“You’re not a prop,” Dustin said. “That’s not what happened.”
“Felt like it.” The loft was spinning from her drinking too much or maybe just thinking too much. “I need to go to bed.”
She thought Dustin might offer to let her crash on the couch, or maybe he’d take the couch and offer up his bed, or perhaps he’d suggest the bed was big enough for them to share it, but all he said was, “Let’s get you an Uber.”
Dustin took the elevator down with her and waited for the car to arrive. She was drunk enough not to feel the poor economic decision of taking an Uber rather than the subway.
“Text me when you get home,” he said.
“Will do,” Rae said, closing the door before she tried to pull Dustin in with her.
She thought she might start crying and wondered how many drunk girls had cried in this back seat before. Refusing to be lumpedinto this statistic, she just stared out the window as the car crossed the Williamsburg Bridge back into Manhattan, blinking at the blurring lights, too tired to wish on them, as she replayed the words Jenn had whispered in her ear as they’d hugged good-bye tonight.You’re really good for him, Rae.
“It’s a scramblette, not an omelet,” Rae corrected, taking control of the spatula and grazing Dustin’s hand in the process.
They were wedged into the Perry Street kitchenette on a Saturday afternoon, the first weekend of June. It was the time of year when the city began to stick with humidity and all the heat rose to the top floor. The window air-conditioning unit was wheezing feebly.
“You have to mess up the eggs more,” she said.
“Got it,” Dustin said, reclaiming the spatula to poke at the contents of the skillet.
“Notthatmuch. You still have to preserve an element of omelet elegance.”
“Apologies for my irr-egg-erence,” Dustin said, suppressing a smile.
His mood was lighter today, and it made Rae want to twirl.
They’d never ended up addressing the events of the double date-ish but had slipped back into friendship just as easily, or uneasily, as they had before.
Even though that night had quickly devolved, Rae figured it was a good sign that he’d been entertaining the idea of romance. She’d pushed him too hard too soon, perhaps, but once the depression lifted just a little more, he’d be ready for more.
This afternoon they’d gone to the Whitney Museum to see a politically themed Mexican mural exhibit, and since it was right in the West Village, they’d come to the penthouse afterward so Dustin could finally get a tour and meet Ellen, who would be returning from yoga any minute.
They ate on the couch, repurposing Ellen’sVoguemagazines as place mats for the coffee table. “So what’s the verdict on the scramblette?” Rae asked.
Dustin took two more bites before answering. “I like how the flavors are intertwined more than in a traditional omelet but there’s still greater structure than in a pure scramble. An admirable merger of culinary genres.”
Rae happily shoveled in her own eggs. After they finished, she asked, as if walking on the eggshells they’d cracked together, “So how have you been feeling about … things?”
“All right,” he said. “Getting by.”
“Have you still been going to therapy?”
“Yup.” He carried their plates to the sink, where he started washing them and the rest of the procrastinated dishes.
Rae held in her hundred follow-up questions, which felt a lot like holding her breath, except without the comfort of knowing she could open her mouth whenever she wanted. Her eyes drooped, and she was lulled half asleep by the sputtering of the sink. The pipes needed fixing, but she was too tired to call the super to report the problem. Between deals and job applications, she’d been averaging only a few hours of sleep.
“Sleepy?” Dustin asked, voice close. The water had stopped, but the pipes were still gurgling.
Eyes closed, she nodded.
He scooped her up, then set her back down on the couch, his lap as her pillow. “I’m not trying to hide anything,” Dustin said, tucking a strand of Rae’s unwashed hair behind her ear, and then another. “I just have so much rain in my life, I want to keep you as my Rae of sunshine. But that’s pretty shitty of me, isn’t it?”
She opened her eyes. “No,” she said, refusing to succumb to her stormy, selfish tendencies, not when he was the one who was hurting. “You’re the antonym of shitty.”
He smiled his lyrical smile, and she smiled something back, the other half of the verse she’d been stuck on.
Keys jiggled in the apartment door. Ellen entered, yoga mat in hand. “Rae-bae, I’m home,” she sang, stopping midsyllable as she spotted Rae’s head on Dustin’s lap.
