Chapter 40 Claire
Claire
Iopen my eyes and stretch, the twin-sized bed somehow feeling even smaller without Jay in it. I glance at my phone and see he must have left for work. I scroll through my notifications to see if there are any texts from him or Chloe, but there’s just Facebook requests and email alerts.
Jay wasn’t kidding. His place really is tiny, but despite its size, it feels just like him.
Some parts are reserved and steady — the bare white walls or the single framed photograph of him in the middle of Ronan and Mikey, sitting on his dresser.
Then, some parts are personal and warm — the sandalwood candle on his kitchen counter or the worn toothbrush next to the soap by the sink for cleaning his nails of stubborn grease.
And then of course, some parts are just…
Jay — the mismatched sets of dumbbells, the books and ashtray on his bedside table.
All of these things together fill this small space with everything it needs — him.
Jay gave me more of himself last night than he ever has.
The circumstances were completely unexpected, my dad selling the Maverick to his long-lost brother, but it’s like fate pulled that whole story together for this reason.
Like I had to do a favor for my Dad, not once, but twice, for me to meet Jay and get us here.
Better yet — and I’m not one for “everything happens for a reason,” — but if this was the endgame of losing my job, disappointing my parents, and stressing about my entire future, it just might be worth it.
I reach for my phone again and send a quick text to Jay.
ME: Text me after work. I miss you already.
I know he might not be able to check his phone for a while, but I want to remind him I’m waiting for him when he gets done. I swipe out of those messages and into my chain with Chloe to send her one too.
ME: Are you alive?
After a few minutes, and no texts back, I decide to head home. I have no idea when Jay gets done today, but I’m in desperate need of a toothbrush and a shower.
Feeling refreshed, I sit down at my computer to work on my novel.
I still haven’t heard from Jay or Chloe, but I have writing to do anyway.
I've barely touched my draft since I started it the other day and after last night, I’m flooded with ideas.
Apparently, all I have to do is have mind-blowing, heart-shattering, sex with a man who is tall, inked, and handsome, to bring my dreams and fantasies to fruition.
I had the idea to write a story about childhood best friends growing up together after Jay told me about his tattoo with Ronan.
He told me sparrows survive in all kinds of difficult situations, and it made me think that friendships, or any kind of relationship, are like that too.
Whether it be the type that finds each other in the thick of the heavy stuff, like Ronan and Jay’s, or the type that just deals with new problems as they come, like mine and Chloe’s, all relationships experience trials.
Which is why I started my story of Alice and Owen — two young friends who grow together and take on life’s hardships as a team.
I hope that by telling the story in two different time frames, one with them as children and one as teenagers, young adults will be able to relate to the natural ebb and flow of a relationship as people get older and evolve over time.
Friend and friend, sibling and sibling, parent and child, the goal is that there’s something relatable for all types of connections.
I write for the next few hours, continuously it seems, barely stopping for even a check in spelling.
Before I know it, my computer’s dying, my stomach’s growling, and my hands are cramped in the best possible way.
I save my document, close my laptop, and check my phone, surprised to see there’s still no new messages.
Jay doesn’t shock me, from what I know he rarely checks his phone as it is, but even when there’s time at work, his hands are usually too dirty to even risk looking. Chloe, on the other hand, surprises me.
I scroll through my contacts until I reach her name and call her.
Right to voicemail. I try again thinking it was just a fluke and again her voice pops through saying, “Sorry, I can answer the phone right now, I just don’t want to.
Leave a message. Bye!” I feel the thoughts start swirling in my mind but I remind myself it’s Chloe.
She probably left her charger in the car again and is just too lazy to go outside.
I occupy myself with a cup of tea and another Google search for jobs. Scrolling through the short list of nearby available positions, I expand my search and one listing catches my eye. I click on the post.
Description: Freelance writer needed for pet rescue
Responsibilities:
Writing creative descriptions of available animals
Interviewing adopting families for website content
Regularly updating brochures with rescue information
Requirements:
Relevant writing and editing experience
Open availability to meet demands of intake and events
3+ years of professional writing experience preferred
Okay, so I wouldn’t necessarily say I’m an “animal lover.” I always wanted a dog, but Dad said no one would ever be around enough to take care of it. Then at the Start of Summer Carnival, I won a goldfish, but let’s just say I knew there was something I forgot when I left for camp.
Besides that, the rescue is also pretty far from here and I have zero or less years of professional writing experience, but it does get me thinking.
I never thought about piecing work together until I could figure out my next move.
I have had it so ingrained into my head that there’s only one right way, only one direction, that it never even crossed my mind that there might be something that allows more time in my schedule for my novel but also pays my rent.
I favorite the post and change the job search at the top from “Education” to “Freelance Writer.” Dozens of jobs populate, so many of them either nearby or remote — news journalist for a local paper, interviewer for an online memoir company, food-feature writer for a restaurant chain — now that’s something I could get excited about.
The possibilities seem so vast to me. As someone who’s lived the last decade or so on such a narrow path, I guess black and white thinking has become a learned trait.
I condemn my Dad for thinking my life’s work means teaching or failure.
Am upset by his thought that if I leave education, I’m not the successful child he raised me to be.
But somewhere along the line, I’ve started to see the world the same way.
I have developed the thought that if it’s not teaching, it’s book-writing or nothing.
That I either have to give up on my dream or take it on so aggressively that I have to give up everything else.
But the world is filled with so much gray.
So much beautiful, glistening silver that holds opportunities I’m just now seeing for the very first time.
I close my laptop, determined to ride out this new high.
And find my best friend.
I’m pretty sure Chloe’s neighbors either hate me or are eighty-year-olds with their hearing aids turned all the way off.
I am pounding on Chloe’s door and not one has poked their head out to see where the fire was.
I didn’t even knock first, just went straight to breaking down the door.
Call it adrenaline but the second I got here and didn’t see her car anywhere nearby, I started freaking out.
I raise my hand to whack the door one more time, but instead of the door, my fist hits bone. I yell and two other cries follow. One is Chloe’s God-awful screech and the other is deeper, more guttural — low like a growl. I focus my eyes and see a half-naked Ronan hunched over, hands to his face.
“Oh my God, Ronan!” I yell.
“Claire!” Chloe yells back. “What the hell?”
“I didn’t kn…What is even happening here?”
The aftermath is pure chaos, Chloe running to the freezer for ice, me running to Ronan, and Ronan stumbling back onto the chaise behind him.
“You’re not supposed to be here!” Chloe says as she wraps a bag of frozen fruit into a dishtowel.
“You weren’t answering your phone!”
“It’s dead!”
“Well, I thought you were dead!”
Meanwhile, Ronan holds his nose, blood slowly creeping from his nostril, and snaps his head back and forth between the two of us.
“Not dead! Just wish I was!”
“Hungover,” Ronan clarifies. I try to steady myself, pieces slowly falling into place. Ronan, Chloe in a man’s t-shirt, two glasses on the kitchen table, Chloe’s Spiritual Gangsta tank top near the bathroom on the floor.
“Wait a second. Did you two—”
“No,” they both say in unison.
“Then will somebody please tell me what’s going on?”
“I got drunk,” Chloe says.
“Very,” adds Ronan.
“Okay, I got very drunk. Ronan drove my car home for me and allegedly put me to bed.” She winks at me waiting for his response.
Ronan looks up from under his makeshift ice pack at Chloe with a wrinkled brow. Then he turns to me.
“I walked her in and tried putting her right to bed but she insisted on me saving her “thug tank” from any probable vomit. So, I gave her my shirt and put her in the bathroom to change.”
“My hero,” Chloe says and Ronan rolls his eyes playfully, bringing the fruit back to his face.
“I didn’t have a car.” He looks back to Chloe. “Or a shirt. So, I fed us each a glass of water and slept on the couch. And apparently forgot to charge her phone.”
“You guys realize it’s the middle of the afternoon, right?” I say.
“She wouldn’t let me leave.”
“I woke up late and The Goonies was on. Nothing happens when The Goonies is on,” Chloe says matter-of-factly.
“She was all, 'Don’t ask questions, Sonny. Take a seat’.”
“Gambino,” we both say, looking at each other knowingly.
“Okay, well, you freaked me out,” I say.
“I got that,” Ronan says.
“Yeah, that’s my bad.”
“It’s fine. You pack a killer punch. Jay will be proud.”
I smile in the cheesiest way, thinking about him and missing him all the same.
“I’ll make sure to tell him when I see him,” he continues. “I was just heading out.” Ronan hands the fruit to me and turns to Chloe who looks at him confused.
“I’m sorry, but I’m pretty sure it’d be frowned upon to enter the establishment in which I work and own, not covering my nipples.”
“Well, that does not sound like any sort of establishment that I’m interested in,” Chloe quips.
Her familiar smile tells me there's a probable chance she's more than interested in both Ronan and his business. She goes into her room to change shirts, leaving Ronan and I alone for the first time.
It may be because I'm seeing him shirtless or just that the bar fight look is working for him, but suddenly I understand Chloe's interest. Ronan is objectively a very handsome guy.
“I’m really sorry, again,” I say.
“Don’t be,” he laughs. “Chloe’s lucky to have a friend who’s so…passionate.”
“Hey, you wouldn’t happen to have heard from Jay, would you?”
“No, my phone’s dead too. Why? Is something wrong?”
I hesitate to tell him about anything with his brother. It just doesn’t seem like my place to say, and as far as not hearing from him during the day, it’s not something I’m necessarily worried about. I’d love to get a reply, sure, but we all know despite his schedule, he’s a man of very few words.
“No, no, I just haven’t heard from him yet today.”
“You know how he is. I’m sure he’ll call you after work.”
Chloe comes back out in a neon yellow t-shirt with a chicken on it wearing sunglasses and tosses Ronan his shirt back. He throws it over his head, careful to avoid his nose which is no longer bleeding but is already starting to bruise.
“I’ll see you ladies later,” he says as he walks toward the door. I shoot Chloe a follow him look and she hurries to meet him.
“For real, thank you for last night,” she says. “And this morning.”
Ronan leans in just inches from her mouth and says, “It’s okay, Goonies always make mistakes.” Chloe’s lips part, but right before he brushes them with his, he tilts his head, landing a gentle kiss on her cheek.
“Just don’t make any more,” he whispers into her ear.
And that was the moment that I saw my best friend fall in love.
Well, not really.
But, maybe.