Page 75 of Best Year Ever

“What happens when you get tired of me?” she asks.

There are thoughts that come out of nowhere, and then there’s this.

How do I answer a question like that? I don’t want to pretend it’s impossible, but it feels like it’s definitely impossible. “I don’t know. It has never happened yet.”

She makes a sad-sounding laugh, mostly just a catch in her throat. “And what happens when I get tired of you?”

“Are you? Tired of me, I mean?”

“Not yet. But what if it happens?”

She’s not playing. Her voice doesn’t sound like her teasing voice at all.

Am I supposed to say that I’ll spend my whole life making it easy for her to love me? It seems a little early in our relationship (if we even have a relationship) to say something like that.

We sit in the quiet for a long time. I think about Sage, about her radiant joy and her fears. About her laughter. About her incredible medical knowledge, all taken from the internet and almost all unhelpful. About her blue eyes, the freckles across her nose. About those unbelievable red curls. About her strong fingers. About the way she looks up at me with her chin tilted a little to the side. Her ease. Her fearlessness. And I realize she’s not fearless at all. She plays brave, but she craves the security of reassurance.

I can give her that.

“Sage?” I say. “You still there?”

This exhale sounds a little more like a laugh. “It’d be pretty awful of me to get up and go, just walk away and leave you on my porch.”

“I mean, I’d rather you didn’t.”

“Okay. I won’t walk away without saying anything.”

I don’t think we’re talking about this doorstep moment anymore.

I lean closer to the door. “I won’t either. And if you need space, I’ll give you space.”

Her words come out so quietly I almost wonder if I hear her. “I don’t want you to give me any space.”

“What do you want me to give you?” I ask. I feel an immediate rush of panic. I should not have said that. I didn’t mean to turn this into athing. What did I just do? I can’t believe I just set up the moment to define the relationship before I’ve even kissed her.

But she doesn’t sound panicked. She answers simply.

“Three things,” she says.

I wait.

“First, I need twelve hours. I have some things to consider and some decisions to make.”

She shifts on the other side of the door, and I wonder if the insulation on these apartments is really bad or if we’re just exceptional at holding conversations through walls.

“Second, please say you’ll still come with me to this Theodore Halverson concert. It’s recently become a little more important.”

“Of course,” I say. “Totally planning on it. I can’t wait.”

There’s another long pause. It feels like forever. Maybe because my legs are falling asleep. Maybe because kids are walking past to head toward their dorms. Maybe because it’s forever.

“What’s the third thing?” I ask.

She stays quiet long enough for me to second- and third-guess any chance I have of providing what she needs. Too many terrible possibilities run through my head. I try to bat them all away, but they keep circling—all the things she might want from me that I can’t necessarily promise her. There are so many possibilities. She was raised with so much privilege, and maybe she needs to know that she’ll always have what she’s always had. All of it.

There are so many ways I might disappoint her, and they’re all crowding into my brain. For the first time, I understand what it must feel like for her to worry about every illness, every injury, every possible negative medical outcome.

Is this what it’s like in Sage’s mind all the time? Because it’s exhausting.

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