This Is What It Feels Like

by Rebecca Barrow

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want me to—”

  Autumn’s eyes closed, a somehow pretty sheen of sweat on her cheeks and a breathless voice when she said, “Keep going. Do not stop.”

  Jules slipped her hands around Autumn’s beautifully round hips and kissed her thigh, her slick skin. And for her first time giving oral, she thought she did pretty good. Or from Autumn’s gasping reactions, it seemed that way. It was not like she imagined, like things she’d read online had told her it would be: it was better. And when Autumn reached down, her fingers grasping for Jules, and when Jules reached up and twined her fingers through Autumn’s, it hit her.

  This was it. Real romance. Not just the sex, but the laughing at each other, spilling their fears, talking about laundry and color-organized books. It wasn’t magic; not everything was glittery and gold all the time. And declarations in the pouring rain and flowers on her doorstep—the idea of them paled in comparison to the reality of this, Jules realized. This everything, and this right now—Autumn’s fingers threaded through hers, this most intimate stolen moment that was theirs and no one else’s—what more had Jules been aching for?

  And she had it now, and maybe it wouldn’t be a forever thing, the end of all her longing. Jules had no idea. But this, right now, was enough.

  Jules was enough.

  Dia

  The morning of Lex’s birthday broke bright and clear. When Dia’s alarm went off, Lex was already wide awake, bouncing around in her crib with bedhead curls sticking in every direction. “Mama!” she squeaked. “Hi.”

  “I’m up!” Dia rolled out of bed and padded over to the crib. “Hey, do you know what day it is today? It’s your birthday! How old are you?”

  Lex scrunched her face up before answering, “Two!”

  “That’s right, my baby genius, you’re two today.” Dia lifted her out and smushed their faces together. “Let’s go get some birthday breakfast.”

  Her dad was already at work in the kitchen, but he abandoned the stove to come over and plant a kiss on Lex’s head. “Happy birthday to my favorite grandbaby!”

  “I’m two,” Lex said, proudly holding up her hand and actually showing three fingers. Dia folded one down and smiled.

  “That’s right,” Max said, rescuing pancakes from the stovetop. “Are you hungry?”

  “For chocolate-chip pancakes?” Dia said, pretending to gnaw on Lex’s hand. “Always, right, Lala?”

  They ate breakfast outside, all four of them. Her mom put sliced bananas on Lex’s plate, and Dia added a giant swirl of whipped cream. Birthday rules.

  After breakfast Jules arrived with Autumn in tow, and they spent an hour setting up in the yard—streamers strung from the fence, balloons tied to the lawn chairs, and their table draped in paper tablecloth and so much glitter. It wasn’t a real huge party, more of a come-to-the-house-there’ll-be-food-and-music thing. Lex was only two, Dia figured; there wasn’t much point in going over the top. But it was one of the rare times where Dia could make magic. For Lex, she’d make magic whenever she could.

  Dia was setting out the food when the doorbell rang and Hanna came in, Molly following. “Where’s the cake?” Hanna said. “I’m here for the cake.”

  “You have to wait,” Dia said. “Molly, help yourself to drinks, they’re outside.”

  “Cool,” Molly said, strutting off in that self-conscious, attention-seeking way that was so thirteen-year-old.

  Dia turned to Hanna. “Does your mom know she’s here with you?”

  “Yes,” Hanna said, rolling her eyes. “Molly told her. She said Mom went all quiet first, and then super enthusiastic, and the only thing she said to Molly was to be home by dinner.” They both watched Molly in the yard. “She gets so much more freedom than me. But she deserves it.”

  “You deserve it, too,” Dia said.

  Hanna nodded but said nothing, and Dia grabbed her arm, pulling her outside. “Come on. This is supposed to be fun!”

  By two their little yard was as full as it ever was—mostly with her mom’s friends, her dad’s EMT crew and their older kids, neighbors (including Waffles the dog playing gently with an overexcited Lex), and a couple of moms from day care watching their kids running through bubbles.

  After Dia spilled soda on her shirt she went to change, tossing the dirty clothes in her overflowing hamper. Before she went back out, she went in the bottom drawer inside her closet and took out the baby book that she’d never quite finished. But still, she allowed herself the luxury of five minutes sitting there, paging through the pictures with her messy writing underneath: Forty weeks pregnant and Dia holding her belly for the camera. Alexa’s first day home, a tiny ball of a baby in a too-big onesie and mittens. After a while it became just pictures, hastily pasted in: Lex standing with Dia’s hands hovering, ready to catch her, and sitting in a kiddie pool in the backyard, and with cake smeared all over her face from a year ago.

  Her baby was two and she’d so far managed to keep her alive, relatively unharmed, and seemingly happy. Dia didn’t really believe in a god or heaven or anything, but she closed her eyes anyway and thought words that she couldn’t say out loud to anybody: She’s amazing, Elliot. You’d think so if you knew her. Or maybe she wouldn’t even be here if you were still here. I don’t really know what might have happened if you hadn’t gone and died on me. But it doesn’t matter. You changed my entire world and I’ll never get to tell you what that means to me. I have this piece of you, though. She’s here, and I’m here, and you’re not, but we’re okay. We’ll be okay.

  She opened her eyes and laughed at herself. “Get it together, Valentine,” she said, running a careful finger under each eye so as not to smudge her mascara. “Jesus.”

  Dia left the book on her bed and went out again. When she got to the back door, she called to Jules, “Come help me with the—” She stopped. “Oh.”

  Jesse was out in the yard, and from where Dia stood it looked like he was rescuing a balloon that’d gotten free and tangled in the tree that trespassed over from the neighbor’s yard. She watched as he reached for it, stretching high, his shirt riding up showing yet another bruise, on his back this time. He got it and handed it to one of the older kids, and Dia leaned against the door frame. “When did he get here?”

  “I don’t know.” Jules was at Dia’s elbow now, and she followed her gaze. “Like, ten minutes ago?”

  “Oh,” Dia said again. “Okay.”

  “What?” Jules looked at her. “Is he not supposed to be here? Is something going on with you two?”

  “Nothing’s going on.”

  “Your face says you’re lying,” Jules said. “Did he do something?”

  “He didn’t do anything,” Dia said, and that was the truth, at least. “Forget it. Come light the candles with me.”

  Everyone crowded around as Dia sat with Lex on her lap and helped tear open some of her presents, and then pretended she wasn’t getting emotional while everybody sang “Happy Birthday.” She pressed her face close to her daughter’s so they could blow out the candles together, and whispered in her ear. “Happy birthday, Lex. You’re my best present every year.”

  They passed around cake, vanilla with strawberry buttercream, and someone—Hanna, Dia suspected—turned the music up, A Tribe Called Quest soundtracking the afternoon turning to evening. People began to drift home, full up and happy. Dia snapped picture after picture on her phone: of her dad holding on to one of Lex’s shoes while she ran circles around him; her mom swinging Lex high in the air; Jules smushing a kiss on Lex’s cheek while she giggled.

  She wrapped up pieces of cake and gave them to people on their way out, thanking them for coming. She watched Molly and Autumn showing Lex how to thread daisies into a chain. She watched Jesse petting the dog and talking to Candy with the leash in her hand. She didn’t mean to avoid him, and she didn’t want to push things. He had come to her house, though. He was on her territory.

  Why is he here? Dia thought. He’s supposed t
o be done with me. What is it going to take?

  Dia took a piece of cake and held it carefully on her way over to Jesse. “Hi,” Dia said. “Sorry to interrupt.”

  “It’s cool,” Candy said, clipping the leash onto the dog’s collar. “I have to go pick up Christopher from work now, anyway. Thanks for having us, Dia. I think Alexa’s having a great birthday.”

  “I think she cares more about the fact she got to see Waffles than any of her presents,” Dia said with a laugh. “See you later.”

  Candy waved as she led the dog away, and Dia looked at Jesse. “Lex loves that dog,” she said. “You know how she is.”

  “It’s a pretty cute dog,” he said. “I can see why she’s so into it.”

  Dia smiled and then looked at her feet. “What are you doing here?”

  “Well, I don’t like to miss free cake,” Jesse said, and he wasn’t exactly smiling, this guarded expression on his face. “Aren’t we supposed to be going back to the way things were?”

  “I . . .” Dia wasn’t sure what to say to that.

  Jesse nodded toward Alexa. “And you don’t turn two years old every day, right?”

  “Right,” Dia said. Of course he came, she thought. Of course. Because he was a good person and Dia had told him to come, months ago, and so even though things were weird, he was still here. Because he didn’t want to miss her kid’s birthday.

  “I had a gift already,” he said. “I wanted to make sure Alexa got it.”

  “Oh. Thank you,” Dia said, and then, “Here.” She presented the cake to him. “I know it’s not butterscotch cookies, but we were all out.”

  Jesse waited a long beat before taking it from her. “Thanks,” he said, and then he looked at her properly for the first time all day. “How did it go? Round two?”

  Dia pulled in a slow breath. “Okay,” she said. “Good. I think.”

  “Good,” he repeated, nodding. “All right. I gotta go. I’m supposed to be at work in fifteen minutes. I . . .” He ran a hand over his head. “Sorry if I made it weird coming here.”

  “It’s okay,” Dia said again, and she silenced the part of her that wanted to ask him to stay, to talk about things, because she didn’t have the words and she knew, really, that she should let him go.

  So instead she nodded and said, “Thanks for coming,” before walking away, back to Lex.

  When everyone but her friends had gone and the yard looked like a whirlwind of glitter and ice cream had hit it, Dia changed the music to Carly Rae Jepsen and started cleaning up. Her mom and dad had taken Lex on a walk around the block, to try to calm her down from everything, and it was nice to breathe for a minute.

  “What do you want to do with the leftovers?” Hanna said. “In the fridge?”

  “Yeah,” Dia said, grabbing a trash bag. “Tupperware is under the sink.”

  She started gathering up all the torn wrapping paper and paper plates while Molly helped Hanna box up the food and Jules . . . well, Jules didn’t seem to be doing anything but sitting and watching the others work. “Juliana,” Dia said, “can you get off your ass and help?”

  “I am helping,” Jules said, kicking her legs out and folding her hands behind her head. “I’m observing. Making sure you get everything.”

  “You’re being obnoxious,” Autumn said, hands full of streamers. “I don’t make out with obnoxious people.”

  “Go get me a soda,” Dia said. “That’s helpful.”

  Jules groaned. “Fine,” she said, standing.

  Dia cleared the table of debris while Jules did as she said, and when she came back with the soda they both sat in their plastic chairs. Dia put her feet in Jules’s lap as she read the happy birthday texts from cousins she hadn’t seen in years and her aunt who’d recently learned how to use emojis. “People love birthdays,” she said to Jules, flicking from her texts to her email. “It’s like—holy shit.”

  “Your aunt Jeanie said holy shit?” Jules said. “Wow.”

  “No,” Dia said, and she opened the email that was from Sun City Radio, her fingers slipping on the screen. “Hanna! Come here, now!”

  Jules sat up. “What is it?” she asked. “Is it the contest?”

  Hanna came over, and Molly and Autumn stopped cleaning up to look over. “What?”

  Dia cleared her throat and began to read: “‘Dear Wildfire: We are so stoked to let you know that you have made it into our top three!’”

  “We’re in the top three?” Hanna asked, her eyes wide. “Wait. Read that again. We’re in the top fucking three?”

  Dia started laughing and couldn’t stop, and then to her surprise Molly took the phone from her hand and took over.

  “Listen,” she said. “Okay . . .

  “Dear Wildfire:

  “We are so stoked to let you know that you have made it into our top three! And here’s our surprise: round three includes YOU becoming part of the lineup at next week’s show at the Revelry Room! You’ll perform for an audience of real live music fans and Glory Alabama themselves! The judges will take this performance along with everything else into consideration before choosing the winner. We’ll be in touch with more details very shortly. Congratulations!”

  When Molly stopped reading there was silence, until Hanna said, “Wait, what? Perform?”

  “That’s what it says,” Molly said, looking around at them. “What?”

  Dia took her phone back and ran over the words again and, sure enough, right there it said it: round three includes YOU becoming part of the lineup—

  Part of the lineup?

  “Oh my god,” she said, her heart pounding. “A surprise? What do they think this is, a reality show or something? We have to perform next week? Like, in front of people? In front of Glory Alabama?”

  “No,” Jules said, shaking her head. “No way. They would have told us that already. Wouldn’t they?”

  Hanna tugged at her hair. “Oh my god,” she said. “We haven’t performed for real people in years.”

  “Fuck,” Dia said, starting to panic a little, and she looked up at the others. “What are we going to do?”

  Autumn lifted her hands filled with paper the same colors as her hair. “Isn’t this good news?” she says. “Isn’t this what you wanted all along?”

  Jules cracked her knuckles. “Not exactly.”

  “What are we going to do?” Dia repeated.

  “You’re going to play,” Molly said confidently. “You’re going to show them what I saw for an entire month. What’s the big deal?”

  They were silent for a minute, and Dia could almost feel them all spinning through what this really meant.

  Jules blew out her cheeks. “Well, Molly’s right,” she said eventually. “We’re going to play, aren’t we? What other choice do we have? We’ve done it a hundred times before. And we did it last week.”

  “In front of three people,” Hanna said.

  “Three, three hundred, what’s the difference?” Jules’s grin was shaky, and Autumn put a hand on her shoulder. “Come on. Okay, we weren’t expecting this, but! We can do it. What, are we going to pull out now because we’re scared?”

  “I’m not scared,” Dia said immediately. Okay, so that wasn’t completely true, but it felt like Jules was issuing a challenge, and Dia was not one to back down from a challenge.

  Not anymore.

  “I am!” Hanna said, raking a hand through her platinum hair. “We haven’t played a real show in years. And GA are going to be there, watching us? We can’t.”

  Dia took a deep breath and surveyed the wreckage of the yard, her friends standing there, Autumn and Molly waiting expectantly. “Yeah, we can,” she said, and the initial rush of panic was replaced with adrenaline now. They were going to play a show in front of an actual audience—wasn’t this everything they’d really wanted?

  Dia looked at Jules, at Hanna, and gritted her teeth. “We better get back to practicing.”

  Hanna

  Hanna rushed home to Ciara’s house and used
the spare key to let herself in. Ciara was sitting on the couch with her laptop, coffee in one hand, and looked up when Hanna came clattering in. “What?”

  “Can I borrow your van tomorrow?” Hanna asked, her words tripping over each other. “It’s an emergency.”

  Ciara’s eyebrows shot up. “Emergency?”

  After Hanna explained everything, Ciara nodded and got up. “Okay,” she said. “We can do this. One minute.” She disappeared into her bedroom and Hanna sank to the couch. In less than a week she was going to be on a stage, in front of hundreds of people, playing while Dia sang her words. Playing to people who either wouldn’t know who she was or would remember her, Hanna the drunk. No big deal, not at all.

  She scratched her nails on the arm of the couch and took a deep breath, held it for three, let it out.

  I am okay.

  Look at it this way: the people who didn’t know her couldn’t think anything about her, not anything that mattered. And anyone who did remember her, who might look at her and get that light in their eyes as they recalled her alcohol-fueled screw-ups—what did they matter, either? They didn’t know her. No one really knew her, not anymore. Only Dia and Jules, Molly and Ciara. Only the people who actually mattered to her. Those were the opinions she cared about, and everybody else? Fuck ’em.

  Ciara came back then and Hanna jumped to her feet. “I switched my shift,” Ciara said, slipping her phone into her back pocket. “We’ll take care of it, first thing tomorrow.”

  “You don’t need to come—”

  “Will you shut up and let me be a part of this?” Ciara said. “Shit, Han, I have restrained myself from pushing into your whole reunion operation this long. I am only so strong!” She grabbed Hanna by the shoulders. “And you know you can practice here, right?”

  Hanna tried to frown, but it gave way to a smile. “You’re sure?” she said, relief flooding her before being swallowed up by all the adrenaline currently flooding her system. “Thanks, C.”

  “No sweat,” Ciara said. “This is what we do. Right?”