Chapter 4
We tracked the taco smell down two blocks over from the historic downtown. And as we rounded the corner, we were back in the twenty-first century. On the other side of some bushes was a strip mall. Dollar General, Payday Loan Check Cashing, a discount tobacco shop, a nail salon. And like the stores we’d seen on the main street, they were also all closed.
But that didn’t really matter because there, in the parking lot, was a woman behind a folding table, making tacos. There was a grill with meat cooking on it, and the most amazing aroma wafting toward us. My stomach rumbled as I breathed it in, which made sense, since the last time I’d eaten had been at eleven a.m.—a fifteen-dollar pizza slice and seven-dollar can of soda.
There were a surprising number of cars in a parking lot where no stores were open, but a second later, I understood why. We weren’t the only ones who thought tacos would be a great idea—there was a line of people waiting that had to be ten deep. I could see some people eating right there, sitting in their cars or on the little raised concrete barriers in front of parking spots.
“What do you think?” Russell asked.
“I think yes please,” I said, and he laughed. We could have walked around to the street entrance to the strip mall, but we both headed toward the scrubby knee-high bushes, cutting through to the parking lot.
He stepped through them first, then turned back and extended his hand to me.
My pulse started to pick up, and I took a deep breath, trying to steady myself. And then I reached out and took Russell’s hand.
As soon as our palms touched and his fingers closed around mine, I felt a jolt run through me—like it went from my fingertips directly into my chest. And I flashed back to the bus station, when I’d somehow known that it would be like this if we touched. That it would be electric.
Russell’s hand was big, almost enveloping mine—and I was so distracted by the fact that we were touching, that his hand was on my hand, that I wasn’t paying any attention to what my feet were doing. I tripped over a rock and stumbled forward—but then Russell’s arm was suddenly around my back, catching me.
“You okay?”
I looked up at him and nodded. My heart was thumping wildly in my chest, in full-on dance party mode—because flight was certainly the last thing on my mind. His arm was all the way around my waist and I was pulled in close to him, closer than I had yet been.
I could see now that there were little flecks of gold in the blue-green of his eyes. There were faint freckles scattered on his cheeks, an unplotted constellation. I wanted to trace it with my eyelashes. I wanted to run my fingers over it until I had it memorized.
As he’d wrapped his arm around my waist, my tank top must have gotten pushed up, because I could feel that part of his hand was touching the bare skin on my back, making it feel like it was on fire. His other hand was still holding on to mine, and I could feel the blood pulsing in my fingertips—I was pretty sure I could feel his, too. I wasn’t sure how any of this had happened, but I didn’t want it to ever stop.
Russell was looking down at me, and I could see he was breathing a little harder now. I was too, like it was taking more of an effort just to be this close to him. And for a second, I thought about stretching up on my toes so that our faces would be level. I was so close to kissing him—only a few inches, a breath, and a bit of courage away. I could practically hear the orchestra starting to swell, the music kicking in…
Yes!Katy swooned. Kiss him kiss him!
No.Darcy. Stop behaving like a damsel in distress, Didi admonished.
Shh!Katy said. Go for it, Darcy.
But then Russell blinked and looked away from me, breaking this moment. He released his arm and I stepped down onto the asphalt of the parking lot. He held my hand a second longer, then let it go. “You okay?”
“Uh-huh.” I tucked my hands into the back pockets of my jean shorts. Normally, I would have been blushing up a storm. But I somehow didn’t feel embarrassed—just disappointed that his hand wasn’t holding mine anymore, that his fingers weren’t brushing against my bare skin.… I tried to compose myself. “Sorry about that. And thank you.”
“Sure,” he said. “My pleasure.” We were still standing maybe a step closer than we needed to—it was a large parking lot, after all—and his eyes lingered on mine for a moment, then dropped down to my mouth before he looked away.
I felt a swelling in my chest and smiled—clearly, we were on the same page with the whole wanting-to-kiss-each-other thing. I had to fight down a wave of incredulous, happy laughter. How had this happened? How had the worst situation I’d ever been in turned around so decisively into one of the best? “Okay,” I said, really needing to focus now. “So. Tacos.”
We headed across the parking lot together, now definitely walking a little closer than we had been before, like we’d somehow crossed a threshold. Like I was pretty sure that wouldn’t be the last time we touched. That there was more coming at some point.
When?Katy demanded.
We got in line, and the sheer number of people, combined with the truly heavenly smell, was convincing me that this was the right thing to do—and so much better than anything we could have gotten from a vending machine.
There was a chalkboard easel with a menu written on it. And as I scanned it, I crashed back down to earth. I had been so focused on the tacos—and then on Russell, his hands and eyes and heartbeat—that I’d forgotten about things like commerce.
The woman behind the table was selling tacos, burritos, muletas, tamales, and quesadillas. All of them were much cheaper than anything at the festival had been. But none of them were free, which meant I needed to do some math. I silently cursed Romy as I pulled my remaining cash out of my shorts pocket.
“What looks good?” Russell said, squinting at the sign. “I’m suddenly starving.”
“Me too. I’m just… okay. So I have thirty-two dollars.”
“I think that’s enough.”
“No—it’s just—Romy, the girl I went to Silverspun with—”
“The one keeping the party going in Palm Springs?”
“The very same. She took my cash when we split up, in addition to my charger. I still have to pay to get my car out of the lot at Union Station, so I just need to do some math.…” It was eight dollars every twenty-four hours you had your car there. So I would need twenty-four for my car. “Okay, I think I have eight left,” I said, tucking the rest of my cash in my pocket. “Should we split something?”
“I have some money. Why don’t you let me get this? It’s my treat.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“You’re not letting me. I’m offering. What if the bus takes forever to get fixed and you need more to get your car out?”
This possibility hadn’t occurred to me, and the thought of it made my stomach drop. “Only if you promise to let me Venmo you. You know, once I get my Ameche charged.”
“It’s really okay. I have…” He spun his backpack around and rifled through it. “Twenty bucks! More than enough for a taco feast.”
“Well—thank you. That’s really nice of you.”
“I can’t believe your friend took your money.”
“Well—friend might be too strong a word. More like gym-class acquaintance.”
Russell’s eyebrows flew up. “You went to a music festival with a gym-class acquaintance?”
“Well, when you put it like that…” He laughed. “On some level, I knew it was a mistake. Didi and Katy certainly told me that enough. We had PE together, but it wasn’t like we ever hung out just the two of us. I must have been really far down the list of people she was asking to go.”
“So… why did you say yes?”
Seriously,Didi grumbled.
“I think I just… wanted this.” I gestured around us.
“Tacos in a parking lot?”
“I mean, not no,” I said, and Russell laughed. “I think… I just wanted an adventure. A little bit of the West to take with me. Especially because I’m leaving. Music and flower crowns and big horizons…” I glanced over at him and smiled. “But really, the main draw was the Nighthawks. When I saw they were closing out the festival, I was in.”
Russell nodded and took a step forward even though the line hadn’t moved much. “Did you guys get along okay?”
“Friday night was good.” I flashed back to how the fairgrounds had looked after we’d first set up the Merediths’ tent, everything still new and well-maintained, the crackle of excitement in the air. We’d dashed back and forth between all the stages, plotting out who we wanted to see. “But then she found some people to party with on Saturday, and I didn’t see her again until I was taking down the tent and she grabbed her stuff.”
“And some of your stuff, too, it sounds like.”
“Yeah. But I really think it was an accident. We were just dividing everything up and she took my pouch by mistake.”
“That’s really frustrating.”
“It’s okay, actually.” I looked over at Russell and gave him a smile. “And if she hadn’t, I might not be here now. So I’m kind of finding it hard to be upset about it.”
Russell looked down at the ground with a smile, the tips of his ears turning red.
We stood there for a moment in comfortable silence, the sound of conversation around us and meat sizzling on the grill. I looked back and saw that since we’d gotten there, three people had stepped into line behind us. I tipped my head toward them. “Looks like we came here at the right time.”
“Have we somehow discovered a hidden Jesse gem?”
“Seems like it. Unless the line is because this is actually a secret speakeasy and we need to know the password.”
“I’m sure someone would tell us. We look like we’re down for a good time.”
I nodded toward a white van, parked crookedly in its space. “The entrance is through that van. They’ve built an underground club. Literally.”
“You know, I’ve actually been to one.”
“A van club?”
“I mean, I wish. I meant I’ve been to a speakeasy. In Paris—Candelaria. It just looks like this little taqueria, but through the back there’s a bar.”
“Wow.” I nodded, trying to pretend like this was just normal for me. Like my friends were also always talking about their time in Paris going to bars. “It’s cool that they let you in.”
He laughed. “I wasn’t worried about that. I was with my… my cousins.”
“Oh.”
“They’re twins,” he explained. “And very cool. Astrid and Artie. They’re the best.” He smiled, like he was calling them to mind. “Have you been?”
“To Paris?” I shook my head, suddenly feeling out of my depth. But then a second later, I remembered Russell had said his mother was French. This suddenly didn’t feel quite so intimidating—maybe he’d been there visiting relatives. “Non. Not yet, I mean. Hopefully someday.”
“I just thought… because your mom.” I looked at him sharply. “Because she was in London—I thought maybe when you would visit her, you guys went over there.”
“No,” I said, keeping my voice light, ready to move far away from this subject. “I’ve only been out of the country a few times. Mexico, Prince Edward Island—”
“Where’s that?”
“Canada,” I said, trying not to sound as scandalized as I felt. “It’s where all the L. M. Montgomery books are set.” Russell just looked at me, his expression blank. “See, this is how I can tell you don’t have sisters. She wrote Anne of Green Gables, the Emily books…”
“Oh, right! Got it.”
“And then we went to Panama a few years ago.”
“Panama?”
We moved forward a step in line. The line really wasn’t moving very fast, but I found I didn’t particularly mind. “Yeah, my dad got their tourism account and was trying to help them rebrand. The official slogan before had just been ‘Panama!’ with an exclamation point. He was trying to come up with something a little more specific.”
“That’s so cool he’s in advertising.”
“It’s fun to be around. Like when I was younger, I’d hang out at the offices a lot. I’d just be trying to write a book report on Wonder, and I’d hear adults going into full-blown meltdowns about what cereal mascots would and wouldn’t say. And when he was working at home, during the pandemic, he’d let me pitch on taglines or concepts.”
“That’s awesome.”
“It really was.”
Russell looked at me, his head tilted slightly to one side. “But…?”
I was a little taken aback by the fact that it seemed like Russell was able to read me so easily already—but then a second later, I realized this was a good thing. This was how these nights went, right? You got to know the other person fast. How else were you supposed to be in love by sunrise? “But,” I continued, giving him a smile, “it’s just… not what he set out to do. He wanted to be a novelist. There was this whole sci-fi story he was working on, back when I was in elementary school…”
“Did he ever try to get it published?”
“I’m not sure. I just know one day he was working on this book, and talking about it at the dinner table, and then it was like none of that had happened. I think maybe it just got to be too hard? Raising me, doing his job, and writing a book…” I wasn’t about to tell Russell this, but it was ultimately one more thing that Gillian had taken away.
“Well… maybe he’ll be able to now? Now that you’ll be off to college?”
I nodded, even though I doubted it. Because I could practically see what the house would look like when I was gone—my dad sitting alone at the kitchen table. Me in Connecticut, him in Raven Rock, both of us unhappy.
“Next!” the woman called, and we all took a step forward.
Now that I was a little closer, I could see that by the table, there was a cooler filled with ice, with waters and cans of soda sticking out, and I edged up a step, trying to see more clearly. “You think she has Sidral Mundet?”
“What’s that?”
“What’s that?”
“Is it a kind of taco?”
“It’s a drink,” I practically sputtered. “A delicious Mexican apple soda that’s basically pure sugar. Do they not have taco trucks in Ojai?”
“Of course we do.”
“Good ones?”
“Really good.”
“I don’t know about that. If they don’t have Sidral Mundet, I’m not sure I trust them.”
“My favorite one makes their own tortillas and they have horchata on tap.”
“Oh. Well—that actually does sound delicious.”
“It’s amazing.”
“Still. I bet mine is better. Leo’s, on Raven Rock Boulevard, across from the little Target. I can show you.”
Russell smiled wide at me, like he could somehow see the same thing I could—this night, this feeling, just continuing, pulling us forward through time and space until there we were, the two of us holding hands outside my favorite taco spot. “Sounds like a plan. And I’ll ask for an apple soda.”
“Sidral Mundet.”
“That’s the one.”
“Next!” the woman called, and I realized that four of the people in front of us had been in a group—which meant there was only one person ahead of us, a man who stepped forward to order. The back of his T-shirt read The Nevada Independent.
I breathed in the scene for a moment, trying to etch it into my mind. How many nights had I stood like this, waiting in line for dinner in parking lots and sidewalks? Knowing I was only moments away from a paper bag with foil-wrapped tacos or a burrito or a quesadilla sandwiched between two paper plates, red and green salsas on top along with the little plastic bag with lemon slices and radishes.
“Oh no,” I groaned, as a terrible realization hit me all at once.
“What? You okay?”
“Decidedly not. I just realized this is the last authentic taco I’ll have until Christmas, probably.” I let out a breath. “Is it possible to be nostalgic for something when you haven’t technically left it behind?”
“I’m sure there’s a word for it. Probably a really long German one.”
“I can look it up.” I reached for my phone and then immediately realized this was futile. “No, I can’t.”
“Can you get some more tacos before you go? When do you leave for Connecticut?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Yeah, I’m taking the red-eye to New York, and then the train to Connecticut. My dad and I have a whole plan. We’re going out to dinner first—he’s calling it the Last Supper. And then on the way to the airport, we’re going to In-N-Out to pick up shakes for the drive, since I’m going to be without it for the longest time in my whole life.”
Russell shook his head and folded his arms—god, they were nice arms, bare except for his watch. It was an actual watch, not an Apple Watch. A worn leather band, a white face with gold numbers and hands. “I didn’t even think about the fact you’re not going to be able to get In-N-Out for months. That’s rough.”
“But you won’t have it either—I assume there’s none in Michigan.”
“Jeez, that’s right. I guess I’ve been in denial.”
“But at least there’s good stuff in Ann Arbor. My friend Jack went there last year. He was always talking about that one deli…”
“Zingerman’s?”
“Yes! He brought us back black-and-white cookies once; they were awesome.”
“But maybe you’ll have something like that—I’m sure they have something really delicious in Connecticut. Maybe they’ll have amazing tacos there, who knows.”
“They have nothing good in Connecticut. It’s barely a state. Nobody even has a concept of it.”
“That’s not true. I’m sure there’s something.”
“Like?”
“Like… Yale? Hedge funds?”
“I appreciate the effort, but Connecticut is basically the beige of America.”
“So… um, why are you going there? It doesn’t sound like you’re that excited about it.”
“I’m not.” I said this shortly, then immediately regretted it. I shook my head, trying to think of how I wanted to put this. “Sorry. I just—got a really good financial-aid package. One that was pretty hard to turn down. But it wasn’t my first choice.” I figured that Russell didn’t need to know how exactly I’d gotten my free ride, or that it had been pretty much my only choice.
He nodded, looking right at me—like he was letting me know that if I wanted to tell him about it, he’d be listening. I considered this for a second, but then pushed it away. Tomorrow, and everything that came after it, had no place here, tonight, with Russell.
“Next!” the woman called as she handed the man in front of us a brown paper bag and a dripping can of soda, and I realized with alarm that I hadn’t even made my decision yet.
“What did you want, Darcy?” Russell asked, and I couldn’t help but notice how much I liked the way he said my name.
“I’ll get a carne asada taco and a cheese quesadilla.” I took a breath to order, just as Russell stepped forward and ordered for me in perfect Spanish. I just stared at him as he ordered for himself—a chicken burrito and an al pastor taco—then took a step back to stand with me while we waited.
“Sorry,” he said, looking abashed. “I probably shouldn’t have done that. I just wanted to impress you.”
I felt a happy little flutter in my chest. “Well—it’s working.” I gave him a smile and tried to focus, even though it felt like it was getting harder by the moment. “I thought you spoke French.”
“My mom’s a translator. You had to pick up multiple languages in my house if you wanted to eat.”
“That’s so cool! How many languages does she speak?”
Russell frowned, his head tilted slightly to the side, like he was counting in his head. And with every second that passed, I got more impressed. I could just see them—Russell and his dad and mom, all sitting around their cozy kitchen table, multiple languages flying rapid-fire as they talked and laughed together.
“Five,” Russell finally said. “French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. But she’s currently trying to pick up Korean, so let’s say five and a half.”
“So does she translate books?”
“Now she does. When she started, it was more in hospitality. That’s where she met my dad, actually. He was in France and ended up hiring her to be his translator because he kept accidentally insulting people.”
“So that’s the opposite of building bridges.”
“Exactly.”
“More like tearing down bridges. And you can’t have that.”
“Okay, fun fact—”
“Oh yay!” I clapped my hands together, and Russell laughed. “Another one!”
“I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic.”
“I swear I’m not. I wouldn’t do that to you. I’m no Tall Ben.” I paused—something had just occurred to me. “You guys never went with Big Ben instead?”
“Okay, where were you back in fifth grade?” He swung his backpack down to his feet and started to unzip it. “I’ll text him—”
“Dead phone.”
“Right. It’s hard to remember.”
“The fact? Sorry I keep interrupting you.”
“Oh—well, it’s about French. Did you know it’s one of the most precise languages? The vocabulary is a lot more limited than English. So a lot of contracts and treaties are written in French, because you can really drill down on the language and specificity.”
“That is a fun fact. A fun French fact, even.”
“Okay, now you’re being sarcastic.”
“Maybe just a little.”
We stood there in silence for a moment, just the sound of the meat cooking, the faint hum of one of the cars idling in the parking lot, and two women sitting on one of the raised concrete parking blocks, eating their tamales and talking, with occasional bursts of laughter.
A gust of warm air—a desert wind—swept across the parking lot, blowing my hair across my face. I was pretty sure I had a hair tie somewhere in the depths of my canvas bag, but I didn’t want to go looking for it right this minute, so I just tucked my hair behind my ears. “There’s a line I love. It’s about the moment you understand someone’s humor without having to ask. How it’s the turning point in any relationship—when you’ve found the skeleton key to the soul.”
“What?” Russell asked, staring at me.
“It’s from Theseus’s Sailboat,” I explained, knowing this would be necessary, since most people had never heard of this book. It had come out ten years ago, it wasn’t a bestseller, and there had never been a movie or anything. I’d found it at the Raven Rock Library two years ago when I was looking through the New and Noteworthy section (it must have been mis-shelved; it was neither of those things). Looking back on it, I had no idea what about it had grabbed me—the cover? The title? The fact that my dad was waiting for me and I had to hurry? I could no longer remember, but I’d checked it out—and then I’d devoured it.
It all took place over one night on a small island off the coast of Maine. A twentysomething guy, Will, gets locked out of his hotel room—with a cat—and ends up spending the night walking around the island and talking with Emma, a marine biologist waiting up to see the first whales in a generation return to the harbor at dawn. In between the story of Will and Emma falling in love over the course of the night, there are cutaways to the summer camp on the other side of the island—this was admittedly my least-favorite part of the book. Well, that and the two chapters in the middle that were from the cat’s point of view.
And even though I’d tried to get my friends to read it—even gifting copies to Didi and Katy for Christmas last year—neither of them had gotten into it. “It sounds like Before Sunrise,” Didi had said dismissively.
“It’s not like Before Sunrise,” I’d protested, even though it was, a little. “It’s Maine, not Vienna. And there’s a camp! And a cat!”
“Pass,” Didi had said, and no amount of arguing could get her to even give it a shot. But I kept at it, because I wanted her to experience just how wonderful it was. In my mind, it was the perfect book. The first time I’d read it, I’d immediately wanted to crawl inside the world that it portrayed. And that feeling had never gone away, despite two years and countless re-reads.
Russell was still staring at me, and I realized I probably hadn’t been at all clear. “Sorry, it’s a novel,” I explained as he knelt down by the backpack at his feet and started digging through it. “It’s actually my favorite novel. It’s—”
He stood up, and I saw he was holding something in his hand—a battered hardcover copy of Theseus’s Sailboat.
“Oh my god. What?” I took his copy from him, just staring at it. It was a different edition from mine—his cover showed a couple looking out at the water, a cat winding around their feet, a whale breaching in the background. This was the book, I realized, he was reading when I’d first seen him across the bus station.
“How is it your favorite book?” he asked. “It’s my favorite book, and nobody’s ever heard of it.”
“I know! It’s a tragedy! I keep trying to get my friends to read it, and nobody ever will.”
“I did get Tall Ben to start it, at least. He couldn’t get through the camp stuff.”
“Yeah, that part can be rough. But if you just make it through—”
“I know! He’s missing out.”
We just looked at each other for a moment. What was this? How was this happening? Even in all my daydreams about what it would be like when I fell for someone, I hadn’t allowed myself to imagine something this wonderful. Someone this cute, this easy to talk to, who just got me—and loved the same book I did. It was like opening up the most beautifully wrapped present under the tree and finding a kitten inside. A level of wonderful I hadn’t even known to ask for.
“This is… crazy,” Russell said. He took a tiny step toward me.
I looked up at him, my pulse galloping, his favorite book in my arms and my eyes locked on his. I took a step toward him. Everything in me was screaming for me to kiss him, or at least take his hand again, and—
“Ready!” the woman behind the table yelled. We both turned to her as she set a big paper bag with our order on the table. “Drinks?”
She didn’t have Sidral Mundet, so I got a Sprite and Russell got a pineapple Jarritos. He handed over his twenty to pay, and as she counted out his change I noticed a little cardboard box on the table—selling candy for the Jesse High Teacher Supply Fund. There were bags of Skittles and Hershey bars, but then also less familiar candy—Big Cherry and Abba-Zaba.
“Want anything?” Russell asked. He picked up the Abba-Zaba and turned it over in his hands. “Oh man, I haven’t had one of these in years.”
“I’m not sure I ever have,” I said as the woman set Russell’s change down on the table. He bought the Abba-Zaba, too, and dropped the rest of the change in her tip jar. I started to walk away, figuring we’d be sitting on the parking blocks to eat like those women, when something occurred to me. I turned back and nodded at the candy box. “This high school,” I said. “Where is it?”