“That’s understandable,” I say absently before it hits me like a whack upside the head. I’ve embarrassed her by coming on to her. Now she’s chattering on and on because I’ve made her feel stupid. Time to fix this problem. “Ham is awful. Simply dreadful. You need to be able to converse about ham.” I bang a fist on the table to emphasize this critical point and try to defuse the discomfort.
She smiles and laughs lightly. “Yes, exactly. I need to have conversations every day—about ham or synthetic vanilla or when the next train is coming or what I’m doing this weekend or whatever else comes up,” she says, sounding natural again, and I breathe a sigh of relief. Perhaps I haven’t totally scared her off with my hand-under-the-table routine. The routine she loved, the devil in me says.
“Absolutely. Couldn’t agree more.”
“Right? You get it. I know it’ll take time, but I thought if you could help me, and I can truly immerse myself in the language, then I can start to feel like I belong here. I can make the progress I want to make in my career, and I can potentially achieve one of my dreams. To speak another language.”
My spine straightens. All the noise in my head disappears as I key in on that word. Dream.
An image of the sheet of paper I keep in my wallet snaps into crisp focus.
6. Help someone you care about achieve their dream.
That item from Ethan’s list has always been a tough one for me. I haven’t been quite sure how to tackle it, so I’ve put it off. Now I know. Now I get it. This is how I fulfill that wish. This isn’t Christian’s satirical commitment to find a rich vixen. This is real. This matters to Joy. And this mattered to my brother.
“Yes,” I say, clear and confident.
She beams, her eyes sparkling, her smile stretching wide. “You will?”
“Under one condition,” I add.
“Okay,” she says, curiously.
“You can’t pay me.”
“What?”
I swallow thickly and look her in the eyes. “It’s an item on my bucket list.”
“Are you sick?” Her tone is laced with concern.
I shake my head and steel myself to tell her. “No. It’s my brother’s list.”
“Is he ill?”
“He was. When you asked me about him the other day, and I said he’s very funny, that wasn’t entirely true.” I take a breath, remembering Ethan toasting me when I landed the job at the aquarium several years ago, saying the job sounded great but a little fishy. I’d rolled my eyes, telling him to try again with a better pun. He never stopped the fish jokes, and I’d do nearly anything to hear another one. “He was funny. He died more than a year ago.”
“I’m so sorry,” she says, her hand stretching across the table. She threads her fingers through mine, and I can tell I’m forgiven for my wayward action before. This isn’t a prelude to seduction. It’s the gesture of a friend. Perhaps I need that more at the moment. Maybe we both do.
“Yeah, me, too. Sorry I didn’t say anything the other day. I guess I should have but . . .”
She shakes her head, dismissing the notion. “We only say things when we’re ready. You weren’t ready then.”
Her response warms some cold, brittle part of me. The part that’s been on ice for the last year. “I think I just wanted to enjoy that day with you. I didn’t want to bring anything sad into our Île de la Cité adventure.” I take a breath then dive into the deep end. “He was in a car accident four years ago. Hit by a drunk driver, and wound up in a wheelchair. Couldn’t walk. Could barely use his hands. I helped take care of him. Which is a really weird thing to say—that I took care of my adult brother.”
“Why is that weird?” Her voice is soft, and her hand squeezes mine.
“You just don’t expect to be in that position. Maybe I was Blaze Dalton, in a way.”
A faint smile tugs at her pretty lips. “Were you?”
I shake my head. “Not really. He had carers, or aides as you call them. But, you know, they’re not family. And we don’t live in a castle or on an estate. We all helped. Mum. Dad.” I shrug. “What else can you do?”
“You can’t do anything else.” She swallows roughly. “I’d do the same for my sister, Allison. You just have to help.”
“I was getting ready to move to Paris shortly before the accident. We’d even talked about going together maybe, Ethan and I. He was keen on the idea . . .” My voice trails off momentarily, as the memory of our plans sharpens, images of those days, jogging in London, plotting our next steps, snap before my eyes. “But that didn’t happen. I stayed in London, writing marketing materials for the exhibits at the aquarium and doing translations of them for French visitors. That old marine biology degree came in handy after all, since it enabled me to have a job near home, which meant I could help out, along with my parents. Ethan was so tough, though. Sturdy in his own way. Not saying he was happy about it, but he didn’t let it get him down. At least, not like you’d think it could get you down.”
“That’s incredible. It takes a lot of internal strength, I imagine.”
“He had that.” I sigh. “And the rub is, he was actually managing well enough with his lot in life before he came down with an infection. That’s what did him in.” I shake my head.
