Chapter Twenty-One
I stare down at the crinkled piece of paper in my hand, then back up at the giant brick condominium building in front of me.
“Oh well,” I mumble to myself. “Here goes nothing.”
Biting my lip, I buzz the apartment number Tey gave me.
Static sounds on the other end. Then a lovely high-pitched voice.
“Come on up!” a woman sings.
The door buzzes open, and I hurry inside.
Nico’s mother’s apartment is on the second floor at the end of the hall. I prepare to knock, but she beats me to it. “Door’s open!” she calls from the other side.
I take a deep breath and turn the handle.
The apartment is tiny but charming. It’s a studio with one big window lighting up the space and a view of a big oak tree outside.
There’s a small kitchenette, where a teakettle heats on the stove.
The wallpaper is peeling slightly, but the crown moldings are in excellent shape.
She’s replaced all the light fixtures with ceiling fans.
Even standing in the entryway, I can tell this isn’t merely an apartment.
This is a home.
A safe space to start over.
To get to know yourself again.
Nico’s mom sits cross-legged on a cushy love seat.
She’s as beautiful as I remember—big eyes, a blue so light they’re practically gray, and Nico’s blond hair flowing down her back.
But now, more than a few strands of white mingle with those honey locks, and those eyes are creased with well-earned wrinkles.
When she sees me, her face breaks into a wide smile that I’ve seen on her son only once or twice.
“Joonie Saboonchi, is that you? I haven’t seen you since you were small enough to hide under my skirts! Nico, come—look who it is!”
At the sound of his name, Nico steps out from behind the curtain separating his mother’s bed from the rest of the space.
He’s dressed in the same clothes he was wearing this morning, but his normally neat hair looks messy.
As if he’s been pulling on it the way he tends to do when he’s stressed.
Or like a lover ran her hands through it.
I swallow back the bile making its way into my mouth and put on a brave face.
“Hi,” I squeak.
Nico looks at me as if I’m a mirage, his eyes wide with disbelief. “What are you doing here?”
“Tey sort of gave up your whereabouts.”
“Shouldn’t you be with your soul mate?” Nico’s voice is hard, relentless.
My stomach drops about twenty stories.
“About that… Nico, I need to talk to you. I’m so—”
“Not now,” he says, clenching his jaw as if the words require effort. “I’m with my mom. You should go.”
I nod, trying not to let my insides splatter all over the floor. “Okay. I’ll go.”
“Nonsense,” Nico’s mom says, turning around to scowl at her offspring.
“I can barely get you to visit me once in a blue moon, and now that I’ve got a special visitor, you’re trying to scare her away?
” She walks over to the kitchenette and opens a cabinet, pulling out mugs.
“Come, Joonie. Stay for a cup of tea. Fill me in on the last decade and a half of your life. Of course Nico keeps me updated on the basics, but I want all the juicy details.”
I walk over to the love seat and allow myself to sink into the cushions. “He does?”
She laughs. “Are you kidding? I practically know your schedule by heart. I swear, you should hire him to write your newsletter. It’s always Joonie said this the other day or You won’t believe what Joonie did this time.
I’ve never seen someone burrow their way under Nico’s skin quite the way you have. ”
“Mom!” Nico yells, his cheeks flushing in a manner I’m all too familiar with.
“Oh hush, honey. It’s just a little bit of girl talk. Don’t be so sensitive. Honestly, the way you go on and on about her, I never know whether you want to kill her or kiss her. But since blood has always made you a little queasy…”
“Isn’t that the truth,” I mutter.
Nico looks up at the ceiling. “Okay, I’m ready for the apocalypse to start anytime now.”
His mother looks between us and frowns. “Why are you two sitting so far apart? And avoiding eye contact? You’re acting strange.”
She squints at us, and I squirm in my seat.
Nico takes a sip of tea.
His mom’s hand flies to her mouth. “Oh my God, you’ve had sex!”
“What? No!” I shout.
“How could you possibly know that?” Nico groans.
“Mother’s intuition.” She beams. “So it’s true?
Oh, this is so wonderful! I’ve always thought you two would make the cutest couple.
Joonie, you had the most adorable crush on Nico when you were little.
You were always coming up with silly excuses to follow him around, to play with him, to ask him questions. ”
I feel all the blood rush to my head.
“Now, now. That’s nothing to be embarrassed about. You two were kids. It was so sweet. I remember one time when he was in the bath, you—”
“I would really, really like to stop having this conversation,” I interrupt rather rudely.
“Finally, we agree on something,” Nico mumbles.
“Never thought I’d see the day,” I retort.
His mother just giggles, her voice like the ringing of a bell. “Oh, you two are too much. What banter! Finally, someone who can keep up with his witticisms and call him on his bullshit. I mean, bull crap.”
“Mom, I’m almost thirty,” Nico says. “You can curse in front of me.”
“Hush,” she says again, pulling him to her chest and planting a big wet kiss on his forehead. “You’ll always be my baby. My boy. So strong, even when you didn’t have to be.”
Her lower lip quivers.
Those gray-blue skies darken.
Oh God—the waterworks are about to start.
“The truth is, I’m relieved,” she says, turning to face me once again.
“Nico hasn’t brought a girl home to meet me…
well, ever. He hasn’t talked about anyone but you for the last decade.
I was starting to worry that he’d never let anybody in.
You were so young, you probably don’t remember, but my divorce from his father was messy.
It really did a number on all of us, Nico most of all. It wasn’t fair.”
Nico shakes his head, sucking in his cheeks. “No, Mom. What wasn’t fair was Dad cheating on you. Over and over again. And with your sister. You always say we can choose love. Well, he had a choice. And his decision was to walk away from us. His son and his soul mate.”
He spits the last word as if it’s a curse.
“Honey, I won’t pretend your father’s actions didn’t hurt me.
They wrecked me. But we didn’t have a perfect marriage.
Not even close. We saw the world differently—he was always worried about the things he couldn’t change, and I was so caught up in the small changes I could make.
We bickered to avoid talking about the big stuff.
It’s one thing when someone who doesn’t really know you tries to hurt you.
It’s whole different situation when the person who knows you best in the world takes a shot.
We both knew where to aim our cruelest comments.
How to dig the knife in and really make each other bleed. ”
Nico rubs his hand down his face like he can’t believe what he’s hearing.
“But you two were the perfect couple. Next-door neighbors, high school sweethearts. Fated in the womb…” says Nico.
“Well, we were so young when we met. We didn’t know yet that you’re a new version of yourself every day. Which means that every day, you’re in a new relationship with a new person. You have to keep checking in. And we stopped doing that.”
I think about this. Using Nico’s mom’s logic, many different versions of ourselves can love many different versions of someone else. Like alternate realities. Different dimensions.
Or second-chance romances.
“Even so, I wouldn’t take back loving him for the world.
I grew into myself while falling for him.
Our love painted my world with color. And loving him led to loving you, Nico.
I’ll always have love in my heart for him.
But love isn’t a bucket, baby. It’s a well.
And I have so much more love left to share. ”
I smile to myself. “Love isn’t a bucket; it’s a well,” I repeat. “I love that. Mind if I use that in one of my fics?”
Nico’s mother puts a hand on her chest. “Why, it would be an honor! Nico told me you’re a writer.” She smiles at me. “You always did love happy endings, even as a little kid.”
I turn to look at Nico, swelling with pride. But he’s quiet, his fingers twined together. Contemplative. Processing all this information and thinking it through.
“How can you still believe in happy endings when your story ended in tragedy?” he finally asks. “How can you still believe in love?”
She takes a long sip of her tea, then hums quietly.
“Because, sweet cheeks, love is matter. Love is the stuff the world is made of. Love is the reason to get up in the morning and the way to sleep soundly at night. My marriage ended, but that wasn’t the end of love.
It was an evolution. Because love doesn’t just disappear into thin air.
No, sir. When I got divorced, I took all that love I had for your father and put it into myself. ”
Nico stares at her, his eyes growing misty. “You never told me any of this.”
“I know. And that’s on me, kid. After the divorce, you were so angry. Anytime I tried to talk about your dad, about love, you changed the subject. You’d bring up climate change and the end of the world and all that. I gave up trying. And I’ll always regret doing that.”
Nico swallows hard, as if he’s trying to will his face to remain neutral.
“But I’m telling you now,” says his mom. “Hopefully I’m not too late.”
My cheeks feel damp. I raise a hand to my face and discover I’ve started to cry.
What would my life look like if I stopped looking for love outside of myself and summoned the love inside me instead?
“Plus, the best stories have tons of plot twists.” Nico’s mother turns to throw me a wink. “Isn’t that right, Joonie?”