But she didn't.
I wonder if Theo's making her do this.
I don't have to wonder how Theo will feel if I don't grab this olive branch and grab it tight. And I just like him.
“Of course,” I say. “Sounds fun.”
She puts one arm around my towel-wrapped shoulders and gives me a quick squeeze. Oh. “Go get changed,” she says.
Josey's car is much better than Theo's but her driving is much worse. This is definitely a side of her I haven't seen before. She yells obscenities out her window at semi-innocent drivers who she thinks have slighted her in between talking to me in that honey voice of hers.
“I am so hungry,” she says. “I'm hungry all the time lately. Maybe I'm going through a growth spurt.”
“How tall are you?”
“Almost five-ten.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah, but I'm not taller than Theo yet. That's the goal.”
I settle back in my seat. I have the seat heater on, even though it's still warm outside, because hey, I'm not going to have a seat heater and not take advantage of it. “Is Josey your full name?”
“Josephine,” she says. “But if you call me that I might have to kill you.”
“I think it's pretty.”
“Aww, thank you.”
“Josephine?” I say, hesitantly.
She laughs. “Yes, Taylor-phine?”
I want to ask if she likes me.
“Are we, um. In a relationship? You and me?”
She looks at me when her eyes should be on the damn road, smiles at me. “Look who's all bold, asking questions!”
“Technically I was told asking questions wasn't allowed.”
“Yeah, and that's why you've been all timid. Mmmhmm.”
“I'm not timid!”
“It's okay, it's cute,” she says. “So, yes, we are in a relationship. But probably not a kind of relationship you've ever had before.”
“I have a father and a sister and I've never had those before,” I say. “Relationships I've never had is a concept I'm nice and familiar with.”
“So you're ahead of the curve.”
“I think for there to be a curve there would have to be some kind of...established path for this kind of relationship. With an established curve.”
She laughs a little, shakes her head. “You have got to meet my parents.”
“Are they like us?”
“With some of them. Let's see. Aunt Annie's with both of my parents, romantically, sexually speaking. She's the one they've known the longest. There's Lee, he's only involved with my mom, as far as I know. My dad has this guy Charlie who I think is also involved with Annie but I could be wrong. And Charlie and my mom fool around some I think, but they're not like serious.”
“Huh.”
“You're not allowed to think they're freaks,” she says. “You're a freak now too.”
“But it's different, they're all...sharing people. You and I are both just attached at Theo.”
“Well that's what I'm saying, is that it's not that simple. And that's why you asked. Because you know it's not that simple either.”
“We're kind of on a date right now, aren't we,” I say.
“Ha, maybe a little.”
“What if we wanted to be together? Hypothetically.”
She says, “You mean, romantically sexually speaking?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well,” she says. “I haven't been with a girl since I was figuring myself out in middle school, but I'm not closed off to it or anything.”
“I've never been with a girl, I don't think I want to, I'm just...”
“Taylor.” She reaches over and squeezes my hand. “Ease up. We're just talking.”
“Right.”
We're just talking.
We're talking, just the two of us, for the first time really in a very long time.
And...
Shouldn't this be harder?
Or easier, maybe?
It just should be one of the two, that's all.
She parks outside Wendy's. “Okay, so hypothetically if we did want to do that, we'd talk about it and then move forward how we wanted to.”
“Wouldn't we have to ask Theo?”
“We'd get his okay, after we'd made up our minds. He wouldn't have to be part of the discussion.”
“So we're...allowed to have stuff just you and me?”
“He's not the boss of us!” she says.
“I know.”
She tilts her head a little. “You kind of don't, do you?”
I look down. “I'm working on it.”
She squeezes my hand again. “Not the boss of us.” Her hand is so soft and cold.
“Yeah.”
“I'm not gonna let some guy be the boss of me, come on. If you and I wanted to get involved with each other, we'd talk about it and clear it with Theo, same way he would if there were someone else, or same way we would if you or I wanted to get involved with someone totally new.”
“I...don't think I want that,” I say. “This is busy enough.”
“That I agree with,” she says. “There have been guys that I was kind of interested in but every time I seriously considered it it was like...ugh, I'm in four APs and I do tech and food bank and basketball and I work at my dad's store on weekends and Theo and family dinners and no, dating someone else sounds way too exhausting. I'm happy how I am.”
Being happy how you are sounds amazing.
Hey, I shaved three seconds off my butterfly time. I had a nice conversation with Josey. Maybe anything's possible.
“Come on, firefly,” she says. “Let's feed our growth spurts.”
All our parking and talking means we don't have time to eat at Wendy's, so we sneak everything back up to the catwalk and have a feast by the light board. Josey half-heartedly runs through cues she has lined up in a spreadsheet taped over the board. Of course she would have a spreadsheet. She probably has her spreadsheet of her nights with Theo, too.
Her hand that isn't hitting light cue buttons once in a
