Chapter XV
XV
James
We head back to the party, and it seems no one suspected what we were up to at the other end of the roof.
That is, until Lucy and I return to the dance floor and her underwear slips out of my pocket and falls to the ground.
A guy in his forties drinking a margarita and dancing with mostly his neck casually picks them up and hands them to me like they’re my keys. “You dropped this,” he says.
“Thank you,” I reply as politely as I can, the blood rushing to my ears, and when I turn back to Lucy, she’s cracking up. So I present them to her in an attempt to turn the tables, but she’s just as chill as he was. She makes a show of carefully folding them and placing them in her purse.
Lucy catches up with Delia before Delia leaves with Asher. Then Rebecca, Lucy, and I hit the karaoke machine for an off-key but heartfelt rendition of “Wrecking Ball” by Miley Cyrus.
When Rebecca’s more inebriated friends start careening down the Slip ’N Slide, Lucy and I creep down to Rebecca’s apartment, steal blankets and pillows from everywhere we can find them, curse Rebecca’s too-short love seats, and curl up on the floor to sleep.
The vinyl planks are hard, but Lucy’s body against mine is warm and soft.
Her ass presses into my thigh, and I sleep like the dead.
Lucy
The day after, I take James to lunch in my dining hall, and we both eat like we haven’t eaten in days.
He’s in sweats he borrowed from me after our shower at my place—they’re purple and too tight across his thighs, and he looks fucking adorable in them.
I’m in gym shorts and the Miss Piggy T-shirt I told him about.
There’s a sort of freeness between us that I think comes with knowing exactly where we stand with each other.
At one point, I call something Capraesque, and James asks me what that means.
I realize how much I love this about him: that he’s curious and he doesn’t pretend.
Turns out, he doesn’t know Frank Capra by name, but he knows a bunch of his movies, and we end up debating whether Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is too hopeful for modern audiences.
I say yes; he says I should watch it again and try not to cry.
He tells me how his parents forced him to stop playing soccer in high school after he got a concussion, even though he could have gotten a scholarship. How he was so mad at them at the time, but now he sees it as an act of love.
I tell him about Delia, how she was the first friend who made a real effort to stay connected with me whenever I traveled with my mom. She bought us matching Lisa Frank stationery to write letters and helped me believe I was someone worth holding on to.
But talk of leaving leads us back to our inevitable end and the things other than distance that would break us apart.
“I hate traveling,” he says with a charming, sheepish grin.
I point at him, triumphant. “I knew it!”
He shakes his head. “I’m sorry! I know you love it, but it’s just not for me.”
“You don’t like seeing new parts of the world? Experiencing different cultures? The food?”
“That’s the promise of travel. But for me, it’s just been a lot of time and money and inconvenience for something that’s usually a letdown.”
I want to understand him, not just cement why we’re essentially opposites.
But my experience has been so different.
“Visiting new places makes me see possibility. Potential,” I tell him.
“It’s what made me want to do what I do.
Just the idea that so many nations can function so differently from one another, and yet they mostly function.
The entire concept of international law is a fucking miracle. ”
His smile is so big that it makes me blush.
“I just really like knowing what’s coming.” His tone is unapologetic, confident. “Waking up in the same comfortable bed. Going to the same familiar places. Always having friends and family around. I don’t know. I like feeling grounded.”
I run a finger up and down his forearm. “Sounds like you want to be a plant.”
“Yes. Ideally a fern.” I grin, and he leans over the table, his eyes brightening. “Admit it. That sort of life would drive you insane.”
I lean in to match him, our noses a few inches apart. “It sounds like fucking torture.”
James sits back and chuckles.
“I love waking up somewhere new and knowing the day is going to be an adventure, that I’m going to learn something or see something I’ve never seen before.
” I point a stern finger at him, making him crack a smile.
“But. That doesn’t mean hitting every item on some tourist checklist. You can’t try to make unforgettable memories.
My mom taught me to look at it more like, ‘Hey, today is Tuesday. How can I make this Tuesday different from the last one?’”
James gazes at me like I’ve almost convinced him. “You know today is Sunday, right?”
I throw a napkin at him, and we both laugh.
James
After lunch, Lucy has an hours-long bar exam study session, and I have a catering gig, but we plan to meet back up for a late dinner at my place.
I make us Gruyère-Fontina grilled cheeses, and she sleeps over.
The next night we go see the one-woman mermaid show my roommates are producing, and it’s actually kind of amazing.
I sleep at Lucy’s place that night, and then again the night after that.
In bed, I tell her about the restaurant plans that are coming together: the contractor I found and the replacement for the paisley wallpaper. I don’t tell her I’m excited to get to Oregon to start work in earnest.
She shares how anxious she is about the bar exam and how much more anxious she is about the grant, even though her advisor told her he’d be “shocked to death” if they didn’t select her.
I don’t know what she isn’t sharing with me, and I try not to notice the cloud looming over us in the quietest moments.
If I thought there was even a chance of us turning this into something real, I’d tell her I love her. But what would be the point?
I’m on the subway, heading back to my place from Lucy’s, repeating what’s become a mantra: This is going to end. That’s just the way it is.
My phone vibrates. I’ve barely thought about another living person for the last four days, so it’s jarring to see Miriam’s name pop up on my screen.
“Hey you,” her text reads, “I heard from Dave that you’re moving back to Newport to open a restaurant. Is that true?”
I almost forgot that I was planning to reach out to Miriam when I move back. Definitely not yet. Just getting this message feels disloyal to Lucy.
And contacting me with a “Hey you” . . . that has certain implications. This doesn’t feel like a friendly check-in.
I do want to see Miriam in Oregon. She’s someone who makes sense for me. And I think I make sense for her. I don’t want to deal with this now, but I don’t want to leave her waiting.
After opening and closing the message a few times, I start typing, “that’s the plan. how’ve you been?”
Then I take out my notebook and jot down tweaks to the fresh-pea risotto I’m going to menu test for Lucy tonight.