When Tristan turned out of the bathroom, Miles shoved his phone away. They dapped each other up on our way out while I stared forward.
I casually told Tristan about Miles asking for my number while we walked.
“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” He was angrier than I’d expected, storming back toward the café. I stared at the pretty, glowing makeup counters through Sephora’s windows, refusing to be the girl tripping after some pissed-off guy.
Tristan eventually sulked back down the street. “Sorry. I’m being dumb.”
“You are.”
“But, like, what a dick—he sees me with you.”
“Yeah, but you’re notwith mewith me.”
“No, I know, but still.”
I didn’t know why I even told him about the encounter. Then I saw that I’d wanted to hold a mirror up to him to see his reaction. How was he that different from Miles? A guy going after what he wanted regardless of the rules? For that matter, how different was I? At least I was trying to find a new way. Tristan was doing what men had done forever.
Seeing my somber face, Tristan cracked a goofy smile. I laughed, but I had a slight sinking feeling not dissimilar to when Jay stormed out ofthe art gallery. It was the feeling that we didn’t have a shared understanding and that everything hinged on reaching one.
We passed a string of upscale shops, windows advertising slabs of marble for your countertops, a gold faucet for your new kitchen, Pandora, Glossier, Billy Reid. On the corner of M and Wisconsin, across from the domed Farmers and Mechanics Bank branch with the big clock in the middle, two women held up signs that said, “What Are You Going to Do About the West Bank Now?” I remembered hearing about a West Bank boy who was shot by an Israeli sniper a day after celebrating Gaza’s ceasefire with his family.
As Tristan and I were passing, a woman cradling a small dog yelled at the two women with signs. How dare they, they needed to go back to their country, this was America. People danced around the commotion with armfuls of shopping bags.
Tristan stood between the women with the signs and the woman with the dog, telling her to back up. His anger was attractive to me then. I asked the two women if they were okay while he managed the dog lady. They said they were used to it. Then the dog-carrying woman started yelling at me and Tristan, calling us DEI hires and telling us to do some crack. I broke out laughing because why would I just do some crack? My laughter incensed her.
We decided that going back and forth with this woman was useless and walked toward the river. I realized we’d essentially retraced our footsteps from that snowy night. Maybe that’s what all relationships were about, going in circles.
Tristan touched my shoulder. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. You?”
He nodded.
I laughed.
“Do you always laugh at awful shit?”
This startled me. “I’m laughing because I don’t know what else to do.”
His hand closed around mine. “I’m joking, my little DEI hire.”
I smiled, but I missed Jay. It wasn’t a negative reaction to Tristan. It was that I wished Jay could be there with us. We’d unpinned that possibility with our deception though.
“What are we even doing?” I asked.
“Enjoying the view of this dirty-ass river.”
“I mean what are you and I doing?”
“Oh.”
“Nia might be into an open relationship if you asked.”
He let go of my hand. “I’m not though.”
I glared at him. “What you mean is you wanna fuck around, but you don’t want her to. She was so right.”
“No, that’s—what do you mean, she was right?”
