don't tell me what I mean," and I'd never heard her voice like that before harsh, angry.

      "Okay. Okay. I won't."

   Leila started to cry then. And even though we couldn't see them, I knew that my mother was rubbing Leila's back in wide circles, the same way she did mine when I was upset.

I wished I could do that for Malik. I knew it would make him feel better, but I couldn't. Instead, I reached over and grabbed his hand and squeezed it tight. He didn't look at me, but he didn't let go either. This was the moment when we became true, real friends.

Then my mother said in her most serious, most deadpan voice, “Your boobs really are pretty goddamn amazing." Leila burst out into laughter that sounded like a seal barking, and then she was laughing and crying at the same time. Everything was going to be okay. If my mother was cussing, if Leila was laughing, it would all be fine.

I let go of Malik’s hand and stood up. He did too. We walked back to the beach, neither of us saying anything. What was there to say? "Sorry your mum has cancer"? "I hope she doesn't lose a boob”? When we got back to our stretch of beach, Khalil and Amir had just come out of the water with their boogie boards. We still weren't saying anything, and Amir noticed. I guessed Khalil did too, but he didn't say anything. It was Amir who said, “What's with you guys?"

“Nothing," I said, pulling my knees to my chest.

"Did you guys just have your first kiss or something?" he said, shaking water off his trunks and onto my knees.

"Shut up," I told him. I was tempted to pants him just to change the subject. The summer before, the boys had gone through an obsession with pantsing one another in public. I had never participated, but at that moment I really wanted to.

   “Aww, I knew it!"" he said, jabbing me in the shoulder. I shrugged him off and told him to shut up again. He started to sing, "Summer lovin', had me a blast, summer lovin', happened so fast ..

"Amir, quit being dumb," I said, turning to shake my head and roll my eyes with Malik. But then Malik stood up, brushed sand off his shorts, and started walking toward the water and away from us, away from the house.

"Malik, are you on your period or something?I was just kidding, man!" Amir called to him. Malik didn't turn around; he just kept walking down the shore. "Come on!"

“Just leave him alone," Khalil said. The two of them never seemed particularly close, but there were times when I saw how well they understood each other, and this was one of them. Seeing Khalil protective of Malik made me feel this huge surge of love for him-it felt like a wave in my chest washing over me. Which then made me feel guilty, because why should I be feeding into a crush when Leila had cancer?

I could tell Amir was feeling bad, and also confused. It was unlike Malik to walk away. He was always the first to laugh, to joke right back.

And because I felt like rubbing salt in the wound, I said, "You're such an asshole, Amir."

Amir gaped at me. "Geez, what did I do?" Ignored him and fell back onto the towel and closed nmy eyes. I wished I had Khalil’s earphones. I kind of wanted to forget this day ever happened.

Later, when Khalil and Amir decided to go night fishing, Malik declined, even though night fishing was his favorite. He was always trying to get people to go night fishing with him. That night he said he wasn't in the mood. So they left, and Malik stayed behind, with me. We watched TV and played cards. We spent most of the summer doing that, just us. We cemented things between us that summer. He'd wake me up early some mornings, and we would go collect shells or sand crabs, or ride our bikes to the ice cream place three miles away. When it was just us two, he didn't joke around as much, but he was still Malik.

From that summer on I felt closer to Malik than I did to my own brother. Malik was nicer. Maybe because he was somebody's little sibling too, or maybe just because he was that kind of person. He was nice to everybody. He had a talent for making people feel comfortable.