Epic Adventures of Lydia Bennet (9781476763248) (32 page)

I started playing with the seams of the couch's slipcover. “Strangers aren't all bad, right?”

Jane just shook her head. “Of course not, but you have to be careful. I mean, Bing did get mugged—”

“—twice. Yeah, I know.”

Awkward silence wormed its way into the room. I don't know if Jane noticed, because she just hummed a little to herself as she sipped her tea.

Then, suddenly—

“I have to do a couple of work emails, but the office gave me the afternoon off so we can spend the day together.”

“Oh.” I blinked. “Great.”

“So what haven't you seen yet?” she asked excitedly. “Have you been to Macy's? It's huge, so much bigger than the one in the mall back home. Or what about the Cloisters? That's really pretty.”

“Haven't seen either,” I replied.

As Jane started tackling those work emails so we could enjoy an afternoon of shopping and cloistering, I smiled and played along, but I had this weird feeling in my stomach.

Now that Jane's back, it's like I'm back to being Jane's sister. Back to being the tourist, being shown around. Not that that's bad! But for the last three days, I haven't been a tourist. I've been part of the city. Part of a group.

I like that version of Lydia. But now that Jane's back . . . I have to go back to the old one.

Or maybe not.

Hey, what are you doing tonight? Milo and I are going to see Wicked with some friends and one bailed so we have an extra ticket. Interested? —Kat

A flutter went through my stomach. I'd love to spend one last night being that other Lydia . . . but I was worried things were left a little weird with Milo and the whole asking-me-out thing.

But then, another text chimed my phone.

You leave Saturday right? You can't leave without saying goodbye, anyway. Might as well do something fun :)

I did have so much fun at the party the other night. And on the tour with Milo, despite any weirdness.

“Hey, Jane,” I called out, pulling her attention away from email. “Do you think we'll be out all night?”

“Um . . .” She squinted, considering, and I swear I saw her eyes flutter shut a couple of times. “We can if you want to be! Again, I'm so sorry I've been gone for half the week. . . . Was there something in particular you wanted to do tonight?”

You wanna know the truth? Old me—Internet-famous me—would have totally loved dragging my big sister out for a night on the town, playing her guilt over going MIA in my favor to party till 3:00 a.m. and sneaking into VIP lounges and whatever other stuff Jane would never want to do if I just asked.

But now, I wanted something else.

“No, it's okay!” I said. “Actually, um, Casey invited me to go see
Wicked
later. She's got an extra ticket. And we'll probably hang out after. Is that okay?”

Jane looked relieved as she said, “Of course! It sounds like fun. And it's a great show; you'll absolutely love it.”

I grinned and typed out a quick message:

Definitely.

“But until then . . .” Jane hit a few last keys on her computer and stood up, grabbing her purse. “You ready to go? The continuation of our New York adventure awaits!”

We wrapped up our second-to-last day of sisterly sightseeing early (as expected, travel exhaustion hit Jane fiercely before dinner)
and I met Milo at the subway stop near her apartment that evening.

“Kat's meeting us at the theater,” he said, almost sounding apologetic. “She had a late class today, it was easier.”

Any worries I had in that moment that hanging out with Milo on my own, even just for the subway ride, was going to be awkward or weird were quickly erased.

“So how're your feet?”

“My feet?”

“Your sister's back, right? Figured you continued your city tour.”

“Oh, yeah. My feet are better this time,” I said. “Getting used to walking city blocks.”

“Good.” He smiled. “Soon you'll be all assimilated.”

“Does that mean that I'll be a speed-walking, neutral-color-wearing New Yorker before I leave on Saturday?”

“I hope not,” he replied. “Saturday, huh? Did you make it to the Brooklyn Bridge in your travels?” he asked.

“No,” I said. Truth be told, Jane had suggested it, but when I asked if we could wait and go tomorrow night, she put on her worried face and insisted it was much safer during the day.

So we didn't go.

“But I'm kind of burned out on the tourist stuff, anyway.” I shrugged. “It's not as cool as I thought it would be.”

Milo looked at me, remaining steady as I gripped the metal railing to avoid tumbling into him as the train began to slow down for the next stop.

“The touristy parts of New York are fine. You just gotta know how to look at 'em.” He moved away from me, toward the door.

“This isn't our stop, is it?” I asked, looking up at the map to see where we were.

“It is now. Come on.”

The door dinged open and he looked back to make sure I was following him before stepping out onto the platform.

A platform with signs pointing toward the Brooklyn Bridge.

We emerged into the slowly setting sun, rounded a corner, and there it was.

“I thought you said it's best to see it at night?” I asked.

“It'll be dark by the time we get across.”

“Won't we be late?”

“Nah, we got time. Besides, this is important.”

We started walking, the footpath in the center of the bridge crowded with people in suits headed home after work, families, tourists with cameras. Instead of doing the usual crowd-dodge (at which I am skilled), we strolled slowly, each step both wandering and deliberate. Kinda like our conversation.

“So bridges, huh?” I asked, looking around us as we walked side by side down the pathway. “What do you like about them so much?”

The view was pretty, all the cars trailing along below us, and the water flowing beside them. The tourists were fun to watch, eavesdrop on, just like they had been everywhere else. The bridge itself was neat, if a little old for my tastes. But so far, I didn't see why he thought it was the end-all-be-all of things to do in New York City.

“You know all that stuff you like about psychology?” he asked, and I nodded. “That's what I like about architecture. Figuring out how things are put together, how they get made.”

“Bridges are people, too?” I teased.

“It's not just bridges,” he said, delicately running his hand along the railing. “I like the idea of making something that's still gonna be around for decades, maybe even centuries. Places mean something, even if they just . . . blend into the background of a memory for most people. They're still part of it, y'know? I could make something that'd be a part of so many people's lives, even if they didn't know it. And maybe whatever happens coulda happened on another bridge or in another skyscraper or tunnel that somebody else built in that spot if I didn't do it—who knows, doesn't matter. What matters is I would know I did that.”

“Lofty goals,” I said, if only because I didn't know what else to say to something so . . . figured out.

“If you're gonna dream, might as well dream big,” he said. “I think I read that on a coffee cup somewhere.”

“Right,” I said, smirking. “Anyway, if this”—I waved my hand around, indicating the expanse of the bridge—“is the backdrop to my memory of my last big night out in NYC, I think I should know more about it.”

“Yeah? Like what?”

“Things an architecture student slash bridge enthusiast should know. Like . . . who built it?”

“I could just make up all the answers—I'm pretty good at that, you know.”

“You could,” I agreed.

He paused, and I saw the hint of a smile flash briefly before he nodded and answered my question:

“John Augustus Roebling. He designed the bridge. But like a thousand guys built it.”

“When?”

“Finished in 1883.”

“How? Did they even have cranes or whatever to move big stones back then? I'm assuming those tower thingies are made of really big stones, right?”

A grin spread across his face and I blushed, realizing I was shooting off a dozen questions in a row again. “Sorry.”

“Don't be,” Milo said, still smiling. “I like that you ask a lot of questions.”

“I thought you didn't like questions when you could be looking at bridges.”

“Might've changed my mind,” he said, shifting his gaze from me to the sky.

I reminded the butterflies in my stomach that they shouldn't be there, couldn't be there.

“Stop here for a sec,” he said suddenly, and we did. “The sun'll be behind the skyline in a few minutes, and this is the best place in all of New York to watch the sunset.”

I frowned. “Aren't you supposed to go up to some high point to watch a sunrise or a sunset? Shouldn't we be at the Empire State Building or something?”

Milo laughed. “Why would you wanna do that when you can be right in the middle of it all? Just . . . watch.”

So I watched.

I watched the sky separate into three distinct bands of blue, yellow, and pink as a little boy clapped his hands while his dad lifted him up onto his shoulders so he could see over the rail.

I watched lights flicker on throughout the city as a woman stopped her bike to take a selfie with the sunset, and then turned around and just looked at the sky.

And I watched Milo watch the sunset. I watched the open-mouthed smile on his face as he watched the last of the light hovering between the cables stretched out in front of us, reflecting off those golden flecks in his wide eyes.

He watched the sunset. I watched the people. But somehow, I think we still saw the same thing.

Either way, he was right. There's no way the bridge wasn't the best place in the city to be right now.

“Wow,” I said as the sun disappeared behind the Manhattan skyline.

Milo forced his stare away from the sky and looked over at me. “Worth it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Worth it.”

I'd been looking into his eyes, still bright even without light to make them sparkle back at me, but my eyes followed the same path the sun had just laid out in the sky behind him, drifting down the length of his barely crooked nose, past the day-old stubble underneath it, and landing on his lips.

I wondered if they were as soft as they sounded when he spoke
of things he loved. I wondered if his fingertips were callused from long hours holding his pencil as he drew things the way only he saw them. I wondered, if he kissed me, if his hair would brush across my temple, tickling my skin enough to make me break away, giggling, until he pulled me back in.

I wondered if I had been wrong. If this was right, after all.

My gaze flicked back to his eyes, which were still fixated on mine, and I wondered if I should lean forward, if I should—

But then he looked away, so suddenly that the only thing I was left wondering was whether those few seconds had really happened at all.

“I'm really glad you got to see that,” he said, picking up the walk across the bridge once again. “Wouldn't be a trip without it.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

The sky grew darker and the city lights brighter as we crossed the rest of the bridge into Manhattan. We didn't talk much for the rest of the way—a surprisingly easy silence—before hopping onto another train that would take us as close to the theater as possible.

“Two missed calls from Kat,” Milo said as we emerged from underground and back into the land of cell reception. “You?”

“One, and a text,” I said, already flipping through my phone out of habit. “She says they left the tickets at will call for us because the show's about to start. Crap.”

“It's okay, we still have a few minutes,” he reassured me. “Kat gets paranoid about being on time for stuff. Looks like I've been getting
Where are you?
texts since half an hour before showtime. Oops.”
He sheepishly stuffed his phone back in his pocket and picked up the pace.

I have to admit, part of me had been a little disappointed that this version of Lydia's last hurrah with her new friends was going to be spent doing something so very touristy and not just part of blending into the city, but first there was the bridge, and now even as we ran through the outskirts of Times Square—the most touristy part of New York—to get to the theater on time, that feeling had almost completely faded. Milo knew exactly where we were, exactly how to cut through the crowds and around obstacles, and I was right there with him.

We grabbed our tickets, snuck into the theater just as the lights were dimming, and made our way up to the balcony.

“Look who showed up,” Kat whispered as we sat down in the seats next to her. A guy I recognized from the party leaned forward and waved at us from the other side of Kat, and I waved back, whispering to both of them:

“Sorry we're late, we—”

The sudden burst of sound from the orchestra cut me off as the show began. I shot a quick glance over at Milo, and at Kat, both already watching the stage. I realized even if this wound up being terrible and horrendously touristy, what mattered to me now was that I was experiencing it with people who made me feel anything but. I settled back into my seat, all misplaced disappointment having vanished as we got lost in the spectacle in front of us.

*  *  *

“Wow!” I said, twirling around on the sidewalk several hours later. “That was amazing. No wonder Jane loves it so much.”

“The tourist
would
love
Wicked
,” Milo teased, directing his comment over my head and toward Kat, who was walking alongside of me.