I remove the final boxes and she shuts the back door of the truck. I carry them upstairs and settle them on the floor. She gets us some water with some paper cups left by the prior tenant. After a sip, she shivers and moves to close the front window. On the floor, she finds a backpack and fishes out a black T-shirt. She shrugs it over her tank. I almost pass out when I see what it says. It’s the same shirt I bought her the first time I took her to see The Cure.
CHAPTER 47
“Which song is your favorite?” I point to her shirt.
“Don’t know. Never listened to them.”
This information cuts me like a serrated knife. Instead of letting it show in my expression, I say, “‘Mint Car.’”
“Mint what?” she asks as she sips her water.
“It’s a my favorite of their songs.” I’m hoping for a reaction because they played it live in concert the first time we kissed. But still, it’s clear from her expression the name means nothing.
“You should check them out.”
“I’ve been meaning to.” She pauses, appearing uncomfortable. “So, pizza... I want to pay you back, but will you take a rain check for another day? I have a lot of work to do here.”
“You want help unpacking? I don’t want to brag, but I’m the master of organizing kitchens.” I wave my hand over the boxes.
“I couldn’t possibly. I feel guilty about today as it is.”
“I did want to help. I do,” I correct. “Promise. Neighbor.” I smile, hoping one last time I can get her to mirror my own.
“Neighbor,” she repeats, but the word doesn’t fit. We’ve been so much more. “So?”
I’m trying to remember where this conversation started. It dawns on me. She wants me to leave. “Right. Another time. No problem.”
I stop at the door, needing to see her again to believe I spent the morning with her, and it was everything I never wanted. Nothing about today was what I hoped it would be. It was wrong, uncomfortable, and most of all, disappointing.
“Cait?” The truth is on the tip of my tongue again. But now we’ve spent some time together, I know the truth will scare her away, so I hold back, if only to get to see her again. It’s greedy, but I never thought I’d have this chance.
“Yeah?”
I dig into my pocket. “Your keys.” I lift them. A diamond-shaped Rush Street Apartments keychain hangs from the ring.
“Thanks. And thanks for your help.” She accepts them.
“Call me if you need anything. Number’s on the keychain.”
“I will.” She shuts the door in my face before she finishes saying the words. I count the steps back to my apartment. There are one hundred steps between us. She’s closer than she’s been in years, but I’ve never felt so far away.
Back inside my apartment, I head for my bookcase. I remove a stack of old CDs I haven’t touched in ages, except for one. Flipping through I find it and open the plastic case. On one side sits the greatest hits CD for a post-punk band that was popular long before we met—The Cure. On the other side sits the paper jacket with the lyrics and a silver key.
I use the key to open the second bedroom door. Dust particles swirl through the air when I do. I pin back the curtain and open the window to allow fresh air inside. The weak October sun beams in, brightening the room. I’ve gone a year without being in here—Cait’s old room. A record.
It’s how she left it on the last day: her dirty clothes in the hamper, necklaces hanging on the wall from nails, and her old art deco dressing table, meticulously organized with perfumes and makeup. On her desk, near her old Apple desktop, I find a CD player. The lavender thing was a relic when she bought it at a flea market. I pop the lid, set the disc inside, close the top and press the play button.
The music causes me to stumble backward until I find her bed. As I have so many times before, I lie down while listening to the lyrics.
Before my eyes, images of the three years we spent together drift past. The day she moved in and became my roommate and then our first kiss at the concert. There were family holidays, college parties, our friends, the fights over little things and big things, the dreams we had for the future. It all advances into such a storm of emotion. I find myself tugging at her pillow and curling into those moments, wishing I could have more.
This bed used to smell like her. I slept here for months after she left, but it wasn’t long before her scent slipped away. The room turned stale and void of life as though everything here wilted like a dying flower without her to nurture the contents. The same could be said for me.
I had a small amount time in between where I thought I could forget her. I traveled and attempted to date. Those things only made her a neon flashing sign in my head. No one could ever compare. And if I was traveling the world, it should be with Cait.
My business partner, Shelby, says I never gave anyone a chance. Maybe that’s true, but again, how could I when Cait was still out there? There was no real closure to our relationship. One day she was here and everything was perfect and the next she existed without me. The concept seemed impossible. If I couldn’t function before, there’s no hope for me now that she’s living in the same building.
“Fuck!” I scream.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” a voice hollers from the other room. Shelby appears in the doorway, arms crossed.
“Fuck, I forgot our class.”
“You’re damn right you did. Which on any other day would have been fine but since that fancy fitness blogger was expecting to interview you today, I’d say that’s a big fuck-up. And you left your door unlocked again, you big stupid head.”
I begin to speak, but she raises her hand. I’m so tired of meeting with these blogger chicks. There’s a new one every week I have to meet for coffee, and all they want is to shove their tits in my face, when all I want to do is dream of Cait. I moan. I’m so fucked up.
“And don’t even tell me we’re back to this again. You told me you emptied this room a year ago.” She sits on the end of the bed, appearing disappointed.
“I said I was thinking about it.”
“Why do you do this to yourself? Can’t you see it’s torture? And you know every girl in 312 is dying to sleep with you. No chick from college is this awesome.” She swings her hand around.
“Thanks to my asshole brother, that chick is now living upstairs.”
“Shut up.” She hurtles for the door.
I leap out of bed to grab her arm, heaving her back into the room and onto the mattress. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“I want to see her.” She tries to wiggle free. She knows I’ve been pining after someone for a long time but not the details.
Shelby and I met on a blind date orchestrated by Linden. It was a disaster. I wasn’t ready and she was smitten with Linden, who was going through shit with Viv. Shelby hoped I was the next best thing. Little did she know.
“You’re being unreasonable, especially if it affects our business,” she says.
“It won’t happen again. Promise.”
“Prove it.” She hands me a business card.
“What’s this?” I turn the card around and read the front.
“The fitness blogger thinks you were sick today, so she wants to arrange a new time to chat. And you better pour on the charm.”
“Fine.”
“And can you please turn off this old-ass music?”
She heads out of the room. I turn off the CD and follow, making sure she stays put. She’s in the kitchen raiding the fridge, piling random items on the island.
“What are you doing?”
“The least you can do is make me lunch. I’m starved.”
CHAPTER 48
I make Shelby lunch and later, dinner, and after, dessert.
“I’ve got a stomach of steel,” she claims as she hovers over an entire homemade peanut butter pie while slurping on a half gallon of milk from the carton.
“And you wonder why you can’t get a guy.”
She flings a f
ork full of filling at my face and nails me in the eye. The goo slides down my cheek and into my palm. I eat it because that’ll be all she shares unless I piss her off, making her throw more.
“What do my eating habits have to do with dating?”
“Nothing, except you would be the most expensive date on the planet.”
“I can buy my own damn food. I just need a guy for sex—for at least half of the time. The other half, I’m fine on my own.”
“Only half?”
“Oh, sorry, should I be a full-time Hand Solo, like you? How’s that working for you?”
I give her a look. She knows how it’s working. Terrible.
“Well, good thing Miss Awesome is back. You can finally play lightsaber with someone else.”
“Not happening.”
“Why the hell else would she move back if didn’t want to patch things up?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Please, Evan. Make me understand why you have a shrine to this woman in your home, why you haven’t had sex in five years, and why you hide in this apartment, away from every beautiful woman who wants you?” Shel’s voice intensifies.
“I don’t hide.”
She rises, grabs her keys, and marches for the door. She stops to finish me off. No one ever escapes her wrath without an earful.
“Evan, you’re the suckiest best friend ever. Every time we hang you let me blah, blah, blah about my amazing life and you never tell me anything interesting about your own. This is a very fucked-up, one-sided friendship. I’m demoting you until you can come straight with me. Is that what you want? Because if you think it was lonely in here before, it’s about to get really scary without my charismatic personality to brighten your boring-ass days.”
“Will you just shut up and sit down?”
She purses and twists her lips to the side. This is how I know she’s ticked.
So I say, “Fine, I’ll tell you everything.”
She runs across the room, leapfrogs over the back of the sofa, and lands on her back, stretched out in a reclined position. She adjusts a pillow near her neck and laces her hands behind her head. When she’s relaxed, she says, “You may begin.”
I groan. I can’t believe I’m about to do this. I sit on the armchair near her and start. “For score and a million years ago, I posted an ad on the student union’s billboard for a new roommate, but my friend Steph knew this girl who needed a place to crash.”
My story continues until midnight. For the most part, it placates Shelby. What’s more annoying is, she’s making it her goal to see that Cait and I get back together and live happily ever after. Which in a perfect world would be amazing, but Shelby makes some interesting points I haven’t had time to consider in the last eighteen hours.
She insists Cait isn’t the same person anymore. She couldn’t be with everything she’s been through and neither am I. So maybe leaving the past in the past is the best solution, and aquatinting myself with Cait as she is now might be the first order of business.
“I mean, what if you hate each other now?” Shelby suggests. “Maybe you’ll get to know her and she sucks, and she gets to know you and thinks you suck, and you’ve gone and ruined her life again by telling her you dated before and you were in love. You know what I mean? What I’m saying is, it’s already too late to admit you know her, anyway.”
As soon as she says this, I know it’s true. A normal person would have greeted her like they knew her from the instant they saw her. I didn’t have a chance to do that because Linden bombarded me while I was half asleep. Instead, I acted for what he prepped me for, because he had already acted as though he didn’t know her in their interviews. Maybe she wouldn’t have accepted the job in Chicago if she knew the truth. In fact, I’m positive she wouldn’t have based on our conversation earlier today. What did she say? That she needed a fresh start away from everyone. A reboot?
“You’re right. I’ve already fucked this up before I started.” I should have followed my gut instinct to hug her and tell her I missed her when she appeared at my front door. Even if she would have turned around and left after, I would have done what was right. I would have done what I couldn’t before.
“Yep. But that’s your own fault for being a dickhead and being a brother of a dickhead. Speaking of, where is Linden these days? Haven’t you told him I’m ready for him to ask me out?”
“Never happening. You know he still loves Viv.”
“Aren’t they separated or something?”
“You know those two, one minute they’re on, the next they’re off. It’s like fighting fuels their fucking.”
“What is it with you Wade boys? It’s like, once you mate, you’re done for life.”
“Maybe loyalty’s our thing.”
“I think stupidity’s your thing. That’s what you’re better at.”
I catch a glimpse of the time. Two a.m. I stand and yawn, ready for bed. “You staying?”
Shelby’s already snoring, mouth wide and drooling over her cheek. I grab a blanket from the closet and toss it over her and flip off the lights.
I pause at Cait’s room. Browsing the contents, I decide to do something desperate, something I know in my heart is wrong. I lock the room, like I’m locking up our past. Because I can’t stand the thought of losing her a third time, even if it means I only say hello to her in passing. I convince myself this is the right thing to do. She wants a fresh start, and I’ll make sure she gets it.
CHAPTER 49
At nine a.m. my cell rings. When my eyes focus, they scan a Maryland number.
“Cait.” I juggle the phone before swiping the face to answer.
“Hello?” I say and sit up in one swoop, faking alertness.
“Hi, um, Evan?” she asks.
“Yep. Yes.”
“This is Cait. Did I wake you?”
“Nope. What’s up?” I wipe sleep crud from my eyes.
“Sorry to bother you on a Saturday, but I about froze last night. The heaters aren’t working. Any chance you can have someone look at them today?”
“No problem. I’ll be up in a few.”
“Oh, okay. Thanks.”
For the second morning in a row, I’m showering and dressing with light speed. As I’m about to head out the door Shelby stirs on the couch and speaks. In my excitement, I forgot she was here.
“Where are you going? I need breakfast. I was thinking omelets and fresh rosemary potatoes.” She stretches.
I throw a twenty-dollar bill on her face. “Breakfast is on me. Eggscellence Cafe is down the street. Lock up when you leave.”
“Evan!” she yells as I exit. Even with the front door closed, her rants shadow me up the stairs. She’s so high maintenance.
When I reach the sixth floor, I don’t knock on Cait’s door, I knock on the one across from her—Mr. Gusterson’s. When he doesn’t answer on the third try, I jiggle the doorknob and find it unlocked. Typical.
Inside the TV’s on and the volume’s cranked. He’s asleep in his recliner, wearing his brown furry bathrobe, which makes him look like skin-and-bones roadkill. His gray combover won’t stay combed over, so the sparse hairs claw at the air on one side of his head like a drawbridge that never closes. The smell of booze always hits me first when I approach. One silvery blue eye pops open as I near.
“Still sleeping. Go away,” he grumbles and turns over.
“I need your tools.”
“I didn’t know you knew what those were.”
“Very funny. Heaters are on the fritz in 6A again.”
“I’ll get to it tomorrow. Busy today.” His laziness pisses me off, but today it works to my advantage.
“That’s why I’m here. Fixing it myself.”
“Ha!” he barks.
“In fact, for now on, anytime 6A needs work, I’ll do it.” The words burst out before I consider if I can actually do what I’m suggesting. I’ve never had a handy bone in my body. I tried to hang some wire shelves in the laundry closet
once and though it seemed like a successful endeavor, they’ve since slumped to a forty-five-degree angle, leaving them unusable.
He looks over his shoulder. “What’s so special about 6A?”
I open my wallet, but it will take more than twenty bucks to appease him. I throw three twenties in his direction. His wrinkled paw grabs the bills before they land. It’s magic when they disappear before my eyes.
“That’s a good start, but I was thinking one hundred.”
“To do your work?”
“Think of it as a tool rental fee.”
“I’ll buy my own if that’s the case. Or kick you out?”
He pops his recliner into a sitting position. He’s suddenly fully aware. “Or I can remind our pretty neighbor about your past. Your choice, hot stuff.”
Damn it.
“She’s got the ambrosia, right?” He slides his hands back and forth on the chair’s puffy arms.
“It’s amnesia. And how the hell do you remember that?” Mr. Gusterson worked here when Cait and I lived together. He was here when everything went down, which means he knows everything, because he makes it his business to see and hear everything.
“Still sharp.” He points to his head and raises his open palm for an additional payoff. When I shift where I stand, he twiddles his fingers. He knows he has me by the balls.
I sigh and reach back into my pocket. I wave the remaining forty dollars in front of him and say, “You keep your trap shut. No gossiping about this. She can never know, and I handle 6A’s maintenance issues. Deal?”
“And you’ll me give one hundred a month off my rent.”
“Fine.” I slap the money into his greedy, wrinkled hand.
He counts the bills close to his face. “If I recall, Miss Venti lived here too, so you might want to visit her next. Heard she could use a new flat-screen TV.”
My temperature rises, and I cross my arms. Apparently, the two have been discussing their blackmail plans.
He continues, “And a Wii with two VR glasses... and ten games of our choice.”
“Don’t push it, old man.”
“You deliver and we’ll keep a lid on it.”
Ten Thousand Points of Light Page 27