BECKETT INSISTS AN afternoon in Dolores Park will help me unwind, as he nicely put it at the warehouse, where I walked in anxious circles around him. Perched between the stately Spanish buildings of the Mission and the rainbow-splashed Castro, Dolores Park is one of my favorite places in the city.
Emerald-green grass slopes upward with strips of sidewalk breaking the lawn in a U-shape. Cement stairways lead to higher grounds, and tennis courts showcase barefooted and shirtless men lobbing a ball back and forth. For late April, it’s sunnier than normal, which all of San Francisco seems to be taking advantage of.
The park is packed, and we find a spot on the outskirts of Hipster Hill. Beckett spreads out a blanket on the stubbly grass, and we sit. I tuck my legs to my chest and rest my chin on my kneecaps. Here, in the park, I’m infinitely calmer than I was at Bigmouth’s. For a few hours, I don’t want to think about Yoga Leigh, my dad, and his pathetic attempts to protect me.
I close my eyes for a moment and feel the breeze whistling through the air.
A Frisbee soars across the sky. On the other end of the park, kites fly. Sounds wholesome until you look closer and see two naked men constructing a Slip’n Slide down one hill. We even have a nudist that comes to the bowling alley. Dad lets him bowl as long as he’s wearing his city-issued sock (yeah, disgusting), but here in Dolores Park, people bare all.
“You want your sewing?” Beckett asks, holding out the tote bag with my sewing kit.
“No thanks.” I shift until my cheek rests against my knees comfortably. “You were right the other night, when you mentioned sewing being my passion.”
“Yeah?” Beckett stretches his forearms back.
“I was supposed to go on a tour at FIDM, but I chickened out.” I sigh heavily.
“What about Bigmouth’s? You sure you don’t want to enter the family business?”
“The bowling business is dying. At least the way my dad runs it. We don’t have a liquor license. People bowl to get drunk and have fun, not hang out in a stale warehouse with a broken cigarette machine.”
“Don’t be so certain. Trends are cyclical. Maybe good old-fashioned bowling will make a comeback.”
“Stranger things have happened.”
Beckett pulls a water bottle out from his backpack and takes a swig. “Like us hanging out again?” he asks, offering me the bottle.
“Exactly like us hanging out together.” I grab the water bottle and take a sip before realizing I’m sharing germs with Beckett. “I guess it’s weird. How things turned out. A week ago, I couldn’t stand to look at you, let alone talk and hang out with you.”
“Past tense,” Beckett observes with a smug grin. He ditched his work uniform in the car and wears a plain blue shirt with fraying seams. It’s frustrating how his T-shirt brings hidden elements of blue in his gray eyes to light.
“It’s not funny! Last year… sucked.”
“Hey, it sucked for me, too! I’m glad we’ve made it here, though.” Beckett shifts on the blanket, and his shoulder brushes against mine. Maybe it’s static electricity from our clothes, but something sparks and I feel the charge throughout my body.
Here. He means back to each other. I hang my head back, reveling at the weirdness of Beckett and me hanging out in our free time. Without the pretense of bowling, making money, or saving Bigmouth’s. We’re us again, two friends sharing a blanket and sitting beneath the San Franciscan sky. After my sleepless night yesterday, I’m more certain than ever that I want Beckett back, even if this ends, even if it all falls apart, even if I move to Arizona.
That want? It scares the shit out of me.
“You could’ve fooled me.” I relax ever so slightly until my side presses solidly against his. “From my point of view, you moved on, made friends—”
“Not friend friends,” he says. “Superficial friends. I wanted to seem like I was okay with losing you.” He drops his voice to add, “I wasn’t okay.”
“And now?” I ask. “Are you okay?”
Beckett grins, squinting as the sun hits his eyes. “I’m sitting here with you, aren’t I?”
“You are so cheesy,” I deflect, unable to tame the happy flush his words ignited.
“Psh,” he scoffs. “Like you don’t love it.”
I shift in the grass so I can face him. Because while I might enjoy the thrill of him saying those words, I have to remember that Beckett’s like this with literally everyone. Friends. Strangers on the street. Checkout cashiers at the grocery store. An accidental flirt to the very end. “I don’t,” I say resolutely, lifting my chin.
“Mmm, see, this is where we disagree.” Beckett’s smile stretches even wider, and he casually rests his hand on my knee. “I think you’re forgetting that I know an awful lot about you.”
I stare at his hand, brows pinched. Then he tickles me.
Caught between surprise and laughter, I fall backward into the grass. “You asshole! I told you that in confidence.”
I’m not ticklish like a normal person. My ribs or the bottom of my feet do nothing. But my knees are hypersensitive, something I made the mistake of telling Beckett years ago. So I take aim at his sides, tickling him back in revenge. It takes only a second of retaliation for him to abandon my knees, scooting a safe distance away from me.
“Truce?” he asks, his chest heaving from laughter and his curls mussed.
“Uh-huh.” I push upright, picking grass from my hair. “Not funny! I’m never telling you anything ever again,” I tease, leaning over and trying to smack his arm, but he catches my hand and curls my palm to his chest.
For a second I think it’s a mistake. A midair collision of our two hands. That he’ll let go. Instead, he presses my hand to his sternum. To the space above his heart. Warmth radiates between us, my fingers limp.
“You wanna know something?” he asks, his gaze tracking up from our hands and settling on my face.
“Sure.” My voice is faint. The busyness of Dolores, and all I see is Beckett. All I smell is the warmth of his body and the cinnamon on his breath. All I feel is his hand pressing mine to his heart.
“You haven’t laughed, not once, the past few days. I’ve missed that sound.” His shirt is oh so soft, and there’s the thud thud thud of his heart. Or is that my heart? “I just… wanted to hear you laugh.”
Beckett loosens his grip on my wrist and laces his fingers through mine. Friends don’t hold hands, right? We certainly didn’t hold hands before. “After I tried apologizing, your dad told me to give you space until you came around. But I’m afraid I gave you too much space, and I lost you.”
I look anywhere but at him. At the blanket, a My Little Pony beach towel I sincerely hope belongs to Willa. At the guy wandering between picnic blankets with a backpack selling edibles. Anywhere, everywhere, other than our intertwined hands.
Goose bumps ridge my skin, and I inhale sharply. “You didn’t lose me, Beck. I’m right here.”
The strange thing is, no part of me—not even my overactive and judgmental brain—wants to pull apart. My hand stays still. Locked with Beckett’s. Twice the size of mine and pleasantly warm, especially now that the breeze is picking up, a whistling chill.
How did we get here? We’re holding hands. The sensation of his skin against mine reminds me of our girlfriend-boyfriend hustling act. Reminds me of how Beckett’s hands have affected me in ways I’m not proud of. How they lingered warm against the curve of my hips, the low indent of my back. Flexing in anger when I piss him off. Gripping me and spinning me off my feet in the bowling alley.
We’re friends—faux dating on hustling nights—but today’s a regular Tuesday. We’re in public, sitting atop the grassy knoll of Dolores Park holding hands like it’s the most natural thing in the world. I’m nervous, so nervous, but in an excited, hopeful way. The constant yarn ball of panic that’s lived in my chest the last five days is unwinding.
My gaze flickers toward his mouth, and no matter how much I try backtracking, it’s too late. My mind has already gone there, a place where I spent most of sophomore year. What would it be like to press my lips against Beckett’s? It would be so easy to lean over and kiss him.
Shit. I can’t be thinking this. Beckett and I are finally friends again—complicated, potentially non-platonic friends, but we can’t be doing this. Maybe not ever, but especially not right now. We’re partners in crime. If hustling is a business, that makes us partners.
And thou shalt not kiss thy hustling partner.