Chapter Nineteen #2
This time last year, when the wound of losing Lucy had been only seven months new, Ron and Valeria took me out to a concert to cheer me up, despite neither of them liking EDM or any of the featured artists.
Sadly, Gryffin wasn’t performing, but it was still the best birthday party I’d had in a long time.
It was fun because I spent it with two people who didn’t care that I was unpopular, only ever wore black, and hadn’t had my first kiss yet.
I type out a text in our group chat again—my fourth one of the day—and hit send before I can regret it. A minute later, the “Read” status appears for them both, but they don’t respond.
Sighing, I head to the table in the backyard and take my three birthday gifts inside the house. Dad and Appa are both at the café, so I have all the privacy to open my presents without their curious eyes on me.
I sprawl on the floor and go through my presents.
If I sit on the couch with my clothes in this condition, Dad will come home and have a heart attack.
Raj makes himself comfortable beside me, his tongue wagging, as I rip open wrapping paper.
Seth got me a fifty-dollar gift card to Target, which was sweet of him, considering we’ve barely talked.
Julien got me his favorite Pablo Neruda poetry collection that he personally annotated. Cute. As for Lucy…
I frown when the black packaging gives way to a Polaroid-style photograph with a QR code on the back, as well as a piece of paper listing ten of Gryffin’s songs in Lucy’s neat handwriting.
The picture, taken by Lucy during our sophomore year, is of me wearing my black Gryffin merch T-shirt, my hands in the finger-guns pose.
When I scan the code with my phone, it redirects to a Spotify playlist titled “MRG” with those same songs.
I scan the handwritten list next. Beside the title of each song is a small message from Lucy, ranging from “Remember when you streamed this on loop every day for three straight months?” and “When this plays on the radio, all I see is you dancing to it in your living room” to “This song used to remind me of us.” A shaky breath escapes me.
That final song is undoubtedly my favorite Gryffin song of all time…
about friends falling in love. I know she doesn’t mean it that way, but it’s sweet nonetheless.
Why would Lucy do this for me if she hates me so much?
Or, at least, used to hate me? Thanks to the Plan, we’re as close to friends as we’ll ever get.
But this must have taken her hours to put together.
It’s not a last-minute present. And the name, “MRG”…
those are my initials. Is this the Gryffin playlist from Sushant and Lucy’s shared Spotify, the one he told me about during the museum trip?
“What does this mean?” I say out loud, scratching Raj under his chin as he barks. I guess it’s time to confront all the weirdness that’s gone down today.
I pick Raj up in my arms and take the stairs to my room.
I head into the shower while he waits outside, whining softly.
I scrub the colors off my body, grateful for the oil I applied beforehand that makes every stain come off.
The hot water rains down on me, and I close my eyes, finally replaying what happened at the party over and over in my head.
The “moment” Sushant and I shared, the one that would have made Ron and Valeria promise me that the Plan is working—if they were still talking to me, that is.
My mind drifts to the way Sushant, high on bhaang, didn’t take his eyes off me while he put color on me: my face, my neck, my shoulders. The way he brushed my hair off my cheek. The way his hand lingered before one of his friends hosed him down and he fell to the ground, laughing.
The way I didn’t feel…anything.
Raj stops pawing on the bathroom door when I get out of the shower, wrapped in my fluffy gray bathrobe.
I sigh and ignore him, so he runs across my room and settles himself in a corner, where sunlight is streaming through the window.
I pull my damp hair to one side and lie back in bed, putting a hand to my head.
What is wrong with me? I’ve loved Sushant since I can remember. He’s the first and only boy I’ve ever wanted to kiss. Everything I’ve done this year has been to make something happen between us. But now that it feels like the Plan just might work, despite all the screwups, all I feel is…nothing.
I should be thinking about how warm his rough and calloused hand felt on my cheek, the way his hip was pressed up against mine.
But I’m not, because I’m thinking about Lucy’s giggle seconds before I hit her with the water balloon, how the colors spun in the air around her, suspended for a second before settling on the wet white dress that clung to every inch of her athletic body.
After having a moment with the boy I love, the only person on my mind is the girl I hate—the one who gave me the most thoughtful birthday present in the world.
What does that mean?
“Knock, knock.” Appa pokes his head into my room. He smells like incense; he must have come home on his break from the café. “Want to talk?”
I can’t get over how psychic Appa is. I nod and make space for him on my bed. Appa sits beside my feet, and I clutch a spare pillow against my chest and turn to him, still lying down.
Appa looks at me with fondness. “How was the party, putta? Did you have fun?”
It takes me a few moments to figure out what I want to know from him. He waits patiently, his eyes laced with concern, until I speak. “How did you know you loved Dad?”
Appa throws his head back and laughs. “I must have told you this story a hundred times. It was love at first sight, really.”
“No.” My voice is low, frustrated. “How did you know he was it for you? Your twin flame, your soulmate, the One?”
“Oh.” Appa twirls his mustache, thinking. “I didn’t know that right away. Or maybe I did, but I was afraid to believe it because the feeling was so strong. It scared me at first.”
“What changed?”
He smiles, his eyes misting. He must be going back in time—at least twenty-five years—in his mind.
They met in high school, after all. “I saw something in his aura that I’d never seen in anyone before.
At first, it was soft, murky, foggy. But the more time we spent together, the clearer the aura got.
It sparkled; it shone and shimmered. And my soul lit up every time I saw it. Every time I saw him.”
I sit up and peer at him. “What did you see?”
“The Universe.”
I try not to laugh. That sounds like a line straight out of a Shah Rukh Khan movie. “You’re being so silly, Appa.”
He doesn’t look amused, and his eyes narrow. “It’s not silly. It’s more like…being around him feels holy. Our relationship is a divine connection. I know, because he is in every cell of my being, and I am in every cell of his being. Just like my relationship with the Universe and my Angels.”
Somehow this conversation is frustrating me. “But what does that mean?” I ask desperately, gesturing with my hands. “You’re just saying words. Random spiritual words.”
“You won’t understand me now, but you will when you feel that way about someone, putta. You’ll know it to your very core when you feel this connection with someone.”
“What if…” I pause. “What if I thought I loved someone, but I’m not so sure anymore?”
Appa’s face crinkles into a soft smile. “Soul unions never end, and love often gets put on hold, even if it’s with your soulmate.
But no matter what, some emotion will always tie you to your twin flame—whether it’s love, hate, anger, or bitterness.
The only emotion you will never, ever feel for them is indifference. ”
My eyes widen. That’s literally how I felt when Sushant touched me. Indifferent.
Appa pats my damp cheek before getting up from my bed with a grunt. “Give it some thought. And remember, everything always works out in divine timing the way it’s meant to.”
“Thanks, Appa,” I mumble.
He stops by the window to bend down and scratch Raj’s belly before closing the door behind him.
Once he’s gone, I let out a loud groan and press my face into my pillow as I replay Appa’s wise words in my head.
Even though not everything he said made sense, one thing is clear: Sushant doesn’t belong with me after all.
So does he really belong with Lucy? And if so, has my Plan been working against the Universe?
Am I, not Lucy, the villain in all this?