Airports, Exes, and Other Things I'm Over

by Shani Petroff

  We hung up, and I fished through my backpack. I had an external charger in there somewhere.

  I found it, but unfortunately it was dead. Figures. There were no outlets nearby, but I wasn’t ready to give up my nice, private little table. Not yet. My phone still had a tiny bit of power, I’d charge it later. I still had plenty of time left at the airport to do it.

  I looked over my set list again. Maybe I should change it up. I had been so sure about it before, but now … Leaving off my best song just because it reminded me of my ex seemed so amateurish. I was a musician, I was supposed to channel my emotions. I’d see how I felt tomorrow. I didn’t have to decide now.

  I quietly sang my songs to myself, tapping the table along with the beat. Even though it wasn’t even close to full volume, and it was sans guitar, it still felt nice. At this point, anything that took my mind off the airport, my ex, and all the other things that had gone wrong today was a welcome relief.

  “Sari!”

  I jolted back, almost falling out of my seat. “Seriously, Zev!” I had not expected someone to be standing over me.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”

  I sneered at him. “Well, you did.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “What do you want? I told you I wanted some time alone. You said okay.”

  He crossed his arms. “Hey, I’m just trying to help you. Your mom has been texting me in a panic. You’re not answering your phone.”

  My mom was texting him? Come on, Mom.

  I glanced at my phone. “It’s dead.” My mom loved hearing from Zev so much, what was one more text? “Can you just tell her I need to charge my phone, and I’ll get in touch with her after?”

  He nodded.

  I looked around the food court. All the outlets were taken. I let out a sigh, took my shoes back off (yes, there were a few disgusted stares, which I totally understood. Yet, the idea of walking in those shoes seemed a lot worse than the nastiness of not wearing them), and grabbed my stuff. So much for my private little table. I needed to do something about my phone. I wandered around the gates. All the outlets and charge stations were taken there, too. I shouldn’t have been surprised, with so many people’s flights delayed, of course they’d grab all the good spots.

  So annoying. Especially with Zev at my heels. “You don’t need to keep following me.”

  “It’s just in case your mom writes back.”

  “Uh-huh.” We both knew he was full of it. I stared at the nearest charging station. All the plugs were, of course, taken. “This is hopeless.”

  Zev rubbed his hand on his chin. “If you only knew someone who had an external charger, someone who would share with you, hmmm, I wonder who that could be?”

  “Good point,” I said, ignoring his very unsubtle hint, “Fitz may have one. I’ll check.”

  “What is with you and him?” Zev asked, fidgeting back and forth. “You don’t like him, do you?”

  I shrugged. I didn’t owe him an explanation, no matter how sad he looked or how big the puppy dog eyes he was giving me were. He was the one who kissed someone else. It wasn’t my job to make him feel better.

  I had no luck with Fitz. He offered to let me use his phone, but he couldn’t help me with mine. So I continued on my hunt, Zev still trailing me like a puppy.

  “Excuse me,” I said to a guy in a suit who had both his laptop and his phone plugged in. “Can I borrow one of the outlets for just a few minutes? My phone is completely dead.”

  The guy actually said no. He didn’t even offer an explanation. He just went right back to using his laptop screen. He didn’t care about my phone, as long as he had his. The airport clearly brought out the best in people.

  “So you’re really going to keep bugging strangers rather than just use my charger?” Zev asked.

  “Yep.” Now the question was, who to ask? I eyed the crowd. Who looked friendly? No more suits. The people with headphones on wouldn’t want to be bothered. There was a woman knitting whose phone was charging. Maybe her?

  “Hi,” I said, squeezing my way by everyone’s bags to get to her. “Beautiful sweater. Great color. I love blue. I was wondering if I could ask you a favor.” She looked at me skeptically, like I was going to beg for money or ask her to smuggle a package onto her flight. “My phone died, and I was wondering if I could use your outlet for a little bit. Just enough so I can text home. I have my own charger; I’ll leave the phone here; you won’t have to get up or anything.”

  “Oh,” she said, “yeah, I guess that would be all right.”

  Yes!

  I handed her my phone and charger to switch out with hers, but the woman seated next to her gave me the look of death. “I’ve been waiting for a plug for hours,” she said. “I’m next.”

  I wanted to explain that it would just be a few minutes, enough to text my mother, but I could tell she wouldn’t want to hear it. I didn’t when the lady cut in front of me and Fitz to talk to the agent. Maybe this was karma.

  The knitting woman gave me back my phone with a look of apology. “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I appreciate you trying. Thanks, anyway,” I said.

  I went to the next gate with a whole different crew of passengers, preparing to beg all over again, when Zev dangled his external charger in front of my face. “Look at it right here for the taking,” he said.

  I knew I was being ridiculously stubborn, but I pushed it away and squatted by a guy sitting on the ground next to an outlet. “Excuse me,” I tried again. “Can I plug in my phone for a few minutes?”

  He snorted. “Use his,” he said, jutting his chin up toward my ex-boyfriend who was still hovering, charger in hand.

  I stood back up and glared at Zev. “You are making this difficult,” I hissed. Was his new mission in life to torture me? Didn’t he understand that I didn’t want any more favors from him? I already felt like I owed him something for coming to Boston with me, I didn’t want to be more in his debt than I had to be. My insides were shredded enough from having to spend all this time with him. I didn’t know how much more I could take.

  “It doesn’t have to be,” Zev said. “You can just use the charger.” He moved it back and forth in front of me like a pendulum on a grandfather clock.

  If he thought he was charming, he was wrong. “Fine, you win,” I said, as I reached up to grab it. Only Zev pulled it away.

  “Not so fast,” he countered. “This one is gonna cost you.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You’re kidding me.” I knew something like this was coming.

  “’Fraid not.”

  I rolled my eyes. He really was the devil, and now he was making me sell my soul—and my sanity. “What’s your price?”

  “Just to talk.” He tossed the charger up and caught it in his palm, to taunt me. “I think that’s fair.”

  “Fine whatever, just give it to me.” I didn’t have much choice. If I didn’t figure out a way to get in touch with my mom soon, Zev would remain the go-between, and that would be even worse.

  “Promise we can talk?”

  “I do,” I conceded.

  He handed it over, and I plugged my phone in.

  Then we just stood there, awkwardly facing each other, waiting for my phone to charge. “Sari,” he finally said, his face getting all serious. “About Bethanne—”

  “No, not now.”

  “You said we could talk.”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t mean in the middle of the airport.” We were right around gobs of people, the grouch who wouldn’t give me his charger, families, couples, random others. They didn’t need to hear my drama. “I’d like at least the illusion of privacy.”

  “Fine,” he said, and gestured toward his suitcase. “You might as well have a seat while we wait.”

  “On that? Are you kidding? I’ll crush it.”

  “You will not,” he said. “Just sit. It beats standing around the airport barefoot.”

  He did have a point, and I was getting tired, so I
agreed. “Fine.”

  A moment later, I was falling backward. “What the…?!”

  “Just relax,” Zev said. He had tilted the suitcase to a forty five-degree angle and was starting to roll it, and me, across the terminal.

  “My stuff!”

  “It’s right here,” he said. I looked back. He was wearing my backpack and had my guitar case in one hand as he pushed me along.

  “This is crazy. Where are we going, Zev?!” I was grasping the sides of the suitcase. “I’m going to fall.”

  “I got you,” he said.

  This was ridiculous. “Where are you taking me?”

  “You said you didn’t want to talk in the middle of the airport, so I’m giving you your illusion of privacy.”

  And causing a spectacle as he did it. The random barefoot girl being pushed around on a suitcase got more than her fair share of raised eyebrows and head shakes as Zev and I made our way through the crowd.

  He put me upright once we got to the corner of the terminal. There were still people around, but we had a little section to ourselves.

  I jumped up. “That was not funny.”

  “I wasn’t trying to be funny. I’m just trying to talk to you. What I’ve been trying to do all week. And you promised.”

  I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “All right, then. Go ahead. Talk.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  Zev fidgeted as I stood there, hands on hips, waiting for what he had to say. “Well?” I questioned.

  He seemed to be trying to find the right words, but I was pretty sure there were no right words for I betrayed you.

  “I’m sorry, Sari. I never meant to hurt you. I love you.”

  “Funny way of showing it,” I said. Too smugly, no doubt.

  “Please, let me get this out, then you can say whatever you need to. I just want to explain. She kissed me. I would never have done that to you.”

  I bit my lip. It was taking every ounce of willpower not to interrupt him.

  “I was just caught off guard. That’s it, I promise. It was just a second. When you walked in—”

  I couldn’t stay quiet. “When I walked in is when you stopped. So you want me to believe I just had such impeccable timing that I got there at the exact moment she planted her lips on yours and you hadn’t been going at it beforehand?”

  He took a step toward me. “We weren’t. I promise.”

  I countered by taking a step back. “That’s quite the coincidence.”

  “I don’t know, maybe Bethanne saw you come in, and that’s why she swooped in at that exact moment.”

  “So you finally admit she does want you back?” I shook my head. I had been telling him that for months. She had started dropping by our table at lunch, but never to say hello to me, she’d pop up at his improv shows, and of course liked every single thing he posted online—unless I was in it—but Zev kept telling me I was reading too much into everything, and that she just wanted to stay friends.

  “Yeah, but I didn’t know,” he said.

  My hands flew off my hips and into the air. “I told you.”

  “I thought you were being—”

  He stopped himself.

  “Jealous?” I asked. “What I should have been was smart. I should have known something was going to happen.”

  He was picking at his nails so hard, I thought he might draw blood. “Nothing happened.”

  “I. Saw. You. You were with her. You wanted her.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  When I opened them back up, Zev was standing closer. “No. I didn’t. And I don’t. It wasn’t like that,” he said, his voice softer.

  “Then what was it like, Zev?” I said, matching his lower volume. “A whole party full of people and you spent the entire night with your ex. An ex who dumped you, an ex you loved, an ex who hates me and wants you back. Tell me, how am I supposed to feel? What am I supposed to think?”

  “You’re supposed to trust me.”

  “I did, and you kissed HER.” I shook my head. “I don’t even understand why you were you hanging out with her in the first place. She’s awful. How could the same person who says they like me ever have liked her? Bethanne and I are opposites.”

  He sighed. “Not completely. I know you don’t want to hear this, but she’s not all bad.”

  He was right, I really didn’t want to hear this. It hurt hearing him come to her defense, but I held my tongue, and he kept talking. “She’s funny, she goes after what she wants, she’s great with animals—even volunteers at a shelter, and she’s really loyal to her friends.”

  I gave him a skeptical look, but he continued. “She wanted to stay friends after we broke up, but I didn’t.” They had ended things April of sophomore year. “I told you how my dad had a heart attack that summer,” he said.

  I nodded.

  “Well, Bethanne called me every day to check on me, she even babysat my sister so my mom and I could go to the hospital.” His sister was ten years younger than him. “She was there for me. I haven’t forgotten that. I don’t want her back, I didn’t even back then, but I thought maybe she and I could make it as friends. She was there when I needed someone, I guess it helped me overlook some of the bad stuff. But I should have listened to you when you told me what she was up to.”

  “You never told me she did that,” I said.

  “She wasn’t exactly your favorite subject. But you have to believe me. I didn’t want to kiss her. I was just … I was caught off guard. I was going to stop it, that’s when you came in. Honest. I know how that sounds, but it’s the truth.”

  “I don’t know.”

  This time, he was the one to shake his head. “How can you not know? I’m trying here, Sari. What I don’t get is how you don’t trust me. You know how I feel about you.”

  “And I know how you felt about her.” Zev was my first love, but I wasn’t his. There was nothing he could do about that, but I hated it anyway. It made what happened last week with Bethanne even worse.

  “That was ages ago,” he said, his eyes focused on me, “and what I feel for you is so much stronger.”

  I stared at my feet. This was so much to take in. Was he telling the truth? I didn’t know. I saw him kiss her. I knew how much he liked her. I saw the GroupIt posts. I’d been humiliated. “If Bethanne didn’t break it off, you’d probably still be together right now. We might not have really known each other back then, but I knew about your breakup. Everyone did. All anyone could talk about was how she crushed you.” I glanced back up at him.

  He was rubbing his temples. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say to that, Sari. Yeah, I was hurt when she dumped me. Yeah, I moped around. Yeah, I wanted her back.”

  Zev and I had never really talked about Bethanne. Other than me saying she wanted him back, we never really got into their relationship or what happened or anything like that. Hearing it now, reminded me why. It was as if he took one of my shoes and stabbed me repeatedly in the gut with the heel.

  “But that was then,” he continued. “I got over it, I moved on, I went out with other people, then I met you. I fell in love with you, and it’s not like anything I ever felt before. Bethanne isn’t the one I want back, you are.”

  I wanted to believe that was true.

  “She knew about our breakup, Zev. If you wanted me back, why would you spread that? I hadn’t told people we were over, but she knew. You told her.”

  “I told her I didn’t want anything to do with her anymore. I called her the morning after the party to tell her to quit texting me, that I didn’t want to hear from her anymore. And when she asked why, I said that after what she did at the party, I lost you, and that I was going to do whatever it took to get you back. And that included not hanging out with her anymore.”

  I studied his eyes. Was he telling me the truth? I wasn’t sure. “Really?”

  “Yes. She’s out of my life. I told her. I should have done it sooner. I should have listened to you. I’m sorry, Sari. Please tell me w
e’re okay, that you forgive me.”

  Memories good and bad were crowding my mind. Zev’s lips on Bethanne. Zev’s lips on mine. Reading the comments on Bethanne’s post. The stories of when they broke up. The night Zev asked me out. The time we went to his family’s lake house and accidentally fell asleep on the neighbor’s dock and freaked out his parents. The time he raced back to my apartment to get my lucky guitar pick because I forgot it and needed it for my performance. The first time he told me he loved me—I had been crying after getting kicked out of band—he totally made me forget all about it.

  “I need to think,” I said. “I need some time, Zev. Time alone.”

  He didn’t say anything; he just nodded, lifted the handle on his carry-on, and walked off, dragging the suitcase behind him. He didn’t look back.

  I wasn’t sure if I was relieved or disappointed.

  TWENTY-THREE

  Fitz was sitting on the ground with his back against the wall. I joined him. He had his headphones on and was reading some philosophy textbook.

  “Get your phone charged?” he asked.

  I nodded. “Now I think I’m just going to relax and listen to some music.” That was my hint that I did not feel like talking.

  Fitz seemed to get it. He went back to his book and left me alone, but I still wasn’t able to relax. All I could think about was what Zev said. Maybe it was all a big misunderstanding. But what if it wasn’t? If someone other than Zev had tried to kiss me, I’d have pushed them away and said, “What the hell?” in a fraction of a second. He had lingered.

  I gnawed at my lip. Was it possible he had just been completely caught off guard?

  I debated it with myself for the next half hour—until Zev himself came over.

  He held up his hands. “I’m not following you. It’s just getting close to boarding and this is the gate, but I can go sit over there.”

  I patted the floor next to me. “You can stay.”

  For the next few minutes Fitz, Zev, and I pretty much sat there in silence. That is until I saw Zev typing away on his phone. I peeked to see who he was writing to. For a brief moment I thought maybe it was Bethanne, but the name I saw at the top of the screen surprised me even more.