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people was not to dump your baggage on them, and here Chico had basically done it twice. Naturally, Rafael wanted nothing to do with him. Chico should be content with that. It proved what he’d been trying to tell Davi; he was not ready to be out in the world.
    He listened to Rafael greeting the fruit seller, then grabbed his bag even tighter and turned to head back home.
     
     
    IT WAS Sunday and a day off. Chico lay in bed with his old laptop, playing episode after episode of a show about how things were made and then, after a while, switched it to episodes of Project Runway .
    His mom called, but he let it go to voice mail since he had nothing to tell her. Friends from the city were doing fun Sunday things and letting everyone online know. He noted each update with vague curiosity until it was time for bed.
    Then the next morning he got up and drove in to work.
    He was back in bed that afternoon when Davi stormed in, using his key like a pushy landlord.
    “I’m not going to ask why there are two peppers on your kitchen table along with two empty cartons of ice cream. Just get up already.”
    “Davi.” Chico buried his face beneath a pillow. “I already went out to encounter other humans. It didn’t work. Leave me alone.”
    “Oh yeah? Who did you encounter?” Davi went quiet at the idea, then grunted and seemed to forget it. “It didn’t work because you’ve forgotten how to talk to people. It takes practice, like anything else. Come on. Get up, loser. We’re going volunteering.”
    Chico rolled over, although he kept his face under his pillow… which smelled a little. He needed to do laundry. “Why are you doing this?”
    “Because they need the help.” Davi had to be deliberately misunderstanding him. “Get up. And take a shower. Yuck.”
    “It doesn’t matter what I smell like, Davi,” Chico argued, but slid part of his body toward the side of the bed. He put his feet on the floor without his head leaving the pillow.
    “Remember when you washed my hair for me after I got out of the hospital, so I could feel human again?” Davi was gruff. “It matters.”
    Chico heaved a sigh and pulled the pillow away. “I’m not… I don’t think I should go into the dance studio again.”
    “Are you about to tell me again that painting a stupid background canvas for a kids’ play is too difficult for you?” Davi threw away the ice cream cartons and put the peppers in Chico’s very bare fridge. “You can’t actually ask junior high and high school kids to do that stuff. They’re only focused on the dancing. And their parents are practically show parents. Half of them are there for their kids because the kids like the dancing. They don’t understand the fuss. The other half, from what I can tell, are the obsessed kind who chose this school for what it could offer their little angels. They’re the worst, and they get nothing done. Come on. My first year up here, I did it and I survived. Chico,” he drew out the name in a whine. “Don’t make me go alone. The yoga…. Don’t make me go alone.”
    “That yoga teacher….” Chico arched an eyebrow and sat up. “She’s adorable, I hear.”
    “Shut up and get dressed.” Davi could almost stand up straighter than Rafael when he wanted.
    “Why are we really doing this?” Chico asked for the third time and gave his cousin a direct stare.
    Davi made a face, as though the answer was obvious. “To get our lonely asses out of the house.”
    That was honest, brutally so. But strangely, it didn’t hurt. Davi was right. Chico had never been a social butterfly, but he was used to people and family and conversation.
    He could do this.
    “Okay.” Chico stood up on wobbly legs to head to the shower, then paused and turned back. He could do this, but it was still scary as hell. “But don’t leave me alone, okay? I need help.”
    “As long as you can admit it,” Davi teased, but softly. “Now come the fuck on.”
     
     
    CHICO CAME the fuck on. He put