It’s fine, I mouth.
She shakes her head, waving for me to go to her. She whispers in Rebecca’s ear, and Rebecca looks over her shoulder at me and nods, smiling gently, andno. Oh no. I am not letting my best friend kissmeon her first New Year’s Eve with her girlfriend.
I may not like New Year’s, but this isBea’snight. She starts to plan her outfit in October. She orders sparkly headbands and those awkward year sunglasses in bulk.
Maybe it’s the fact that my parents haven’t renovated it since I was in the third grade, but standing in this kitchen—with its old wood panel cupboards and knob handles, with a refrigerator that still features photos of me with braces—staring across the room at Bea feels like déjà vu.
This high school rager isn’t nostalgia. It’s a shackle. We’ve all graduated university, most of us have even completed graduate degrees. Finn somehow made it through law school.
I am not clinging to another one of our silly traditions.
No, I mouth more forcefully, shake my head strong enough that my short wavy hair gets in my eyes.
“But you have no one to kiss!” my very best, very loud, friend says. She doesn’t mean to announce it to the room; she’s just not capable of volume control.
“No. It’s fine.” I hold my hands out to our group as they turn toward me. “I’m fine.”
For reasons I cannot—and refuse to—fully understand, I find him in the crowd again. He leans against the counter, his hands tucked behind him. He doesn’t look at me and another surge ofirrational anger spikes my blood pressure because excuse you Finn Collins, how dare you lookembarrassedformewhen you have no one to kiss either.
Bea must follow my gaze, because she says, “Finn!” like an Ancient Greek mathematician might sayeureka!or one of my speech therapy patients might saytruck. Like he is a great new discovery, the long-sought answer to a most pressing question.
“No,” we say at the same time. I read the word on his lips. The absolute horror on his face at the mere thought of kissing me—rude!—shouldn’t hurt since I feel that same horror.
And yet.
Bea huffs as someone shouts that we have thirty seconds left. She leaves the circle of Rebecca’s arms to grabs Finn’s wrist and march him across the room, pushing people out of the way. She is small; for most of high school she hadThough she be but little, she is fiercefromA Midsummer Night’s Dreamin her Instagram bio. She changed it in university; “A bit on the nose,” she’d said, but it’s still true. Still, I don’t need Finn’s height to track her progress through the crowd. I can barely make out the top of her head, but she manages to part the sea of people like her favorite Hebrew prophetandkeep her grip on Finn’s wrist despite his obvious feet-dragging.
“You’re always talking about new beginnings, Eleanor,” she says primly. Her cheeks are flushed, and the exposed skin of her collarbone is patchy and red, a sure sign she will remember none of this tomorrow. “So,begin”—she shoves Finn toward me—“to forgive Finn for whatever it is you decided to hate him for in the sixth grade.” Before she leaves she also pushes a mug of room temperature liquid at me, cheap champagne sloshing onto my hand.
“We don’t have to,” he says the second she turns her back.
“Ten seconds,” she shouts.
“I know we don’t.”
“Nine.”
“I like new beginnings, too,” he says quietly, quickly.
“Eight.”
I frown. “Are you making fun of me?”
“Seven.”
He shakes his head, bewildered. “What?No. I’m just…” He throws up his hands. “Trying to be nice.”
“Six.”
“You’re never nice.”
Except the moment the words leave my lips, I don’t know why I said them at all. They’re not true. Not really.
Finn is notnotnice. He’s just…Finn. He thinks he’s smarter than me and sometimes it feels like it might actually be true. He’s charming and I don’t trust charming people. He gives his opinion far too freely, which is fine in practice, but I just so happen to also give my opinion freely and why does his always have to be the opposite of mine? He’ll argue with me about the superiority ofPride and Prejudice(1995) overPride and Prejudice(2005)—laughable—until everyone else gets bored and leaves the restaurant without us and then we have to share a sullen, sulking cab ride home. He argues that there could possibly be a better ball player than my favorite ball player—categorically absurd—and tries to call my obvious facts “opinions” when I tell him he is wrong.
“Five.”
He snorts. “You’renot nice.”
