“Hamilton?”
“Why do you say that?”
Rhiannon gestures to Marlon’s phone case. Which is, indeed, a Hamilton phone case.
“The touring company is here in DC right now. Let’s send him there.”
“How will we get a ticket to that?”
Rhiannon smiles. “He doesn’t need to attend. He just needs to think he did. Come on.”
We get to the theater just as people are filing in. Rhiannon takes a picture of Marlon in front of the marquee with his thumbs up. He sends it to all his friends. They respond immediately.
No way!
How did U—
We’ll cover for ya!
Rhiannon and I head to dinner then, earbuds shared, blasting the cast album.
We end up at a pizza place a few doors down from Politics and Prose. We’re both excited for food, and exhausted from the day. I am enjoying my time with her, but about once every five minutes, I think, X is gone. He’s really gone.
And I don’t feel relief. I feel regret.
I know I can’t keep this inside. So I tell Rhiannon.
She has no idea, X’s voice says in my head. Not really his voice, of course. But now a part of me will use his voice to get its points across.
It doesn’t matter. I want to tell her, I say back.
“There have to be others,” she assures me. “If there were two of you, there are likely three, if not three thousand. You’ll find them. You can have the same conversations with them. Without the evil streak.”
I’ll never know how evil.
Nor will I ever know if I could have somehow convinced him to go the other way.
I doubt it. But I’ll always wonder.
“So what’s your plan?” Rhiannon asks. Then, seeing my expression, she clarifies, “For tonight, I mean.”
“I’m going to go back to Hamilton when it lets out, and get someone to give me a ticket stub. Then I’m going to head to a residential area, because if I keep going to sleep in a hotel, I’m going to end up flying to Paris before I know it. And I want to stay here. Near you.”
“Do you want me to stay with you?”
“No. You need to get back. You have school tomorrow.”
“I know. But I’ll stay if you need me.”
“If that’s the condition for you staying, then you’ll never get to leave.”
“You don’t need me.”
“I absolutely need you. And our whatever-this-is.”
“The love that can’t find the right word.”
“Yes. That’s what we have.”
“It’s weird.”
“It definitely is.”
“No—something else. I was going to say that it’s weird the way I always thought our big question was whether we’d manage to be together. But it’s like the question’s shifted, and now it’s not whether we can be together but in what way we’ll be together.”
“And what’s the answer to that question?”
“It’s the word we haven’t found yet. But it’s there. I can feel it there.”
So can I. And I don’t know what to call it, either.
I am just grateful it exists. I am grateful that after everything that’s happened, it holds.
* * *
—
An older couple is nice enough to give me one of their ticket stubs. Then I listen to the cast album some more as I walk up to Dupont Circle, writing Marlon’s evening inside his head and hoping the memories I’m creating will feel real.
A little before midnight, I use Marlon’s phone to order a Lyft. The driver knows to take him back to his hotel.
Very quickly, I fall asleep in the back seat.
RHIANNON
I return to my life. The fact that A is near is definitely a part of it. But it doesn’t define it. It can’t.
That night, I take my time walking back to my car. I can’t get the sight of Wyatt and his family out of my head, or the thought that if we hadn’t done something, he might have been lost forever.
This, I realize, it what it feels like to be part of something much bigger than yourself. Not just with friends, but with strangers.
It allows me to understand the strength it takes not just for A to be human, but for all of us to be human, if we want to be important not just to friends, but to strangers.
Months ago, back when I was with Justin, I never would have even approached such thoughts. I was too busy staring down to look out. I can see this now.
It’s not that I feel that everything’s shifted.
It’s that the shifting, once started, is continuous.
That’s what it feels like.
* * *
—
When I get to school the next morning, it feels like any other Wednesday. The excitement from the protest has given way to the usual mix.
At lunch, I say to Rebecca, “Do you think that every single thing that happens in high school can be categorized as either gossip or stress?”
She thinks about it for a second, then says, “That sounds right to me.”
Every conversation I hear wears its label instantly. Gossip. Stress. Stress. Stress. Gossip. Stress. Even my own conversations. But not my thoughts. Those are much more complicated. And when I am messaging with A, finding out where A is, what A is up to, it feels like more than gossip and less than stress.
After school, I hang out with Alexander, and I find that our exchanges also resist the labels. When I explained to him that I’d sought shelter in the National Gallery during the protest, he asked me what I’d seen. I told him about the room of Rothkos, and how I was still trying to figure them out. Now, when we get to his room, I see he’s hooked a projector up to his laptop.
“Before we hit the books, how about we take a walk through Mr. Rothko’s universe?” he asks.
I turn off the lights, and for the next hour, we slip from one painting to the next, the room reflecting the colors off the walls. Alexander plays some music and we don’t say too much—only the things that we don’t want to keep in, the observations meant to be shared.
I have found someone lighthearted who takes me seriously.
I really like you, I think. Not relative to anything else. Not based on the day we met. On its own terms.
This becomes one of the observations meant to be said out loud.
* * *
—
I tell A about this. I want to be able to tell A about everything. I tell that to A, too.
A responds immediately, saying this is exactly the way it should be. Whatever I feel for Alexander or anyone else doesn’t affect our whatever-it-is-we-have.
Together, we are in a separate place, looking at everything else.
* * *
—
After school that Friday, I drive back to DC.
A is waiting for me by the cherry trees, which are looking like any other trees in the months before they bloom. We decide to walk along the Potomac until sunset. The paths are winding and tourist-quiet. The weather is holding back its coldest gusts.
Even though we’ve written to each other about our weeks, it’s not the same as talking about them. So now we get to talk about them, see how the events form themselves into stories.
“There’s been no sign of X?” I ask.
“No.” I see the burden in A’s face, and want to know how to lift it.
“Nathan’s been going over to Wyatt’s every day,” I say. “He’s bounced back well, considering. He’s certain that he wouldn’t have lasted much longer.”
“I’m happy for him.”
“You don’t sound happy.”
A looks at me mournfully. “I’m happy and sad at the same time. They don’t cancel each other out. They coexist.”
“We had to do it,” I remind him.
“But that’s not going to happen to you. Not anymore.”
“When Wyatt pushed X out—what happened to his body was like a fever was breaking. The body didn’t want him there.”
“Because X was harming it. That’s not you.”
“I hope not. But how can I know? How can I possibly judge what harm I do? Nobody should ever be assigned to be their own judge.”
“That’s why you have me. And you’ll find other people. To talk to. To make sure everything is right.”
“But why would you want to do that? Why would you want to shackle yourself to a person like me? I can’t understand it.”
“And I don’t understand why you’d want to shackle yourself to a person like me,” I say. “Don’t you think I need your help as much as you need mine? Don’t you think I need someone to help me make my judgments, make sure my actions don’t cause harm? Yes, our situations are different. But we’re both human, and that means we both have the nearly infinite potential to mess things up, and need a nearly infinite amount of patience and grace in order to be the people we should be.”
“You are not as messed up as I am.”
“I can tell this is going to be a very fun contest.”
A stops walking. “Seriously. I wonder if you’d be better off without me. I only make things worse.”
Now I’m mad.
“Haven’t you learned anything? Are you really telling me you want to run again?”
“No. Not at all. But—”
“There’s no but. We’ve been through that once, and we are not going to turn it into a cycle. Are you listening to me now?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Because I’m only going to say this once. The whole point of love isn’t to have fun times without any hard times, to have someone who is fine with who you are and doesn’t challenge you to be even better than that. The whole point of love isn’t to be the other person’s solution or answer or cure. The whole point of love is to help them find what they need, in any way you can. What we have—it’s definitely not normal. But the whole point of love is to write your own version of normal, and that is exactly what we’re going to do. I am never going to be your girlfriend. We are never going to see each other every single day and introduce each other to all our friends. We are not going to the prom. We are not going to worry if we’re going to break up after high school. We are not going to worry if we’re going to break up after college. We are not going to worry about getting married or not getting married. What we’re going to do is be there for each other. We are going to be honest and we are going to share our lives and we are going to mess up together and help fix it together and we are going to make mistakes, often with each other’s feelings. But we are going to be there. Day in, day out. Because I don’t want you to be my date, A. I don’t want you to be in my life and back out of it. I want you to be my constant. That, to me, is the whole point of love.”
The minute I say it, I realize: I’ve found it.
I’ve found our word.
“Your constant,” A says. “My constant.”
“Do you understand?”
A smiles. “Yes. I completely understand.”
LIAM, AGE 18
You are a coward. You are a coward. You are a coward.
I spent two years telling myself this.
Okay, maybe there was a grace period of two or three weeks—the two or three weeks after I met Peter at the Melbourne Writers Festival.
It was too entirely good to be true. Two bookish, anti-blazer genderqueer kids meeting at a book festival. Like, if you’d asked me, When you find your true love, where will it be? I would’ve said, At a bookstore or a book festival, duh.
But I didn’t believe it was actually possible.
Until I was right there, in the moment, looking at Peter and thinking, I must have conjured you. There’s no other explanation.
I didn’t usually allow myself to have such thoughts.
No, strike that.
Amend to:
I never, ever allowed myself to have such thoughts.
My best relationships were always with my notebooks, or with the scraps of paper I’d subjugate to my whims each and every day, typing up the words that were worthy of typing each nightfall. I was pretty sure I was going to spend much more time writing about life than actually having a real one.
Enter: Peter.
Of course he had to live in another town.
Of course he had to live way too far away.
Of course, I thought this was a mere formality. What mattered was words.
And words—well, we shared our words every day.
But I was a coward. I took the easy route. I didn’t try to see him, hid behind the Internet. Because it wasn’t like he was inviting me over. I suspected something was going on with him. I suspected he thought there was something going on with me. He had no idea. I was such a coward.
Then, finally, after two years of trying to get up the courage to see him again, come what may, I saw that a bunch of our favorite authors were going to be at the Adelaide Festival.
I got tickets for the festival.
I saved up money for a last-minute plane ticket.
I told him I was coming.
And in the hour it took for him to respond, I thought, This is it. The next level. The truth.
Then he wrote back and said he didn’t want to change things. He said words were our thing. We should live and die and love by words.
I was like, Oh, that’s so cool. We’re so pure. Blah blah blah.
But what I was thinking was: Now you’re the coward.
And I thought: What are you hiding?
And I thought: Was that question directed to him or you, Liam?
And then I thought: I have to see this through. Because words are great, but they aren’t everything.
And: If he’s not going to love me in person, then it’s not really love.
So the day came, and I bought that plane ticket.
I didn’t message him until I landed.
You can’t be here, he wrote.
Oh, I definitely am, I wrote back.
I can’t, he wrote.
And I wrote back:
Whatever you’re afraid of, I’m afraid of it, too. Whatever you think you’re risking, I assure you I’m risking more. I want to see you, whoever you are. And I want you to see me, whoever I am. All or nothing. Now or never.
And he wrote back:
All.
Then:
Now.
* * *
—
By the time I got to the festival, it was in the middle of its opening night party. Revelry in every corner, fireworks in the air. He said he would meet me at the main stage, which would be empty for the night as everyone drank and embraced their merry. He told me he’d be holding a copy of Black Juice, the book I’d been reading the day we met. I assured him I’d recognize him, even though I hadn’t been sent a photo in a while. He said not to be so sure.
I told him I’d picked up a copy of Yellowcake. So he’d recognize me.
I walk into the empty amphitheater, the chairs all waiting for the next morning’s first
speaker. Behind me, there’s music and disco lights and what sounds like a thousand conversations blooming at once. I see a figure in the shadows, can see it’s holding a book.
“Peter?” I call out, my voice giving everything about me away.
He steps out of the shadows and I drop my book in surprise. Because he is not a he. He is not Peter at all—he is a girl nowhere near Peter’s height.
And she—she is looking at me in surprise as well. Because I am also a girl; not quite as short, but certainly not the height he met me at, either. (I am, however, wearing the same glasses. For some continuity.)
Suddenly it all makes sense. All of it.
“It appears,” I say, “we are much more alike than we ever could have imagined.”
“And now look,” he says. “We’ve found each other for real.”
A: Hello. You don’t know me, but I saw your post from a few weeks ago and was hoping I could talk to you.
M: I was a mess then. I’m feeling much better now. But I appreciate your concern.
A: It’s not that. (Although I’m very happy to hear you’re feeling much better.) It’s about what you were describing.
M: The depression?
A: Not that. The other part. About changing every day. I know exactly what you mean. Exactly.
M: Oh.
A: Can we talk?
M: Sure.
NATHAN
I keep going back to it: the one day that altered the course of my life.
But the more I live with it, and the more I live in general, the more I realize: We all have days that alter the course of our lives. Not each and every day, maybe. But a lot of them. Most of them.
Jaiden and I talk about this some, and Wyatt and I talk about it a lot. Sometimes we’ll drive up to DC with Rhiannon and Alexander and meet up with A, and we’ll all talk about it.
There’s no real conclusion to be made. We all agree: There are some days you know ahead of time are going to be important, but most of the important ones end up catching you by surprise. The best thing to do is to treat all your days well.
Someday Page 31
