Fuck it. This isn’t how I should end things. Not with Layla.
I’m three blocks from her dorm and already pulling my cell phone out of my pocket when a loud bang on my window makes me jump. When I look, there she is, standing in the middle of Canal Street traffic, her hand pressed against the glass, more tears streaming down her face while she struggles to catch her breath.
The cars are moving ahead of me, but I don’t care. In less than a minute, I’ve double-parked the car and jumped out into the street, ignoring the honking horns and New Yorkers cursing me from the cabs and trucks trying to get down the thoroughfare. All I see is Layla.
“What is it?” I say as I kiss her lips over and over again.
She hiccups back a sob, returns the kisses, returns them all.
“I just...” she hiccups again. “I needed to say...”
“What baby?” I ask. “Tell me.”
“I love you.”
The words are so quick, I’m almost not sure she said them. But when I pull back to look at her face, I can see them shining through her big, sad eyes. My heart expands and breaks all at once. This is why people say not to fall in love. Because it makes you feel like flying and jumping off a cliff at the same time.
But it’s still love. And I don’t regret a thing.
I press my forehead into hers. “I love you too.” My eyes are closed. God, this hurts. “Layla, I—”
“Get the fuck out of the road!”
The shouts of angry New Yorkers interrupt our moment, and Layla steps away. I fight the urge to pull her back. I already miss her so fucking badly.
“I’ll see you,” she says with a limp wave. “Drive safely.”
I smile, but as the honking behind us picks up, all I can do is nod and get back into the Jeep.
“Be good!” I shout again as I start the engine.
Layla nods, but she’s already jogging back down the street, wiping her eyes and hugging herself around her waist. Instead of jumping out of the car and chasing her down like I should, I just watch in the rearview mirror while she disappears around the corner. And then, like the fuckin’ coward I am, I step on the gas and drive on, ignoring the earthquake going on in my chest.
Because the truth is, love was never going to be enough. We had a good run, but she’s better off. A real future between us was never going to happen. She might be the best thing that ever happened to me, but I was always a bad idea.
Epilogue
May 2004: One Year Later
Nico
The shadows of the palm trees are long and thin, stretching down Sunset Boulevard like spider legs. The engine of the Jeep kicks. I’m still regretting buying this hunk of junk. Sure, it looks great when I go to the beach––it’s one of the few cars in LA that still gets points for charm. But the thing guzzles gas and breaks down every other month. For real, I never thought I’d miss the subway until I had to pay for car repairs.
But now I’m done with it. I’m dropping this thing off with some starving artist in West Hollywood before I go to K.C.’s going away party. He says it’s for us both, but there aren’t that many people who will want to say goodbye to some random security guy. I didn’t think it was possible, but people in LA are even more shallow than New Yorkers. If you don’t know anyone important, you’re no one. I controlled the names on the list, but after they got through the door of whatever club we were at, I might as well have been a shadow.
But now it’s over. This crazy fuckin’ year is over, and I could not be more ready. In two days, K.C. and I will start the long-ass drive back to New York in his Yukon, which never breaks down and has air conditioning. He’s taken a job at a radio station in the city, one that won’t require him to play clubs up and down the Eastern seaboard (unless he wants to) and will pay a lot more money. I’m proud of my friend, who’s really hitting the good life these days. But more than that, I’m actually excited about my own life for the first time.
I’ve finally got a reason to go back that doesn’t involve obligations. No back-rents to pay, no bathrooms to caulk, no boyfriends to beat up. I didn’t think I’d miss the city this much, but I really have. I think the real reason I left was because it always felt like New York didn’t want me, instead of the other way around. I kept giving that city everything I had, and it kept shitting all over me. My family’s shit. My friends’ shit. But now New York is finally giving me a break. I’m looking at a future I want there, a job I want, and I’m going to go back and be somebody.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s probably K.C., wondering where the fuck I am. He wants to make an entrance together, the two of us. It’s nice the way he always wants to include me, but it’s unnecessary. I’ve never needed to be the center of attention like he does.
“Yo, man, I told you, I’m just dropping off the car, and then I’m on my way.” I practically yell so he can hear me over the roar of traffic. Sunset Boulevard at the tail end of rush hour is a bitch. And you know what no one ever tells you about convertibles? They’re fuckin’ loud. And you get a lot of bugs flying into your mouth.
“N-Nico?”
It’s a voice that’s uncertain and small. A voice that’s shaking and barely audible over the combination of wind, car horns, and rolling tires. It’s a voice that blows through my head like a grenade. And not just because I haven’t heard it since she told me two months ago, in no uncertain terms, to fuck the hell off. Her voice creaks and shakes over my name. She stammers, which is not something she ever does unless she’s really scared or really nervous. The girl I know is usually calm and well-spoken. She’s never, ever sounded like this.
“Layla?” I call out. “Is that you?”
“I-I want you to k-kill him,” she stutters words that are cracked and raw. “I want you to come with your-your boys, your friends. Flaco. K.C. Who—I don’t know—who-whoever you would bring to help you. And I-I want you to beat the sh-shit out of him, j-just like you would have, w-way back w-when...you know...w-when you were y-younger...”
All the hair on the back of my neck, the tops of my arms stands up, even under the warm California sun. It’s eighty-five degrees in the shade today, and I’m sweating in my tank top, but I’ve got goosebumps all over. Layla has asked me for a lot of things over the course of this crazy fuckin’ year, but she’s never asked for anything like this. The whole time I’ve known her, she’s barely even mentioned the past that always seemed to follow me around like a black cloud. Unlike everyone else who’s ever known about the kind of person I used to be, she never treated me like a thug. Even when she was pissed as hell at me, when her friends told her I was no good, when everyone, including me, told her I was just a bad idea, I was always a person to Layla. I was only ever Nico.
Cutting off a white Mercedes and earning a loud “Fuck you!” from its driver, I pull the car over to the side of the road and shut off the engine.
“Where are you?” I demand.
“I’m-I’m at a payphone,” she stutters. “T-two blocks from h-his place. H-he...I c-can’t...”
She trails off as a siren sounds behind her. I can hear the noise of whatever busy street she’s on. Her boyfriend lives somewhere close to my old place—I know that from our last incredibly painful conversation—but otherwise I can’t picture her. Two blocks from his place could mean anywhere. It could mean some nasty alley closer to the River, or it could be just a block from CUNY. I check my watch. It’s ten at night in New York right now. Even though the city lights never allow the sky to completely dim there, there are plenty of streets that are dark enough on their own.
All I know is that something happened. Layla’s scared, angry, and alone somewhere up in West Harlem, and I’m stuck here in the land of eternal sunshine. I close my eyes. I can’t go there. If I start imagining some of the places I know Layla shouldn’t be, combined with the fact that I’m three-thousand miles away from her, I’ll go motherfuckin’ crazy, right here in Beverly Hills.
“Layla, what the fuck is going on?” I snatch off
my sunglasses and throw them on the seat next to me. “What did that motherfucker do to you?!”
But all I get is a patchy response, since I’m far enough into the Hills that my reception cuts off. Fuck! I can only hear every other frantic word she’s saying.
“He...to...me...I don’t...help...he’s coming...need...go!”
Then the line goes dead.
“Coño!” I roar, startling an elder lady out walking her dog. I try to call back the payphone number, but there’s no answer. When I try Layla’s cell phone, an operator tells me it’s no longer in service. I let out a torrent of Spanish that would have caused my mother to rinse my mouth out with soap, no matter if I’m twenty-seven years old or not, and hammer my fists on the steering wheel for a solid ten seconds. The old lady stares at me with her mouth open, and when I look up, practically runs away from the car.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to think. The girl I’ve been in love with since the second I saw her just called me, freaking out after her shithead boyfriend did something to her. Layla’s not a drama queen. And she wouldn’t hurt a fly. She wouldn’t have made that request if something seriously fucked up hadn’t happened.
I slam the steering wheel again, this time making the horn honk at another couple of pedestrians. They glare at me; I stare a hole through the window. I should be careful, I know. In a neighborhood like this, being a brown dude throwing a tantrum in his shitty car is enough to get me arrested, and I cannot afford to have a record that’s anything but squeaky clean. It would throw everything I have lined up in jeopardy.
But instead of acting calmly, I spring into action. The Jeep screams away from the curb, and there’s only one path on my mind: drop this hunk of junk off with the buyer––I don’t even care how much they want for it. At this point, I’d pay them to take the thing off my hands. Fuck this car. Fuck the party. Fuck California and all three-thousand and some miles in between me and the girl I’d tear through steel doors to get to. I just want it all gone so I can get my ass to the airport and onto whatever red-eye flights they have available.
K.C.’s going to have to make the drive by himself. I gotta get back to New York.
Lost Ones
Book Two of the Bad Idea Series
I
Saudade
Chapter One
August 2003
Layla
Fifty-eight...fifty-nine...
I turn from the register in the empty juniors’ department at Nordstrom. It’s exactly three thirty, and I’m officially off the clock for good.
“Sarah, I’m out of here,” I tell my twenty-something manager, who’s busy digging through boxes in the stockroom.
Sarah pushes her picture-perfect, light-brown hair out of her face. It always takes her a moment to remember the temporary employees like me. I’m not sure that in three months she’s even managed to learn my name.
“Oh...right,” she says. “When are you here tomorrow?”
I smile tightly. “Today’s my last day. I’m headed back to school.”
Realization dawns on her vapid face. Sarah’s nice, but her world doesn’t extend very far beyond the sales floor. “Oh! Well, thanks for the great work this summer. Let me know if you need a reference.”
“Layla.” I nod. “Will do. Good luck with...everything.”
There’s not much else to say. I’m practically skipping out of the door after I go through employee security for the last time, grab my purse, and sprint to my car. This giant brick building in the middle of downtown Bellevue has felt like a prison for the last three months, and now I’m free. Two weeks of vacation with my parents, and after that, I can go back to New York, back to the city that’s been calling my name since May.
It’s true what they say: you can never go home again. Fewer of my high school friends came home this year, so I feel like a stranger in the town where I grew up. On top of that, my dad seems to be working even more than normal, often spending his nights at his office while my mom disappears to the country club with her chardonnay-drinking friends.
The bright side is that their negligence has only given me more time to save money. Between working overtime at the mall and answering phones at my dad’s office, I’ve managed to save enough that I won’t have to work during the school year. The problem with boring jobs, though, is that they leave too much time for daydreaming, and I have an active imagination. I had two goals this summer: make money and forget about a certain handsome ex-New Yorker who broke my heart last spring.
Well...I succeeded at one.
The long afternoon shifts don’t keep me from imagining him striding around every corner. They don’t stave off dreams of how he spots me, picks me up, and swirls me around like the guys in cheesy romance movies. They don’t calm my heart every time I see a FedEx truck. Do you know how hard that is? Those things are everywhere.
Broad shoulders and strong hands, the kind that lifted me up like I weighed next to nothing. Tattoos that decorated an excruciatingly defined body, under which lay a heart of gold. A smile that made me lose my footing regularly, and which could probably power all of Manhattan during an outage.
But in the end, the fantasies hurt. I remember that I’m stuck here, and he’s in California after he left New York to seek a real future for himself elsewhere and wouldn’t let me come with him. And I remember that after exchanging a few phone calls once he got there, and then even fewer text messages, he changed his number and hasn’t called me back since.
That’s when the real pain starts. So I try to think about how I’m going back to New York in two weeks with a savings account full of money. Which means I won’t have to work at the entertainment law firm anymore—a relief, since the place would no doubt remind me of the man I met there. Instead, I can focus on my classes and getting the kinds of internships that will help me get into law school.
If, of course, that’s still what I’m going to do. The idea has been sounding worse and worse to me lately, although I haven’t mentioned it to my parents. Since they’ve shown absolutely no interest in me, I’ve chosen not to bring it up, and they haven’t either. Works for me.
Surprisingly, both of their cars are in the driveway when I pull up to our house in Redmond. Despite the fact that I grew up here, it’s never totally felt like home. For one thing, it’s huge, far too big for just three people. With six bedrooms sitting on three acres of lush forest, it’s more like a museum than a home. My mother has stocked it with priceless antiques, and the immaculate white carpet has never seen a shoe, much less a dropped backpack or spilled snacks. Everything has its place, but none of those places ever seemed to fit me. Let’s just put it this way: when I saw Beauty and the Beast...I felt for the Beast, not Belle. I understood why he was such a dick locked up in the big castle. The guy was lonely.
“Layla?”
My dad’s deep voice echoes through the long hallway when I enter the house. I remove my shoes and carefully place them in the hallway closet, then pad into the kitchen, where I find him and my mother sitting together at the marble-topped island, both of them holding their favorite drinks: scotch on the rocks for my dad, dry white wine for my mom.
It wouldn’t be such a strange sight if it weren’t four in the afternoon. My parents like their cocktails, but they aren’t exactly lushes. They’ll usually wait until at least five to break out the alcohol.
“Sit down, Layla,” my dad orders, his thick Brazilian accent more pronounced than usual.
I slide onto a stool across from them at the island. At first glance, they don’t look any different than normal. I suspect that Mom has occasionally taken advantage of the fact that her husband owns a successful cosmetic surgery practice—her glossy exterior never seems to change, while the rest of my friends’ parents have all gotten older. She’s still the same bottle-blonde, white-toothed, blue-eyed ingénue she’s always been, despite having celebrated her forty-second birthday last month. Same tasteful blue sundress, same mid-height pumps, same pearl necklace a
nd solitaire ring.
Dad’s slightly more olive-toned skin shows his age a bit more, and his thick black hair is shot through with silver on the sides. He wears one of his many starched, button-down shirts and shiny leather loafers. On his wrist is one of the tastefully expensive watches he gets for Christmas from his wife. But unlike my mother’s blasé sweetness, my father is always stern. Sergio Barros never, ever smiles. That, more than the fact that he has over ten years on her, is why he has more wrinkles than his wife. His forehead is always puckered when he frowns.
Today they both look a little more their ages than usual. Dad really does look fifty-eight, and Mom really does look forty-two, mostly because their faces are shot through with something different. Sadness, maybe? Dread?
I grip the edge of the counter, already bracing myself for something. “What’s up?”
Mom takes a long drink of wine. Her tennis bracelet clinks against the glass.
“We waited as long as we could,” Dad says. “Your mother and I, we wanted to give you one last summer here before...well, it’s time.”
My gaze ping-pongs between them. “Time for what?”
“Your mother and I have decided we will no longer live together.”
Silence drops on the table like an anvil while his words echo around the big house. In here, everything has its place. Nothing feels shattered...yet. I’m not even sure if I heard him correctly.
My parents have never been happy together—that much was always clear. They’re an odd couple—a Pasadena princess with a magnanimous foreigner many years her senior. My dad is loud and authoritative while my mom is diminutive and quiet. They’ve never been affectionate, never even socialized together beyond work events. Once, when my mother had too many glasses of wine and my dad was working late, I asked her if she loved him. She laid her head in my lap and cried. I was twelve.
Bad Idea- The Complete Collection Page 36