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He’d been tagged, too, but when I clicked his name, a message popped up that told me his profile did not exist. My skin went cold at the words.
Anthony Travolo didn’t exist in this world. But once upon a time, he absolutely, gloriously had. He’d been an artist; he’d helped create murals and a single, tiny, perfect painting that was good enough to hang in a sumptuous, multimillion-dollar Tribeca loft. I already knew such interesting things about him. What else had he been?
It wouldn’t take more than one painful conversation with Mom to get his parents’ email. I wanted to know about him, sort of. I wanted to step closer. I just wasn’t sure of the cost.
So much about last night felt vague and distant. After I’d gotten home, I’d checked in with Mom and Dad, who were pretending not to be awake until I was home safe, and then I’d crawled into bed, letting Rachel give me a stern tuck-in, before she and Jake took off.
In bed I’d tossed and turned for hours, unsure if I was suffering the effects of alcohol or exhaustion. First Claude and then Maisie, then Bushwick, Lissa, then, finally, when I’d been almost too tired to process him, I cleared my head to fill it with Kai. That part of the night was confusing. A thousand moments crystal clear, a thousand others as dark as storage closets.
Why was the interconnection such a snarl? Why, in the bleak patter of this morning’s rain, did last night at Areacode feel so immediate—and yet not part of any reliable whole?
Kai had said he had to get back to Hatch, who I’d revised in my imagination from thuggish wingman to somebody younger, more sensitive—maybe a brother or a cousin. So it made sense that he wouldn’t have jumped out of the cab when I didn’t jump in. But he could have called or messaged me anytime. Last night, or this morning—anytime. Though with every passing hour, my hope on that deflated.
As I glanced at my phone to see if someone was texting their arrival, the doorbell rang again, insistent. Mom and Dad were out doing errands, and I wasn’t expecting anyone.
I raced downstairs, then unlocked the door and threw it open. “Oh!”
“Hey.” The rain was a steady drizzle. I shaded my eyes. Holden stood on the mat, wearing the Driza-Bone that he’d bought years ago on a family vacation to Australia. I’d always loved that raincoat; it made him look edgy, like the bank robber hero in a spaghetti western.
“What are you doing here?”
He shrugged, a little self-conscious. “Can’t a guy come check on his ex?”
“I guess. If he’s feeling unloved.” I crossed my arms and leaned against the doorframe. “But I thought college guys didn’t need to make time for their high school exes.”
His smile deepened. “Here’s the thing, High School Ex. I was home doing my Sunday-laundry drop-off, and that’s when I heard a voice in my head saying to go treat you to lunch. So my advice is you better hurry up and say yes before I realize I’m way too cool to hang out with you.”
“You’re serious, aren’t you? I’d need to dig up my rain boots.”
“No rush.” He gestured to the cab idling at the curb.
“You are serious. Okay, hang on. Let me change real quick and leave a note for my parents. If they come home to find me gone, they’ll freak.”
I’d missed one cab last night—this time, I was getting in. Holden and cabs went way back, on account of the fact that he didn’t like to drive. After I’d passed my driver’s license test, I was always the designated driver, picking him up in the Volvo whenever we wanted to get out of the city. Of course, Holden was also always totally fine to bike, walk, or subway. But if he had half a choice, he defaulted to cabs, which wasn’t very Brooklyn. I wouldn’t say it was Holden’s fault. His mom didn’t even know how to drive; Holden and his older brother, Drew, had been given credit cards to pay for rides since they were in elementary school.
“Those Wildes have their heads in the clouds,” my mom always remarked.
“Or up their arses,” my dad liked to respond. Dad, who’d grown up on “old” egg-creams-and-Dodgers Brooklyn, thought the Wildes were a perfect example of everything that was wrong with “new” boutiques-and-cafés Brooklyn.
But Dad had a point. The cabs, the credit cards, and the endless supply of twenty-dollar bills had always set Holden apart from the rest of us. Even snotty Claude lived in a regular apartment with two parents, one sister, one and a half bathrooms, and a Murphy bed for guests. But the Wildes, who presided over the neighborhood from their five-story town house on Columbia Heights, had never known what it meant to want what you couldn’t have. As far as I’d ever witnessed, being a Wilde meant that life passed in an easy spin of private lessons and extra-long vacations at their genteel-shabby lake house upstate.
I’d always dealt with the Wildes just fine, without ever warming to them. They could be arrogant, but they’d been nice to me—except right after my breakup with Holden, when Mrs. Wilde had pulled some strange moves. Like once she’d crossed the street right in the middle of Montague so she wouldn’t have to talk to Dad and me. Another time she and Mr. Wilde both painfully, deliberately ignored me in line at Key Food. Since money couldn’t fix our relationship, it was as if they’d made a pact to quietly reject me.
The Wildes would have been displeased to see me in this cab with Holden, after I’d hurt him so badly. Even considering all that had happened to me afterward. None of them—especially not Drew—was generous with forgiveness. Not by a long shot.
“So what gives?” I asked as we whooshed down the rainy streets.
“Rain makes me think about you.”
“Ha. That sounds like bad Taylor Swift.”
“We-ell, dang,” he drawled. “You got me.” Then Holden began to sing “Love Story” with a croaky country accent. Joking through the earnestness.
Don’t let me go. Kai’s words—I heard them again, rough and honest and deeply vulnerable in the moment. Last night with Kai was a bruise on my lips.
Last night with Kai, I’d never have thought that I’d be sharing my next day with Holden.
Who looked great as always, casually slouched with a knee knocked lightly against mine. Over the bridge, we watched the East River glide past, slate water touching the sheen of a pearl-soft sky. I couldn’t help wondering (okay, maybe a little gloatingly) why Holden had decided to spend the day with me and not Cassandra. I knew they’d gone to Oktoberfest together. Plus a dinner-and-a-movie thing. Holden played a close hand with the details, but even from his bare-bones report I got a sense that he liked this girl. And while I wasn’t sure how I felt about it, I’d resolved to play the role of former girlfriend with as much grace as I could.
