36. Grant
Grant
I’m at The Break. No clients. This would usually be my signal to text Annabelle.
We could get lunch, or put on a movie, or actually watch a movie.
I could help her pack orders and bring them to the post office, or pretend to think up better captions for her cards while secretly loving the ones she wrote.
Instead, I’m at work with my most annoying sibling. They all take turns. Today, June gets the honor when she hassles me about missing family dinner on Sunday.
“Family dinner isn’t a command performance,” I say.
“You could have texted the chat, though.”
“I was busy.”
“Doing what?”
“Nothing.” Mostly feeling sorry for myself when I wasn’t feeling like an idiot. Bouncing between those two states takes a surprising amount of time.
There’s a box on the center table with plate shards sticking out of it. I’m about to take it to the dumpster when June tries to pull it out of my hands. “I need that.”
I take a second look when I recognize the floral and hot pink pieces. It’s the remains of Annabelle’s tiered tray. The one she spent so long making. The one that had pride-of-place on her desk, holding her most important pens—the tools of her trade. She loved that tray.
Loved. Past tense. The word feels small, like it’s shrinking down to nothing, and that’s what I decide I’ll feel. Nothing.
“She did it yesterday,” June says. “I let her in.”
“Why?”
“Because she needed to do it.” June’s chin is trembling. “Watching it happen kind of broke my heart.”
“That’s your problem right there.” I get ready to chuck the contents in the disposal bin. “You put your heart out to get broken.”
June tries to take the box from me. “What are you doing?”
“Getting rid of this.”
“No you’re not,” June protests. “I’m going to remake it.”
“You can’t.”
“Yes I can. I can glue it if I’m patient enough.”
We’re wrestling over the box now. Both of us trying to hold onto it. It’s so stupid. I let go and she stumbles into a table.
She straightens and glares. “Quit being an ass.”
“Annabelle’s not your best friend!” I roar. “You barely knew her. I spent more time with her than—”
I stop myself before this conversation gets even stupider.
June gives me a measuring look. “Maybe she’s your best friend. Do you know her favorite color? Her birthday? How she takes her coffee?”
Pink. May fourteenth. Lots of vanilla creamer.
June continues to prod. “Do you know her favorite movie? Do you know what made her cry in fifth grade? Do you know how she learned to cook?”
I know all of that. And so much more. I know what brand of shampoo she uses, the name of the goldfish she had as a kid, and how many after-school art classes she took. I know she’s ticklish behind her ear. I know the exact way to make her call out my name in bed, and how much I like hearing it.
But I’m not going to hear it again. I told Annabelle who I was from the start and she saw me for who I am. I was fine for a placeholder, but in the end, Annabelle was always going to go off to seek true love.
June’s got a duster in her hand, smoothing the feathers over and over. “You still have her number. You could call her and ask—”
“She’s gone.” I thrust out my chin, daring her to contradict me. “She went to California and she’s not coming back.”
“She might.”
“She won’t.” I point to the box of broken pieces. “That, right there, shows you she’s not coming back. Everything you need to know is in that box.”
June smacks the feather duster onto the table. “Well, shit.”
“Very shit.” My gut feels like someone’s crumpled paper left on the floor. I hold the back of a chair, my shoulders slumped.
June blinks rapidly. “Do you need a hug?”
“Why would I need a hug?” Hugs don’t solve anything. They just make you feel mushy and worse.
“The rage room is free all day,” she says. “You could suit up and have a go.”
“No.”
“It might help.”
“It won’t.” What I have buried inside me needs to stay inside. The person who would emerge in a rage session is a person I don’t want to be.
June slides the box of tray pieces toward herself. “Someday, you’ll meet an amazing woman, and you won’t push her away. You’ll show her how you feel.”
“Not going to happen.”
“It might. But first you have to admit you have feelings.”
“I need to sweep the rage room.”
“No one’s been in there since Annabelle, and I already swept.”
“I’m going to sweep again.”
I grab the big broom and head to the back. June reset the room yesterday, leaving only small bits and dust.
A bright pink shard catches my eye. I stop, gripping my broom handle, debating whether I should pick it up. Let it go, I tell myself. Some things are meant to stay broken. But it belongs to Annabelle’s tray. June might want it. Against my better judgement, I lift it out of the pile.
Before I know it, I’m looking through every speck I’ve swept up, making sure I didn’t miss any pieces.
It’s utterly irrational. June is never going to fix that tray.
Even if she did, Annabelle isn’t going to want it back.
She’s on the other side of the country, looking for a new life, and looking for a new someone to share it with.
I hope she finds a man who lives up to the ridiculous standards she has in her head. I truly do. But I know she won’t, because love’s not real.
No matter how much we all want it to be.