Right Where I Want You

by Jessica Hawkins

  “I’m not trying to keep you here. You want to move somewhere else? We’ll figure it out. But not the one fucking place I can’t even bring myself to visit.”

  “You haven’t even tried,” she pleaded.

  “Don’t.” I showed her my palms, and my hands shook with anger. “Don’t pretend to know what the last year has been like for me.”

  “I’m not doing this to hurt you,” she said. “This is what I need.”

  “I hear you loud and clear.” I sniffed, backing away. “This isn’t enough. Not New York, not your job, and not me. So go.”

  “You’re the one who’s scared, not me,” she shot back. “You can’t even bring yourself to question why you won’t sell your mom’s house. Why you won’t even step foot in a city you love so much that you light up when you talk about it, even when it’s painful.”

  I couldn’t deny that. I hated that my hometown would always be part of me no matter how much I wanted to forget. I couldn’t escape my love for it, my loyalty to it, and still, it continued to hurt me. “I’m not willing to sell because it was my mom’s home. Period. It’s all I’ve got left of her.”

  She shook her head. “It’s more than that, Sebastian. It’s deeper. I know it’s scary, but you can’t heal until you face it.”

  I didn’t want to hear it. Any of it. What did she know about death? About losing not just a parent but a lifeline? A childhood? Healing wasn’t as simple as putting my grief on the market and walking away. I wouldn’t stand here and entertain the thought of forgetting my mother while Georgina made excuses to keep me out of her life. If she wanted that so desperately, I’d give it to her before I abandoned Mom’s memory.

  I handed her Bruno’s leash, but she just stared at it. “Take it,” I said.

  “But—”

  “Boston was too far. Whether you think it’s about me or not, it is on some level. You do what you have to do, but I’m done.”

  When she didn’t move, I took her hand, flipped her palm face up, and put the leash in it. The sleeve engulfed her hand. I couldn’t bring myself to ask for my jacket back.

  “Sebastian, please.”

  I had to turn away from the tears streaming down her face. She was scared, and I was fucking done trying to get through to her. I walked away with her words ringing in my ears.

  “It’s deeper. I know it’s scary, but you can’t heal until you face it.”

  Heal? My mother’s death, her home, was the one place in me that would never heal. There’d always be a dark hole in my heart when it came to Boston, and if Georgina insisted on living there, then so fucking be it.

  I wasn’t going to follow.

  But she’d known that.

  26

  SEBASTIAN

  Justin idled at the curb in a convertible with the top down despite the fact that it was cold as fuck. I tossed my TUMI leather duffel in the back, and Opal leaped in the moment I got the door open. I rarely even had to put a leash on her, she was the most loyal fucking dog.

  I hesitated before officially trapping myself in a car with Justin for the next few hours. “Somehow, you managed to convince me to go to the beach in December,” I said, “but I’m sure as hell not riding all the way through Long Island like this.”

  “Don’t get your panties in a twist,” Justin said. “I’ll put the top up. All you had to do was ask politely.”

  “That so? Let me try.” I straightened my shoulders as I pulled off my gloves. “Please, may I skip this weekend?”

  Justin glanced up at me as he raised the top. “No, but I really appreciate you doing this for me, brother. Women like this don’t come along every day.”

  It was always about a woman—in this case, a Swiss foreign exchange student whose time at NYU was almost over had invited him to a winter wonderland party in the Hamptons.

  I shook my head at Opal as I removed my coat, sat in the passenger’s seat, and blasted the heater. “Winter wonderland my ass,” I muttered. “I could be sitting in the sauna at Equinox right now.”

  “That’s no way to spend a Saturday,” he said, plugging in his iPhone before searching Spotify. “Nice to have a rental car for a change, isn’t it? Not at the mercy of the Uber driver’s playlist.”

  “Let’s get on the road,” I said, trying to take the cell from him. “I can play DJ.”

  “Are you kidding? You’ll never lay a hand on my phone again after you dunk-tanked it last month. Thank Jobs for waterproof electronics.”

  I sat back in my seat as Ace of Base came through the speakers. It wasn’t unusual for Georgina to pop into my mind on the regular, but this time, she was deliciously naked in the shower, scrubbing shampoo in her auburn hair as she shimmied to “The Sign.”

  I looked over at Justin. “What the fuck?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve had this album stuck in my head ever since Georgina brought it up.”

  Bullshit. He just liked to torment me. I looked out the window. It’d been weeks since I’d walked away from the vet, but I still had Georgina stuck in my head. Not just visions of her showering, but also the way she’d hugged me tightly on the curb, taking solace in my neck as she’d sobbed. I’d thought it was all for Bruno, but as I played the night over and over in my head, I wondered if I’d had it wrong. Maybe she really had wanted that job but had known what my answer to Boston would be. Maybe she’d cried knowing she’d been trapped. That I wouldn’t be able to come with her and face my past to start a future.

  That I wasn’t able or wasn’t strong enough?

  I’d been asking myself that since I’d left. Why did Georgina think my inability to sell the house ran deeper than saying goodbye to my mom? What could possibly be deeper than that?

  We were still at the curb, Ace of Base on the stereo. The road opened ahead of us, Opal panted at my back, and the day was sunny if not wintry. Depressing, if you asked me. A perfect day was just a reminder that I wasn’t spending it with Georgina.

  Justin had stopped using his phone to watch me.

  “Well?” I raised my eyebrows. “What’s the hold up?”

  “It’s a good thing you took my advice and finally shaved. You were getting pretty scraggly. But I have to say, it didn’t really work. You still look miserable.”

  “Well, I am,” I said. “But what the fuck can I do about it? It’s going to take some time for me to get over Georgina if I ever do. Until then, I’m leaning into it.” Opal moved around in the backseat, then stuck her cold nose against my ear. I reached back to pet her. “Anyway, I miss the beard. It kept me warm.”

  Justin looked thoughtful as he peered out the windshield. I braced myself for whatever words of supposed wisdom he thought himself qualified to impart, but instead he just said, “You can’t pull off a beard. Sorry.”

  “If you don’t put the car in drive within the next five seconds, Opal and I are getting out.”

  “So you can go upstairs and wallow some more?” He shook his head. “Let me pose you a scenario.”

  Here we go. I sighed, wondering if Opal was swift enough to make a break for it with me, or if she’d hold me back.

  “Just because I rented a car for the Hamptons doesn’t mean we have to go there,” he said. “There somewhere else you’d rather spend the weekend?”

  “The gym. My couch with Opal. Satan’s asshole. Literally anywhere else.”

  Justin chuckled in his knowing way, and it told me all I needed to know. He had something up his sleeve. “Think, Quinn. We can go anywhere else within driving distance.”

  Ah. I got it. This wasn’t the first time he’d hinted at taking a trip. “We’re not going to Boston.”

  “Why not? I hear Massachusetts is lovely this time of year. Not to mention you might get your life back there.”

  A life I hadn’t even had a hold on before it’d slipped through my fingers. I’d refrained many times from calling up Georgina or driving out to see her new place. At first, I’d been too angry, but once that’d worn off, I’d stayed where I was because it wasn
’t fair to either of us. No matter how much I missed her, unless she was coming back or I was going there, what was the point of making things harder? I only knew she was in Boston at all since she and Justin had kept in touch.

  “I’m serious,” Justin said when I didn’t respond. “Why can’t we go? I know you’ve been thinking about it. You’re not pissed at her anymore—you understand why she had to go. And your sister told me you’ve been asking about the property.”

  “You talk to my sister?”

  “All the time, man. We’re in a virtual book club together.”

  “Fuck.” I closed my eyes and dropped the back of my head against the headrest. “You’re like the chick in that movie Single White Female.”

  “I know.” Justin unzipped his jacket and showed me his t-shirt, which read, I put the hot in psychotic.

  I rolled my eyes, trying not give him the satisfaction of a laugh.

  “I’m your best friend,” he said, all joking gone from his voice. “And as much as I want you in New York, I think Georgina’s right. I think Libby’s right. And I think you feel the same. You’ve put this off too long.” He raised the volume on the radio. “So unless you’re able to convince me a hundred percent that you’re not ready to go home, that’s where I’m taking you.”

  Home. Home was not an unkempt house that was probably in disarray. It wasn’t Massachusetts or even Eastie. It was Georgina. Bruno. Opal. The family I’d been too stubborn—and yeah, scared—to allow myself. “I’m not showing up on Georgina’s doorstep.”

  “We’re not going there for Georgina,” he said, opening the console. “We’re going to see the house.”

  “What about your party?”

  “Let’s say you owe me one Swiss girl.” Justin opened a map of the northeast and pointed to a circle he’d made, the sneaky bastard. I let my eyes wander over the familiar neighborhood in East Boston.

  Home.

  * * *

  Four hours, a couple Big Macs, and a stop for fuel and Dunkin’s later, Justin pulled up to the fence surrounding my mom’s house. From the passenger’s side window, I took in the small, two-story Colonial, less imposing than I remembered, even though I’d only been there last year. Despite dead grass and patches of dirt, a row of flowers wrapped along the little porch, and the front door had a fresh coat of brown paint. Libby and Aaron must’ve been keeping an eye on the place.

  I got out of the car and Opal followed, running over to sniff along the line of a rickety wood picket fence. As she lifted a leg, I checked the mailbox. Libby was getting the remnants of Mom’s mail, but there were a couple pieces of junk addressed to Adina Quintanilla. This was what remained. I took a deep breath, creasing a glossy card for window washing in my grip.

  “So this is it,” Justin said, coming around the car. He handed me my coat.

  I put it on, having forgotten the cold for a moment. “It’s not much,” I said, shoving the flyers in my pocket. “Two-bedroom, three if you count the curtain divider Libby installed when we were twelve.”

  Justin turned around. “Neighborhood looks like it’s changing.”

  Mom’s house was in better shape than I’d thought it’d be, but it was still one of the more rundown places on the block. A few had been renovated, others were dated but maintained, and some were up for sale. “It’s a good time to sell,” I said.

  “Libby left a key in a lockbox around back.” Justin opened the gate. “I’ll grab it.”

  Opal entered through the fence, looked back at me, and sat in the middle of the walkway. My gaze moved from her to the white, chipped-paint façade. The house needed work, no question. Libby and I could hire that out, but I knew the place inside out. Nobody else would give it the care and attention to detail I would.

  Was I up to the task?

  I finally had an updated résumé, and if I was honest, I was eager to use it. Things hadn’t been the same since Georgina had left, and although that was the point of her time at Modern Man, my discontent ran deeper. I no longer trusted Vance, but I’d also been questioning whether I was getting what I needed from the job. The answer? I wasn’t. Not since Mom’s death. And since I’d begun to realize that the New York City playboy role no longer fit me. But was it too late? Was I already that person?

  And if not, who did I want to be?

  As I looked up at the house, I forced the other questions to the front of my mind that I’d been mulling over lately.

  Where did I want to be?

  Who did I want to spend my days with?

  Opal barked as Justin came back around to the front yard. He’d gotten me here. That was the hard part. The nearly impossible part, I worried, was going inside. But if I wanted any shot at starting over—with Georgina—I had no choice but to confront what lay ahead.

  “Coming?” Justin asked, dangling the keys. He jiggled the lock before swinging the front door open.

  Opal waited as I walked up the path, then trotted ahead and right into the house. She wasn’t scared. Maybe, I thought as I entered, she even felt a welcoming presence there as she sniffed her way through the living room. The house was still, musty, and bone cold. I crossed my arms against the chill, my eyes roaming over hardwood floors that needed refinishing, pots without plants, and a staircase railing that looked dodgy at best.

  I’d been hit with so many memories over the last year, and I’d been here recently enough, that walking in didn’t feel strange or unnatural. Covered furniture remained. Libby wouldn’t sort through anything without me. It was the emptiness that struck me most of all. The only life in the room was Opal bounding between the kitchen, living room, and hallway.

  “It’s okay if you need to cry,” Justin said. “Stays between us.”

  A low laugh rumbled in my chest. “I’m good.”

  If I’d tried to do this last month, I wasn’t sure I could’ve handled it. But ever since Georgina had reopened the Boston wound—and not only poured salt in it but also questioned why it hurt so much—I’d been giving it a lot of thought. I’d been back on Google Earth and had even pushed myself to dust off a photo album of childhood pictures Mom had made of Libby and me a couple Christmases ago, before she’d told us about the cancer. It all stung, but in a way, the photos, memories, and four hours in the car to come to terms with where I was headed had all helped prepare my mental state for this.

  “It’s not in terrible shape,” Justin said, opening a closet of empty hangers. “I’ve watched a lot of HGTV, and you could probably knock out this renovation in no time at all. Maybe even do an addition.”

  I gave him a look. “First of all, if HGTV is your only reference point then you know basically nothing. Second, you’re such a girl.”

  “Are you kidding?” he asked, shutting the door. He checked the wiring of the TV I’d installed a few years ago. “Women fucking love HGTV. I don’t watch it for the programming—it’s my best pick-up line. ‘Hey, did you see that last episode of Property Brothers when the couple asked for an open floor plan?’”

  “Isn’t that every episode?” I asked.

  “Works like a charm.” He shrugged. “You’re welcome.”

  I walked through the white-tiled kitchen, Mom’s domain, although Libby was a good cook—I’d never be without first-class salsa verde, that was for sure. I smiled a little as I opened a few oak cabinets. It would be nice to live closer to Libs and the kids. Not here, but in the city. Fix up the house on the weekends maybe.

  I made my way around the backyard, upstairs to my old bedroom, and came to a stop outside the master.

  Justin followed but waited in the hallway. “We can get a hotel and come back tomorrow if it’s too much.”

  I was here. I wanted to get it over with. The sooner I endured the house, the closer I’d be to answers. Could I come back here, and if so, would Georgina have me? It’d only been a few weeks, but I’d let her down by retreating when she’d turned up the heat. Maybe she’d already met someone new. With Bruno, in the park, no doubt she got her fair share of att
ention.

  I shoved the thought away and opened the door. Four white walls, a worn beige carpet, and a door leading to the bathroom. Everything else had likely either been sold or moved into storage. Had I known, I might’ve railed at Libby for cleaning out the space without me, but standing here now, I was grateful. She wouldn’t trash anything of value, and what remained was bearable in that moment. It looked like any other room instead of the one in which my mother had taken her last breath.

  I inhaled deeply. I was here. I was facing it. Was this moving on?

  My last conversation with Georgina hadn’t left me.

  “It’s more than that, Sebastian. It’s deeper. I know it’s scary, but you can’t heal until you face it.”

  Was I healed?

  I returned to the hallway. Justin kept his distance, hanging onto Opal’s collar.

  “Now what?” I asked.

  He shrugged and made a face as if to say it was my call. “What do you need for closure? Want to sell the place as is? Fix it up? Go home and pretend we never came?”

  I sniffed and looked back into the bedroom. In a sense, I’d been pretending this place didn’t exist long enough. I’d treated it as a problem I’d get to one day when I had the strength. “I want Georgina, and she comes with Boston. So I need to be done with this.”

  “Then maybe it’s time to put it on the market.”

  Sell, sell, sell. That was what everyone kept telling me to do. The house wasn’t a home without Mom, Libs said. It didn’t serve any purpose but a painful reminder. Aaron would add that there was a profit to be made. But who was I without it?

  Without a mom?

  Who would stop me from turning into the persona I’d crafted for myself? This stupid, sagging pile of bricks and memories was the only thing keeping me tied to my upbringing, my family, my childhood. It was the only thing rooting me to this earth anymore.

  That was the deeper—the more that Georgina had spoken of. By letting go of the house, I wasn’t just admitting Mom was dead. I was scared it meant the good parts of myself were gone too. That I’d no longer be able to take off the mask—I would become it.