3. Philip
Philip
Shoving our caps and balled-up gowns into the trunk of my car, Ophie waves goodbye to her family as they pull out of the restaurant parking lot. “Was the joke about Daisy’s meatballs really necessary?” With a true beleaguered sitcom-wife sigh, she slides into the passenger seat of my car.
I grin to myself, waving to Kel and Maggie as they follow the others. “Better than making a joke about Elvis serenading us as he signed the marriage license,” I point out as I climb behind the wheel.
Joining the Moores for a celebratory lunch had been equal parts painful and fun. On the one hand, poking subtle fun at Ophie’s oldest sister and making Maggie giggle had been a delightful way to spend an afternoon. And once Mrs. Moore forgave me for my joke earlier, she had smothered me with motherly love.
But every squeeze of the shoulder or “that’s lovely, dear” was a reminder that my family is thousands of miles away. And of the giant secret we’re keeping from all of them.
We head back to my place in silence for a few minutes, and I can’t help thinking about how little time I have left.
The familiar panic of “where do I go now?” swirls in my belly, amplified by the silence. Two years felt like forever when I arrived in the States. Now it’s almost gone, and the expiration date on my student visa is too close for comfort. Especially since I have no home to go back to.
“Have you heard from any of the jobs you applied to?” Ophie asks, breaking the quiet.
“Some. Most of them aren’t willing to jump through the immigration hoops for me, but there are a few potential ones that I haven’t heard from yet. What about you? Has the port called you back about the job?”
The setting sun glints off her sunglasses, golden hour approaching as we near my apartment. Ophie stares out the window for a beat before turning to give me a small smile. “Port’s a no-go. At this rate, I might be using you to get a visa somewhere.”
I snort. “Sadly, my South African privileges are fairly limited, Mrs. van der Merwe.”
“Not Mrs. van der Merwe.” She clucks her tongue against her teeth.
“Technically…”
“Technically, I did not indicate a change of last name on the marriage license. So I am still and forever Mssssss. Moore. We are married on paper only.”
Sunlight catches her phone screen, blinding me every time she turns it over in her hand. The somber mood in the car irks me. Today should be a day of celebration, not already burdened with what happens next.
Not ready to declare the festivities over, I crank up the radio and start belting out Icona Pop’s “I Love It.” I add some arm dancing, eliciting a giggle from Ophie—my goal.
“Come on, ball and chain. Let’s go home.” I flip my indicator to turn right at the light and get a smack on the arm for my cheek before she closes her eyes with a deep sigh.
“Wake me up when we get there, poopsie. I need a nap.”
I don’t know if the warmth that spreads through my chest is from the sun shining through my window or from the privilege of getting to see her playful side—not many people have that privilege.
Since the first time I sat beside her in class, Ophie has tested my resolution to turn over a new leaf when I came to the States. My older brother and parents had long given up on me being anything more than the family clown. When I got accepted to the University of Portland’s master’s program, they didn’t have much faith that I would make it to graduation. Not that I could blame them. I’d only graduated from UCT—University of Cape Town, the family alma mater—by the grace of a few professors.
As I pull up at another red light, Ophie closes her eyes, resting her head against the chairback. I allow myself to stare at the way the sun drips across the curve of my wife’s cheek for a long moment before I focus back on the road.
I know my parents won’t approve of our quickie Vegas wedding, but I am convinced they’ll love Ophie. They’ve chatted with her before over video call. But they’ll absolutely lose their minds when they find out what I’ve done. Worse, they won’t be surprised. If they find out.
We’ve already managed eight weeks without anyone suspecting a thing, so I’m starting to think that Ophie’s right, and we’ll be able to get a quiet divorce in a few months with no one the wiser.
I promised my mum that when I got to America, I wouldn’t waste the opportunity I’d been handed and would take my studies seriously. The promise had been fairly easy to keep during orientation. Since we were older than the undergraduate crowd, ours was, disappointingly, not at all like I’d expected from the American TV shows and movies I’ve seen—not a keg stand in sight. Instead, it had been more like a series of mixers and networking events full of shaking hands and sober discussions of class load and work-study assignments.
Dreadfully dull.
I’d swallowed down the temptation to liven up the gatherings with some great tunes or a hot dog-eating contest. Just.
But when I’d sat next to a dark-haired woman in my second class of the day, something had possessed me. She’d pulled a laptop out of her bag and set it perfectly square on the desk in front of her, then proceeded to set a tiny notebook and three different-colored pens beside it before sitting back in her chair and clasping her hands in her lap.
All of this without a single word or glance at anyone else in the room. As prim and proper as you please. And I’d been overcome with a burning desire to break her—to make her a little messy.
I’d made a comment about her pens. She had pointed out that I had no supplies of any kind ready for the start of the lecture. I’d snagged one of her pens before pointing out that it was the first day of class, and it was unlikely we’d hear anything worth writing down. The shock on her face had egged me on to more and more ridiculous declarations.
We’d kept it up throughout the class, in hushed whispers at first, then scribbling notes back and forth in her little notebook after the professor called us out for being disruptive. If I hadn’t caught the hint of a smirk on her face when we got called out, I would have given up at that point. But something told me there was a naughty side to Ms. Ophelia Moore that no one had set free.
She’d balked when I asked for her number, until I explained my hard and fast “no dating while in America” rule. Apparently she had a similar life motto. On the agreement that we were just going to be friends, we’d headed to the nearest coffee shop. The rest, as they say, is history.
“Dude, are those sirens?” I crane my neck to see where the noise is coming from. The movement disturbs Ophie. “Wakey-wakey, liefling.”
Beautiful whiskey-brown eyes blink open, and she stares at me with a dazed expression. Her hair sticks up around her face, making her look more like a secretary bird than the starling I usually compare her to in my mind. Wiping her mouth, she looks around in confusion. “What’s that noise?”
“I think there’s a couple of fire trucks in the parking lot ahead.” Checking my rearview mirror, I don’t see any more emergency vehicles. But my heart picks up speed as the sirens grow louder the closer we get to my street.
Ophie points to the fire engines clustered near my apartment building. “Oh shit. Philip, is that your place?” She’s awake now, her hand trembling as she gestures to the billowing smoke.
“Fuck. That’s my kitchen window.” I scan the road and the parking lot, the nearest driveway blocked by a police cruiser. “If I just pull in here, can you—”
“I’ll take care of it.” Her frantic voice cuts me off as she waves her hands, shooing me out of the car. The second I put the car in park, I’m out in a flash, not bothering to close the door as I sprint toward the noise and commotion.
“Sir, you can’t go in there.” A firefighter steps in my path, blocking me from bounding up the stairs to my home.
“That’s my apartment. Is my roommate okay? Was he in there?” I peer over his shoulder, not sure what I’m looking for. Smoke is billowing out of the window in thick plumes, but there’s only a trickle coming out of the front door.
“Philip!” Chris calls my name from somewhere behind.
I whirl, catching sight of my roommate. He’s leaning against the hood of his car, an emergency blanket draped over his shoulders. “Thank god.” Fright still racing through me, I hurry over to him, then clap a hand on his shoulder. “I thought I was going to have to find a new roommate, and you know how hard it is to find a decent one.”
Chris laughs at my joke. Now that I know he’s okay, my instinct is to make jokes until the panic goes away. To trade the adrenaline of fear with the endorphins of making someone laugh. “So, was it ramen in the coffee maker again? Left a grilled cheese on too long?” The familiar roller-coaster of emotions I’ve felt my whole life swings from fear to giddiness at the drop of a hat—much to my mum’s chagrin.
“Frozen pizza in the oven.” He shakes his head, looking sheepish. “I put it in when I got off shift and fell asleep on the couch while I was waiting.”
My roommate is a first-year teacher, but since he makes next to nothing, he also has a part-time job bartending at a local restaurant. The man works so much he’s hardly home. A perfect roommate, really.
“Is everything okay?” Ophie huffs as she jogs up beside me. “What happened?”
“Chris was just testing the City of Portland’s emergency response teams’ reaction times.” I grin at her, but she doesn’t look impressed.
“Only took them six minutes,” Chris adds, leaning forward on the hood of the car. His unconcern at the situation only amplifies her consternation. “Hey, how was graduation? Are you two finally going to drop your ‘no dating in grad school’ nonsense?”
Ophie coughs and turns bright red. His joke catches me off guard too, and I swallow back a surprised curse.
“Didn’t I tell you I booked us the honeymoon suite at the Four Seasons?” I laugh off the familiar accusation. No one seems to accept that Ophie and I are just friends. Best friends, sure, but just friends. We drew that line at the beginning of our relationship. A line that had been crystal clear until eight weeks ago.
Chris holds his hands up, the emergency blanket slipping off his shoulders. “Okay, okay, whatever. If you two would just start dating, everyone would leave you alone. You have to admit it’s weird how much you two hang out and you’re not together.”
“I hardly think that our dating status is more important than the fact that there is a fire in your apartment.” Ophie sticks her hands on her hips and glares at my roommate.
I get caught in the crosshairs as well, but it rolls off my back. She’s never really mad at me. Annoyed, for sure, but angry? Never. And I like keeping it that way, so I jump in with my own defense. “We only graduated four hours ago.”
“Four hours is plenty long enough to change your relationship status.” Chris shakes his head at us before pointing to a man standing beside one of the fire trucks. “Fire chief said it was contained in the kitchen. They have to assess for smoke damage, but nothing outside of the kitchen was burned.”
As if summoned by Chris’s words, the man makes his way over to the three of us. “Fire Chief Mason. You the other roommate?”
“I am.” I hold my hand out to shake his. His eyebrows dart up at my accent, then furrow in thought. He’s about to ask me where it’s from, guaranteed.
“Are you English?”
And there it is. For as much as Americans like to watch British television, ninety-nine percent of them assume that’s where my accent is from. You’d think between Charlize Theron and Leo’s decent attempt in Blood Diamond, more people would recognize the accent.
“South Africa—Cape Town, specifically. Any word on the damage?” I cut the twenty-questions game short, impatient to know the worst.
The fire chief takes his baseball cap off and runs a hand through his hair before he answers. “The kitchen sustained the bulk of it, but there is smoke damage throughout. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to stay in the home for the time being. Do you have somewhere else you can stay?” He tips his chin in Ophie’s direction. “Your girlfriend’s house?”
He directs the question to Chris, and I have to restrain myself from growling at him. My wife takes a hasty step away from Chris and closer to me. “Yeah, I have space.” She looks up at me, her brown eyes full of concern. “Maggie’s all moved out now, so I have a spare room. Chris, do you have somewhere to stay, or do you want to sleep on my couch?”
“Thanks, but I already texted my boyfriend, so I’m good.”
“I won’t be able to let you in to get anything until tomorrow at the earliest, just as a safety precaution.” Chief Mason glances back at his men still buzzing around the parking lot and front door.
I shrug. “I’m pretty sure she’s stolen enough of my hoodies and sweatpants that I’ll be fine for a day or two at her house. Do you need us for anything else, or…?”
Once he verifies he has our contact information, he declares us free to go. I’m sure this is going to be a pain to deal with, but not one I can do anything about tonight. With a final wave to Chris, Ophie and I head over to our cars.
“See you at home, Mrs.—”
Ophie’s hand slapping across my mouth cuts me off before I can finish teasing her.
“Do. Not.” She growls the words, glancing around the empty parking lot.
I wink at her and step back into a small bow. “Ms. Moore. Shall we?” I know she doesn’t want anything to change between us, and even though it breaks my heart a little, I’ll keep pretending that’s true. Starting by not using this unexpected stay at her house to my advantage.
Ophie holds her glare for another moment until she dissolves into giggles. Forcing a laugh, I lean against my car, facing her. “Oph, you know nothing’s changed, right? We’re still friends. It’s just a piece of paper. Insurance in case it takes longer to find a job than anticipated. Fingers crossed, we never have to tell anyone about it.”
The tension releases from her shoulders as they sag, and I pull her in for a hug. “Promise?” Her voice is muffled against my chest but still audible. Or maybe it’s just that I’m so used to hearing it that I could pick it out of a crowd anywhere.
“Promise.” I kiss the top of her head, something I’ve done often in the past. I’ve even done it a hundred times in the last eight weeks, and nothing was different. It’s the most natural thing in the world and yet somehow, in this moment, with my heart still pounding from the shock of coming home to my place being on fire, entirely new.
I’m still puzzling over the change, unable to pin down exactly what’s different, when we pull up at her place and I take the parking spot her sister used to claim. I heard all about Maggie and Kel’s roundabout romance last fall from Ophie. She was rooting for them from the start and treated me to long diatribes on the awkwardness of Kel’s pursuit of her sister.
“You know you can stay as long as you need, right?” She looks back over her shoulder as she lets us into the condo. It’s a small place—just two bedrooms and a single bathroom—but she and her sister have done their best to make it nice. Maggie has a flair for color and decor, and most of it is still here.
The familiar white couch squeaks as Ophie flops onto it, her chunky heels dangling precariously off her feet. “I don’t know if I need a nap or a shower.”
I pull her shoes off and set them beside mine at the front door before dropping into the easy chair, my legs splayed in front of me. “Nap. Definitely a nap first. At least we never have to write another paper again.”
Peering at me from underneath the arm draped over her face, she grimaces. “Don’t remind me. I don’t want to think about my thesis or the problems with the Oceania ports of call ever again. And I’m working the morning shift tomorrow.”
My head thunks back on the edge of the chair as I groan. “I still have ten essays left to grade for Higgs—damn him and his acceptance of late work. Grades are due at midnight tomorrow. Why did I decide to TA for an Economics 101 class?”
Rustling and grunting sound from Ophie’s direction before she replies, “Because the US immigration system is confusing as fuck, and the only job your counselor thought you could have with your visa was as a TA.”
I lift my head to glare at my best friend. She’s rolled over to sprawl facedown on the couch, her dress barely covering her ass as it sticks up in the air because she didn’t bother to remove one of the many cushions that decorate it. “Right. That.” Normally, I would reach over and smack her bum without a second thought, but now I hesitate.
We both swore that getting married wouldn’t change anything between us. But somehow, everything suddenly feels different.