“Totally.”
“Bri . . .” he says in a scolding tone.
“If you don’t believe me, come with. You need the sun anyway.”
He sits up quickly. “Bet.”
~
Liem goes with me down the few short blocks to my client’s place, waiting outside for me to grab the dogs. The park is halfway between their apartment and ours, an easy trip even though my insides ache like someone is finger blasting my fallopian tube while hanging from my pelvic floor like a basketball hoop. That said, it’s hard not to smile when there are puppies around.
At the dog park, I let them loose to begin their F1-speed laps around the perimeter. Liem watches, laughing at their antics, seemingly carefree. He does too much for me, offering to help when he owes me nothing. Of course, I want to stay another month or eight with him. That isn’t the point. While I may be two steps closer to my financial goals, all that progress will reset the second I’m back in California unless I can line up a job before, or within two weeks of, my arrival.
It shouldn’t be this hard, and yet it is. While I believe the universe puts us where we need to be, even if we can’t recognize it at first, I’m struggling to understand why it wants me to stayhere.
I sit cross-legged on the bench next to him, hesitating to mention his offer again.
“So . . .” Liem says. I know exactly what he’s going to bring up.
“I can’t bum off you for another month,” I say.
“It’s not bumming.”See?“You’re taking care of me as much asyou’re taking care of yourself. You get that I like having you here, right?”
“But the whole goal is to go back home, isn’t it?”
He doesn’t seem to like that answer. He turns his body toward me. “Then, if we won’t know each other after next month, can I be blunt?”
I ignore his assumption that I’ll stay. “Obviously.”
“You aren’t in a place to leave yet. Not if you want what you set out to have from the day we met,” he says, and I don’t appreciate it. “This is your opportunity to keep working toward that goal, and you’re turning it down because of your pride. Why is it so hard for you to admit you need a little help when all you do is help everyone around you?”
“I don’t help anyone. Ican’thelp anyone.”
“You do, though. Maybe not the way you’d like to, but you bring light into people’s lives and take on so much emotional labor. You do for me,” he says. “Your body is against you, and even if you are better than you used to be, you’re still forced to live your life around it. You shouldn’t have to lower your standards or settle for the first shitty opportunity that comes along just because you gave yourself a timeline. Give yourself a break instead. Give yourselftime. You can’t recoup three years of theft in a month.”
Who does he think he is? Being all right and shit.I can’t trust good news in my life because so much has been taken away. My momma, my body, my independence. Liem is the balance for all the awfulness that happened with David. Whether I deserve it or not, life led me here, colliding me with him, giving me a moment of happiness and space to breathe. When will I admit that’s what I’ve needed the most?
I give in. “Fine. I’ll consider another month.If. . .”
“If what?”
“If you promise to work on your goals too. Meet some people.Learn how to find your chosen family. Go home knowing you can make friends anywhere, not only when you bribe a brokenhearted baddie with pasta.”
He twists his lips to hide his smile. “Meet people and make friends? I don’t know how to do that.”
“That’s where I come in, Hoodie.” I tug on the strings of his hood. “Here’s a cheat code. You pick a place you like to go to on your own, right? Then whenever you pass by one of your neighbors or coworkers or peers, you ask them if they want to go too. That way, if they turn you down, you’re just going to your favorite spot anyway.”
“That’s smart.”
“I’msmart.” I wink. “Tell me. What would a perfect day look like?”
“Other than hanging out with you?”
Warmth settles in my cheeks.My sweet guy. “If you were alone, babe. Here, close your eyes.”
“We’re going to meditate?”
“We’revisualizing.”
