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Lauren: No.
Me either.
Me: On my way.
I jump out of bed, fully aware it’s a bad idea. I step into a pair of gym shorts and throw on a shirt before quietly slipping out of the house and into the warm summer night. Grasshoppers chirp as I stroll down the walkway and then up the stairs.
The door is unlocked, and she’s on the couch, her legs brought up to her chest. Hair wet. Eyes swollen.
“You know,” I say, walking into the room, “the chances of you falling asleep are higher in a bed than on the couch. I can almost guarantee that.”
She pats the cushion next to her. “Hey, I find this couch comfy. I can’t believe you haven’t changed anything in here.”
“I have yet to find the time to hone in on my interior design skills.” And I want to keep the memories. Even though they haunt me like a motherfucker, I want them all. “I had nothing in Chicago that reminded me of home, so the recollection is nice sometimes.”
Curiosity crosses her face, curiosity of what my life was like in Chicago, but she stops herself from asking those questions.
Not that I blame her for her interest. It’s what every Blue Beech resident has wanted since I came home. Answers. A report of what I was up to. Questions of why their golden boy got dumped, moved thousands of miles away, and then never came back for years—not for holidays, not for reunions, not even for my father’s retirement party from the electrical company. Instead of celebrating that with him here, I flew him to me. I kept in touch with no one, didn’t join any social networks, and became a stranger to the place that had raised me.
She clears her throat. “You want to watch a show or movie?”
I’ll do anything to get her mind off of her horror of a day. I collapse on the other side of the couch and keep my eyes on her while making myself comfortable. “True crime still your jam?”
“My jam. My peanut butter.”
“Your pickles on your peanut butter, you mean?”
A flicker of a smile comes my way. “My pickles on my peanut butter.”
Lauren is the only person I know who enjoys PPB & Js—pickles, peanut butter, and jelly. She’s most likely theonlyperson on the planet who does, considering I have yet to meet someone else with that indulgence.
“True crime it is then,” I say. I dramatically shake my head. “You and your serial killers.”
She snags the remote off the coffee table. “Blame yourself. You’re the one who got me obsessed with all those documentaries. My nickname at work is Nurse Paranoid because I assume everyone is a serial killer.”
“Those shows are what made me decide to go into law enforcement.”
My mom was the ringleader in our true-crime obsession. I grew up watching them and, as Lauren and I grew closer and older, we shared our loves of different interests with each other.
I got her hooked on true crime, and she got me hooked on strawberry-banana milkshakes.
She messes with the remote and scrolls through the guide on TV. “See, something good did come out of our documentary binges. Do you have any new favorites?”
What I want to tell her is no, I don’t because I stopped watching any shows involving true crime years ago. Not because it reminded me of her, but because it became my life. I’ve seen it firsthand—the murders, the bribery, all of it. I don’t though because she needs this. Her mind deserves to venture into somewhere else, and if it means I have to sit through something that might give me flashbacks, so be it.
“The choice is all yours,” I answer.
Her feet drop as she lies back on the couch and brings herself to the fetal position after making her selection. A thin blanket is wrapped around her shoulders, her head rests on a pillow, and her attention goes to the TV.
I stay in my corner, my feet crossed at my ankles, and I surprisingly stay calm. Maybe it’s her presence. Maybe my attempt to soothe her has done the same for me.
Two documentaries later, she’s snoring. We made no light conversation. It was all solitude as we sat in the dimly lit room. I quietly slide off the couch and tiptoe out of the loft even though all I want to do is stay there, drag her into my arms, and create more memories on that couch.
I don’t bother turning on the lights when I make it into my room and fall on the bed. My heart feels lighter tonight, and a smile is twitching at my lips as I think about how great it is to be around Lauren again. It doesn’t take long for me to fall asleep, which is out of the ordinary.
Too bad my nightmares still come back to haunt me, sucking away all the calmness she gave me.
It’s the same conversation.
