Page 81 of The Lipstick Flip

You could still hear it in my voice, though, when the video came back to me. “Noah’s a nurse. He’s a good nurse. And if you know any nurses, you know what that says about him. He cares about people. He does a job that, a lot of the time, is thankless, and he does it with a smile. He’s going to start graduate school to become a doctor of nursing practice, and even though most people have to apply three or four times to get into a program like that, Noah was accepted the very first time he applied.”

Auggie had wanted me to take that part out because he said it was a little too specific, but I told him it had to stay.

Then the video showed Noah at his college graduation. He was even skinnier, if that was possible, and he looked like a baby in his gown. The video followed him as he crossed the stage and received his diploma. The graduation ceremony had taken place in a college arena, and thousands of other faces swam in the background, but I didn’t know how anybody could miss Noah.

“I met Noah when I was recovering from a gunshot wound. I was in a really bad place in my life. For a lot of reasons. A lot of them my fault. And at the time, I didn’t—I didn’t know if I wanted to get better.” The video came back to me again. I wasn’t crying, but my face was blotchy, my eyes were red. Auggie said the filters could only do so much. “I wanted to stop hurting. And it took me a long time—” I stopped. “It took Noah a long time to help me understand that not hurting wasn’t the same thing as living.”

And then Auggie edited in a montage of pictures of me and Noah. One of our early dates, a selfie Noah had snapped of him curled up on my chest, my face visible behind him. I was surprised. And I was frowning. And a picture of us at Moulin Vert, which Noah had picked not knowing that I had way too many weird associations with that place, but it turned out none of them mattered because I was so happy to be there with him. The first night in the new condo, the two of us surrounded by takeout containers and cardboard boxes, Noah’s head in my lap, and one of my hands on his chest like I was keeping him from floating away. The time Noah had wanted red highlights and turned his whole head—and my hands—the color of a carrot. He was going to hate that one, but God, I couldn’t not use it.

My comments continued as a voiceover. “At first, Noah was my nurse. And then, to my surprise, he was my friend. And then, one night, I kissed him, and I was lucky enough that he kissed me back. And after a while, I asked him if he would marry me.” My voice tightened with emotion. “And he said yes.”

Another video began to play. This one was from our wedding. It was our first dance, and the song was “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” because my mom really had loved the King. Noah in that ridiculous paisley jacket. And me in a white shirt and bow tie and suspenders because Noah had thought it was such a good look.

“Marrying Noah was the best thing I ever did. And I don’t always show him that. I want to be better about that. I want to do a better job of making sure he knows, every day, that I love him, and that I want him, and that he has made my life so much better.” A wet laugh burst out of me. “God, obviously I love him. I wore suspenders for him.”

I’d wanted to edit that part out. But Auggie said no, so we kept it.

And then the video was of me again. “There’s so much more I want to share about Noah with you. I want you to know how much he’s done to support me and to support Second Chance Homes. And I want you to know that he’s a big part of what we do. I want to tell you how he staged this house for the holiday tour, and the hard work he put into it, and I want everyone to know how talented he is. But today, I’m going to keep it simple. I’m going to ask you for a small favor. Because today is Noah’s birthday, and I was wondering if you could wish him happy birthday with me.” I was already looking into the camera, so it wasn’t like I could do anything dramatic like turn or whatever. But my voice changed. Got thicker. “Happy birthday, Noah. I love you.”

In the caption, I tagged him. And then I posted it.

Auggie and Theo were nice enough to sit there with me. It kind of had the feeling of people visiting you in prison, like they didn’t know what to say or do, but they wanted to be there with you. Auggie got up to use the bathroom. I kept checking my phone.

Which was why I saw when my followers started to drop.

“Well,” I said. “I guess I should have seen that coming.”

“Cart,” Theo said. But he stopped. And he squeezed my shoulder and hung on.

“What happened?” Auggie asked when he came back, but his tone said he already knew.

I shook my head.

And then my phone buzzed, and it was Noah.

“Fuck,” I blurted.

Auggie and Theo looked at each other.

“He’s calling me,” I said. Which yeah, was really fucking obvious, but for some reason my mouth seemed about a mile away from my brain right then.

Auggie and Theo looked at each other again.

“What should I do?”

Theo squeezed my shoulder again, and this time, he put a little shake on it. “Answer it, you big hooze.”

I put the phone to my ear. The chambray was sticking to the small of my back, and I pulled at it. For a second, the silence inside the phone buzzed so loudly I thought something was wrong. And then Theo nudged my knee, and I remembered to say, “Hey.”

“Howie.” Noah sounded like he was crying. And the tears sounded even thicker when he asked, “Why’d you do that? You shouldn’t have done that.”

“Because I love you, I guess.”

“Don’t say, ‘I guess,’” Auggie whispered.

“Because I love you,” I said. And then the only thing I could think of was “Happy birthday, Noah.”

He must have been crying harder because I could barely understand him when he said, “I don’t know what you want me to do. I don’t know what you expect me to do with that.”