Meet Cute Diary

by Emery Lee

  The doorbell rings again, which catches me completely off guard because I’m pretty sure there’s nobody else in Denver I actually care to talk to.

  I turn to Brian and say, “Did you invite someone over?”

  “Nope.”

  So I head over to the door. I’m too short to actually see through the little peephole, so I’m hoping it’s just a package delivery and not some guy in a ski mask waiting to kidnap me.

  I pull the door open and freeze.

  But it’s not some guy in a ski mask standing there.

  It’s Becca.

  I scream, and she screams back, and we jump into each other’s arms just screaming in excitement.

  “Yikes,” Brian says. “The downstairs neighbors are gonna run me out of town because of you two.”

  Just for good measure, we scream a little more before slipping into the apartment.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask. I whip toward Brian, eyes narrowed. “Did you know she was coming?”

  He shrugs. “Only since this morning.”

  Becca laughs. “I told him not to tell you because it’s supposed to be a surprise,” she says. “But yeah, long story short, I came to Denver for a university workshop, so my parents wanted to make a little vacation out of it and visit some family in Boulder.”

  “How long are you here for?” I ask.

  “We’re leaving tomorrow, which is why I had to stop in to surprise you before we go.”

  “Oh my God, hold on,” I say.

  I reach for an envelope on the counter and pass it off to her. I was originally going to mail it out to her, but since she’s here, she might as well take it now. She accepts it with a raised brow before slipping it into her back pocket, but she already knows what it is. I texted her a couple nights ago to let her know I’d be revising her list to something actually useful, like “someone who gives you the space to talk in your own time while still making it clear they care” and “someone who lets you be the star of your own show.” It only seemed fair since she’d done so much for my relationship already.

  It kind of felt like the least I could do after I’d been such a useless friend. Hopefully she’ll need it later for her Insta girlfriend, but even if she doesn’t, it’s a good little something to remember me by while we’re miles apart.

  “So,” Becca says, hands on her hips, commanding all of the attention in the space. “You must be Devin.”

  Devin pales, fiddling with eir hands. “Um, yeah, I am.”

  Becca smiles, crossing the room and pulling Devin into a hug that e eventually manages to return. “Ugh, I’m so happy you’re not Drew!”

  Devin blinks at me, an eyebrow raised. “Thank you?”

  “Okay, enough,” I say, shoving my hands between them and prying them apart. “No Drew talk either. Let the past stay dead.”

  I haven’t heard from Drew since the fight, and it’s actually been a huge relief. If I was still stuck on the twelve steps, I guess I could take this as a sign that he absolutely failed, but now it’s just a breath of fresh air. I don’t know if I ever really loved him or just loved the idea of him, but I’m moving on to bigger and better things, and wherever he is, I guess I hope he is too. Whatever keeps him out of my life, really.

  “Amen to that,” Becca says. “So what’s the plan? Skiing down a mountain? Kayaking down a roaring river?”

  I smirk. “Checking out Devin’s favorite comic shop?”

  Becca smiles. “Ugh, thank God.” She turns to Devin. “That was a test. You passed with flying colors.”

  Devin laughs, but I’m sure all the attention is making em a little uncomfortable. I slip a hand into eirs so e knows I’m there if e needs me. And, like, e can totally choose to tap out at any time. We set that boundary too.

  “Hope you don’t mind me tagging along,” Becca says.

  “Obviously not,” I say. “You still have to catch me up on everything.”

  “Have fun, children. Don’t get arrested because I won’t be bailing you out,” Brian says.

  I roll my eyes. “Whatever, Brain. Okay, who’s driving?”

  “I can do it,” Devin says.

  “You sure? My uncle’s car is pretty sweet, and the guy’s a dick, so I don’t even mind draining his gas,” Becca says.

  I turn to Devin, an eyebrow raised. I want em to know that e doesn’t have to commit to anything that makes em anxious.

  But e just smiles back at me says, “No, it’s okay. I think we’re all safer in my car anyway.”

  I smile. E’s probably not wrong about that.

  We end up at two different comic shops plus a bookstore, though we fortunately manage to avoid Amy’s shop. At the bookstore, Becca tears through the romance section, making jokes about all the bad puns used for titles.

  “When does your trashy romance come out, Noah?” she asks.

  I roll my eyes. “Okay, first of all, I’m done with coming out. I think I’ve come out of the closet enough times this summer.”

  “Ugh,” she groans, “that’d be your book. Coming Out of the Closet but with a literal closet involved.”

  I laugh, picking up a bright and colorful book with a cooking pun on the cover. I haven’t been much in a reading mood lately, and I’ve mostly been avoiding the Diary. Since my not-discussion with that troll, I’ve tried posting a handful of meet cutes, but the Diary’s been losing followers, and honestly, I don’t know how to save it. Then again, maybe it’s me. Maybe my stories have been uninspired since the whole fiasco with Drew. Maybe I just don’t have a lot of faith in meet cutes anymore, especially given how Devin and I met.

  But then, who’s to say we have some epic love story when I can’t even ensure we’re endgame? I leave in a week, and then that’s it. No more Devin and Noah.

  “Something wrong?” Devin asks. E slides up next to me, wrapping an arm around my waist.

  I want to lean into em, hold em close for our last week together, but God, whoever said that it’s better to have loved and lost bullshit never dated Devin. Every time I look at em, I feel like I’m slowly prying off my own fingernails. Like I’ve been handed a pair of child safety scissors, and now I have to use them to cut out my spleen.

  “Noah?” e says, and I shrug em off.

  “It’s nothing,” I say.

  “Okay,” Becca says, putting another book back on the shelf. “I’m tired of wading through bad book titles. Let’s do lunch.”

  Devin spares me a quick glance, but I’m already turning and heading for the car.

  We stop at a pho shop for lunch, and Devin orders a matcha green tea, and I stare idly at the cup, having an existential crisis. I mean, I didn’t even know e liked matcha, let alone enough to get a large. What else don’t I know about em? What other secrets are waiting to crawl out of the woodwork and destroy our entire foundation?

  “Noah?” Devin says, idly playing with eir straw. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I snap, and it’s rude, and I don’t know why I do it, but I can’t take it back. I should be enjoying the last few hours I have with Becca and the last week we have together, but all I can think about is our impending breakup and who’s going to say the words first. Are we going to be back at the little boba shop e took me to? The gym? Starbucks? Am I never going to be able to drink a vanilla latte again without thinking about the love that I lost?

  This is different than losing Drew. Sure, I was dreading the eventual fallout, but that was because I knew we weren’t meant to be together and I didn’t want to have to clean up the mess.

  But Devin’s been perfect. I’ve been happier these past two weeks than I’ve been in all my time in Denver. Hell, maybe my whole life. E’s been everything I imagined for myself when I created the Diary, and everything I thought I could find with Drew, and now I’m supposed to just give it all up.

  Becca grabs my tea out of my hand and squints at it. “What do they put in this stuff?”

  Devin laughs, but it sounds kind of hollow. Or did eir laugh always
sound like that? Great, we haven’t even broken up yet, and I’m already forgetting the sound of eir laugh.

  “Is there anything else you two want to do?” Devin asks.

  Becca shrugs. “I’m actually kind of wiped. I’ll probably head back after this so I can get some sleep.”

  I choke on boba. “Wait, what? You’re leaving already? We barely spent any time together!”

  Becca raises an eyebrow. “You’re the one who’s been acting like a zombie since we left the apartment.”

  And yeah, I know that, but that’s ’cause we’re kind of running out of time.

  “Noah, it’s okay,” Devin says, reaching a hand out to me, but I swat it away.

  “No, it’s not okay!” I snap. “You’re both abandoning me, and apparently I’m the only one who cares.”

  The table falls silent for a minute, and I wonder if I’ve gone too far, chasing away the two people who mean the most to me in a matter of seconds.

  Finally, Becca says, “I mean, you’re the one moving to California.”

  And God, I know she’s right, but that’s such a fucking low blow. Yes, I’m the one who left her in Florida, and I’m the one leaving Devin in Denver, but it’s not like I did it on purpose, or even by choice. Does she really think I’d leave her if I had a choice?

  And I know I’m being unreasonable, but I can’t stop. I whip my head toward Devin, who’s staring idly down at eir chopsticks. “Do you have something to say?” I snap.

  Devin looks up at me for a moment, as if verifying that my question really was directed at em, before saying, “No.”

  “No?”

  “I’m not gonna fight with you, Noah. If you really want to lash out and ruin our last week together, you’re doing it on your own.”

  We sit through lunch in silence, but more than anything, I kind of just want to cry.

  When we get back to the apartment building, Becca turns around and heads to her uncle’s car with a quick goodbye to Devin and nothing for me. I can’t really blame her.

  Devin comes up to the apartment like e usually does, but once we get to the door, e turns to go.

  “Wait,” I say.

  Devin turns back hesitantly, eyeing me like e expects me to throw my shoe at em or something.

  “Can you come in for a little bit?” I ask.

  Devin nods and follows me inside.

  I consider turning on some music or at least the TV to fill the space with a little bit of noise, but I know it’ll only distract me.

  I’ve known since the Christmas party that this was coming, and I kept putting it off because I was hoping my feelings would fade and it wouldn’t hurt so much. But my feelings haven’t faded, and I’m starting to think they never will, and now I’m tearing everything apart over the fear of not being able to hold on to the one thing I know I can’t have.

  “Devin,” I say.

  E’s already got tears in eir eyes, so I imagine e knows what comes next. E rubs a hand across eir face and says, “This is the part where you say you don’t want to see me anymore, isn’t it?”

  I wait for em to lower eir hand before saying, “It’s not—I’m leaving soon, and when I do, I don’t know if we’ll ever see each other again, and I don’t know how we’re supposed to handle that.”

  Devin looks down at eir feet, a sad look on eir face, and I don’t know what to say. I don’t want to hurt em, but that’s all I’ve been doing, lashing out because I don’t know how to live in this in-between of what should’ve been a perfect relationship.

  I hate knowing that the pain on eir face is entirely my fault, and no matter what I do now, I’m just going to keep hurting em again. And I hate knowing that there’s no way we continue on like we were, and e’s probably going to blame emself for all of it, but I don’t know how to make it better.

  Finally, I say, “I love you, Devin. I just—I wish I wasn’t moving to California. I wish I could stay here with you forever, but I can’t, and that means I need to learn how to live without you around. This is hard for you too, right? Knowing that we’re going our separate ways? And I just don’t know if it’s worth the pain it’ll cause both of us to try to maintain a relationship through all of this. I need time to think and decide if it’s worth the struggle of trying to make this work.”

  “Oh,” e says.

  And then we plunge into silence. I feel like I should say something else, but I don’t know what to say. Apologizing feels fake, and I’m not exactly good at comforting people, but just standing there in silence feels wrong, like I’m drawing out eir pain.

  Finally, Devin says, “Whatever you decide, I hope things go really well for you in California, Noah. I really do. You deserve to be happy.”

  “You too,” I say, because I can’t think of anything else, and I stand there feeling like the asshole who says “you too” when the waiter tells you to enjoy your meal even after Devin leaves, closing the door behind em.

  Sunday, July 29

  Thebraveofheart posted:

  So . . . is the Meet Cute Diary just . . . over? It seems like the mod isn’t posting anymore, and everyone’s just walking away? What are we supposed to do if we want happy trans stories?

  The next morning, I wake up with a headache, which only seems fair. Becca’s probably already on the road back to Florida, and wherever Devin is, I guess I’m not really allowed to worry about it since I’m the one who asked for space. I try to close my eyes again when I hear a knock floating in from the front door. Is that what woke me up in the first place?

  I crawl out of bed and slip out of the closet. Brian’s nowhere to be found, and the little digital clock above the stove says it’s just after ten.

  I open the door to find some guy I don’t recognize holding a small package. “Noah?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “I live down the hall. Some kid gave me this and told me to give it to you at ten.”

  I’m hesitant to accept the package from him because hell, it could be anthrax, but I do, closing the door behind me.

  It’s not a big box, and I’m a little spooked, but I tear off the tape anyway and open it to reveal a reusable Starbucks cup. I pull it out and find a little folded letter taped to the inside, which reads:

  Noah,

  There’s a free vanilla latte waiting for you at Starbucks. Go pick it up, and ask for extra foam. Oh, and then, you know, follow the instructions and stuff.

  Love,

  Devin

  At the bottom of the note is an address, presumably for the Starbucks. I type it into my GPS—only about a ten-minute walk from here.

  I don’t know what’s going on, and given our conversation last night, I’m not sure how to feel about it, but if Devin went through the trouble of speaking to some random stranger just to get my attention, I feel like the least I can do is follow through.

  About a half hour later, I’m dressed and ready to go. It feels like a rushed morning prep, but I had to find a balance between looking good for Devin and getting out of here at a reasonable hour.

  Popping into Starbucks, cup in hand, I get in the line, which is fortunately short. When I get up to the counter, I say, “Hi, I’m here to pick up a vanilla latte with, um, extra foam?”

  The cashier raises an eyebrow, her voice low as she says, “Are you Noah?”

  I nod.

  She laughs, taking the cup and passing it down the line. “Your boyfriend seems really sweet.”

  I smile even though I should probably correct her. She passes me a little folded-up slip of paper and says, “Good luck.”

  I unfold the next note, which reads:

  Noah,

  If you’re reading this, that means you’re actually following my quest, and I really appreciate it because I put a lot of effort into this. Anyway, pick up your coffee and exit the Starbucks. There’s a ride waiting to take you to your next destination.

  Love,

  Devin

  A barista places my latte down on the counter. I grab it before stepping out
through the front doors. A rideshare idles just outside, which is super sketchy, but I take in a deep breath and slip into the back seat.

  “Where are we headed?” I ask.

  The guy shrugs. “I’m just following the map, kid.”

  Also super sketchy.

  I idly sip my coffee, but my nerves are sparking to life. Where the hell are we going, and what the hell is Devin planning?

  The car stops in front of the tea shop Devin took me to when I told em about the Diary. The driver just gives me a look until I finally step out of the car. The shop looks closed, so I’m not sure what I’m doing here until the car drives away and I turn toward the lot to find Becca staring back at me.

  “Becca?” I say. “I thought you would’ve left by now.”

  “I would have,” she says, “you know, if Devin didn’t try to rope me into this whole thing.”

  I smile. “Do you have a note for me?”

  “Maybe,” she says. “Do you have an apology for me?”

  God, that’s so Becca, but it’s really comforting to hear right now. “I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry. I’ve been a terrible best friend because I’m scared to lose you, and I’m scared of being alone.”

  She smiles, quickly pulling me into a hug, and I really don’t want to let go, but eventually she pushes me away and says, “Come on. I have to get back before my mom gets pissed, and you’ve got someone to meet.”

  “My letter?” I say.

  She rolls her eyes and pulls a slip of paper out of her bra.

  “Gross,” I say.

  She shrugs before slipping into the driver’s seat of her uncle’s car. I buckle in before opening the note.

  Noah,

  I’m sorry the shop’s closed. I had to choose between getting you Becca or tea, and I settled on the first.

  Do you remember when we first came here? It was the first time you opened up to me about, well, everything. I don’t know how much all of that meant to you, but it really meant the world to me. There haven’t been a lot of people I could talk to since I left Florida, but that day, with you, I finally felt like I could be me. Like I wasn’t wrong, and honestly, that’s exactly what I needed.