Chapter 14 Ris #5
“I don’t mean that meanly! I’m really sorry this isn’t going the way you’d hoped.
I hate seeing you sad. I wish people were better at following through, but no one is.
No one ever shows up when they say they will; no one ever wants to hang out or talk.
No one wants to show up just for the sake of showing up. It sucks.”
“It really does,” she agreed. “I think I underestimated how invested people are in believing they’re already fulfilled. I just don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”
“You’re not doing anything wrong, Nanaya.
This is just the way folks are. Remember that docuseries we watched about face-to-face conversations and how low ability the test group was after they were given their first smartphones?
The internet ruined us for actual connection.
It’s easier to text than to have a conversation face-to-face.
Everyone talks about needing a village until they have to be a villager. This is why—”
He broke off, swallowing hard. For a moment, Ainsley said nothing, looking down at his guitar, strumming softly, swallowing again before he continued.
“When I say Tate was the only friend I had that I could count on, I’m not exaggerating.
He was the only one that I always knew would be there when I needed someone.
He might moan and bitch about it, but he showed up.
He always showed up. Until those last few years.
No one else ever wanted to be inconvenienced. ”
For a long moment, neither of them said anything, that same chord progression becoming the soundtrack to their mutual disappointment in other people.
“I know how much you miss him, Ains,” she murmured eventually. “And I know you’re still hurt over everything that happened and you think you didn’t matter, but . . . I hope you know you were probably that only friend for him, too.”
A burst of that hard laughter. Ris realized that he hadn’t been to the Thursday night group since Fitz had come home with them. Maybe this is his group now.
“Yeah, I think I’ve worked past that in therapy.
I know what being allowed in as close as I was meant .
. . I just wish he had trusted me about all this as much as I trusted him.
Do you know what he did when I quit that band?
He left the club one night at, like, 2 a.m. or whatever stupid time he used to get off, walked over the guy’s building, it was this total dickwad demonborn, like, just such an arrogant fuckface .
. . anyway, he went to this douchebag’s apartment and hotwired his car.
By the time the sun came up, he had taken apart the engine block.
Sold the whole thing for parts by the end of the week, and gave me the money.
I think that’s actually how I bought this guitar.
No one wants to commit grand theft auto for a friend anymore.
Like, what’s the point of being friends?
! You can’t even get any of your ballerinas to meet for coffee! We’re all doomed as a civilization.”
“I don’t think I have anyone!” she blurted, heat rushing up her neck. Ris was horrified to realize she was on the verge of tears. “That’s so pathetic to admit! I don’t have anyone in my life I can count on that way. Other than you.”
Ainsley grinned. It wasn’t his blinding, brilliant smile, and she knew he might never get back that same level of carefree exuberance. Maybe, she considered, like the anxious, afraid-of-his-own-shadow dog in his crate, who was most certainly not a rambunctious little puppy, this was better.
“Yeah, well, you’re stuck with me. I hope you don’t mind pushing around these creaky old bones when I’m eighty, and you’re still wearing your hot little yoga outfits.”
“There’s no one else I want to be stuck with,” she confirmed.
And what happens when he’s gone? Who will be your person then, if you can’t make this work?
“I just . . . I really want to make this work. But I don’t even know where to start, apparently.
Three people! That’s pathetic! I wasn’t asking anyone to come and give a kidney as collateral, it was literally just coffee at the library! ”
“It was too far,” Ainsley shrugged, not looking up from his fingers as he worked through another section of music. “That’s probably the main issue.”
Ris twisted from her spot on the sofa, staring at him open-mouthed. “What?”
He didn’t say anything for a moment, pausing to write down the notation of whatever he’d been working on. When he looked up at her at last, his eyebrows shot up at her expression.
“Well, you said the three who showed up were from your yoga class, right? That’s just up the street from the library. Who else lives in the area? I don’t mean in Bridgeton, I mean like, right here.”
Ris lifted her hands, wanting to throw a pillow at him but not wanting to frighten the dog. “It’s not like I asked them to pack an overnight bag!”
“No, but you asked them to leave their bubble. Like, I mean, when I lived here in the city the last time, we lived our whole lives in a ten-block radius. Literally. When I lived in Starling Heights, it was even smaller. The Pixie was the furthest thing in my routine.”
“Oh, you are so full of shit!”
They both looked down quickly, checking Fitz’s reaction to her slightly raised voice. He had disappeared back into his crate. Ris closed her eyes, shaking her head, annoyed with herself, exhaling hard before continuing in a softer voice.
“You literally came to see me in Cambric Creek, like, a week after we met! We did things here in the city! We did things by your apartment, we did things near my condo. Do you mean to tell me—”
“Yeah, because you’re super hot and I was super into you.
Also, and I don’t think you can discount this, but we’re weirdos.
We like going out and doing things. Most people don’t want to put on pants if they’re not at work.
And, not to sound speciest, but you’re asking them to come to a mostly human neighborhood when most of them probably never leave the Creek.
Didn't you say that was the whole downtown initiative? So that residents don’t have to leave? ”
“Yes, but—”
“We’ve already established that folks barely want a real connection with anyone.
I just don’t think you can expect that they’re going to be willing to travel for something they don’t think they need in the first place.
Everyone wants to believe they’ve already won, not that the day-to-day is still something you have to work at.
Mirrors are hard, babe. No one wants to look at them too closely.
Wanna do a video chat with my therapist? ”
She sat back, wrinkling her nose. Un-fucking-believable. He was right. The three attendees she’d actually had were right from the neighborhood. And almost everyone else is from Cambric Creek.
She wanted this to work. She desperately wanted to make it work not just for herself, but for all of them. She knew how much they needed it, how much they would need it, even if they didn’t realize that themselves just yet. We’re going to need it when all our people are gone.
“I’m going to drop into group, I think. Are you good?”
She turned her head up as he rose from his seat, fist wrapped around the guitar’s neck, bending to kiss her when she nodded. “I’m good. We’ll have those brownies when you get home.”
“I love it when you give me a reason to be excited about coming home.”
He squatted before the open crate once he’d emerged from the bedroom, lounge pants swapped for jeans, a hoodie under his arm. “Be a good boy. I won’t be gone long.”
Fitz came to lie with his head hanging out of the crate once more, pressing into Ainsley's palm. He was silent, dark eyes shining up.
Time and patience.
It was good that he was going back to group.
Good that he’d been home tonight to talk this through with her, to help open her eyes to what was evidently a gaping hole in her strategy.
Patience and time. It was what she needed as well.
He was right — she wasn’t just creating a social group, she was creating a revolution.
A tiny one, perhaps, insignificant in the larger world, but hugely important to her own.
One that would change the future, once it worked. And that can’t be rushed.
Ris slid to the floor, her back against the sofa, tapping open her tablet screen.
She had a good amount of maybes, and not this times.
And those aren’t nos. At least, they don’t have to be.
She needed to rework her initial plan, opening the Cambric Creek Community Center’s website, searching for a day she might be able to reserve an empty room.
Fitz crept from his crate like a shadow, pressing to her hip as he curled up beside her like a grey comma. Time and patience.
This was only a roadblock, and it didn’t need to be permanent. And now you know what you need to do. It’s time to go home.