by Tessa Bailey
“Yeah.” He gives me a once over, his gaze lingering at my low neckline. “I have late classes tonight, so this was my only chance.” He drops his hands, but jiggles the bag he’s holding. “You know when you have a gift for someone, it burns a hole in your pocket until you hand it over?”
“That’s for me?” Charlie nods and the sidewalk turns into ocean waves under my feet. “Oh.” I love presents. Everyone loves presents. I’ve just never accepted them from men, because it was against the rules. No gifts was one of mine and Charlie’s ground rules, too, but technically that was before we stopped hooking up and became friends. So it’s okay to accept, right? Man, this situation is confusing.
“Don’t think about it too hard. Please?” He’s watching me with a hopeful expression. One that makes my palms sweat, my mouth dry right up. Cautiously, he hands me the bag and we step into the shadow of my building, allowing cranky Villagers to pass on the sidewalk. There is so much tissue paper in the bag, and none of it was placed there skillfully. It’s a manmade mess. “Go ahead and laugh.”
“Somewhere in Connecticut, Martha Stewart is rocking in a corner.”
“Smart ass,” Charlie murmurs, propping an elbow on the building. “We wrapped presents in newspaper growing up, and it worked just fine.”
“It would have worked fine for me, too—” I stop talking when I finally reach the actual gift and remove it from the bag, a couple pieces of tissue paper flying away on the wind. It takes me a moment to realize what I’m holding, but when I do, my heart jerks and stutters, like a stalling car engine. I’m holding a metal tree, welded to a stand, with big branches poking out in different directions. At the end of each branch, there is a little spiral. “It’s for holding my notecards when I cook.”
“Yeah.” He looks relieved that I figured it out, but he’s trying to hide it by gesturing and not meeting my eyes. “I noticed you had them all over the counter that night in the kitchen . . . they kept falling down.”
“Charlie.” I press the notecard tree to my chest. I’m horrified to feel little pinpricks at the backs of my eyelids, but there’s no help for it. I can’t recall a time someone has bought me a gift this thoughtful. “I’m going to use this all the time. It’s perfect.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
He’s suddenly serious. “I found it because you needed it, and I thought you should have it. Your job is hard, and I hope this makes it easier.” We’re standing closer now. Who moved? “But I also wanted you to know it hasn’t stopped bothering me. How you thought of yourself as some kind of mistress. I should have been a better friend. I can be.”
There it was. The F-word. And yet it wasn’t nearly enough to ruin the gift. Or the moment. “Do you want to come to the farmer’s market with me?”
His shoulders lose tension, but his eyes stay sharp. “I thought you had plans.”
“I’m making dinner for Nina later. That’s the plan.” I shouldn’t be telling him this. I know. But the way he’s looking at me is so earnest. And I’m holding his thoughtful gift in my hands, and I don’t want him to leave just yet. “I’ll just run this upstairs and be back down. I-If you want to go—”
“I’m going.”
Chapter 14
Charlie
The Union Square farmer’s market has changed. I have fuzzy memories of my mother bringing me here when I was a child, before she split, but they don’t match up with the huge production I’m walking into with Ever. There are so many stands set up, I can’t see the end of them. As with every major park in the city, there are sightseers and slow movers, so the market is twice as packed as it needs to be. Normally, an overcrowded sea of people makes me extra vigilant, because my father and Greer have trained me to be suspicious and careful.
Every ounce of my vigilance, however, is being occupied. It’s a good thing I came with Ever to the market, because unlike the times my mother brought me here? There are no little old ladies selling carrots from their gardens. No, it’s like bridges and tunnels of Manhattan vomited a bunch of oversized, bearded farmers into Union fucking Square and every one of them knows Ever by name. Not to mention, they all have food in common with her, which is brilliant. Just brilliant.
Oh, they don’t like seeing me there with her, either.
Good.
Because I’m in a perfect mood to dissuade every single one of them from sniffing around Ever. She sent Reve a knock-knock joke this morning, through the dating site.
What did the alien say to the garden? Take me to your weeder.
Sure, the joke was cute as hell like everything else she does, but I could read between the lines. Could see our text conversation made her even more determined to move on. I’d already had her present sitting on my desk, but the gut-sick intuition that she was fighting to put me behind her got me moving even faster.
Her message to Reve also served as a reminder to Charlie. I have less than a week to convince Ever that her dating mission is ill-fated. Less than a week to prove that this better, friendlier version of what we had before can make her happy. Sure, it’s not the kind of commitment she thinks she wants. But I know it’s better than opening herself up to strangers who could cause her pain.
We stop at a booth beneath a big sign proclaiming the best produce in Vermont. “What do you have today, Oscar?”
Oscar. Fuck this guy.
“Hey there, Ever.” His hairy-knuckled hand digs through a bunch of greenery. “We’ve got some Swiss chard. Some baby bok choy.”
“Ooh. I’ll take some bok choy, if you please.” She hands over her tote bag and tugs some bills from some magical, secret pocket on her dress. “How’s your day going so far?”
“Great. Thanks for asking.” Oscar the Friendly Knuckle Dragger is quickly becoming Oscar the Grouch. Probably because while Ever has been counting out her bills, I’ve been giving him a don’t even think about it look over her shoulder. “You brought a friend today.”
“Yes.” She turns those sparkling eyes on me. “This is Charlie. If you have any problems with vegetable thieves, he’s your man.”
“Nice to meet you,” I say, guiding Ever away with a hand on her hip. Low enough to warn off Oscar. High enough not to raise Ever’s suspicion. Not that I don’t throw Knuckle Dragger the side eye for good measure. “What else is on your list?” I ask Ever, when we’re out of ear shot.
“I don’t have one.” She lifts her shoulders and lets them drop. “I’m winging it.”
“Such a wild woman.” I scan the booths. “My mom used to buy the pulpy apple juice. We hated it, but she kept bringing it home.” A dull ache forms behind my jugular. One I’ve lived with so long, I’m not even sure what it means anymore. “It was just one of the things we complained about.” After a minute, I realize Ever is looking at me funny. “What?”
“Nothing.” She looks down quickly, adjusting the straps of her bag. “You’ve just never mentioned your mother before. I wasn’t sure she was in the picture.”
“No, she’s been gone since I was six.” Feeling jumpy, I take Ever’s hand and head for a fresh-baked-pie booth. “I don’t know where she went.”
We stop at the back of the pie line, and Ever speaks in a low voice. “Your father doesn’t know?”
“She asked him not to look.” I don’t know why I’m having such a hard time explaining the damn situation. It’s not like I haven’t had almost two decades to acclimate to having no mother around. There isn’t some big drama surrounding what happened. People grow up in single-family homes all the time, right? “Look, she didn’t have anything to stick around for. If you want the truth, we were awful to her. She cooked and cleaned and took my brother and me everywhere . . . and we just made more messes and fought all the time.”
Ever’s forehead creases. “Of course you did, Charlie. You were six.”
“Yeah, well, I still knew better.” The sun seems hotter and more intense than it had when we arrived. “My father told me that . . . I should have known better
.”
The tote bag drops off Ever’s shoulder, but she just leaves it dangling near her ankle. “Hold up.” She chews her bottom lip and studies me. “Was he implying that if you’d acted better, your mother wouldn’t have left?”
“Yes.” Why is she acting as though this is some huge revelation? I can remember my mother slamming cabinets and weeping over the sink while Greer and I acted like dickheads. I remember giving her some shoddy Mother’s Day card I’d made in school and nothing else, even after everything she did for me. Of course she’d blown the Burns Popsicle Stand as quickly as humanly possible. Why wouldn’t she? But the way Ever is staring at me, as though she’s holding her breath? It is one of those moments where you realize you’ve been pronouncing a word wrong your entire life, except this is trying to hit me much harder. “She had to get away from me, from us, she said. I heard her talking to my father . . . and he let her go. He understood.”
“No. Oh no, Charlie.” Ever pulls me out of line, leading me to a pathway beneath a fall of trees. I can’t account for the numbness as she wraps her arms around me, but her fingers messing with the ends of my hair makes me feel better. Makes me feel anchored in the present again. She presses her ear to my chest for a while, before glancing up at me. “I have no experience with kids, but I know from the Internet that parenting is hard. For everyone. And you don’t just get to walk out and never look back. You wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t, either. That was wrong of her, Charlie. Wrong, wrong, wrong. And nothing about it was your fault.” Her breath expels in a rush. “I’d like to smash something so hard right now.”
Is she right? She seems so sure. My heartbeat sounds like it’s being amplified through a loud speaker. I need something to drown it out. The way Ever makes me feel is the only thing that can do that. “Will you kiss me instead of smashing something?”
Ever doesn’t just kiss me . . . she cares for me. I stand up the entire time it happens, but mentally I watch it happen from flat on my ass. Her lips tug on my bottom one as she makes a sad noise. Maybe it’s crazy, but that little noise of hers kicks something free inside of me and then, I’m sad, too. I can’t remember being sad before. Not like this. I can’t control it and don’t know the source. It drags me down and stabs me between the shoulder blades, but Ever doesn’t leave me there to flounder. She props me up, stroking my face and kissing me. Right there in the park, the way couples do.
“Not your fault,” she murmurs against my mouth. “Not one bit.”
Here’s the problem, though. I don’t know if I believe her. As bad as I want to swim into the cool lake of comfort Ever is beginning to represent, I’ve lived with this certainty too long that I wasn’t enough. Or worse, I was too much. For so long, these memories of loss and guilt and shame were suppressed. Now they’re riding in with guns blazing and I’m totally unarmed. My father was there when it all went down. Ever wasn’t. She can’t know it wasn’t my fault. Not when I remember so differently.
Oh God, I will avoid having something and losing it—again—at all costs. So why am I clinging to Ever like a drunk with his last forty-ounce? She’d been the initiator, but the engine of desperation inside me is in overdrive, and I’m practically mauling her mouth in public, yanking her onto tiptoes so I can get her from every angle, even underneath.
“Charlie.” Her whisper is shaky and I want to feel that tremor, so I kiss her with suction, dragging, dragging, her into my lungs, until she twists free. “Charlie.”
Breathe. Breathe. “I’m sorry.”
I don’t even know what I’m apologizing for. Or to whom. I’m caught up in a confusing slide show of past and present, and Ever’s eyes are the only concrete things I can grasp. I woke up this morning with renewed determination to get Ever back the way I had her before. The world made sense. Now I’m veering into a place I don’t recognize.
My goal was to be Ever’s friend with benefits. To lure her back to the perfection we had together, while allowing myself to get safely closer to her. To understand her better. Am I fooling myself into thinking that’s realistic? I’m pretty sure friends aren’t supposed to make you feel as though you’re drowning without them around. What happens if we get even closer, then she cuts me off? The burn of being cut off from someone I loved is so unnaturally fresh right now, and it hasn’t been in so long. I should walk away now. Leave Ever to find someone who doesn’t resent her for having the ability to leave.
I resent her for having the ability to leave?
Has that insecurity been shoved down so deep, I couldn’t even see it?
I feel unclean, just knowing it exists. That someone could hold anything against this amazing, optimistic girl. Especially something out of her power. I should go. I shouldn’t play any more games with her. But when she holds out her hand and says, “Come on. We’ll buy a pie and go home. I have some vanilla ice cream in the fridge.” I thread our fingers together and promise myself a little more time.
Chapter 15
Ever
Charlie looks as if he’s just disembarked that creepy ride at Willy Wonka’s factory. His eyes are glazed as we walk into my apartment, his step lacking its usual confidence. God knows I’m the furthest thing from maternal, but I have this impulse to bundle him into bed, wrap him in my comforter and guard him from the world with a metal bat. I do none of those things, though, because I’m not sure what he’s thinking. I’m not even sure he wants to be here.
The sun is beginning to grow subdued. Not quite afternoon, not quite evening, and it gives the apartment a golden vibe. When Nina and I first moved in, we hung crystals in the window and they’re showing off their effects now, painting the wall in dancing prisms. I watch Charlie out of the corner of my eye as I unpack my goodies, stowing them away in the fridge for later, save the strawberry rhubarb pie, which I leave on the counter.
I’m still coming down off our kiss in the park. I have this distinct impression Charlie has no idea that we kissed for nearly an hour. His gaze was almost startled when I finally broke away, as if we’d only just begun. I spent the quiet walk home stuck in this weird limbo between arousal and outrage. Who would let a child think his mother left because of him? Even if by some crazy long shot it were true, which it couldn’t be, wouldn’t a parent go to extra lengths to assure him otherwise?
Across the room, Charlie falls into a sitting position on the couch, hands clasped between his knees. Did I push too far when we talked about his mother? His shoulders are rigid. He wants to leave, I think. I don’t know. But something tells me if I let him walk out the door like this, I won’t see him again for a long time.
I’m pretty freaking far from okay with that. And no, I don’t want to examine why. Not when I’m more worried about his current state of mind than anything else.
“Do you want that piece of pie?”
“What?” His head comes up slowly. “Oh, sure.”
I take two plates out of the cabinet and remove a knife from the drawer. Just as I’m preparing to slice the first piece of pie, I hear a familiar ding across the room. The knife in my hand drops. The sound that is bleeping from my still-open laptop is the signal that I’ve received a message on the dating website. My pulse purrs a little louder, but I pick up the knife again, intending to continue cutting, as though nothing is amiss. And nothing is amiss, right? I mean, just because I spent an hour making out with Charlie in Union Square Park doesn’t mean he’ll be weird about matches coming in while we eat pie together.
Do I want him to be weird about it?
Charlie’s gaze is already zeroed in on the laptop . . . and he stands. The second he moves in the direction of the device, I drop the knife and jog out of the kitchen, intending to beat him there. And I lose.
He slides into the rolling chair at my Ikea desk and rubs his index finger across the control pad, bringing the screen to life. Behold, in all its glory, the match site of mundane questions and inopportune dinging.
“Charlie, that’s private.”
Yeah, he’s ignoring me. Gli
ding a finger along the pad and tapping over the red bubble that decrees I have fourteen new notifications. “In high demand, aren’t you?”
The hair on the back of my neck prickles at his tone. It’s half-detached, half- . . . on the verge. Of what, I’m not sure. “You don’t really want to look at this, do you?” I strive for casual, attempting to pick up the laptop. But he intercepts my wrist and pulls me down on his lap, wrapping a forearm around my waist. “It’s none of your business, Charlie.”
“Oh come on,” he says with a flat laugh. “Let me see a few of the contenders.”
I try to stand, but he tightens his hold. “No. Don’t look.”
“I want to help, Ever.” His voice is hard. Not Charlie-like at all. “I’m a guy, which gives me a first-hand perspective on the bullshit they’re spewing. I can weed out some of the bad ones for you.” He gives a rude snort. “Although, that might narrow the field down to zero.”
Oh, screw this. He isn’t going to sit here, in my apartment, and make this undertaking of mine sound stupid. I won’t let him. “Leave it alone. I don’t need any help.”
“You’re getting it anyway.” He clicks on the red bubble and I close my eyes, rage simmering like hot oil beneath my skin. I hate this. Hate it. He’s still raw from talking about his mother in the park—I see that—and if we’re really attempting friendship, I should probably be more understanding. But I’m raw, too, goddammit. My lips are still swollen from the over-the-top passionate way he’d kissed me before deflating into Phantom Charlie . . . and we are now browsing my dating matches together?
When I feel his body stiffen beneath me, my eyes fly open and I only get a glimpse of the cursor hovering over a vaguely familiar face before my hand flies up and slams the laptop shut. I’m done with this.
