by Jamie Howard
He hesitated for a moment, suspicion coating his features. I flicked my fingers at him again. Giving in, he leaned forward on his elbows and extended a hand in my direction. I turned it so that it was palm up, valiantly resisted the urge to trace the lines that crisscrossed his palm, and instead ran my thumb along the tip of his thumb and forefinger. Calluses—just like I expected.
“Guitar,” I said with a smug grin, releasing his hand and relaxing into the high back of the booth behind me.
“Impressive deductive reasoning skills.” He nodded. “So, how about you? You don’t happen to be a violinist, do you?”
“No, although,” I held up a finger, “I play a mean piano. But, for my brief stay in the city, I’m moonlighting as a waitress.”
His beer stilled on its route to his mouth. “Brief stay?”
“Yeah, I’ll be calling this place home until December.”
“And then?”
“Back to Texas, pass the bar, take a position at my father’s old firm.”
His eyebrows shot up, and it seemed the powers of movement returned to him as his pint glass finally made it to his mouth. “So, why the layover?”
The waitress returned with our dinners, pressing pause on our conversation. I twirled my fork between my fingers, picking up the thread of conversation once the waitress had, reluctantly, left us.
“I told you about the list I’m finishing for my friend?”
Ian nodded, his mouth too stuffed to do anything more. Turns out his “usual” was an enormous double burger covered in what looked like onion rings, barbecue sauce, and possibly even a mozzarella stick or two. For my purposes, I referred to it as the Heart Attack Special.
“Well, one of the items on the list is to live here for six months on my own. So, here I am.” I shrugged and dunked a few pieces of lettuce in dressing.
Swallowing down his mouthful, his tongue darted out to lick away an errant drop of barbecue sauce. He caught me staring at his lips, and I was willing to bet that the flush working its way through my cheeks was even worse than the one creeping across his.
I got into Columbia Law on early admission, but apparently this—determining if this ridiculously hot, somewhat odd guy was actually attracted to me—I couldn’t do. And without my brain bogged down by schoolwork, my sex drive seemed to be making its obnoxious presence known. Welcome to life after grad school, where your brain is no longer firmly rooted in your skull, but has migrated south and taken up new residence in your lady parts.
Ian looked at me in question, and I realized I’d missed whatever he said since I was too busy fantasizing about his tongue on my lips.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“The list, do you have a copy of it?”
“Uh, yeah.” Sifting through my purse I pulled out the extra copy I’d made, unfolded it, and slid it across the table to him. I carried it with me just in case inspiration struck.
He wiped his hands on the half-shredded paper napkin, and picked it up. I pushed a crouton around my plate while he read, debating how much I wanted to eat it versus how much I probably shouldn’t. Complex carbohydrates were the devil.
“This should be our thing,” he said.
“Our thing?”
“Yeah.” He smiled at me. His face was made for smiling. It was the kind of smile that made you involuntarily smile back until your cheeks ached from the effort. “I could help you with some of these if you like. Or, not help really, but tag along if you didn’t want to do them alone. That’s assuming that you don’t have anyone to do them with, and . . . I’m rambling.” He brushed a hand through his hair, drawing his shirt tight across his chest. He looked so adorably uncomfortable.
“I’d love the company.” I speared another round of lettuce leaves. “While we’re on the subject”—or at least hovering near it—“is there maybe a girlfriend at home who’s going to be annoyed that you’re hanging out with me?”
“No girlfriend.” He frowned. “I don’t . . . date.” His eyes searched mine as I tried to process that statement, looking for some type of reaction.
“Like, ever?”
“Not in a long time.” With another quick rub through his hair, he turned his attention back to his plate and put a quick end to that conversation.
Picking up my napkin, I dabbed it across my mouth while my mind spun in crazy circles. He didn’t date? Maybe Harper had been right about this guy. “Enigma” seemed like the perfect word for him.
The ebb and flow of cheering and screaming at the televisions around us had dulled into a subdued roar of voices. My attention drifted to one of the many flashing screens just in time for the Mets game to flip to a commercial break. As I watched, the TV switched to a 60 Minutes advertisement, and right there, in front of me, my face appeared on the screen.
Chapter 14: Ian
8 Years Earlier
I reconsidered my stance on PDA when it came to Maggie. As long as it involved her soft lips on mine, I couldn’t really care less what was going on around us. Anywhere was fair game. The two of us together was magnetic, explosive—like a roll of Mentos in a two-liter bottle of soda. (Fair warning, always perform that experiment outside.)
I lasted exactly three hours and twenty-one minutes before asking her out in the middle of the hallway on our way to chemistry class. She smiled that smile that made me feel like I was wrapped up in sunshine, linked her fingers with mine, and said yes.
My face spent every day twisted up into a goofy grin, always looking forward to the moments we could steal together between classes, the evenings cuddled together on the couch, sneaking kisses whenever my mom and dad left the room.
I’m ashamed to admit that my friendship with Rachel fell a little to the wayside. I was that guy, and in truth, I felt like a turd. This time it was me plastered up against the lockers with Maggie’s lips sealed to mine, barely aware enough to see Rachel passing by, darting a glance toward me through downward lashes.
I’d noticed she’d taken to carrying extra textbooks with her when her backpack wouldn’t hold anymore. Her seat at our lunch table remained conspicuously empty, and though I scanned the cafeteria for her, she was nowhere to be found. I planned on looking for her, but then there was Maggie, sitting next to me, draping her legs over mine, and offering me half of her cookie, and any thoughts of Rachel simply fled my brain.
I was a shitty-ass friend.
A few weeks passed, then a few months—three so far, and Rachel had become little more than a wisp of smoke that appeared and then disappeared in the periphery of my vision. I was planning on tracking her down, but it turned out she found me first.
I flicked through the channels, trying to find something to watch as my butt sank into the permanent indentation I’d made on this couch cushion. Maggie’s laughter drifted out from the kitchen, mixing with my mom’s while they cleaned up after dinner. Mags had blended seamlessly into our close-knit family, until it felt like she’d always been there.
A knock sounded from the front door, and I pushed myself to my feet. “I’ve got it,” I shouted. More laughter erupted, and I doubt they even heard me, or the knock for that matter.
The face behind the front door was as familiar as my own. Rachel’s sleek brown hair was tied back in a tight ponytail, and her ever present backpack was hanging off her back, weighing down her shoulders so that she slumped backward.
“Hey,” I said, pulling the door open for her.
“Hey,” she said, barely bothering to glance at me before she brushed by.
I frowned at her back, then followed her. Her head turned toward the kitchen where the sound of voices was as heavy as the smell of chicken pot pie in the air. With a heavy exhalation, she shook her head, and kept right on walking.
Through the living room, up the stairs, past my bedroom. I stopped at the top of the stairs, leaning on the banister. “What are you doing, Rach?”
The look she gave me was withering. “I don’t think that’s any of your concern, Ian.”
I flinched as if she’d slapped me across the face. Sure, we’d had our arguments, but she’d never looked at me quite like that. Could I really blame her though?
Lifting a hand, she rapped on Ben’s door. A few seconds later it opened for her, she slipped through, and closed the door behind her.
What the hell?
Too curious for my own good, but not willing to beg Rachel for information, I climbed the last few steps, crept over to Ben’s door with soundless footsteps on the beige carpet, and listened for all I was worth. It was such a chick move.
Despite my disregard for my brother’s privacy, I didn’t have any luck hearing anything, at least not anything distinct. There were voices, hers and then his, but their words were muffled, like they were . . . well like they were speaking on the other side of a door. But then something caught my attention that made my blood turn icy, freezing in my veins like someone dumped me in the Antarctic—a zipper was being pulled down, the sound of it completely unmistakable.
Before any thoughts managed to form in my brain, I shoved the door open, and found the startled glances of both Ben and Rachel land on me. All clothes were present, and they weren’t anywhere near his bed. Not even close.
Ben lounged in his desk chair with Rachel leaning over him, pointing to a pile of papers in front of him on his desk. Her backpack, the zipper culprit, sat gaping on the floor.
“Ever heard of knocking, asshole?” Ben asked with a scowl.
Rachel’s lips thinned into a pinched line as she glared at me. “Get out, Ian, this doesn’t concern you.”
“Yeah, Ian, run along and play.” Ben waved his hand toward the door, but I stayed firmly rooted where I stood.
Rachel gave me her back, pretending that I wasn’t there. “You got all that?”
Ben nodded. “Yup.” Reaching into his pocket, he passed her a sheet of paper, the edges frayed like he’d ripped it out of a notebook. “Here’s the rest of the stuff from today. I’ll come find you in the morning?”
“You know where I’ll be.”
Their words circled around my brain, rolling round and round as I tried to make sense of them. While my mind worked on overdrive, Rachel packed up her things, covered a huge yawn with the back of her hand, and walked right around me like I was a sign post rather than a person.
Ben grinned at me and lifted a shoulder in a half shrug, turning back to his laptop.
I took the stairs two at a time, coming right up on Rachel’s heels.
“You’re not even gonna say hi?”
She stopped dead in her tracks and started laughing. Not an actual laugh, but a sad and tired one that sounded like she dragged it up from the very bottom. “Seriously, Ian? You’ve been too busy sticking your tongue down Maggie’s throat for weeks to even acknowledge me and now you want to talk?” She shook her head. “I’m busy. Very busy.”
I didn’t doubt it. She looked like she’d walked through a hurricane and come out the other side barely intact. Honestly, I thought if she sat down for a second she’d be dead asleep in five seconds flat.
When she went to walk away, I grabbed at her. My fingers hooked onto her backpack rather than her arm, and it slid off into my hands. Suddenly determined to figure out what she was hiding from me, I ripped it open and grabbed for the paper Ben gave her.
Her eyes went wide, and she reached for it. “Give it to me.”
I had more than enough height on me that when I held it above my head she couldn’t reach it. Turning around so that I was facing the stairs, I unfolded it. All the while, Rachel climbed me like a spider monkey, trying to get it back.
I don’t know what I expected to be written there, but a list of Ben’s homework assignments wasn’t anywhere near the top of my guesses.
She slid off my back and waited. Waited for me to turn around. Waited for me to react.
“This is what you’ve been doing? You’re doing his homework for him?”
Lunging at me, she ripped the paper from between my fingers, leaving me with the tattered corner. “Not that it’s any of your business, but yes, I’ve been doing his homework. I’ve been doing it for months, which you probably would have noticed if you’d spoken more than ten words to me recently.”
Guilt—I was swamped with it, drowning in it. The only thing I could think to do was to shift the blame. “Get over it, Rach. You’re just jealous.”
“What?!” She half-shouted, half-screeched it at me, her voice reaching an octave that only dogs could hear. “Yeah, I’m so jealous that I’m not in a soul-sucking relationship that took over my entire life and made me completely forget about my best friend.”
“No, you’re just doing my brother’s homework because you’re so in love with him that you think this might finally make him realize you’re alive.”
The horrified gasp didn’t come from Rachel, but from my mom. Maggie peered out from behind her, an equally shocked expression on her face. But it wasn’t either of their expressions that sucker punched me in the throat and made me feel like I was going to hurl—it was Rachel’s.
Her chin trembled, tears pooling in her eyes, but not quite to the point where they started spilling down her very pale cheeks.
“Don’t you fucking talk to her like that.” The angry voice came from behind me, and I turned to see Ben, standing on the stairs, his fists clenched at his sides. I thought he was going to punch me in the face, and I half wanted him to. I deserved it.
“Alaric Benjamin Mathis, you watch your mouth when you’re in my house. All of you—in the living room.” Mom lifted a finger and pointed, though we all knew well and fine where the living room was. “Now.”
Ben nudged Rachel with his shoulder as he walked by. “Uh-oh, I must really be in deep shit if she’s first-naming me.”
“Ben!” Mom groaned.
“My bad, Ma.” He winked at Rachel and a smile broke across her face, which was completely at odds with the few stray tears that leaked from the corner of her eyes. The pain in my gut twisted harder. When had Ben taken my place with her?
We marched into the living room in a single-file line. Maggie and I sat in the love seat, her hand automatically finding mine.
“Not your best moment,” she whispered in my ear.
I rubbed a hand over my face. “Any chance Ben didn’t actually hear what I said?”
“Not a snowball’s chance in hell.”
“Damn.”
Mom’s eyes shot to mine, and the heat of that look would have scorched off my eyebrows if it could. I gave her a lopsided smile in apology.
To the left of us, Rachel went for the recliner, tucking her feet up underneath her and tugging the red afghan down from behind her to cover her legs. Ben just leaned against the wall, crossing his feet at the ankles and folding his arms across his chest.
Mom stood centered between all of us, brushing back a wisp of brown hair that floated in front of her eyes. She sighed. “I think you’re all getting a little old for one of my lectures, so let me keep it short. Ben”—she shook her head—“stop using Rachel, do your own homework.” Her eyes swept toward me. “Ian, I understand your relationship with Maggie is new and exciting, but that doesn’t mean you can forget about your friends. You’ll both survive if you take some time apart. You owe Rachel an apology.” Finally, she turned to Rachel. “And dear, I probably can’t stop you from doing my son’s homework if you’re dead set on it, but the only way he’ll learn is when he fails and has to pick himself back up again.”
The front door shutting had five heads turning toward it. My dad glanced up from perusing his gold pocket watch and started when he found himself the focus of everyone’s attention.
“This some type of intervention?”
Mom crossed to him, giving him a quick kiss. “Nothing to worry about, dear. Just sorting a few things out.”
A wrinkle formed in his forehead, his mouth pulling down at the edges. His gaze settled on Rachel, and he shared that look with my mom where they managed to communicate witho
ut actually speaking. I wondered if Maggie and I would ever be able to do the same thing.
“What do you think, boys?” he asked. “Some music for the ladies?” He reached into the closet, depositing his jacket and pulling out our guitar. We had two of them, but most times we’d take turns playing. I’d grown up with my fingers on the strings, and not a day went by that I didn’t at least strum out a few chords.
“Your choice, Rachel,” Dad said. “What would you like to hear?”
She rolled the tasseled ends of the blanket between her fingers, and I could see the thoughts churning behind her eyes. Three months ago she would’ve brushed it off, asked me or my dad to play whatever we liked. But something had changed with her. Instead, she looked up at Ben and said, “Will you play ‘Wonderwall’ for me?”
He studied her for a minute. “Sure, Rach.” Crossing the room, he took the guitar dad held out to him, and set about tuning it.
Maggie elbowed me in the side. “Fix it.”
It took a second for her meaning to sink in, but when it did, I felt a smile spread across my face involuntarily. This girl. I dipped my mouth toward her ear, her wayward curls tickling my nose. “You’re amazing, you know that?”
Her smile lit up her eyes, but instead of answering, she just nudged me again.
Catching Rachel’s gaze, I tilted my head toward the side and scooted closer to Maggie, making a space on my other side. She hesitated, looking between the two of us like she was unsure of Maggie’s reaction to her coming over. Whatever she saw must have been reassuring because she gave in and walked over to us, blanket and all.
When she plopped down next to me, I laid my free hand on her leg.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my voice cracking just a tiny bit in a very unmanly fashion. To my left, Maggie squeezed my hand, and in that moment my heart swelled, doing its best Grinch impression. Except my heart had never been too small, it had always been just right. So now, it was practically bursting from my chest, so full of feelings that I swore any day now I’d end up getting my period.
“I know.” She dropped her head onto my shoulder. “I forgive you.”
