Page 45 of 32 Days in May

Miss Geometry is appalled, and we are instead given an armful of eggplant and mauve war crimes.

I try on a litany of dresses—some tragic, some kind of nice but nothing interesting enough to move Liv out of her current position: head in her hand, nose scrunched. She gives me a little “Nah” or “Meh.” Only one dress is bad enough to merit a loud and swift “Ugh!”

“Okay, we’re done.” I throw my arms up in defeat. I’m trapped in a trumpet-cut dark blue nightmare. It’s long-sleeved, but there are cutouts on my hips. I look both slutty and sad about it. “Why won’t you just tell me how you feel about my hair?”

Liv is already standing up, grabbing her sunglasses and purse. “I told you it looks great. What else do you want me to say?”

I try to shuffle after her, but my shins are imprisoned. “You don’t think it looks great. You never think anything looks great.”

“That is not true,” she says, pushing her sunglasses up into her dark waves. “I think lots of things are great. Like—”

I don’t even give her a chance to pretend like she can recall the last time she liked something. I lean over and yank a purple organza-tiered disaster off the designated No! rack and hold it back up against my chest. “You told that woman that you’d rather swallow a screw than look at any more dresses like this.”

“Okay, so, you know I’m being honest! Clearly, I don’t hold back.”

I take a shaky step down off the platform, wobbling on my borrowed heels as I clomp back toward the chair where I left my clothes. “I can’t deal with you anymore.”

“Nadia, wait.” To my surprise, Liv grabs my arm, nearly pulling us both off-center. I catch her eyes in the mirror as I trip over my own feet. She’s chewing at the inside of her cheek. “I really do think you look nice.”

“But?”

“But I don’t think you cut your hair off because you wanted a nice, new haircut. I think you did it because you want everyone around you to fuck off and leave you alone, and you figured if you cut off all your hair, I might get so mad at you, I would fuck off and leave you alone and let you rot.”

My breath comes out quick and tight. The lights overhead are buzzing and this dress, with all its buttons and itchy tags, makes me feel trapped and strangled. My skin prickles and itches, and I may start screaming.

“I’m not going to let you push me away anymore. It’s stupid. You’re being stupid. And I know things are hard right now, but it’s me—”

“It’s in my kidneys,” I blurt out. “Lupus. In my kidneys. I found blood in my urine, and they ran some extra tests and now, I’m scared—terrified, actually. It’s not uncommon, but—but it means I’m getting worse even with all the medicine I’m on. I’m still getting worse. I feel like shit, Liv. I feel sick and exhausted and—what if it gets so bad that I can’t do it anymore? I just started to feel normal again, and I know you think I’m being dramatic, but there’s so much I don’t know right now—”

“Who else have you told?” She cuts me off.

“No one,” I say quietly. “Just you, for now.”

Without any hesitation, she pulls me to her chest.

We get home and change into sweatpants before driving down to the boardwalk to pick up a pizza, which we eat on the balcony, in our rocking chairs, facing the ocean. I wrap myself up in my new cardigan, delighting in how it clashes ridiculously with my mustard-yellow St. Cecilia’s High School of Philadelphia sweatpants. We eat in silence, Taylor Swift playing from my phone. If Liv was cooler, I’d ask her to split the joint chilling in the ashtray between us. Unfortunately, my beloved sister is a narc.

“If you need a kidney, I’ll give you one,” she says, wiping grease from her chin.

I reach over and swipe at the single, thick droplet of orange she missed. “No way.” I shake my head. “You have a semi-husband. He has first dibs—legally.”

“Oh, yeah,” she mumbles around another mouthful. “I guess he does. Maybe Marco can give you a kidney.”

I let out a tut of laughter. “As much as I’d love to see that headline, I don’t think I’ll be making Vinny Baldacco aware of my internal organ situation.”

“So,” Liv says, dragging out her vowels. “Do we get to meet this guy?”

I furrow my brow at the horizon. For some reason, I like the idea of Liv meeting Marco. I think he’d actually really get a kick out of her. Liv is endlessly entertaining—she’s so extremely normal, she’s actually circled back around and become a freak again. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. There’s no way that could be arranged in the next twenty-some days. “Hell no,” I conclude.

“Boooooring,” she sings.

“It is what it is.” I punctuate this piece of wisdom with an eye roll. “We’re not actually anything. Twenty-odd days and it’ll all be a memory.” When I look up, she’s giving me the gobstopper, but with a twist—she’s grinning like she has a wild hare up her ass, like she’s auditioning to play the Joker. “What?” I demand.

“Nothing.” Liv’s eyes twinkle. “You just sound sad, that’s all.”

Wednesday, May 10

My phone rings in the middle of the night, and it actually wakes me up—something a tornado siren couldn’t even do. I answer with a grunting “Hello?” and a familiar voice fills the line, deep and rich.