I can’t help it. I ask, “Do you think that’s fair?”
“What do you mean?” A asks.
“Look,” I tell A, “I’m happy you’ve come all this way. Really, I am. But I didn’t get much sleep last night, and I’m cranky as hell, and this morning when I got your email, I just thought: Is all of this really fair? Not to me or to you. But to these…people whose lives you’re kidnapping.”
“Rhiannon, I’m always careful—”
“I know you are. And I know it’s just a day. But what if something completely unexpected was supposed to happen today? What if her girlfriend is planning this huge surprise party for her? What if her lab partner is going to fail out of class if she’s not there to help? What if—I don’t know. What if there’s this huge accident, and she’s supposed to be nearby to pull a baby to safety?”
“I know. But what if I’m the one that something is supposed to happen to? What if I’m supposed to be here, and if I’m not, the world will go the wrong direction? In some infinitesimal but important way.”
“But shouldn’t her life come above yours?”
“Why?”
“Because you’re just the guest.”
It comes out sounding harsher than I mean it to be.
I go on, “I’m not saying you’re any less important. You know I’m not. Right now, you are the person I love the most in the entire world.”
“Really?” A sounds skeptical.
“What do you mean, really?”
“Yesterday you said you didn’t love me.”
“I was talking about the metalhead. Not you.”
The waitress brings our grilled cheeses and our French fries.
“I love you, too, you know,” A says once she leaves us alone.
“I know.”
“We’re going to get through this. Every relationship has a hard part at the beginning. This is our hard part. It’s not like a puzzle piece where there’s an instant fit. With relationships, you have to shape the pieces on each end before they go perfectly together.”
Relationship. I want to know if that’s what this really is. But A is not the right person to ask.
Instead, I point out that A’s piece changes shape every day.
“Only physically,” he argues.
“I know.” I eat one of the fries. I’m tired of talking, but don’t know how to get out of it without making A feel bad. “Really, I do. I guess I need to work on my piece more. There’s too much going on. And you being here—that adds to the too much.”
“I’ll go,” he says. “After lunch.”
“It’s not that I want you to,” I try to assure him. “I just think I need you to.”
“I understand.”
“Good.” I make myself smile. I need to change the tone. “Now tell me about this date you’re going on tonight. If I don’t get to be with you, I want to know who does.”
Then I sit back and listen as he tells me about this girl named Dawn who this boy-born-a-girl, Vic, loves like oxygen and needs like nothing else in the world. It’s a love story, pure and simple, and I find myself glad that someone in the universe gets to have one.
Even though I’m only meeting Vic this once and I’ve never set eyes on Dawn, I think about them after A leaves. I imagine the shit they must have to steer through to be together. It’s the first thing today that feels perfectly timed. I have it bad, sure. But people can put up with a lot to get to the place they need to be.
I need to remember that.
After school, Rebecca, Ben, and Preston take me for ice cream. They want to know more about my Mystery Man—that’s what they call him, and I don’t know that they’re far off.
I don’t tell them much. They respect that. But it’s also clear that their curiosity is going to continue, and I’m going to have to either invent some further lies or break up with Mystery Man pretty quick.
I am sure to make it home on time for dinner. Over chicken and potatoes, I tell my parents that Justin and I are over. To my extreme mortification, I start to cry. Even though I know it’s the right thing, and even though I know it’s my fault, saying it at the dinner table makes it more real than it’s ever been before. I don’t tell my parents about any Mystery Man. So the full story is that Justin and I are no longer together.
I know they’ve never liked him. I know they’re not going to tell me to try harder, to make it work. I am grateful for that. My father says, “There, there.” My mother says she’s sure it’s for the best. Then they just sit there and watch me cry. They wait for me to put myself back together. They change the subject, and ask me how Rebecca is doing.
I calm myself down as I tell them about an invented weekend—basically, I take the night with Rebecca and spread it out over two days. Lots of movies. Lots of talk. Lots of memories.
Justin isn’t mentioned again.
I know that I owe A some kind of communication. Later that night, I send an email.
A,
Today was awkward, but I think that’s because it feels like a very awkward time. It isn’t about you, and it isn’t about love. It’s about everything crashing together at once. I think you know what I mean.
Let’s try again. But I don’t think it can be at school. I think that’s too much for me. Let’s meet after. Somewhere with no traces of the rest of my life. Only us.
I’m having a hard time imagining how, but I want these pieces to fit.
Love,
R
After telling so many lies to so many other people, it feels good to be honest with someone, and to know that honesty will be appreciated. If A is going to be the one true thing in my life, I have to keep it true…even as I wonder if I can make it real.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I am ready to meet him wherever and whenever I have to. But when I finally get an email from A the next morning, it’s to tell me he’s woken up in the body of a boy whose grandfather has died. He has to go to the funeral today. There won’t be any way to meet.
I want to type back that I’m sorry for his loss. But it’s not his loss, of course. I actually feel bad for the boy whose body he’s in, because he won’t get to attend his own grandfather’s funeral. It’s not A’s fault. But it’s still not fair.