by Lily Menon
He took his place right beside her. “Pluto.”
Her shoulders relaxed. “Pluto.”
“Your mother loved this view, you know. The city lights in the distance, the silhouette of the mountains in the dusk until the night takes them away … I think the view was what sold her on this house. She used to say she’d raise you on this deck.” He chuckled.
“Is that why you don’t want to leave?” Annika asked, glancing at him. “Because it reminds you of her?”
He swallowed. “Yes. It’s too big for me, but … leaving would feel like leaving her behind.”
That’s how I feel about Make Up, Annika thought, but couldn’t quite muster up the nerve to say. She didn’t know if her dad would understand or dismiss her out of hand. Make Up was an homage to her parents’ love. Ever since she was four years old, the one thing Annika had wished for was to give her mom and dad a do-over, to somehow change the past. She’d realized how impossible that was as she got older, but she’d thrown herself into doing for others what she couldn’t do for her parents.
“Do you regret it, Dad?” she asked softly. “Do you ever regret falling in love with Mom so hard, and then…”
“Losing her just as we got started?”
Annika nodded.
Her dad smiled. “Never. First, she gave me you.” He rubbed her back, and Annika smiled, too. “Second, how do you regret the single most beautiful thing that ever happened to you? Do I wish she hadn’t got cancer, so she could still be here with us? With every single breath I take. But regretting falling in love with her would be like regretting witnessing a meteor shower because it didn’t last forever. You don’t, though, do you? You just enjoy it while it’s happening. You’re mesmerized and enthralled and completely happy for as long as you get to witness it. And then you always look back fondly on the time you got to see it.”
“That’s a really inspiring way to look at it.” She laid her head on his arm. “Do you ever get lonely?”
Her dad patted her head. “With you coming to visit me every week? Not a chance.”
But just underneath the surface, she could hear the emptiness.
* * *
They ate not too long after that. Even as someone who was vegetarian with the exception of when she was at her dad’s (he worried enough about her protein intake as it was), Annika had to admit the pork was every bit as delicious as she’d expected. “Mmmm.” She closed her eyes and savored her last mouthful. They were sitting at the table out in the backyard, the landscape lit with glowing string lights and lanterns. In the distance, a rock waterfall gushed down a gentle slope. “Seriously, Dad, you could quit your job and go on a cooking show and become a famous chef somewhere.”
He chuckled and dabbed at his mouth with a napkin. “Oh, cooking’s just a hobby. But I’m glad you enjoy it. Your mother always thought I was a tad too adventurous.”
It’s like she’s still here, Annika thought. She’s in nearly every conversation we have, and she’s been dead almost twenty-five years. “Well, I love it. Is there more I can take with me?”
Her dad grinned, genuinely pleased. “Of course.”
“Awesome.” Annika sat back, her belly pleasantly full and her body warm from the glass of red wine she’d had.
“How’s June?” June was one of her dad’s favorites. The only thing he enjoyed more than feeding Annika was feeding June, on the rare occasion she made the trek out here, too.
“Great. She’s got her eye on someone new.”
“Oh, really? That hedge fund man she was excited about?”
Annika screwed up her face. “No, not him. That didn’t work out; he turned out to be something of a jerk. But the guy she’s into now seems nice. He works just down the hall. He’s a partial owner of this business, Break Up.”
“Oh, yes. Next to the man you told me about. What’s his name again?”
“Hudson.” Annika’s pulse beat a little bit faster. Memories of the night at the fountain resurfaced once more, like a nest of bugs you thought you’d gotten rid of but were hiding in a little hole in your house somewhere. She took a deep swallow of ice water. “Hudson Craft.”
“Right, right, Hudson.” There was a pause, as they both wandered around with their memories. The twinkling lights reflected like stars in the lenses of her dad’s glasses. “So, do you?”
“Do I what?” Annika wondered if she’d missed something because she’d been thinking about Hudson again.
“Have your eye on anyone new? Like June?”
No, and the last guy I tried to kiss practically ran away from me. Not very flattering. Annika waved a hand. “I’m too busy for all that.”
Her dad leaned back in his chair, the wicker creaking with the movement. “Really? Too busy? Do you think that’s ever going to change? You have to make the time.”
“Not everyone can be lucky enough to meet their soulmate at twenty-three, Dad. Besides, I’m happy how I am.”
Her dad patted her hand. “Of course you are,” he said, but she saw the concern in his eyes again.
Just for once, Annika wished she didn’t feel like she was letting her dad down on all fronts.
* * *
The next afternoon, Annika sat on the floor of her apartment in an old UCLA T-shirt and sweatpants, using tweezers to paint by stickers.
As organized as she liked to keep the office, her apartment was the exact opposite. It was the one place she didn’t have to worry about looking put-together or in control. Here, she could let her inner slob shine, and no one cared.
Dust mites floated in the sunlight that streamed from the glass doors to her right. The throw pillows were tossed on the floor, where Annika frequently sat. On the coffee table was a pile of books—business memoirs, tech start-up manuals, and, of course, romances. June’s cup of coffee rested next to a potted plant on her end table, which was really just a collection of twigs, the plant having died from overwatering many weeks ago. Sleepless in Seattle was playing on the TV, though neither she nor June were really watching; they had all the lines memorized anyway.
“That looks tedious,” June remarked from where she was sprawled on Annika’s navy-and-white-striped couch. She was wearing old shorts and a crop top, but somehow still looked as glamorous as an Old Hollywood starlet.
“Mm. It’s relaxing.” Annika carefully laid a slice of purple sticker on the lion’s nose.
“Well, I found out something that’s not going to make you feel so relaxed,” June said, her nose wrinkled. “Ziggy said that Time is doing this big profile on Hudson and Break Up. ‘His meteoric rise in the tech sector,’ that kind of thing. They’re going to make it look like he’s the next Zuckerberg.”
Annika squeezed her tweezers. “Of course they are. And of course the investors at EPIC are going to see it and be all impressed. Shit.” After a pause, she added, “But you know what? Let’s talk about something else.” She’d spent enough time stewing about Hudson Craft and the almost-kiss and what it meant that she’d wanted to kiss him, her mind going around and around in useless circles, like a merry-go-round that wouldn’t stop. Her brain was such a muddled puddle that she hadn’t even mustered the energy to tell June what had happened. Annika glanced at her best friend. She would—soon. Just not right at this second. She didn’t need to stress about the Time interview this minute, either. There would be time for damage control later. Right now, she was mentally exhausted and needed a reprieve.
Glancing up at June for just a second, she said, “You and Ziggy went out again last night, right? How was it?”
June’s gaze dropped to her hands, which were obsessively playing with a couple of errant threads on the couch. Annika resisted the urge to stop her before the entire couch collapsed in a heap of thread and batting beneath her. “It was…” June sighed. “I don’t know.”
Annika looked up from her picture, the amber-colored sticker that was meant to go on the lion’s eyeball hanging precariously from the tweezer. “Uh oh. That doesn’t sound good.”
/> “Well, it started off fine. We went zip lining—oh my god, what a thrill. I’m serious, Annika, the next date you go on, make sure it’s something that gets your adrenaline going. Our cheeks were flushed, our hearts were racing … talk about an aphrodisiac.”
Annika half smiled. “Thanks for the tip. Not that I’ll need it anytime soon.” June frowned and opened her mouth to say something, but Annika waved her off. “Continue.”
“Okay, and then we went to dinner at La Rouge, and then … I suggested skinny-dipping.”
Annika laughed and chose another sticker. “That sounds about right.”
June shook her head and sat up, crossing her legs. “He didn’t want to go skinny-dipping.”
Annika’s eyes went so wide, her eyeballs felt like they were in danger of popping out. “Wait, what? He didn’t want to go skinny-dipping with you?”
June bit her lip, tracing a finger down a stripe on the couch. “He looked at me in the moonlight and said, ‘You’re beautiful. And you don’t know how hard this is for me to say, but … I don’t think we should. I want to take this slow.’” She put her face in her hands. “I’d already started stripping, and then I had to pull my top back on. It was awful.”
Annika set her tweezers down and reached forward to squeeze her friend’s knee. She suddenly realized this was June’s first time ever being rejected by a guy. “I’m sorry. But—”
June peeked at Annika from between her painted fingernails. “But what?”
Annika shrugged and said hesitantly, “It sounds like the reason he said that is because he likes you. Like, he really likes you.”
“No!” June said immediately, as Annika had guessed she would. She picked up her coffee cup. “He doesn’t like me. Come on—we barely even know each other. He’s probably just weird about sex or something.”
Annika considered her friend for a moment. “What would you do, though?” she pressed. “If he does really like you? Would you continue to see him?”
June looked at her over the top of her coffee cup, her pale face swathed in steam. “I—I don’t know,” she said, looking completely thrown.
“Whoa.” Annika stared at her. “This is the first time you’ve ever responded with anything other than, ‘Move on because men are like trains. There’s always another one coming.’”
“Doesn’t mean anything,” June said, but she wouldn’t hold Annika’s gaze. Fascinating. Very, very fascinating. “Can we talk about something else now?”
“Sure.” Annika picked up her tweezers again and turned to study the palette of colored stickers. “Of course.”
If there was something going on here—if Ziggy really was somehow worming his way into June’s heart—she would be really happy for her. Happy like from-the-head-to-the-toes-of-her-soul happy. But there was a small part of her that felt … “jealous” was too strong a word. Call it … “unsettled.” Yes, unsettled had a better ring to it.
June was the one who went out on strings of first dates because she wanted to, not because they never called back—unlike Annika. She was famous for saying that her twenties were all about sowing wild oats and her thirties would be about wedding dresses and babies. She had a timeline all planned out, a timeline that made Annika feel infinitely better about not having a serious boyfriend yet. And now, here they were, all of twenty-four years old, and June seemed to be changing her mind. Wasn’t it a bit early for that?
And if June had found The One when she wasn’t even looking, what did that mean for Annika, who’d always been open to something serious? Was she completely hopeless and destined for solitude?
“Hey.” June snapped her fingers. Annika blinked and looked up at her. “What’re you thinking about? You look like Eeyore after his dog got run over.”
Annika forced a smile. “Nothing! I’m just … musing about dating and stuff. That’s all.”
June narrowed her eyes, not one to be fooled so easily. “Mm hmm…”
Annika set her tweezers down and pursed her lips, unable to keep the secret any longer. “Something happened on Thursday night.”
June took a sip of her coffee, biding her time. She knew Annika well enough to know when to push and when to wait.
“With Hudson. After the rooftop party.” Annika took a deep breath, placed her hands flat on the coffee table, and said in a rush, “He told me he couldn’t stop thinking about Vegas and I told him I’ve been thinking about it, too, and then I got caught up in the moment and tried to kiss him and he physically held me off and rejected me. Oh, and I don’t think he stole the app idea after all.”
June set her mug down slowly. “Whoa. That is a lot of information.”
“Yeah, I know. I’m sort of a Dumpster fire.”
“So he thinks about you.”
“Yeah.”
“And you think about him.”
Annika winced. “… Yeah.”
“And you tried to kiss him, but he said no?” June frowned. “Why?”
Annika leaned against the couch and groaned. “He said it was because I’d had a lot to drink and he wanted me to be clear-headed when he kissed me, but I don’t know. That was probably just an excuse. Right?”
June shrugged. “I don’t know. I mean, I saw the way he was stealin’ looks at you that night. I don’t think there was any part of him that didn’t want to kiss you.” She paused and leaned forward. “Is there any chance he’s just … a gentleman?”
Annika scoffed. “The creator of Break Up, a gentleman? I don’t think so.”
June sat back. “But you don’t think he stole the idea for Make Up and turned it into Break Up.”
“No. He seemed pretty genuine about that. I’m not sure why he came up with Break Up, but…” She trailed off and shrugged, picking up her tweezers again.
There was silence, apart from Meg Ryan’s character talking to that fiancé everyone knew was no good for her.
“But you don’t want to date him,” June said casually, as if the answer didn’t matter to her one way or another.
“No!” Annika looked up at her. “June, me and Hudson? Can you really see it? It wouldn’t work on any level. Our philosophies on life and doing the right thing are so diametrically opposed that the universe would combust if we dated.”
“Okay,” June said, shrugging. “I get it. But, um, if you’re not going to date him … Ziggy told me about this guy he knows, this Greek dude named Alesandro. He’s really successful, he has his own bakery, and—”
Annika held up a hand. “I’m gonna stop you right there and say no.”
June pulled a pillow onto her lap and squeezed it just as her phone pinged with a text. She glanced at the screen, set the phone aside, and made a face. “Ew. Hedge Fund Harry. He’s been trying to set up another date.” She turned back to Annika. “But seriously, Alesandro could be so great! I’ll see Ziggy for a bit, you’ll date Alesandro, we’ll go on double dates together…”
Annika put a sticker on the lion’s snout and raised an eyebrow at her best friend’s very convenient selective memory. “Are you serious? I’ve been on two blind dates in my entire life, and they were both ginormous disasters.”
“Come on. What are the chances Alesandro’s hair will catch on fire? Or that he’ll get hit by a bike messenger while you take a romantic walk in the city?” Picking up her mug, she waved it around, not noticing the tiny splash of coffee that sloshed onto the carpet.
Annika sighed and grabbed another sticker from the sticker book, slightly ripping a corner in her agitation. “I don’t know, but with my luck, probably a hundred percent.”
June grabbed her phone off the side table. “Okay, but just look at his picture. Doesn’t he look like the sweetest man? Plus, you wouldn’t have to worry about the universe combusting if you dated him. Y’all have a lot in common.” June held her phone out to Annika.
Alesandro was an olive-skinned man in his late twenties, with brown eyes that crinkled at the corners when he smiled. He was dressed decently, too, in a button-down shirt
with an open collar and dark jeans. His hair was thinning, but that wasn’t a big deal. He did look like a nice guy. It had been a long time since Annika had gone out with a nice guy.
She sighed, and June’s smile got bigger, as if she could sense weakness. But she sat quietly.
“All right, fine,” Annika said, turning back to the sticker book. “I’ll do it. You can tell Ziggy to tell Alesandro I’m in.” A couple of thoughts flashed through her mind: Would Ziggy tell Hudson? Would Hudson get jealous? She shook her head, annoyed at herself. Why would Ziggy bother telling Hudson? Besides, she couldn’t afford to think like that. She and Hudson were never going to work. Did she find Alesandro as attractive as Hudson? Not really. But that was neither here nor there. Everyone knew physical attraction should be a very small part of the equation. And the emotional attraction would probably come very soon. Like June said, she and Alesandro had way more in common than she and Hudson did.
June squealed and began typing furiously on her phone. “Okay, it’s done. I’ll let you know which days work for him and we can go from there.”
“Great.” Annika placed a white sticker on the lion’s mane, feeling nothing but a deep sense of foreboding. Here she was, putting herself out there again. Her string of first dates in the last year alone already told her it wouldn’t amount to anything, but at least June was happy.
June’s phone bleeped with a text and she giggled before responding. Annika sighed.
chapter eight
On Monday morning, June was already at her desk typing away industriously when Annika walked in at eight. “Oh, hey,” she said, setting her latte down on her desk and stashing her yoga gear in the closet. Thankfully, after that one time they’d run into each other at Breathing Tree, Hudson had stopped going to her classes. Something that required as much internal strength and awareness as yoga was probably a bad match for him. “You’re in early.”
