by Easton, Meg
He just smiled and took another bite. “This really is delicious. You better eat some more before I accidentally eat it all.”
“How?”
“My grandma is friends with the band director’s grandma. She asked them to practice outside, and his wife wanted to join in as a way to get the blanket there and ready for us.”
“And you planned all of this today?”
“Nah. Some of it was last night.”
“All this for me?”
He wanted to reach out and smooth the disbelief from her face.
“Just so I could have the perfect ‘spontaneous’ date?”
“And so you could have a great birthday.”
“Ian, I...” She trailed off, pressing a knuckle right below her bottom eyelashes. “I think that’s the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me.”
He wasn’t sure if he should’ve told her the details and ruined the spontaneous, universe-having-her-back magic. He really hadn’t planned to. But based on the way she gazed into his eyes with those beautiful ones of hers with the perfect amount of gold rimming the green, he knew he’d chosen correctly. She seemed even more touched by the fact that so much effort had gone into it. Plus, she still got to witness the magic as they went along. It made the hours of work lost planning everything today totally worth it.
“So, what was your plan for how to get us back to your truck?”
In a move that he couldn’t have planned the timing on more perfectly, a man burst into the restaurant and said, “Anyone need an Uber? I was supposed to pick someone up, but then they said never mind. I can take you anywhere in Quicksand that you need to go—it’s already paid for.”
And then, to his surprise, Addi leaned across the table separating them, grabbed his collar, pulled him in closer, and kissed him on the lips.
16
Addison
Addison didn’t step through her front doorway—she floated through it. As soon as the door closed, she sunk against the wall, breathing out the biggest happy sigh of her life. All three roommates ran into the room.
“How has your birthday been?” Timini asked.
“I thought you were only working until lunchtime,” Bex said, trying and failing to look innocent. “I’m surprised to see you just getting home.”
“You all need acting classes. Bex, Ian already spilled the beans about you sneaking over to tell him it’s my birthday.”
Timini grinned. “So how was the date? I saw you two on scooters.”
“It was so amazing,” Addison breathed. “Best date of my life.”
“Oh my lands, Addison! That’s so exciting!” Peyton was clapping her hands together and practically jumping with happiness. “Isn’t that so exciting? It’s what we’ve all been hoping for! And to have it on your birthday is just perfect.”
“Come,” Bex said, herding them toward the kitchen, “talk around the table. Food’s getting cold.”
As soon as Addison went through the doorway, the oddest scents hit her. She sniffed, trying to figure out what they could have possibly made for dinner, and failed. She wasn’t even sure if she thought it was good or not.
“My plan,” Timini said, motioning to the messy kitchen, “was to make chicken scampi. I found a recipe and thought I could do it. I had the timing worked out on each part of it, too. But really, that just meant that every single part burned at exactly the same time.”
“But the timing was flawless,” Bex said as they all sat down at the table.
“Then Bex helped me to clear out the smoke and get everything thrown out so we wouldn’t keep smelling it. And then we—okay, mostly Bex—threw together chicken fajitas out of practically no ingredients at all.”
“And I brought cake!” Peyton said.
“This is perfect,” Addison said. “Absolutely perfect. I hadn’t brought up my birthday because it made me sad that it was going to be my first one without my sister. But you all made it wonderful.”
“Well,” Bex said and cleared her throat, “I don’t think it was just us that made it wonderful.”
Addison felt her cheeks warming just thinking about the date. “Okay, Ian helped quite a bit, too.”
“Aww, now see?” Timini said as she grabbed the dish of tortillas. “I want a guy who will make me blush like that.”
“Me, too,” Peyton said.
Bex grabbed a couple of tortillas when they came to her. “And me.”
When Bex handed the dish to Peyton, Peyton said, “I don’t think you can get to the blushing stage by only going on a string of first dates.”
Bex picked up a cherry tomato and tossed it at her. “Or by not noticing what’s right in front of your eyes.”
Peyton just looked confused, which made Addison laugh out loud. Someday, the girl might figure out that she liked her best friend. At the rate she was going, though, it might be a while.
Timini added cheese, lettuce, and sour cream to her fajitas like she was making a work of art. “Obviously none of us have a love life worth chatting about, so tell us more about yours. We need to live a little vicariously.”
“Even though you, Addison Sparks,” Bex said as she piled the peppers and onions high on her fajita, “are going against our No Falling in Love pact.”
“I never said I was falling in love.”
Peyton laughed in a way that was very close to a snort, and she covered her mouth with both hands in shock that she made the undignified sound.
“No, really,” Addison protested. “I have just fallen in like.”
“Yes,” Peyton said. “Like. A very strong, can’t-stop-thinking-about-him, thinks everything he does is perfect, notices how beautiful he is, like.”
Addison nodded. “Exactly. Besides, I’m not so sure this relationship is going to go very far, so no sense letting myself fall in love.” She didn’t believe her own words, but somehow she needed to convince herself of them.
“What?” Timini said. “How can you be so unsure about it? I saw how you two were together today and I’m not unsure about it at all.”
“Oh, I’m sure about what happened today. It was magical. Like I’m your fairy godmother and I’m here with a wand magical. It’s the future I’m unsure of.”
“I don’t get you one bit,” Bex said.
“I’m just...” How could she even explain? Well, probably like Ian said—inelegant but effective. Just saying it. “I’m just not the girl who gets the guy. I actually had a guy say to me once ‘You’re not the kind of girl guys like to date—you’re the kind they like to marry.’”
“He did not,” Bex said.
“I swear to you he did.”
Peyton looked around the table, eyebrows drawn together. “What does that even mean?”
Addison shrugged as she wrapped her tortilla up tight enough to pick up. “I don’t know. That I wear mom jeans? That I’m responsible but not fun? Who knows? But it explains why the only guy I did manage to ever keep was someone who didn’t want a real relationship—just one of convenience. Kind of like how you’re grateful for your microwave when you need it, and you really like it, but you don’t want to have to think about it when you’re not standing there holding a plate of cold chicken casserole.”
She shrugged and took a bite of her fajita, which was actually pretty good, despite the strange smell—apparently of burned chicken scampi—still hanging around the kitchen. Talking about Matthew hadn’t hurt, which surprised and pleased her. And as long as she didn’t think about Ian and that she would probably lose him before long, she was just fine.
“I think you’re wrong,” Timini said. “I mean, I don’t know about your past, but I know you pretty well in your present. And I’ve seen you and Ian and the looks you give each other, and I think you’re wrong about him.”
Addison swallowed her bite. “The point is, guys like Ian don’t fall for girls like me. He’s amazing! So, so, so incredibly amazing. He really could have his pick of anyone. If he’s even ready to get serious with anyone yet. One of
the reasons I was going to stay away from him was because he wasn’t recovered from his broken engagement yet. And then, I don’t know, life just kept pushing us together and I went and fell for him when I was trying not to.”
That was the biggest part. The more time they spent together, the more Addison was convinced that Ian was her happily ever after. She hoped she hadn’t destroyed her chances with him just because it was happening before he was ready.
“So when things go wrong and I’m a blubbering mess because I let my heart get in danger, just know that I’m coming to the three people who tried to talk me into it in the first place.”
“And we’ll be here for you,” Bex said. “We’ll wrap our arms around you and tell you that you’re pretty and that everything’s going to be okay.”
“And we’ll feed you cake!” Peyton said, getting out of her seat and grabbing the layered cake off the counter behind her.
“So what I’m hearing is,” Addison said, “that I can fall as fully for Ian as I would like, because when I fall, I have a soft spot to land.”
“Exactly that,” Timini said.
Addison took another bite and thought about how easy it would be to do exactly that. Or maybe she didn’t need to fall fully for him. Maybe she was already there.
17
Ian
Ian pulled into his driveway, turned off the lights on his truck, and got out. He didn’t ever want to be the one holding things up at any home, so he decided he was going to stay as long as it took to finish everything on the Koermer house. Even if it meant staying this late. He dragged himself into the house through the kitchen door and kicked off his boots.
“Grandma?”
“In my office, sweetie!”
Ian opened the fridge and found the lasagna that his grandma had texted to say she had saved for him. He was so hungry that he probably could’ve eaten everything that was left in the pan. Instead, he got out a large piece and put it in the microwave. As it warmed up, he went to find his grandma.
He heard voices as soon as he turned the corner into the hallway, and when he went into the office, he was rewarded with smiles from his two favorite people. Addi and his grandma were sitting across the desk from each other, going through piles of papers. After such an incredibly long day, he couldn’t believe how great it felt to come home and see Addi’s face smiling up at him.
“Hi, sweetie. Did you see the lasagna?”
He nodded. “It’s in the microwave warming. Addi, have you eaten?”
She smiled as he pulled her to her feet and wrapped his arms around her waist. “I ate with your grandma before we got started.”
Ian glanced at his grandma, then at the recycle bin next to her. “Are you sure you want to throw that paper on top away?”
As his grandma turned to look at what paper she had tossed into it last, Ian pulled Addi closer and kissed her on the lips, savoring their warm softness. Then he nudged the curls away from her ear and whispered “It’s so good to see you.”
She let out a breathy giggle as his words tickled her ear, then snuggled in a little closer, even though he was probably covered in sawdust, so he left a few kisses on her neck while he was there.
“Why would I need to keep a receipt for having our lawn aerated from eight years ago? Oh. That was just to get me to look away. You know, I can leave the room if you want privacy.”
Ian laughed and let his arms fall from Addi’s back so she could sit back down. “No need, Grandma. I’m going to go get some of your lasagna.”
He couldn’t stand being in the same house as Addi and not being in the same room as her, so he took his food into the office and ate while chatting with them. When he was finished, he announced he was going to go get in the shower and didn’t miss the blush that crossed Addi’s cheeks and decided that was his favorite color.
“We’re working on the closet next,” his grandma said, “and there’s a couple of boxes in there with your name on them.”
“There are?” He vaguely remembered having a few boxes he didn’t unpack when he moved in after Grandpa died, probably because he didn’t know what to do with the stuff, but he hadn’t thought about them again since probably that first week.
“Yep, and if you don’t go through them and get your stuff organized, Addison and I are going to.”
There was a teasing gleam in his grandma’s eyes, but that didn’t necessarily mean that she was joking. “Wait, really?”
She nodded. “So you might want to get to them.”
He looked toward his room, then back to them, holding his hands out, like he was trying to get them to pause. “Just—just leave them there. I’ll take a quick shower and be right back.”
He raced into his room, shut the door, then into his bathroom and shut that door, too. Hopefully his showering was quick enough. He only dropped the shampoo once and hit an elbow into the shower wall twice, fully aware that the office was on the other side of the wall from his shower. It probably wasn’t more than ten minutes after he left that he was back in the room, wearing a clean t-shirt and jeans. Had it just been him and his grandma working on the project, he probably would’ve just worn gym shorts, but with Addi here, he still wanted to look good.
They both smiled when he entered the room in a way that told him they had been talking about him. He hoped it was good. The closet had quite a few boxes in it, so he started pulling them out, organizing them based on what was written on them, and found three that were his. He had no memory of what was in the boxes, so he wanted to make sure he was the first to look at them.
As he went through the box, he remembered why he hadn’t unpacked these in the first place. They were just full of stuff that was fun and memorable, but not that he needed to use. He wasn’t even sure what to do with it all. As he pulled out some artwork from when he was in elementary school, he chuckled. Maybe he should’ve taken his grandma’s offer of having her and Addi go through it.
Although, it was kind of cool reliving all the memories while chatting with Addi and his grandma. Eventually, he started making a pile of things that could probably go into some kind of a scrapbook or something, and a pile of objects that he wanted to keep, but didn’t want sitting out somewhere. He even had a minuscule pile of things he did want to put out or use right now—a pile that currently held two things.
When he got to the end of the second box, he pulled the third one to him. As soon as he cut the packing tape on the third one, he knew exactly what it was. It was a box of random things he had packed half full at his apartment in Salem and never unpacked. It had been sitting, opened, in the closet in his room, so he started tossing in mementos from when he and Zoe were dating and engaged. Wrist bands from concerts, playbills, museum fliers, and even a restaurant receipt from their first date. When Zoe had ended things, the box was too much to face, so he’d sealed it up and put it on the floor of the office until he decided what to do with it. His grandma must’ve moved it to the closet.
Zoe broke up with him two and a half months ago. It had been long enough that he could handle dealing with this stuff now. He started tossing mementos in the “throw out” box, and after getting rid of quite a few things, he came across his wedding invitation. It sat there, on top of everything in the box, staring at him. They had all gone out to their guests before Zoe called it off. In fact, they’d already gotten the RSVPs back, the seating chart worked out, and presents had started arriving.
All of the questions that he’d been asking himself when she first ended things returned. Was he just not a good enough person? Or was he so obtuse that he hadn’t realized their issues himself? That night, Zoe had brought up that neither of them enjoyed each other’s friends and hobbies. It had definitely been an annoyance, but he hadn’t thought it was a deal breaker. It must have shown on his face, because then she’d brought out the big guns.
“When you asked me to marry you,” she had said, “I thought I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. Now I know that I don’t. It wasn’t any
thing specific you did—it was just… a little of everything, I guess.”
He wished it had been something specific. Then he would know. Since it wasn’t, he had to assume it was everything. He had been happy enough in their relationship, and at the time, he’d figured that was enough and he’d accepted it. He hadn’t realized that Zoe wasn’t going to be happy. That her expectations, dreams, and vision for their future wasn’t going to be met.
Sometimes he worried that he just wasn’t husband material. Other times, he really felt like that wasn’t true—he recognized it as simply doubts creeping in, and he forced them to go away. But when he did, it left the nagging feeling that if that wasn’t the reason, then it was simply that he and Zoe weren’t a good match, and he hadn’t noticed. It meant that his judgment hadn’t been solid.
He and Zoe had worked together to undo all the wedding preparations—to cancel everything, return everything, send back the gifts, get out of the contract for the apartment they had leased and were days from moving into—and it was mentally tough. If his judgment had been solid, he would’ve realized their issues before it became so difficult to break off.
He couldn’t take on the weight of anything else in the box that might be related to the wedding that never happened. He shifted a big stack of papers and cards to see if anything else was in it that he might need to go through, and saw the edge of a rock. Lifting everything above it so he could more easily get to it, he reached into the box and pulled out the flat stone, smiling.
The scene that Addi had painted was exactly like he remembered it. He ran his finger across the trees by the shore, and the way the river curved outward in their favorite spot, making the water calmer, and the perfect spot to jump in. Not that it was deep—most of the time, it only went halfway to their knees. Even though the little Ian and the little Addi were only painted about an inch high in the scene, she still managed to get big smiles on their faces as they held hands and jumped in.