The Book of Love

by Lynn Weingarten

  “Really? Literally?” said Lucy.

  “Also figuratively,” he said.

  And Lucy laughed. The truth was, she’d been riding around his neighborhood for the past hour. She’d finally seen his truck in the driveway and had forced herself to ride for ten more minutes before she rang his bell, to steady her nerves.

  “Well, come in, then.” Tristan led her into his house and up to his room. “Stay here,” he said. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

  Lucy sat at Tristan’s desk and looked around. She’d always liked his bedroom. Tristan’s truck was a crazy chaotic jumble of stuff: lollipop sticks, empty coffee cups, harmonicas, a box of old glass seltzer bottles rescued from the side of the road, a big inflatable deer head, which sometimes rode shotgun, and for a while he’d even had a popcorn popper that he plugged into the cigarette lighter. His truck was fun, but it wasn’t exactly soothing.

  His room, however, was a whole different thing.

  It was clean, calm, and uncluttered with a light wood floor, mint green walls, and an olive striped comforter. But there were still charming bits of Tristanliness: an old map was hung up on the wall decorated in hand-drawn sea monsters (which Tristan had obviously added himself), a vintage harmonica collection sat on his desk, and at one end of the bookshelf there was a glass apothecary jar containing nothing but a tiny plastic cow. She’d once asked him what it was. “Oh that,” he’d said, completely deadpan. “That’s my experiment.”

  It had been months since Lucy had been in here, but the room smelled exactly the way it always had—like pine trees, apples, and earth.

  “Okay! Get ready for ultimate refreshment,” Tristan shouted from the hall. He walked in carrying two frosty glasses and handed one to Lucy. “Homemade limeade. Squozen with my very own hands.”

  Lucy sipped her limeade. It was tart and cool, and in theory she knew it was delicious, but somehow it felt as though someone else’s mouth was drinking it.

  “It’s my new favorite thing,” Tristan said. “Making it is like working out with one of those hand-exercise ball thingies, but then your prize at the end is a delicious drink.” He took another gulp. “So,” he said. “Did you have fun at the show? You left the concert so fast we didn’t really get to say good-bye.”

  “Sorry about that. My friends wanted to leave . . . ,” Lucy said. “Phee seems nice. . . .” She smiled, then squeezed the tiny vial in her pocket. Her heart was hammering. “Did you guys have a good time?”

  Tristan nodded. “Yeah, an excellent time. Phee actually ended up hooking up with one of the guys from that band Offshore, so she was pretty excited.”

  Lucy ran her thumbnail over the tiny diamond.

  “Oh,” said Lucy. “I thought maybe you two were . . .” Lucy stopped herself. It wasn’t her business. And it shouldn’t matter now anyway.

  “Together? Nah, we’re just buds.”

  And Lucy felt a rush of something along her spine. What was it exactly? Relief is what it felt like, probably because if he were dating Phee and Lucy fixed his heart, it would just mean another person would get hurt. It was easier this way. Simpler.

  “Okay,” Lucy said. “It just kind of seemed like she liked you.”

  “Well, I guess she did at first.” Tristan coughed. “But I’m not up for anything right now, so I told her that. And then actually stuck to it.” Tristan gave Lucy a wry smile. “I used to think that when I told a girl I wasn’t looking for a relationship, it meant I was freed from all responsibility. So then if we hooked up and she wanted me to be her boyfriend and her feelings got hurt, I’d think, ‘Well, yeah, but I warned her,’ as though somehow saying that made it fair. Which is completely wrong, obviously.” Tristan shook his head. “It’s just easy to believe your own lies. But I’m not doing that anymore.” Tristan smiled. “And there ends Tristan’s self-discovery hour.” He laughed. “Sorry for being all weird lately.” He drained his glass and put it down on the nightstand. “I’ve just been . . . thinking about a lot of stuff these past few weeks.” And he looked at her. He pushed his damp hair back from his forehead.

  Was it time yet? Should she do it now? “That’s not a bad thing,” said Lucy.

  “No,” said Tristan. “I don’t guess it is.” Then Tristan took a breath. He leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees. “Luce,” Tristan said. “The reason I was going to call you is because I actually need to talk to you about something and it’s a little bit serious.” He pushed his hair away from his forehead. “I know things have been kind of funny between us lately, and we haven’t really talked about why. But I guess what I wanted to say is that it is completely my fault.”

  “No, it’s not,” Lucy said quickly. “I’ve been—”

  “Just let me explain, please, okay? I tried to tell you something a couple of months ago, right after you broke up with Alex. But I had really terrible selfish timing, so it didn’t happen then. And I’ve tried to tell you other times too, the other night in my truck when you called me, and a dozen times before that.” He paused and smiled. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be so cryptic. You probably have no idea what I’m talking about. . . .”

  Lucy looked down. Of course, she did have an idea—in fact she knew exactly what he was about to say. But he didn’t need to make any painful embarrassing confessions, because in a minute, the thing he was about to confess wouldn’t even be true anymore. Once she fixed his heart, he’d be free of all of this. Should she stop him? She held the magic in her hand.

  “I know that once these words are out, I can’t take them back,” Tristan said. “And I know it will change things. But I guess even unsaid, it already has, so . . .”

  “Wait!”

  But he didn’t. He took a breath. He looked brave. He lifted his head up and looked her right in the eye. “Lucy, I love you.”

  Lucy raised her hand to her lips. And even though none of this was news, she still felt surprised, surprised that they were having this conversation at all.

  “Wait, before you try and say anything, I guess I might as well tell you I have kind of felt this since we first started being friends. I mean, I wasn’t aware of it the entire time, but it was always there. And it was only when you started dating Alex that I really admitted it to myself, and I thought I’d just forget about it, let it go, ignore it ’til it faded, only then your friend Gil said something once, just this offhand thing that made me think that maybe . . .” He paused and stared down at his glass.

  “Maybe what?” Lucy’s heart was hammering.

  “Never mind.”

  “Please,” said Lucy. What had Gil said?

  Tristan shook his head. “It’s not important anymore because she was wrong.” He looked back up and their eyes met again. “What’s important is I guess just that I’m telling you. Because . . . I just needed you to know.”

  Lucy nodded. She lowered her hand to her chest.

  “Well, thank you for telling me,” Lucy said. “But you don’t have to worry, I can fix your heart.” The words popped out, and she heard them as she said them. She hadn’t meant to tell him. She was just supposed to do it. “I . . .” She stopped. He was shaking his head.

  Tristan laughed softly. “I’m pretty sure time will be the one in charge of that,” he said. “That’s how it’s supposed to work. And that’s okay. It’s . . . maybe it’s not even such a bad thing, right? I’ll have inspiration for a million terrible poems after this. It’s just too bad more things don’t rhyme with your name.” He grinned sweetly. “But Lucy,” he said. He sounded, just then, so very sorry. “Here’s the thing. You’re really lovely to want to help, I mean, it’s part of why I feel the way I do, I suppose. But I think, this is really hard to say, maybe even harder than what I just said, but I think I probably need to stop pretending that I can be friends with you. At least for right now.” There was no bitterness in his voice. He wasn’t trying to hurt her or punish her. All he was doing was telling the truth.

  And then Tristan stood. Lucy stood too. Her entire body was
tingling. She pulled the vial from her pocket and held it at her hip. She stared down at the tiny winking diamond eye. It was now or never. It was time. She started to uncap the vial, but before she could, she felt arms around her, felt Tristan leaning in for a hug.

  “I’m really sorry,” he said. “I hope you can understand.”

  She could feel the warmth of his skin through his thin shirt. And without thinking, she let her body melt into it. They had hugged before, of course, they had hugged a million times, but it had never been like this, their entire bodies lining up from head to toe. She could feel his belly against her belly and his hands on her back. She could hear his breath in her ear, feel his heart against her cheek.

  “Tris . . . ,” Lucy started to say. There was heat passing between them. She could feel him warming up her insides, her cold heart. She tipped her head back and looked up at him, his face lit by the afternoon sun.

  And then, before Lucy knew what was happening, he was inching toward her, closer and closer until finally their lips were touching.

  His mouth was soft. He tasted like sugar and limes.

  She could feel his hands on her back, resting so lightly as though at any moment she might try to run away, and he would not try to stop her.

  But she was not running. She was kissing him back. It was gentle at first, chaste and sweet. Then she felt his tongue in her mouth, and she reached her hand up and held the back of his neck. And for a split second all there was were her lips and his lips and their hands and tongues. And she was just there, wholly and completely in that perfect luminous moment with no future and no past, only here, now, this.

  But then the thoughts started rolling in.

  This was Tristan, her best friend whose heart she had broken, her best friend who loved her. She could not keep kissing him if she could not promise him her heart. But her heart wasn’t hers to give anymore. And wasn’t she supposed to be fixing his?

  What was she doing?

  Lucy stepped back. She stared at him, blinking.

  But Tristan didn’t look upset. He just nodded and put his hands in his pockets. He seemed, if not happy exactly, at least somehow free. And Lucy realized then what he’d been doing when he kissed her—he hadn’t been making one final attempt, hoping that somehow things could be different between them. No. What he’d been doing was kissing her good-bye.

  Lucy stared at him. She squeezed the little gold vial in her fist. But she knew she wasn’t going to use the Diamonding Powder that day, not then, not on him. It wouldn’t be fair. It wasn’t what he wanted.

  “I should go now,” Lucy said.

  Tristan nodded. He walked her downstairs, and then he stood there waving in the doorway while she pedaled away, waving like she was already gone.

  Twenty-Three

  What the hell had just happened?

  Lucy’s head was spinning. Her legs were exhausted, but she forced them to go.

  Lucy had never liked Tristan as anything more than a friend. In all the years of knowing him, it had never even occurred to her that he would ever be anything but one. When he’d first tried to confess his love for her almost two months ago, she had been scared—scared that, if he did, nothing would ever be the same between them. And so she’d stopped him from telling her. But what if instead . . . she’d let him?

  No! Lucy tried to shake her head, to shake the thoughts out. Why was she thinking about all of this now? When it was far too late for anything to ever happen?

  And why couldn’t she stop feeling his lips on hers?

  Lucy lifted herself off the seat so she was standing, still pedaling. She felt the small gold vial pressing against her leg inside her pocket. The Diamonding Powder. The magic she so badly wanted but now couldn’t even use. She should go to Gil and she should give it back.

  And then a thought popped into Lucy’s head. What Tristan had said, about Gil. He confessed his love to Lucy because of something Gil said.

  Gil said something. . . .

  But what?

  Lucy’s heart pounded along with her fist as she rapped on Gil’s front door. She could hear sounds coming from inside—music, a TV sitcom with a heavy laugh track. She felt strange and fuzzy, like she was trapped behind glass, like the fear she was feeling was not even her own.

  Lucy knocked again, harder this time.

  The door swung open, and a girl popped her head out. She looked vaguely familiar, but Lucy was pretty sure she’d never actually met her before. It would be impossible to forget someone this stunning. The girl’s skin was flawless, her eyes were fringed in thick lashes, her hair was lush, and her lips were pursed into a Cupid’s bow, both sexy and sweet. Everything about this girl was perfect except better, because perfection gets boring, and this girl had the sort of face you could stare at forever. Lucy blinked. She forced herself to look away.

  “Hi,” Lucy said. “Is Gil here?”

  The girl’s mouth spread into a luminous smile and she laughed. Lucy knew that laugh.

  “Luce, it’s me!” The girl threw her arms up in the air and did a twirl. “Gilly-bean!”

  Lucy stared at the girl. “I don’t understand,” said Lucy. “What happened?”

  “Magic!” Gil said. She stuck out her hip, waiting for Lucy to react. But Lucy didn’t say anything—she didn’t know what to say. Gil pushed her lips into a pout. “Okay, fine. I’m sorry.”

  “For what?”

  “For what you’re here about.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Gil narrowed her eyes. “You mean you don’t know?”

  “Don’t know what?”

  “Have you been to see Tristan yet?”

  “That’s why I’m here.”

  “So then you know what I did.”

  “You mean what you said?”

  “What I said when?”

  “Wait, what are we talking about?”

  Gil laughed again. “I don’t know, Luce, why don’t you tell me.”

  “I went to see Tristan,” Lucy said. “I was planning to use the powder on him. But I ended up not doing it. It didn’t seem right.”

  “Okay, fine,” she said. She looked, Lucy thought, the tiniest bit relieved. “But then what’s the problem?”

  Lucy closed her eyes. She could feel Tristan’s arms around her. She opened her eyes and looked at Gil. “Tristan told me that he’d been planning to let his feelings for me fade, that he was just going to ignore them until they went away, but then something you said made him change his mind. So what I want to know is, what was it? What did you tell him?”

  Gil shrugged. “I just told him the truth.”

  “The truth about what?”

  “The truth about you and him,” Gil said slowly. “That you could fall in love with him.” Gil smirked. “Well, not anymore, of course, but, you know, back then.”

  Lucy’s heart lurched and she felt the ground shift beneath her feet. “That doesn’t even make any sense,” she said. Lucy had a sudden urge to reach out and grab Gil. To shake her and shake her until that pleased little smile shook loose from her face. “You’re lying.”

  Gil shook her head. “People lie. But magic never does. You remember how I said I was using the Love Lines potion, and that’s how I found out that Alex would never love you back? Tristan came to meet you after class that day, and I saw everything. It was just lucky, I guess.”

  “Lucky?”

  “For you, because you got to be a Heartbreaker. And then, of course, lucky for me because . . .” Gil gestured toward her face.

  “And how exactly did that happen?” Lucy asked.

  Gil pursed her lips, opened her eyes wide, and looked up to the side in mock innocence. “I don’t know, Lucy. You tell me.”

  “How can I tell you?” Lucy said. “I don’t even know what’s going on.” Only then, all at once, she did. “Olivia said Diamonding Powder was supposed to be as versatile as a diamond. It could be used to give someone a diamond-strong heart . . .”

  “Or,” Gil finished,
“a diamond’s beauty.”

  Hands shaking, Lucy pulled the goddess head out of her pocket, the vial she’d been so carefully guarding. She pulled the stopper out and stared down into the little golden space.

  There was nothing there.

  “Oh my god,” Lucy whispered. She looked up.

  “I’m sorry, Lu,” Gil said. But she didn’t even bother trying to sound it.

  “I broke Colin’s heart for this? So you could become really pretty?” Lucy leaned against the door frame. Her body did not want to hold her up anymore. “When you left the vial while I was in the shower, had you . . .”

  “It was already starting to do its thing,” Gil said, nodding. “But I needed to make sure no one saw me because it hadn’t finished taking effect. And at that point someone still could have stopped me.”

  Lucy could barely breathe. “Did you ever actually plan on helping anyone?”

  Gil rolled her eyes. “Does it matter?”

  Lucy blinked. “You’re like an entirely different person,” she said. “It’s not just the looks. You don’t even seem like you anymore.”

  “I guess all that stuff they say about it being dangerous to leave one person alone with too much power is kinda true.” She let out a laugh. “I really did want to help Liza’s sad mommy, at first. Okay? But then I spent all that time with Beacon. And I just started thinking, well, why? She is sad, sure, but whose fault was that really?”

  “You said it was no one’s fault,” Lucy said.

  “Well, what do I know? I worked hard for this. I earned it!” Gil paused. “Look, I know that you probably feel a little annoyed right now, but I’ll make it up to you, okay? I realize I wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without you, and I haven’t forgotten that. Next time you want a couple of extra tear vials, you just let me know. I’ll tell you how to break into the safe.” Gil smiled at Lucy. It was not a cruel smile or a spiteful smile. It was just a smile that said, I’ve gotten what I wanted. And nothing else matters. “Besides, you didn’t even want to use the powder on Tristan anyway. So it’s really no biggie, right?”