by Beth Reekles
So I asked Dixon for a ride home (again) and now I sat on the couch waiting for Brad to get home from Boy Scouts and Dad to get home from work, scrolling through my Twitter feed in case anything interesting was going on. Nothing was.
I tried calling Noah, but he didn’t answer. Maybe he was studying, I thought. If he was, he probably didn’t want to be interrupted.
It wasn’t long after that my cell trilled, and I jumped to answer it, not even pausing to check who was calling. “Hey.”
“Hey, Elle.”
My heart sank; it wasn’t Noah. I got a heavy, sick sort of feeling in my stomach, like after you watch a sad movie. Maybe he’d call me later. “Hi, Levi.”
“You sound disappointed. I guess you were hoping for somebody else?”
“Kind of. No offense.”
“None taken.” Then, “Noah?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, if you’re not too busy sitting around waiting for your boyfriend to call you, do you wanna come over to my house for dinner?”
I was a little taken aback, until something clicked into place. “Is this payback for helping me babysit Brad?”
“Yes indeed.”
I sighed heavily, like it was a total hardship to stop doing nothing and hang out with a friend for the evening. (And, hey, it’d take my mind off Noah and Lee a little, too.) “Text me your address. I’m on my way.”
Twenty minutes and one wrong turn later, I walked up the driveway and rang the doorbell. Levi’s house was small but sweet-looking, with a tidy front lawn and peeling paint around the windows. A wonky brass 209 was nailed to the bright green door. Levi opened it seconds later wearing a floral apron, his hair sprinkled with flour. He was wearing the shirt he’d worn to school, with the sleeves folded up to his elbows, but the pants from his school uniform had been switched for skinny jeans.
“Hey!”
“I like the apron. It’s the epitome of masculinity and macho-ness.”
He laughed. “That’s the look I was going for. Come on in. We’re baking brownies.”
“Sounds yummy.”
“I’m not sure about that,” he admitted as I stepped inside and slipped off my shoes, placing them neatly on the shoe rack by the door and hanging my purse from a hook. “I’m aiming for not poisonous.”
Now it was my turn to laugh. “Just don’t ask me to help. I’ve sworn off baking ever since my home-ec disaster back in the eighth grade.”
“Ooh, an embarrassing story? Tell me everything.”
“I may have used baking soda instead of a pinch of salt and my cupcakes may have…exploded in the oven. Just a little. It was messy, but there was no fire extinguisher required.”
“Damn,” Levi muttered. “All the best stories have a fire extinguisher. But if that’s the case, maybe just…don’t touch anything in the kitchen.”
I held up my hand. “Scout’s honor.”
As we walked through to the kitchen, I couldn’t help but look around. It was pretty much the same layout as Cam’s house, except a little more worn in—I guess the previous owners didn’t care to refurbish much before selling. The dark hardwood floors in the hallway were scuffed and slightly scratched, maybe from moving furniture in and out.
In the kitchen, there was a rack above a counter with spatulas and serving spoons and ladles hanging from it, scrawled pencil drawings and report cards and certificates on the refrigerator were held in place by brightly colored magnetic letters, and school books and papers were splayed out on the breakfast bar.
The messiest thing in the kitchen by a mile was the eight-year-old girl who stood on a small, sturdy plastic stool so that she could reach the counter. Her frizzy brown hair was falling out of its pigtails, and she wore one of those easy-clean aprons—again, floral, and pink. She turned round when we walked in, and the entire lower half of her face was covered in chocolate goop.
“Becca!” Levi cried, exasperated. “I told you not to eat any more. You’re gonna make yourself sick.”
“Who’re you?” she asked me, completely ignoring her brother, in the same way Brad ignored me if Lee was around. She had wide, hazel eyes, and right now, they were fixed on me.
“I’m Elle. I’m one of Levi’s friends from school. He asked me to come help babysit.”
“Are you his girlfriend?” She turned her attention to her big brother. “I liked your old girlfriend better. She had freckles.”
“Becca,” he snapped.
But I smiled. “No, I’m not his girlfriend. I’m just here for the brownies.”
I let them direct me to greasing a cake pan while they finished off the brownie mixture. Becca talked at both of us about the drama from recess that day. I held the pan toward Levi, ready to say, “Hey, is this okay?”
Except I barely got out “Hey” before he threw a healthy sprinkling of flour in my face.
I gasped, coughing and spluttering, flour flying from my mouth and nose and obscuring my vision. I blinked some bits of flour out of my eyes to see both of them laughing at me.
“Did you just…throw flour…in my face?”
“Becca did it.”
“No I didn’t! I didn’t, Elle, I didn’t. Levi did it. You saw him.”
“I’m going to kill you,” I assured him, glaring.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I did it,” he said, grinning maniacally.
I set the pan down on the counter and wiped my hands over my face, shaking flour onto the floor and onto the front of my clothes. While Levi had his back to Becca, I noticed her sneak another finger into the bowl and lick the mixture off her fingers before her brother could turn around again.
“If you do that again, I’m going to unfriend you. Officially. I’ll unfollow you on Instagram and everything.”
Levi held a hand to his heart, pouting. “In that case, you have my sincerest apologies.”
I grabbed some flour and threw it right back at him.
* * *
• • •
The brownies turned out great. Levi cut one in half and we shared it before dinner, away from Becca’s prying eyes. After dinner, he refused my help with the dishes, so I sat in the living room with Becca while she did some homework.
She stopped writing to look up at me from the floor, tongue poking between the gap in her two front teeth.
“I liked Levi’s old girlfriend a lot, but I like you, too.”
“That’s okay. You can like lots of people.”
“His old girlfriend was called Julie. Has he told you about her?”
“No, he hasn’t.”
“Well, I’m going to tell you all about her,” she announced, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. She abandoned her notebook to sit next to me on the sofa and she told me gravely, “They were in love.”
I leaned in, dropping my voice, too. “Really.”
“Really. But she broke up with Levi just before we moved. He cried a lot, but whenever I told him I knew he was crying, he said he wasn’t. She had freckles and orange hair, and she played violin and piano. And she bought me nail polish for my birthday.”
“She sounds very nice.”
“I miss her.”
“I’m sure Levi misses her, too.”
Becca pursed her lips. “I think he still cries about her sometimes.”
If I’d wanted to say anything else, I couldn’t: the front door opened. I hadn’t even heard a car pull up outside. Keys jangled and plastic bags rustled and a voice called, “I’m home! Whose car is that outside, Levi? Have you got a friend over?”
A woman I assumed could only be their mother walked in, dropping down some Publix bags filled with groceries. She wore a pantsuit and didn’t have a hair out of place, but despite the stern appearance, she had a kind face, which softened her whole demeanor.
“Hello.”
“Hi. You must be Mrs. Monroe.” I stood up quickly, putting on my most parent-pleasing smile. “I’m Elle, a friend of Levi’s from school. It’s so nice to meet you.”
She smiled back. “I’m Nicole. Lovely to meet you, too. Levi’s told me a lot about you.”
“Mom.” He’d just appeared in the doorway behind her. Catching my eye, he shot me an apologetic smile.
“Oh, Levi, go put the groceries away, will you? Have you had a bath yet, Becca?”
“No, but we made brownies.”
“I hope you saved me some.”
Before Becca let her mom usher her upstairs, she poked my arm and said very politely, “Thank you for babysitting me.”
I suppressed a giggle, but smiled. “You’re very welcome, Becca.”
She babbled away to her mom as they went upstairs, and I collected the two remaining Publix bags and took them to the kitchen.
“Oh, thanks.” Levi took them from me. “I was just about to come back for those.”
“Your sister’s not half as bad as you made her out to be, you know.”
“I could say the same for your brother. Maybe we should switch them.”
“That might not be such a bad idea.” I looked past him at the clock hanging on the wall. “I guess I should probably head home….”
“You don’t have to leave,” Levi said quickly, then blushed. “I mean, you’re welcome to stay a little longer, if you want, but obviously you don’t have to.”
“I don’t mind staying.” And then I heard myself saying, “So, um, your sister was telling me about Julie.”
Levi’s whole body seemed to sigh.
“You never mentioned her at school, to any of us.”
And I hadn’t seen anything on his social media about her. Rachel and I had snooped, one lunchtime.
“She broke up with me when we found out we were moving here. We’d been together since freshman year. It was…”
“Whoa.”
And I’d thought a few months felt like a long time to be dating.
“When I broke the news about the move, she broke up with me then and there. She said that senior year was really important—and it is, obviously—and that a relationship on top of all that was hard enough, but a long-distance relationship was something she didn’t think she could handle. She said…she said it was better this way for both of us. A clean break. And that was that.”
“You didn’t fight for her?”
“She didn’t want me to. I tried, but not much. It was killing her, I could see. She didn’t want to break up, but she didn’t want a boyfriend she’d probably not see unless we ended up at the same college. And honestly?” He shrugged, giving me a smile. “I have no plans to go to college. So that was never gonna happen.”
I blinked, surprised. We’d all been talking a lot about college lately, and now that I thought about it, Levi had never shown much enthusiasm or talked about where he wanted to apply or what he wanted to major in.
“I’m kind of jealous of you, you know. Because you and Noah—you guys are trying, at least. I wish she’d given us a shot. Even if it didn’t work out.”
“Maybe it was for the best, though. Like she said.”
“Yeah, but…”
“But you loved her,” I finished gently, my voice soft.
Levi sighed again and went back to putting away groceries.
I didn’t know what to tell him. It wasn’t like I had any experience to speak from, and I wasn’t sure that the stuff I’d read in romance novels really counted. I settled on asking, “Do you still talk to her?”
“No.”
“Oh.”
“I’m just trying to move on, you know? That’s why I haven’t kept in touch. And I guess that’s why she hasn’t messaged me either. I even deleted all the photos of us. It felt weird, keeping them up, seeing them, whenever I went on my profile. Now I’m just waiting to find that girl who I look at and who makes me forget all about Julie. Or maybe it’ll only ever be Julie.”
“I can’t tell if you’re a romantic or not.”
He just laughed. Then said, “Sorry, you probably don’t want to listen to me pining after some girl who’s states away from me and not even my girlfriend anymore.”
“I don’t mind. I mean, I’ve only ever been with Noah, so I’m not sure I’m best placed to give you any advice, but I don’t mind listening, if you want to talk about it. I know the guys might not seem like the best audience for pining to. They goof around a lot, but they’re delicate, sensitive little flowers underneath it all. You know, Cam cried once because he thought Lisa was ignoring his texts. But you didn’t hear that one from me.”
His smile was small, and shy, but he looked touched. “Thanks, Elle. I appreciate it.”
“Any time.”
Levi grabbed the plate of brownies, the groceries all put away now, and brought them over to the breakfast bar. I took a seat next to him and grabbed a brownie. “So,” he said, tossing his curls back from his face, “now you know all about my ex and the fact that I’m not actually going to college….What else do I need to tell you about me? I feel like we’re really unraveling the mystery of Levi Monroe tonight.”
I laughed. “Oh, come on. Like you don’t love being all mysterious.”
“One girl asked me last week if I really did cameo in Riverdale. That one was kind of cool.”
I smiled, but found that I did have a question, now that he’d asked. “Where’s your dad tonight?”
Levi shifted, a little uncomfortable. “He’s, uh, he’s…”
“I’m sorry, you don’t have to answer that.”
Levi didn’t talk about his dad much at school, but as far as I could tell his parents were still together. There was even a photo of his parents on their wedding day in pride of place in the living room, I’d noticed. But Levi’s malaise made me feel like I’d poked a hole in something I shouldn’t have.
“No, it’s okay.” Levi sipped his scalding hot coffee, then said firmly, “He’s at a support group. He goes after work. He’s in remission from prostate cancer. That hit him hard, and then he lost his job, and…things kind of spiraled. That’s why we moved. Fresh start, you know? He’s been doing better since he got a new job, even if it’s only part-time.”
“Oh my God.”
Because, honestly, I didn’t know what else to say.
“I know, right? Talk about a bit of a bombshell. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. Just…forget about it, all right?” He started to get up, cheeks blotchy, unable to meet my eye.
“No, I…I just…Well, I’ve never known anyone with cancer before, so I’m not really sure what to say, that’s all. I hope everything’s okay for your dad.”
“It will be.”
Levi sounded so convinced I didn’t dare try and suggest things might be otherwise or that I was there for him if that was the case.
“Don’t tell the others, though, will you? I just don’t want them to treat me weird or anything because of it. Everyone at my old school did, except Julie. She was the only person who didn’t look at me like I was some sad, stray puppy after my dad first got diagnosed.”
“You said he’s in remission,” I said, “and that’s…that’s good, right?”
“Well, he lost his balls, so no more surprise siblings—oh, shit, you didn’t hear that either. Becca was totally planned.” He shot me a crooked smile. Cracking jokes because that was his way of dealing with things. Not wanting to open up too much about the hard stuff. I got that. I really got that.
In that moment, I really felt for Levi. The poor guy had lost his girlfriend, moved away from all his friends, his parents had lost their jobs, his dad had been really sick…No wonder he hadn’t opened up much. I had the urge to hug him tight.
“But, yeah, otherwise, it’s good,” he went on, befor
e I could. “They caught it right in the first stages and it was all resolved really quickly.”
“And I guess it’s good he’s got support groups to go to.”
Levi nodded but was quiet.
“You know, my mom died. Years ago, when I was little. She was driving and it was icy, and she didn’t make it home.”
Now it was his turn: “Oh my God.”
“It’s weird, though, because I’m just used to it now. Like, I’ve spent nearly half my life without a mom, and sometimes I really, really miss her, and then I feel guilty for not missing her all the rest of the time, too, which makes things worse.”
“Didn’t your dad ever remarry?”
“No. Sometimes I think he’s still not over my mom dying. Or maybe being a full-time dad and having a full-time job doesn’t leave a lot of time for dating.”
“But you’re…over it? Okay with it?”
I gave Levi a wan smile. “I don’t think it’s something you get over. You just go on anyway. But I get it, you know? People looking at you weird because of something like that. I think the guys would all be okay with you about it, but…I don’t know. If you want a shoulder to cry on, or someone to vent to…”
Levi gulped, eyes shining. “Thanks, Elle.”
“Anyway,” I said briskly, “I totally forgot to ask you earlier—are you going to Jon Fletcher’s party in a couple of weeks?”
* * *
• • •
After my heart-to-heart with Levi, when I got home later that night, I took one of the old family photo albums out of the small cabinet in Dad’s office. He walked past the open door on his way to the kitchen and stopped when he saw me sitting cross-legged on the floor flicking through pages of photos from before even Brad was born.
“What’re you doing, Elle?”
I shrugged, not quite trusting my voice.
Last time I’d done this was in February. I’d had a complete breakdown because I’d forgotten it was Mom’s birthday that day until Dad mentioned going to get some flowers to take to the cemetery. I spent the entire afternoon and evening studying photos of my mom and wondering what she would look like now. I did that when I missed her badly. I tried so hard to think if I remembered her looking like she did in the photos because I really did remember her, or just because I’d seen her photos around the house so many times.
