by Lexi Scott
“Hope you’re hungry, Gen. Ma says there’s a second pie in the kitchen,” Deo says with a wink that only I see.
I pull out my chair, one painted bright yellow, with a sun carved into it, and sit down.
“Carrot tofu quiche, Deo-baby, not pie.” Marigold corrects him.
“Where’s Rocko?” I ask.
“Had an appointment run over.” Marigold shrugs.
“Lucky bastard,” Deo mutters. I watch that familiar, cocky grin spread across his face and it’s contagious. I’ve missed it. Before there was Whit, there were regular dinners at Marigold’s. I got to see that smile often.
I force a return smile and take the plate that Marigold has filled with a heaping scoop of quiche. I’m not even remotely hungry, so I spread it around on my plate, fully aware that Marigold and Deo’s eyes are on me.
“What brings you by, Gen?” Deo asks. His voice sounds normal, but when I look up to answer, his eyes are intent. He’s fishing. And I know good and well that anything I tell him is going straight back to my brother and his best friend, Cohen. “Adam working late?”
“Not exactly,” I answer. What am I doing? I’m not about to lay all of my problems out in front of Deo. I can’t tell him how we faked a marriage for citizenship. He’d run straight to Cohen and rat me out. “He’s um, he’s working at home tonight. Research. I just wanted to give him some quiet, so thought I’d come and say hello.”
Marigold nods in a way that I know is basically calling bullshit on everything I’ve just said.
“So everything is good with you two? I don’t have to go all big-brother and kick his ass or anything?” Deo says with a throaty laugh, the same one that I used to find so damn sexy. But this time, it just sounds like a regular laugh.
“Everything is perfect.”
The words leave my mouth and a sob that I can’t stop follows behind the lie.
Marigold and Deo’s eyes turn into matching sets of saucers as they glance at each other then back to me.
“Genevieve!” Marigold cries.
“I’m sorry,” I say, waving off the attention. “I think I’m just tired, I don’t know what’s wrong with me tonight. I shouldn’t have come.”
“Yes, you should, Gen. Where else would you go?” Deo asks. “We’re just as much your family as that nutty Rodriguez clan.”
He reaches over and rubs my arm with his rough, calloused hand. And it’s a nice gesture, but it just feels like any warm hand on my skin. Not the way I thought it would feel to have Deo comfort me. It doesn’t feel the way it does to fall into Adam’s arms when he picks me up from a club I don’t want to be at, or how he lightly brushes the hair from my face when he thinks I’m still asleep.
“Why don’t you take your food to-go, Deo?” Marigold shoots him a look that dares him to argue. I expect Deo to make a crack about getting kicked out of his own mother’s house, but he just gives me a tight, worried look then gets up to kiss his mom and squeeze my shoulder then heads to the door. “Bring some for Whit, there’s that whole extra quiche on the stove!” she calls after him.
“I’m sure she’ll enjoy every bite, Ma!” Deo calls back, his tone laced with sarcasm.
“Little asshole,” Marigold laughs. She shakes her head and clears her throat. “Now, back to you, darling.”
She holds out her hand with a jingle of her infinite bangles, reaches for mine, and closes her palm around it.
“What’s got you so worked up tonight?”
“Adam and I—”
“Oh, don’t tell me there’s trouble there, sweets! That boy loves you more than waves love the shore.”
“I’m not really sure about that. It’s a long story, but I think maybe we got married for the wrong reasons?”
“Do you not love him, Genevieve?” Marigold asks.
I shake my head. “Of course I do. So much more than I really expected to.”
“Expected to?” Marigold settles into her chair, her body language letting me know she’s in for one long haul of a story if that’s what I’m offering.
I have no energy to go back to the twisted beginning of things, so I paraphrase. “It’s complicated. I guess I just thought that Adam and I were on the same page, and now…now I think maybe we’re too far apart to come back together. I’m not sure he loves me the same way that I love him. Or at all.”
“Did you have a fight?” Marigold narrows her eyes at me like she’s trying to read in my face what I’m not saying aloud. “You’re being unusually vague. This isn’t like you. You know that your secrets are always safe with me, honey. The things you tell me won’t leave these trippy walls.”
I glance around at the kitchen where I’ve always felt so comfortable spilling my deepest secrets, ever since I was a young girl. “I know that. I just don’t want to get you in any trouble, because, the thing is—”
“You thought you were marrying for one reason, but it turns out you married for a completely different one?” Marigold asks, raising a brow and making the light reflect off of her glittered eye shadow.
Relief bolts through me. “Exactly! How did you know?”
Marigold shrugs her delicate shoulders. “Because you’ve never trusted yourself, Genevieve. Not as much as you should. When you decided to marry Adam, I’m sure you had your good reasons. But I bet none of them are the reason that you’re sitting here so upset about right now.”
I distractedly take a small bite of the quiche and immediately regret it. The flavor is okay, but the texture… Marigold watches me chew and swallow, and I don’t have the heart to gulp down the massive glass of water in front of me the way I want to.
“Why would Adam lie about being in love with you?”
“Why would Adam lie about being in love with me?” I repeat, every syllable sharp. “That’s the two million dollar question.”
“No, it’s not. It’s rhetorical. He wouldn’t,” Marigold says firmly.
I decide to lay it out and let her see just how direct her question really is. “I married him so that he could stay in the country, because his student visa was about to expire and—”
Marigold is nodding. “But that’s not really why you married him. You married Adam because you love him, but you didn’t trust that to begin with, so you used the excuse of the visa as your reasoning. You love Adam the way a wife should love her husband, am I right?”
I brace for the tears that burn at the edges of my eyes. “With every single thing in me, Marigold. It snuck up on me and now I feel like I’m losing him—it. And maybe he doesn’t feel the same way. Maybe this was just about a green card to him, you know?”
“No, that’s ridiculous.” She says the last word with an edge of impatient temper. “Do you trust me, Genevieve?” Marigold asks.
“Of course,” I nod. And I do, so much.
“Then trust what I’m telling you right now. That man showed up with pure, true love in his eyes and in his heart when he came looking for your ring. He’d scoured every jewelry shop in town, but he wanted to find the right ring for you, sweetie. A man who didn’t care about you wouldn’t have done that. You aren’t giving him enough credit.”
I swallow hard around the burning in my throat.
“But all he can think about is how he’s going to lose all of his work if he has to leave.” And it’s silly, but I’m more upset about the idea that he may have been faking his feelings for me than the prospect of me ending up in jail.
Marigold purses her pink-lined lips. “Did you ever think maybe he’s doing it to protect you? He’s a man, so he’s obviously going to do things the most backward, stupid way possible. But, maybe he thinks that if he pushes you away, if the worst happens, it’ll be easier to part? I think even Rocko would try to do the same in that situation, if he thought it’d be easier on our hearts in the long run.”
“But my heart is hurting right now,” I say, pressing my hand where it beats dully, out of tune. “So, he’s not doing a really great job protecting it.”
“Ah, but
the point is that he’s trying.” Marigold leans in, her eyes on mine. “That’s all you can ever ask from anyone. They can’t always say all the right things, do all the right things. But if they’re trying to protect you, to make you happy, to take care of you, that’s all you can ask of them. Sounds to me like Adam is scared, and that’s a new feeling for him. So maybe he’s going about showing you that in the wrong way—”
“I’d be there for him, if he’d just tell me that. Instead, he’s making me feel like this is all my fault, like I ruined everything.” The tears hang wetly on my lashes and threaten to jump.
Marigold tips my chin up with her long finger. “Adam feels like things are spinning out of control just as much as you do, honey. When you’re caught up in a riptide, the natural reaction is to put all your energy into going the opposite direction, as far away from the undertow as you can, and that’s true for both of you. You’re my doll, but you are a spitfire, Genevieve. I imagine Adam has his work cut out for him when you get upset. Anger, lust, and curiosity, all of those things are going to send you running toward someone. But it gets tricky with fear. Fear drives us away. Fear will send you running from what might just save you. Don’t let it, Genevieve.”
She brushes my hair back off my face and meets my eyes. “You and Adam are in the middle of something scary right now, and it may seem like there’s no end in sight. But you stand a far better chance of making it through this if you stop wasting your energy trying to fight against the current. Because, baby, it’s bigger and stronger than you are. You know how when you’re in a riptide, you have to relax and move in the direction that feels counterproductive? You do that because it’s the only thing that will save you in the end, but it takes a whole lot of courage and trust. And it’s so much easier to face anything with courage and trust when you have someone you love by your side.”
I let the tears fall, and my voice shudders around a sob that’s half relief, half trepidation. “I feel like I’ll never know all of these things like you do. Like I’ll never be a real grown-up, capable of solving my own problems.”
Marigold throws her hands in the air, making her bracelets jangle. “Genevieve, you’re comparing yourself to an old woman. I’ve had life experience—I’ve had so many loves, so many lovers, so much loss. Why do you think you need to have it all figured out right now?”
I wrap my arms around myself. “I’m just ready to be done with feeling so lost all the time. And I sort of thought I was done for a while, but now…”
“We all have things that make us question our paths, Genevieve. We all have setbacks.”
“Even you?” I ask, an eyebrow raised.
Marigold laughs and claps her hands together. “Of course!”
“Marigold, would it be okay if I maybe stayed in the guest room? I’m not up to driving to my parents’ place tonight.” I feel so drained I could lay my head on this sky blue table and fall asleep in a few sweet seconds.
Marigold strokes my hair back. “You’re always welcome to stay, love, but don’t you think you should go home? Kiss and make up?”
I shake my head. “I think maybe I should give it a few days. I’ll just stay tonight, though. I can crash at Mom and Dad’s tomorrow.”
I love Adam, I’m certain of that. And after talking to Marigold, I’m pretty sure he might love me, too. But I don’t want to push it. I don’t want to run back and end up fighting again right now. I don’t want the stress of the immigration situation to crumble everything we’ve built. We just need a little time.
“Stay as long as you need, love.”
Chapter Nineteen
Adam
“Fuck my life.” I have so many petri dishes in front of me, scattered across the table, it’s just stupid. Beyond it being generally stupid, since there’s just too much going on to properly analyze any of it, there’s also stupidity in the fact that they’re out on the counter, exposed to temperature dips and peaks I can’t control.
“Hey, man,” Cody says, his voice cautious, like he’s sneaking up on a rabid animal. “You cool?”
“Hey, Cody,” I sigh. I let my head bang onto the countertop. “I’m fucked. How are you?”
“Can I help?” He takes a long sip of coffee and squints just enough to let me know he’s a little hung over.
I never had the days of easy college life Cody has, even before I was a married man facing deportation and possible legal action by the U.S. Government. Right now, I realize being hung over should be enticing. I should wish my biggest problem was making it through my day with a headache and a sour gut.
But I don’t feel that way.
Genevieve called to let me know she was safe and sound at Marigold’s house and was going to spend some time with her parents. She told them I’d be in the lab nonstop, and she didn’t like being home alone so much. Maybe it was my demented attempt to make things better between us, but I decided to make her cover story into our reality. I parked my ass in the lab, going home only when I’d fallen asleep over my keyboard so many times, my forehead was doing more typing than my fingers.
I’d always hold my breath for a few seconds when I turned the doorknob, hoping she’d be standing in front of the stove, cooking something that made the entire apartment smell like heaven. When that dream got shattered, I didn’t call her. Didn’t drive to her parents’ house and beg her to come home. I made myself a sandwich, took a shower, slept fitfully in our big bed, and went back to the lab.
Because when my thesis was done, I could spend fewer hours at the lab.
And then she would come home.
Never mind that it was just the story she invented to keep suspicions down. Some deluded part of my brain was convinced that if I made the story true, the end product would be Genevieve, back in my life. My wife, back by my side.
And I was desperate as hell for that endgame, because life without her was proving to be a totally pathetic experience.
“So, nothing in any of the counts?” Cody asks, peering into one of the microscopes.
“Nope. Every single number is too damn low. Every one. And I’m hungry. Starved.” I lean my head back on the rolling chair that’s got my body’s imprint embedded in it, and spin it around. “So damn hungry.”
Cody walks over and brushes the counter full of junk food wrappers into the garbage next to my desk. “Dude, seriously? It looks like you ate half the vending machine.”
“It doesn’t fill me up,” I gripe, planting my foot to stop the chair from spinning before I make myself puke. “Nothing fills me up.”
“You wanna take a break? Go out and get some real food? There’s this diner that has coconut french toast. I hear it’s pretty damn amazing.” Cody picks up the keys he just dropped into his desk drawer and shakes them.
I drop my head into my hands. “Genevieve ruined any chance I’ll ever have of enjoying anyone else’s breakfast cooking.”
Cody chuckles. “Dude, you’re so damn wrapped up in that girl. I seriously doubt she’s such a good cook that no other chef in California can compare. This place got a write up in the Times.”
I shake my head. “My mom had this recipe, and I loved it. You know how there are things from when you’re a kid, and nothing can touch them? Ever?” Cody nods. “Gen blew my mother’s recipe out of the water.”
“Your mother’s recipe?” Cody has a soft spot for his mother, who’s a surf coach and organic gardener. “That’s serious.”
“I know it,” I concede. “It’s the shape, you know? Of the bread. My mom had this pan she used to make this bread—it’s called challah bread—and I thought that was how you made it, you know? In the pan. But Gen took it and made it free form on a cookie sheet, and the whole effect was—”
I look at the petri dishes.
The little plastic, sterile worlds that trap my yeast and keep the numbers at researchable levels.
The dishes that are killing my experiment.
“Holy fucking shit. Holy shit.” I stand up. I sit back down. I jump up a
nd pace. “What if…?”
“What?” Cody grabs my arm, and I know the worried look in his eye is just because mad scientists in their crazed states have done stupid things. Like ruined masses of samples on one broken whim. “What’s wrong? Are you okay? Let me start putting your samples back, okay? The temperatures are probably getting compromised and—”
“Fuck the dishes!” I yell, triumphant. “I’ve been looking for an outcome that can’t exist in the environment I put it in. I need to disperse the samples, let them intermingle. Maybe a sterile container with multiple cups? Maybe something I can keep cross-contaminated, but in a controlled way? I know what I can do. Cody, hand me that graph paper and the catalog with the latex gloves that don’t suck. You know, the one with the dorky goggle girl on the cover.”
Cody has that face people must have when they’re rubbernecking at an accident they just can’t tear their eyes away from. He hands me what I ask for and puts my useless samples back, and I don’t stop him.
I’ll need an extension, but this will be worth it. And I may not have to throw all my work away, because maybe—just maybe—some of my isolated samples can be made to integrate the way I want.
“Is everything okay, Adam? Do you feel okay? Do you feel…like you might want to take a break?” Cody asks, sounding like a worried school nurse.
“I feel great, man. I feel so damn great. Get lost. I have work to do.” I have six screens open on my computer, looking at my data, deleting what I need to scrap, culling what I can salvage. I type a few lines to my adviser, minimize the tab, and grab my phone to call—
Genevieve.
My wife.
The only woman—the only person—I want to talk to. I want to tell her every detail, even if half of it will go over her head.
And I have no business calling her. I’ve screwed that up. I thought there was one way to make our marriage work, and I screwed it up by insisting that was it. But I can fix it. I can fix anything.
“Cody!” I yell, turning to find him. He jumps, because he’s standing right behind me.
