That was it. I didn’t even get the courtesy of punctuation or capital letters. Yeah sorry been busy. He probably thought I was this heart-eyed baby high schooler trying to nab a college boyfriend, and now he’s just sitting there with his stubble and his pleated pants, an ankle resting on his knee in that trademark Casual Dude Pose.
A horrifying thought occurs to me: What if he thinks I’ve been pining for him all year?
I have a sudden urge to take a bath in mango smoothie.
“Quinn?” a nurse calls, and I spring to my feet.
Tarek makes a move to follow me, but I hold up a hand. Blessedly, he sits back down, resumes his CDP.
The nurse takes my vitals and tells me the doctor will be in shortly, which in urgent-care-speak means anywhere from three minutes to eternity. No one seems to take the “urgent” very seriously. Once I was here with my best friend, Julia, when she sliced her heel on a jagged rock at Green Lake, and we waited for two hours before someone stitched her up.
“I’m sorry, that doesn’t look very fun,” says the doctor when she steps inside.
“That’s where you’d be mistaken. I’m having the time of my life.” I explain to her that I’m allergic to mangos but I haven’t had a reaction in forever. “Gimme the good drugs.”
The good drugs turn out to be a dose of Benadryl along with a prescription stronger than what you can get over the counter, plus a topical steroid cream.
“The rash should clear up in a few days,” she says, and tells me to come back or see my regular doctor if it doesn’t. “Oh—and the antihistamines are going to make you a little drowsy.”
By the time I meet Tarek back in the waiting room, where he’s scrolling through his phone, the guy with the possible missing finger is gone. It’s seven thirty, and Naomi and Paul have probably already had their first dance. We’re usually scheduled to leave after the cake cutting, but with a wedding as big as theirs, we’ll stay longer to coordinate transportation for the guests.
“Everything good?” he asks, slipping his phone back into his pants pocket. “You’re already looking a lot better.”
My face flames at this non-compliment because of course it does. “I’ll survive. Just have to pick up a prescription, if that’s okay.”
Fortunately, there’s a drugstore around the corner. My eyes are droopy and I’m all out of small talk for Tarek. This is worse than having played harp at a wedding with Jonathan, worse than fake-smiling through the ceremony and pretending all of it isn’t some grand romantic ruse. It’s a reminder of the time last year I felt it could have been real—until a crushing wave of reality made me realize I’d been right all along.
The drive to my house is quiet as we chase the watermelon sky. Seattle summers can feel infinite, and it’s not even the solstice yet. A couple times, I catch Tarek’s eyes flicking over to me, as though he’s making sure I’m okay or maybe trying to make sense of this whole thing.
I have spent the past year convincing myself I despised you, I want to tell him. And I’d finally gotten good at it.
He puts the car in park. Rubs again at the redness on his wrist. Stop scratching, I can practically hear his mom say. I’m not scratching. I’m TOUCHING, he’d say back.
“Thanks for playing chauffeur,” I say, unzipping my bag and removing my keys, ready to pull the covers over my head and sleep for a year. Or at least until the next season of The Bachelor.
“Of course.” Tarek gestures to the purple lanyard on my key chain. It’s a newer addition, a gift from my parents when my sole college acceptance rolled in. “Hey, congrats. You’re going to UW? I meant to ask you—I never saw anything about it on social media.”
I look him right in the eye and summon all my saltiness. “Yeah, sorry, been busy.”
3
The meds send me to bed at eight thirty like the wild party animal I am. I wake up Sunday morning with our eleven-year-old cat Edith on my chest. Lady Edith Clawley—so named because of Asher’s Downton Abbey obsession—was originally Asher’s cat, but she bonded with me because I slipped her slivers of deli meat. She rewards me by regularly cutting off my air supply.
“Hi, baby,” I coo at her, trying to slide her to one side. Her eyes are half closed, like it’s too early for her to give a shit. Same, Edith. Same.
I roll over and grab my phone, pushing the bottle of antidepressants on my nightstand out of the way. They’re for my OCD, and while they don’t completely silence my intrusive thoughts, they make them a lot quieter. I reply to a few texts from Julia announcing she’s returned to civilization after a camping trip and informing me I’m coming over later to get ready for Alyson Sawicki’s grad party tonight. Our last grad party—or at least the last one we’ve been invited to.
The reality of a summer weekend hits me in a way it hasn’t yet. Graduation was last week, and the next three months before college stretch ahead of me. The University of Washington is only a twenty-minute bus ride away, so I’ll be living at home, which I’d be okay with if my parents hadn’t already picked out my first-year business classes, a freshman business group for me to join, and a spreadsheet of other courses they think will serve the future career with Borrowed + Blue they’ve also picked out for me, the same way they did for Asher. Except Asher worked an after-school job that helped her save up enough to live in the dorms, while my after-school job has been practicing the harp.
It doesn’t feel like I’m moving “onward and upward,” like our valedictorian talked about at graduation. It feels like nothing is changing.
Thinking about college
