by Fields, MJ
Pushing through the crowd, I tried to make my way to the bar. The easiest way to make it through a sea of dancing people was to dance as you walked. My fingers glided along the back of some girl’s mesh shirt, and I got bumped into an overly sweaty guy.
Someone came up from behind me, circling my waist and pulling me back. “Where do you think you’re going?”
I didn’t know the voice, and I didn’t like his tone.
Turning around, I saw it was the guy who had climbed onto the speaker with me. I moved to the side and tried to get around him when he grabbed my forearm. I looked down at his fingers on my skin.
I pulled my arm back. “I’m here with my boyfriend,” I said.
Nine out of ten times, those were the magic words to get a guy to move on to the next girl.
“What’s he doing, letting his girl dance on a speaker like that?” he asked with a cocky sneer.
He tried to put his hands on my hips again, but I backed away, hitting some girl who was getting her freak on. She gave me a look of annoyance. So was the guy who just wouldn’t leave me alone.
“Get away from me.”
He leaned in closer. “It’s just one dance.”
“She said, get away,” a male voice echoed behind me.
His arms slid around my waist. Where the other guy’s hands felt cold and calloused on my skin, these felt warm and familiar. I put my hand on Adam’s arm that was strongly gripping me.
The guy eyed Adam up. While Adam was tall, he was very lean. Not intimidating when it came to stature, but there must have been something in his stance. The way he was staring the other guy down must have let everyone in that club know I was off-limits.
The guy’s palms went up in the air. “My bad, man.” With a nod, he walked away.
Adam spun me around and placed his hands on the sides of my face. “Are you okay?”
He had this look in his eyes. It was anger but filled with worry. It was the first time I’d seen it—the protector in him.
I pulled on his shirt and yanked him in, forcing my head to fall onto his chest. I let him hold me—but not because I was frightened for my life.
It was the first time I’d noticed how, if you stared directly into his eyes, you could see your own reflection. It was weird, seeing what someone else saw. With Adam, you could. If you stared long enough, he’d show you inside his soul. And, in that moment, the only thing in those eyes was me.
An odd sensation passed through me. It was peace. Even though we were standing in a loud club, sweaty bodies all around, I felt serene and safe in the way Adam cradled my head in his palm. Safer when he ran his thumb in circles on my cheek. The comforting touch made me look toward his mouth and how it parted, taking controlled deep breaths.
“Where’s Brad?” he asked.
I shook my head. I hadn’t seen him in a while.
He grabbed my hand and pulled me through the crowd, away from the dance floor and the mob of people, and around the side, heading toward the bar. I liked the way my hand felt inside his, so I gripped it harder. He squeezed back. He must have liked it, too.
That was when Brad appeared from the back of a speaker. Another large speaker was on the floor, and Brad had just crawled out of it. But this one was hollow in the back. A guy was sitting on the floor inside.
“Who’s that?” Adam asked, referencing the guy in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, sitting inside the black cube.
“Friend from art school,” Brad replied.
“It’s time to go,” Adam said. He wasn’t asking. He was telling.
When I look up, I am in front of Adam’s mom’s house. The Craftsman-style home still bears the olive-green siding and dark wood shutters. The freestanding basketball hoop is still there in the driveway. Landon probably uses it these days. Not that long ago, Adam and I played here.
“We have to talk.”
It had been three days since Adam and I had that moment on the school basketball court. The moment I wanted to kiss him. The moment we almost did.
I’d tried to talk to him at school, but he was always walking in the other direction. I had a feeling it was on purpose.
“Are you avoiding me?” I asked.
“Yes.” He had the keys to his mom’s car in his hand.
With my hands on my hips, I demanded, “Why?”
“You know why.”
He moved toward the car, but I stopped him.
“Play me,” I dared.
He tilted his head sideways.
“One-on-one. First to five. If I win, we talk about it.”
His eyes roved over my face as I gave him my most serious pout. For a second, I thought he was going to get in the car.
“Ten,” he countered.
“Deal.” I slid off my shoes and threw them on the grass.
He questioningly eyed my bare feet.
“I can’t play in flip-flops.”
With a shrug, he opened the garage, grabbed the basketball, and then slid off his sneakers. Wearing just his socks, he dribbled the ball toward me.
“I don’t want you to say I had an advantage when I beat you.”
I wiggle my finger in a come-hither motion. “Bring it on, Reingold.”
His lips rose and fell. He was wary of letting himself be excited. His body was facing the basket. He gripped the orange ball, and with knees bent, he swished the ball right into the basket.
He held a finger up in the air. “That’s one.”
I didn’t laugh because a sheer will of determination came over me. It was my ball, and I wasn’t going to let him take it from me. I dribbled it to the side, and he was right behind me with his arms out, ready to snatch it away. He had taught me the week prior how to crossover dribble behind the back, so I did that. Then, I took a step in one direction and quickly dipped to the side, taking a second step in the other direction. It was a perfect fake-out that let me dribble the ball up the court for a layup.
I held up a finger and put it as close to his face as I could. “That’s one.”
His smirk grew bigger. “Who taught you to play like that?”
I tossed him the ball. “Coach asked if I wanted to join the team.”
“You’re kidding.” He bounced the ball off the floor between his legs, catching it on the other side of his body. “Are you gonna your senior year?”
I reached in to steal the ball but failed. “Hell no. I’d rather dance.”
“That’s my girl,” he said.
He bounced the ball away from me, heading toward the basket. We both ran to it. He reached it first, but I was quick on his back. My eyes solely on the ball, I did what I could to get it. He tried to shoot. He missed. He got it again, but I knocked it out of his hands.
He grunted. The game was on.
For an hour, we were in nonstop combat. I had him on the defensive, and I played the hardest I had in the months we had been playing. He had me down three to one for a while, but I needed him to talk.
I had an amazing boyfriend, yet I couldn’t stop thinking of Adam. It had been slow-starting. I’d lie in bed and think of something funny he’d said or find myself casually mentioning him in conversation. Yet, recently, I had been more likely to want to be with him than Brad, and that thought scared me. I had a great guy. Adam had a great guy as a best friend. I didn’t want to lose Brad. But I wanted to be around Adam.
So, I rallied. I put on my offensive game, used every play he’d taught me, and made my baskets one after the other until my breath was ragged.
And I won the game.
His hands were on his knees, his head bowed down. When he looked up, he knew it was over. “What do you want to talk about?”
My mouth opened. I had the opportunity to talk about the attraction we had, the way we’d been fighting it for months, and, most importantly, how I wasn’t able to pretend like it didn’t exist anymore.
I never got a chance to breathe the words.
An ambulance whirled through the streets, straight toward the park.
Adam didn’t stay to answer my questions. He ran because he already knew the answer.
Twenty-Two
“I see that you got your car fixed.”
Dad just scared the daylights out of me.
I wasn’t expecting him to be on the recliner in the sitting room, his leg crossed over the other, with a book in his hand, a floor lamp casting a warm white glow over him. Yet the sight of him is relaxing. The feeling of being home is grounding.
I stare at the McConaughey keychain in my hand. “Yeah. Got it back tonight.”
He pats the sofa next to him, offering me a seat.
Placing my bag on a table by the door, I slide off my shoes and walk across the living room and into the small room on the side where Dad likes to read. It’s a small space for his recliner, a love seat, and a tall bookshelf boasting his beloved classics.
I take a seat on the chenille sofa and point to his book. “What are you reading?”
“Dubliners,” he answers with closed eyes and a grin. Even he knows it’s crazy that he’s read James Joyce as many times as he has. Especially Dubliners, which is a series of short stories. “Some say it’s Joyce’s simplest work. I find the more I read, the more I learn.”
“Which story?”
He rotates the book in his hand. “‘Araby.’”
“Ah, the story of the boy who whacks off to his best friend’s sister.”
Dad chuckles. “You’re being a realist. It’s about the consequences of idealization. The boy builds the girl up in his head and creates fantasies about her, so when she finally speaks to him, he can’t even put two sentences together. But what is real is not always what we build up in our minds.”
I tug at a loose thread peeking through the couch cushion. “He thinks she’s this amazing person when, in reality, she’s just like everyone else.”
“You can’t create love or conflict where it doesn’t reside.”
I pull too hard on the thread, and a small hole appears. “Crap! I ruined your couch.”
“I’ll sew it in the morning,” he says. He leans back into his chair, his leg recrossing, as he looks back at me.
He is sitting in silence, watching.
“What?”
“You want to tell me what’s eating at you?” He has the nature of someone who will wait all day for me to speak. Sitting in his chair, he lovingly gazes at me and just waits for his little girl to finally own up to what’s been going on the last few weeks.
I sigh. “What do you already know?”
He laughs lightly. “Why don’t you start from the beginning?”
“I got into an accident,” I say, looking up at him. He doesn’t seem surprised, so I continue, “My friend—this girl, Victoria, was driving. She was high, so as soon as the cops came, she left, leaving it to look like I was the one behind the wheel. I wasn’t though, I swear.”
Dad looks on at me. “I know. Adam told me.”
I clench my fists together. He had no business telling my dad about my accident. I can feel my face tense as I think about how he went behind my back and—
“A father deserves to know about the safety of his daughter.”
“He went behind my back.”
His finger taps his knee. “What happened next?”
I run a hand through my hair and take a deep breath. “I was arrested, but Adam made a deal with me—community service and probation. Here’s the thing. Adam knew I wasn’t driving the car. He had his proof the very next day. He made me feel like a criminal for weeks.” I look up at my father, and a knot forms in my stomach. “You knew everything.”
“I made a few guesses along the way.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I knew it was under control.”
I slump into the couch, the worn-down cushions molding around me. “You knew Adam had it under control.”
“No.” He puts the book down on the side table and leans in—his elbows on his knees, his hands out toward me. “I knew you had it under control.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
He laughs lightly. “Let’s just say, I like to see how my books play out, one chapter at a time.”
I turn my head away from him. Crossing my arms, I let out a huff.
“You’re not mad about the community service,” he says.
I raise a shoulder and shake my pinched mouth. I’m mad about everything. I’m mad about nothing. It all seems so simple. It all seems so trivial. Maybe I’m the problem.
“I let him into my kitchen, Dad. I showed him who I was on the inside, and he made me feel like a fool.”
My father takes my hand from my lap and holds it in his hands. “Do you know why your mother and I mortgaged our home for you?”
“Because you’d do anything for your children.”
“I’ll let you in on a little secret. I would never have given that money to Emma.”
My head shoots up, surprised by his statement.
He whispers, “She’s too uptight.”
I want to laugh, yet I’m too confused. His comment is true. Half-true. Emma can be a lot of fun, but when it comes to work and dreams, she’s a little frigid.
“And Luke,” he continues, “he’s too distracted. He’ll probably change his major ten times before he graduates. And that’s okay. It’s his choice to make.”
He squeezes my hand tighter. “But you, my dear Leah, have always been strong in your conviction and bright in spirit. You have the gift, the gift to make people laugh and sing, and the brains to balance books and solve problems others don’t foresee. You’ve known from a very young age what you wanted to do, and you’ve never let up.
“The difference between you and Emma is, you know how to live. One day, your sister is going to crack. She is too focused, too determined. But you? You find joy in everything. That is a rare and blessed gift. The work will be hard, the days will be long, but you’ll always enjoy life, no matter what.
“That is how we know you’ll succeed. Your mother and I, we’re not investing in a bar. We’re investing in you.”
Tears rise up behind my eyes. I know they’re glassing over because I’m curling my brows in to keep them from falling out.
He tilts his head down to catch a glimpse of my eyes. “For someone with so much confidence, you sure act insecure. That pains me. It’s like all this flair you present on the outside is your way of protecting your heart from being broken.”
A stray tear falls down my face. I wipe it away. “I know I’m amazing. I also know what others think of me. I don’t care what they think. All I care about is my family.”
“And?” he pries.
“My friends.”
“You’re forgetting someone.”
His words make my heart ache.
“Adam has thought the worst of me for years. And I…well, I suppose I’ve been doing the same to him, too.”
Dad pats my hand. “The consequences of idealization. Just in reverse. You have both created monsters out of each other.”
“He started it.”
“He was brave enough to create an opportunity for you two to find common ground.”
I blink back at my dad. “No.” I shake my head. “There’s too much to our past. It was wrong to think we could even be friends.”
He leans back in his chair. “Life is a series of commas, not periods.”
I look up at him. My mouth opens and then closes, confused by what my ears think they just heard. “Did you just McConaughey me?”
“I believe I did.”
Bowing my head, I laugh. The man never ceases to amaze me.
I rise and lean down to give him a hug. “I’ve never been prouder to be your daughter.”
He grabs my arms and looks me square in the eyes. “And I’ve never stopped being proud that you are my daughter.”
I walk across the living room and up to my room. Closing the door, I flick on the lights and walk over to my vanity. I’m taking my earrings out and looking o
ut my window. Across the way is a black pickup truck sitting on my street. Adam is leaning against the driver’s door, wearing blue jeans, that T-shirt from earlier today, and construction boots. He looks devastatingly handsome.
The worst part is, now, I know what it feels like to have that body in my hands. I know that, if I run my fingers down the outside of his torso, he’ll push his hips into me to fight the shiver. I know that his hair is silky and thick. My fingers can rake through it and tug when I want to draw him closer. And, if I flick my tongue on the inside of his lip, he’ll swoop in and suck on it.
Shame is, I also know what it’s like to be lied to by that man. I don’t know what his motives were, and I don’t care. He played on my greatest insecurity. He played me for a fool.
Even still, it’s not as bad as the words he said to me years ago. The words that kept me at a distance for seven years.
It rained the day of Brad’s funeral. I stood on the grass, my heels digging into the wet sod, as I clutched on to Emma, who was holding a hot-pink umbrella. It was the only one I had. My parents were in the crowd with a sensible blue one. Emma and I stood out in a sea of dark with the hot pink dangling above our heads.
It wasn’t like we had an aging uncle or a sick grandmother. No one had expected a vibrant, healthy, happy eighteen-year-old guy to die. And we certainly hadn’t expected it to rain on his funeral. If I had, maybe then, I would have bought a black umbrella.
I cried on Emma’s shoulder, ruining her silk dress she wore to performances. She never said a word. She just held me and let me mourn the first boy I’d loved. The one I had given all my firsts to.
Yet, even as I cried into my sister and prayed for the boy I’d lost, I couldn’t help but think of the one person who wasn’t there. Everyone asked, and no one knew why Adam wasn’t at the funeral.
His mother didn’t even have a good excuse other than, “He’s taking this really hard.”
Brad’s family received guests at their home after he was laid to rest. I drove to their home with my family. My dad had made a casserole. My mom had knit an afghan. Emma played the violin, and Luke sat awkwardly on the sofa, too young to know what to do with himself at such an event.
