Page 128 of Love Felt Like This

“You’ll make the deadline,” he says. “I’ll make sure it happens. I’ll even go with you to the pitch if I have to.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I would.”

“You’d embarrass me by being all”—I wave my hands around—“grumpy.”

He smirks. “Well now I might do it just to prove you wrong.”

The little lines beside his brown eyes show happiness in a way that barely anyone gets to see. He does so much for everyone else, and I wonder if anyone even knows.

He wouldn’t randomly text me Hey stranger.

I can’t tell if I’m happy about that or not.

I inhale. He does too.

With the exhale, I bypass him to head back inside.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Selfish for More

Griffin

It’s dusk. There are pink and purple brushstrokes over the sky as Beverly, her family, and I sit in the yard between the houses, watching the sunset paint the end of a day.

Ava and I have been back in our garage apartment for a week now. While she plays with her toys and dances, I hammer out lyrics and notes—songs that now pour from my fingertips like water. Some songs are for Birds, but then there are others…

I’m crooning new chords that echo memories of Beverly’s laughter that night at the bar. Every strum is my fingers entwining through hers. Every breathy note is the exhalations against her skin on the red carpet.

Being back in Elk Grove is disorienting compared to that.

Our Adirondack chairs surround a large firepit, where we’re nestled in coats and thick quilted blankets. Beverly’s mom and dad curl together on one seat while Rob plays his video game, tucked almost completely under his blanket. Greg sips hot cider that may or may not be spiked with cinnamon-scented liquor.

And my chair is beside Beverly’s. The edges of our chairs’ arms touch, as close as we can get without our armchairs overlapping.

Ava sits in Beverly’s lap. She plays with the wooden bird, now fixed with a single felt wing Beverly crafted onto it. The two of them look so natural together. My girl’s head is settled on Beverly’s chest, and with each laugh, I think I see Ava’s shoulders rise, too, as if contagious with Beverly’s laughter.

I get it. I’m infected by her too.

“So, Polished Shoes going on the road?” Greg asks.

Rob shrugs. “Maybe.”

“Rob,” Beverly’s mom chastises. “What about college?”

“Oh, he’s fourteen,” Nana argues on Rob’s behalf. “Let the boy live.” Rob peers up from his game with a sheepish smile. She tosses a wink to him.

“Beverly, you’re gonna have a show soon,” her dad teases. “Give him a job or something.”

From beside me, Beverly laughs. It’s nervous. They know how hard Beverly works, but I’m not sure they see the anxiety nestled below the surface. Though, for Beverly, you don’t have to look far. Her lower lip is bitten to hell.

“He’s too young,” Beverly’s mom says.

“I could go to LA, though,” Rob says, straightening up.

“I don’t have a show,” Beverly says.