Page 90 of Take It Till You Make It
I frown. “How do you know my favorites?”
“Your mom is a devilish co-conspirator.” Crispin stops, a smirk on his lips. He gives a significant look toward the buffet we’re standing beside, and I look down to see a display of pictures of me scrolling through a digital picture frame.
The picture changes from one of me a couple years ago, dressed as an angsty Elizabeth Bennett for a Pride and Prejudice skit Dad and I did, to a picture of six-year-old me holding a mostly empty ice cream cone, a smear of ice cream runs down my shirt, and I’m bawling.
“Nice.” At first, I screw up my expression that Mom apparently sharedallthe pictures, but then I laugh. I’ve got nothing to hide except maybe a few bad haircuts. The next photo is from immediately after that event. Dad holds me in his arms, and I’m laughing because he just smeared his own ice cream cone down his own shirt so I wouldn’t feel alone. A rush of happy emotions floods me over the memory, and I laugh again. Mom did good.
Crispin’s arm sneaks around my back, his hand wraps my waist, and we continue toward the kitchen. “I wish I’d known him.”
I grin. “I wish you had too.” I don’t mention that if Dad were still alive, I’d never have taken the part of Stella, and that we’d likely never have met. Because it’s enough to imagine a life where Dad and Crispin could conspire against Mom and me one practical joke at a time.
Chapter Thirty-Five
“I seeyou finally took my advice and attacked Crispin with your mouth.” Glory says as she climbs into bed with me.
I let my head hit the wall I’m leaning on. “And now I’m obsessed. It’s literally all I want to do. Twenty-four/seven. Three six five.”
“Guh. You are so lucky.”
I shake my head and stare up at my ceiling. “I feel like I’m in the longest, strangest dream ever. I keep thinking I’ll wake up.”
“He’s incredibly kind. I mean, obviously. He flew me out here to surprise you because he said you missed me so much and he hated to see you sad.”
I arch my brows. “That’s what he said?”
Glory nods. “He was just going to fly me out for the heck of it. I’m the one who told him to make it a birthday party.”
“Oh my gosh, it seemed so random when he offered to have a party for me. That’s why.” I shake my head and laugh humorlessly. “I can’t believe I thought he was a conceited jerk when I first met him. He’s one of the most thoughtful and generous people I’ve ever met. How did I not see that?”
Glory shrugs, eyeing her bowl of cake and ice cream to find the perfect next scoop. I arranged for the caterers to donate the exorbitant amount of leftovers to a homeless shelter, but I kept the cake and ice cream. “He’s an actor. He was putting on a persona.”
I think about it and recognize the truth in Glory’s statement. “It’s strange how lonely and sociable he is.”
She eyes me. “What do you mean?”
“He’s had to guard his heart because of all the people who have taken advantage of him over the years, so he doesn’t have a lot of close friends. But he makes friends with absolutely everybody. He’s still friends with a restaurant owner who catered a movie he did when he was fifteen.”
“A restaurant owner. You mean, like an adult?”
“Yeah. He says he’s always been surrounded by adults and that it’s easier now that he is one himself.”
“That’s kind of sad.” Glory pokes her spoon into her bowl as she thinks about it.
“Yet, he’s always had one hundred percent support from his family. So, that’s like a safety net of sorts. It has to be why he’s remained so kind and thoughtful.”
Glory puts her bowl aside and grabs my hand. “I’m sorry you lost that safety net.”
I wrap my other hand over hers so she can feel what a lifeline she’s been for me. “Of course, I am too. But, I can’t say that this past year hasn’t taught me some huge lessons I wouldn’t have learned otherwise. And I’ve been exposed to so many new experiences. And now I’m dating Crispin Moore.” I smile at my friend. “For a sucky year, it wasn’t all bad.”
“You’re so strong, Ari. Incredibly strong.”
“I don’t feel strong. I feel…I felt lost.” I pick at the comforter, while images from the last year, the first time I had to back up the trailer and couldn’t figure out which direction to turn the steering wheel, collection notices for bills from back home that I hadn’t even known to pay that eventually caught up to us, and Mom curled up in her dark room twenty-four hours a day. “I just kept going because I knew if I stopped, it would all crash into me. But I didn’t know what I was doing. I wasn’t being strong at all. I was barely treading water. And on the set! When I delivered those stupid, corny lines they originally wrote for me, I thought, ‘I left everything behind for this?’”
Glory grabs my hand and lays her head on my shoulder. “But that is being strong, Ari. That’s surviving. You could’ve crawled into bed with your mom and waited for the bank to collect the house. I don’t think anyone would have been surprised if you just did nothing. Hung out at home, attended school to get your diploma, and then flipped burgers for a living. Your life was upended, and there’s no script on how to handle it.”
I raise an eyebrow. “I’m pretty sure there are plenty of scripts focusing on a person recovering from grief.”
She slaps my thigh, covered with the thick quilt. “Fine, there’s no manual then. There’s no timeline on grief or recovery.”
