Page 8 of College Town

Tommy presses his lips tight together, a flat line, and his chin lifts a fraction. His face is so much older, and more masculine, but Lawson would know that expression anywhere; first glimpsed it the day he stuck his hand through the air toward the new kid and invited him to lunch. “It’s you,” he says, surer now, more composed. Lawson instantly misses that breathy little utterance of his name, like maybe the sight of him punched Tommy in the gut. “Shit.”

Lawson’s knuckles ache; he’s got a death grip on either side of the register that he doesn’t remember taking. It takes three tries, but he finally draws in a shaky breath at the same moment he realizes he can’t do this. He’s broken out into a full-body sweat, and his heart is racing, and hecan’t do this.

“Welcome to Coffee Town,” he starts, and Tommy’s brows fly upward, face blanking with surprise. “What can I get for you today?”

Lawson’s proud of the way his voice doesn’t shake, though the rest of him does.

“We’re having a special today on apple cinnamon–”

“Lawson.”

“–muffins, fresh-baked here in house. You can get a half-dozen for–”

“Lawson.”

By some miracle – maybe God doesn’t hate Lawson Granger the way he’s always thought – Jessica materializes at his elbow. “Okay, do you need me to–”

“Yes,” he says, and nearly mows her down in his haste to get away.

“Lawson!” Tommy says behind him, sharp, bordering on angry.

But ten minutes later, when Lawson emerges from the kitchen, Tommy is gone.

5

People talk about “arrested development” in therapy terms: like it’s something uncommon that only happens to certain people. People who maybe lack the emotional fortitude to grow up properly. It’s for overgrown children, and not real adults.

But I think it happens to everyone. At least in part. I think there are parts of all of us that fix somewhere in the past, and never move on.

~*~

He makes it through the rest of his shift, then sends an S.O.S text to Dana.

U grab wine, I’ll order pizza, she texts back right away. Then, a beat later:Do u need us to come help w/ your dad first?

His eyes and his throat burn as he stares at his phone screen in the coffeeshop parking lot. She’s too good to him.No, he texts back.Nancy’s on shift tonight.

Roger that.

He swings by his favorite liquor store – spares a momentary thought for the sad state of having a favorite liquor store in a college town full of them, and of being on a first-name basis with Gary who works the till – grabs four bottes, two white, two red, and drives on to Dana’s.

He still thinks of her house as her “new place,” though she moved in over a year ago. When she first started her firm, she lived in a swanky condo in a new-build subdivision populated by other young professionals. She’d been engaged to Zach, then, who they now both exclusively refer to as The Asshole, capital T, capital A. Lawson doesn’t know why she ever agreed to marry him, though he suspects his abs, and pecs, and biceps may have blinded her – he doesn’t really blame her. Zach had been a personal trainer, and a hot one at that. But when Dana found him in bed with her hairdresser, she dropped his ass.

She kept the condo until she met, and had then been dating Leo for a year.

Lawson likes Leo. He’s Zach’s polar opposite. Lawson can’t confirm or deny the presence of abs beneath his soft sweaters, but that doesn’t matter when he makes Dana so quietly happy. He’s a professor, with the rimless spectacles, rumpled chinos, elbow-patch sweaters and soft-spoken voice to go with the title. Dana’s new place is a cozy bungalow in an established neighborhood not far from the school, the sort with huge, ancient trees, and shaded back gardens, and quaint little front gates. Being inside it always sparks Lawson’s creativity, and has him itching for his laptop.

Walking the familiar aisles of Discount Package, whose unfortunate name will nevernotleave him snickering, his panic subsides to a low, manageable buzz, all the shiny bottles and their promise of oblivion soothing. But by the time he turns up Dana’s driveway, his pulse is hammering hot and forceful in his belly again.

Leo answers the door, still dressed for work, collar of his plaid shirt folded neatly over the collar of his tan sweater. He has so much hair, dark and floppy and soft, a contrast to the sharp angles of his glasses. Adorable.

“Hey, Law.” His smile is a subtle thing, but no less warm for its smallness. “Rough day?”

“Weird day,” Lawson replies with a sigh he can’t check. He hands over one of the clinking totes of wine when Leo reaches for it. “You ever come face-to-face with the unrequited love of your life from childhood in the shitty coffeeshop where you still work at age thirty-seven?”

“Can’t say that I have, no.”

“I don’t recommend it.”

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