“Maybe we can play again sometime.”
Maybe, I’m repeating in my head, still wobbly. I tuck one of my fingers inside the notebook, feeling the indentations my sketches have left there, the slight grit of the graphite on my skin.
But he turns to go before I can answer.
Chapter 8
“Yes. No, wait. No, I think. Or—I don’t know?”
Beside me, Lark is staring down at nine different sheets of paper, all of them covered in some of my most common lettering styles, the ones I seem to rotate through my various clients’ planners and wall calendars. Itmaybe true that I have left out the most popular brush lettering, but it also may be true that if I have to do one more client project with that as the sole focus, I will find some way to break my own fingers, and where’s that going to leave me?
Nowhere, that’s where.
Nowhere, however, is also where this appointment is going, because Lark is having an incredibly difficult time making literally any decision. The question that has prompted this latest round of existential dread is whether she wants black accents. It’s Tuesday afternoon at three thirty and we’ve been here since shortly after noon, or, perhaps, since the actual birth of Christ. I raise my gritty eyes toward the front of the shop, where Lachelle is standing behind the front desk. Every once in a while she looks back here and gives me a sort of cringe of sympathy.
At Lark’s house last week, I’d realized she seemed tentative, preoccupied with her husband’s opinions, small and lost-looking in that big townhouse. In fact, that’s partly why I’d suggested we meet elsewhere today, our first effort at going through possibilities for the two walls—I thought it might be less overwhelming for both of us not to stand before the full, blank canvas, more blank somehow by virtue of the unfinished space of the house.
Of course I’d also suggested it partly because what if Cameron had been there in the awful beanie and black wrist cuffs? What if he’d brought up not liking rom-coms in front of me? I’ve got to keep clear of temptation, is the thing.
Initially I’d proposed one of my standard haunts for client meetings, but Lark had been hesitant; then I’d remembered what she’d said about privacy, so I’d papered over my misstep quickly, promising that the shop’s back workspace would let us review ideas “uninterrupted.” Since Lachelle has never seenThe Princess Tent(“What do you mean a poet-sandwich boyfriend?” she’d said, when I’d tried to explain after showing up early to prep her), so far that’s seemed to work out fine.
Except for, you know. The fact that my leg bones are calcifying under this table. The fact that I’d thought I’d be out of here an hour ago. The fact that I’d wanted to already be back at my apartment and in front of my desk, working on the new sketches I’ve started for Make It Happyn.
Since Saturday night, I’ve done more sketches for Make It Happyn than I’ve done in all the weeks since I first got the call. The game I’d played with Reid—however awkwardly it had ended—seemed to ignite something in me. For each of the sixteen letters we’d gathered together, I’d tried a word—sometimes a month name, sometimes a day name, sometimes the sort of banal general terms that show up in planners and on calendar pages: “TASKS,” “REMINDERS,” “TO DOS,” “BIRTHDAYS,” filling them out with decorative details and sketches. None of them yet seem exactly right for the job, but they’re all—on thewayto something, I guess. On Sunday, I’d been so absorbed that I hadn’t even heard Sibby rustling around the apartment. When I’d finally come out of my room late in the afternoon, determined to forage for snacks, I’d blinked in shock to find a set of boxes already lining our narrow hallway.
“Oh,” I’d said, nearly bumping into her as she was emerging from her room. “I didn’t realize . . .”
There’d really been nothing to do but trail off. It’d been painful, of course it had been. But it hadn’t been stomachache painful; it hadn’t been I’d-better-get-back-behind-a-closed-door-to-cry painful. I’d even helped her—once I’d shoved a granola bar in my mouth—take apart an old, particle-board bookshelf that we’d put together a couple of years ago over slices of pizza and too-sweet cans of wine, her phone blaring music as we’d worked. This time, though, we’d worked quietly, politely. I’d suggested she wrap some of the shelves in a couple of the old beach towels she has under her bed, and she’d thanked me. She’d asked if I’d maybe want to keep one of the nightstands she won’t be needing in her new place, and I’d said no.
Then I’d gone back to my room, eager to keep working.
Now I shift in my seat, my eyes tracking down to the pages in front of Lark. I really shouldn’t be frustrated—I’ve agreed to this job, and I need this job,especiallybecause of all those boxes lining my hallway. Most of my clients these days have a pretty firm sense of what they want already, or they’re happy for me to keep doing what I’ve been doing for them. But Lark’s new to this, and new to town, and also I guess new to being asked to make decisions on behalf of herself and her new husband.
So I need to be patient.
“I know it’s ridiculous,” she says, raising a hand to her forehead, rubbing two fingers along her hairline, right by her temple. I’ve learned in these last three hours that she does this when she’s particularly stumped. Which is often.
Really often.
“It’s only that—it’s going to be on thewalls.”
I smile gently. In this kind of situation, all my cheery lightness is useful, and I deploy it fully.
“But if you don’t like it,” I say airily, “you can always paint over it. And the chalk?Pffft.” I wave my hand casually. “Bit of special cleaner and a big sponge, and you’ve got a blank canvas again. No problem!”
Lark blinks at me. “I couldn’t do that,” she says, sounding shocked. She is really not at all like Princess Freddie, who was defiant, unflappable, subversive. “To all your work?”
It’s nice, that she feels this way, that she takes what I do so seriously. But if this is the problem, she’s definitely overthinking it. A fundamental quality of my work is its impermanence. Sure, my planners are inked, and sure, clients could always page back through and admire a particular spread. But really, thepointof the planners, of the calendars, is that you make your way through them, that you check off the days and turn the page. That you move on.
I open my mouth to reassure her, but then I have a thought.
A memory.
What if you made it more fun?
It’s not the first time I’ve thought of Reid since Saturday night—his low, serious voice and his stern, handsome face, his secret eyelashes and his softswoonshof pleasure. Each letter I’d sketched had been a reminder of the fun we’d had, the game we’d played. But inevitably, I’d remember those last, painful few minutes in the coffee shop, the way we’d left it up in the air, and I’d try to put him out of my head for a while.
But now, I cling to the memory of him in the restaurant, to the walk we’d taken, working out our rules. Without saying anything to Lark, I reach my hands out and messily gather the nine sheets of paper toward me, wrinkling a few. She makes a small noise of distress, but I ignore it, hastily stacking the sheets.
