I shrug, but I’m so buzzed on my own honesty that it doesn’t carry the insouciant edge I’d hoped for. “It’s my side hobby, I guess. I like piddling around with songs and melodies, and it’s not serious. But it’s fun.”
My oldest sister Maren’s challenge comes back to me. Thephone conversation we had right before I decided to leave Bristol and move here:Find out what you want from your twenties and figure out how you get it, Paige. Don’t wait for it to find you, or you’ll turn into Folly, aimless and confused.
Liam is quiet for a minute, studying me. “Let’s be friends, Paige.”
I snort.
A crease forms between his brows. He turns his body to face me, leaning a hip against the railing. “You don’t think I could be a good friend to you?”
I take a sip of my beer, stalling. “Not to pile on after just saying we don’t slut shame anymore, but I think your definition offemale friendhas an impliedwith benefits.”
Liam levels me with a look. “Maisy said you had a boyfriend. Do you?”
I shift my hip onto the rail so we’re facing each other full on. “Yes. But if the answer had been no, would I have been right about your intentions?”
“I’m not going to stand here and act like you aren’t desirable, Paige, but I meant friendship completely innocently. We could hang out. Have fun.”
I shake my head, trying to break up the worddesirablebefore it lodges there.
“What would we do together?” I ask.
“Read in bookshops? Talk?” His smile quirks back up again. “I could teach you about baseball, if it’s still true you know nothing about it, and if you were interested in learning. Especially since that one softball season when you were nine didn’t work out.”
“You have a great memory.”
“Yeah, andthat,” he says, tipping his beer at me, “is the sign of a good friend.”
I can’t help but smile back. “I feel like you’re trying to prove something.”
“I feel like you’re trying to prove something else.” He leans in, smelling like bonfire smoke and sunscreen. “I told you I’m straightforward, and I meant it, Paige.” He looks around the party. “I like this scene as much as the next guy, but it gets old, and you seem…” He drifts off, rubbing a thumb over his lips. “I think we could be good for each other.Toeach other.”
“I give you a more wholesome image, and you help me build my street cred?”
“Why does there have to be an agenda?” Liam asks.
“Because there always is.”
He sighs, looking at the stars, his mouth tight and his palms on the rail. “My dad died a year ago. From a heart valve complication.”
All the playfulness leaves my body, nothing but skid marks left behind.
“I’m so sorry,” I say.
“Thank you. It was really hard.” His eyes drop to the tree line but don’t move in my direction. “He was my role model, but he was also my best friend. Even once I came to college, we talked every day. And it’s not that I don’t have friends on the team, or in my classes. I do, and they’re great, but—”
Finally, he looks at me. His voice comes out gruff. “Sometimes, I feel like you have to set the tone for a friendship at its inception, and once you do that, there’s no changing it. Right now, all my friendships are just variations of this.” He makes a throwaway gesture around the party. “But I need something”—he swallows—“different. So, I guess I do have an agenda, and that’s what it is. I want a friendship that’s different than this, and I want it to be with you.”
We watch each other for a few moments.
“It’s dawning on me I just used my dead dad to accidentally guilt-trip you into being my friend,” Liam says.
“You’re giving me big shoes to fill,” I say.
Liam groans, rubbing a hand through his hair. “That came out all wrong.”
I laugh, swatting his arm away from his face. “I don’t feel guilted into anything, I promise. And I do understand what you mean about friendships being defined a certain way at the outset.”
It’s in factexactlyhow I’d describe my and Maisy’s friendship—with roles that are defined. How accurate those definitions are twenty years in the making? Less certain.
