Page 21 of Finders Keepers
Quentin is about to take a drink but freezes with the mug an inch away from his lips. “Are you…joking?”
“I am not. Last I heard, she’s a member of a traveling troupe called Clowns for Christ.”
“Didn’t have that on my bingo card, I’m going to be honest.” His brow crinkles. “I can kind of see it, though.”
“Anyway, four others went to state schools on sports scholarships. Which leaves four that left for academics—including me.”
“You know that there are really good universities in Maryland too, right?” he asks before finally taking his postponed sip.
“Yes. That isn’t the point. The point is that leaving here is the exception to the rule. Leaving makes a statement—that you are going off to do things you can’t accomplish here. Except now everything I accomplished has suddenly disappeared. I’m not much better off than I would have been had I never left. It’s likehaving to come crawling back to someone you publicly announced you didn’t need.”
Quentin frowns. “Without discounting your feelings, is it possible you’re overthinking this?”
“Of course I am. I have an anxiety disorder.”
“What?”
I suppose this would’ve come up sooner or later. I just didn’t think it would come up rightnow. Whatever. If he can’t understand, then he can go join Jon Bon Jovi in fucking himself.
“I started dealing with some mental health stuff after you left. Depression, anxiety. It was pretty bad the last half of high school.”
I pause, waiting for him to joke about how it must have had to do with his no longer being around. But he surprises me by asking, “Because of Dave’s accident?” Considering it happened a few weeks after he moved away, I wasn’t aware that Quentin even knew about that. As if reading the thoughts on my face, he adds, “Your mom told me about it when I first got back to town.”
I nod slowly.
“I don’t think there was any one cause, but I’m sure that didn’t do anything to help,” I explain. “Things were hard. I felt…crushed. Trapped beneath an avalanche of sadness and worry. And no one…no one really noticed. Because my parents were so busy dealing with my dad’s stuff, and I put up a good front.”And because you weren’t here to see through it.“Eventually I figured out that, with a lot of things feeling so out of my control, I could focus on stuff I did have some control over. Like my schoolwork, my extracurriculars. By the time I left here, I had a feeling I was going to be a success. I didn’t know what that would look like, but I justknewthere would be something good at the end of it all for me. And now I am…this.” I spread my hands.
“A salad?”
“A loser,” I correct.
He frowns more deeply. I can tell he’s about to argue or dismiss what I’m saying as a bunch of self-absorbed rambling. And it probably is. “Even if no one truly cares about what became of me,” I say, “even iftheydidn’t have any expectations, I had a ton of them. And the funny thing is, I was actually a bit proud of my life until a few days ago.”
“Nina…”
He reaches for my hand and I subtly move it away by using my finger to wipe away a tear caught at the corner of my eye. “I know. This is something to discuss with my therapist, not you.” (Not that I can even see my therapist anymore, now that I’m out of state and no longer have health insurance.) “Forget it. Let’s move on. Should we talk about the treasure hunt?”
“Thanks,” he says to the woman who places his food in front of him and swipes the number from the table. Then to me he says, “Nope.”
“Nope?”
“Not here.”
“Not here?”
He picks up his sandwich. “Is this a new game where you repeat everything I say but add a question mark at the end?” Quentin takes a bite, and I resent how my eyes are drawn toward his mouth even when it’s doing something as basic as eating. His teenage braces did their job; his teeth are straight and even. Those light pink lips that were a bit too wide on his youthful face are now perfectly sized (for what, other than consuming a BLTA, I refuse to acknowledge). After he swallows, he says, “You know we don’t talk about the”—he mouths the word “treasure” before continuing at his previous volume—“in public. In fact, if I remember correctly, that wasyourrule.”
“Then why did you suggest lunch?” I ask.
“Because I was hungry and I figured you might be too.” He takes a bite out of his sandwich’s accompanying pickle spear. “Is it really that awful to spend time with me?”
“No comment.”
He shifts his jaw back and forth subtly. “Look, after this we’ll go to Sprangbur, start getting our bearings again.”
The idea of returning to Fountain’s estate with Quentin makes my stomach drop. I can’t tell if it’s guilt, anxiety, or excitement. But it forces me to put my fork down, my intended next bite still speared onto its prongs. “You can’t expect me to spend all day, every day roaming around with you for the next eight weeks. I have other things to do, you know.”
“Do you?”
