Getting Over Garrett Delaney

by McDonald, Abby

  Well, some of the people. Now that I’m a vaguely competent employee, Dominique has exchanged disdain for icy detachment and doesn’t say a word to me aside from orders and occasional demands to go clean something. Josh is friendlier than her, thank God, but he’s still so goofy; it’s hard to get him to stop messing around long enough to have a straight conversation.

  I’m just starting to set up for the morning when he barrels through the door, carrying a fishing rod and a toolbox dangling with hooks. His nose is sunburned and peeling, and his brown hair is sticking up in wayward tufts.

  “You fish?” I ask, resisting the urge to pick pecans from the tops of the muffins as I lay out the day’s pastries. Oh, caramelized deliciousness! I turn to Josh before I break, like, five different health and safety laws. “I didn’t know you were the huntin’, shootin’ type.”

  “Sure.” He grins and unloads his gear with a loud clatter. “Birds, beasts, mammals, I’ll kill ’em all. There’s actually a couple of rodents out back if you’re feeling hungry. . . .”

  “Eww!”

  “What?” He laughs. “Nah, the fishing’s more my dad’s thing. He likes to drag me along sometimes. His idea of bonding, I guess.”

  “You’re lucky.” I sigh. “My mom’s idea of bonding is for us to sit down and fill out goal charts together. Or go for manicures. But, well . . .” I hold up my bitten nails as evidence of just how futile that cause is. “It’s cute, though, that your dad wants to bond.” Finished with the morning setup, I hoist myself onto the countertop. We haven’t officially opened yet, and the coffee shop is a quiet sea of neat tables and full sugar dispensers. The calm before the storm. “My dad and I kind of have the same thing. He’s always traveling,” I explain. “But whenever he’s in town, we always go to a show together, some band I want to see. It’s dorky, I know, but . . .” I trail off, embarrassed. “I don’t know, it’s kind of nice, to have a thing like that. Just us.”

  But Josh doesn’t seem to think I’m being childish. He nods, drumming absently against the counter with a couple of spoons. “Right. I have three older sisters, so my dad has a lifetime of it stored up. You know, football, baseball . . . Pretty much anything involving guns and balls — and don’t even think about cracking a joke right now.” He laughs and points a warning spoon at me. “Because believe me, I’ve made them all.”

  “Lips, sealed.” I mime, trying to keep a straight face. “But didn’t your sisters like sports? Us girls can like balls, too.” I stop, realizing what I just said. Josh cracks up. I blush. “Stop it! You know what I mean!”

  He coughs. “Too easy.”

  I roll my eyes. That’s the thing about talking with Josh; I never know when he’s going to take what I’ve said and twist it into something funny or gross.

  “No,” he explains, recovering. “He tried to get them into hunting and sports, but they were just into other stuff. Dance, swimming, books.”

  “Heaven forbid.” I press the back of my hand to my forehead. “Us girls, with our fancy book learning.”

  “Right, you’re a reader, too,” he says, as if it’s a bad thing. He snags one of the forbidden muffins, breaks it in two, and offers half to me. I pause only a second before taking it. “You know, it’s not good for you,” he says through a mouthful of muffin. “All that sitting around, reading. What are you going to do when the zombies come? You’ll be too out of shape to run.”

  “I thought zombies just kind of shuffled.”

  “The regular kind, sure.” He grins. “I’m talking about the genetically modified ones.”

  “Right, silly me.” I laugh. “Well, when they show up, I guess I’ll just throw my big, heavy books at them and hope for the best.”

  “Good luck with that.” He stuffs the rest of the muffin in his mouth and hops up on the back counter next to me.

  “So are you starting college in the fall?” I ask, curious.

  He shakes his head. “No, I’m done with school — the sitting in class, writing papers kind, anyway. It’s just not my thing.”

  “So what is?”

  Josh gives me a crooked kind of grin. “That, I haven’t figured out just yet. But I will. Believe me, my parents are making sure of that.”

  The door dings with our first customer of the day: a bleary-eyed man in a suit who trudges toward us in a familiar sleepy gait.

  “Hey, Mr. Hartley,” I call, hopping down from the counter. “The usual?”

  “Mmgmmhm,” he murmurs, yawning.

  “One triple espresso and a cheese danish, coming right up!” I set to work on the Beast, hitting the combination levers. It shudders and splutters in protest, but I don’t even pause. I just give its side a smack, and it quickly gurgles out the drink.

  “No Post-its,” Josh notes. He holds his hand up for a high five as he passes.

  I grin and slap his palm. “It knows who’s boss!”

  My mastery of the Beast comes just in time, as we’re soon deluged with a morning caffeine frenzy that doesn’t let up for hours. I find myself shifting into a Zen-like state of order/froth/pour, letting my mind wander to more important things — like Garrett. I’ve always had, ahem, an active imagination when it comes to the two of us, but now that he’s out of reach, my wistful daydreams have taken on a vivid new fervency. I’ve played out the scene at the party a hundred times: if that drunk guy hadn’t wrecked the mood, if Garrett had been able to say what was on his mind. Then there are the “rushing back home” scenarios, where — in the middle of a lecture — Garrett looks at the epic love poem and is struck with the realization it’s about us. He flees the classroom, hitchhikes back to Sherman, and bursts through the café doors to sweep me into a passionate embrace —

  “Hey.” An exhausted voice interrupts my daydream. I look up and see Kayla on the other side of the counter, clutching three of her camp kids.

  “Kaylieeee, I needa peepee!” one of the boys bleats.

  “I’m thirsty!” a girl with pigtails demands.

  “In a minute,” Kayla says. Her eyes meet mine. “The things we do for summer wages.”

  I’m already flushing with embarrassment. “Listen,” I start, shamefaced, “I want to apologize for the other day. . . .”

  But instead of seeming mad, Kayla just shakes her head. “No, it’s my fault! I was the one who loaded you down with all my stuff.”

  “But still . . . I feel bad about what happened. Did you get cleaned up OK?”

  “Sure.” Now it’s Kayla’s turn to look awkward. “I’m really sorry I bailed on you, but that wasn’t really the color to have splashed all over my jeans. . . .”

  “Oh, man,” I say as the implication of red Slushie stains down her pants becomes clear. “I didn’t even think of that.”

  “Me neither,” she says, “until a group of guys started pointing and laughing. I just had to get out of there.”

  A large man behind Kayla clears his throat loudly. “Right,” I say quickly. “What can I get you? On the house,” I add in a whisper.

  “Oh, awesome.” She grins. “Just give me something with ice and syrup.”

  “You sure?” Her bratlets are now terrorizing an unfortunate Seeing Eye dog in the corner. “They don’t look like they need any more sugar.”

  “Not them — me,” Kayla says. “I’ve got another two hours until their parents come!”

  “Sugar rush, coming right up,” I say, marking down an extra-large order.

  My Zen-like work state lasts through the end of the week — if you can call it Zen when I’m obsessively checking my phone every break for word from Garrett. His ambitious course load is taking its toll, and our morning chats have been getting briefer and briefer: barely time for a “How are you?” let alone time for a confession of love, before he’s off to breakfast, or class, or whatever else he’s doing out there in the woods. Without me.

  “Any hot weekend plans?” LuAnn asks as we sweep the floors on Friday night. The café is empty except for a lone woman in the corner determined to l
eech our wireless Internet until the lights go off and we forcibly throw her out.

  I shrug. “Nothing much. Just hanging out. I can cover a shift, if you need me to.”

  “No wild parties and illicit hookups?” She sighs wistfully. “Man, what I wouldn’t give to be seventeen again.”

  I want to laugh. Where do I start? With the fact that I have no access to those wild parties without Garrett or that the closest I’ve been to an illicit hookup is when Kenny Mendolson accidentally touched my chest while reaching for a pipette in chem lab last year?

  “Sure,” I murmur, remembering Kenny’s horror. The least he could have done is looked pleased. “It’s a blast.”

  “I remember when I was your age,” LuAnn begins, sounding as if she’s a jaded fifty-year-old rather than barely into her twenties. “I snuck out past curfew so many times my mom just gave up on me. I had a thing for guys on motorcycles,” she adds with a wink.

  “I know what you mean,” I agree. Well, a Vespa is almost a motorcycle.

  We finish clearing the debris of empty plates and coffee mugs, then take a break by the counter to share the last of the day’s pastries. LuAnn nibbles daintily on a scone.

  “So, are you in school?” I ask her, curious. Most of the staff here juggle their shifts around study of some kind, but I’ve never heard LuAnn talk about her life outside of Totally Wired.

  “Not right now.” LuAnn shrugs. A faint shadow flits across her face. “I tried fashion school,” she says after a moment’s pause.

  “That sounds great. What happened?”

  “It was great, until I dropped out.” She puts down the scone and begins twirling hair around her index finger. “After that, I went to college for a while. English. Then drama. I switched to art history, then dropped that as well. I’m great at starting things,” she tells me, her voice suddenly bright and metallic. “And excellent at dropping out. I do it all the time.” She’s wound her hair so tight that blood begins to pool in her fingertip.

  “So what brought you to Sherman?” I ask, changing the subject. LuAnn may seem offhand about it, but I can tell that she isn’t as blasé about her checkered history as she would like me to think. I circle around the counter and begin to wipe it down. LuAnn reaches for another pastry.

  “The usual.” She gives an expressive shrug. “Love. Hope. Delusions of happiness.”

  I keep cleaning, not wanting to push her anymore.

  “It was a guy,” she finally explains with a self-deprecating look. “He got into grad school around here, so I quit and followed him.”

  “Oh.” I pause. “Are you still . . . ?”

  “Together? Nope.” LuAnn still sounds flippant, but her eyes aren’t quite so light anymore. “He managed to last about a month before sleeping with his TA. His T and A, I like to call her.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Whatever. That’ll teach me not to build my life around a man whose favorite book is Atlas Shrugged. Listen, kid.” She waggles her finger, as if scolding me. “Nothing good comes from Ayn Rand. Trust me on this.”

  “Garrett loves that book,” I protest.

  She hoots with laughter. “I’ll bet he does.”

  By the time we finish cleanup, and finally get our Wi-Fi leech to leave, it’s dark and clouded over outside, another summer storm on the way. “You want a ride?” LuAnn offers, locking up behind us.

  “Are you sure it’s not out of your way?” I ask, pulling my sweater down over my hands against the chill.

  “It’s no problem.” LuAnn leads me toward an old red Civic, parked just down the street. “You’ll have to overlook the mess. And the smell.”

  But just as she pulls the door open for me, I feel a buzz in my pocket. I wait a second, sure it’s just another phantom ring, but no: there it is again.

  I check caller ID, my heart already racing.

  Garrett.

  “You know what? I can take the bus,” I tell LuAnn, already backing away.

  “Private caller, huh?” LuAnn winks. “I get it. Have a good weekend!”

  I hurry down the street, eagerly pressing the phone to my cheek. “Garrett? Hey!”

  And there he is, loud and clear and perfect down the line. “Sadie, what’s up? How’s life toiling down in the mines?”

  “Oh, you know.” I take a seat on a bench by the bus stop, his voice slipping over me like a relaxing balm. No more tired muscles or pain in my back from hoisting dirty plates all day; no, right now there’s nothing in the world but me and him. “Same old. How’s camp? Did you get that poetry paper back yet?”

  “No, the professor’s taking his time with it, but I have this short story I’m working on, for the end-of-summer magazine.” He pauses, and then there’s a cough. “So . . . there was actually something I want to talk about.”

  “Yes?” I take a breath, leaning forward in anticipation.

  It couldn’t be, could it?

  Garrett gives a nervous-sounding laugh, completely unlike him. “This is so weird, not being able to see your face,” he says. “I mean, there’s Skype, but it’s not the same, either.”

  It is! This is it, the moment I’ve been waiting for. Maybe those guys with The Secret are onto something after all. The hours — no, days — I spent imagining this moment weren’t in vain. Just the opposite! Picturing this moment sent something into the universe and made it happen. I manifested my romantic destiny!

  “Uh-huh,” I say, the evening chill and overcast street fading into nothing around me. Nothing exists except the sound of Garrett’s voice and my own quickly beating heart.

  “We’ve been friends forever, and I know I can talk to you about anything —”

  “Anything!” I interrupt quickly, then catch myself. What am I doing? Cutting him off before he has a chance to even say it! “Sorry, you go ahead.”

  “Uh, well . . . The thing is . . .”

  Garrett pauses again, and I can almost hear the drums rolling, the trumpets sounding. My life is about to change forever as I sit here on this nondescript bench across from the Laundromat. Everything is about to change!

  And finally, Garrett takes a breath and says them, the precious words I’ve been waiting so long to hear.

  “The thing is, I . . . I’m in love.”

  Adrenaline floods through my body, a sweet rush of joy. “I love you, too,” I breathe, dizzy, but Garrett doesn’t hear me. He’s still talking.

  “Her name’s Rhiannon,” he says. “Rhiannon,” he repeats reverently. “We met the first night, and I knew right away she was the one, but I thought she had a boyfriend, so I didn’t even hope. But —”

  “Wait,” I stop him. “Rhiannon?” I gasp for air. “I . . . You never said . . .”

  “She’s only the most incredible girl I’ve ever met,” he breathes. “And I know I’ve said this before, with Julie, and Beth, but she’s the one. They were just silly crushes. This is the real thing. I love her,” he says again, so sincerely that I know he really believes it.

  Garrett is in love. With somebody else.

  My heart breaks.

  “She’s here on a special scholarship,” Garrett babbles on, while I stay frozen in shock and horror. The adrenaline in my veins has turned to lead. “She’s already written her first novel, and she just signed with a literary agent. Isn’t that amazing?”

  I have no words.

  “You’d love her, too. You guys are so much alike. It’s why I noticed her to begin with,” Garrett continues, twisting the knife that’s embedded deep in my heart. “She’s got your crazy hair, and our same exact taste in music and movies. She even has that shirt of yours, the one with the maple tree on it? Only hers is in blue. It’s her favorite color.”

  I stifle a whimper.

  “I can’t even describe it, Sadie, what it’s like to connect with someone like this. And for us to wind up here, at camp together . . . It’s fate. It has to be. She’s my soul mate.”

  Garrett, who always laughed at the idea, so I made sure never to brea
the a word of my own faith in the Gods of Destiny, is telling me about fate? About soul mates?

  Tears sting the back of my throat. “I’m sorry — I have to go,” I say abruptly, trying to keep the anguish from my voice.

  “Oh, OK,” Garrett says, clearly thrown. “But you’ll call me back later, right? I want to tell you everything!”

  “Uh-huh.” I manage a strangled response before snapping my phone shut.

  Rhiannon.

  I slump on the bench in disbelief. I can’t even form a coherent thought. I just stare at my battered sneakers in a daze. Some part of me registers that it’s raining now, a cold drizzle falling on my thin sweater, but I don’t move. I can’t. Everything I have is focused on the news he just delivered with such obvious joy.

  Another girl. Garrett is in love with another girl. It doesn’t make sense. It can’t.

  I feel a sob rise in my chest, tears now hot on my cheeks. How could I have been so stupid? All this time, I’ve been certain he feels the same way about me. I was so sure that my feelings were requited that I’d convinced myself he was just getting up the courage to confess. But I was wrong. Garrett’s feelings for me are nothing but friendship — plain, simple, and overwhelmingly platonic. I built his love out of thin air, I realize in horror — crafted it from e-mails and late-night conversations as if my sheer will would make it so.

  It was all in my head. Again!

  But why? Why does this keep happening? What’s wrong with me? I don’t understand why Garrett doesn’t see what’s right in front of him, and this time, it’s even worse. I could always take comfort in the fact that maybe I just wasn’t his type — not one of those high-strung redheads, drama queens, or tiny blondes — but this? Rhiannon? He said it himself: she’s just like me.

  But she’s not. Because she actually gets to be with him, and I get to hear about how madly in love he is. Again.

  The rain keeps falling. A cold drizzle drips slowly from my hair and settles on my face. I want it to pour, to storm and rage and distract me from what I’m thinking, what I’m feeling, but instead, I just get this damp inconvenience, a halfhearted summer shower, as if even the weather is underestimating my feelings.