“Something like that.” A pause fell and then he said, “Anyway, I wanted you to know that you have options.”
“I don’t know what to say. Thank you, Xander,” I said. “Thank you so much.”
I heard him hesitate, heard his throat click as he swallowed hard. “Goodnight, Emery.”
The line went quiet. I lay back on my pillow, my phone on my chest. Tears blurred my vision, my heart full imagining Xander in his room, researching how to help my dreams come true.
Marriage was an extreme option—a total break from my family. Exile. I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to make that leap or even go through with UCLA in the first place. Suddenly, I didn’t feel so alone. I felt like I did back on that rock, seven years ago, with Xander’s hand on my back, gentle and hesitant, but letting me know he was there.
Chapter 15
Xander
I rested my phone on my chest and stared at the ceiling, wondering what the hell I’d done.
“Because she’s my friend.”
Einstein called the speed of light a universal speed limit. Nothing was faster, and that gave the universe some order. I could consider my marriage “proposal” on the same order of magnitude. The distance between Emery and me would be a protective boundary—her in California, me in Massachusetts. We almost couldn’t get farther apart and still be in the same country. That incontrovertible fact would bring order to my universe, where right now there was only the chaos of my heart reaching for what I knew it could never really have.
Helping to make her dreams come true was nonnegotiable. I’d do whatever it took—even marrying her if I had to—to let her escape her terrible father and live her own life.
Another paradox: Sacrificing my happiness for hers would be the hardest thing I could do, and yet there was nothing easier.
Part II
Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature. And that is because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.
—Max Planck
Chapter 16
Xander
Mid-October
“All right, gentlemen.” Coach Daniels clapped his hands. “Time toget in the water.”
The Royal Pride row crew gathered in the gym gave a collective but tired cheer. We hadn’t been on the water since tryouts. Instead, Coach worked us to the point of exhaustion on form and fitness three afternoons per week and most Saturday mornings. The Academy gym had a whole set of ergometers, and we spent our time on the specialized row machines or lifting weights to get into prime racing shape.
Dean let loose a piercing whistle. “You heard the man. Get suited up!”
In the locker room, we changed from our workout clothes into the Academy-sanctioned practice gear: a short-sleeved and short-legged unisuit in black and gold (even our practice gear bore the Academy colors). I threw on a windbreaker and shoes over my row socks—both also team issue.
“Wow, Ford, I’m impressed,” Rhett Calloway sneered from across the row of lockers. “How did you manage to pay for all the gear?” He pretended to have an epiphany. “Oh, that’s right. Tucker’s girlfriend ispaying for it with ‘tutoring.’” He made air quotes, his dark eyes glinting with malevolence.
Tucker glowered at me instead of his friend. “Nah, I’ll bet he had to fill out the financial hardship form. Isn’t that right, Ford?”
They were both wrong. I had contemplated using the Academy scholarship system that helped Bend kids pay for the myriad of technology and equipment required to participate in school activities. For row alone, this meant $1,250 worth of practice clothes, two sets of race-day uniforms, a sweat suit, and goggles, as well as a formal suit, jacket, and tie for the yearbook photo and post-regatta galas and award ceremonies. But my father was doing well—working hard and happy—and in a fit of optimism, I paid for the entire package out of our account.
Not that Rhett or Tucker needed to know any of that. Using facts on people who’d already made up their minds was usually a losing proposition.
As for Emery…her revealing that I tutored her three times a week was both good and bad. Good, because we had nothing to hide, and bad, because we had nothing to hide. Because we were friends.
You proposed to your friend.
I nearly clocked my head on my open locker as the thought snuck in and made me jump. I had to remind myself—for the millionth time since that conversation six weeks ago—that it was for business purposes only.
But facts were also wasted on a heart that had already made up its mind.
