by Erynn Mangum
He gives me a resigned look and then nods. “I’ll get the strawberry one.”
The waiter comes over. “You guys all set?”
I point to myself. “Sweet tea, the appetizer chopped salad, and the chocolate mousse cheesecake. Thank you.”
“And I’d like sweet tea as well.” Luke nods, telling the waiter the rest of his order.
The waiter scribbles furiously and then smiles a fake smile at us. “Sounds good. I’ll have those right out.”
Now comes the awkward part. I look around us. The couple seated right beside us is also waiting for their food, lacing their fingers together across the table and sighing into each other’s eyes.
I look back at Luke. He is smiling at me. I bite the inside of my cheek again and cross my arms over my chest. The way this night is going, my cheek innards are going to have permanent nerve damage.
Happy birthday to me.
“It’s good to see you, kid,” he says in a low voice, and I flinch at the use of his old nickname for me. He smiles in a sad way and weaves his fingers together on the table. “It’s been a long time.”
I meet his eyes for a brief second, and then he looks down at his hands. My mom always used to sing that “If you can’t say something nice” song to me when I was little so I keep my mouth shut.
I look away and then back over at him after a few minutes. He is staring off at something behind my right shoulder, looking so sad I feel the tiniest twinge of guilt.
I blink, willing the feeling away, but it persists, burrowing into my gut.
Seriously, Lord? Do You remember what he said to me?
Somehow I doubt that really matters to God at the moment. I make sure I give heaven a nice eye roll and then clear my throat. “How is work.” It is a question. It just doesn’t come out sounding like one.
Luke’s head pops over to me so fast, I think his ceramic tooth, which he had to have put in after an unfortunate game of freeze tag in the youth group junior year of high school, might come dislodged. “Work?” He’s back to grinning at me. “Work is great. I really love it there, Paige. I get up every day excited to go to work.”
That makes one of us.
“I’m just so blessed.”
Blessed. The word catches me off guard coming from Luke Prestwick’s mouth. I narrow my eyes at him, wondering if it is just for my benefit that he said it.
He is off on a work-oriented train though and doesn’t show any signs of coming back anytime soon. Which is nice because I am too busy fighting the Holy Spirit to pay very close attention to what I am hearing. Plus, the waiter comes by and brings our food, so I try my best to eat as fast as I can while arguing in my head.
I do not want to be polite.
“So I actually just got promoted about a year ago to be the executive — ”
Let all bitterness be put away from you.
“And then I’ve been doing all this training and learning all these amazing new techniques — ”
I wasn’t bitter until he came back here. Just please help time go by in double speed so I can leave. He left everything almost five years ago, God, including You. Doesn’t that give me a little bit of a license to be angry?
“There are so many cutting-edge technologies available to us right now — ”
Restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness and watch yourself that you will not be tempted.
I’m not tempted, Lord. I’m mad.
“Which is why I’m moving here.”
I blink at him, not sure if I actually heard what I thought he just said. “Excuse me?” I say, mouth full.
He smiles. “I’m moving here. For good. Permanently. My work is opening a Dallas office and they want me to be the lead on it.” His smile grows even wider. “Isn’t that great, Paige?”
I open my mouth, but no words are there to respond with.
“And I overheard that it is someone’s birthday.” Our waiter is suddenly right beside us setting our cheesecakes in front of us. Mine has a little red candle sticking out of it, and the waiter clicks a lighter, and without warning, twelve other waiters and waitresses appear and all start singing.
“Happy birthday to you …”
I stare at Luke, at the candle, at the cake, and then at the waitstaff. They finish the song, I blow out the candle, then they clap and leave.
Happy birthday to me.
Chapter
3
My mother, with all her quite loud distaste for organized sports, still somehow managed to end up with my dad, who usually has the TV tuned to ESPN before dinner leftovers have even started the cooling process in the fridge. I remember them arguing about it often during the early years of my childhood, but eventually Mom just gave up. Now she’ll sit beside him on the couch with her book and hot tea, and Dad will watch the games with his bottomless glasses of sweet iced tea.
I guess in an effort to sway his oldest daughter to his side, Dad bought me the Casey at the Bat book when I turned two. And for the next six years, it was my absolute favorite book, even though the love of baseball didn’t stick like Dad had hoped.
But every so often, if I am feeling lonely or homesick for Mom and Dad, I’ll turn on the TV to whatever baseball or football game is on and just snuggle up on the couch, listening to the sounds of home.
I didn’t say another word to Luke other than “Thank you for dinner” and “Good-bye” when we got back to my apartment. Then I turned and ran up the steps before he could offer some reason why I should let him inside to keep me company since it was only seven o’clock on a Friday night.
I locked the door behind me, immediately changed into my black yoga pants and an old soft T-shirt my parents got for me on one of their anniversary trips that said Loo-WOW Luau. Hawaii 1996, and flounced onto the couch, reaching for the remote.
Last night was a baseball night.
And thankfully, it was right at the start of the season.
“There was no joy in Mudville,” I muttered to myself, quoting Casey.
I pour my cereal into a bowl, still wearing my pajamas. I stayed up until almost midnight last night watching ESPN and wishing I was at home on my parents’ couch, listening to Dad talk about the glory days of baseball and how everything is motivated by money now. Mom called and sang a tearful happy birthday and told me she hated that she couldn’t be with me. I read Galatians and don’t remember a word of it.
Moving here. Luke is moving here.
Permanently, he said.
There are things in my life that I would like to be permanent. Nail polish that permanently stayed on my toenails. Hair that permanently stayed away from my legs. Sweet tea that was permanently in my fridge.
Luke is not one of those things I want permanently in my life. Or even in my city.
I crunch a spoonful of Raisin Bran. I should not take my rage out on my temporomandibular joint.
The doorbell rings and I stop, midcrunch, and just sit there like if I didn’t move, whoever is outside will go away. I am wearing a pair of pink plaid pajama shorts, a gray T-shirt, and my hair is in a low sloppy bun. I have mascara smudged all over my face.
Whoever is outside my door does not want to see this.
I creep over to the door all stealth-mode-like and peer through the peephole, half hoping it is a big box from UPS that contains all sorts of birthday gladness, even though my parents’ check arrived two days ago and is already finding a happy new home in my savings account and I can’t think of anyone else who would send me a birthday gift.
It is a girl about my age. She is wearing sunglasses and standing about three feet away from the door. Her hair is almost halfway down her back in dark brown curls, and she is wearing white shorts and a black fitted shirt, from what I can tell. Peepholes don’t always tell the whole truth.
I don’t recognize her, which means she likely has the wrong apartment.
I flip my pajama shirttail inside out, swipe it under my eyes to gather up most of the mascara, and open the door. “Hi, sorry, I think
you might have the wrong apartment. Jeremy lives in 27C. This is 27B.”
“Paige?”
Every single fiber of my being freezes.
I stare at the girl as she pulls her sunglasses off her face and am shocked into complete silence.
It is Preslee.
She is old. That is the first thought that hits me. Four years ago, the last time I saw her, she was a kid. Now Preslee is a woman.
I don’t know what to do. Or say. So I just stand there in my pajamas, gaping at her.
“Can I come in?” Preslee points to my apartment.
I nod mutely at her, feeling mechanical as I step back into my living room to open the door wider to let her in.
She walks into my apartment, looking around. I follow her gaze. The couches that used to be Mom and Dad’s. The picture on my wall of our parents and me last year at Christmas, the fourth Christmas in a row that we didn’t even get a phone call from Preslee.
I finally look back at her. She is thin. Much thinner than she was when she lived at home. Her hair is a lot longer, too. I knew she’d gotten a tattoo on her shoulder blade when she first was threatening to move out, but there is a small brown bird traced onto her ankle now as well.
Finally we just look at each other.
My stomach feels like I’ve just finished competing in a hot dog–eating contest. The nerves in the backs of my eyeballs tingle. I keep waiting for her to talk, hoping she will say something and then praying she won’t say a word and she’ll just leave again, sort of like she did four years ago.
She just looks at me. Half smiling. Half pained.
“Here.” She shoves a gift bag I didn’t even notice at me. “Happy belated birthday.”
Somehow, I speak. “Thank you.”
She smiles another sad smile at me and then nods. “Okay. I just wanted to give you your birthday gift. Bye, Paige.”
She opens the door and leaves. I watch Preslee walk down the steps and out of sight wordlessly.
Part of me is relieved. Part of me wants her to come back. Most of me is just still in shock.
I look down at the cream-colored gift bag with the brown tissue paper in it. Boring colors. My favorites. I feel a little twinge in my stomach that she remembered.
I sit on the couch and carefully pull out the tissue-wrapped blob. It is a tiny brown jewelry box and I open it, biting the inside of my cheek.
A very delicate silver chain holds a tiny charm that says Sister. An even tinier little ring holds my birthstone next to it.
A note card falls out of the tissue paper and I just stare at it.
Then I start getting angry.
Preslee left us. There was none of this “let’s kick her out of the house and see if that turns her around” business at my house. She willingly and unflinchingly walked out my parents’ front door, not even sparing a glance backward. And before she left, she did everything in her power to make my parents’ lives a living hell.
The unicorn on her shoulder blade was the beginning.
I missed a lot of the worst of it. I was already here in Dallas going to school. I’d seen the warning signs that it was coming, though. Preslee had never been one to stick to the rules. While I was home five minutes before curfew the few nights I was out, Preslee never got home on time. I got straight As; Preslee flunked out of a few classes and not for lack of intelligence. I worked the newsletter and yearbook staffs; Preslee started a punk rock band and became a drummer.
We lived down the hallway from each other but we were worlds apart.
Then she was gone. Left, claiming she was going to tour the country with her band and she’d just live with her boyfriend in their tour bus.
“Spike.” Or whatever fake name he had.
I happened to be home visiting the Friday night she walked out, and I can remember the roller coaster of emotions I felt. Sadness because she was my baby sister. Relief because she wouldn’t be there making my parents crazy anymore. And mostly anger because of what she did to my mom and dad.
I look down at the note card, stand up, and walk into my bedroom without reading it. It is time for a shower. A shower and a fun day.
The last eighteen hours have not been great ones.
I get out of the shower twenty minutes later, dry off, pull on a pair of jeans and a gray fitted T-shirt. It isn’t raining today, but it is about 90 percent humidity. That means I am not about to spend thirty minutes styling my hair only to have it fall completely flat by the time I get to the bottom of my front steps.
I brush on some eye shadow and mascara and scrunch my wet hair into semiwaves. I have always had issues with the color of my hair, as in, my hair can’t pick what color it wants to be. It’s red, brown, and blonde. I always have a hard time at the DMV when I’m renewing my driver’s license, but I’ve come to grips with it. I am usually fairly content with my hair, but on days of extreme humidity, I really wish for curls like Layla’s.
My phone is buzzing in the living room when I come back out. I purposefully ignore the half-opened gift on the couch and answer the phone.
“Hey, Paige.”
I smile. “Hey, Tyler.”
“So. I just happen to be about ten minutes away from a beautiful girl’s apartment, and I was just calling to see if she might be up for a late breakfast with me.”
I grin, feeling a blush on my cheeks even though he isn’t even here. Tyler is good with the compliments. “Well, if you’re referring to me, I already ate.”
“What?”
I speak louder. “I said, if you’re referring to me — ”
“No, I heard you. What did you eat for breakfast?”
“Oh. Sorry I yelled. Raisin Bran.”
“Gross.”
“Hey,” I say. “I don’t call your food choices gross.”
“Yes you do.”
I think about that one. Well, okay, he is right. “Never mind. Anyway, I’m free for lunch though.”
“Why aren’t you going to eat lunch?”
I pull the phone away from my head to look at the signal bars on the screen. Full signal. I crank the volume in my voice again. “I said, I’m free for lunch,” I say, annunciating everything clearly.
“I heard you, Paige. Can you not hear me? Hello? Calling Paige Alder.”
“Tyler.”
“Look, all I know is that I took an economics class as a ninth grader, and I definitely was taught that there was no such thing as a free lunch. So if you are planning on being free at lunch, I’m just assuming you’re not eating. How much Raisin Bran did you have this morning? Because I can only stomach so much before it starts getting soggy, and there really is nothing nastier than soggy bran flakes all clumping together.”
I close my eyes. “It is too early to talk to you.”
“Which is why we should eat instead of talk. Come on, Paige. I didn’t even get the chance to give you your birthday gift yesterday.”
I smile. “I’d like that.”
“All right. Ten minutes. See you soon.”
The phone clicks in my ear. I go to find a pair of shoes and decide on flip-flops that do not look very good with what I have on but look supercute with a red skirt and white T-shirt. So it is time to change then.
I stare at the jeans and gray shirt after I take them off. This is always a dilemma for me. I have technically worn them. Does that make them clean or dirty? My mother’s philosophy is that if it has come off the hanger, it’s dirty and should be washed before being hung back up. I think that has something to do with my dad. When Mom met Dad, he was cutting all the tags off his shirts and wearing the front side one day, then flipping them inside out and wearing the other side the next day.
I think he called it “two-timing” his shirts.
I don’t think Mom ever recovered from knowing that about my dad.
I end up just leaving the jeans and shirt on the bed, and I’ll decide what to do with them whenever I get back. I stick my phone in my purse and am just sliding on a pair of silver dangle earri
ngs when Tyler knocks on the door.
He is standing there grinning at me behind a huge bouquet of yellow roses. “Happy birthday!”
I take the bouquet, trying not to blush again. “Thanks, Tyler.” The flowers are already in a vase, which is a relief.
I’m the worst floral arranger in the history of bouquets. Somehow I always get half of the flowers cut three inches shorter than the others.
I smile at Tyler. Tyler is a software engineer, but you’d never be able to tell it by the way he looks. Most of the time he wears jeans, flannel shirts, and work boots. Right now, he’s wearing cargo shorts, a T-shirt, and flip-flops. I am fairly certain this is the first time I’ve ever seen his feet.
It can be a scarring thing to behold a man’s feet.
Tyler’s aren’t the worst I’ve ever seen. They aren’t the best either, but considering the fact Tyler thinks jeans without holes are “nice” clothes, I am not too shocked.
His blond hair is all curly, like he forgot to run a comb through it after his shower. I smile wider. I like it like this.
“Ready for second breakfast?” he asks me as I set the vase on the kitchen table.
“Depends. Are you ready for first breakfast?”
“I’m starving.”
“I bet. It’s almost eleven.” I pick up my purse and follow him out the door, then lock it behind me. When we get to the base of my stairs, he smiles warmly at me and gives me a side hug.
“I’m sorry I had to work so late yesterday. Where should we go to eat?”
I shrug. “I’m good with whatever.”
“Oh great. You’re that person. I might have to rethink this.”
“What person?”
“The ‘no, really, whatever you want to do is exactly what I want to do’ person. I’m sorry, Paige, but if this is going to work, I’m going to need you making approximately 50 percent of the decisions.”
I grin at him and follow him to his blue truck. “Yeah, but you haven’t made any decisions yet either.”
“I did too. I decided we should go out to eat.”
“I am fairly certain that does not count.”
He holds the passenger door open. “Well, one of us has to decide.”
