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I told her in May, clearly, that whatever we’d been doing wasn’t going to keep going. Not because anything was wrong — Bella’s great, she’s funny, she’s easy to be around — but because I don’t have bandwidth for it and I told her that upfront when we started and she said she was good with it and then the end of the semester came and she was not, in fact, good with it. Which I understand. But understanding it doesn’t change the answer.
The answer is no.
It’s been no since May. I was clear.
She’s texted four times in three days and I have not responded to any of them and I feel bad about that, which I’m aware is not an emotion I’m allowed to complain about to anyone in this house, so I’m not going to.
Cash is looking at me.
“What?”
“You made a face.”
“I didn’t make a face.”
“You made a face like someone texted you something you’re about to not deal with.”
“I’m dealing with it.”
“You flipped your phone over.”
“I’m dealing with it slowly.”
He makes a sound that means he's filing this. Cash Rourke is somehow both the person least equipped to give relationship advice and the most likely to give it anyway, which is a quality I find both irritating and useful, depending on the week. He spent the summer, as far as I can piece together, in a series of situations he'll describe when and only when he's ready to, which is fine. We operate on that system.
Wyatt sets a pot of water on the stove and says, to no one in particular, "I was thinking we throw the first one this year."
“The first party?" I say.
“Somebody always hosts the first week back.” He doesn't look up from the stove. “Might as well be us. Theo brought it up.”
“Theo brought up throwing a party?”
“He brought it up like he was against it, which means he wants it.”
This is, in fact, accurate Theo Mercer translation. Theo's default position on anything social is a kind of aggressive neutrality — he'll tell you why it's probably more trouble than it's worth while already deciding where he's going to post up once it starts.
He appeared in the doorway about two minutes ago — dark hair, the sleeve tattoos, the scowl that is his resting face and not a note on the room — and is now leaning against the frame with the posture of a guy who has decided to be present without technically arriving.
“I didn't say I wanted to host it,” he says.
“You said, and I'm quoting,” Wyatt says, “that it would probably be fine.”
“That's not the same as wanting to do it.”
“Theo. Buddy.” Cash swings off the counter. “You spent the whole summer in Providence punching guys during practice. You've gotta put some of that somewhere.”
“I put it somewhere. O'Grady ran us an hour forty.”
“And?”
“Got more in me,” Theo says.
Probably true. Theo runs on a fuel source I've never fully placed — six-four, the tattoos, the jaw, the look of a guy weighing something you'd rather he didn't. He was in Providence for camps, and then somewhere between there and back something happened he hasn't told us, and it's been sitting under the last week like a bruise nobody's pressing.
I respect the bruise. Got one of my own, technically.
I look at my phone, face-down on the counter. Then I look at Wyatt, who's feeding pasta into the pot with the calm of a man who mostly wants everybody fed.
