Always Never Yours

by Emily Wibberley

  “Well, what does he like?” I ask, exasperated. “Paintball? Thai food? Strip clubs? Please let it not be strip clubs.”

  “Concerts?” Owen sounds like he’s guessing. “He’s mentioned the all-ages club on Route 46. You know, the one where college students pretend they’re DJs on the weekend.”

  I wince. “I hate that place. Why is this so hard?” I open the Internet on my phone and search “best date spots in Stillmont.” Before the page loads, Anthony swings by and drops a tray of pizza on our table. Or—pizzas. There’s a whole pie’s worth of slices on the platter, but each appears to have come from the remnants of a different table’s meal.

  “What the hell is this?” I ask, pushing apart two of the obviously disparate slices with a tentative finger.

  “It looks like free pizza.” Anthony shoots me a reproving look. Owen swallows a smile.

  “From other people’s tables?”

  Owen reaches for a slice. “It looks delicious.” He piles enthusiasm on the word. I watch in horror as he takes a bite of what I vaguely recognize was once a Benvolio’s Banquet.

  Anthony glances at me as if to say told you so before he walks away, presumably to check on his other tables. Since I’m definitely going nowhere near the undoubtedly plague-ridden pizza, I pick up my phone to find that the search results have loaded. I tap the top one, which looks promising. It’s a list of “Ten Places to Date in Stillmont” from the Josephine County Courier.

  “Owen, come over here.” I slide to make room on my side of the booth.

  He doesn’t move. “But I’m eating,” he protests through a mouthful.

  “Well, bring your reject pizza with you.” I pat the seat next to me. With an exasperated grunt I know he doesn’t mean, Owen carries his plate and pizza with him, and sits down next to me. His elbow brushes mine, and just like that I’m very aware of how short this bench is. It’s probably meant to hold nine-year-olds.

  I scroll down the list, feeling him looking over my shoulder. Birnam Wood Books, the Constantine, and the club on Route 46 go by. With Stillmont’s size, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised there’s not a ton of places for this sort of thing.

  Owen stops me in the middle of one final halfhearted scroll, his hand grazing mine. “I’ve been there,” he says, setting his pizza down and pointing to an entry called Bishop’s Peak.

  “Where’s there?” I study the photo. It’s of a campground on a mountain overlooking a forest. The view is ridiculous, honestly. Judging by how much higher it is than the dense greenery below it, it must take hours to hike there.

  “It’s the end of this trail,” he says, his shoulder pressing against mine. “It’s beautiful and quiet. It would be the perfect place to take someone if you want to be alone with them.”

  I tilt my head to look at him. “It sounds like you’re speaking from experience.” I raise an eyebrow.

  He laughs, and I realize I feel him shaking all down the length of my side. “No, I was just there to write. I definitely did not get lucky up there.”

  “Well, we should do something about that.” It’s out of my mouth before I fully realize what it sounds like I’m implying. Owen stiffens.

  But he’s not the only one. The flirtatious stuff I say is always designed to put guys on edge and intrigue them, to make them think about me in a way they might not have. But this time, it backfired. This time, I’m unable to think about anything but where my skin touches Owen’s below my sleeve. My face gets hot, and I realize I’m blushing at my own joke.

  I feel an unfamiliar urge to put distance between the two of us, but I’m penned in by the wall. Instead, I settle for clearing the air. “It sounds like it would be a great date spot,” I say haltingly. I uncomfortably rub the Ophelia bracelet from Will.

  “It’s where I’d take you,” Owen replies quickly. Realizing what he’s said, he stutters, “I mean, where I’d—where’d you—where Will should take you.”

  Well, now we’ve both gone and said way too much. I have to smile. Nudging his shoulder, I watch his ears go that delightful, familiar shade of red. “You and I should go there.” His eyes widen. “To brainstorm for your play,” I add with a wink.

  I lean farther into him, and it feels like giving in to how much I like the sound of the things we’ve suggested. I don’t exactly know why, but I’m drawn to Owen. I probably have been for a while. I guess the reason my flirtatious joke backfired is that it wasn’t a joke at all.

  Except I have a boyfriend. Having to remind myself of that is as unexpected as everything else tonight. In all of my relationships, I’m never the one to forget her commitment.

  Will. I want to go to Bishop’s Peak with Will. I’m going there with Will.

  Owen’s face is still close to mine, our shoulders still pressed tightly together. And when I lift my gaze to meet his, I find him watching me with inevitability in his eyes, like he knows exactly what I was close to doing because he’s been waiting for it.

  Which is why I blurt out, “I need to pee.”

  He pulls back, looking confused. “Oh,” he says.

  “So I need to get out,” I say heatedly, beginning to step over him. My lingering confusion has given way to frustration with myself, frustration about not knowing what I want. Or worse, worrying that I might know exactly what I want.

  “Oh.” He stumbles out of the booth. “Were you just going to climb over me?”

  I slide down and straighten up. “You say that like it’d be a bad thing,” I say, stepping past him, attempting to force my voice into its old flirty flippancy. I don’t think it works. Not wanting to hear Owen’s reply, I dart in the direction of the bathroom, nearly colliding with a group of middle-school girls.

  I barrel through the swinging door. Like every other inch of this restaurant, the bathroom’s walls are covered in Shakespeare verses. I face the mirror and ignore them, the way I always do.

  I turn on the faucet and splash cold water on my face. “This is ridiculous,” I tell myself out loud in the mirror. I do not like Owen Okita. He’s a great friend, but he’s not my type. Tyler, Dean, Will, they’re my type. Owen’s bookish, quiet, and constantly preoccupied with his journal, I remind myself.

  Okay, he’s kind of cute, with his startled smile and the way his ears redden every time I—

  “Stop,” I order myself. “I have a boyfriend.” He’s overcommitted, but my boyfriend nonetheless. Owen has an imaginary girlfriend. We’re friends. Nothing else.

  I turn and head for the stall. But one word written in several places jumps out at me from the quotes on the wall. “LOVE is merely a madness.” “I know no ways to mince it in LOVE, but directly to say, ‘I LOVE you.’” “LOVE comforteth like sunshine after rain.” “The course of true LOVE never did run smooth.” Whoever bothered to paint them there used obnoxiously iridescent colors everywhere they wrote love.

  I slam the stall door behind me.

  As I’m about to sit down, I hear the bathroom door open and close, followed by a low voice asking, “Megan?”

  “Eric?” I nearly stumble. That could have been tragic.

  “I—I know,” he rushes to reply. “This is bad.”

  “Why— What are you doing in here?” Why does this keep happening? Why do people get the impression cornering me in a stall is a good time to start a conversation? I pull up my pants.

  “It’s about Anthony.” Eric walks farther into the bathroom. Grudgingly, I unlock the stall and step out to face him. “I didn’t want him to overhear. He’s pissed, isn’t he?” he asks nervously. I open my mouth to answer, but he continues. “Of course he is. He probably hates me. You probably hate me, too. I promise I wasn’t using Anthony because I can keep him a secret. I don’t want to keep him a secret, it’s just— My dad called. He wanted to know where I was. I think he guessed, and— He doesn’t— And Anthony— He’s, you know—”

  I interr
upt him. “Eric, I feel like you should be saying this to”—I glance toward the door—“someone else?”

  He vehemently shakes his head, and he looks defeated. “Not while he’s avoiding me. If he doesn’t want to talk to me, I don’t want to force him. I just want him to know what happened.” He raises his gaze from the floor and looks at me. “If you could just—”

  “Eric, it’s not my place to get between the two of you,” I say firmly. What Anthony told me was that he wanted to hit pause on things with Eric, and I promised him I wouldn’t meddle or rush him along. Telling Eric anything about Anthony’s feelings would undermine his wishes and break my word.

  “But—” Eric starts.

  “No buts. I’m rooting for you, Eric, but you have to talk to him yourself,” I say with finality.

  Eric nods forlornly. “I just really like him,” he says after a moment’s pause. Knocking his knuckles once on the sink, he turns to leave.

  “Eric,” I call him back. “Give me your phone.”

  “Why?” Confusion narrows his eyes, but he holds out his phone.

  “For when it goes well with Anthony,” I tell him while I type my number into his contacts. “I’ll want to hear about it without you cornering me in the bathroom.” I pass the phone back to Eric, whose expression has lifted into a smile.

  He gives me a nod and pushes open the door. Briefly, I wonder if anyone notices him exiting the girls’ bathroom before I go back into the stall to do what I came here for. I follow Eric out a couple minutes later.

  I start to return to our table, but I stop when I see Owen’s back on his side of his booth, writing in his journal. I don’t know if I wanted him to have moved or not, but it doesn’t seem like what a guy would do if he was into whatever was happening between us before.

  It hurts a little. I consider dropping into the seat next to him, our shoulders touching like they were minutes ago. Out of an impulse that’s part instinct and part something deeper, I want to recapture the way it felt to be pressed against him while he looked at me with guarded anticipation. To—

  No. Owen moved for a reason. I should respect that. It felt good to honor what Anthony wanted regarding Eric, and Owen deserves the same consideration. Even if I did like him—which I probably don’t, not really, not in a way that could last—I wouldn’t want to push him into something he obviously doesn’t want. Not to mention the fact he has a girlfriend.

  I slide into the booth opposite him. Feeling bold bordering on reckless, I grab a slice of lukewarm Montague Meat Lovers. Owen doesn’t look up from whatever he’s writing.

  “I’m going to take Will to the club of the college DJs,” I nonchalantly announce.

  “Wait, why?” Owen’s head pops up. Blue ink stains his throat just beneath the corner of his jaw, and I wonder what he was mulling over while he rubbed his neck. “What happened to Bishop’s Peak?” he asks tentatively, either relieved or disappointed.

  I’m not going to bother wondering which it is—I just want things back to normal. “You should have it. If you call it quits with the imaginary girlfriend and settle for a humble Stillmont girl, you’re going to need a place to get it on.”

  He says nothing, but he gives his startled smile, and his ears redden.

  EIGHTEEN

  BENVOLIO: Alas that love, so gentle in his view,

  Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof!

  ROMEO: Alas that love, whose view is muffled still,

  Should without eyes see pathways to his will!

  I.i.174–7

  IT’S THE FINAL MOMENTS OF BRIAN ANDERSON and Jason Mitchum’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead scene. It never fails to surprise me how tranquil everything seems on stage, how measured and quiet. The actors are the only moving pieces on the fixed world of the set, in front of the audience watching in hushed stillness.

  Backstage, it’s chaos. But I’m not complaining. Despite the nonstop commotion in the wings of the theater, the Senior Showcase is going beautifully, and I love the frenzy of the minutes before a performance.

  In the girls’ dressing room, I step over piles of midcentury coats and medieval dresses in search of a tie. I spot it sticking out underneath someone’s bright purple bra. I pull the tie out and rush for the door. But before I reach it, I glance into the mirror and have to stop.

  Jenna Cho, aka my Linda Loman, is smoothing her hair, seemingly oblivious to the fact she’s wearing only one eyelash.

  “Jenna!” I hiss, and she looks at me in the mirror. “Check your eyes. I think you’re missing something.”

  “Ohmygod,” she gasps, fumbling for her makeup bag.

  I dart from the room and duck into the green room down the hall. It’s wall-to-wall insanity. With everyone else’s scenes done, the rest of the actors have begun sneaking drinks from the flasks some of the guys smuggled in, still dressed in a wild array of half-costumes and stage makeup. My eyes quickly find Kasey Markowitz in the corner, muttering to herself, rehearsing her lines.

  “Kasey. Here.” I hand her the tie. She’s dressed in a suit, her hair tucked up under a fedora. She grabs the tie without pausing in her line. “You need help with that?” I ask, the syllables stringing together so they sound like one word.

  “Nope.” Effortlessly, she wraps the tie around her collar and winds it into a perfect knot.

  I don’t have time to be surprised before a stagehand taps me on the shoulder. “The briefcase prop,” he says breathlessly. It’s little Andrew Mehta, a sophomore.

  I wait for him to say more. “What about it?” I fire back when he doesn’t.

  “It’s not on the props table.”

  I sigh. Of course it isn’t. “Try the guys’ dressing room. Tyler keeps forgetting to return it to props.” Andrew rushes off, and I find Owen near the door. He’s frantically fiddling with his collar, and I have to laugh.

  “Need a hand?” I gently tease, coming up beside him and wrapping my fingers in the tie he’s mangled into nothing resembling a proper knot.

  He won’t meet my eyes. “Uh, thanks.” He fidgets with his cuffs like he can hardly stand still while I undo the damage.

  “You’re going to be great,” I reassure him, knowing stage fright when I see it. I begin the knot and find Owen’s now looking down at me—I guess I never noticed he’s about six feet tall, much taller than I am—a distracted, unconvincing smile on his face.

  “We will be, the whole cast. You’ve done an incredible job pulling this together.”

  I feel warmth spread through me, but I focus on evening out the ends of the tie. “Hey, have you seen Will?”

  He looks away again. “He said he might be a little late.”

  “What?” I pause in mid-knot. Will didn’t tell me he’d be late. Once more I hear the vicious voice in my head telling me to be the cool girlfriend, but this isn’t just a trip to Verona. “This is the showcase. This is, like, important . . .”

  Owen reaches up to his collar and places a hand on mine. Gently, he squeezes my fingers. His wrist is dotted with familiar blue ink, and even though he’s in costume I know his notebook and pen aren’t far away. The observation relaxes me somehow. When I look up, his eyes have returned to me. “He knows. Don’t worry about him,” he says delicately. “The show will go perfectly.”

  His hand is still on mine, and I should pull away, but I’m having a hard time remembering why I like Will and not Owen. I rub the stain on his wrist. “Did no one teach you how to use a pen?”

  He blinks once, then his eyes find my finger wiping ineffectually at the blue spot. “I press down on them too hard,” he says, his voice a controlled murmur. He doesn’t remove his hand. “I can wash it off if you want.”

  “No, I like it,” I say, but I don’t stop kneading my thumb across his wrist. Distantly, the applause for the previous scene sounds through the wall. I drop my hand. “That’s our cue.”


  Owen’s eyes flicker, like he’s just remembered where he is. “Right.”

  I usher him in the direction of the stage right stairs, then sweep my eyes over the green room for inattentive cast members. Finding no one, I make my own way backstage, noticing faint blue smudges now coloring my fingertips. I smile even as my chest constricts with the mixture of excitement and nerves that begin every performance.

  My actors have lined up in the wings, and I watch them file on, Tyler with his briefcase. Peering around the curtain, I look into the audience. But the stage lights are on, and I can only make out the first couple rows. I search the faces of drama underclassmen, proud grandparents, and the occasional teacher.

  Nowhere do I find Will.

  Fighting disappointment, I turn my attention back to my scene. “Call out the name Willy Loman and see what happens! Big shot!” Tyler proclaims with desperate bravado.

  “All right, Pop,” Owen replies, placating.

  Somebody sneezes in one of the front rows, and I whip my head back to the audience to find a mortified-looking, allergy-stricken freshman sitting next to—Rose?

  She’s by herself, Erin nowhere in sight, and she’s put herself together annoyingly perfectly for a woman eight months pregnant. Her hair’s done up in a neat bun, and she’s wearing the dangly earrings she can’t around Erin and a long-sleeve dress that highlights just how little weight she’s gained.

  Dad’s in New York, doing something house-related. I guess Rose would have had to drop Erin off at Aunt Charlotte’s, and she came without Dad bringing her. I want to be grateful—she was kind to even look up when the showcase was, let alone make arrangements to come. Yet instead, what I feel is guilty, even a little bitter.

  If not for the divorce, it would’ve been my mom in the front row. She was the one to drag my dad and me to SOTI performances, and she even brought me to the occasional Stillmont High School production when I was younger. She would have loved to be here. Somehow Rose showing up tonight feels like she’s encroaching on my mom’s and my relationship in a way Rose living under our roof doesn’t.