“Being there didn’t change anything for me,” I say, realizing how true the words are as I say them. “I didn’t want to talk to him. Let alone see him.”
“But there had to be a part of you that wanted something from him.”
“I think there’s always gonna be a part of me that wants something from him. But I’ve gotta be okay even if I never get it.”
I smile too brightly and raise my glass in a weak attempt to end on a lighter note. “A toast to daddy issues?”
Ro’s drink remains planted on the table. “I’m not toasting that.”
“Fiiine.” I roll my eyes, but there’s no heat in the expression. “You pick something.”
Ro swirls his glass, eyes trained on his clinking ice cubes.
The patio around us is alive with the sounds of forks scraping flatware, laughter mounting with each next sip of a summer cocktail, and speakers blasting a soundtrack better suited for aMeatpacking nightclub. But when Ro’s eyes meet mine again, everything quiets, like the world is holding its breath.
Or maybe that’s just me.
“To reframing,” he says, finally. “To being back in the right place, at the right time.”
My face falls before I can catch it, but I don’t know why. It’s a perfectly fitting and fine toast. Even if, maybe, I’d been hoping for more.
I shift my glass toward his, but Ro’s not finished. And the familiar glint in his eyes is replaced by something I can’t quite place as he finishes.
“And to doing it with the right person.”
When our drinks connect, the world exhales and the noise returns. It’s not a moment too soon, either, because even the city at full volume is only just enough to drown out the pounding in my chest.
14
Zola had been quick toembarrass herself in front of Ro when she met him. Mom saw his socials and made it perfectly clear she thinks “that boy is foooine.” And when I told Liv about him, she applauded as she dove down her own Ro Jackson Instagram rabbit hole. Still, watching complete strangers respond to Ro out in the world is a whole new study in human behavior.
The cute hostess lingered, the waitress batted her eyelashes so hard she almost took flight. Random doormen don’t let Ro pass without engaging him in conversation. You’d even think the guy with the chinchilla on his shoulder at the Fourteenth Street station was an old friend by the way he chatted Ro up.
Seeing Ro through everyone else’s eyes is like seeing him for the first time all over again. It makes me wonder about the guy under all that shiny packaging. He seems sogood.And there’s nothing scarier to me than a guy everybody thinks isgood.
We’re at a hole-in-the-wall consignment shop in the Village when Ro brings up my next date.
“Can we not?” I ask, thumbing through vintage jackets that cost more than I’ve got in my bank account. “Tell me something else about you. Save me the Google search.”
“You already know all the big stuff,” he says, passing behind me so close that the heathered cotton of his shirt brushes against my bare arm.
“It’s just you and your parents, right? No brothers or sisters?”
“Nah, but my parents both came from big families so I’ve got way too many damn cousins,” he says, laughing. “We were that house on the block where somebody was always coming or going. And Pops has been playing surrogate dad to all the kids in the neighborhood as long as I can remember, so even as an only child, I’ve never been alone a day in my life.”
Ro slips into a worn leather jacket from the rack, and my stomach drops a little at how good he looks. It’s been happening all day—he smiles and my cheeks flush, he guides the small of my back and my whole body tenses. But that’s not why we’re here. Today’s supposed to be my safe space away from all that. Ro’s supposed to be my safe space away from all that.
Say something,I tell myself. Somethingfriendly.
“Can your dad take me in too?” I don’t wait for my awkward joke to fall flat before I rush to explain. “It just sounds like a nice way to grow up.”
Ro shrugs off the jacket. “What about you? You and Zola seem close.”
“We are, yeah,” I say, turning back to the rack. “But when your family’s as small as ours, you kind of have to be.”
“It’s wild how different the two of you seem.”
“Yup.” It’s not the first time someone’s pointed this out to me. “She’s the firecracker. I’m the fizzle.”
