Chapter 32 Georgia
Georgia
I slide into the driver’s seat of Junie’s truck, and it’s the strangest feeling in the world when Eddie gets in and sits down
right beside me. He offered—no, insisted—that he come with me, saying it’s just a thing he does. I’m not sure I’m supposed to know what that means. Maybe he’s developed a thing for ATMs since he and I last spoke, and
honestly it wouldn’t be the most surprising thing that’s happened in the last week.
“Are you sure you’re alright?” Eddie asks.
“Right as rain,” I sing back as I start the truck and pull out of the lot.
When I catch a glimpse of him, I can tell he knows I’m faking. Mostly, I’m embarrassed that he and the rest of the crowd saw
Cece’s loud display of her true feelings for me. Especially when I try so hard to be responsible and reliable—all the time,
but certainly for my family. It’s one thing to know someone doesn’t prefer you, and it’s a whole other thing to have the sentiment
loudly proclaimed to an unsuspecting crowd. And only slightly less, I’m worried about just how much cash this ATM will be
willing to give me.
“I won’t keep on at you, but Cece was awful,” Eddie says. “And in your family? I’m surprised—”
“It’s nothing new.” I resist the urge to mitigate the situation, to explain that Cece is not all bad, to list all the ways she’s quietly attentive.
“I know, I know.” Eddie has witnessed her chilliness before. “But that doesn’t make it ok. Especially when you’ve given up
so much to be there for your family. Right now, all the planning and working, but also before.” Eddie stops there, seeming
to sense the dangerous territory he’s approaching.
He was there for the before; he was the one most harmed by it.
This is how it happened:
Eddie and I were two Star Children in love who chose to attend the same college after high school, a distinguished liberal
arts college in Atlanta that offered us both scholarships. There, we pursued science degrees. Him to prepare to apply to medical
school, and me because I thought it sounded like something difficult enough for a Star Child that would make my folks at home
proud, add another feather in my hometown hero cap.
Until our junior year, we’d been mostly neck and neck academically, switching out for whose grades were barely better than
the other’s. The competition was laced with fun and love, and more than anything it felt like a constant push toward making
me my best self. But that year, we took a mind-blowingly difficult organic chemistry lab where he and I were partners. It
was then that everything changed.
Every class, my chemical reactions wouldn’t take. Eddie did his best to help me, coach me, guide me, pray me into success, but it was as if the knowledge just wouldn’t fit inside my head. Eventually our final approached—my one
last chance to pass the class. He’d prepped me like this was my Super Bowl, and I studied diligently.
On exam day, we worked in silence. Everything went to plan.
After three hours of work, we set out our samples and waited for the chemical reaction to settle before bringing them to the professor for review.
Eddie excused himself to the bathroom, and while he was gone, I sat at our bench and watched that beautiful cobalt salt form from the bubbling mix.
It was the result I’d been chasing all semester.
Only, the sparkly blue grains were forming in his dish.
In mine sat a brown bubbling muck, not a mention of blue.
That one moment in that unglamorous lab I was forced to choose: fail my family or fail Eddie. If I flunked this lab, it meant
getting an F in the class; it meant that my aunts who still had my honor roll certificates pinned on their beauty shop walls
would have to walk back all of their pride in me. It meant letting them down, admitting I was no star. The ache to protect
them from this disappointment burned in me and pushed me to consider the other option: to take Eddie’s work. It was the only
way to keep up the facade. My choice defined me as much as it set the trajectory of the rest of my life.
I set my hands flat on the table, checked to see that the coast was clear (premeditation), and reached out for his dish with
one swift swipe. I walked that sample right up to the professor who was delighted to check off my result as correct. He’d
watched me work so hard for it, after all. What I wasn’t prepared for was the look on Eddie’s face when I turned and watched
him return to the bench.
Mortification and disappointment wound into one and smeared across the face that I loved. It didn’t take long for Eddie to
lift the remaining dish and check for the initials he scrawled on the bottom out of habit. Spaces were cramped and shared,
and samples could be easily mixed up. I could tell he expected a mix-up, an accidental swap an hour back at the chemical hood—an
honest mistake. He lifted the dish to read the initials, GLS. He looked up at me hovering at the professor’s desk, and when
our eyes met, I saw an awkward flash of concern as he pointed to the bottom of the dish. He thought it was a mistake.
I held his gaze as I shook my head, and his eyes flashed first with confusion and then with anger.
Like a heavy tick of a clock, I saw the realization unfold across his face, and he leapt to his feet, brown sample in hand, and marched up to the professor’s desk to accuse me of what I’d done: stolen his work.
His face was mottled red, his brows knitted.
He looked at me seriously and paused, giving me one final opportunity to come clean.
But I was silent. I wasn’t coming clean, and I needed this blue sample. To keep me as the whiz kid my family needed me to
be. Even if it meant losing him.
Eddie opened his mouth, probably to call me out, demand answers, but he froze. His eyes landed on me, and disappointment flooded
them. He closed his lips and shook his head slowly.
“Eddie, something you need?” the professor asked.
“No, sir.” Eddie dropped the sample on the desktop. “Just a bad result—must’ve had an off day.”
“Ah,” the professor said. “Well, it’s a good thing the rest of your grade is so strong. You’ll still have an A.”
Eddie shot me one last look, seething this time, before he marched back to the lab bench and aggressively packed his bag.
He didn’t talk to me again after that, as he rightfully ignored my calls, the notes I left on his car, the emails I sent.
Well, aside from the occasional text response of I don’t want to talk to you or Leave me alone.
I deserved it. I’d done this miserable, cruel thing to someone who’d done everything he could to help me get myself to that
result. To someone who had loved me.
In that moment when I boldly stole his work, I chose my family, I chose myself. And even then, he didn’t turn me in. He could’ve
answered the professor’s question by explaining the truth of what was unfolding in that moment. The professor would’ve believed
him because his story would make sense given our separate track records and the initials right there as evidence. Yet he chose to let me have his work. He chose me.
It wasn’t even a week later that both of us were called into the dean’s office to meet with administration and the lab professor.
The professor had taken a second look at the dishes after we left, when he’d grown suspicious as he considered the sudden shift in performance on both ends.
We were accused of cheating—everyone knew we were a couple, so it wasn’t much of a leap to wonder if Eddie gave me his work, knowing he could maintain a high grade.
This time I took the blame, explaining that Eddie was an innocent victim, using the initials right there as proof.
Why would we have put our own initials on our samples if the switch had been planned? The mortification Eddie endured
during the investigation was the final nail in the coffin of our relationship.
Driving to the ATM, I tell him, “I don’t begrudge them my help.” I already chose them. “I’ve accepted that I won’t ever understand
Cece. I just want to move past it, try to forget what happened.”
“Fair.” He shrugs. “Plus, I’m sure she’ll be perfectly sweet when you return with more cash.” He laughs. “Junie keeps going
on and on about how big you’ve made it. I’m really happy for you.”
I pull into the local Piggly Wiggly and park by the glowing ATM at the entrance.
When I glance over from the driver’s seat, I half expect—all the way hope—for there to be an unease to what he’s saying. The
way exes try to be happy for each other, pretend, when really they’d prefer if things had just worked out between them. So
it knocks against my heart when I look up and see he’s entirely sincere.
“You always were so kind.” I don’t plan to say those words to Eddie. It’s like my brain overrides my better knowledge. “Thank you is what I meant.”
He smiles and opens his mouth to reply. But the words don’t come, and I just know the wrestling happening inside his head
is the same as what’s happening in mine. It’s just that my heart is wrapped up in my thoughts too—something I’m certain doesn’t
apply to him.
“It’s ok.” I say it to save him from the moment.
I look over at him again, and he’s staring out the windshield. “Whatever happened anyway?” I ask. “To bring you back here. Junie mentioned something about your mom.”
My heart picks up a little from asking these regular life questions, being this close to him, so close to our history.
“My mom’s really slowed down. She needed some surgery, so I’m on leave from Vanderbilt. She’ll be fine, but it might be a
while before she’s fully recovered. I want to be here for her because—and I learned this from you—time with our parents isn’t
guaranteed. Sorry.” Eddie gets a look on his face like he’s the one breaking the news that my mother is dead.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “I don’t ever forget her, not for long, and remembering her is always a rush of love. Even if it does
still hurt.”
What I don’t tell him is that Mama lives around and within me like part of her spirit was tethered to me as she passed into
the afterlife. A most precious shaving of her soul. I imagine her here and talk to her memory, asking her for advice and wondering
what she’d think of the situations I find myself experiencing. Over the years, I think my mind has built upon the facts of
who she was when she was alive because once she died I had no choice but to extrapolate the rest of her. It was something
I could do to blunt the cruelty of a life so bright snuffed out too soon. So I imagine who she would’ve become if she’d been
allowed to stick around for me. And for Junie.
“So when she’s better, you go back to Nashville?” I’m thinking about Junie and their dating, and it makes even less sense
if he’s only here for a bit.
Eddie pulls a tight smile. “My position stands at the hospital, but I don’t know. I’ve gotten pretty comfortable here.”
I want to tell him that in addition to his comfort, he needs to think about Junie’s feelings and make sure he’s not going
to hurt her when he moves away. She’s not leaving June’s, so if he’s not staying here, it’s long distance or nothing.
I stare at him, a seriousness behind my eyes, and I think he understands.
“I promise I won’t hurt her,” Eddie says.
I feel it physically, this line landing on me. It rocks me in a lurching way that reminds me of what I lost. What I deserved
to lose because of the ways I failed him. But it also grates against me because I don’t believe him. He is devastatingly lovable,
and if Junie has finally fallen for someone, her style will be to fall all in, right away. It’s just how she lives life. So
if he leaves, he will hurt her whether he thinks he is or not. Has Junie even considered this? Honestly, it’s the sort of
detail she usually waves off, pishposh, as something to figure out later.
I cannot get between them. I can’t mention this to her. I will look jealous, like someone meddling.
“I’m going to grab that cash,” I say and push out of the truck.