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He ran a finger over the book in his lap. “He’s…” If, a second ago, his face had been an open window, now it was shuttered. Locked from the inside. “He’s just getting old,” he muttered.
The server appeared a moment later to take their order. While Allison bit the bullet and took her chance on drunken noodles with beef, she discovered that Colin’s eating habits had not changed. As always, he ordered three appetizers in place of an entrée. He claimed he liked the variety, but Allison had spent enough time with him to recognize that he was a picky eater, and appetizers tended to be safer.
Plus, he was always willing to share, making this his least obnoxious quirk. She smiled as he handed off his menu, glad for this small sense of familiarity not tinged with the bitterness of their breakup.
His cheeks reddened, and he began mopping up the condensation from his water glass with meticulous attention, as if it were a matter of national security. “How was recitation?”
Allison’s muscles yanked taut. Both sections had been a disaster. Again, no one had volunteered to talk and, though Allison had a lecture prepared for this inevitability, she kept losing her train of thought because she was so distracted by that email from her father. She was pretty sure the only thing that anyone learned today was that she had no idea what she was doing.
On top of that, Cole had made it a point to stop by her desk on the way out to inform her how much fun his friends were having inColin’srecitation. “They say he’s really funny and smart and gets the whole class talking.” His tone was completely disinterested, like he’d been commenting on the weather, but every syllable was a stake hammered deeper into Allison’s heart.
She waited, hoping Colin might derail the conversation to echo Cole’s report, but for once, he seemed more interested in her than the sound of his own voice.
Leave it to him to become considerate when it was least convenient.
Allison tried to relax against her seat. “It was fantastic. They couldn’t stop talking about Grendel’s mother. I think every student said at least one thing. I even made a few jokes. And, afterward, two students stopped by to tell me our recitation was their favorite class.”
With every word, her insides slithered into a tighter knot. Her lies just kept growing, more out of control than Pinocchio’s nose. She couldn’t seem to stop herself. Even if it meant stealing Colin’s moments and making them hers.
The right corner of his mouth tipped up into a grin. “Whoa. Superteacher for sure, then.”
Allison shrugged, her fingers crushing into the hem of her skirt. She didn’t want to keep talking about this. There was a tenderness to Colin’s expression that chiseled her lies into pointed blades. She couldn’t wield them anymore today. Not with Jed weighing so heavily on her mind, and Colin so determined to resurrect these things she’d once loved about him.
Her eyes cut to the window. Across the street was a small independent movie theater. The big black letters crammed into its tiny marquee read
Double Feature Friday
JEEPERS CREEPERS
JEEPERS CREEPERS 2
“Oh my god.” She bumped the windowpane with her finger, pointing at the sign.
Colin followed her movements and groaned.
Allison couldn’t help it. She burst out laughing. Then she broke her own no-past rule. “Remember when we saw the second one?”
Colin scratched at the back of his neck, his expression sheepish. “Yeah… but we aren’t supposed to be remembering things.”
She ignored him. “Yousobbedat the end. So hard. You used all my napkins.”
“Yeah.”
“It was a horror movie.”
“Movies just…” Colin blew out a loud sigh. “They always wrap up so easily. Everything fixed and perfect.”
Allison crossed her arms and sat back. “More than half the cast was dead at the end of that movie. The body count was like thirteen.”
“Yeah, but the monster gets caught. There’s a clear ending. Things get resolved.”
Horror movies were famous for doing the opposite of that, but Allison refrained from correcting him. She was not Ethan Windbag. She would not “well, actually” Colin, especially not when he was on the verge of sharing something he’d refused to talk about two years ago.
“You don’t like happy endings?”
He pulled off his glasses and scrubbed at his eyes. His narrow shoulders bent inward. “I think the problem is more that I like them too much. No one gets that in real life.”
Something in his tone tugged at Allison’s center. “I feel like that’s the point, though? Did you ever read ‘Cinderella’ by Anne Sexton? At the end, she talks about how happy endings aren’t life. That happily-ever-after doesn’t leave room for living. Life keeps going. Keeps changing. I always loved that. This idea that the true happy ending is the one that doesn’t stop.”
