Great, I think.Now I’m thinking about a girl I’ve met twice who’s probably going home with Mason tonight.
Counters done, I open the fridge. A yogurt is two days past its expiration date. I know it’s fine, but the date says what it says, so it goes in the trash. I rearrange the shelf, pushing the tall things back and pulling the pickle jar closer.
Close, like Mason’s arm along the back of her chair, the half-inch of space between his fingers and her shoulder. And when I think of her leaning toward it, my stomach tightens, which isn’t really fair given I’ve met her twice and she owes me nothing.
But, underneath the jealousy — simpler and dumber — I know that I want her. But I only let that thought linger for a second before I throw that one out like the yogurt, then close the fridge and stand in the dark kitchen with nothing left to clean.
My phone buzzes on the kitchen counter. The group chat, probably, or another problem queuing up for tomorrow. I don’t go look, because that list is closed for the night, and the last thing I need is another open problem keeping me up.
As I stand there with my hands empty and nothing left to fix, she surfaces in my thoughts.
Nina.
I haven’t thought about her in a while, but like always thoughts of her come back at the strangest times. This memory, sophomore year, sitting on her dorm floor at two in the morning. She’d been crying for a while by then, and she said the line that sticks with me.
“You are everybody’s safe place and nobody’s actual partner, Rowan,” she’d said. “Is there any part of you that is able to just be and not always be looking to solve?”
I tried to answer. I remember my hands opening and closing on my knees, looking for something to hold or do, but whatever I came up with was the wrong shape. I could see it landing wrong before I’d even finished saying it, and it made things worse.
She went to sleep, and a week later we were done.
With Nina shoved back down and the apartment as clean as it gets, I turn off the lights and go back to bed. But sleep still won’t come, and I almost pick up my phone, not to check the group chat, but to text Ivy and ask for Sloane’s number.
But I hesitate, my thumb resting on Ivy’s name, because I already know exactly what I’d do with that number. There’s a version of herself that she hands to a room — smooth, easy, the one she wants people to take — but twice now I’ve watched the other one appear, quick and real, like sun breaking through cloud.
That’s the one I’d chase.
And a girl showing everyone the easy version while she keeps the real one tucked away is the kind of thing I’ve never in my life managed to leave alone. She’d say she doesn’t need help. Nina would say I can’t help it. Neither of them is wrong.
So I don’t text Ivy.
I set the phone face down and lie back in the dark, but I’m unable to shake the fact I want her. Not as a project, not as something to solve, just her. And what I want, more than I’ve wanted anything in longer than I can remember, is to be the one she doesn’t bother hiding from.
But wanting it doesn’t change what I’d do with it. So I do the only thing I know how to do with a problem I can’t fix: I set it down for the night and tell myself it’ll keep till morning, although the morning seems a long way away when I can’t think of anything else but Mason’s hand on the back of her chair.
five
SLOANE
Mason ordersfor both of us before I’ve even opened the menu.
“You’ll love the burrata,” he says.
The waiter writes it down, and I set my unopened menu on the edge of the table, smiling like burrata would have been at the top of my list if I’d had the chance to look.
The Lantern is not the sort of place I’d have expected for a college first date, but it fits the girl Mason wants and the girl I’m trying to be. It’s all dark wood and amber light and leather booths that creak when you shift.
My dress is a cute navy one my mom bought me, all taste and very little suggestion. Opposite me, Mason looks exactly as polished as he always seems to, and he’s smiling at me like I’m a good decision he’s already made.
Then he makes another decision.
“We’ll do the Barolo,” he tells the waiter, who nods and departs, and that’s apparently that.
I have approximately zero opinions about Barolo, but I have many opinions about being asked. But I push it down and reach for my water, because making a fuss isn’t what I’m about this year.
Especially not when I’m on a date with a member of Halden Hockey royalty.
“So.” Mason settles back, one arm draped along the top of the booth. “How old are you?”
