Page 37 of Puppy Love

“I just went through a divorce,” I explain, my voice slightly shaking when the word comes out. Not shaking in an emotional way. Shaking in a foreign way. I think I made it through the entire thing without ever actually saying the word out loud. “We were high school sweethearts, so she was the only person I had been with in…” I let out a short laugh. “Almost ever, really. And that night, with you, that was the first time I ever tried to...” I sigh. “Well that was the first time I tried to have a one-night stand. I knew I wanted it. I knew I’d like it. But I had never done it before. Was it anything like that?”

My pulse quickens, the beat of my heart rapping against the inside of my ribcage. I take a slow breath in through my nose, trying hard to remain subtle. I haven’t told anyone that before, and even though it really doesn’t matter, in this fleeting moment, I suddenly feel like it does. My mouth begins to dry as I look down at Cam, scanning her face for a reaction. My eyes find her soft, pink lips, the corners of them tugging up so sweetly I feel like I’m in a candy store.

“Yes, actually,” she says, a hint of surprise in her tone. “That’s exactly what it’s like.”

thirteen

Frozen Egg Rolls

Cam

Iwas three minutes late to last week’s Criminal Dinner, thanks to Violet. I haven’t been late in over a year. So here I am, forty minutes before seven, gripping a bag of frozen egg rolls.

“You’re early,” Adrian says, throwing their arms around me. Irritated by the snow’s existence, I brush it off my shoes before stepping inside. “Hayden’s here too.”

If I were a therapist, I think I’d diagnose the Pacific Northwest with whatever the opposite is of Adjustment Disorder. One day, the seats of your car are scalding your bare thighs as you sit down. The next, you’re practically in Antarctica.

“How was work?” Hayden asks. Images of Violet flash through my mind, those pierced lips, her luminescent eyes. That bare spot on her forearm. The past week has been a blur of internal screaming, as I try to look at Violet like she’s my boss, and not the person who made me uncontrollably scream her name in a closet. It’s hard enough to do that on its own, but on top of it, I have to act like I never want it to happen again. And I have nobody to talk to about it.

Except Dr. Burton, of course.

“What did Violet say?” Adrian asks, their eyes widening. My body tenses at her name.

“What?”

“About Kira’s tooth?”

“Oh! Right.” I swallow. Kira is a corgi who decided out of nowhere to attack the high-speed Dremel in my hands, consequently chipping a tooth. “Her mom was cool about it.”

I don’t want to be talking to Adrian about Kira’s tooth. More than anything, I want to tell my best friend about Violet. About Monsey’s, about the storage closet. About how good it was and how bad I want it again. But Adrian has a track record of losing things. And by that, I mean not keeping things they’re supposed to, like secrets.

They don’t mean to blab, they really don’t.

Adrian would never hurt someone on purpose, especially not someone they care so deeply for. But, as I discussed with Dr. Burton, the entire world finding out about that night falls directly into The Realm if I were to tell Adrian.

I hold up the plastic grocery bag.

“I cheated this time. Store-bought egg rolls.”

“Thank god,” Avery mutters. Hayden nods, but then quickly stops when he sees that I’m looking at him.

“I’m sure they would’ve been great,” he lies. “If you made them.”

I roll my eyes and walk into the kitchen to preheat the oven.

“So I’ve been thinking,” Adrian says, opening the box of egg rolls. They start lining the rolls up on the pan in neat rows. “It’s been a few weeks since you tried the A.D.D. plan. I know it didn’t end how you wanted it to last time, but I figured maybe, if we went with you, you could have some moral support until you don’t need us.”

“No.”

The word leaves my mouth so quickly, it takes me a moment to realize I’m the one that said it. The truth is, I have thought about the A.D.D. plan. I have thought about trying again. I just hadn’t decided I was going to go through with it until last week, when Violet joked about seeing me again. She laughed it off, and I did too. But as the words repeated in my head throughout the week, I realized that maybe it wasn’t a bad idea.

I’m not usually one to break rules. I might be the only person in existence who actually sees speed signs as a limit and not a minimum. And hooking up with Violet? Well that broke all sorts of rules. Not just Angela’s “no fucking” rule, but it broke the A.D.D. criteria.

The attraction is still there, no matter how insufferable Violet can be. But the difference now is that while I have a deal breaker, her being my boss, I no longer have distance. In fact, Violet and I see one another every day.

And still, I can’t get the idea off my mind. We both want something, something we can give each other, so I learned the other day. I don’t want to have to go back to Monsey’s. I don’t want to go through the stress and anxiety of finding someone who meets all of Adrian and Hayden’s criteria every time I’m ready to try something new.

Violet is already there. She knows what I need, and though she’s almost as annoying as Avery, she does know what she’s doing. So, I made a list.

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