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“Good,” I say, my lip twitching with humor when her smile doesn’t fade.
“I need you to jump Cash’s bones.”
I stare at her. “We are not talking aboutthateither.”
She rolls her lips between her teeth, but it does nothing to ebb the smile she’s clearly trying to hide.
“I don’t even want to talk about it,” I remind her. “We’re just—”
“Friends,” she interrupts. “Blah, blah, blah. The two of you are so hot for each other, if I wore glasses, they’d fog up every time the two of you were in the same room.”
I pull a cleaning rag from the small bucket of sanitizer water and busy myself, wiping down the already clean back counter.
“You already did that,” Madison says, not one to ever let me off the hook. “But seriously, you need to sleep with him.”
With a deep breath of resignation—knowing short of just walking into the back and waiting until she leaves I’m not going to get out of this conversation—I decide to give in to her rather than waste my time trying to refocus her on something else. Madison has never been the type to get easily distracted once she sets her mind to a certain train of thought.
“And why do I need to jump his bones?” I ask, using her earlier terminology.
“You made me a promise.”
“I can’t recollect a single memory where I promised to jump anyone’s bones for you.”
“We always said that we’d end up with Chase and Cash,” she says, and she doesn’t have to explain further.
We spent countless hours in each other’s childhood rooms, planning our future with the boys we had crushes on, but that was too many years ago to count. By the end of eighth grade, Chase had insulted Madison to the point that she claimed she hated him for over ten years. I was so far encamped in the friend zone with Cash, I knew long ago I’d never have a chance with the man. There are some days I’m strong enough to accept that the relationship we have is the only one we’ll ever have. On occasion, I’m even strong enough to imagine finding someone else who could make me happy.
“Listen,” I tell her, dropping the cloth back into the tub of sanitizer. “I’m very happy that you and Chase worked throughall of your issues and have ended up together, but there isn’t the same type of happily ever after between Cash and me. We’re friends, and I’d be foolish to think there could ever be anything more.”
She gives me a sad smile, and I think I hate it more than the hope she’s always had when this subject comes up. I know what comes next. I know exactly the direction she’ll take. She’s not the only one who claims to be able to see the attraction on both our parts. There are many people who claim to be able to cut the chemistry between us with a knife. They’ve said it for years, but they’re blind. I’m right in the middle of it, and I’ve never even felt a minor shift in the way he acts around me. He’s been consistent since middle school. He’s dated other people, and so have I.
He's never pounded on my door and insisted he’s the one for me, and as many times as I’ve wanted to do that to him, I’d never embarrass myself that way. We’re friends and allowing myself to hope for anything different is just a quick way to be even more disappointed. If anyone can claim anything about me, it’s that I avoid pain, confrontation, and despondency like the literal plague.
“We vowed to be pregnant at the same time.”
It takes much longer than it should for a woman in her late twenties for her words to compute, but when they make it through all the grey matter in my head, I can’t stop the smile that spreads across my face.
“You’re having a baby?”
Tears begin to fill both our eyes as she nods. Hers, no doubt, because of how happy she is, and mine because once again I feel like I’m being left behind.
She left right after graduation. She had different plans for her life. I’ve never asked her about it, but I guessed a long time ago that she left because Chase did. Despite her claim of hatinghim, I think she wanted to be a worldly woman, that maybe in her mind that’s the kind of woman he’d want if they ever reconnected. When both of their lives went up in flames and they ended up right back in this sleepy little town, it was their roots and not their life experiences in the city that they bonded over.
We stayed in touch as much as we could, but life always has a way of getting busy and coming between even the closest of friends.
“I’m so happy for you,” I say with genuine excitement despite my own feelings of failure.
I rush around the counter and wrap her in a hug.
“When did you find out?”
“Last night,” she answers, her hands going to her lower belly. “Other than Chase, of course, you’re the first person I’ve told.”
“Your parents are going to flip with excitement!”
I watch as she chews the inside of her cheek. “I’m nervous to tell them.”
Lindell is a very small town, tucked into a mostly forgotten part of Texas, about an hour west of Austin. It’s a place that had remained mostly untouched by time, technology, and all the bad things that come with both of those. With old-fashioned ways comes old-fashioned ideals. I can see how she’s nervous about being a pregnant, unwed woman.
