“Why’s that?”
He looks out at one of the piers beneath us, where there’s some kind of kickball game going on, the occasional distant shout of celebration or objection filtering up to us. “Because you—the lettering projects, I mean. They’re very . . . creative.”
My lips press together in annoyance. Something about the way he’s saidcreative—as if he’s using air quotes around the word—makes it sound like I’m hobbying around, not serious. I tell myself to let it go, but then my mouth uncharacteristically trots ahead of my brain.
“You think creative people don’t have to focus?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“What I do, it’s a business, and—”
“I meant that it seems like it would be interesting, what you do. Lots of variation.”
“Oh.” I think about explaining all theBloom Where You’re Planteds, everyone lately wanting the same kind of brush lettering—swooping, upright scripts with fat, washed-out downstrokes. But it’s probably petty to get into it. At least I’ve been switching up the color schemes.
“Is it not that way?” he asks, and the thing is, even though I don’t really know Reid at all, I once again get that sense about him, something essential. He never asks a question he doesn’t want to know the answer to. In a world of the standard, unthinking “How are you?” where the only real acceptable answer seems to be a neutral “Fine,” Reid’s attention feels special. Acute.
I shrug. “It’s the same as anything else, I suppose. It can get rote, or frustrating. When that happens, it’s easy to make a mistake.”
He coughs. Because I saidmistake. I wonder if the dive into the river from here would kill me, or just maim me. I think my steps actually falter for a second, as though my body’s really considering it. It can’t be as dirty in there as everyone’s always saying.
“It’s okay,” he says, keeping his eyes ahead. “It’s a common word.”
“I’m sure your work is interesting!” I blurt. “Variation, or whatever.” I try to think of some keywords from the absolutely impenetrable Wikipedia page on “quantitative analysts” I read last week in preparation for this meeting. I think I quit reading at the wordstochastic, which actually sort of reminded me of Reid, if what it means is a combination ofstoicandsarcastic. But I’m pretty sure it has to do with calculus.
“What kind of project?” Reid asks, and it is absolutely a deliberate cutoff. He is not interested in talking about his work with me, which I suppose I should be grateful for. It is both too math adjacent and too ex-fiancée adjacent.
I stop, gesture to one of the few empty benches on this busier part of the Promenade. Once I’m seated, I pull my bag onto my lap, reach in for the slim, soft-covered notebook I’ve been using for my ideas. When Reid sits beside me, I wince at the crinkle of stuff inside—a half-eaten bag of pretzels, probably ten balled-up receipts from Target. I start talking immediately to cover it, and maybe it’s a gift—having to rush this out. It ensures that I don’t think too hard about Reid being the first person I’ve told.
“There’s this company, Make It Happyn? ‘Happen’ but with ay, so it’s—uh, ‘happy’ also.”
“I don’t get it.”
Frankly, I don’t get it, either. It is cheesy in a way that makes me slightly embarrassed, but I don’t want to admit that to Reid, so I move on. “They’re a big brand for most of the major craft retailers. They make build-your-own planner materials. Folios and accessories and calendar pages.”
“Like what you make.”
“Not really,” I say, thinking of the big, neon-signed store on Atlantic Avenue that I visited after my first phone call with the artistic director, a bold-voiced, fast-talking woman named Ivonne. The Make It Happyn aisle had been crowded with shoppers, some displays nearly sold out. I’d felt uncertain initially, seeing some of the more generic stuff. A January spread done all in ice blue. February, pinks and reds. March, all green. April, raindrops. May? An actual Maypole, which madeBloom Where You’re Plantedfeel damned subtle by comparison.
But I’d been excited, too, by the possibilities, by the treatments I could create. It could be career-changing, this job, giving me the kind of opportunities most people in my position would love to have. Life-changing, especially now, if it means I can stay in my place on my own, at least for a while.
“I mean, yes,” I correct, raising my chin. “They’re mass-produced, obviously. Not . . .” I trail off.Not containing subtle commentary on the status of anyone’s relationship, is what I’m thinking. That’s another benefit to the job, frankly. Surely I won’t be tempted to weave ridiculous, reckless codes into work I’m submitting for a general audience.
“Unique,” Reid says, and it’s a kindness, I think. The most generous completion of that sentence possible.
I stroke the front of my bag, my face flushing, but stop when I hear the crinkling again.
“So,” I say brightly, to cover the crinkling, “They’ve asked me and a few other artists to produce three treatments, full-year planner pages. If they choose me, they’d produce a line with my work, using my name.”
“Aha,” he says quietly, barely a murmur. “A business opportunity.”
“You say that as if it’s a bad thing.”
He turns his head, looks vacantly across the river. “It isn’t.” He lifts a hand, gestures toward the Manhattan skyline. “Obviously.”
But thatObviously—he’s sure made it sound as if it’s a bad thing. He’s made it sound like business opportunities are the worst thing. Like that skyline is Sauron.
When he looks at me, his blue eyes washed pale with the bright sun, his expression looks harder, closer to the way it had been when he’d come to the shop last week.
