“A double scoop of caramel cookie crunch from Marianne’s.”
I’m so happy that I could break out into a jig.A jig.That’s like the unmanliest thing someone could do.
Knowing that she’s prone to changing her mind, I grab her hand before doubt can roost. “Staten, you can have as many scoops as you want.”
The air is sopped with the wintry bite of everlasting night, a lone streetlight illuminating the darkened ribbon of road where shadows play between the foliage of dogwood. The buzzing bulb overhead strobes, attracting moths to a gilded North Star. The street is pretty desolate despite the packedattendance of the hockey game, and Staten and I take advantage of the privacy, parking our butts on the weathered curb by the eye-catching food truck. The concrete is cold—little deltas lush with weeds resulting from Minnesota’s pressurized temperatures—and the sky is a star-glutted shawl of obsidian.
Pulled pork melts between my molars, my fingers gripping the ever-loving life out of my soft taco, and a landslide of pickled onions, chunky salsa, and shredded cheese slops onto my paper plate. My sated stomach thanks me in silent gratitude, not minding the influx of food that catapults down my gullet. I’m pretty sure there’s sour cream all over my mouth, but I’m too comatose to care.
Staten, with more decorum in her pinky finger than I have in my entire body, picks at her chicken quesadilla like she hasn’t committed to eating it.
I do admit that I’m not always the brightest bulb in the chandelier, so when I realize that I need to read the street curb and try to save some framework of the conversation, I lower my cumin-rich missile.
I forget to close my mouth as I chew, and the words come out butchered. “I’m sorry he was being such an ass,” I mumble.
A frown frosts over her lips. “It’s not your fault,” she dismisses.
“It might be.”
I know it’s not appropriate to be thinking this in any capacity—or not right now, at least—but the reddened tip of her windbitten nose is adorable.
She crinkles it in confusion. “What do you mean?”
And suddenly, my hard-earned food isn’t sitting so well anymore. I abandon my third taco, unsuccessful in attempting to dethrone the guilt that reigns over my mind. I’m not one to ever admit my own faults, but every time I catch a glimpse of Staten’s perpetual kicked-dog look, it bludgeons my heart into an unrecognizable mush of blood-soaked tissue.
Swallowing, I reply, “I just mean that I kind of made things super complicated between you guys without consulting you first.”
Staten ponders me, no doubt surprised I’m even capable of taking accountability. When she eventually decides to speak—apparently vacillating between silence and censure—her voice deepens to that of a scrape. “You were just trying to help. I could’ve corrected you, but I chose not to. I’m just as much to blame as you are.”
My confession is more exhilarating than the thrill of a rollercoaster drop, yet it has the same belly-twisting side effect. Nausea is quick to jump on the bandwagon. “I’m so sorry I put you in such a difficult position,” I apologize, setting my plate down. “We can come clean. I’ll take full responsibility.”
Do I think Staten and Leif are good for each other? No, I don’t. That man has been playing with her heart, and he doesn’t even have half the brain to notice. Do I think Staten wants to be with him more than anything? Yeah, I do. And all I want is for her to be happy, even if that means…even if that means she finds that happiness with someone else.
An aborted breath oozes from her mouth, and Staten takes a minute to really consider my reverse proposition. She sets her food aside.
The waiting is a cruel and unusual form of torture. My ribs compress, and through my carb-induced stupor, it dawns on me that I’m practically begging for beautiful ruination to annihilate the earth beneath my feet. Beautiful ruination in the form of knife-edged wit and the bat of silk-spun lashes.
With my pulse a fatal misstep away from petering, Staten finally makes up her mind, as if she can sense the unease tight-fisting my gut.
“As twisted as this whole arrangement is, it made Leif notice me for the first time.The real me.Not his nerdy best friend withthe sex appeal of a dead fish. I’ve never seen that man jealous before in his life, because, well, hehaseverything.”
“Except you,” I conclude.
“Except me.”
I don’t want him to have you. He doesn’t deserve you.
“So, what do you want to do about our little ruse?” My tone is torched with pain and a pinch of despair.
If we come clean now, I don’t think I’ll ever get the opportunity to reallyknowStaten. Our acquaintanceship will depend on literary analysis and reading comprehension.
A brutal gust of wind pushes her closer, our shoulders bumping as a cosmos of admiration implodes inside of me, deserting me on the winding avenue of an endless, blacked-out horizon. Even despite the numerous layers she has on, she still shivers like the last autumn leaf clinging to a naked spruce branch. I don’t dare move.
“I want to go through with it,” she decides, sidling up to my body to conserve heat, the steam of her breath configuring into a parabola that enters the frosted atmosphere.
Goose bumps proliferate on my arms, but it’s not because of the chill.
“Are you sure?”
