There’s probably a German word for the feeling of missing something you rejected. Or at least never accepted.
There’s probably also a word for climbing out of your skin from missing the touch of someone no longer in your reach. Even mylittle purple friend hasn’t been cutting it. Sex with Ryan has ruined me for masturbation—wouldn’t have predicted that. In all the time I’ve been sexually active, no partner has had that effect. When I was with Nathan and getting it regular—one of the things he praised about me was my ridiculously high libido—I was still insatiable enough to need to auto-stimulate once in a while if he had class or a shift when I was raring to go. It always did the trick, calming my buzzing nerves and settling the tingle in my belly for at least a short while. I’ve never felt evenhornierafterward…like it was only an amuse-bouche before a favorite main course.
Uncannily, my phone chirrups as the car whizzes up the 93 with a message from Jacob, of ye olde NYC roster.You home yet, gorgeous? Missing you.My bottom lip burns and I realize belatedly that I’m chewing on it. What should be a welcome invitation from a tried-and-true hookup somehow doesn’t feel as satisfying as it should. It’s probably just because it’s been a while. I’ll feel differently once I’m back home. I lock my screen without responding just as the car pulls up to South Station.
The three of us agreed to meet at the Starbucks kiosk inside, but Shanthi is alone when I arrive. She nods a hello and hands me a grande cup from the tray she’s holding.
“Bless you,” I say, the first sip like electricity powering through my veins. “How was your day yesterday? Did you get to see everything you wanted to?”
When Shanthi said she wanted to stay in Boston an extra day and return on Monday with us, Mar and I each invited her to join our respective plans. But Shanthi was quick to decline—this was her first time in Boston and she wanted to explore. Hard to believe she’d rather hit up the many cool neighborhoods, museums, and restaurants than watch me do chores at my mother’s house in the suburbs or listen to Maral reminisce about college with strangers. Kids these days.
“It was awesome,” she says. “I walked through Beacon Hill andthe Charles River Esplanade then to the Back Bay Fens.” Mar and I had suggested the parks to her—some of the most beautiful Boston has to offer. Their foliage is at its lushest now, at the tail end of summer, just before it starts to morph into a spectacular kaleidoscope of fall colors. “I wanted to hit up the museums but there wasn’t enough time. When are we coming back?”
“Tomorrow, if my mom has anything to say about it. Where’s Mar?”
“She texted that she’s running late,” she says, sipping her own coffee.
“Weren’t you staying at the same hotel? Why didn’t you come together?”
Shanthi shrugs. “I haven’t seen her since Saturday. She just said she had something to do this morning.”
“What thing?” I ask, surprised.
“I don’t know,” she says, tapping her phone to check the time. 10:25a.m.Ten minutes till boarding.
Weird. We may be out of our routine, but usually I know Maral’s plans right down to buying gum at the bodega. What could she have to do that was pressing enough to be squeezed into the few morning hours before our train departs?
It hits me like a defibrillator shock. Checking her phone more frequently and surreptitiously than usual. Evading my questions about it. My suspicion was right—she’s seeing someone. Someone in Boston, it appears. They must have spent the night together and couldn’t tear themselves away, enjoying each other’scompanyone last time before she has to leave.
My heart swells with happiness for her, my goddess of a cousin who deserves for every man in the world to fall at her feet in worship.
Something niggles beneath the surface, though. Maral is seeing someone and she’s kept it from me. The concern I had over her evasiveness at the bar last week rises like magma.
Why would she keep this from me?
We’ve always been totally open with each other about our love lives. Sure, I’ve only ever had one serious boyfriend, but she had the honor of being privy to every single detail of Nathan’s and my relationship—from my budding crush on a fellow student to our first kiss to every date to moving in together to falling apart. I met every boyfriend of hers through high school and college, dutifully on my best behavior when she warned me not to put them off by, quote,going all Ana. I even helped her write her profile for dating apps (she wasn’t being as effusive about her positive attributes as she should have been, and it’s criminal to undersell the wonder that is Maral). What changed?
The coffee turns in my belly. When Maral strolls into the station, bag slung over the shoulder of her lucky emerald-green wrap dress, long black hair flowing behind her like that of a siren calling from the sea, my eyes sting just looking at her.
She’s so happy, she’s practically radiating with it.
“Sorry I’m late.” She’s slightly out of breath from her brisk walk. “You look…weird,” she says, spying my wretched grimace.
“You look spectacular,” I say, voice hitching on the last syllable.
“Whoa, what’s the matter?” She steps toward me, concerned. “How were things with your mom?” she asks knowingly.
I sniff. “Filling. There’s two weeks’ worth of dinner for you in this cooler.”
She takes in the travel cooler at my feet, then raises worried eyes to me. “Ryan?”
I swallow. “Long gone.”
“Have you heard how his meeting went?”
“Not yet,” I say. “It started at ten—I’ll text him after.”
Shanthi waves her phone at us. “Speaking of which, we need to get boarding.”
