I decide to experiment and lay my own forearm down so my hand sits just on the inside of his. We抮e both still wearing our sunglasses so I can抰 see his eyes to determine whether he抯 noticed.
When he doesn抰 move again, I hold my breath and graze my fingertips along his palm, which he unfurls instantly. I peek at him through my lenses, seeing his throat work and his nostrils flare slightly. His fingertips rise up just so, smoothing along the underside of my wrist.
I physically feel myself wanting to ruin this moment with a dumb remark or?God forbid?a sound effect. Rather than chance it, I shovel back some edamame with my free hand, silently begging for him to be the one to speak first.
揝o?anything new you plan to add in tomorrow抯 set??he asks.
When I lick the spicy garlicky remnants from a finger, his thumb wraps around to push my palm into his. A million synapses begin to buzz, and I will that hand not to sweat.
I search my brain, ping-ponging around in my head. 揢m?Nothing profound. But I did decide to start trying natural deodorant this week. You know, because the regular stuff just has all kinds of chemicals and is actually pretty toxic. And then it didn抰 take long for me to decide that I抎 just rather die a little bit sooner with some of that crap in my system than gain a few extra years having to smell that toxic.?
揂lways love a good public service announcement.?
揈xcept my sex toy one, of course.?
He laughs through his nose as his thumb continues its circles across the top of my hand.
Sushi arrives, and it抯 not until halfway through the meal that I notice him using his fork to eat instead of the chopsticks. It抯 also when I notice that he uses that fork with his opposite hand, so he can keep hold of mine with the other.
It抯 the best lunch of my life.
34 MONTHS AGO
揑 used to think the worst thing in life was to end up alone. It抯 not. The worst thing in life is to end up with people that make you feel alone.?- Robin Williams
MEYER
You wouldn抰 think that many people would spend Christmas Eve out at a comedy club, but you抎 be wrong.
It抯 packed, overheated, and overflowing with the drunk and jolly. Hazel and I agreed to spend this Christmas Eve with Farley who has ferreted her way into our lives and asserted herself as a regular fixture.
I don抰 know how to define our relationship. Friends? I give her occasional advice on her stand-up, but I wouldn抰 go so far as to say that I抦 mentoring her. Friends is accurate, I suppose. The amount of space she takes up in my brain certainly feels friendly.
She and Hazel have a unique bond, and in spite of Farley constantly making jokes about how she should not be allowed to be an influence, I do think she抯 good for Hazel. She makes her laugh, at least. And, more than that, she helps handle some of the stuff that I muck up條ike issues with friend groups, a boy that shoved her down in some game called wall-ball梐nd she handles it with productive advice. I, on the other hand, was ready to yank her out of school entirely and find a private tutor and not let her out of the house ever again.
Instead, per Fee抯 instruction, we all met at a park three nights a week and practiced until Hazel kicked the kid抯 ass handily in wall-ball. He completely avoids her now.
She helps Hazel with her dance routines梬hich, I might add, is a highly specialized skill. Not being able to hear a rhythm requires a different kind of memorization and feel. I抎 been extremely wary梐ngry, even梬hen Farley pushed me to let her join. But the brat has proven me wrong again.
揓ust because she can抰 hear the music doesn抰 mean she can抰 feel it, Meyer. She likes to move, and is begging to do this. It抯 good for her. Let her try,?Farley had said.
I抎 felt powerless and immediately tired by the mere idea of arguing about it, so I did let her try.
Watching her learn a dance?God, it makes me sick with pride. Fee makes Hazel want to be brave, and then she follows that up with helping her apply it. They memorize a succession of gestures to indicate the start of a song and then Hazel takes it from there. It抯 not lost on me that Farley ends up having to memorize the dances herself in order to help Hazel in certain sticky spots.
So, when my parents told me they were headed to Hawaii for Christmas, Hazel asked if we could go to Lance抯 club and see Farley抯 last show of the year, and I agreed. Although as I watch what appears to be a group of frat guys in from out of town, greeting each other with varying degrees of chest bumps and yelling about 揝hots!?I wince and wonder if we should have just met up with her afterwards.
Farley gets up to do her set and the part of my brain that I usually donkey-kick into submission rears up and catches me off guard when she sidles out under the lights.
She抯?she抯 beautiful.
It抯 not as if I haven抰 noticed that she抯 attractive all this time, but there抯 some force that opens my eyes fully in this moment. Maybe it抯 the sum of Hazel抯 recital yesterday, ice skating the day before, and that whole Christmas spirit thing. Whatever it is, I take her in and feel like she抯 in focus. Like one of those pictures that starts out looking like a multitude of different tiny photos but turns into a portrait when you back away from it.
She抯 up there, with her little red boots, some band t-shirt I don抰 recognize, and a skirt that showcases creamy ivory legs. The shadows from the spotlight and the green and red Christmas lights play on the hollows beneath her cheeks, making the lines of her jaw stand out.
I realize that I know the shape of that jaw and how her cheeks pull up when she grins. How she smiles at Hazel and signs梟ot speaking for my benefit and only signing so that I know when it抯 just between them. How she bites the tip of her thumb when she抯 excited about something. I know how the corners of her lips try to pull down when she frowns條ike the time I firmly declined when she hinted at setting me up with a friend of hers. How the apples of her cheeks make her eyes nearly disappear when she laughs full-out.
Fuck.
I have to tell her. As emotionally suppressed as I am, I know that I have to tell her that I抦 developing feelings for her?I need to give her a chance to separate herself a bit while not cutting her out of Hazel抯 life completely. I抣l have to find a non-lecherous way to tell her that it would be more appropriate for her to maintain some space, to somehow define the boundaries of this relationship. All of the late-night texts come back to me, and I feel a rush of embarrassment. Embarrassed to be pining after this young woman when she抯 been nothing but a friend to us. She might jokingly flirt, but that抯 just her. She jokes.
God damn it, Meyer. You can write a script full of comedic foreshadowing and, yet you still didn抰 see this shit coming?!
And then the other, much tinier voice in my brain has the balls to chime in.
What if she抯 feeling the same way back? What if this is more than friendship, or work, or whatever, to her, too?
I haven抰 dared to let myself think this way in so long?
Before I know it the applause is crackling and I抳e stared, stupefied, for the entirety of her set. My mouth goes dry as she walks toward us, as she looks?different, somehow. Almost shy.
揅an we talk later??I hear my own voice ask.
揧es,?she smiles. Just, yes. No questions or hesitations or worried eyes. Just yes.
I feel myself smile back; a quick, small laugh barks out of me. She smiles bigger but looks down, again being demure. Though, that抯 impossible because this is the same woman who once told me (in these mere months that I抳e known her) that she likes to make lists in the Notes app on her phone while she masturbates, in an effort to try and 搕rain her brain to be more into organization and structure.?She wants organizing to make her excited and is attempting to Pavlov抯-dog herself into it. Shy, she is not. I clamp my lips down to stifle another laugh at the memory of it.
We start making our way to the exit after I grab Farley抯 jacket from the spot behind the bar where she keeps it. We say our quick goodbye抯 to Marissa梩onight抯 bartender and Fee抯 friend since elementary, her bunk-slash-roommate. Marissa also fluently speaks ASL, and Farley抯 been trying to get me to hire her for tutoring, which I plan to take her up on soon.
As I help Fee into her coat, that hopeful, optimistic feeling continues to rise. That feeling starts firing off sparklers when she holds my hand on her shoulder and looks up to smile at me briefly.
Thwap
A towel slaps the back of my head. When I whip around and find Marissa at the end of the bar she yells over the noise, 揗istletoe!?and points to a spot above us.
Fee抯 expression pales and she says 揗arissa, stop it!?before she bolts out the door, holding Hazel抯 hand.
I turn an annoyed glare back at Marissa, but she抯 already been called over to the frat guys again.
揓ones棓 I start, trying to catch up to her.
揇ad?!?she says as I get through the door. I frown as I follow her line of sight and see a man, with her same-colored hair, scowling down at her.