She frowned, humming, and shook her head. “I need some more information about your intentions.”
Most days I pretended Tiel was better off without me, that she was happier and moving on with her life. That was the only way I could survive the distance we put between each other. I’d wanted to call so many times and tell her I missed her, I loved her, I needed her . . . but I wasn’t ready until now. I couldn’t give her the broken version of me again. I had to be whole first.
She hadn’t called either, and every time I touched base with Riley, I scanned my texts, emails, and voicemails for any sign from her. I hadn’t considered that she might not be ready for me.
“Is she all right? Where is she?”
“Here’s the deal. Tiel’s the nice one in this apartment. I’m the bulldog.” She nodded emphatically. “You showing up here all impatient and lumberjacked is wonderful, but that doesn’t address my issue with you falling off the face of the planet.”
In that instant, I loved Ellie. As far as I knew, she was the only person who consistently protected Tiel, and even though she was aiming that bulldog bark at me, I appreciated it.
“I love her and I need her, and the only way I’m leaving is with a restraining order, Ellie, and my sister is an excellent attorney, so I doubt that will happen. I’m here to stay.”
“All right. Let’s talk.”
I GAZED AT the committee, quaking minutely where I stood. They paged through my dissertation, murmuring and jotting notes, and I continued knotting and unknotting my fingers. My knuckles hurt—hell,everythinghurt. If I wasn’t writing, I was practicing, and it didn’t matter how exhausted or sore I was because I had to keep going.
I’d fallen apart once. That was enough.
They asked questions and offered blank stares while I spoke, and when I was convinced they were going to haul out a giant ‘idiot’ stamp and slap it on every page of my research, the Dean said, “The committee agrees your work merits approval.”
I smiled through a round of congratulations and discussion of my future plans. There were offers to join a residency program at Boston Children’s Hospital, a research fellowship at McLean Hospital, a clinical position at a school specializing in the autism spectrum, but I couldn’t do anything with that information right now. Forcing a smile, I promised to take it all into consideration, and then I got the fuck out of there.
“Are you having fun?” Ellie asked.
She was altogether too eager for me right now. Sure, I should be thrilled that my work wasn’t tossed in the shredder and I wasn’t laughed out of the building, but it hardly mattered. It was one dissertation with some overly ambitious correlations based upon a narrow sample set. I wasn’t proposing actionable solutions for peace in the Middle East.
But Ellie had been determined to get me out of the house, and I was starting to think she was trying to get me some action, too. She’d insisted on visiting this new bar in the South End, and though it was a strange choice for us, I didn’t have the energy to disagree.
I was okay, sort of.
I managed to pull together a dissertation in two months and added forty-six tracks to my YouTube channel. It was all part of a strategic initiative aimed at keeping me from crying in bed, on the sofa, or anywhere else that reminded me of Sam, and it was only partially successful.
My musical tastes were a blend of depressed teenage girl and eclectic hipster. My recent playlist walked a convoluted course from dark and moody to angry to melancholy to emo-angsty, and my subscribers were hungry for something happy but I didn’t have it in me. Not yet.
I was all U2 (‘One’), The Rolling Stones (‘Paint It Black’), Arctic Monkeys (‘Do I Wanna Know?’), Dashboard Confessional (‘Vindicated’), Muse (‘Madness’), No Doubt (‘Ex-Girlfriend’), REO Speedwagon (‘Take It On the Run’), The Shins (‘Caring is Creepy’), AFI (‘Love Like Winter’), The Doors (‘Riders on the Storm’), My Chemical Romance (‘Famous Last Words’), Joseph Arthur (‘Honey and the Moon’), Tegan and Sara (‘Where Does the Good Go?’), and Taylor Swift (‘Style,’ ‘Blank Space,’ ‘I Knew You Were Trouble,’ and basically everything else she’d ever recorded).
“Your enthusiasm is a little high for me,” I said, propping my elbows on the table. “I’d really appreciate it if we can admire my so-called accomplishments with a hot bath. Or better yet, a nap.”
“I love how you suffer for your art,” she said. “It’s a nice throwback to the nineties.”
“Seriously, Ell,” I said, leaning down to suck my drink through the straw. “I’m not in the mood. I’m tired. I haven’t slept since the vernal equinox and if you tapped my blood, it would be sixty percent cappuccino, and I want to sleep right now. I don’t understand why I have to party tonight.”
Ellie eyed me from across the booth. “You got a doctorate today. Be happy.”
“I will, as soon as I recover.”
“That’s a little fatalistic,” she murmured. She was focused on her phone, and didn’t look up. It was odd—wonderful, but odd—having her back in the apartment again. She’d spent one weekend with me before flying back to the tour, and now she was only home for another two weeks before the European leg kicked off. I was trying to enjoy my time with her but very obviously failing.
I scanned the bar while she texted, estimating how much longer we’d have to stay. It wasn’t even nine at night, but now that I’d successfully defended and spent four hours in the studio, I wanted to crawl into Sam’s clothes—the ones that had lost his scent when I washed them—and sleep for days.
What I wouldn’t do to go back in time. Do it all over again, and do it right. Say all the things I wanted to say, let myself experience big, scary feelings and deal with them like an adult, and then give him as much as he gave me.
Then I heard it. ‘Anna Sun.’
One song about never wanting to grow up. That was all it took. One song and a thousand memories swirled around me, pulling me into the quicksand. I’d avoided that Walk the Moon tune and so many others attached to Sam. All the memories I’d worked so hard to manage were right there, howling for my attention and clogging my throat with tears.
“Are those tears of joy? As in, ‘I’m no one’s research bitch anymore’ tears?” Ellie peered at me.
