I’m high on Connor Lockwood.
42
Lennon
“WhatdoyoumeanI agreed to it weeks ago?” I wail.
He smiles beatifically. “I said, let’s check out my dad’s store, are you in or out? And you said,I’m in. Remember?”
I remember agreeing to something, and not knowing what it was. That’s what I remember. And even the memory of that is foggy. It was before anything happened between us, and it feels like a different lifetime.
Still, that Lennon and this Lennon have one thing in common, and that’s that we don’t love meeting the parents of people we’re getting naked with.
“It’ll be the best,” he continues, entirely undeterred by my lukewarm enthusiasm. “I’ll show you all my favorite things in the store, and you can meet my dad.”
“I can’t tell if you’re trying to scare the crap out of me or sell me on the idea.”
“I’m selling the idea,” he says, leaning in and stamping a blistering kiss on my lips that completely resets me.
I grumble most of the way there, and he chatters happily, telling me all about what a great time I’m about to have. Call me crazy, but I like it. I like our banter. There’s something nice about it. A balance, almost.
Mr. Lockwood is waiting for us on the curb when we get there. He’s shorter and broader than Connor. He has a different body type altogether, and his face doesn’t look like Connor’s either. If it weren’t for the fact that he was standing next to Connor, looking up at him with indisputable fatherly pride, in that first grainy picture I saw of Connor, I wouldn’t think they were related.
Connor’s dad raises his hand when he sees us and his face splinters into a massive smile. An over-the-top smile without a hint of self-consciousness. A smile exactly like Connor’s.
As soon as Connor is within reaching distance, his dad pulls him into a hug that could easily knock the breath out of someone. Connor, naturally, gives as good as he gets, and the result is an exuberant greeting that would be more fitting for two people who haven’t seen each other in years rather than weeks or days.
“Hi, sweetie,” says Mr. Lockwood. “How are you? How’s the hea—”
Connor cuts him off seamlessly. “Still beating.”
If I didn’t know what this family had been through, perhaps I wouldn’t notice how the lines around his dad’s eyes deepen when he hears Connor’s reply. But because I do, I see abject relief. I see second chances and new beginnings. I see a man who didn’t expect his son to live, and who, like Connor, has a unique perspective on life because of it.
“This is Lennon, Dad,” says Connor, doing the double-handed baked good presentation thing again. It’s embarrassing.
I’d tell him to knock it off if I didn’t like it so much.
“Lennon,” says his dad reverently, almost breathless from the honor of meeting me. “What a day. What agreatday.” He looks nothing like Connor, but his mannerisms and voice are so similar it’s jarring. It’s moving. Sweet in a way that makes me like his dad before I get to know anything else about him. “Joy and I have been dying to meet you. Con says you’re a skateboarder. Come on, I have something to show you.”
It hits a bit weird thatthat’sthe thing Connor told him about me. Or thatthat’sthe thing that stood out about me to his dad. It feels good in a way. Right and also wrong. Right because for the longest time, if I’d been asked to describe myself to someone, riding a wobbly board on four wheels would have been one of the first things I said.
Wrong because I’m so different from that version of myself now that I hardly recognize myself.
He leads us into the store, and I can see right away why Connor loves it here. It’s not like any other antique store I’ve been into—not that I’m claiming to be an expert by any means. There’s a lot of old stuff, obviously, but there’s an interesting mix of new thrown in with it. Ornate, antique sofas are displayed with modern coffee tables. Curved, swoopy lines and solid stone. Brutalist lighting offsetting whimsical, dainty dining tables and chairs.
I don’t know enough about this kind of thing to know exactly what makes it work, or what makes it good. I only know that the second I walk in, I can tell that the person who has curated it is an artist.
For his part, Connor moves through the space like it’s an extension of him, and I guess, maybe it is. Seeing him here, so comfortable, surrounded by beautiful things, sucks the breath out of me. What’s fascinating about him is that no matter where he is—on campus, in his car, in the apartment, with his friends—one thing remains constant: Connor is the same.
He’s the same wherever he goes and whoever he’s with, and I think that’s rare.
I think it’s beautiful.
He must know what his dad wants to show me because he leads the way to a large armoire with deep drawers and opens the bottom one. His dad riffles through the drawer and has a print in his hand when he straightens.
He holds it out to me, and I take it.
I can tell at a glance it’s old. The photograph is faded, the paper yellow around the edges with a few faint watermarks on it. None of those things detracts from it.
