Chapter 9
On Monday, I got the college student who worked some hours for me to stay through lunch. I had a plan.
“So, you planning a nooner with that hot boyfriend of yours?” Suz was twenty with a penchant for roller-derby chic and an assumption that the whole planet was having more sex than she was.
“Not exactly.” I sidestepped around her to refill the cup dispenser. It always felt weird working the counter with someone else, even someone as nice as Suz. The space behind the cart was narrow and there wasn’t an easy way to avoid conversation.
“You’re so lucky.” She got that dreamy look that all younger girls get when they see a cute cat—or a sappy couple.
She also had a case of the 10:30 A.M. restlessness that came from having no customers and an empty atrium without people to watch. I usually cured the boredom by cleaning, but Suz got all chatty. “Mmm hmm.” I gazed longingly at the double doors, willing a flood of customers to arrive. “I guess.”
“You guess?” She grabbed my arm, spinning me around. “Wait. You guys aren’t fighting, are you?”
“We’re not fighting.” I tried to sound blasé, but a weary sigh escaped instead.
“Oh. My. God. You’re not breaking up with him, are you? That’s why you wanted me to cover lunch?”
“I asked you to cover because I could use the help.” My stomach flipped as I scanned the atrium. Thank God a whole two customers arrived right then, putting Suz’s inquisition on hold. Two mochas to go and a reprieve for me.
“Yeah. Right. We’ve had maybe a half-dozen customers since the morning rush,” Suz hissed at me as she added dark chocolate syrup to a cup. Raising her voice, she flashed a pinup grin at the Armani-suit-wearing guy who was all expense account swagger. “Whip?”
“I’ve got my own.”
And they were off on a flirty little exchange that netted Suz a five-dollar tip on a four-dollar drink and let me focus on the middle-aged dude who’d accompanied the vice president of swagger. The tip jar got zero moola for my efforts, but I was simply happy with the silence.
“All right. Dish.” Suz didn’t even wait until the dudes were out of earshot before rounding on me. “Why are you unhappy with David? I mean, have you seen how he looks at you? It’s the cutest thing ever. I can’t fucking wait to have someone look at me like that.”
“How he looks at me?”
“Like you’re holding tickets to Cancún and you just cured cancer. Every. Single. Time. He’d do anything for you.”
“Not quite.” I couldn’t keep my mouth shut.
“Wait. Is he terrible in bed? Because those studly nerdy types can go either way; either they’re freakishly good or flat-out terrible.”
“So not discussing that with you.”
“Freakishly good it is.” She gave me a grin that was all teeth. “If he were bad, you’d be happy to complain.”
“He’s a great guy, okay? Fabulous. Perfect. We’re just . . . having some issues.”
“Come on.” Suz hopped on the counter, her feet dangling, as she gave me a sad puppy face. “Don’t make me keep guessing. Knowing you, I bet you haven’t told anyone anything about your issues. You need to clear your energy before you go all Dear John on the poor guy.”
“You know, you don’t have the psych degree yet. I’m not sure you’re qualified to analyze me.” I tried to keep it light, even though she was right. I’d lived with Seth and Mark for three years, but they knew more about my coffee business than about David. Sarah and I shared a love of deep-fried tofu, but deep conversation wasn’t really our thing. Talking wasn’t really my thing with anyone; I’d never really opened up with anyone about what went down with Brian either.
“It doesn’t take a degree to see you’re on the verge of making a shitty mistake.”
“It’s not a mistake.” I’d been over and over this in my head all weekend. I had to tell David what I really wanted. Had to stand up for myself. But I was almost positive it was going to end badly.
Frustration bubbled up in me, made worse by Suz’s concerned eyes. “I’m pretty sure he’s still in love with his dead boyfriend and I’m . . . in love with him and I have no clue what he wants and I can’t get in any deeper with him because it hurts too freaking much already.”
“Oh, sweetie.” She got down off the counter to hug me, which did nothing to counter the broken-glass feeling inside me. “Is it really that bad?”
Then it was like the ancient Hawthorne Bridge creaking open inside my soul and the whole story came lurching out—Craig, wanting to move in together, more Craig, his family stuff, and even more Craig. It was hard to articulate that my biggest worry wasn’t that he’d say no but rather that he’d say yes and then things would get all weird between us because he didn’t really want it.
“Give him a chance. You’re just assuming David’s still hung up on the dead guy. I’ve seen how he looks at you. You need to at least ask him what he wants instead of deciding for him.”
“I will.” Every time I pictured telling David what was in my heart, icy sweat gathered at the base of my spine. I didn’t see this ending any other way than with us breaking up. But maybe Suz was right. Maybe I needed to have more faith.
Articulating wants usually led to disappointment—moves happened anyway, deployments dragged on, grad school requirements changed regardless, boyfriends kept right on lying to their families. My preferences seemed irrelevant and speaking up led to awkward conversations and magnified the hurt. Keeping pain private kept the wounds smaller, helped me buck up and move on. And maybe that was part of it; it seemed inevitable that David would hurt me too. Why speak up and make it hurt that much worse?
But at some point in the last few days, I’d decided that I couldn’t let my aversion to conflict and inability to talk sink the best thing that had ever happened to me. I had to give it a shot. And maybe Suz was right; maybe everything would work out fine.
An hour later, I made a large vanilla latte and headed out into the frigid morning. It seemed important somehow to step out from behind the counter, meet him on his walk over. Downtown Portland was gray and dingy, the sun having fled months earlier. February always seemed far longer than twenty-eight days as the rainy season turned frigid, with a breeze that stung my cheeks and made me wish I’d grabbed my hat.
I met up with David on Ninth. And I watched as he caught sight of me. Suz was right—his whole face shifted, all the tension he usually carried replaced with light, little smile lines lifting up the corners of his mouth and eyes. Somehow, some way, I was going to have to find the right words.
“Hey! This is a surprise!”
“Suz stayed later this morning.” I held out his drink. “Thought I’d meet you partway.”
“I don’t mind coming to you. But thanks.” His words felt like punches, hitting me in the stomach, reminding me of how kind and sweet he was.
“You want to walk?” He studied my face, clearly confused about why I was there, but the softness in his eyes said he was willing to go where I wanted.
My KEENs felt dipped in concrete, every step heavy as I followed him around the block. We ended up at a little plaza tucked between two office buildings. Come April it would be buzzing with people, lunchtime picnickers in business suits jockeying for space with street musicians and black-clad teenagers, but right now we had our pick of benches. I headed for one tucked under the building’s overhang, slightly shielded from the wind.
“Want to sit?”
“Are you okay?” he said as he settled in next to me, leaving a space between us that made my bones hunger for his warmth and nearness.
“I . . . yeah. I’m fine. But we need to talk.”
David fiddled with his coffee cup, his eyes on the cobblestone patio. “Are you breaking up with me?”
Damn. Of course he chose right then to get perceptive.
“No,” I said, but uncertainty crept into my voice. “I don’t want to break up. I want a real relationship.”
“A real one?” He frowned and his question was edged with what sounded like anger. “This isn’t real? I mean, I know this is all new to me, but I’ve had not real. And this feels pretty darn real to me.”
“It does to me too. It’s only . . . I want more than just dating.” There; I’d said it. My heart pounded like I’d run to the riverfront and back. “I want a partnership. I want to deal with your crazy family. I want to hear about when Craig’s family acts like dicks. I want . . . I want to look for an apartment. Together.”
Despite the freezing temperatures, sweat slid down my neck and my hands turned clammy.
“You want to move in together?” He chewed on his lip and I hated that I couldn’t tell whether he was surprised or repulsed or maybe a little of both.
“Yeah.”
He didn’t say anything for a long minute. “And you want me to tell my family about us?”
“You haven’t?” My worst fear confirmed. No matter what he said, this wasn’t real to him.
“It’s irrelevant.” He tried to squeeze my hand, but I pulled it away.
“I’m not irrelevant.” I stood up.
“I didn’t mean . . . look. Robby. This is . . . sudden.”
I could see the lie in his eyes. “You guessed, didn’t you? Last week. You knew I was thinking about living together.”
“Maybe.” His answer was all breath and zero volume, but it hit me like a right hook to the jaw. Any hope I’d had that this was all just miscommunication withered away. Deep inside, I’d believed Suz. Believed that all I needed to do was speak up—
“But I . . . I can’t, Robby. It’s too soon.”
“I can’t keep wrestling a dead guy for you, David. I won’t.”
“I . . .” His face squished up like he might cry. And God help me, I was on the verge of tears myself, my eyes hot and itchy.
“I love you. And I want a future with you.”
“I need time.” It was the worst thing he could have said. Not yes, I love you too. And not putting me out of my misery with a firm no either. He needed time and patience and probably a better guy than me because I had run out of both.
“I need you. I need you in this thing with me. One hundred percent.” My voice broke. My cheeks stung as the wind slapped against my tears. I couldn’t stand for him to see my tears, so I fled. He let me go, still sitting there with his coffee.
This was why I’d wanted to keep silent. Because before I’d had faith, even if it was foolish and unwarranted, and now I had nothing. I had taken Suz’s advice. Told him exactly what was in my heart. Given him a chance, and he’d given me . . . nothing except more waiting.
Somehow I made it back to my cart, kept it together long enough to tell Suz she was covering the afternoon too. And then I did what I hadn’t done since I’d bought my cart two years ago. I took a sick day. Went back to my house, threw myself on my bed fully clothed, and pulled the covers up over my head.