I’m here!!
Good. Now take the 2, transfer at 42nd St, and take the 7 to Grand Central
Are you taking me to the office? Side-eye emoji.
He sends me an Aladdin GIF. Do you trust me?
Eye-roll emoji. Heart-eyes emoji.
Of course, the 2 train’s packed with commuters, and the 7’s even worse. I’m on my way to say goodbye to a boy I’m head over heels for. I’ll wake up tomorrow in a city where I didn’t have my first kiss, in a bed where I didn’t lose my virginity.
I’ll wake up single.
But to everyone around me, it’s just a regular workday. Headphones and pantsuits and scrolling through phones. It boggles the mind.
I text Ben from Grand Central. Okay, now what?
He texts me a picture of a street map, where he’s clumsily traced my route in red. I don’t even have to read the street names. WHY ARE YOU SENDING ME TO WORK BEN ALEJO??? I ask.
He texts me a thinker emoji.
This better not be about the Shumaker files. Side-eye, side-eye, side-eye.
But somehow, I can’t stop grinning. I’m the worst New Yorker ever. I’m floating through the intersections, smiling at strangers, totally captive to my own triple-knotted stomach. Maybe when I get there, Ben will be waiting naked in the conference room. Or maybe a literary agent works in this building, and I’ll find Ben signing a contract for a book deal with movie rights, and the movie’s filming in Atlanta, because things always film in Atlanta, and they’ll need Ben there for filming, so—
“Doctor!” says Morrie. He sips a cup of coffee with one hand and extends the other one toward me—but he’s not going for a fist bump. “I’m supposed to give you this,” he says.
He hands me an envelope with my name on it, but when I start tearing into it, he snatches it back. “You have to find all four. See?” Morrie flips the envelope over, and sure enough, in Ben’s messy handwriting, there’s a message.
#1 out of 4. Find them all and read in order.
NO PEEKING, ARTHUR.
“Okay . . .” I glance at the letter again and back up at Morrie. “Where are the others?”
“You have to find them,” says Morrie, shrugging. And then he turns his cup around.
It’s from Dream & Bean.
My mouth falls open. “Is that a clue?”
“I don’t know. Is it?”
Two blocks to Dream & Bean. I don’t think my feet touch the ground the whole way there. I don’t even know what I expect to find. An envelope, I guess? A whole bunch of envelopes, swarming around Harry Potter–style?
But when I push through the door, there’s no flying stationery. No magic. Just a whole bunch of anonymous New Yorkers lining up for their jolt of caffeine.
A bunch of anonymous New Yorkers . . . and Juliet and Namrata.
“What are you guys doing here?”
“Keeping you on task, as usual.” Namrata points her chin toward the bulletin board. “Go get him, kid.”
“My next clue!”
Right away I see the envelope. It’s in the exact spot once occupied by my poster. #2/4, it says. Arturo, you got this!!!!
I stack it under the first envelope, hugging them both to my chest. Then I text Ben. Treasure hunt, huh??
He writes back immediately with a shrugging-guy emoji.
Where do I go next?
Hmm, if only there were someone you could ask . . . Thinker emoji.
Ohhhhhh, I write—and sure enough, when I look up from my phone, the girls are watching me with matching amused smiles. My heart flips in my chest. I drift back to their table.
“Here’s your clue,” Juliet says, holding up her phone. “I don’t really get it.”
It’s a picture. Of a rat.
“Got it!” I make a break for the door—but then I skid to a stop. “Wait.”
“Wait what?” asks Juliet.
“Wow. Oh my God. I’m leaving. This is . . . goodbye.”
“No it’s not,” says Namrata. “Your Shumaker docs are a hot mess. I’ll be calling you with questions every day for a month.”
I hug her. “Good.”
“But we’ll miss your face,” says Juliet.
“A little,” Namrata says.
“A lot,” says Juliet.
I hug them both again and take off running—until I reach the corner and hail the first taxi I see. I don’t care if it’s just a few blocks: I’m not fucking around with time today. I stare out the back-seat window, practically jumping out of my skin. When the driver pulls up to the karaoke place at last, I fling money at him and burst out the door.
And there’s Dylan on the sidewalk, holding his phone, a pair of headphones, and a giant thermos of coffee. He visibly starts when he sees me. “Shit. Seussical, you’re early. Okay, take these.” He shoves the headphones over my ears and does this giant, gaping yawn. “Fucking Benosaur. It’s too early—okay, wait, we’re on mute. Hold up.” He taps his phone screen. “And . . . you good?”
“So . . . reggae?” I start to ask—but then a moment later, I place it. Not just any reggae. It’s Ziggy Marley. “Is this—”
“A song about an aardvark?” says Dylan. “Absolutely.”
Arthur Read, my bespectacled alter ego. King of the yellow V-neck. The fist that launched a thousand memes.
Dylan looks pensive. “I’m not the only one wondering what it would look like if a rat and an aardvark mated, right?”
“Mmm. You might be.”
“Arthur!” I look up to find Samantha turning the corner. She jogs toward us, immediately crushing me in a hug. “You’re early! Your next clues aren’t here yet, but they’re coming in, like, one second.”
“Clues, plural?”
“Definitely plural.”
“You done with my headphones, Seussical?” Dylan plucks them off my head before I can answer. “Hey, don’t look now . . .”
And right away, I see them. They’re crossing the street, walking toward us, their steps perfectly synchronized. But they’re not wearing rompers this time. They’re wearing lederhosen.
“Holy. Shit,” I murmur.
“I . . .”
“So this is Wilhelm, and this is Alistair,” Samantha says. “And they’re here to escort you to your last stop.”
I can’t stop staring. The handlebar mustaches. The man buns. The way they’re even more identical up close. They’re each holding an envelope with Ben’s handwriting.
“How did he . . . find you?” I ask.
Wilhelm smiles, mustache twitching. “Craigslist.”
“I’m just.”
Holy shit. Ben put up a missed connection. For me. Well, for the twins. But I’m the reason he did it. Me.
“We check Craigslist every day,” says Alistair. “We’ve had thirty-six missed connections since we moved here.”
“Is that . . . a good thing?” asks Dylan.
“It’s a very good thing,” says Wilhelm. “Open the envelopes.”
“In order,” Samantha reminds me.
Ben’s handwriting. Four sentences.
Arthur, I know you’re the one with the grand gestures and no chill.
But the truth is, no one deserves a grand gesture more than you.
I’m not as creative as you, but this is me going the extra mile.
And making you walk an extra mile. I love you.
My eyes prickle with tears—I feel so achy and happy and strange. The next thing I know, the twins are herding me back uptown. It doesn’t even feel real. If it weren’t for my rioting heart, I’d swear I’d left my body. The twins keep asking me chatty questions about music and movies and Ben, but I can barely form words. It’s hard to be a fully functioning Arthur when your heart lives in four envelopes.
I try to catch my breath. Be normal. Make conversation. “So do you guys live in, uh, Brooklyn?”
“Nah, Upper West Side. Well, we used to live on the Upper West Side, but we just moved back in with our parents on Long Island.”
“We’re
writing a webcomic,” says Wilhelm.
“About dinosaurs,” adds Alistair.
I stop short. “Of course you are.”
Wilhelm points up the street. “Look, we’re almost there.”
I follow his gaze. And without a doubt, I know.
I break off from them at full speed, weaving around strollers, shoving between couples, clutching the envelopes to my chest. I’m sure I look ridiculous, or at least ridiculously determined. I didn’t even know I could run this fast. I’m a five-foot-six southerner in glasses, and I’m the fastest fucking dude in New York.
I see its awning from a full block away—its white stone exterior gleams in the sun.
United States Post Office.
And there’s Ben, leaning next to the doorway, balancing a cardboard box on his knee.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Ben
We’re back at the start.
Arthur walks into the post office, and wow. His face is winning the game. Like always. It doesn’t matter if he’s just reading chemistry trivia off index cards or eating a hot dog or embarrassed because his parents are talking about his childhood or even now, looking tired and wearing glasses. My heart is running wild, which wasn’t the case when we first met. It should’ve been love at first sight like all the great stories, but I wasn’t ready yet. And that’s okay. We still got somewhere great. The worst story would’ve been never finding each other again, or never meeting in the first place.
I put down the box as he hugs me.
“How’d I do?” I ask. Mapping out memory lane seemed like an epic way to close out this summer.
“Best curtain call ever,” Arthur says. “I really don’t want this to be over.”
“Me either. Super me either.”
“I want a time machine. Go back and do everything right. Literally everything would’ve been different if I had just gotten your name. I would’ve just followed you on Instagram and taken it from there.”
“The universe knew that was too easy and outsmarted us.” I kiss his forehead. “Everything means so much more because of all the hoops we jumped through, right?”
I don’t know if we’re a love story or a story about love. But I know whatever we are that it’s great because we kept jumping through the hoops in the first place.
“I still want the time machine,” Arthur says. “So we can jump ahead. I want to leave right now and see where we end up.”
“Won’t fight you there,” I say.
He looks down at the box. “That better not be what I think it is. Don’t bring this full circle with my very own breakup box.”
“It’s not.” I pick up the box. “It’s a best friend box.”
“Really?” His smile will still be wonderful on FaceTime, but it won’t be the same.
“Really. But don’t tell Dylan. He doesn’t believe in multiple best friends, and he might hire someone to make you go missing.”
“Noted. What’s inside?”
“Just some things so you always remember our summer.”
Arthur shakes his head. “I don’t need this box to remember.”
“Fine. I guess I’ll keep this very sexy scene between Ben-Jamin and King Arturo on the back of a Central Park postcard—”
“—I want the box.”
“—And the packaged cookie from Levain Bakery that was supposed to be one hundred percent for you.”
“I said I want the box!”
I’m going to miss him and his no-chill energy so much. “There’s also a touristy magnet with my name. I’m keeping the one with yours.” I take a deep breath in his silence. “And I framed the photo Dylan took of us with your birthday cake. I have one in my room too.”
Arthur is tearing up. “Thanks for this. For everything. This morning. This summer. I know I’m a lot, and you’ve been so cool about it.”
I laugh a little. “We’re the worst. I mean, we’re the best. But we’re the worst. You always think you’re too much, and I feel like I’m not enough.”
“I will say it a hundred more times, but you are more than enough.”
“I’m starting to believe you.”
We get to the clerk’s window and I kiss Arthur’s name on the box before handing it over. The clerk gives me a what-the-hell look because he doesn’t know what Arthur and I have gone through in the past few weeks to be back here right now.
Once the box is off on its way, so are we.
This time when I leave the post office, I’m holding Arthur’s hand. We stop underneath the metallic lettering of the post office.
“One last pic to hold us over,” Arthur says, pulling out his phone.
I close my eyes and kiss his cheek while he takes the picture. When I look at the picture, Arthur has this Hamilton-ticket-lottery-winning smile.
That smile is gone when I look up at him. “I can’t believe I’m actually leaving.”
“Me either.”
There couldn’t be a worse morning to have to say goodbye to Arthur. We’re walking to school, where I have to pass an exam that will determine my future. Like things aren’t complicated enough. But I’m feeling okay. Sad and nervous, but hopeful. I bet I’ll be the only person laughing in the classroom since Arthur’s ridiculous but super-helpful mnemonic devices will lead me to victory.
“I’m not ready,” I say outside my school.
He’s crying. “Me either.”
“Arthur, you know I would try if I thought we could beat the world, right?”
“I know. We never let anything stand in our way before, but this is . . .”
“Next-level. I can’t lose you forever. You can’t be someone I just knew for one summer. I have to know you every summer.”
“You will,” Arthur promises.
We press our foreheads together and he wipes away my tears.
“I should get in there,” I say, holding on to him like I’m hanging over the side of a building and he’s the ledge.
“I should catch my flight,” Arthur says through tears.
“Okay, King Arturo.”
“Okay, Ben-Jamin.”
He leans in. Our last kiss. I stay pressed against him because this is it, this is all we have to get us through the coming days when we can’t hold hands or kiss or wake up next to each other. I try pulling away, but I’m sucked back into him. It’s not enough and it’s never going to be enough, so I slowly count down from ten in my head and at zero we’re done.
“I’m about to walk away,” Arthur says. “I can’t turn around once I get moving. But you shouldn’t be standing here and watching me in case I cheat. Just run into the school. Okay?” He takes a step back.
I nod.
“I love you, Ben.”
“Te amo too, Arthur.”
Our fingers unlock and that’s it. Arthur somehow finds the strength to turn away, and I feel emptier with each rapid footstep he takes. He gets to the end of the block and he stops. Long enough that I’m expecting him to spin a one-eighty and run back for one more kiss. But he keeps on moving. It’s for the best. I run up the steps into school and my phone buzzes. It’s Arthur texting me the picture of me kissing him in front of the post office. One picture sparks summer memories and I don’t feel empty. I feel like I’m breathing in hope.
The universe wouldn’t get us together for just one summer, right?
Epilogue
What If It’s You and What If It’s Me?
Arthur
Fifteen Months Later
Middletown, Connecticut
Ethan’s not picking up.
I feel ridiculous, scrunched up against the wall, two halls down from Mikey’s dorm room. I’m supposed to be at a party, living that College Arthur life. But College Arthur and college parties don’t mix well. It’s more than two months into freshman year, so I can officially say that. I mean, I keep trying anyway, mostly for the Life Experience, but also because I highly doubt Lin-Manuel Miranda stayed in his dorm all night watching YouTube and throwing away his shot. But parties
make me nervous, which makes me talk too much, and then everyone thinks I’m drunk, which I’m not, because let’s be real: no one’s ready to meet Drunk Arthur, not even me.
Anyway, I told Mikey I’d be there, so I’m here. Or at least I was here, until I saw Ethan’s Instagram Story. Now I’m the best friend, reporting for duty.
I try texting. You okay my dude?
Nothing. Five minutes later, still nothing, not even an ellipsis, and I feel a little sick about it. When Jessie broke the news to me yesterday, she made it sound like it was mutual. I’ve talked to her twice since then, and she seems okay—sad, but okay. But Ethan won’t answer my calls. He’s barely responding to my texts.
I rest my head on the cinder-block wall, shutting my eyes. I mean, I’m sure Ethan’s fine. Maybe he’s ignoring my texts because he already met an awesome new girl who can sing and play piano and looks like Anna Kendrick. Maybe she is Anna Kendrick. Though you just know Ethan would blurt out that he likes the original cast soundtrack of The Last Five Years better than the film, which, duh, but how rude is it to say that to Anna Kendrick? So obviously she’ll dump him, which means he’s double-dumped, which means we’re back where we started, but worse.
Guess I better call again.
I’m sent straight to voice mail. For a minute, I just stare at my phone, only half listening to the Radiohead song drifting out of someone’s dorm room. I hate how helpless I feel. And not the romantic kind of helpless. Not the Eliza Schuyler kind. It’s more like the feeling you get watching the end of Titanic. You want to reach into your screen and tip the boat back upright. You want to fix the unfixable.
A text from Mikey: Hey, where’d you go?
I should text him back. Actually, I should just suck it up and go back to the party. It’s not even the intimidating kind of party. It’s mostly just a cappella people sitting on Mikey’s bed and drinking. College is like that—at least Wesleyan’s like that. It’s like the nerds rose to power, kicked out all the popular kids, and stole their weed and alcohol. Which isn’t to say everything’s about smoking and drinking here. A lot of people just sit around talking or gaming or making art, and they’re sometimes naked, and I kind of love that. Not the nudity in particular. But I love that give-no-shits mentality. Also Wesleyan has the cutest boys, far cuter than a certain other Connecticut school that shall remain nameless until I name them. I’m not even bitter that Yale waitlisted me. That’s how cute the boys are here. Case in point: Mikey, with his bleached hair and wire-framed glasses and above-average kissing ability. I’d say he’s the third-best kisser out of the six boys I’ve kissed. Second best was this guy I met when I visited Jessie at Brown. First best was Ben.
What If It's Us Page 27
