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“I believe you just said what was wrong with it,” I responded. “Lime does not belong in beer. And that brand of beer does not belong in this house. It will insult my other beer. The good beer.”
Ryan rolled his eyes and sighed. He was the first one in the house with me, and as such was tasked with making sure I was all right before the others showed up, in case they needed to bring bail money, a therapist or a priest, depending on my mood. It was the way we had handled things since we were children. A train of guys showed up to keep the sad or angry person company without a gap all day and night. One of us would stay overnight. One of us would take the morning shift the next morning and so it would go for a day or two until we felt the aggrieved party was going to be all right on their own. No one ever seemed to mention it like a plan or anything, it was just assumed that someone would make the call, stating they were going to be first and that they needed the other to be second. Ryan had been first this time around.
“Look,” he said, putting one hand on the rapidly self-destructing cardboard case, “this stuff has like four percent alcohol in it. Your stuff has like eleven to fourteen. The whole damn point of this beer is that it goes well with tacos, which I plan on making a shitload of, and it will take you goddamn forever to get drunk.”
“I don’t plan on getting drunk,” I said.
“No one really does, but if I have you drinking this stuff, I can make sure you won’t. You could probably drink this entire pack and barely be buzzed,” he said.
He ripped open the top, which took minimal effort since it was already falling open and grabbed one of the cans of cheap beer. Cracking it open, he handed it to me, looking like the world’s worst impression of Stone Cold Steve Austin, cracked one for himself, and offered the can up for a clink. Reluctantly, I took a sip.
“Oh, Jesus, it’s worse than I thought,” I said, coughing as the tangy lime beer went down my gullet. “Why would anyone buy this stuff?”
“It’s beer,” Ryan said. “Most people drink it to eventually get drunk.”
“Whiskey gets you drunk and tastes amazing,” I argued.
“Whiskey is expensive, and you look like an alcoholic buying bottles of that, whereas every dude in Texas buys beer a couple times a week. Drink up.”
“I don’t know if I can,” I muttered.
Ryan laughed. “Try it with the tacos. I bet it’s better. Probably pairs well.”
An image of the baking shows I’d watched with Kristen before she left shot through my mind, and I winced. I couldn’t even have a conversation about terrible lime-flavored beer without thinking about her. This was going to be harder than I’d thought.
The guys slowly filtered in and out throughout the day, and the tacos did seem to make the beer at least more palatable. True to Ryan’s word, they did go down quickly, and it wasn’t until I was well into the second pack that I felt like I was starting to feel anything resembling a buzz. By that point, Victor was there, a duffel bag with his overnight stuff with him and a care package made by Melanie containing some of her store’s cupcakes.
I didn’t have the heart to tell him that cupcakes were a trigger for me. It was sweet of Melanie to try. She had no way of knowing that baked goods were going to make me feel even lower.
Around ten, Victor was setting up the couch to crash on, deciding against staying in the guest room that Carmela sometimes still stayed in, and instead lying back and enjoying the eighty-inch television. My phone rang, and I went to it, finally feeling something resembling happiness when I saw Kristen’s name. It was a video call, and I took it to my bedroom to answer it.
“Hello,” I said. “Long time, no see.”
It was a silly phrase, but as silly as it was, it really did feel like it had been a long time. An eternity, even.
The screen wasn’t her face, though. It was a mostly empty living room.
“I wanted to bring you on tour,” her voice said from somewhere behind the screen. Suddenly it flipped to her face, and she waved before flipping it back. “I thought you would enjoy knowing where I was before I started talking about the insanity of moving in here.”
“I would,” I said, grinning a mirthless grin.
The truth was, I was happy to go on the virtual tour. I was happy that she wanted to share this portion of her life with me. I was happy I got to see her and hear her again, and it made it feel less like things had ended and there might be hope.
But in the end, it was a shell of what it was like to have her in my arms. To have her sitting on my couch instead of Vic. To have her to eat tacos with.
I couldn’t make her feel bad about it, though. I wasn’t going to try to manipulate her into not following her dream. Instead, I smiled, nodded, and laughed with her. When she described the difficulty of getting the few things she’d brought with her to the house inside due to steps she wasn’t familiar with and were deeper than usual, I laughed when it was appropriate and was concerned for her when she described scraping her knee.
It was all sort of genuine. I did feel bad for her. I was happy for her. The stories were funny.
I just wished she wasn’t there. That she’d never fallen because she hadn’t moved in. That those stories were stories about her day in Slater.
Because I didn’t want her to be there. I wanted her to be with me.
12
KRISTEN
Iwas going to be excited about this opportunity and throw myself into it completely.
