Page 57 of The Now in Forever
Down the street, there’s a Plaid Pantry. I get Anh a club soda, Saltines, her favorite peanut M&M’s, and two kombuchas—ginger for her, spirulina for me. Looking at the fashion magazines, I’m trying to decide which to pick, when Ed pops up from the other side of the aisle wearing ridiculous pink rhinestone heart-shaped glasses.
“Are they me?”
The pink actually looks good with his mussed-up hair and dark stubble. “I think you might need them for your next author photo.”
He laughs, pushing them up on his head like a headband. “My publisher wouldlovethat.”
His smile vanishes, and he wanders off.
We head back to the hotel and split up when we get to our rooms. Anh is asleep, the television still on the reality TV that was playing when I left. I take my kombucha, the breakfast bar I bought, and my notebook and head to the balcony. It’s a gorgeous clear morning, not a cloud in the light-blue sky.
I check my email and find an interview request for the middle school position in New Haven. After a few clicks, I select one for first thing Tuesday morning after the holiday. I never pictured myself living there full-time, but it would be nice to be close to Grandma.
Setting my phone down, I open my journal and make a quick to-do list, update my calendar, and then tuck into my story. It’s a trickyscene; my protagonist finds out the man in the book can’t leave the bookstore.
“What are you writing?”
Anh startles me. I didn’t even hear the sliding glass door open. Her hair is wet, her face clean, and she looks a little less green than when I saw her last.
“It’s nothing.”
She sits in the chair and cracks open her club soda. “So…”
I put down my notebook. “So?”
“Where were you last night?”
So, she hadn’t been asleep the whole time. I smile, unable not to. “I was with Ed.”
She swats at me. “I knew it! Details. I need all the gross hetero-normative details.”
I laugh. “You know what’s really crazy about the whole thing? Do you remember when I told you about that guy I worked at the bookstore with for one day?”
Anh nods. “The perfect day.”
“That’s the one.” I take a sip of kombucha, biding my time and trying to decide if I should tell her. I swallow and go for it. “It’s him.”
Anh freezes mid swig. She coughs, sputtering on the soda. I pat her back. “Are you okay?”
She slowly gets ahold of her cough. “It’s him, like actually him? I thought you were going to say he reminded you of that guy. But he isthat guy? Fromthat day?”
“Yep.”
I tell her about our night but don’t go into excessive detail. I know she’s hurting, and I don’t want to rub my happiness in her face.
Anh sits back in her chair. “That’s nuts.”
“It really is.”
Standing, she puts a hand to her head. “Be careful. He broke your heart once already. Don’t let him do it again.”
I’m about to defend Ed, to explain that he was with his mom that day in December, but I don’t. Part of me knows she’s right. He could very well destroy me again. Anh heads back inside. I open mynotebook again and lose myself in my story, where the only people getting hurt are fictional and it’s all my doing.
I’m not sure how long I sit there before there is a small knock on the sliding glass. I turn to see Ed’s face smashed against the slider, his arms spread out wide.
He opens the door. “Want to go see a movie?”
“Sure.”
