Chapter 28

ROONEY

Rows of long red and silver tinsel are strung across the room, dangling over the bar and tables at Hugh’s, the local bar and grill where Jack will be playing his first show with Toby and Mac. The band’s equipment is set up on a stage across the room. On the left is an upright piano for Toby, in the middle a violin for Mac, and to the far right is Jack’s bass.

“So this is Christmas in Los Angeles,” I mumble, giving the room one more look-over. A cardboard fireplace is positioned under the bar counter, complete with ribboned garland and stockings. Ornaments are individually strung from the ceiling like decorative raindrops.

I stir the peppermint stick into my hot chocolate, a light dusting of the crushed red-and-white candy lining the rim. The air smells of cinnamon but this time there’s a hint of evergreen from the Christmas tree in the corner.

“It’s fake,” Jack says, catching me admiring it. “Hugh lights evergreen candles to make the tree feel real.” Jack is sitting across from me at a table for eight, waiting for the rest of the team to join us for the show. We’re both early again.

I can hardly take him seriously in his white bunny suit with the hood pulled over his head, blue latex gloves with the fingertips cut off, and booties covering his shoes. It’s the uniform of the Red String Theorists, and Jack, after all, is a team player.

“Speaking of fake. This interaction,” I say. “You’ve been avoiding me. Why?”

Jack looks at me, his eyebrows pinched. “I don’t want to be,” he says finally.

I lean back against the chair and cross my arms. I came here tonight to tell Jack how I feel about him—that all the signs add up—but I don’t want to do it before understanding why he’s been distant. “We have so much to catch up on. I’ve been wanting to celebrate the MoMA news with you.”

He offers a small smile. “It’s wonderful, Rooney. You’ll do it in the new year?”

“After the first showcase here, so I’ll go back in February. I’ll get paid half up front when I sign the contract, but between that and selling all of my string art pieces and having a waitlist, I should have enough for Baby Being Born,” I explain.

“That’s incredible,” he says, his encouraging tone not matching his expression. “Honestly, I’m so happy for you. You’re going to win it. I’m glad it all worked out as you wanted it to. You took a big risk.”

The peppermint stick is thinner now, half of it dissolving into the chocolate liquid. Kenneth and the team were not thrilled, but there’s been a huge spike in public interest, and contractually, I don’t represent NASA. For this entire artist-in-residence, I am able to work on outside projects, some riskier than others.

Hugh, the owner of the bar, brings over two Holidae Sundaes to our table. Under the cloud of whipped cream are two scoops of ice cream, one peppermint and another I can’t quite place. Eggnog, maybe? Hot fudge drips down the scoops onto sliced bananas and gingerbread crumble.

“I think you’ll appreciate those flavors,” I say as the bite melts against my tongue. “I don’t know what it is about this coast, but I eat way more ice cream here.”

Jack takes a bite, taking some fudge with it. “California is actually considering making it its official state food.”

“Then it’s settled. I’m moving here,” I joke, scooping up another bite.

It feels like the first time I met Jack in New York when I tried to get him to crack a single smile. He finally lets one through. This is the version of Jack I can’t get enough of. He’s a star that’s light-years away, his light now finally reaching me. In the silence, I study Jack’s face, the multicolored string lights casting a rainbow over it.

His grin emboldens me to tell him how I feel and that I want us to be together. I take a deep breath in to steady myself. As I do, Jack’s eyes drop to his bowl, and I can tell he’s wrestling with a thought by the way his eyebrows twitch.

“What is it?” I ask instead, breaking the quiet lull. I poke the whipped cream waiting for his answer.

Jack lets his spoon hover mid-lift. “I think we need to create some distance between us,” he finally says after what feels like an eternity. He looks at me with sad, apologetic eyes.

I open my mouth and then close it. Distance?

“You don’t want to spend time with me anymore?” I ask.

Jack shakes his head. “That’s the problem. I want to spend every second with you. But if we want to achieve our goals, I think we see each other only when we need to and in group settings. Red String Theory is complete now. You’ve been reinspired.”

My chest deflates, as though all of the air is being sucked from my lungs. “Where is this coming from?” I ask meekly.

In this moment, Toby and Mac arrive and go to the stage. They’re about to start warming up. Jack notices that he’s needed.

“Can we talk about this after the show? Sundaes are on me,” he says, pulling out his wallet.

“Wait, we need to finish this conversation,” I say.

He lifts a twenty-dollar bill from his wallet. The top of something familiar sticks out, thick and crinkled. I make out the word “lophole.”

“What’s that?” I ask, pointing at the paper.

Jack removes it and slowly turns it over.

In curvy red words is my handwriting—“This is how it works.” These are the words I wrote that day Entangled closed.

Why would Jack have it?

Unless…

My breath catches in my chest. I blink slowly and try to keep my face neutral. My heartbeat quickens, like its running on a treadmill set to a speed I’ll never be able to keep up with.

Jack grabbed my note from my installation.

Blood drains from his face when he grasps what I’ve realized. “Is this… yours?” he asks on an exhale.

“You’re my stringmate.” The words come out on their own, taking shape without me being able to swallow them down. I’ve never said these words out loud before to anyone. I’m frozen in place, my outburst, my feelings, all of it echoing in the chambers of my mind. I can actually feel time slow down as I sit here and wait for Jack to do something with those three words. They hang there as thick as the hot fudge dripping onto the table.

Across the room, someone brushes against the tinsel lining the bar. I swear I can hear the planets spinning from here.

“You literally just discovered that I pulled your note, and now you think I’m your stringmate? Because of this?” He waves the Fate Note in the air.

“Not only because of that. I wanted to tell you at the Hollywood Sign, and I came here tonight to tell you that I want to be together. I thought about all of the signs that brought us together. Even during our Fate Tests, everything kept us together. And now this. Is this not the biggest sign?” I say, feeling myself start to slowly thaw.

“Rooney, I want to be with you more than you can imagine. But it’s like you said in New York, timing is everything. And right now, the timing couldn’t be worse. You literally just told the world who you are. You have MoMA lined up. I need to focus on getting this promotion. I’ve worked too hard and am so close now. To give us a fair shot, we should wait until the circumstances are right,” he says. “Momentum is building in both of our careers. Let’s follow that thread before we follow ours.”

“Why can’t we have both?” I push back, heat creeping into my cheeks.

“I can’t date you while I’m your liaison. The optics don’t look good, and I’m too close to a promotion to quit.”

I process his words. “You’re probably right,” I finally admit.

“You’ll be in New York for a couple of months in the new year. Where will you be after that?” he asks.

“Back here for the second showcase,” I answer.

“What about after that?”

I set my spoon down against the glass dish. “I don’t know.”

“What about next year, after the program ends?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Exactly. There are so many unknowns. What I do know is that my job is here. Your job is… everywhere. Your career flight path is as unpredictable as a butterfly’s,” he says, his voice thick with emotion.

“Why are you trying to control it?” I ask.

“So I don’t get slapped in the face by your wings,” he says, referencing my own fear. “When things settle with our careers, we can see where we are and if a relationship makes sense for us. But love doesn’t exist from a distance. It’s too hard. It doesn’t work.”

Jack clenches his jaw, his lips set in a firm line. One word in particular stands out among the others, suspended in its own antigravity chamber.

“Love?” I whisper. Tears prick the backs of my eyes.

He sets his gloved palms on the table like he’s grounding himself. “Rooney, of course I love you. Resisting you has been the biggest test of all. But everything has become intense being together. I literally trespassed for you. Twice. We’ve kissed,” he says, lowering his voice and leaning forward. “I fear how far I’ll go if we don’t cool our jets and take time to widen our orbits.”

I want to focus on the first thing he said. “I love you, too, Jack. I think ever since that night in New York, I’ve loved you.”

Jack’s jaw tightens, the scar on his bottom lip more pronounced in the changing light.

“But fate…” he says, his words trailing.

My peppermint stick has completely dissolved, pink and white slowly spinning on the surface of the beverage like a lunar swirl. Bing Crosby croons lightly over the speakers, the jingling background noise at odds with the pounding in my ears.

“I know you have an issue with fate, Jack. How is that possible when you believe there’s dark matter, an invisible substance that makes up, what, twenty percent of our universe?” I ask.

“Twenty-seven,” he mumbles.

“Thank you for helping me make my point,” I say. “You believe that dark matter is real, even though you can’t see it or feel it. It’s literally a mystery. And yet fate is too difficult to fathom. The signs are more obvious to me now than they’ve ever been. You can’t honestly tell me you don’t see any.”

“We have different interpretations of what signs are,” he says as he rubs his thumb along the back of his spoon.

“You study the universe. You explore it, try to build machines that will get us there in person. Yet when the universe tries to tell you something, you actively ignore it. The signs are there. Sometimes they’re big, like this note! Or they’re us meeting over and over again. Being paired together to release a lantern on the night of the Lantern Festival, you choosing me as the artist-in-residence.”

Jack shakes his head vigorously, a strand of hair pushing past his hood and flopping down over his forehead. “Everything you described are coincidences,” he says desperately, almost as if he’s trying to convince himself. He shifts in his seat. “From space, astronauts see Earth, and it’s beautiful. But when they get closer and come back to Earth, they see all of its flaws again.”

“Are you saying I’m Earth?” I ask, making a face.

“I’m saying we are,” he says, biting his bottom lip. “From above, it’s easy to romanticize us being together. But the closer we get, the more I start to see our failure points. When you really break down how we’d be together, the messiness shows. We’ll rarely be in the same city. The closer we get to launch, the less time there will be for each other.”

“What you’re saying actually sounds longer than just waiting a few months to figure things out,” I say. “You’re afraid to believe in fate and admit that you can’t control everything. The thing about control, Jack, is that you never really have it. Control is an illusion to help you feel a little bit better about the chaos that is life.”

Jack grimaces. “What I’m scared of, Rooney, is that I will love you so much that, if we go any further just to not end up together, I’d never recover.”

“I’d never recover if we didn’t try at all.”

Jack rips a receipt from his wallet into little shreds. They fall like snow from his fingers.

“We’re bound. I know you can feel it, too,” I add. I’m trying so hard to hang on, but the thread between us is pulled so tight, it might snap.

Jack sighs sadly. “I would choose you every single day of the week for the rest of my life. You should want to be with me because it’s something you choose for yourself. Not fate. Not some thread. You’re looking for something bigger, more meaningful. And I don’t think a simple choice is enough for you.”

I stare at the mound of paper in front of Jack. “I’m scared that love isn’t enough. Just like making the choice to be with somebody, you can make the choice not to be with somebody. What’s the difference?” My tears catch in my throat. “I know choices may give you the comfort of a plan, but even plans aren’t always dependable. We’re being pulled together by something stronger than a choice you or I could ever make, don’t you see? We’re meant to be together. It was never a choice.”

“But you can’t prove that. And neither can I,” Jack says. “Sure, dark matter can’t be detected, but it also doesn’t directly affect my heart. You, Rooney, you do.”

I shake my head in protest and pull my sleeves over my hands. “You can’t stand that testing fate worked.”

“Those were choices that we made,” he says. “A literal test.”

“They were choices guided by fate.”

The sundaes between us are now warm, melted sugar and dairy soups. Overhead, Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” blares. A new wave of cinnamon drifts our way as cocktail shakers continue to rattle. Somehow, the world around us still spins.

“If you’re such a nonbeliever, I’ll prove that you’re my stringmate,” I say with conviction. “I’ll show you the Fate Note I pulled. I know the note I grabbed is yours.”

Jack frowns. “What? How do you even know I put one in?”

“Because I know you. You wouldn’t have taken one without giving one. You think you got one on me, Jack,” I say, digging into my pouch for the Fate Note that I pulled. I slap the note onto the table and slide it over to him.

Jack unfolds the note and reads it. He blinks rapidly, his eyes glossy under his lashes.

I knew it.

“I told you, Jack,” I say.

He reads the note out loud. “One day we’ll be surfing on Mars.”

I point to it. “There you have it. Mars. It’s right there.”

Jack runs his hand down his face and shakes his head.

I gesture to the note in his hands. “You don’t need to draw this out for dramatic effect. It’s yours. Tell me that it’s yours.”

His eyes flit from the note up to me.

“Just admit that it’s yours, Jack,” I press on.

A single tear rolls down his cheek.

Jack slides the note back to me and shakes his head once more. “I guess fate had other plans.”

We sit there quietly, the void between us continuing to expand. And there’s nothing either of us can do about it.