“Rowan, what’s up?! We miss you already!”.
She smiled at the warmth. She missed it. Aside from fleeting moments she spent with her dad, her time home had been cold, unsocial, unforgiving.
“Manny. Emmanuel. My man-uel. I miss you guys too. I hope you’re not killing our winning streak now that I’m gone.”
They also played on the same pick-up basketball team they had lovingly dubbed Geeks in Sneaks at the gym in their neighborhood.
Laughing, Manny insisted, “We’re holding it down without you. Don’t worry about your legacy.”
“Alright, good.”
“How’s it going out there?” He asked.
“Uh, it’s going.”
“Nah, I need more than that. What’s been going on?”
“I spent a few days with my dad, out fishing with him on his boat during the day, and cooking what we caught for dinner, which was really great.”
“That sounds awesome. I’m so jealous.”
Emmanuel and Rowan had met in their first year of law school at an environmental advocacy event. He was a first-generation college student of Haitian immigrant parents, also the son of a fisherman. They bonded quickly over their meager origin stories and the subsequent culture shock of being thrust into the elite, high society world of the Ivy League, with its rich students, their presence sometimes more the product of nepotism rather than actual hard work.
“I know, it was exactly what I needed. Uh, but then I started this job.”
“And?”
“The job itself is amazing. Can’t say enough about how exciting it’s been,” she answered tentatively.
“But?”
“But… I may have run into the issue I was telling you about, when I was deciding whether I wanted to take the job and move home or not.”
“No way. What do you mean?”
Rowan sighed. “I work directly with her. I have since the first day.”
“The same girl from before?”
“The same girl from before,” she confirmed.
“Oh my god,” he laughed as he spoke, “and how is that going then? I’m guessing not great by the likes of your voice.”
“It started out rocky, really fucking bad actually, but I think we just had a moment.”
She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose at the realization that Juniper had felt something too. The notebook clutching, the subsequent opening up, the eye contact while they touched. This definitely had to end.
“What kind of moment,Rowan?” He asked, his tone full of teasing anticipation.
“You know. A moment.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line. “You guys fucked?”
“No! What the hell, Manny?” She laughed outwardly, but internally she groaned and flashed right back to the feeling of her hand on the back of Juniper’s leg.
“I don’t know!” He exclaimed in mock frustration. “This conversation has me on a roller coaster. It’s good, then it’s bad, then it’s good, then it’s maybe sexy time. You’re tormented, man.”
“You’re sick,” she accused back, laughing again, “but yeah, maybe tormented is right.”
