Let Me List the Ways

by Sarah White

  Last night it had hurt to see him unaffected by our kiss, but at least I hadn’t seen regret. Sitting in that booth, I got a front row seat to watch him think about how he wished he hadn’t kissed me. It magnified the pain I had been feeling until it nearly choked me.

  “It didn’t mean anything,” I lied. “You were just helping a friend. It was impulsive and a mistake. It’s not going to happen again so maybe you shouldn’t mention it.”

  His eyes stayed locked on mine, as if he was looking for something in them. “So it isn’t worth mentioning?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “It’s only going to hurt her. Let’s just forget it ever happened.”

  “That’s what you want?” Nolan asked, and I was beginning to feel like I was gaining some control again. I couldn’t go back and stop it from happening, but I could write the narrative on the role it played in our friendship, and right now I was writing it in as a tiny footnote instead of giving it its own chapter.

  I nodded.

  “Okay.” He opened a small creamer and poured its contents into his steaming hot coffee. He reached for another creamer. “I’m really sorry, Zie. I know I’ve put you in a position where you’re going to have to keep a secret too. I should never have kissed you.” The cream formed a tan cloud in his coffee before he stirred it in.

  “You were trying to help me. It was my fault too.” I swirled my soda with the straw.

  We fell silent as our waitress approached our table with our breakfasts. She set the plates down and slid a bottle of Tabasco sauce toward Nolan before he’d even had a chance to ask for it.

  “Thank you, Zie,” Nolan said when we were alone again.

  I smiled at him even though I was sure a little part of my heart was cracking. It was settled. He wasn’t going to tell Erin about our mistake and I was going to keep our secret.

  I unzipped my purse and opened my kit. Nolan watched me as he aimlessly moved his eggs around his plate. I quickly tested myself, administering the insulin for the food I was about to eat, and then I tucked my kit away again. Nolan scooped up some eggs, concentrating hard on not spilling them using his left hand as I took the first bite of my bacon. “I’m going to miss this place when we’re away at college.”

  I laughed around my mouthful of breakfast. “Me too. There are a lot of things I’m going to miss,” I said, smiling at him so it was clear I was talking about him. The only comfort I could give myself was to think about how determined we both were to remain friends. Even if it wouldn’t always be exactly how I wanted it, we’d still have each other in our lives. “You always had great ideas about what kind of trouble we could get into to keep busy.”

  “I’m full of great ideas,” Nolan said. “And maybe a bad one or two,” he added as an afterthought as he nudged my foot beneath the table. I knew it was his way of continuing to take the blame for the kiss last night. I gave him a lopsided smile to let him know I accepted his joke and was cool with moving on from last night.

  We both ate our breakfasts without talking until Nolan looked up from his plate and glanced around. “Why is it so quiet in here?” he asked. “I feel like there should be some background tunes or something.”

  Apparently Nolan had magical powers, because as soon as the words were out of his mouth, the men’s choir began to sing. We both fought our laughter, but lost in the end.

  “What kind of sorcery was that?” I asked through my laugh.

  “Don’t question my powers,” he commanded in a booming voice, quickly scrunching his napkin into a ball and tossing it at me. Sometimes I wondered if being friends since we were young had stunted the maturity of our behavior while in public together. Sure, we’d just had a good heart-to-heart, but in the end it always boiled down to playing around like a couple of ten-year-olds.

  We clapped when the song ended and went back to our breakfasts with grins still on our faces. From across the table he asked, “Do you have a pen?” I gave him a curious look but dug around in my kit until I found one.

  “Sure. What do you need it for?” I held it over the center of the table and only realized when he didn’t reach for it that I’d have to be the one to do the writing.

  “I think we should make a list,” Nolan said.

  “That’s a great idea.” I couldn’t wait to create another list with him. I could still feel the one I had tucked into my pocket that I’d brought with me and I couldn’t think of a better way to get our friendship back on track.

  “Let’s make a list of all the things we have loved doing together over the years. We’re going to revisit every single one of them before summer. It will be a celebration of our friendship—kind of like a huge graduation party as we move from childhood friends to adult friends. It will be our ‘Senior Year Bucket List.’”

  “This sounds like the best idea!” A thought occurred to me. “I thought these types of lists were for things you’ve never done that you want to do before you die.” My bad habit of chewing on the ends of pens took over and I found myself clenching the cap between my front teeth.

  “We’re going to do that too. Let’s put down everything we’ve loved and everything we can think of that we want to experience together but haven’t had the chance to yet. We’ll change the title to ‘Senior Year Redo Bucket List.’”

  “I like that. You go first.”

  “Do you remember when we camped out in my yard when we graduated fifth grade? I want to do that again.” I remembered that night very well. I woke up with two mosquito bites on my forehead.

  “Okay, but you’re bringing the bug spray.” I grabbed a clean napkin from the stack at the end of the table and wrote camp out on the list.

  “Deal. Your turn.”

  “Fine. Do you remember when Patrick Bower made fun of you for that terrible haircut you got? We snuck out at night and met up.” I waited for the recognition to set in.

  “How many rolls of toilet paper did we use? That was ridiculous but totally vindicating. Write it down. It’s time to revisit that for sure. We’ll worry about who our target is later.”

  I wrote down late night TP party. “I believe it was sixteen rolls.”

  “Go big or go home, huh?”

  “Thank God your mom has a Costco card. Nothing beats buying the toilet paper in bulk. I can’t believe our moms agreed it was a good idea.” Nolan’s mother had been furious at Patrick for teasing Nolan in front of his friends. If he had lived farther away than the one block, I’m pretty sure she would have signed up to be our getaway driver.

  “My turn. There are so many things I’d want to do again but we’d never finish this list before summer. I’m trying to pick out just the highlights. Let’s see—I want to go to Disneyland again. Just you and me so we can ride Space Mountain a million times if we want.” Last time we’d gone there we had to go on all the rides his brothers and our parents wanted to go on too. I agreed and wrote Disneyland on our list.

  “Oh, we are definitely running through the park sprinklers at night. That was awesome!”

  “That’s a good one,” he chuckled. I wrote epic sprinklers and immediately wondered if they would feel as epic now that we were older. It didn’t matter; I had to do it at least one more time with him.

  “If we think of anything else that has to be on that list, we can add it. Let’s come up with a few things we’ve never done. I’ll go first; I want to get a tattoo,” he said.

  “Like you want me to go with you while you get it?” I asked.

  “No, like I want us to get tattoos together. They don’t have to be huge and something terrible we’ll always regret, but just something small to say we got our first tattoos together. You can even pick what we get.” He took a sip of his coffee and then set it down and pushed the napkin a little closer to me so I’d write it down.

  I lifted an eyebrow in question, but I could see by the seriousness in his expression he wasn’t joking. “What if I pick something ridiculous? That’s too much pressure.”

  “If you can’t think of s
omething to get, I’ll pick. Let’s just see what happens when we get there.” He looked back down at his plate and began spearing the breakfast potatoes with his fork. I wrote down tattoos and instantly felt excitement as the idea washed over me. Somehow committing to it on a napkin made it more real and I started falling in love with the idea.

  “I don’t think any friendship can be complete without a road trip. If we can’t manage that, then all of this will be for nothing,” I teased dramatically. “Maybe we can go for a day or two over spring break. It doesn’t have to be anywhere too far, just enough to be disconnected from everyone and experience life on the road.” Road trip made our list without any argument. He simply nodded and gave me a playful smile. In that moment I might have been the happiest I’d ever been.

  “Eat your breakfast.” He pointed his fork at my plate to emphasize his command.

  “Now you’re just getting cocky with your left-handed fork control.” We both scooped another bite of potatoes into our mouths and chewed as the men started up another tune. When breakfast was over and our waitress had dropped off the bill, I folded up our list, which felt so much more valuable than just an item used to clean a mess. I tucked it into the empty pouch of my kit since that was something that was always with me. Circumstances in our future might make it harder to be together, but we would always value and work on what we had.

  Seventeen

  THE MOVIE THEATER was still lit up when we finally made our way to our seats. I thought it was surprising that they had been able to sell so many tickets to a movie about a billionaire and his meek love interest on a Thursday afternoon. I had clearly underestimated the amount of moviegoers who were free for an early weekday showing. Nolan followed along behind me, holding our popcorn while I moved into our favorite seats in the first row of the stadium seating so we could rest our feet on the metal bars in front of us. This movie was the only option we had besides a children’s cartoon or a foreign movie with subtitles if we wanted to make it to his appointment on time.

  “You are going to owe me for this!” he whisper-yelled as we sat down. I set my diet soda in the cup holder between us and exaggeratedly rolled my eyes at him.

  “Don’t pretend you aren’t curious. Everyone is talking about this movie.” I winked at the end, and it was his turn to roll his eyes.

  “You can say what you want, but if I have to watch Jamie Dornan in all his full-screen glory, you are sitting through any movie I choose without question next game night.”

  “Oh, God, not the piranhas. Anything but that.” I made a sour face as I unzipped my kit.

  “Oh, there will be piranhas, or sharks, or anything that comes when lots of girls are frolicking around in the water on spring break. I can see the bikinis already.” He held his hands up and framed an imaginary screen.

  “I have such trouble suspending my scientific knowledge in order to believe that suddenly a man-made lake is swarming with fish found only in other countries. It’s absurd.” I pressed the lancet to my finger and drew a drop of blood. He chuckled while peeking over at the meter screen. When my number was normal and I’d covered myself for the snacks I was about to eat, he tilted the popcorn in my direction.

  “If I have to pretend that Jamie is into Dakota, then you can pretend those vicious fish could live in a man-made lake. Talk about suspending belief.” He turned around in his seat and waved his arm across the crowded movie theater. “I want to hear from one woman here that she’d let some guy take her into that ‘Red Room’ if he didn’t look like some Hollywood actor.”

  I slapped at his shoulder and laughed. “Okay, okay, okay. Stupid fish and barely legal girls in bikinis it is.” My words had satisfied him, and he turned back around and slouched to get comfortable in his seat.

  “Should I take notes or something?” he teased when the lights started to dim.

  “You can do whatever you want, just don’t get in the way of me watching the magic happen.” I tossed a fallen piece of popcorn at him.

  Believe it or not, he was on his best behavior throughout the entire movie. He only made a few Yeah right faces, but I ignored them and stayed focused on the very important and difficult plot. Okay, maybe I just watched Jamie take his shirt off.

  When the lights turned back on and the theater began to empty out, he turned to me and asked, “Does that really do it for you?” I couldn’t tell if he was serious so I just gave him a little push so he would continue walking out of our row. “I didn’t really picture you as a paddle kind of girl.” He laughed.

  “Stop!” I scolded with a giggle.

  “I can’t even picture you in a strip club, let alone some special torture room,” he said with disbelief, making an older woman smile as we passed her. I could feel my cheeks flush.

  “I think I might actually crack up if someone ever danced for me. I’m too goofy for that.”

  “Well,” he said, as if he was about to admit something big, “I think you’re pretty safe with me, but if I ever do get all spun up and feel like dancing, I’ll test out my moves on you. In all fairness, I’d be a little disappointed if you didn’t find it funny enough to laugh.” We exited the theater and made our way to his truck.

  “For the sake of your ego, I hope if you ever decide to dance that way for a girl, she doesn’t laugh.” I moved around to the passenger side to let him in and dug for the keys in my purse.

  He laughed softly. “You’re right, it probably would kill my ego.” It only took five minutes to drive to the doctor’s office, so we decided we’d sit in the truck for the next fifteen minutes before his appointment. I found a nice spot under a big tree where we could hang out. I killed the engine but left the music playing.

  “So when should we start our list?” He tapped his hand on top of my purse since my kit and the list were inside.

  “What were you thinking? I’m game for whenever you want.”

  “Well, you have that date tomorrow, and I promised Erin I’d take her out too. How about we start with our campout Saturday night?”

  “Sure. I’ll bring the chips and salsa, you bring the bug spray.”

  “Do you still have a sleeping bag that fits you? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you use one besides that Beauty and the Beast thing you had last time.”

  I laughed at the memory of that monstrosity. I’d insisted on sleeping in it as a child so often that it didn’t properly zip anymore and my feet had wiggled a big hole at the seams. “I’ll get a new one later. Should I grab a tent too?”

  He didn’t answer right away. He seemed to be weighing some decision. Finally he said, “I was thinking it might be kind of cool to sleep under the stars. What do you think?”

  “I think that’s very cliché of you,” I answered, “but I also think it sounds great.” He nodded his head with a grin.

  “That’s if I don’t have to get pushed into surgery or something today.” He looked up at the windows of the tall building.

  “I hope that isn’t the case.” We sat there in silence for a while longer. We both knew that another surgery would take him out for the rest of the season. It was unclear what exactly that would do to his USC offer, but to Nolan, sitting the bench would be tragic. He truly loved the game and had loved it since the first time he stood on that T-ball field when he was five. I couldn’t tell you how many of our spring days were spent down at the Little League field when we were younger, then all over the place with his travel ball team. His heart was so far into the game that I worried what would happen if he ever had to quit playing altogether.

  “You’re coming up with me, right?” he asked when his appointment time approached. I never went into his doctor’s appointments with him, but something told me that day that he needed me there. I nodded and turned the keys the rest of the way before removing them.

  “Sure thing.” We entered the building and waited for the elevator. When the doors opened a toddler came running out at full speed, his father dashing after him, trying to grab his son. His mother followed them ou
t with a baby strapped to her chest. We stepped inside and turned to watch the family. The little boy circled around a potted plant and headed back for the elevator. He stumbled and was unable to regain balance. He tumbled to the floor and his shirt hitched up a little, revealing an insulin pump.

  Nolan nudged me with his good elbow and I nodded. It always hurt my heart to see young children have to live with diabetes, but it seemed doubly unfair that he couldn’t even have been two years old. When his mom met my eyes, I smiled at her and lifted the hem of my shirt to show my pump. With a little wave I said, “Stay strong,” just as the elevator doors closed.

  There are many challenges diabetics face, and I knew they had probably just begun to face some of them since he was so young. Sometimes the challenges I faced were small, like curious eyes on me as I tested myself in the open at a restaurant or clipped my pump to a more conspicuous place on my outfit. It could be frustrating when people gave me unsolicited, unhelpful, and incorrect advice, like that eating a healthier diet, a low-carb diet, or an organic diet would cure my disease. And it was hurtful when my peers would joke that they couldn’t eat one more candy bar because they’d get diabetes. One day I hoped there would be a greater understanding of diabetes, but in the meantime all we could do was support each other and try to educate people when they were willing to learn.

  The doors slid open and we stepped into the long hallway. Nolan was usually a very confident guy. He rarely got nervous, but on the few occasions he was freaking out about something big, he gave away his emotions with a few tells. First was the collar adjustment. His fingers would slip into his collar and tug as if it was choking him. Next he’d rub his hand over his head, causing wrinkles to form on his forehead. I wished I could tell him it was going to be okay, but we both knew there was a very real possibility it wouldn’t.

  His feet stopped outside the door and he slowly lifted his good hand to turn the knob. I waited until he pushed the door open and then captured his hand in mine. Of course our fingers were laced together the correct way.