Chapter 25 Larissa
LARISSA
You have to feed him with a flat hand,” I said. “Like the way you feed the goats at a petting zoo or he’ll bite your fingers.”
Chris laughed from the driver’s seat. “He doesn’t do that to me.”
“What do you mean? He bites me every time I give him a treat. He’s too excited.”
“You gotta make him wait until he’s calm,” he said, changing lanes. “He has to be a good boy to get a treat.”
“So what you’re saying is, he’s a totally different dog with you,” I deadpanned.
Chris glanced at me, his eyes sparkling.
We’d been driving around for two hours. It was almost 1:00 a.m.—way past his bedtime. We were all the way out by Hugo now. It would be another thirty-five minutes to get home, but he’d insisted on doing one more picture.
I felt bad, but I did need the money.
And I was having a good time.
“I’m going to have a word with Woofarine when I get home,” I said.
“You think he can be negotiated with?” he asked.
“Yes. I think we should normalize arguing with our pets. He threw up yesterday, by the way.”
“He did? What did he eat?” he asked.
“His favorite. Trash. I need to get a can with a lid. He was completely in there. I got him out and he threw up. Before I could grab him, he ate the vomit.”
“I think Woofarine would tell you that it’s better to have eaten something, thrown it up, and eaten it again than to have never eaten it at all,” he said.
“I feel like there’s wisdom in there, but it’s too gross for me to see it.”
He chuckled while he turned onto a dirt road, the entrance to our sixth and last billboard. They’d all been the Toilet King.
The billboard was next to the freeway, but I couldn’t get a good shot of it driving by. The board number had to be in it, and my camera wasn’t the greatest, so Chris navigated to it taking the back way.
We crept down the service road at a crawl, the car bumping along the uneven ground. It was wooded and dark. A rabbit darted in front of us and disappeared into the brush.
“Weren’t you going to tell me a story about work?” I asked, peering out the window at the moon slipping between the trees.
“Oh, right. So I was at Bergmans yesterday and a guy comes in to pick up his prescription. He was pissed because his insurance didn’t cover it.”
“Yeah…”
“He came with a ziplock bag full of change.”
“Like, to pay? What’d you say?” I asked.
“That I wasn’t taking it. He said I had to because it’s legal tender. I told him no and that there’s a coin machine at the grocery store across the street and he can cash it in there if he wants to, but I’m not counting that.”
I shook my head. “I cannot believe that people act like this. But then also, I can.”
“Why? People act like dicks at Donna’s?”
“Ha. You have no idea,” I mumbled.
He glanced at me. “Like what?”
“Like the guy who told me my tip was to get a better job? The enormous group that comes in every Sunday and leaves me pamphlets instead of money. Or the lady who likes to come in with a party of five and give me three silver dollars at the end.”
“Are you serious?”
“Oh yeah. She’s very proud of it too. She thinks they’re special so I should be excited about the two percent tip. She goes to the bank just to get them. I can’t even put them in the machine at the laundromat.”
“Wait,” he said. “Why are you going to the laundromat?”
“Because my building doesn’t have a working laundry room?”
“Go to Mike’s.”
I looked out the window again. “The washing machine is in Donna’s house. I try not to be over there more than I have to be.”
We were pulling into a clearing. The billboard loomed in the middle on its thick steel pole like a strange tree. Chris drove up to where I could get a good shot.
“Why don’t you want to go to Donna’s?” he asked, putting the car in park.
I didn’t answer.
His brows drew down. “Is she mean to you?”
I shrugged a little. “Not mean, just… unenthusiastic?”
He seemed bothered by this.
“She’s never said or done anything,” I said. “Please don’t tell Mike.”
“I won’t.”
“She’s fine, honestly.”
He was quiet for a moment. “You know Mike would not be all right with that if he knew. He would talk to her.”
“About what? Liking me more?” I gave him a face.
He pressed his lips together.
“It’s okay,” I said.
“It’s not though. She’s lucky her son has someone like you. She should be grateful.”
I scoffed. “Right.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m not exactly a prize, Chris.”
He looked at me like I’d lost it.
I ticked off on my fingers. “I’m a high school dropout, thirty thousand dollars in debt, my father is a felon, my mom is my mom—”
“So? You take care of him. You’re smart, you’re funny, driven. And you’re—”
He stopped.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, tell me. What?” I said.
He rubbed his mouth. “I was just… I mean. You know.”
“What do I know?”
“You’re… you’re beautiful.”
I grinned. “Awwwwww, you think I’m beautiful?” I teased.
“Stop.”
“No way.”
“Objectively,” he said. “I’m not saying that I think—”
“Oh, of course not.” I grinned again and pulled my legs into my chest under my dress. “Thanks, Chris. You’re beautiful too.” I put my cheek to my knees. Then I lifted my head again. “If you think I’m pretty, why didn’t you want to drive me home that night? You didn’t even hit on me,” I joked.
“I… I tried,” he said. “You went with Mike.”
I blinked at him. “What?”
“I mean, I tried to drive you home,” he said quickly. “Not hit on you.”
He glanced at me, then looked away. His cheeks were turning pink.
He was lying.
I stared at him. “You were interested?” I asked. “In me?”
“We should not be talking about this—”
“No, you just seemed so irritated. I’m surprised is all. I thought…” I trailed off. “I thought you didn’t want to. I figured I wasn’t your type or you weren’t looking or something. Or you really didn’t want to drive a stranger to River Grove,” I said, laughing a little.
He sat there, silent. Peering out the driver’s side window, probably so he wouldn’t have to look at me. I looked at him instead, like I could glean what he wasn’t saying from the side of his face.
I couldn’t.
“So did the coin guy come back with bills?” I asked, changing the subject.
“The coin guy dumped the whole bag and clotheslined it over the counter at my pharmacy tech.”
“He didn’t…”
“I had to call the cops,” he said, looking back at me. “He got arrested for assault. With pennies.”
“Are you kidding?”
“I’m not.”
“Working retail should be mandatory. You could not convince me that the world wouldn’t be full of better humans.”
“Treat it like jury duty,” he said.
“Yes. And they have to substitute teach one day too.” I sat back in my seat and sighed. “I would love to get out of customer service.”
“Me too. I might start looking for something else.”
“Like what?”
“A hospital job probably. Won’t have to deal with patients or customers,” he said, looking up at the billboard.
Then the conversation stopped. We just sat there, looking up at the sign.
Had Chris really been interested?
I thought back to that night. Mike, being Mike. Flirty and smiling at me. And Chris, hands in his pockets, dark cloud.
But then I remembered something. How he’d mentioned that he was closer to River Grove than Mike was.
At the time I took it like he was letting me know that I’d be inconveniencing Mike more than him. It didn’t feel like a bid to get me to go with him.
But now that I knew Chris, I saw it differently. That was a bid. And I’d missed it.
Chris had been hitting on me, in his own quiet way, but was eclipsed by Mike. He’d wanted me.
I don’t know why but this flipped my entire reality around. A record scratch.
I just never thought…
I never thought I was good enough for someone like him.
And that’s really what it came down to. Yes, he’d looked unapproachable. But really, when I reflected on it, it was when Lexi told me Chris was a pharmacist that I chose Mike.
I figured someone like Chris would want someone smarter or more educated. A doctor or something. Someone on his level.
And what did he think now? Did getting to know me make it different?
I guess it didn’t matter.
Obviously what was supposed to happen happened.
I was with Mike—and I cared about him. Deeply. But I wasn’t sure if I loved him. I kept waiting for it to be clearer, and it just never was.
Maybe what Lexi said all those months ago had been right, my candle was burning low. I thought that things would heat up as time went on, but they didn’t, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Or if I should do anything at all.
I didn’t want to be the kind of person who gets comfortable in an okay relationship and just wiggles down into it and never leaves.
I didn’t want to make mistakes and then just keep making them like Mom did.
But I also didn’t want to be the kind of person who gives up something steady and promising without giving it a chance to be great.
I didn’t want to break up with a good man, especially when he hadn’t done anything wrong.
And maybe in six months I’d feel differently, I’d know for sure which way I was leaning.
But no matter which way that ended up being, this was the direction I’d chosen and Chris was right: There was no point in talking about it now.
We were friends. He was my boyfriend’s best friend.
Whatever “What If” could have happened didn’t and it never would.
Maybe it wasn’t supposed to.
We stared up at the sign for a moment. I had to take the picture, but I didn’t want to. Once I did, the night would be over and I wasn’t ready. Maybe I wanted the adventure of it, or the high of making the money, or maybe I didn’t want to go back to my tiny, crowded, smokey apartment.
Or maybe it was something else.
“Thanks for taking me to do this,” I said.
“No problem,” he said, not looking at me.
I smiled softly up at The King. “Can I pay you for the gas?” I asked.
“No. Then you won’t make your quota.”
“Please?”
“Nope.”
I wanted to argue, but I didn’t think it would help. And anyway, he was right. I couldn’t really afford to give it to him.