Nineteen, page 12
“It feels like it.”
“It’s been longer than three hours,” she tells me. “Can we try the locks again?”
I reach out blindly to hit the button. All of them on my door.
Nothing budges. Not the locks or the windows.
“No go.”
“Ugh,” she groans unhappily.
I twist to look at her in the back. “Where does this date rank? Above or below the bathroom?”
“Which bathroom?”
“The second one.”
“Above,” she answers instantly. “At least I’m not vomiting out my ass this time. Can you imagine?”
“I don’t want to.”
“God, that sucked. I was a mess for days.”
“Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing, Butler. Penitence doesn’t suit you.”
“You’re right. It was your own fault,” I lie blandly. “You ate the pizza. Three massive pieces.”
“Douchebag doesn’t suit you either.”
“It seems to fit more often than anything else.”
“Where do you get that from?”
“The douchebagginess? Probably my daddy.”
“No, I mean the negative attitude about yourself?”
I swallow, flexing my shoulders to stretch them out. “My daddy,” I repeat.
“Not your stepdad.”
“No. My real dad.”
“I thought you didn’t know anything about him.”
“I don’t.”
“So how do you know he was a bad guy?” she asks carefully. She doesn’t use my word - douchebag. She’s being subtle, but I can feel her trying to steer me away from it.
“Because my mama ran away from him when she was pregnant and broke,” I explain. “He couldn’t have been anything good.”
“Has she ever said he wasn’t?”
“She doesn’t say shit about him. No one does.”
Brooklyn goes quiet.
I roll my head to look at her, my eyebrows raised. “What’s goin’ on? You gonna try and fix me, B?”
“There’s nothing wrong with you.”
I laugh, looking away again. “Yeah. Okay.”
“Why are you getting hostile?”
“I’m not,” I answer sharply.
Except I am.
Damn it!
I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with air that tastes like her perfume.
I exhale slowly, releasing the pressure inside my chest.
“Can we talk about something else?” I ask quietly. Gently.
“Yeah, of course.”
Only we don’t. We’re quiet for a long time, so long I start to wonder if she fell asleep. I wonder if I’ll ever be able to. I check my phone for the time, grimacing when I see it.
Four fifty-seven.
“It’s late?” Brooklyn asks.
“It’s so late, it’s early.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah.” I drop my phone into the empty passenger seat. “Shit.”
“I have a question.”
“Is it about my dad?”
“No.”
“Go for it.”
“You drove an extra five hours to come get me,” she says softly. “You lost half a day on that detour.”
“That’s not a question.”
“Was it because you didn’t want to make the drive alone? Or was it because you wanted to make the drive with me?”
I release a weak chuckle. “Why are you asking me, B? You already know the answer.”
She sits up in her seat, her back against the door. She’s looking at me. Frowning. “I do, don’t I?”
“And I know why you came with me.”
“You do?”
“Yeah.”
She nods, her face clearing. “Okay.”
“Okay.”
I don’t know what we just agreed to, but it was something important. Something small but meaningful.
“I wanna ask you something,” I tell her.
I didn’t mean to speak. I don’t know where the words came from but there they are. There’s no taking them back and I won’t lie to get out of the knowing. I’m an asshole but I’m not a coward.
“What do you want to know?”
“Are the rumors true?” I look her in the eyes, making myself very clear. “Are you sleeping with every five-star that you can find?”
I’m surprised that she smiles. Small and resigned. “I was wondering when you’d ask me that.”
“How’d I do?”
“You lasted longer than I thought you would.”
“It’s been killing me.”
“I bet.”
I take in a deep breath, rub my hands over my face, and exhale hard. “Look, you don’t have to answer me. I know it’s not my business—”
“It is,” she interrupts gently. “We both know it is. At least a little.”
“I wasn’t sure if you—I didn’t—”
“I think with everything—” she gestures back and forth between us “—you deserve to know. Or I want you to know, so you don’t have to wonder or listen to the rumors.”
“Okay. Good.”
“Right. It’s—I don’t know exactly what rumors you’ve heard.”
“I heard what I said – that you sleep with every talent you can.”
“It’s not true. I’m into football, you know that. I meet a lot of guys with a lot of talent, but I don’t sleep with all of them.”
“But you are sleeping with some of them?”
“Some,” she admits without embarrassment. “Yeah.”
“Most?”
“No. Only the ones I like.”
“What about me?”
Her face softens. “You’re different. I don’t look at you the way I look at them. I don’t want to fuck you and walk away.”
“I’m not talented enough?”
“You’re insanely gifted, Butler. That has nothing to do with it.”
“With me or with all of them?”
“With you,” she confirms.
“So, it does matter to you if these guys are gonna go pro?”
“It does. Yeah.”
I don’t know how to feel about that. Meyerson was right – she’s a star-fucker. But—
“Why?”
Brooklyn inhales deeply, prepping herself. “Today I’m nineteen. I’ll spend the rest of my life not being nineteen, but for this one year, I am. Someday I’ll be thirty-three with a couple of kids, a husband, and an SUV full of Goldfish crackers. I’ll belong to my family and the PTA, not to myself, not completely. Not like I do right now, because right now—”
“You’re nineteen.”
She nods, her eyes searching mine. “And when I’m watching football every Monday night with my family, I’ll see one of these guys on TV. He’ll be like a time capsule cracked open and my past will spill out around my feet, and just like that, I’ll be nineteen again. That’s real, living, breathing memory. I’m going to need that, Butler. I’m going to need some piece of me, a reminder of who I am, because once you have a family, that’s who you become. You’re a mom and a chauffeur and a chef, and I want to be that but I still want to be me. Even if it’s only once in a while.”
“You sleep with these guys so that someday when you see them on TV you’ll remember what it felt like to be free?”
“Basically. Yeah.”
“Have you…” I’m not sure I should ask this one. I bite down on it, tasting it to see if it’s poison or not.
Brooklyn, though, she can read my silence.
“Yeah,” she answers, unashamed. “I’ve slept with one since I met you. And I’m pretty sure if I asked if you’ve slept with anyone since we met, you’d say yes too.”
“Yes,” I answer instantly.
“And no one is mad about that. Right?”
“Right.”
“Okay. Good.”
I have more questions. I know that she has since we met and I really want to know who, but I know I shouldn’t ask. It wouldn’t be good for either of us.
Luckily, my piece of shit car saves me before I make a massive mistake.
The doors suddenly unlock.
Brooklyn looks around in surprise. “Was that them? Are we free?”
I shove my door open before they can lock again. Cold air rushes into the truck. “Yeah,” I sigh, relieved. “We’re free.”
“Oh, thank God. I have to pee so bad!”
We climb out quickly, stretching slowly. Brooklyn looks at me as she raises her arms up over her head. She smiles, breathing a heavy sigh of relief that makes me chuckle. She laughs, dissolving into giggles, and I know what we were talking about didn’t make it out of the car with us. It’s still locked inside. Or it evaporated on the air, hurrying out the doors into the dark with us. Lifting away on the wind.
There was a time for questions about what we are and where we’re going, but that’s over now. Now it’s time to grab a room, get some sleep and a shower, a plate full of pancakes, and get back on the road. Back to Oregon.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Seven days. That’s how long Brooklyn has been staying with us. One week.
I was worried the guys would be annoyed that she’s basically living with us, no end in sight, but she made dinner the first night she was here, and has made it every night since, and no one is complaining. We have workouts in the morning but I’m the only one trying to graduate early so I’m the only idiot who’s gone all day with classes. I come home around five every night to the same scene;
Brooklyn on the couch next to Weiss. Meyerson in the recliner. Eustis on his laptop at the dining table, surrounded by dishes set for a meal.
Once I walk in, they all shout, “Welcome home, honey!”
“Never gets old,” I chuckle.
“How was class?” Eustis asks.
I toss my backpack on the floor by the closet. “Boring. Long. What’s for dinner tonight?”
“Pot roast, I think.”
“With potatoes,” Brooklyn confirms.
I walk behind the couch on my way to the kitchen. I squeeze Brooklyn’s shoulder as I pass. “Thanks for cooking.”
“Thanks for letting me crash.”
She follows me into the kitchen. I offer to help, I always do, but she waves me away as she puts on mismatched oven mitts. One is blue and the other is a chicken with big, wobbly eyes across her knuckles.
“It smells good,” I tell her gratefully.
She grins. “My mom’s secret recipe.”
“What’s the secret?”
“A whole stick of butter.”
I grab a beer from the refrigerator. “I don’t think you know what ‘secret’ means. You gave that up way too easy.”
“You’ll need to know it when I’m gone. They’ve asked for pot roast twice this week. I think Eustis is addicted.”
“I’ll do my best but I can’t cook like you.”
“I’m deeply domestic. It’s one of my many skills.”
“Really?” I ask, watching the way her ass curves under jeans as she bends over to pull the potatoes out of the oven. “What are your other skills?”
Brooklyn looks back, catching me in the act. She smiles. “Those actually are a secret, Red Shirt.”
We eat dinner at the dining table like civilized people with Brooklyn here. She doesn’t even set it for us. She says she doesn’t care. She’d set up plates and silverware on the counter in the kitchen, buffet style if we wanted, but we don’t. She makes real meals with real ingredients and somehow that makes it feel like we should be eating at a real table. Weiss sets it every night. The plates don’t match and we use paper towels for napkins, but it’s a lot fancier than eating on the floor in front of the TV. We won’t do it when she’s gone, but for now it’s kind of nice. It makes our house feel more like an actual home.
When dinner is over, Meyerson does the dishes. Eustis and Weiss turn on reruns of The Bachelor – I’m not sure why, but it’s their thing lately – while Brooklyn and I go back to my room.
We leave the door open.
It looks like her suitcase exploded in the corner, her clothes strewn in a precise three foot radius. It’s contained, though. It doesn’t drive me as crazy as it could. When she first got here, I was doing her laundry for her to try to keep the room clean but she just threw the clean clothes next to the dirty ones and my mind almost imploded. I had to walk away after that.
I sleep in the living room on the couch, just like the old days. We didn’t really talk about it, but it felt like it made sense. She’s a woman in a house full of men. She should be able to sleep behind a door that closes and locks. I’ve lived with these guys for a year on their couch already. What’s another week? Or two?
“I was thinking I’d go home in a few days,” she tells me from her perch on the bed.
I’m at my computer desk, scrolling through emails. They’re all junk but I pretend to be interested because she just said the words I’ve been dreading since she got here – she’s leaving. I feel sick and I don’t want her to see that.
“Why?” I ask casually.
“Why would I go home?”
“Yeah.”
“Because I live there.”
I force a grin, turning to face her. “But you mostly live here.”
“I don’t think they” she whispers clearly, “would like it if that became permanent.”
“Whatever. They’d love it. They love you.”
“They like me. They tolerate me squatting in your room right now because I make them delicious dinners.”
“Accurate.”
“Anyway, it’s time for me to go home. You need your room back and I’ve worn the same five shirts for two weeks straight.”
“The same five underwear, too.”
“Six, thanks, but yeah,” she giggles. “I need a change.”
“I’ll buy you underwear.”
“Or you could help me score that plane ticket home.”
“Alright, yeah. I can do that.” I turn off my monitor, spinning around to give her my full attention.
She’s beautiful. Even after living with her for a week straight, it hits me every time I look at her. My favorite thing in the world is when she’s wearing one of my hoodies, especially the yellow one. The one she’s wearing right now. Her legs are bare under black shorts, her hair is down and loose around her shoulders. She looks so right sitting on my bed, I feel anxious. In a good way.
I pull out my phone, slowly raising it to take her picture. I go slow to let her know what I’m doing, and she doesn’t tell me to stop. She smiles, meeting my eyes behind the camera.
Click.
I don’t ask if I can post it. I don’t want to. I’m keeping it for me, along with the others I’ve collected, in a folder simply named B.
“Is it a good one?” she asks.
“They’re all good ones.”
“Charmer.”
I nod to her suitcase. “When do you want me to get that ticket for?”
“Four days from now? Five?”
“Six?”
“Or four.”
“Five it is.”
Brooklyn smiles. “Thanks.”
“Yeah, no problem.”
“Have you turned your phone back on?”
“Nah. Not yet.”
Mama only ever calls in the morning. Brooklyn was who I talked to in the evening and with her here, I like the silence of a sleeping phone.
I like the way the noise stays away when Brooklyn is around.
“Do you want to take a walk?” she suggests
“I’d rather go for a drive.”
“No,” she laughs. “Not a chance. Not in that deathtrap.”
“You’re starting to sound like my mama.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“I wanna buy you fro yo. French Vanilla, right?”
“Good memory, Red Shirt.”
“Quit with that shit.” I stand up, towering over her. I offer her my hand. “Let’s go.”
I take her to get frozen yogurt, but we don’t go anywhere in Eugene. Instead, I drive the forty-five minutes up to Corvallis. It doesn’t take long for Brooklyn to figure out we’re not staying in town. It takes even less time to realize where we’re actually going.
“That’s a long way to go for yogurt,” she comments.
“I like killin’ time with you.”
She doesn’t say it, but she likes it too.
Brooklyn settles into her seat, watching the fields fly by out the window. I play country music on the radio. It only shorts out twice, jumping to a Christian talk show both times. They tell us we’re God’s children. They remind us to be kind to each other. To love each other as much as our hearts will allow. That’s the key to Heaven, they say. Love.
Kane Brown interrupts our Sunday school lesson to remind us that love is less of a key to eternal salvation and more of a rodeo.
We buy frozen yogurt from a small store in a shopping center deep in Beaver country. I expected Brooklyn to take off my hoodie once we crossed the city limits, but she doesn’t bat an eye. She doesn’t complain when I put my hand on her back to guide her into the store ahead of me, either. Or when I drape my arm over her shoulders in line.
When our yogurt is gone and we’re driving home in the faded evening light, she takes my hand on the center console.
She holds it the whole way home.
It feels natural. Like coming home to her and the way she looks in my clothes. On my bed. She fits in these spaces in my life that I didn’t realize I had before. I was so focused on school and football and what it’s gonna take to get to the NFL, I didn’t know I had room for anything else. But there she is.
Here she is. Holding my hand like it’s nothing and everything all at once.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“You’re here again, huh?”
I arc my back to look over the arm of the couch. Weiss is standing there in his underwear, his arms crossed over his chest as he looks down his nose at me.
“For now,” I acknowledge, settling in again.
I listen to him walk into the kitchen. He opens the fridge, light spilling into the living in a sharp shaft that looks too well defined to be real.
The door shuts with a muted thud. “How long is she staying?” he asks.
“Are you getting sick of her?”
“No. I like her. I’m worried about you, not me.”
