Chapter 16 #2
He doesn’t really know what he’s doing in a social setting like this. I can understand that. It makes me feel closer to Derek, in a way.
Maybe it’s easier for me to say that, after knowing he has no interest in deep brown eyes or hedge funds explained in superhero terms.
“Well, that’s great to hear. Because she definitely has a thing for Locke.”
Her words crawl their way under my skin, pressing into my nerves and setting my heart rate skyrocketing.
“Why would you say that?”
“Are you serious?” Blinking, my little sister flicks the popcorn bucket and shakes her head. “You brought her one snack and the girl nearly fell to her knees.”
“That’s an exaggeration.”
“It’s really not.” She looks at Grant. “Back me up here.”
His hands fly up, head shaking. “Can’t put my two cents in until I cross check with Lily, sorry.”
Billie’s eyes roll back for what feels like the twentieth time today. “God, Grant, you’re so whipped. It’s disgusting and adorable.” He doesn’t argue. Just shrugs and smiles. “Locke and Rosie will be at that point soon. They’re halfway there, I would guess.”
“What are you talking about?”
I’d love to know. I search my brain for what part of Rosalie’s place in my life feels half fulfilled. Nothing clicks.
There are an infinite number of things I’d still like to learn about my roommate.
What makes her feel better when she’s sick, how she spends the holidays with her family, what commercial from her childhood sticks out the most in her brain.
That’s the sort of thing Rosie would analyze for a lifetime.
Technically, our time together is about a quarter filled.
By the end of this school year, the two of us will have no obligation to see each other in the mornings and wish one another good night.
Saturdays won’t be guaranteed for a marathon on a couch, accompanied by Ghost’s sleeping figure and the sounds of downtown Boston sliding in through the breaks.
Rosie in theory, should be half. Half of a dorm and half of a friendship.
She doesn’t feel that way. In every way I perceive her, Rosalie is whole. An entire heart of passion, a full representation of friendship—a whole home.
My sister doesn’t give me the answer I’m looking for. She slaps a hand on her forehead instead, and sighs. “You cannot be this oblivious.”
“There’s nothing to be oblivious to.”
“You’re actually starting to scare me. Are you in denial?”
“What would I be denying, exactly?”
“Oh my god, he’s hopeless!”
“Woah.” Rosalie’s sweet voice suddenly appears behind us, and it’s like a weight is lifted off my shoulders. “I wouldn’t call your brother hopeless.”
“Thank you.”
“He is hopeless.”
Billie ignores the glares I send her, choosing instead to focus her attention on Rosalie. Through the motions of my roommate returning to her seat, explaining there was a line for the bathroom, and apologizing for taking so long, my sister doesn’t break her stare once.
“Rosie, what’s your type?”
The back of my chair digs into my spine again. Head hanging, legs uncomfortably sprawling out under the table while I slide down into my seat.
Of all the sisters in the world, I got this one.
Rosie chuckles, although it’s off-cadence and different than the ones I’m used to.
“What do you mean?”
“What you look for in a partner. Loud? Quiet? Funny? Tall? Good at math- Ow!”
My hand doesn’t make full contact with Billie’s leg. Half of it clips the edge of her chair, and the force of my mishit makes my pinkie throb, but it’s worth it. For those few satisfactory seconds breaking through my humiliation.
I don’t see their faces, but I can hear Liliana and Grant laughing from the other side of the table.
“Um.” Rosie does that off-beat giggle again. “I don’t think I have a specific type. Just a few things I like in a guy.”
“Go on.”
I know Billie is trying to get a kick out of me. I want this conversation to end.
I’m leaning slightly to my left. The board game café is starting to fill with patrons, and the volume of the room is raising by the minute, and I’m making an effort to find Rosie’s voice. To listen to what she has to say.
I want this conversation to end, I swear. In two minutes. I’ll give it two more minutes before I cut it off.
“They’re silly. Nothing to be taken seriously.”
“Humor me.”
A minute and thirty seconds.
Rosalie coughs, and I decide not to count that towards my mental timer. “I like guys who take care of themselves. Who seem put together.”
By pure coincidence, my hand finds the wrinkle at the hem of my baby blue button down, and I smooth it out.
“And I like sweet guys. I’m not really into those brooding, alpha male sort of men.”
“Guys who are soft-spoken, then?”
There’s a pause. I stop my mental timer. Just to be safe. To be fair.
“Soft-spoken is great, yeah.”
I’ve traced over the wooden pattern of this table at least fifty times.
I have the lines of it memorized. I can’t bring myself to look anywhere else.
I don’t have much courage to begin with.
Most of it was used to whisper with Rosie when no one else was looking, and to hand over a snack I know would make her smile.
Staring at her while she answers these questions is beyond any courage I’ve ever had.
There’s clapping to my right before Billie says in a sing-song voice, “Anything else?”
“Uh, no. That’s about it.”
I let out a slow breath. The tight coil in my chest made that feel like the longest two minutes of my life.
Right as I’m rolling my neck and preparing myself to sit straight again, Liliana resets the timer and conversation.
“You’re forgetting one.”
The most I can do is stare at Rosie through my peripherals. I catch her hand coming up to her neck and rubbing the skin of her collarbone anxiously.
“No I’m not.”
“Yes you are”
“Don’t be shy.” My sister jumps in. “Share with the class.”
Rosalie is the life of the party. That’s how I see her, anyways. She’s energetic, bubbly, and happy to interact. If it weren’t for how unapologetically extroverted she is, I’m not sure I would feel so at home in our dorm.
For the first time since running to Jeremiah at the mixer, Rosie doesn’t have anything to say. She continues to rub the skin exposed by her v-cut blouse, and it’s Liliana who speaks for her.
“Glasses. Rosie really likes guys with glasses.”
I manage to pull my eyes away from the wood. Looking over Liliana’s face, I search for a joke somewhere. An embarrassing story she uses to explain this away, or something that will change the implications I’m suddenly grasping onto.
Liliana’s eyes are set on me, lips thin, and I know there’s nothing additional to say.
I fall into what’s familiar. Spine straight. Shoulders back. Chin up.
Except, it’s different this time. I’m not falling in line as a son. I’m officially someone who has the tiniest chance at winning Rosalie Mendoza’s heart. That’s ten times more important to me, and infinitely more deserving.
The subject dies. Derek shifts the discussion to our next game. While he’s distributing cards to everyone, Billie knocks my knee under the table about a thousand times and even goes as far as to text me in all caps, “YOU HAVE A MONTH TO LOCK IT DOWN COWARD!!!!”.
I pretend I don’t see it. The rest of the night is dedicated to our friend group as a whole, and not the six minutes and forty-seven seconds I spent holding my breath.
We play a card game. Then a deduction board game. Then a game with play money, and my sister has too much fun pitching unfair trades between property deeds and rent payments.
I’m not sure how many hours we spend in that board game café, but I end the night knowing three things.
First, I have friends. Beyond my little sister who has been my rock through the heavy weight of being a McCarthy, and Grant, who is connected to me by blood.
People who I can sit around a table with, and laugh with, for an entire night.
That’s friendship, even if minimal. I’m grateful to be gifted something so precious.
Second, nothing between Rosie and I is partial. Whatever we share isn’t half. I carry that with me when I remember I might have a chance with her. It’s not a quarter chance, or a half chance—it’s whole.
After we drive home, without any mention of the popcorn or Billie’s question ambush, Rosalie tells me she had an amazing night.
Despite being together for more hours than two roommates probably ever are, we get stuck at the kitchen counter.
Talking for more hours. About our friends, about life, about the bird she saw on her walk home yesterday. Everything and nothing.
At the very end of it, when our drooping eyes can’t keep the conversation anymore, Rosie side-hugs me at my bedroom door. Smiling up at me, she unknowingly stabs me in the chest and says, “Goodnight, Locke. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Then she walks to her own room and shuts the door. Right as I’m gathering courage to say something to her that would turn her and I into us.
The last thing I end the night knowing is I never want to be left looking at wood again.