4. nick
NICK
CHOKED ON HIS OWN DICK
Nobody questioned when I booked the same flight as Tallulah. There were only a handful of flights from Houston to Toronto anyway, and we both had to leave for Canada the same week. I thought it’d be my first chance to talk to her alone. I wasn’t expecting Fridge to offer to take me.
I popped open his trunk for my suitcase. “Dude, if you don’t want to talk to that blonde from the bar, don’t answer her messages. It’s that simple.”
“I don’t want to hurt her feelings.” Fridge threw his head back to groan. “I don’t want her to think it’s anything serious—I’m so bad at this shit. I can’t end things. I don’t want to be the bad guy.”
“Rip off the Band-Aid.”
“Do it for me.”
I grabbed his phone, typing an appropriately worded goodbye message. Even if it’d been a year since I’d sent one, it was muscle memory, the easiest thing to write. The “it’s not you, it’s me” kind of thing.
“Thank you,” Fridge sighed.
I elbowed him. “Gaming Thursday?”
“Don’t ask stupid questions, Nick. Of course we’re gaming Thursday.” He chuckled and I grinned his way, until my gaze diverted to the black car pulling up to the curb.
My heartrate picked up at the sight of her.
Tallulah Walker stepped out of the car, her long, dark hair pulled back with a strawberry-print headband, a pink shirt tied at her waist, soft blue jeans hugging her thighs. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, gazing up at the airport that was already busy at seven o’clock in the morning.
Tallulah was so pretty. And soft. And lovely. A word I’d never really used before, but it fit her so perfectly because I loved to look at her.
Fridge patted me on the shoulder, jostling me out of my daydreams, bypassing me. His voice was purposely low. “It’s my last time seeing her for a couple of months. I appreciate the excuse, Nick.”
“Excuse?” I repeated. “What—?”
“Fridge!” a woman’s loud voice pierced the bustle of the airport crowd, and I didn’t understand what I was seeing.
This unknown woman was a Tallulah from a parallel universe.
Was that Tallulah’s mom? Both women were Native with the same hair, facial features, the same walk—but that was where the similarities ended.
Her mom belonged at a punk rock concert with her leather jacket and heavy, dark makeup, and tattoos lined her neck.
My surprise deepened when Tallulah’s dad slid out of the car. Leather jacket, prominent tattoos, his long hair in a braid over his shoulder, a huge septum ring protruding from his nose.
My eyes bounced between Tallulah, walking quietly into the airport, and her parents, wrapping Fridge in a bear hug.
When Tallulah’s family went to the help desk, I grabbed Fridge by the arm. “Those are Tallulah’s parents?”
“Yeah.”
“How did they have Tallulah?”
“Her parents…” Fridge bit back a grin. “I don’t mean to brag, but…”
“Brag?”
“Her dad’s Jacoby Blackgoat. He designed the stratosphere bender—a type of guitar. It was really famous fifteen years ago.”
“Her dad made a guitar?”
“Series of guitars. The stratosphere bender is the one everybody had. And her mom’s Kendra Walker.
She’s a producer, her discography is incredible.
A decade ago, she was part of The Hard Corrosives.
” At my blank stare, his grin widened. “Metal band. You’ll know them, their big hit goes like—” He muttered guitar notes under his breath, whispering the lyrics.
My eyes widened. “I know that song!”
“Everybody knows that song, Nick.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s in commercials.”
I threw him an exasperated look. “You said her parents are laid-back! You never told me—”
“They are laid-back. You’d think they’d be pretentious—they’re not. They’re the coolest people you’ll ever meet. On Saturdays, they scroll through sites looking for people to donate to—” He fell silent when Tallulah’s parents returned and her dad chortled.
“Fridge, are we still getting breakfast?”
Fridge nodded, grinning. I couldn’t believe he’d never told me about her parents. I couldn’t believe nobody ever mentioned them. Tallulah and I hung out in pretty much the same circles—how did it never come up?
I held out a hand. “Hello, sir—”
“Do I look like a sir to you?” Jacoby laughed, shaking my hand. “Fridge, who’s this?”
“Nick Kurosawa—”
“Nick?” Kendra asked with new interest.
I smiled. “Nice to meet you—”
“Nick the Dick? The Puckboy? The Playboy?”
My smile fell. I stole a glance at Tallulah, shuffling things between her luggage and her backpack, out of earshot. I shifted uncomfortably. “Uh, that’s what I used to be known for—”
“Used to?” Her dad snorted. “Fridge told us about how you slept with that goalie’s girlfriend and he kept getting penalized for trying to kick your ass through the game—”
“That was in Minnesota—”
Her dad clapped me on the back, moving in. “You’re going to Canada, too?” I nodded and he squeezed my shoulder. “Do me a favor. Stay away from my daughter.”
Fridge and Tallulah’s mom burst into laughter, probably at the absurd, random timing of it, but Jacoby’s eyes narrowed through his pleasantries.
I had the distinct feeling he wasn’t kidding.
When Tallulah returned, she was quiet through the goodbyes, hugging her parents tight. Fridge pulled her into a hug as well and her face darkened with a blush. I didn’t know what to make of that.
Then she left for the line that’d separate us from everybody else.
Us from Houston and what we were leaving behind.
Us from her parents who I was pretty sure didn’t like me.
Us from Fridge.
I stepped behind her in line and Tallulah did a double-take. “You’re…?”
“We’re on the same flight,” I said, aware of her waving family in my peripheral vision.
“Oh,” she squeaked and repositioned herself, head bowed.
If I wanted a new introduction, it had to start now. I cleared my throat. “Tallulah? I know your mom’s band.”
Her eyes darted my way, eyebrows knitted like she wasn’t sure she heard me correctly. “Okay?”
“The Hard Corrosives? My mom had their CD growing up.”
“Mm.”
“Everybody would know them at school.”
She gave a light shrug, silent.
“Why didn’t you tell anybody? I don’t get it.”
Silence stretched between us, her gaze darting to mine a few times before she sighed, shouldering her backpack covered in gold and black beaded flower keychains.
“On the Cherokee Reservation, everybody kind of already knows my mom, and if they don’t, they don’t make a big deal about her.
” She slipped her ID out of her wallet, facing away from me again.
“Off the rez, at festivals, presentations, awards—people can be so weird about her. I didn’t want that to happen at Marrs. ”
Security separated us into different lines as I realized what she was saying. Tallulah didn’t want to tell anybody about her parents because people would freak out about them. Which was exactly what she thought I was doing.
I wasn’t doing that at all, I just wanted a connection with her! I went through the detector, muttering under my breath. What could I say? I had to salvage this.
I jogged to Tallulah, stopping her from walking to the gate. “Do you want to get breakfast?”
“Um, me?”
“Yeah. You. Me. Breakfast. Before the flight.”
Her eyes were so wide, a deer caught in headlights. “We only have—”
“They won’t leave without us. We’ve got, like, thirty minutes. It’ll be fine.”
I might as well have asked Tallulah if she wanted to hop on top of the plane and hold on for the flight.
She gaped at me. Because I was talking to the girl who did her assignments before everybody else.
The girl who used to text my coach to ask if she could come to games, every game, like she wasn’t automatically invited.
Tallulah was kind of a nerd. No. She was a nerd, and that never stomped out the crush. If anything, I thought it was cute. Used to anyway. Now, I wanted her to ignore the rules she clung to and have breakfast with me.
“No, I don’t think so,” she said awkwardly, walking past me. “I don’t want to miss the flight.”
Strike two—what was wrong with me? I used to be so confident. Tallulah had me tripping over my tongue like nobody else. For the first time in a long time, I felt a flush creep up my neck as I followed her to the gate.
She hung by one of the columns, book in hand. Of course she had a book, she liked nerd shit, but I didn’t know any details about the stuff she was into, so I had to nix that for a conversation starter.
I needed to say something funny. Something to recover.
One of the gate agents took to the microphone. “It looks like we have a Luxury Air flyer today! We’d like to personally thank our premium, exclusive Luxury Air flyer and welcome them to be first aboard!”
That was perfect. I dipped down to Tallulah. “What kind of rich prick asshole has them read off the shit like that?”
Tallulah’s face darkened with a blush, stumbling over her words. “That—that would be me.”
“What?”
“My mom did the voiceovers for their safety guidelines,” she mumbled. “They gifted us the lifetime program.”
Holy fucking shit. There was no way—fuck.
Strike three.
I was out of the game, and we hadn’t even gotten on the plane yet. I watched Tallulah shrink into herself, boarding before everybody else, and put my fist against my forehead, head low. “Fuck. Me.”
This was a fucking disaster.
Leaning against the column, I glanced down the hallway. I still had time to admit the Canadian trip was a terrible idea. I could refund my ticket, give the Blades and Coach Tomasini a big “fuck you,” and spend my summer at Marrs. It’d be so easy to give up.
If I gave up. There it was, that big ‘if.’
Would I really give up so easily?
Something my teammates used to say came back to me—no concha.
No concha—don’t spiral, don’t panic. This was a setback, nothing more.
I clenched my jaw, rolling my shoulders. Determination set. They called my group’s number, and I boarded.
No. Concha.
I refused to spiral and I refused to give up.
Tallulah sat in the third row, just like I knew she would. I’d overheard from Zariah and June in a conversation at Gianna’s and booked my flight the same day. I sat in the seat next to her.
Tallulah looked mortified. “We’re—we’re sitting together?”
“It was the last first-class seat,” I lied. I could be chill about this—I would be. “Tallulah? I’m sorry about what I said.”
“Um…it’s okay.”
“I want a new introduction with you,” I said truthfully. “I don’t think we’ve ever had a real one.”
Her eyes slid between my outstretched hand and me. “I—I don’t understand.”
“What?”
“Why are you talking to me?” she whispered. “I don’t understand, because…you never talk to me.”
I could feel the flinch in her words. Tallulah was wary of me. Of course she was, I’d basically been ignoring her since last summer. How could I explain? How could I say I couldn’t trust myself around her and she was the reason I became celibate?
I hesitated. “I—uh—”
“Nicholas. Kurosawa,” a girl interrupted, slinging her arms over the back of the seat in front of me, scowling. “You. Fucking. Asshole.”
This couldn’t be good. Especially since I had no idea who she was. I held up a hand. “Uh, lady—”
“Lady? You don’t know who I am?!”
I leaned around, gesturing to get the flight attendants’ attention. There was no way this was her seat. Despite my hard pointing, the flight attendants were oblivious to this code red situation. Weren’t they supposed to have a sixth sense about problem customers?
“You and I had sex.” The unfamiliar, angry college girl sucked in a breath, furious. “I invited you to my dad’s office party, and you slept with my mom in the back room!”
I grimaced. “Shit.”
“They’re getting a divorce—you ruined my fucking life!”
I didn’t remember her, but I definitely remembered her mom. That happened in Minnesota—what was she doing here? “Lady, your parents’ marriage was already on the rocks—”
“You’re a whore!”
A whore? Fuckboy I could handle, but damn, whore actually hurt. “I’ve changed—”
“I don’t give a fuck,” the girl snapped.
“I’m not that guy anymore!”
“I hope you take a long walk off a short fucking cliff and your bones break and wild animals eat you—” She made sure to get Tallulah’s attention, pointing at me like she wished her hand was a gun. “Take my advice, don’t speak to him. Nick would do the world a favor if he choked on his own dick!”
The flight attendants finally ushered her away, but after that performance was there really a point? I stared in disbelief at the safety cards. She was from Minnesota. What were the odds of that girl and I being on the same flight?
I couldn’t think of anything to say and Tallulah was burrowed against the side of the plane, bulky headphones over her ears, effectively cutting me out.
Fuck.
Me.
How was I supposed to recover from this?