“Miss it?”
“Can’t say I do. The not shaving, though—yeah, I miss that.”
“Art and houseplants?” Dustin said after work the next week as he unwrapped Rae’s no-special-occasion gifts in the Lorimer Loft kitchen and folded up the boxes for recycling. “Trying to make me into an adult or something?”
“Or something,” Rae said. “You’ll be thirty in September, after all.”
Dustin didn’t seem to be dreading the ominous gateway into that decade nearly as much as she was herself. No surprise, given that his fertility would stay strong for decades to come, Rae thought. She resented his male privilege, though she knew it wasn’t his fault.
Recently she’d been looking into freezing her eggs. It would give her more flexibility to let life twist and turn, but it was insanely expensive and there wasn’t enough research on the long-term consequences for Rae to think seriously about it.
“Thanks for reminding me of my old age,” Dustin said. He pulled her into a hug. They were a better height for hugging than for kissing anyway.
Rae didn’t mention to Dustin how art and plants were associated with lower levels of anxiety and depression. Vegetables, too, which was why she’d brought over greens along with the usual pizza for one of their post-work platonic catch-ups.
“I brought Command strips to hang it,” Rae said, breaking away to fetch her purse. “So your landlord won’t charge you for holes in the wall.”
“Very thoughtful,” Dustin said. “But I actually own the place, so we’ll be good.” He said it casually, as if announcing that he drank coffee in the morning.
“Youownit?” She didn’t know anyone except the higher-ups at work who owned a place in the city. Not for the first time, she had the feeling that he came from money and tried not to judge him for it.
He set about hanging the print across from the couch, in the space where someone else might put a TV. It was a nice feeling, knowing something was sturdily hanging from the walls rather than resting precariously on plastic and Velcro like everything in the penthouse.
“Looks good,” Dustin said when they were done, taking in the dose of primary colors. “But this better not have been expensive.”
“It wasn’t,” Rae told him honestly. “To quote the ever-profound Bellini:Buying art is a fool’s game. Open a tab instead.”
“Note how he suggested a tab, not a salad,” Dustin replied dryly.
“Well, he wasn’t exactly the picture of health.” She’d read snippets from Bellini’s biography and learned he’d been a depressed drunk for most of his life. It had hit on a peculiar kind of fear to know that she and Dustin both gravitated toward the words of such a tortured soul.
Busying herself, she arranged the plant in the kitchen window. She’d transferred it from its original plastic black pot into a red clay one. “This is a philodendron. They date back to the Victorian age, apparently,” she said. “Only needs to be watered every eleven days.” The instructions had said ten, but she figured eleven would be just fine.
Learning from the thyme debacle, Rae had researched “hardest to kill” plants and selected the philodendron. It showed more ambition than succulents but was still promised to be “failproof for beginners.” The heart-shaped leaves were nothing more than a coincidence.
“Does this window get sunlight?” Rae asked. She’d never seen the Lorimer Loft during the day, and though that sounded scandalouslyromantic, it was just the bleak reality of long days at work and early sunsets. “It’s supposed to be somewhere bright but not in direct sunlight.”
Dustin moved the clay pot farther from the windowsill. “What should we name it?” he asked.
Rae thought about it. “Phyllis. Phyllis the philodendron.”
A weak smile fought its way across Dustin’s face. “You and your alliteration.”
“Alliteration is one of those little things that never stops being delicious. Like ice-cold lemonade on an August day.”
Since she’d been a little girl, she’d planned to have an August wedding and serve giant pitchers of homemade lemonade. The image crashed into her thoughts again now, and she didn’t kick it out.
“I like the leaves,” Dustin commented, running his hand over the green hearts.
Rae looked away, embarrassed. “Let’s eat,” she said. “The pizza’s getting cold.”
“Or the air’s getting warm,” Dustin said. “Depending on how you look at it.”
“I’d rather debate philosophy on full stomachs,” Rae said, as she set the pizza and salads on the coffee table. Even though Dustin had a kitchen table, they always ended up on the couch.
Rae could feel a heaviness about Dustin as he sat down beside her, in how he bent one knee and then the other, then reclined vertebra by vertebra.
Rae inhaled her food while Dustin picked at his.
