Page 41 of The Plus One
The tinge of remorse in his voice had Indira’s heart stretching tillit ached. Acting on instinct, she reached for Jude’s hand, giving it a gentle squeeze that sent ripples of golden warmth up her arm. “Stop. You don’t have to apologize. We were both little shitheads. I think it’s what made us… us. I like our past.”
Jude’s smile was hesitant but earnest. “You like that I’ve never been a particularly nice person?”
Indira snorted, chewing on her lip as she looked at him. “You might not necessarily be nice, but I’ve always known you were kind.”
Jude’s eyes were dark. Intense. Tracing across her face with a vibrant type of openness that made her pulse double.
Indira felt too much all at once, and she pulled her hand back, pretending to flip through more pages of her notebooks as she tried to cool the hot flush of her cheeks.
“God, those summers were always so fun,” Jude said after a few moments of heavy silence. “Exploring the woods. Our little ‘hikes.’ Climbing that big oak. Every summer we got a little higher.”
“You and Collin got higher,” Indira said, jumping at the safer conversation topic. “I stayed firmly on the ground. Humans weren’t meant to climb trees. It’s none of our business what’s going on up there and, quite frankly, it’s rude to the birds making their nests and trying to raise a family. You two were basically home invaders.”
“That’s a lot of words to say you were, and apparently still are, afraid of heights.”
Indira rolled her eyes. “Yeah, how weird that I don’t want to fall from high places and break every bone in my body.”
“I miss those summers.” His voice was soft from equal parts nostalgia and wonder as he looked back down at the notebook.
“I miss that house,” Indira said, trying to ignore the sudden and sharp prickling along her nose and eyes. While her dad had been decent enough to let her mom keep the house when he abandoned the family, Angela hadn’t been able to hold on to it, despite working two jobs to make ends meet.
“So many memories there.”
Indira remembered her bedroom, with its pink comforter andshaggy purple rug. She remembered running down the wooden steps to the kitchen every morning, the third from the bottom always squeaking in greeting. She remembered the small rectangle of stained glass above the front door, the afternoon sun casting a rainbow into their entryway, turning the dust motes into fairy sparkles Indira would conjure stories from.
“What other gems are you hiding in these?” Jude asked, gingerly picking a different journal.
“The inner workings of a highly profound and complicated teenage girl, I’m sure,” Indira said with a haughty sniff. She grabbed a black velvet notebook, one she recognized from her moody high school years, and flipped to a random page and began reading out loud. “Math isn’t real and its textbooks are consumerist propaganda. Nobody needs sixty-two watermelons…see, told you these books were full of genius.”
Jude chuckled.
She flipped to another page. This one had a green sticky note taped to the inside. Indira was surprised to see Jude’s messy handwriting scribbled across it.
Movie wasn’t half bad. Might let you pick more often. Your singing is the worst though.
P.s. I thought you looked nice in your dress.
Now there was a memory that transported her right back to the moment.
Indira had been a gangly teen with a mouth full of braces going to homecoming for the first time. She’d gone with a group of somewhat popular girls after Tamar, the queen bee of the group, had recently acknowledged Indira’s existence.
Tamar had been so nice to Indira the few weeks leading up to homecoming, even advising her on how to text Matt, the boy Indira would have put money on that she would fall in love with and marryand have lots of kids with and never get divorced and live happily ever after. In retrospect, the texting “advice” was more like Tamar instructing Indira to bombard disinterested Matt with endless questions.
At the dance, instead of Tamar setting Indira up with Matt like she’d promised, she’d told Indira that her dress was pretty but would be more flattering if she actually had boobs to fill it out, then proceeded to dry hump Matt on the dance floor, making out with him while Indira watched in horror. She remembered how that night was the first time she and Lizzie ever talked, Lizzie calling Tamar an asshole and solidifying what was to become their decades-long friendship.
“I had tobegyou to drive me home,” Indira said, remembering the instant onslaught of tears as she ran around the gym looking for Collin and Jude, her legs wobbly and unstable like a baby giraffe’s as she navigated emotions and high heels.
Jude’s mouth was tense again. “We were kind of assholes about it.”
Indira waved him off. “You were horny teenage boys with dates and plans… You two werenotsubtle about your intentions for how the night would end.”
Jude let out a surprised bark of a laugh.
“I can’t say your reluctance to drive me home was misplaced.”
Jude glanced at Indira, his look hesitant. Gentle. Indira smiled, and his muscles relaxed a fraction.
Collin had begged and bribed until Jude finally agreed to drive Indira back to the Papadakises’ apartment. The car ride had been tense, Indira quietly crying, Jude giving her the courtesy of pretending not to hear, waves of annoyance radiating off his shoulders.
