Our Year of Maybe

by Rachel Lynn Solomon

  I used to love the newness and novelty of him, but what strikes me now is his familiarity. Though we were only officially together for a few months, it’s easy to picture him draping an arm around the back of my chair or me sliding my hand into his, tracing his knuckles with my thumb.

  “Hi,” I say as he takes a seat across from me.

  “Hi.” He sips his coffee, but it must be too hot because he makes a face and sets it back down right away, so forcefully that some of it splashes the table. He didn’t get a napkin, but I got two, so I hand him one. “Thanks,” he says as he mops up the spill.

  “Thanks for meeting me.”

  A brusque nod. Then: “Have you listened to the new Tarts album? It just came out.”

  “Oh—no. I haven’t yet.”

  “Oh. It’s good.”

  My tea has cooled down, so I take a sip. He tries his coffee again. “How . . . are you?” I ask.

  “Honestly, not great,” he says, bringing his eyes up to mine and stretching a hand across the table to graze my sleeve. “Peter, I’m so sorry about what I said on Saturday. I wasn’t thinking clearly, and I get why you’ve been so upset with me.”

  It takes a second for it to sink in: He thought I needed space because I was upset with him.

  “Stop. Stop. I have to say something first.” I take a deep breath, trying to find the right words. There’s only the truth. We can’t move forward unless he knows it. “The night we broke up, after we fought . . . I went to Sophie’s.”

  A muscle in his jaw ripples, as though he’s clenching his teeth.

  “I was really distraught,” I continue. “A total mess. I told her what happened, and she was comforting me, and there were all these emotions, and . . . and we slept together.” I expect to feel lighter after I confess it, but I’m only more keyed up, waiting for his reaction.

  He closes his eyes for a moment, and when he opens them, he can’t look at me. He’s quiet for what feels like the length of an entire song.

  “I—wow, a lot of thoughts right now.” With a sigh, he scrubs a hand down his face. “I guess I’m glad you told me. Are you . . . together now?”

  “No,” I say quickly. Emphatically. “We’re not. I’ve never been more certain Sophie and I aren’t meant to be together that way.” I pause for a few moments. Explaining Sophie and me to someone else has never been easy, and what happened Saturday didn’t exactly change that. “I know Sophie and I have a weird relationship, and the transplant complicated it a million times over. I’ve been feeling like I owed her for what she did and guilty that our relationship wasn’t what it used to be.”

  “Is that why you did it?”

  It would be so simple to say yes. But that’s only half the truth. “That was part of it, but I think another part was that I was curious. Like you said, maybe I needed the time to figure it out. I used to like her, years ago, and the closeness of our friendship messed with my mind. I thought those feelings were still there underneath. But . . . they’re not there now. Earlier this week, Sophie and I had this massive fight, and even if we manage to come back from it, I’m pretty positive we’re never going to be as close as we used to be.”

  “Shit. Wow.” He doesn’t exactly look heartbroken for me, but shocked, definitely. “I’m . . . sorry.” He grimaces. “That was hard to say, if I’m being totally honest.”

  “I appreciate that. But you don’t have to apologize. I messed up. The timing was really not great. I know that.”

  He goes quiet again. And then: “I’m not going to pretend this isn’t extremely hard for me to wrap my mind around,” he says. “But—you and I weren’t together. I wanted you to figure this shit out with her. I know that with you, I stepped into something more complicated than I could imagine, but . . .” A long sigh. “I was sure you were worth it.”

  My heart picks up speed. “And now?”

  “Now . . . I need some time to process all of this.”

  Time. Okay. Time is doable. Time doesn’t mean “the end.”

  “Of course. Of course. I get it.” I pause, debating whether I should say what I want to. I have to get it out. “I do still like you. A lot. I’m not saying that to make you process this faster or anything. I swear. I just wanted you to know that I’ve never felt better than when I’m with you, or with the band.”

  These words clearly affect him, though, twisting his mouth into a sad smile. “Like ninety percent of me is telling me I like you too much not to try this again.” Before I can get excited about that, he continues: “And the band misses you. I know it’s only been a week, but they get attached quickly, I guess. So . . . if you want to come back to practice tomorrow afternoon, I think it would make them really happy.”

  “I’d hate to disappoint them.”

  “Yeah,” he says, his eyes hopeful behind his old-man glasses. “It’s not the same without you. I mean—that’s what they say.”

  Peter

  10:21 p.m.

  You don’t need to respond, but I wanted to tell you that I’m so sorry, Sophie.

  For so many things.

  Sophie

  10:37 p.m.

  Thank you for saying that.

  10:38 p.m.

  Oh. Hey. You’re there. I wasn’t expecting that.

  10:40 p.m.

  What can I say? I’m full of surprises.

  10:44 p.m.

  You don’t owe me an answer to this, either, but . . . did you mean what you said? About . . . not liking who you are when you’re around me?

  11:19 p.m.

  I still need some time to figure it out.

  11:25 p.m.

  Okay.

  CHAPTER 35

  SOPHIE

  THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS AFTER you break up with your best friend, the person you loved more than anyone in the world. You stop giving them rides to school. You avoid them in the halls. Your parents, who were also best friends, drift away from each other again. At doctor’s appointments, you don’t learn anything you didn’t already know. Sometimes you hurt, and sometimes you ache, but the worst pain is one you can’t put a name to and can’t swallow a pill to fix.

  The weekend after that weekend, Tabby drags me to the Early Bird for free waffles and a mountain of French fries.

  “You’ve been mopey,” she says, pointing her fork at me. “You needed this.”

  “Mopey. Yeah.” I dip a chunk of waffle into syrup. Dipping is a much more satisfying—though less economical—use of syrup. Regarding my mopiness, I’m not even sure where to begin. “Everything with Peter is a complete mess.”

  “That can’t be true. I can’t imagine anything could happen between you two to cause that.”

  “Well . . . we slept together.” It’s a relief to tell her.

  “Holy shit. What?”

  “Last weekend. And . . . I thought we were finally together, but we’re not, and when we tried to talk about it, we just exploded at each other. What you said, about being friends with him knowing we can never be together? I couldn’t do it. Too much of my life has revolved around him. It needs to fucking stop.” My voice hitches, and Tabby reaches across the table to squeeze my hand.

  “Soph,” she says quietly, but I shake my head to indicate I’m not done.

  “Whatever happens, it’s going to be impossible for me to ever forget him because of this.” I gesture toward the scar beneath my shirt. “All I want to do is stop loving him, but he’s been part of my life for so long that I don’t know how.”

  “What do you love about him?” she asks, grabbing a handful of fries.

  The question throws me. “I—” I start, another piece of waffle halfway to my mouth. No one’s ever really asked me that. Because he’s Peter. Because those are the feelings I have for Peter. “He’s smart, and sweet, and funny, and . . .” I trail off, realizing those are totally vague traits that could apply to just about anyone. But Peter is not a vague person. I shake that away. Loving Peter has become as natural as my own heartbeat. “His music, that’s a big one. We h
ave this deep respect for each other as artists, and I’ve always loved that. Like we understand each other on a completely different level from people who don’t get music. And he just knows me. Better than anyone.”

  Tabby nods. “Okay. I can see that. I was always sort of jealous of you two growing up. You bonded so immediately. You had each other and I . . . didn’t have you. My older sister.”

  “Tab,” I say, her words a blow to my heart. “You and I aren’t that far apart from each other, are we?”

  “No, but we’ve never been best friends or anything. And now with Luna . . .”

  “That doesn’t mean you and I can’t be close.”

  “I guess it doesn’t.”

  We chew in silence for a couple minutes, until I realize this entire conversation has been focused on my problems. “How—how are you and Josh?” Lately, they’ve seemed okay, and Josh is back to spending most of his time at our house. I’m not sure why I ever resented that. These days, I like that there’s always someone around.

  “We’re good,” she says. “Josh and I have disagreements. That’s normal. But having a baby makes those about a hundred times more intense.”

  “Why did you decide to do your GED online?”

  “Honestly? I knew it would be weird at school. It was bad enough when I was pregnant. Everyone knew, I mean, obviously. It was the worst from the teachers, though. They’d give me these judgmental looks, like they thought I’d ruined my life.” She shakes her head. “But did Josh get any of that? Nope. He didn’t get lingering stares or subtly offensive comments. Some people didn’t even know he was the father or that we were dating. But for me, it was impossible to hide. It’s hard having total strangers know something so private about you.”

  “I guess that’s sort of what pregnancy is. Like carrying around a sign that says I HAD SEX.”

  Tabby snort-laughs at this. “I never thought of it that way.”

  “You have your friends, though.”

  “My high school friends?” She raises her faint auburn brows, which are the same shape as mine. “Soph, I haven’t seen any of them in months. It feels like I don’t have anything in common with them anymore, and it’s hard to make mom friends because most of them are so much older. . . .”

  “I had no idea. I’m sorry.”

  “I lost a lot. My classes and my friends and a good chunk of my independence. It was a sacrifice. I knew that going into it. But we also felt like we could raise a baby, with help, of course. I just never want it to feel like ‘mother’ or ‘teen mom’ is the only piece of my identity.”

  “That makes sense. You’re my annoying little sister before you’re a teen mom, that’s for sure,” I say, and she laughs again. I’m learning that laughing with my sister is one of the very best things. “What I don’t get is how Mom and Dad were so against the transplant but so on board with your pregnancy.”

  “Sophie. You have selective memory or something. They were furious at first. I was fifteen. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Telling them I was pregnant was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But . . . we got through it. They love Luna. I’m sure they wish this were happening ten years from now, but this is our life. And I think we’re dealing with it okay.” She tows a fry through ketchup, drawing a red heart on her plate. “I’m not naive enough to assume Josh and I will get married. I love Josh an absolutely ridiculous amount, even when it’s hard. We’ll see how we feel after college. We don’t want to feel pressured to rush into it, even though we have a kid.”

  Tabby’s more mature than I could have imagined. “That’s good.”

  “Maybe it’s my maternal instinct, but God, I feel so weirdly protective of you now. Like, I want to go fight Peter!”

  “Please don’t. And we’re only a year apart. Maybe we’re supposed to protect each other.”

  “I like that.”

  “Sometimes I feel like you’ve left me behind. You’re growing up, and I’m stunted. Like, you and Josh started having sex when you were fifteen.”

  “We’d been together for a while at that point, and we’d discussed it, and we felt ready.”

  “Do you guys still . . . ?”

  “Yeah. We’re super careful. Obviously. After I got pregnant, I was anxious about it, but Josh has always been the sweetest.”

  I can hear the love in her voice.

  “He’s a good one,” I say, and she smiles.

  “I want us to be able to talk like this,” she says. “You and me. It’s a total waste of a sister if we don’t.”

  “I—I know,” I admit. “I want to.”

  And then we fight over the last French fry.

  When we pull into the driveway at home, my phone buzzes. I’ve spent so much time this year waiting on messages from Peter that for a moment I think it must be him.

  But when I unlock my phone, it’s not a text. It’s an e-mail.

  It starts with “Congratulations.”

  Which might be even better.

  It takes me the entire weekend to go through my room and get rid of anything that reminds me of Peter. Scraps of sheet music from our Terrible Twosome days, which are almost assuredly over now. A used Philosophy for Dummies book he gave me as a joke for my sixteenth birthday. I never told him, but I actually read the whole book because I wanted so badly to understand the thing he loved so much, even though it took me forever and I loathed every minute of it. Into a trash bag it goes. Notes we sent back and forth in elementary school, most of them making zero sense to me now. Homemade cards, from his calligraphy phase in middle school, for various Jewish holidays. All of them go into the trash, even the one that just says, HAPPY DAY! He gave it to me on a completely random day, one that meant nothing to either of us.

  Then I reach down to the medical ID bracelet, with the charms I thought were so sweet. I thought they meant Peter understood me on some deep level, but it’s no big revelation that I love to dance.

  So I dig my fingernails into the wire.

  And I rip them off the bracelet, the ballet slipper and the music note.

  I need to be away from all this, figure out who I am on my own. I’m hoping the workshop will help. No one will know me in San Francisco. I won’t be quiet Sophie or Peter’s best friend Sophie or kidney donor Sophie. I won’t be Sophie, hopelessly in love with someone who does not love her back. I can be anyone, and I like the sound of that.

  I gave Peter a piece of me—but maybe I also gave him the freedom to figure out who he was without me. And I should have realized much sooner that I’d given myself the exact same thing.

  As I’m taking the last trash bag outside, I freeze when I see him across the street. He and his parents are getting out of the car. When he spots me, he pauses too, lingering in the driveway while his parents go inside.

  I lift my hand in a wave. He watches me for moment, like he’s weighing what he wants to do.

  Then he waves back. It’s not even a full wave; he just lifts his hand and then brings it back down.

  He didn’t owe me his love, and I didn’t deserve it because of the sacrifices I made. Truthfully, Peter and I were unbalanced for a long time.

  A friendship breakup has got to be worse than a relationship breakup. With a relationship, you can go back to being friends. There’s at least the possibility of it. But after a friendship ends, what do you go back to? Do you simply become nothing to each other? Fade away until you barely recognize each other anymore?

  He shuts himself inside his house, and I return to mine, a sense of calm spreading through me. I thought the fight and fallout would turn my love for him to ashes. The flame is still there, though, a soft flicker. Every day I love him less, and one day I will love only our memories.

  CHAPTER 36

  PETER

  MY FIRST PRACTICE BACK WITH diamonds are for Never is awkward, but by my third, everything feels almost normal.

  “I wrote a song for us,” I announce during my fourth practice.

  Everyone turns to face me. Over the past few weeks
, Chase and I have started sitting together at lunch again, and he gave me a ride to practice today.

  “You did?” Dylan says.

  “Yeah—I mean, I’ve always kind of written music.” I pause. It’s hard to think about the Terrible Twosome without my chest aching just a little. “But I wrote this one with the band in mind.”

  “The floor is yours,” Aziza says, motioning with a drumstick.

  I adjust the mic in front of me, the one I’ve used to sing backup until now. My lyrics have hopefully improved significantly since “Dancing through My Heart.” The song isn’t about Chase or Sophie, not explicitly. I love subtext too much for that. But my emotions from this past year are all over it. It’s a mix of melancholy and hopeful, quiet until the final, crashing chorus.

  “I love your voice,” Kat says when I finish. “What were those lyrics in the second verse? ‘At night the stars are jealous of/the wishes people make on us’?”

  Staring at the keys, I nod. My lyrics in someone else’s voice—that’s trippy.

  “That’s fucking beautiful.”

  “You want to sing backup for me?” I ask.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Can you play that opening again?” Chase asks. I’ve been most anxious to hear his reaction, but his tone is hard to interpret. “I want to try something.”

  “Sure,” I say, gliding my fingers back into position.

  Chase plays some harmonics, and combined with my soft piano notes, it sounds wistful and bright and amazing all at once.

  “Keep going,” I say as we slide into the chorus.

  Together, we play the rest of the song. He experiments with chords, and I sing around a smile, and the rest of the band watches us.

  “Did you guys just get back together?” Dylan says, and Chase flushes. Aziza plays a rim shot.

  I cough, unable to look at him. “Um. Should we try it with all of us?”

  We work on my song for the next hour, creating something whole and cohesive from my notes, my lyrics. The entire process still astounds me. We have a few shows booked this summer, and Kat and Dylan want to do a Pacific Northwest mini-tour next year if we’re all still together.