Chapter XIX
XIX
Lucy
Today, I managed to take a shower, order a pizza, and watch twelve episodes of Gilmore Girls. That’s progress.
The law firm wants to hear my answer by tomorrow, and I’ve tried working up the will to call, but I’m not there yet.
I also haven’t gotten up the nerve to tell my clerkship that I won’t be showing up. Or to call the airline to try and beg for a refund for my nonrefundable Netherlands ticket.
It’s almost 7 p.m., and I realize James hasn’t reached out today. Yesterday he called three times and texted twice.
I don’t want to explain myself to him, but the more time that passes, the more I just want him to hold me and tell me it will be OK.
And then I want him to keep holding me.
But I know I can’t have that. So I turn my mind off and my TV on.
In the midst of Emily Gilmore being iconic, my phone vibrates. It’s a text from James. “lucy,” it reads, “i really think we should talk. i’m in front of your building.” My heart skips a beat, and I see that he’s still typing.
“did you get the grant?”
I’m really not sure what happens next, but without deciding to, I’m shuffling out the front door of my building in my too-warm slippers, directly into James’s arms.
James
Lucy doesn’t say anything for a few minutes, and I don’t either. We just stand under the awning, holding each other. I didn’t get a good look at her before she sank into me, but she seems about as spent as I am.
“I didn’t get it,” she whispers against my shoulder and neck.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper back. I want to ask when she found out, what her plan is. But I resist the urge and just keep holding her.
She nestles deeper into my neck. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
“You’re going to The Hague,” I tell her. “That’s what you’re going to do.”
She shakes her head, and I can feel the doubt and sadness coursing through her. “You can get a personal loan,” I go on. “Or maybe I can—”
She steps out of my arms abruptly. “You can’t. This is my problem, not yours. I need to figure this out on my own.”
I hesitate, but I have to ask the obvious question. “Why?”
Lucy doesn’t seem sure how to respond. Then she crumples into tears, and I move to hold her again, but she puts trembling hands up to stop me. “Please don’t. I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve you.”
“What do you mean?”
She shakes her head, looking away from me.
“I got a job offer. The same day I heard about the grant. It’s the firm I worked at last summer, and I knew the offer was coming, but I didn’t tell you because the firm has an office in Portland.
” I try to keep up as the story spills out of Lucy.
“And you’re going to be a few hours from Portland!
And it would be so easy for me to take that job even though they have an office here in New York that would let me stay by my friends and work bigger cases, but I don’t actually want to work at either of those places yet because I want to go to The fucking Hague and have this amazing clerkship that I’m so proud of and that I can’t imagine throwing away, but I have to because of stupid money, which is just so stupid! ”
Silence falls.
Then I nod. “OK. So let’s get you to The Hague.”
Lucy stares at me, looking a bit stunned. Her brow is furrowed, and her tears stop falling. “What?”
“I said let’s get you to The Hague. There are still bank loans. We could go in the morning—”
“You—you heard what I said about Portland.”
It takes me a moment to understand what she’s really asking. “Yeah. You said you don’t want to move there.”
“But—” Her voice softens, and uncertainty creeps in. “Would you . . . want me to move to Portland?”
I look into her black eyes, glistening and raw. I feel no hesitation, no fear. “Lucy. I love you. I want you to have your dream.”
The tears come streaming down her cheeks once more, and she falls into me. “I love you too.”