Friend Is a Four Letter Word

by Steph Campbell

  “I miss you too. I’m sorry.” I try to word what I’m thinking in a way that won’t leave me sounding like a total putz. “I keep thinking that if I take the perfect photo, that I’ll be able to sell it—”

  “Ben, you could sell any one of your photos right now— today. They’re amazing.” She lets her eyes slit a tiny bit wider and brushes her thumb over my bottom lip, and I’m instantly filled with a total shock of the purest kind of happiness, the kind only Quinn can seem to bring to life.

  I appreciate her faith in me, and my pictures are good, but not good enough for someone to pay for or to want to hang in their home. In Quinn’s mind, I’m the next Andreas Gursky, which I guess is fair, since in mine, she’s the next Giada De Laurentiis. But I ignore her attempt at flattering me and continue. “Did I tell you about that guy from school? He took a photograph of a rock, a rock! And sold the thing for six-figures. I keep thinking if I take the perfect photo, that I’ll be able to sell it and take care of you the way you deserve.”

  Quinn and I are happy here. Our apartment is small, but there’s only the two of us, and we’re together and that’s what matters. But even though we both work, it’s only scraping by on our meager checks and our extra student loan money. Quinn’s home life may never have been perfect, but she always had nice things, and I want to give that same security to her. I have to.

  She scoffs. “You, Benjamin Shaw, are more than I ever deserved.”

  I kiss the part of her bottom lip where it meets her chin—my favorite place. I find a new favorite spot of her every day.

  “Anyway, what do you want to talk about?” I push up the cotton top she’s wearing and run my hand over the smooth skin of her stomach before pressing my lips to the same place.

  She slides closer in my arms, works her hands into loose fists and runs them up and down my back. I can feel the jagged patches of half-gone nail polish. She always picks it off when she’s nervous. “I have this opportunity,” she finally says. “To go away for school.”

  “Rad, where to? For how long?” I reach over and turn on the second bedside lamp, because this is amazing news, and I want to see her when she delivers it and let her see me. I want us both awake and bathed in light when we share this to make up for all the creeping in the dark I’ve had to do lately.

  “Italy.” Quinn raises her dark eyebrows and gives me a nervous smile that ends with her chewing the side of her lip.

  “For how long?” I repeat, pretty much refusing to acknowledge that Italy is across the damn world. I don’t even do well with Quinn being across the mattress. I rub my hand along her shoulder, trying to work out the tension knots that have bowed her shoulders in.

  Quinn opens her eyes wide and turns the corners of her mouth up like I’m a little kid and she has to deliver some bad news as gently as she can. ”Just a month.”

  I let out a long breath I never realized I had trapped in my lungs. “Wow. A month? Wow.” I switch to rubbing my own neck, instantly tense.

  It’s not that I can’t be without Quinn, I can. I just don’t really want to be. It’s taken a long time to get to this place we’re in and I’m freaking happy as hell. But this is school…

  “So, you’re gonna go, right?” I ask, not about to let her see that I’m even one percent nervous about this.

  This time the wide eyes and big smile are real, and her face is alive with an excitement I love. An excitement that I used to see more before things got to be such a grind in general. I didn’t realize how much I missed that face until I saw it glowing in the golden light of our room. “What do you think? I mean, it’s Italy. I’d get to see places that I’d probably never get to go on my own.”

  I could take you, I want to say. But I swallow the words, because right now, I can’t, and who the hell knows how long it’ll be before I’m able to give her what I want to. What she deserves right now. What she needs to go after.

  “They had someone back out, so it’s not even like I was first choice, but it’s only for a handful of students. I’d get to go and learn from these chefs that are just, wow, world class, you know? It’s in this amazing little town that’s way off the beaten path and I can’t pass it up, right?” she says, every word laced with excitement that’s undeniable. It’s not a question.

  “Right.” I say it in a way that hopefully sounds sure and confident and convincing, like I have zero doubt that this is exactly what she should be doing. But I hear the word come out sounding twisted and gruff, and anything but the right way.

  Her smile flickers, but she gets a hold on it. “Okay. So, I leave on Tuesday.”

  All my attempts at keeping a game face are ripped out by the roots by that one word.

  Tuesday?

  A handful of days away?

  Tuesday?

  “Tuesday? Like, next week Tuesday? Why are you just now telling me this?”

  Quinn and I have had a rocky road to get to where we are now, and we don’t have secrets, or apparently, we do. I thought we were doing great on the communication front. Is this because I’m gone so much? I want to ask her, but I’m nervous about the answer. What the hell is going to happen if things are weird now with me just staying out too late, with her being gone for a month? I can’t ask her to stay —that would make it so much worse.

  Quinn shrugs, a quick rise and dip of her already knotted shoulders, and her mouth flattens into a tense line. “I don’t know. I didn’t find out until two weeks ago… and then, with Thanksgiving this week… and everything… I just wanted us to have a nice holiday.”

  It all melts for me then. She wanted us to have a nice holiday. Our first together. “And you were worried about the confrontation?”

  “Maybe,” she admits, her scowl losing some of its punch because of the confused squint of her eyes.

  “I want you to go, baby. I do. I’m going to miss you something fierce. But, I’ll be right here when you get back. Waiting for you to cook me dinner,” I joke in a hoarse voice, because it’s all I can do, and she falls into my lap and winds herself around me.

  I run my hand up her thigh and watch her skin cover with goosebumps and her nipples perk up under the tissue-paper-thin t-shirt she’s wearing. I’m instantly hard. I may be used to seeing Quinn’s body, but I can’t help the reaction I always have to her.

  “A month, huh? You’ll miss Christmas.” It’s a little embarrassing how much I was looking forward to Christmas with her. Last Christmas she’d shown up on my porch like a drowned rat, gorgeous and ready to make everything we’d fucked up so badly perfect again. That day changed my life, and I was all about celebrating the anniversary of that.

  “That’s another reason I was nervous to tell you. I mean, I wasn’t going to go home to Georgia with Carter and Shayna anyway—” She picks off a fleck of glittery pink nail polish and flicks it off the side of the bed, pinching her lips together.

  “It could’ve been just you and me here,” I say, my voice low around the disappointment I can’t hide. I totally get that she needs to go, but the alternative would be pretty fucking awesome, too.

  “I know.” Her gaze shifts down to her chipped nail polish. “I did think about that. I did. I feel like a huge jerk—”

  “Quinn,” I reach over and tip her chin up so that she’s looking at me again, her pupils big and black in the dim light. “I want you to go. I honestly do. I’m going to miss you, but I’m proud of you. You need to do this. It is sort of weird that you’ll be gone for Christmas, though. I mean, why not hold the classes in January?”

  Quinn shrugs, “It is, right? The curriculum is all about traditional Italian cuisine, and leads up to the final at the end where we cook the Feast of Seven Fishes.”

  I smile and nod like I have any clue what she’s talking about.

  “Maybe… maybe you could go and see your family for Christmas?” she says it slowly, gauging my reaction as she releases each word.

  I grit my teeth.

  I talk to my dad semi-regularly, but I haven’t talked to
my mom in almost a year. It wasn’t an easy pill to swallow— my deciding to pass up going to school at Columbia to instead, move to California with Quinn and go to art school. Mom probably could have gotten over my choice to pursue a career in photography, but that, combined with the choice to pursue a future with Quinn was too much for her. I know Quinn feels guilty about the lack of relationship I have with my family, but it’s not her fault. I try to make her see that every chance I can. I chose her, and my mom needs to stop acting like a damn child and accept it. If she can’t, I’m totally happy here.

  “Maybe.” I leave it vague. “Can we just concentrate on us right now? I’ve only got you till Tuesday.”

  “Ready to show me how much you’ll miss me?” Quinn stares up at me and then winks.

  “You’re about to have your mind blown with the display of just how much I’m going to miss you.” My hands tighten on her hips and my breath catches.

  She smirks. “Is that a fact?”

  “Ready?”

  I slide the oversized t-shirt off of her shoulder and press my mouth onto the perfect patch of now-exposed skin. I love this look on Quinn the most. Sleepy and casual and so devastatingly beautiful that I want to taste every inch of her. I want to capture this moment right here. My hand twitches at my side, wanting to grab my camera back off of the nightstand.

  “No chance you’re going to let me take a picture of you right now, huh?” I ask, half-hopeful, but already knowing the answer.

  “No, not gonna happen,” Quinn laughs and slides out from underneath me.

  I lay back and she straddles her legs around me and leans in. She lets her lips hover above mine, just close enough so that her bottom lip barely brushes against my top lip when she speaks. “Thank you. For letting me do this, I mean.”

  “I’m not letting you do anything.” I pull the hair back away from her face and kiss her cheeks, her nose, and her neck. “I think it’s fantastic that you have this opportunity. Really.”

  “So, that means you’re fine with it?” Her lips nuzzle my neck and her tongue flicks over my jugular, beating like crazy. She knows I can’t be anything but fine when she’s doing this kind of craziness to me.

  “I mean, yeah, it makes me nervous. I won’t be there to look out for you,” I say, trying to wrangle my voice.

  “Ben,” she laughs, “I don’t need you to take care of me.”

  The words are like a kick to the gut and she knows it instantly because she closes her eyes and shakes her head like she can’t believe what she just said.

  She grabs both hands behind her neck and blows out a long breath. “That’s not what I meant… I mean, I just… fuck… I’m sorry.”

  I pull my lips into a tight line and nod, pulling her close to me again, but the spell’s been broken. Completely broken. “Quinn, I know what you meant.”

  But the trouble is, I don’t.

  I want her to need me.

  “Quinn, seriously, stop,” I say. I slide my arms around her and pull the pan out of the oven.

  “I got it,” she says. And I know, like the weight of everything else, she can handle the weight of taking a turkey out of the oven, but still, I try to help.

  She lets out an exasperated breath, blowing her long bangs out of her face. I set the bird onto the countertop and she wipes her hands on her apron, looking uncharacteristically prim and proper. Looking the part of the girl my mom always thought I should end up with.

  “And anyway, I don’t know why I’m going to all of this trouble, since it’s just us.” She tightens the tie on her apron and marches across the black and white linoleum floor like a woman on a mission.

  “So what if it’s just us?” I say. I pull the oven mitts off and cross the room to her where she’s piping icing onto a chocolate pie. I nuzzle my face into her neck and breathe in the familiar smell of her.

  “Sooo… You know, Thanksgiving is a family holiday,” she says. She gives a small shrug, just that same quick jerk of her shoulders that she rolls out when she’s most stressed out.

  “Hey,” I say. I touch my fingertip to her chin and angle her face toward mine. Our noses touch, and I kiss along the familiar band of freckles that runs along hers. “You. You are my family.”

  She nods, because it’s all she can do. We’ve been down the family road more times than I can count in the last few months.

  Because I want to be sure this feels like family for her. That I feel like family for her.

  We’ve settled into our one-bedroom studio in Southern California, right down the hall from her brother, Carter. And Quinn… well, for once, she seems happy. Content. Safe. Grounded.

  “I just…” Quinn says, accidentally squeezing the icing bag so hard, she leaves a blob of the stuff on the pie. Quinn lets out a gasp and starts to do damage control, and I watch her turn a gooey blob of cream into this gorgeous flower with quick precision. When it’s all better, she sinks back against the edge of the counter, but her relief only lasts a second. She looks at me and holds her frosting smeared hands up in defeat. “I just…”

  I press my index finger to her lips.

  “Don’t. Seriously. Just don’t. Let’s enjoy this. It’s our first Thanksgiving here.” I take in the apartment, small as it may be. Its walls are covered in my photos and shelves lined with Quinn’s favorite cookbooks. We’ve made it our home, and I feel a sense of pride in that, because I feel like even though she lived in a nice place with her parents before this, that this is her first real home. The first place that she can just be her and it’s okay. Better than okay, because we’re together. At least for now.

  Fuck, why do I keep thinking things like that? It’s just a month. It’s nothing in the grand scheme, right?

  “Okay,” she says. She checks her watch, the face fogged with smeared icing. “My brother and Shayna won’t be here for another thirty minutes. I mean, if there was anything else you wanted to do… until then…”

  I don’t wait for anything else. I wrap my arm around her waist and pick her up until her back is against the wall and push my lips onto hers. “Like what?”

  She playfully jerks her head toward our bedroom. I shake my head.

  “Nope.You.Here.Now,” I growl.

  I hoist her up, and she wraps her legs around my waist just as I slam her back into the wall. Gently, of course. No more begging her to stop before she pushes me too far. In this new life, she’s all mine.

  I pull her hair back away from her face and kiss her throat. “You’re beautiful,” I say.

  “I love you,” she says. And as the words tumble from her lips, they squeeze at my heart just like they do every single time she utters them, because I know exactly how lucky I am—we are—to be right here. “But you’re going to have to be quick.”

  “Quick I can do,” I say, lifting her hand and licking frosting off her fingers.

  “Don’t I know it.” Quinn winks.

  “Just for that, you’re getting a long session… in the bedroom.”

  I carry her into our bedroom and let her fall back onto the mattress, and start working on the buttons on her shirt.

  “We don’t have time for all that,” Quinn says, swatting my hand away. She reaches out and undoes my belt. She doesn’t quite get it all the way undone before my phone starts buzzing in my pocket.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she says, her glare so sexy, I’m glad the phone buzzed when it did.

  “Never.” I grin.

  She reaches into my jeans for the phone. Maybe she plans to toss it across the room. Or onto the nightstand. Or even out the window. Right now, I don’t really care where the hell it ends up. I just want her, as soon as humanly possible.

  But instead, Quinn stops.

  She holds the phone out a little and her brow pulls down, like she’s focusing hard, making sure her eyes are seeing it right.

  “Baby? What is it?” I ask. I reach out for the phone, but she yanks it back. She crawls backward off of the bed and stands several feet away from me.
>
  “Why is Caroline calling you? Today?”

  Ben frowns back at me. His eyebrows are pulled together in confusion, or annoyance, or maybe a thin line between the two. “I have no idea, Quinn. Come back over here.”

  But I don’t. Instead, I clutch the phone closer to my chest and shake my head. I don’t understand why things can’t just be okay. Why in the middle of our first holiday in this apartment is his ex-girlfriend calling? The same ex-girlfriend whose appearance spiraled our relationship out of control last year?

  “Quinn, if you want to know why she’s calling, just answer the phone. I don’t know, and I sure as shit don’t have anything to talk to her about.”

  I roll the phone back and forth in my hands and consider his words. I take two steps toward him. His dark eyes and the small nod he gives tell me he gets that it’s hard for me to take steps forward, rather than running.

  “Or, just ignore it, and come back over here. I promise I can make you forget.” He reaches out and links his index finger through my belt loop and pulls me back into him. I don’t push away. We spent so much of our past with me yanking back and Ben grasping for me.

  “I’m sure it’s just because it’s a holiday… right?” I hate the jittery shake in my voice.

  “Mmhmm,” He murmurs against my mouth.

  “But like, has she called before?”

  “Quinn.” Ben rolls his head around and sighs like he wishes to god I’d let this go. “She may have called once or twice. But I never answer. I think she’s just lonely.”

  “And?” I press him back, hold out for more. I want to know why the hell this is all coming up and out now and if any of it ever would have if I never saw that call. And then I wonder if any of it matters.

  And I realize that, even if it doesn’t matter to Ben, it matters to me. It matters whether I want it to or not. And I hate that.

  But at least I’m not running away from it.

  Though running would feel so… clear. So freeing. This is messy as hell.