Always Never Yours

by Emily Wibberley

  He fixes me with an indicative glance, and what he’s really saying fits into place in my head.

  I remember how he danced with Melissa every time the Saint Margaret’s guys were nearby, and how he danced with Anthony only when they weren’t. He’s not out to his school. He did invite Anthony with a purpose, but it was ruined when people he knew showed up.

  I nod, hoping my expression tells him I understand. Wordlessly, Eric peels off his gloves and takes a water pitcher out into the restaurant.

  I return to Anthony, who’s exactly where I left him, hanging out with the flour and canned tomatoes. “It’s safe to come out now,” I tell him. Expressionless, he walks out into the kitchen and picks up an order of breadsticks off the counter. “But you should know,” I continue, “Eric’s not dating Melissa, he said she’s not his type, and he looked at you twice. I think he got cold feet at the party because he’s in the closet. If I were you, I’d ask him out on a more private date.”

  But Anthony doesn’t meet my eyes. “Thanks, Megan. I have work.”

  He goes into the dining room, and I’m left in the kitchen, confused and a little hurt. I just served up the guy Anthony likes for him with a side of breadsticks. Instead of going for it, Anthony chose to walk away. Brusquely, I shove open the door in the back of the kitchen and kick the gravel as I walk to my car.

  I’m getting out my keys when I hear Anthony call my name. He’s still wearing his frilly hat, which only makes me laugh a little inside because whatever fear was in his eyes earlier has disappeared. Now he’s angry.

  “This is why I was avoiding you.” He strides toward me but halts suddenly in the middle of the parking lot, like he doesn’t want to come too close. “I knew you’d do something like this. You cannot keep interfering with my relationships. I know you come into any hint of a romantic situation guns blazing, but I’m not like you. I can’t just rush into things.”

  I’m in no mood to be lectured. “Why not? You like him. I think he likes you, but you’ll never know until you try.”

  “He’s had every opportunity to talk to me,” Anthony replies darkly, “to explain what you’re only guessing. If he wants this, he would’ve come to me.”

  “It doesn’t work that way,” I almost yell. “It’d be nice if it did, but getting the boyfriend you want is hard work. You can’t expect anything to happen if you don’t make a move. If you want him, do something about it.” I know I struck a nerve because his expression clouds over. “Don’t be afraid of this,” I go on, gentler. “The only way this definitely doesn’t work is if you do nothing.”

  He stays silent. I’ve done my best. “I have to go home,” I say, pulling out my keys.

  I get in the car and twist the key in the ignition. With the windows rolled up, I barely hear the muffled, “Did he really look at me twice?”

  I roll down my window. “Forlornly.” I nod.

  “I guess . . .” He puts his hands in his pockets. “I could invite him over for carne asada.”

  My lips begin to form a smile. “What?”

  Anthony returns the hint of a grin and nods in the direction of Verona.

  “Break a leg,” I tell him.

  When I pull onto the highway, for once I’m grateful for Dad and Rose’s trip to New York, because I know what I’m going to do tomorrow night. I’m taking my own advice.

  TWELVE

  ROMEO: Thou canst not teach me to forget.

  I.i.246

  I WORKED HARD ON THIS OUTFIT.

  I hunted for nearly an hour in my closet for a dress, but nothing felt quite right. It was only when I got the brilliant idea to take apart the bridesmaid dress from Dad and Rose’s wedding that I found the perfect thing—a pale pink shift with lacy detailing in the neckline. It hits me mid-thigh, and I’ve paired it with studded black ankle boots and feather earrings to keep from looking too girly.

  Because tonight, I have a plan. Will’s coming over, and we’re going to have sex for the first time. I’m not going to wait around for him to define our relationship. I want to enjoy every part of whatever this is with him while I can, and though I haven’t fallen for him yet—though our relationship’s much younger than Tyler’s and mine was—I’m not letting that get in my way. Why would I? I’m practically an adult. I’m a non-virgin, a sex-having person. This relationship’s quickly expiring under a ticking clock named Alyssa, and I want to feel that closeness with Will. So what if I have to rush a few steps?

  By eight, I’m downstairs in my bronze eye shadow doing what every girl dreams of on a Friday night—reading Romeo and Juliet on the couch. Dad and Rose went to the airport this morning, Erin’s at my aunt’s, and I have the house to myself.

  I roll my eyes at Juliet’s latest oversentimental proclamation. This bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath, may prove a beauteous flower when next we meet. The play’s a terrible distraction while I wait.

  The doorbell rescues me from Juliet’s pining. I leap off the couch, then take a second to rearrange my hair. When I reach the door, I know I look amazing. I pull it open, and Will stands before me.

  Never mind. He just redefined amazing.

  He’s wearing a faded denim jacket over a plain white V-neck, and he’s cuffed his tight black pants above his Timberland boots. He rests his hands lightly in his pockets, and it takes everything in me not to attack him right there on the doorstep.

  “Hey,” he says, and my pulse pounds. “I thought you might need a break from Romeo and Juliet”—he holds up a copy of Shakespeare in Love—“with some Romeo and Juliet.”

  I laugh and shut the door behind him. “Two sexy Williams in one night? I think I’m blushing.”

  He raises an incredulous eyebrow. “I’ve never seen you blush.”

  “Then you’re not trying hard enough,” I say over my shoulder, walking farther into the living room. I reach the stairs and look back to find he’s sitting on the couch. Instead of following me. Owen was right, he is clueless. I remind myself he’s probably never done this before. “Oh,” I say nonchalantly, “I thought we’d watch on my laptop upstairs.”

  “Why?” Will looks puzzled. “We’ve got the bigger screen down here.”

  Oh my god. “I thought we’d watch on my bed,” I clarify with a meaningful look.

  It takes him a second, but then the light goes on in his eyes and he jumps off the couch. “Oh. Yeah. Of course. Good thinking. Great thinking.”

  Finally! Smiling to myself, I lead him upstairs. He’s quiet the whole way. As I’m putting the movie into my laptop, I notice he’s standing aimlessly in the middle of the room. Hands back in his pockets, he meanders over to my bookcase—on the opposite side of the room from my bed.

  “That’s from The Crucible,” I say, nodding to the cast photo on the shelf he’s studying. “Freshman spring. It’s the first show I ever assistant-directed.”

  “I remember,” he says, his back still to me. “I was in the crew.”

  “No way.” I put the laptop down, surprised I don’t remember him and never noticed him in the photo. I walk over to the shelf beside him. Searching the photo, the first thing I notice is Tyler in the middle of the group, putting on his not-yet-perfected Tyler Dunning grin. There’s Anthony, a couple of rows behind him, his hair grown into something resembling an Afro and his arm around me. We were dating at the time. I lean in and inspect the back rows, and—

  “No,” I gasp. Because there’s Will—or Billy, actually—rail-thin and with the awkwardly stringy hair of freshman boys everywhere.

  “Don’t say a word,” Will says through his teeth.

  I round on him teasingly. “But your hair.” It’s a sharp contrast from the perfect, gelled sweep of blond hair he’s presently running his hand through.

  He steps back from the bookcase, a flush of red rising up his neck. “I know, I know,” he mutters. “It’s the reason I’ve never had a girlf
riend.”

  I wait for the “until now,” but it doesn’t come. Will continues to look at the other shelves in my room, and I’m left once again wondering what he considers me. I told myself it didn’t matter if I’m his girlfriend or just his hookup buddy, but I kind of want to know. Before I get the chance to ask, he turns back to me, the confident glint back in his eyes.

  “Not everyone can be like you,” he says, nodding to the photo. “Beautiful then, too.”

  His words push the question from my mind. We’re obviously on the same page, because he wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me to his lips. The kiss somehow feels different, charged with both of our expectations. For the first time, it’s the first step to something else.

  Breaking off, I lead him to the bed and slide off his jacket, my lips still stinging. I lightly push him onto the mattress and close my laptop on my desk. “I don’t think we’ll need the pretense,” I say, kicking off my boots and climbing on top of him.

  “We wouldn’t have watched much anyway,” he breathes before I grab him and kiss him again.

  His hands slide down to my waist, and I feel his fingers pressing into the small of my back. I run my hands down his chest when he moves to kiss my neck, his hand inching up the hem of my dress. Then I’m pulling off his shirt. Then I’m lifting my arms over my head, and my dress hits the floor. Then his fingers glide up my back.

  Then my phone buzzes.

  “Shit.” I jump off the bed. The phone vibrates a couple more times, and I know Dad’s upset. The rule was me texting him, not him texting me. “Give me a second,” I tell Will. “I forgot to do something.”

  Dad’s sent exactly the same text three times—Where are you, Megan?—and then an accusatory line of question marks.

  im home, I shoot back.

  I set down the phone and start to climb back into Will’s lap. Just as we’re picking up where we left off, my phone rattles from my desk once more. I sigh angrily and scramble off Will again. “Sorry . . .”

  It takes me a second to make sense of what my dad’s sent. The first message reads, What do you think? and below it are three images too small to discern on my phone’s lock screen. I slide it open, and my heart plummets.

  Three photos, each a different angle of a badly lit sidewalk view of a house. Chesapeake Lane, reads the sign on the street corner.

  What do I think? Like it matters what the house looks like. Whatever house they choose, it’ll be a perfectly nice place for Erin and the baby to grow up, and for me to stop by on holidays to sleep uncomfortably in an impersonal spare bedroom.

  looks fine, I send back.

  I toss my phone not gently onto my desk and turn back to Will, eager to put Chesapeake Lane out of my mind. I crash into him again, and he’s pulling me closer, and I’m reaching for my bra. But I can’t bring myself to do what I wanted to. He’s sitting underneath me, and he’s gorgeous, but I feel hollow.

  He’s noticed my hesitation and caught the look on my face. “What is it?” he asks.

  “It’s nothing,” I say, because there’s no reason to tell him more.

  I clamber off him and pick up my dress off the floor. I’m pulling it over my head when I hear him say, “Wait, what?”

  “I’m sorry,” I say in a flat, unconvincing voice. “I’m just not in the mood right now.”

  “Okay . . .” He sounds skeptical, even indignant. I watch him get dressed. “Guess we’ll do this another time.”

  If he even wants another time, a familiar voice says in the back of my head. With the way Alyssa’s been acting around him, and how I just totally screwed tonight up, I’d understand if he didn’t want to give me a second chance.

  He walks out of my room, and I don’t bother seeing him to the front door. I pause uncertainly in the middle of my room, wishing I could have ignored my dad and just focused on Will.

  But even now, I find myself staring at the photo Will and I were looking at minutes earlier. I survey the plays on my bookshelves, the coat rack in the corner, the playbills pinned to my bulletin board. In a matter of months, everything will be packed into cardboard boxes and shipped to New York, and the room I grew up in will be empty.

  I collapse onto my bed, where a hard corner digs into my back. I reach under me and pull out the DVD case of Shakespeare in Love.

  My plans for the night come back in an uncomfortable rush. I feel unsteady. And I know it’s not only because of the impending New York thing. I run a hand through my hair impulsively, trying to iron the tremble from my fingertips. What was I doing with Will? What felt promising and exhilarating and right an hour ago feels upside down now.

  I thought I could do this. I thought our relationship status wouldn’t make a difference. I thought I could have sex with Will right now and capture the connection, the closeness that I’m desperate for—a little too desperate, I guess. Part of me wonders if I didn’t know deep down it wouldn’t work.

  Part of me wonders if the texts from Dad weren’t the only reason I stopped things.

  I’m glad Will and I didn’t go further, I decide. But everything’s in limbo now. My relationship’s not a relationship. My home won’t be for much longer. Everything’s lurching out of reach, and I’m in territory I don’t recognize.

  I force myself upright. I can’t look at Will’s DVD right now. I can’t be reminded of how tonight could have gone, and how fractured we left things. I shove Shakespeare in Love into a drawer and out of my mind.

  * * *

  Owen’s on my doorstep the next morning.

  When I woke up after three hours of fitful sleep, I threw on the first things I found in my room. Now I’ve parked myself on the couch in the living room once more, and I’m reading the same scene of Romeo and Juliet I was last night. It still sounds ridiculous, and while I’m finally beginning to memorize the lines, it’s not helping me to picture myself saying them on stage at Ashland.

  I open the door to find Owen wearing a dark blue button-down with his hair neatly combed, and for a moment I regret my old jeans and hole-ridden The Clash T-shirt.

  He holds up a crisp white paper bag, beaming. “I brought coffee and bagels.”

  “Oh. Wow, thanks,” I say, stepping aside to let him in. We’d planned a couple days ago that he’d come over this morning for our second play/Will-information session. What we hadn’t planned on was him bringing me breakfast.

  He turns to give me a knowing smile. “I figure you probably had a late night.”

  He means Will. “Something like that,” I say.

  I grab a couple of plates from the kitchen and set them out in the living room. But when I look up at Owen, I see his eyes flit into the kitchen, and a strange combination of expressions crosses his face. “Does a baby live here?” he asks abruptly.

  I follow his gaze to Erin’s high chair, which, I realize, Will probably didn’t even notice. “Oh, yeah. But she’s at my aunt’s.”

  Owen looks pale. “Whose . . . baby is it?” he ventures gently.

  “Oh my god,” I explode. “You do not think I had Tyler Dunning’s love-baby.” It’s too ridiculous for me to be offended, honestly.

  He looks briefly relieved, until he winces in obvious mortification. “I’m— I didn’t—” he stutters.

  I have to laugh. “Erin’s my half sister,” I explain. “My dad and my stepmom’s kid.”

  He nods understandingly. “I have a ten-year-old brother. You can hardly go five feet in my house without stepping on a LEGO.” He winces again.

  “I was in your house.” I take a sip of the still-too-hot coffee. “There wasn’t a LEGO in sight.”

  “Yeah, because I cleaned for two hours before you got there.”

  He says it casually, like it’s something he’d do for anyone. And who knows? He might. Still, it’s sweet. I almost tell him that, and then I remember it didn’t exactly go over well last time I c
alled him sweet. “Hey, I’d trade LEGO for applesauce in my hair any day,” I say instead.

  His eyes widen. “It was applesauce!”

  I nod grimly.

  Owen sets the bagels down on the coffee table in the living room. I reach in and grab a cinnamon raisin. He takes the other and drops into the armchair next to the couch. “You probably don’t need my help, what with last night,” he preempts me, crossing a foot onto his knee. He’s dashed lines of familiar blue ink on the white rubber edges of his Converse. “Will told me when you invited him over yesterday.”

  I don’t reply right away, spreading cream cheese on my bagel. “He didn’t text you afterward, I guess.”

  Owen’s eyebrows go up. “Guys don’t really do that, Megan.”

  “Do what? Text?”

  “No . . .” he says slowly, looking a little amused. “Text about . . . certain topics.”

  “My mistake.” I return a faint smile. “Well, I kind of hoped he’d texted you. Things ended . . . weird.”

  Owen frowns, concern creasing his forehead. “Weird like he didn’t want to?”

  “Owen. Please.”

  He goes red. “I— Of course, he wanted to,” he stutters.

  Wait, what? Was that Owen calling me hot? Or hook-up-with-able, or whatever? Part of me wants to press him on the subject further, but I’m not sure if Owen’s the type to handle my flirtatiousness. He might think I’m genuinely coming onto him. “He did want to,” I say, “and we did, or started to. Then when we . . . didn’t, he seemed kind of pissed, and I don’t know where we stand now.”

  Owen’s blush hasn’t entirely faded, but his voice is even when he tells me, “Will’s not pissed. He’s a better guy than that. What happened?” He clears his throat, and the blush comes raging back. “I mean, why didn’t you guys do it?”

  “I got a text from my dad.” The words come out before I’ve even thought about how I’m bringing up my family. But once they’re out there, I realize how much I do want to talk about it with someone. Before I know it, I’m telling him more. About the hookup, about the photos from my dad. About New York.