I’m standing in the entryway to the kitchen, my hands on my hips. He’s swiveled around in the chair to face me, his blue eyes almost black in the dim lighting. “Someone dumped food on your head?” he finally asks, like he can’t wrap his mind around it.
I close my eyes and sigh. I won’t dignify that with a response. “The friendship thing…that’s an experiment. It’s possible that what happened to me…what I went through…is too much for them to get over.” I realize that the mugs are still in my hands, and I turn to rinse them and place them carefully in the dishwasher. William really needs to replace this piece of garbage. Some of the prongs are broken, meaning they don’t hold up dinnerware like they should. I learned this the hard way by shattering an old diner-style coffee mug months ago.
I turn to face Adam, who’s now stood up and is at the entrance to the kitchen. I’m tall—five-eleven—but Adam is taller still. I wonder briefly what it’d be like if he hugged me, his big frame feeling so warm and so safe. I shake my head free of the thought.“So…I mean, like I was just saying. I don’t even know if fake friendship would even work. But—” I swallow, horrified that I think I might cry in front of Adam Noemi again, and so I use every iota of willpower to stop any tears from forming. “If it did, it would be worth it. One hundred percent. To give you the exclusive to my story. And let’s be honest. Given the emails and calls and randoms appearing on my doorstep the last two years, wanting to interview me? There is a large potential readership. It could definitely be the big break you’re used to, even if the friendship part of it turns out to be a waste of my time.”
“Being friends would be a waste of your time? Even if we became friends for real?” He sounds tough, but that toughness is covering a vague wound. The old gods know why. This man has countless friends.
“There’s no guarantee with regard to a real friendship.” I know I sound a bit snide with the wordreal, but I can’t help it. I do not believe Adam and I are compatible as friends. The evidence for the argument that we could be simply doesn’t exist. “You could decide you want nothing to do with me after writing your piece on me. Just like everyone else.” I lift my hand to gesture around. “I mean, I get that that makes me sound like I have trust issues, but they’re not there for no reason. I can guarantee you a story, and you can only guarantee me theillusionof friendship. Not a genuine friendship. So it’s the illusion that has to be the basis of our agreement.” I sigh and walk around him—my shoulder sliding against his in such a way that I wonder if shoulders can be uncommon erogenous zones, a thought I immediately suppress for its stupidity—and grab my purse from the table. “Thanks for what you did tonight. I guess this means that you can stay for the next dinner I bring William next week. If you want.”
I walk to the front door, but once again, so quickly that I get déjà vu, Adam beats me to the doorknob to open it for me. “Oh, th—”
“Okay,” he says. “Deal.”
“Deal?” My voice comes out unsure and squeaky. “To…public, illusory friendship in return for my story?”
“In exchange for your exclusive story about what happened that day, and in the eight years after,” Adam clarifies.
I nod. “Okay! Okay. This is good.” Another thought occurs to me, this one making my stomach sink a little bit. “And you’ll—I mean. I know you need to be objective in your writing.”
Adam raises an eyebrow. “Yes?”
I close my eyes briefly before settling on his. They’re sparkling and so blue, I think of a list of dumb things—Picasso’s blue period.Untitled (Blue Divided by Blue)by Mark Rothko. The blue whales I can sense when I’m in bed trying to fall asleep, gliding across the blue, blue water with their families, each one singing sacred whale songs. I shake my head. “In the piece, I need you to extend me some grace, but you don’t have to act like you believe every word I say.” Because the old gods know, there are going to be words he’s going to find difficult to take in. “Just don’t make me sound crazy. Don’t make me sound like a liar. Otherwise, it will ruin all the work of our potentially real friendship.”
“I won’t.” He says it so calmly and confidently that I’m surprised that I really, really want to believe him. “Of course I won’t.”
He holds out his hand and I place mine in his. After a brief, super awkward shake, wherein I certainly do not notice how big his hand is, I pull mine back and point to the still half-open door. “Okay. Thanks. Good night, then.”
“Good night, Sky.” He gives me a half smile and steps outside.I think he might walk me to Nadia’s, like this is the end of a date or something, but he stops at William’s ancient, threadbare welcome mat, arms crossed. I walk across the street and when I make it inside, I press my eyes to the door screen, where I can see Adam, still watching, from the still-open door of William’s house, the front light all warm and ambery, making him appear a bit like an angel…or a ghost.
I spend my Sunday offin Nadia’s sunflower-yellow kitchen, melting honey and butter together, kneading sweet dough, and frying up the eggplant I brought home from the farmer’s market last week. All this for Sage, and, indirectly, baby Oak. Sage says breastfeeding hunger isunreal. Which I can believe, based on the last time Teal and I have gotten her away for a meal since she’s had him. We watched this woman inhale two burgers and three slices of pepperoni and roasted red pepper pizza, and ten minutes later ask about dessert. She said Tenn can barely keep her fed even with frequent trips to get fast-food sandwiches and burritos and fries. So I decided to surprise her today with a mountain of good, home-cooked deliciousness.
“Hello!” As soon as she answers the door to her apartment, I hold up a basket filled with honey butter rolls, all still ooey and gooey and warm from the oven.
“Hey!” Sage is dressed in a soft-looking pink pajama set, with what probably is a milk stain on her chest. She leans in for a half hug around the basket. “What’s all that?”
“Carbs.”
“Mmm. My favorite.”
“There’s more where this came from. Give me a second.”
I rush toward the car and grab two more pans, one filled witheggplant parmigiana, the mozzarella a fancy buffalo sort I’d picked up from a cheese shop just outside of town, and the other, cinnamon bread pudding, another one of Nadia’s famous recipes. Her secret to that one is using both vanilla and almond extract in equal parts, as well as adding nutmeg to the cinnamon topping. The result is fairly intoxicating, perfect for a nursing mama needing calories. Sage lets me in much more quickly this time, and I place all the dishes on the countertop next to the rolls. She’s got one in each hand, moaning as she eats. “Good?” I ask.
“Sogood. Oh my God.”
I glance around, noting the stacks of dirty cups in the sink, the little piles of unwashed laundry all over, wondering if she would be mad if I offered to clean up later. “Is Oak asleep?”
“Yeah, thank God.” Sage’s mouth is so full, I can barely understand her. “He nursed for literally one hour straight. My nipples are so numb, I wouldn’t even notice if they fell off.”
I snort. “Noo! That sounds awful, Sage.”
“Meh. It’s better than when he tries to bite them off.” She shudders as she grabs another roll from the basket.
“Can I go see him?” I ask.
Sage nods and says, “Sure—” But then she grabs my arm. “Jesus Christ, Sky, is that asnakeon your arm?”
“What? Oh.” I lift up my left forearm, where a black garden snake named Geri has wrapped herself around me. Made things pretty difficult while I was trying to cook all morning, but she’s stubborn and wouldn’t let go even when I offered her an egg for a yummy snack. “This is just—she wanted to come for the ride.”
