Riptides (Lengths)

by Campbell, Steph

  Fuck.

  “And the last one?” I just want this over with. I nod to the last card, the guy kicking back.

  “Ah. The Hanged Man.” Marigold laughs when I shake my head and groan. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. Look at him. He looks happy, right?” She waits for my begrudging nod. “It’s a very good card for a future, Enzo. It’s a card about accepting what life offers you. Right now, you might be hung up on the way you see things going. So much so, that you’re blind to what’s really there. But things are going to work out. You’re going to see things as they’re really meant to be, and you’re going to be happy. Even if you get to that happiness kicking and screaming, convinced it’s the wrong path for you.”

  “You say that like you really hope it’s true. Are you just trying to protect my delicate feelings?” I ask, watching as she picks the cards up gently and puts them into a neat pile.

  She doesn’t make any eye contact as she slides the cards into the little silk bag. “No. Not at all. Enzo, if I wanted to protect your delicate feelings, I’d have just said, ‘She’s the one. There is no doubt. Go for it.’” She stands, drops a motherly kiss on the top of my head, and squeezes my shoulder a little too hard. “The truth is, you’re the only one who can know for sure. And the bigger, cosmic truth? It’s going to be fine. You’re going to be just fine.”

  I’m staring at my hands, spread flat on the table, when Deo comes in. “Dude. Did my mom creep you out with her hippie voodoo? C’mon, get out of the dark and come chill with us. We’re at the point now where we’re debating just staying up all night and powering through the wedding on Red Bull and love. What do you think?”

  I stare at the bare wood where the cards just were. “How did you know?”

  “Know what? About the Red Bull? The love? Staying up all night? You need to be more specific, man, because there’s a shit ton I know a shit ton about.” Deo collapses into a chair next to me and smiles his trademark goofy grin.

  “Love. You and Whit. How did you know?” I ask.

  “Ah!” He folds his hand and lays his forehead on them. His voice comes out muffled. “Honestly? I felt it. I felt like I couldn’t live without her, even when it hurt. Even when it sucked. And, eventually, after a long and arduous process where she was very, very mean to me daily for a long time, she decided she felt the same way. Or I just wore her down. I’m good at that.”

  “Was it like that for my brother?” Cohen and I talk about a lot, but he’s always kind of protected Maren from the family. Like we were a huge nuclear plant just waiting to melt down and irradiate her.

  “Yes and no.” Deo lifts his head and shuts one eye, making it look like he has a permanent wink. “They had this whole slow smolder. It took them forever to get around to admitting they wanted each other. But once they did, she couldn’t keep her hands off your big, fine brother.” He snickers, and I roll my eyes.

  Deo is rad, but such an asshole.

  “Gen and Adam kind of did the whole marriage of convenience thing.” I bring up the fact kind of randomly, just toying with the idea of it. I also don’t want to admit how much easier this would all be if Jess needed me in some legal way, the way Adam needed my sister.

  I realize I must be losing my mind if I’m sitting here wishing my girlfriend needed to be with me for citizenship reasons.

  “You and the girl with the abbreviated name got a real thing going on?” Deo asks, his grin stretching his entire face wide.

  I shrug. “Yeah. No. I don’t know. I thought I did. I try to get close. She runs away.”

  “Well, it could just be your natural repulsiveness,” Deo muses. I chuckle even though I don’t want to give him any fuel for his idiot fire. “Or it could just be her thing. Girls run. I felt like Whit and I were in a marathon for the first couple months. And she was, like, pacing herself and being all badass in her sexy running shorts, and I was just crawling after her, panting like a dog.”

  “Sounds fun.” I glance out into the living room. Whit is looking for Deo, and I know the minute she sees him, her eyes will go soft. It’s so hard to wrap my head around the fact that it was ever any other way between them.

  “Love slays you, man. It rips you apart and leaves you hanging there, oozing blood and guts. But, shit. What other choice do you have? It was go through the shredder for her or lose her for good. So, you know, blood and guts was really my only option.”

  He’s talking to me, but looking at her. When she sees him, she does this adorable kind of skip to his side. It’s cute as hell because Whit is such a goddess. It’s rad how being around Deo brings out something sweet and goofy in her.

  “What are you two doing in the dark?” she asks as she comes in and sits on his lap, twining her arms around his neck.

  “Enzo needed my superior knowledge. I was just dispensing my mad wisdom. You know. Like I do.” He looks up at her and she kisses him softly, then turns to me.

  “Listen to nothing he says. Nothing. This man is a fool.” The last word comes out as a squeal because he stands up abruptly, tossing her into his arms. “Deo!”

  “Forget the Red Bull. I need my bed tonight,” he declares, waggling his eyebrows at her. “C’mon, missy. You need me to tuck you in.”

  “Goodnight, Enzo!” Whit giggles. “Please remember not to take advice from a man with a mermaid tattoo.”

  “A merwife tattoo. Dude, you wanna come hold my hand while I get my centauress?”

  “Centauride,” I correct. “Sure. I may wanna get a mergirl of my own.”

  Whit shakes her head. “No! So much no!”

  I smile at them, but all the joking falls flat, because I can’t even pretend to have what they do. And after the way Jess blew me off and Marigold’s crazy cards, I don’t know what’s real or possible.

  I say my goodbyes and head to the bakery.

  ELEVEN

  There’s something jazzy and slow playing loud in the back, where Jess is working. A woman’s voice wails and Jess sits on a marble countertop, her knees pulled to her chest, mounds of floured cake pans on every surface.

  “You should lock your door,” I say softly.

  She startles, and then gives me a tired look. “Forgot.”

  “This area isn’t the best, Jess. It worries me that you’re here alone and don’t——”

  “Stop!” she snaps, jumping down off the counter. “Jesus, Enzo, just back off for a second, okay? I’m a grown woman! I made a mistake, but I definitely don’t need a damn lecture.”

  “I worry about you,” I tell her. “I worry that things will happen to you when I’m not around.”

  She turns her eyes on me, dark and sad. “Enzo. We’ve known each other for a few weeks. I survived on my own for years, and will keep right on surviving. With or without you.”

  They’re sharp words, but she delivers them without any venom. They come out as bald facts, and that feels worse, somehow.

  “So tomorrow——”

  “Can we talk about that tomorrow?” She walks over to me, both hands out, and puts them on my chest. “I have so much work to get done. I’ll call you, okay? Please, Enzo. I need to figure so much out. I still need to get so much done. And I need…I just need to breathe.” She slides her hands off me, and I watch her finger the cigarette pack in her pocket.

  My immediate worry is that she’ll go in the back alley to smoke. Fuck. Why is it so hard for her to understand how dangerous this area is?

  The bigger fear that eats me alive is that her need ‘to breathe’ is a sign that she needs me to back up. That she doesn’t want me sweeping her to the beach to watch the stars. ‘Breathing’ for her is all about space. Alone.

  It’s that inability to do anything for her that kills me. I get that my absence is what she needs most from me right now. But I certainly don’t like it.

  “Right. Tomorrow.” I kiss her cheek. “Talk to you then.”

  I glance back once I’m outside the bakery and see the plume of smoke from the back alley that means she’s back th
ere, alone, with a cigarette.

  And even though it goes against every single instinct in me, I walk away.

  I look up at the moon. Damn, wasn’t it full and bright enough to make midnight feel like noon just the other day? Maybe I lost track of time, because now it’s nothing but a tiny sliver in the sky, its light pale and wan.

  It doesn’t seem possible that it’s the same moon that hung in the sky when I first started falling for Jess.

  ****

  The day dawns bright and clear. I know Cohen is saying his Modeh Ani, thanking the Big Guy for coming through and giving Maren the kind of day any bride would be all thrilled about. I’m shocked when, just as I’m thinking all this, my phone buzzes, and it’s the groom-to-be himself.

  “What’s up?” I ask, sitting up in my big, lonely-as-fuck bed.

  “Maren and the girls spent the night in that little weird hotel Lydia keeps calling ‘boutique.’ Said it was bad luck for me to see her before the wedding or some bullshit. Anyway, I slept like ass. Figured you might wanna meet up and help me lug some shit so we’re ahead of schedule.” Cohen’s voice shakes like he’s nervous, which is bizarre.

  My big bro always has shit under control. But I’m glad to help if that’s what he needs. I think about Marigold’s freaky Tarot reading and the card with all the weird gold circles that’s all about family loyalty. Hell yeah, I’m here for him.

  “Yeah. I’ll meet you at the synagogue in an hour.” I stand up and glance at the window, hoping to see Jess’s car in her usual spot. It’s empty.

  “Don’t forget your tux,” Cohen reminds me.

  “Right.” I hang up and double check to make sure I didn’t miss any messages or texts.

  Nothing.

  After a quick shower and shave, I grab the tux Cece picked up and dropped off for me the other day and head to the synagogue. There are a few different routes I can choose, and one of them takes me right by Jess’s bakery.

  Not ‘right by’ exactly. I may be going a fair twenty minutes out of my way, but I want to see if she’s there, if I can pop in when she’s not so busy and talk to her about where things went wrong and why.

  But when I drive past, the shutters are down and her car isn’t out front. I glance at my truck’s dash clock and see it’s not even six. Cohen and I are used to getting up at daybreak to catch the best waves: we forget normal people are still sleeping at this time. I’m sure that’s the deal for Jess: that she’s just sleeping. Even if the cake isn’t totally ready, she’d still have hours before she has to deliver it. All is cool, and I tell myself to quit my damn worrying.

  “Hey, man. You look like shit,” Cohen announces. His face is kind of gray and he has dark circles under his eyes.

  “Right back at you, asshole.” We do a quick, rough hug-thing and back up to survey each other. “Seriously, did you sleep at all last night?”

  “I’m used to having Maren right there with me,” Cohen growls. “I couldn’t get comfortable without her in the bed.” He snarls, “What’s so goddamn funny?”

  “Nothing, man!” I hold my hands up, surrender-style. “I just think it’s funny that you always had to sleep with that little bear. Remember? The one with the sombrero Uncle Pepe won for you at the bootleg carnival?”

  Cohen laughs at the memory. “Don’t disrespect Mr. Salsa.”

  “Holy shit!” I crack up. “Mr. Salsa! That’s right! Dude, what the fuck kind of name is that?”

  “I have no idea. I was five. I really liked salsa. Anyway, shut your mouth. Do you remember that disgusting blanket you chewed on until it was a ratty ass ball of yarn? You have no room to talk.”

  “Manta,” I say, not telling Cohen I still have a couple strands of yarn from old ‘manta,’ the blanket our granny made me. “I guess we were predisposed to be candyasses from childhood?”

  Cohen shrugs. “If being a candyass means having a rad bear like Mr. Salsa to keep me company as a kid and a hot woman like Maren in my bed as an adult, then I’m proud to be one.” He pulls a key out of his pocket and lets us into the synagogue. We head to the rec room to set up the tables before the caterers and decorators show.

  We start rolling them out and setting them up. It’s silent for a while, and I usually appreciate not having to keep a constant commentary with Cohen. But my head is buzzing, and I can’t shut it up.

  “You and Maren really heading out after this?” I ask as we snap the legs in place and set a table up under the long, opaque windows.

  “Yeah.” Cohen surveys the set up. “Let’s move those three over there farther apart.” We head over and he looks at me. “I have to. It’s the best school for what she wants to study.”

  I help him drag one of the tables over a few feet. “Shit, you know I think you should go. Mami and Papi have good intentions and all, but they’re on your back all the fucking time. I don’t know how you stand it.”

  He starts flipping chairs open and setting them around. “They mean well. But Maren and I need to get our bearings on our own for a little bit. Mami knows that, even if she keeps panicking.”

  “You have way more patience than I would, seriously.” I take a deep breath and say out loud what’s been scaring the shit out of me for a few days now. “You know my date? Jess?”

  Cohen stands tall and narrows his eyes at me, like it hurts him to look my way. “Damnit, Enzo. Is she a stripper? Just tell me. I swear, I won’t beat the piss out of you as long as you promise you aren’t going to get caught screwing in one of the Hebrew school rooms again.”

  “Nah, not a stripper.” I unfold chairs, realizing shit is pretty screwy when I find myself wishing my girlfriend was a stripper, because that’s a problem I have some experience with. “Jess is a baker. A baker with a PoliSci degree.”

  “Oh.” Cohen’s eyebrows are knit with confusion. “So. That’s good. Right?”

  “I’m getting seriously mixed signals from her.” I try to sum it up. “It was hot and heavy for a few weeks, and it was amazing. I finally felt like this was the girl I was waiting for. Like she was the real deal. And that’s usually what girls want, right? But when I told her I thought it was serious, she started to pull back like mad.”

  “Cold feet?” Cohen shakes his head. “Look, I don’t want to get all sappy on you, but if she’s not into committing with a guy like you, she’s not worth your time, E. I’m glad you’re stepping up and dating girls with some direction, but you may have just fallen for the fact that she’s got her shit together. You laugh, but that’s a sexy thing. Doesn’t mean she’s the one. But I think you’re going in the right direction, if that helps.” He gives me a rueful smile. “Bet it doesn’t help much, though.”

  I consider what Cohen said. It’s fairly well known that I have a thing for girls that are fun. Fun is amazing… until it isn’t. The weird thing is, Jess was fun, for sure, but what I liked about her best was the aspects that were no fun. The fact that she clung to me when shit was rough, even if she didn’t always give me much background to go on. The fact that she told me I wasn’t like anyone she’d dated before and that I made her feel so good. Maybe I liked feeling like her protector.

  We finish putting the tables together, and Cohen sighs, checks his phone, and says, “What the hell do we do now? There’s nothing else to set up or get going for a few hours.”

  “Did Whit go with the girls?” I ask.

  Cohen nods slowly, then smiles when he reads my mind. “Should we ask Adam, too?”

  I shrug. “He’s probably bugging out, especially since he and Genie have been arguing about the whole Belgium thing. I say we do the right thing and ask him.”

  “It’s barely any fun to watch him surf lately,” Cohen gripes as he punches out a text to Adam. “He actually stays on the board now. And he isn’t half bad.”

  “How could he be? He’s had the best fucking teachers ever.”

  TWELVE

  We leave the cool quiet of the rec room and drive over to Deo’s. We beat down the door and wake him up just as
Adam pulls in.

  “We were just talking about how you’re not even good for comedy anymore, Abramowitz. You haven’t wiped out in forever.” I nudge Cohen, and he and Deo snicker with me.

  “Why don’t you call Ryan? That guy’s gotta be a riot on a board,” he says with that mild punch he manages to deliver whenever we rag him too hard.

  Deo’s eyes shine like Adam is Santa Claus offering him a tour of the North Pole workshop. “I’m calling him now!”

  By the time we’re out on the beach, I feel like it’s a decent enough hour to text Jess. She can breathe all she needs, but she’s got to expect me to check on her now and then. I send a general, non-committal ‘good morning’ message.

  “That your girl with the abbreviated name?” Deo yells when he catches me staring at my phone.

  “Yeah.” I toss it back onto my gear bag. “I’m not sure what’s up.”

  “No worries on the cake if she’s stressing about it,” Deo says. “My mom had this freaky premonition or some bullshit. She called Whit over early, and the two of them baked some crazy hippie shit for the wedding.” He frowns at Cohen. “Sorry, man. We could always stop by the supermarket or whatever and get something actually edible.”

  Cohen shakes the water out of his hair and waves it off. “No worries. If your mom made it, Maren will love it.”

  “I know Mare will be cool. But the ‘gogue has limited bathroom access. Are you sure you wanna play with all your guests’ intestines like this?” Deo asks.

  We all laugh hard.

  “We’ll do the cake last,” Cohen declares. “Hey, guys, look. I think Ryan is gonna…whoa! Shit. Nope.”

  As bad as Ryan was at dancing, at least that was dry land and he was marginally in his element. He’s a thousand times goonier on the water, and it’s an unquestionable laugh riot to watch him wave his huge arms around and topple off the surfboard.

  “I’m sure Jess will come through,” I say with way more confidence than I feel.