One Little Lie: a hate to love rom-com

by Whitney Barbetti

  “I’ll be back,” I said with a smile that I knew didn’t reach my eyes, ducking out of the room as soon as I could.

  Frustration made my hands shake as I grabbed two cans of soda and retreated to the deck. It wasn’t until I finished half of the one soda, the other cold can pressed to my forehead, before I felt like I could try to unpack my feelings.

  “Hey grandma.” Tori joined me, wrapped up in a robe with a cup of steaming coffee in her hands. At my look, she elaborated. “You went to bed earlier than my roommates go to bed.” She took a long sip of her coffee and looked out over the fog-covered lake with me. “But then again, Adam retired early too. And neither of you left your room.” One perfectly groomed eyebrow arched as she took me in. “Did you?”

  I nodded and drained the rest of the can. I pulled the one I’d been holding to my forehead away and cracked the top of it.

  “Uh oh,” she said. “You’re pretty quiet. I mean, you’re often quiet, but something else is going on. Was it bad? Oh, no, honey.” Instead of sounding patronizing, Tori sounded like she was actually concerned.

  “I don’t know how I feel. I mean, last night was great. Really great. But then when it was done, the reality sank in.”

  “Hollis.” She brushed hair from my shoulders. “Whatever happened between you was the reality.” She tapped my forehead. “Whatever got up in here, that’s feeling. Which is very real, too, but you have to remember that last night wasn’t one of your books—it was you and it was Adam and whatever feelings you’ve got as a result can be figured out.”

  I wished I had a pad of paper so I could sort through my thoughts in a more tangible way. I sighed and the frustration settled firmer in my head.

  “You love him, don’t you?”

  It was different when it was all in my head. But when the words were said, when they were out in the open, it meant that everything was real. This wasn’t a fantasy. My feelings weren’t fleeting. They were solid. They were real.

  “Yeah.” Why did that make me want to cry?

  “Aww, Hols. You knew this could happen. I mean, it probably happened way back in middle school.”

  “Maybe.” I took a deep chug of my diet soda. “But even then, it was just schoolgirl feelings. They weren’t from actually knowing him.”

  “And now you do and you like him even more than you expected to.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Is that a bad thing, though?” She leaned against me, our arms draped over the railing. “To find out the guy you have feelings for is even better than whatever fairytale you’d subscribed to in your head?”

  “Maybe if my feelings weren’t significantly further along than his.” I dropped my head to my free hand. “He just got over the hurdle of not hating me.”

  “Whatever. He looks at you like you’re a sandwich.”

  “A sandwich?”

  “Guys love sandwiches.” She took a long drink of her coffee. “Oh, I’ve got a few photos on my phone from the hike. I’m going to upload them later today and tag you guys.”

  “All right.”

  “Think your folks are going to amend your trust fund?”

  “Probably not,” I said, but it was moot anyway. Since my outburst, I had more or less resigned myself to the fact that the trust fund wasn’t going to come through, that I’d have to do the LSAT or face the disappointment and disdain from them. And I didn’t want to do the LSAT. I wanted to control where my life went after college. I certainly wasn’t willing to go all the way to an engagement with Adam just to satisfy the terms of the trust. No, if anything further happened with Adam, it needed to be real, like everything else. I didn’t want him to feel obligated to stay with me anymore. I only wanted him to stay if that was what he wanted to do. “It is what it is. I think I need to have a very frank talk with my parents about their expectations and mine. And,” I said with a sigh, “I need to have a talk with Adam too.”

  “But this is why I don’t do the whole relationship thing. Relationships are messy.”

  “But ours is fake, it shouldn’t be messy.”

  “It’s not fake, and that’s why it’s messy. You keep trying to shove it into a neat little box, pretending it’s something you can stack away neatly in your mind, but you can’t.”

  What she said made sense. I was fond of neat and orderly and expected. It was why I had chosen to move in with Navy, because she was neat and tidy but also more spontaneous and more compassionate than I was; she was someone I wanted to learn from. “We still haven’t talked about high school, and what happened, and how it happened.” It was the elephant in the room, that loomed over every fight we’d had—though those had been few and far between lately.

  “What are you so afraid of, bringing it up?”

  “That bringing it up will remind him of all the reasons he doesn’t like me after all.”

  The back door opened, causing us both to turn. Keane stepped out, still in pajamas, his face white. He held his phone in his hands, and it shook as his entire body trembled. “We need to go back. Now.”

  39

  Adam

  The moment your world falls apart around you doesn’t happen in an instant. It happens in steps, just like the ensuing stages of grief. The moment is a drop in the water, but it’s the ripples it creates, too.

  After Hollis left the room, I checked my phone in the bag of rice, but it was no use—it was likely permanently fucked. And as I set it back into my bag, my scalp prickled in keen awareness that something was wrong.

  It started with the yelp across the house, loud enough to hear in my room. And the noise from the scrambling of frantic footsteps, the creak of the back door sliding open and the gasps that followed whatever the muffled voices had said.

  I was frozen, my shirt in my hands, when those same footsteps made their way to my door. The anticipation that wrapped me up was suffocating and I wanted the words one way or another. Like a bandage being ripped off, I wanted the bad news at once.

  “Adam,” Keane said. I could see it on his face, the white cheeks and the wide eyes. His phone was in his hands, and it clattered to the floor. He didn’t even look at it.

  “It’s Gram, isn’t it?” I asked, but the words sounded underwater. My whole body shuddered in acute awareness. There was no disbelief, there was acceptance because I had already known—and it was the acceptance that hurt. I believed it. I knew, I fucking knew, and I could hardly swallow around the rock in my throat. It felt like my ribs were caging my lungs in, the sharp edges of my bone pricking them, because I took a deep breath in and got nothing but deep, untouchable pain.

  Keane could only nod, his eyes closing briefly.

  “We need to get back.” Casey. Fuck. She was alone. Well, not alone. But she didn’t have any family. I knew I was trying to process this, but my brain was going a hundred miles a minute. I couldn’t succumb to my grief. I shoved it to the side, needing to focus on what needed to be done.

  “I know. The girls are getting ready.”

  I nodded, trying to swallow around the lump again. I stared around the bedroom, trying to make sense of what I needed to do. “I need to call Caleb.”

  “I will. What’s his number?”

  I didn’t even argue with him. Maybe I could pretend it’d be better coming from me, but how much better could it fucking be? “I don’t know,” I said, fists coming to my forehead. “I have no fucking clue. It’s on my phone.” I picked up the bag it was in, belatedly remembering that my phone wouldn’t turn on. “Fuck!” I yelled, throwing the bag across the room. My hands shook, so I curled them into fists to keep myself together.

  “Don’t worry about this, Adam. I’ll figure it out. Get your stuff, just get your things.”

  I felt rather than saw him leave the room, and in the quiet I sank to the bed, fists pressed to my eyes as the first bits of moisture stung. My jaw quivered, my body quaked, but the sound of footsteps approaching sobered me. Lifting my head, I saw from the feet alone that it was Hollis. I couldn’t deal with
this right now. Whatever this was, I couldn’t fucking deal.

  “Hey,” she said.

  I couldn’t lift my head the rest of the way to actually meet her eyes. This moment was the most vulnerable of my life, and the last thing I needed was for her to see me fall apart. “We need to go,” I said, grabbing my bag and zipping it up with more force than necessary. She adjusted her weight from one foot to the other, as if she was trying to decide where to move.

  “I know. Can I help you with anything?”

  “No.” I picked up the bag and moved toward the door with my head down. At the last second, she pressed a hand to my chest, halting me.

  “I’m so very sorry, Adam,” she said, her voice hushed. She was sincere and gentle, and I didn’t want it. I just wanted to get home, to be with Casey, and to be able to grieve without an audience.

  I moved around her hand, out of the door to her car which was already running and waiting.

  “I got ahold of your brother. He’s going to come this week. And Casey’s with my mom at the hospital,” Keane said once we’d climbed in the car. I nodded and turned to gaze out of the window. Hollis and Tori were in the driveway embracing. Tori placed her hands on either side of Hollis’s head and said something to her, to which Hollis nodded mutely. “Do you want to go to the hospital or home?”

  “Home.” It was no question. Gram wasn’t at the hospital anymore, not in spirit anyway. I wasn’t grieving her body, I was grieving the essence of who she was. After our mom had died, that hospital smell had lingered so long that if I concentrated hard enough, my memories would flood back and break me down with all five senses: the sight of the pink leaving her skin, the sound of her monitor giving a deafening solid tone, the touch of her hands going colder, the smell of antiseptic, and the taste of bile coming up.

  I didn’t want to have a breakdown in Hollis’s car. I had to think about something. Anything else.

  “Anyone else you want me to text?” Keane asked beside me as Hollis and Tori parted and Hollis made her way toward the car.

  “Bobby.”

  “Lead singer Bobby?”

  I gave one nod. “He’s on Facebook.”

  “What do you want me to tell him.”

  Navy exited the house, meeting Hollis in the driveway. “Tell him to find a new band member.”

  “R-right now?”

  I nodded again. Maybe it didn’t make sense, but it felt easier to have Keane tell Bobby, who would tell the others. I was sure that everyone knew it anyway, but I didn’t know how long I’d be wrapped in a bubble and telling Bobby and the others didn’t need to wait. “Casey needs me.” I turned to him. “I’m not going back.” I couldn’t even summon up any grief over admitting the band would need to go on without me. Gram had been my everything—my confidant, my protector, my shelter, my whole fucking heart. Everything else was just noise.

  “Tell him my gram died. He’ll understand. I don’t want to continue to delay the inevitable.”

  Keane stared back at me before agreeing, his thumbs flying across the screen.

  40

  Hollis

  It had been two days since we’d returned from our trip. Two days since Adam’s grandmother had died. Two days since he’d last responded to my messages. I knew, from Keane, that he’d gotten a new phone. But he hadn’t changed his number.

  Which is why I had volunteered to bring the casserole Navy had made for Adam and Casey, over to their house.

  Nerves were ever present as I pulled into the driveway, beside a car I didn’t recognize. I stared up at the house for a moment, wondering if coming here was wise. We hadn’t spoken since the cabin, not even a word since we’d walked out the door. I had given him his space initially, hadn’t pressed him when he didn’t respond to my messages. But I cared about him. I really did. I knew he was hurting and I didn’t want him to be alone with that hurt.

  The man that answered the door looked remarkably like Adam, but a couple years older, with more facial hair and glasses. “Who are you?” he asked.

  “Uh…”

  “That’s Hollis.” Casey appeared beside him and reached for me. I barely had a moment to adjust the casserole to my side before she’d wrapped her arms around my middle and pressed her face to my shoulder.

  Crap. I wasn’t accustomed to grief like this. I’d been fortunate enough to never lose anyone I was close to. Casey had lost so much—Adam too—in so few years. I wrapped my arm around her waist and held her close.

  “Hollis?” The man before me lifted an eyebrow, but still hadn’t stepped aside for me to enter. It had taken a minute, but I recognized him as Adam’s older brother.

  “She’s Adam’s girlfriend, Caleb.”

  “Then who…”

  “That girl is just a friend. Come on, Hollis.”

  Which girl? The thought entered my mind before I could stop it. The living room was empty save for a dozen flower arrangements. “Where’s Adam?” I asked her as I put the casserole in the fridge.

  “He’s out back.” She looked over her shoulder and turned back to me. “He’s smoking. He doesn’t do that.”

  I looked Casey over, noting the dark circles under her eyes, the pallor of her skin. “How are you doing?” I asked, realizing I should have asked that minutes ago.

  Casey lifted a shoulder, her eyes downcast. “It isn’t real yet.”

  “I’m sure it isn’t.” I put my arm around her and she led me back to the living room where Caleb, who I figured was Casey and Adam’s older brother, was assembling a piece of furniture. “I’m Hollis.” I held a hand out in an introduction.

  Caleb looked at my hand and then my face. “Yeah, Case said that.”

  I tucked my hand in the back pocket of my jeans. “I’m very sorry about your grandmother. I know she was well-loved.”

  “Right.” He turned his attention back to the furniture and Casey gave me a shrug and an eye-roll. She grabbed my hand and pulled me back out the front door. At first, I thought she was signaling for me to leave, but then she plopped down on a chair on the porch and gestured for me to take the other one.

  “Adam’s not doing great.” She picked at the flaking paint and chanced a glance at me. “He’s kind of being a dick.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. I’m so sorry for all of you.” I was so awkward with grief, but I wanted to be better. “Is there anything I can do to help you?”

  “Make Adam stop being a dick.” She leaned in, tucking her loose hair behind her ears. “He has a girl here.”

  The very last thing I needed to be thinking about was myself, but I couldn’t help it. Those five words had the effect of a sucker punch and I leaned toward her in order to hold my stomach with my arms, to still my instant shake. “He does?” My voice sounded squeaky.

  “Yeah, but I don’t think she’s that kind of girl. You know, like you are.”

  But I didn’t know what she meant, and it felt like I was crossing the line having Adam’s sister disclose what Adam was doing.

  “Her name’s Sarah.”

  Recognition and sadness settled together in my chest, simultaneously. This was the ex that he’d mentioned before. The one from Colorado, who knew Adam in a way I had only hoped to.

  “Oh.” I stared hard at the rose bush blooming off the side of the porch, focusing on the shape of the petals, the thorns along the stems. But it was like a foghorn in my brain:

  Sarah is here.

  Adam has avoided you because he has the person he really wants.

  “I should probably go,” I said, when it got too overwhelming. Casey stirred beside me, and I felt guilty for worrying about my feelings when she had so many more life-altering things happening. I closed my eyes, blinking back the burn, and turned to her. “What if I take you out for burgers later? I know you’re kind of a burger fanatic.” I looked back at the house. “Get you a breather.”

  “That sounds great.” She practically vibrated in her seat. “Tonight?”

  “Yep.” I stood, wiped my hands on my
jeans, and gave her a hug. “I’m going to say hi to your brother and then I’ll take off.”

  “Come on,” Casey said, waving to me to follow her to the back door.

  I calmed my unsteady heart by telling myself to be strong. I could be strong. And then I followed her.

  41

  Adam

  How did people walk around just carrying their grief like it didn’t bother them? How did they smile without feeling it tug the smile, how did they laugh without acknowledging the guilt that came from the luck to be able to laugh? How did they love again, how did they trust and how did they do something as essential as sleep when there was nothing good waiting for them when they woke?

  Maybe that last part was melodramatic. But the days had run together after Gram died. The first night, it had been me up late with Casey as she’d cried herself to sleep, with my head resting on her mattress so that I’d wake if she did. We didn’t stray too far from each other for the first day or so, and then Caleb had shown up and, well, I had checked the fuck out. Caleb was responsible in the practical ways, so I left him to handle the funeral arrangements, to arrange a meeting with Gram’s attorney.

  Not once had we heard from our father. Not that it was a surprise. But we three were an island in the center of a hurricane, and our last tether in the world was MIA. As usual.

  Shortly after Caleb had arrived, so had Bobby and Sarah. Both of them uninvited. I might have been an asshole to them, but they’d stuck. We didn’t talk, we just sat outside. Smoking—God, how I had missed it—and staying outside of the house in general.

  Each time Caleb made a comment about how much shit he was dealing with alone, I wanted to tell him to grow the fuck up. But I was the one who’d checked out. How in the hell had I thought I could take care of my sister, when I couldn’t even be present enough to handle Gram’s affairs?

  I flicked the cigarette in the old glass bowl and sighed.