You Know Me Well (12 page)

We have the place to ourselves.

Still, Ryan closes the bedroom door behind me. He puts some indie band on the speakers and makes sure the song is wrapping around us. I kick off my shoes and sit on his bed, because that’s what I always do.

“I have so much to tell you,” he says. “So so much.”

He can’t stand still. He’s changing the song. He’s lining up my shoes. He’s fiddling with a tennis racket that for some reason is on his desk.

“Okay,” he says. “Where do I start?”

I see how happy he is. I see how eager he is to talk to me. And I realize with a painful clarity that comes from years of studying his face: This has nothing to do with my message. This has nothing at all to do with us.

He doesn’t sit down next to me. He stays by the desk, fiddling with the racket.

“So the thing is, Taylor is throwing a party tonight and he really, really,
really
wants me to come. It’s not like a rager or anything—it’s just a Pride thing his friends do. Watching movies and hanging out. It sounds so awesome. I mean, we’ve been texting so much it’s like I already know most of the people who are going to be there. He’s friends with so many artists—there’s this one girl who’s a puppeteer. Like, that’s her life’s work. How cool is that? And Taylor’s cooking—did I tell you he cooks? He’s not braggy about it or anything, but I have this sense that he’s awesome at it, too. I mean, you don’t make the food for your own party unless you’re good, right?”

I don’t even buy the potato chips for my own parties, so I can’t begin to answer that question.

But Ryan’s not looking for an answer. He just wants me to listen.

“I know it’s last-minute, but I would love it if you could come with me. Taylor’s really excited to meet you, and honestly I’m not sure I’m ready to go back and forth from the city solo. Taylor would’ve come and picked me up, but it’s his party, so he has to do all the pre-party things. And like I said, some of his friends sound really cool, so who knows—maybe you’ll hit it off with one of them. And even if you don’t, we’ll just be watching movies, so it’s not like you’ll be forced to have awkward conversations if you don’t want to.”

He is so blithely happy and I can’t stand it. I honestly can’t stand it.

He keeps talking. “I know it’s not as exciting as the party you were at on Saturday night—which you still need to tell me all about, by the way. But yeah. It’ll be fun. Really.”

“So let me make sure I’ve got this right,” I say. “You made me come back here from the city just so I could go back into the city with you?”

“I didn’t know you were in the city until you told me you were on the train! I thought you were at home. Maybe working on your
Plath project
.”

“What does that mean?”

“Why don’t you tell me? I think you’re the one with the secrets here.”

He says it playfully, not meanly. He’s in a good mood. He’s having a ball. The world is his oyster, Taylor is his pearl, and I’m somewhere on the other side of the shell.

I want to play along. I want to be his friend here. I want to be able to smile and laugh and slap him on the back and go along with whatever he says.

But I can’t. I just can’t.

“No,” I say.

Ryan looks at me strangely. “No?”

“Yeah. No.”

“What do you mean, no?”

“I mean I can’t do this. I really, truly can’t do this.”

My heart is in full panic mode. Of all the things I’ve imagined saying to him, why is this the one that’s coming out? I’m already figuring out how to backpedal, how to pretend I’m only kidding. It’s not too late.

Then he asks, “You can’t do
what
?” And it’s too late.

“Are you serious?” I say. “Can you possibly be serious?”

He puts down the tennis racket, as if doing this suddenly makes him serious. He’s looking at me like I’m a pet that’s gone feral.

And, fuck it, maybe I am.

“Look,” he says, “I’m sorry I yanked you back here to go into the city again. Had I known you were there, I would’ve just met you. You understand, right?”

“No,” I say. “No no no no no no
no
. This isn’t about that. You can’t possibly think this is about that.”

This is where he should ask,
Then what’s it about?
But he doesn’t. Because he knows. And asking that question will take us one step closer to the answer.

I give it to him anyway.

“When I say I can’t do this anymore, I mean I can’t continue to trample over my own feelings just to keep things okay with you. I can’t. And that means I can’t sit here on your bed and tell you that, sure, I would love to go with you to your new boyfriend’s party. The fact that you could ask me to do that means you’ve done a much better job separating yourself than I have. But there’s only one me, Ryan. And he’s so fucking in love with you it’s scary.”

I’m starting to shake. I can’t believe this is happening.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Ryan says.

“That’s not my point!”
I shout.

“I know.” Ryan’s voice is quieter now. “I know that’s not your point.”

There. I’ve done it. I’ve defeated his good mood. And it doesn’t make me feel any better.

“We talked about this,” he says gently. “We knew what we were doing.”

“We were lying!” I tell him. “The whole time,
we were lying
.”

He shakes his head. “I never lied to you.”

“No, but you lied to yourself. If you actually feel there isn’t anything more to what we’re doing than friendship, or if you really don’t think that fooling around affects what we are—then you’re lying to yourself. But have you ever really believed it? Do you really have no idea how much I love you? How much I want this to work out?”

Ryan looks horrified, and I understand that both of us have been afraid of this conversation, for different reasons.

“Why are you doing this?” he asks.

“Because you are the best thing in my life and I know I’m the best thing in your life. Because it’s one thing for me to think you aren’t ready to be with anyone and it’s totally another for you to want to be with someone besides me. Because I know how it feels when we kiss each other. Because I feel like I have spent my whole life waiting to tell you the truth, and if I hold it in any longer, it is going to make me hate both of us. Because I don’t want to be your wingman—I want to be your goddamn copilot.”

“But what if I don’t want that?” Ryan is adamant. “What if I want Taylor?”

I can’t look at him. I am falling apart. I wrap my arms around myself. I stare at the carpet under my feet.

“I mean,” Ryan continues, “what if Taylor’s the one I want to date? That doesn’t mean I don’t want you as my best friend. I want you as my best friend. Always. Doesn’t that matter more than dating?”

I don’t look up. “I know. I know all that. And maybe I’m being selfish, but I want everything. I want all of you. Because I’m in love with all of you.”

I say this and I realize—there’s nothing else I can say. I can repeat it a million different ways—but there’s nothing more I can add, nothing stronger than this.

I am trying not to think about kissing on this bed. I am trying not to think about being naked on this carpet. I am trying not to remember all the times we closed that door and became those people and made everything feel possible.

He walks over and sits next to me. I feel the weight of him against the mattress. The dip and the slight lift.

He puts a hand on my shoulder. Not romantic. Consoling.

“Look,” he tells me, “I can say it over and over again. You are my best friend. You are my best friend.
You are my best friend
. I love you like that, which is huge. I don’t want to hurt that, and I don’t want to hurt you. I know you’re making it seem like it’s obvious that you’d react this way to Taylor, but honestly, it feels out of the blue to me. I know it isn’t—I know that now. But you have to understand, to me it is. I never thought what we did was … that. I am very, very sorry if you did. But I didn’t do anything to make you think that. I didn’t. It’s always been clear to me. And that doesn’t make you any less awesome to me. You are completely awesome to me. You’re just not my boyfriend. You’re my best friend.”

“But do those have to be two different things?” I ask, barely keeping the sob from engulfing my voice.

“In our case, yes.”

This is so much worse than I feared it would be.

We sit there for a minute or two. I have nothing left to say. He has nothing left to say.

Finally, it’s Ryan who breaks the silence.

“Look, I saw you dancing on that bar. And I read about your adventures on Saturday night. Man, that made me jealous. But I’m glad for it, because it shows that you’re going to have plenty of opportunities—you’re going to find someone as awesome as you, and I’m really hoping that when you do, you’ll tell me all about it. Because that’s what best friends do. And even though right now it’s so totally awkward, I know it’ll pass, and I know it’ll be fine, and I know we’ll get through this. Okay?”

I don’t want someone else. I want you,
I think. Even now.

But I’m back to keeping it inside. Before it was because I feared it wouldn’t work. Now it’s because I know it won’t work.

I can’t tell him it’s all okay, either. I can’t lie like that.

I just look at him and think all of the old things one more time.

You are so beautiful.

I understand you.

You understand me.

I know you well.

We’re in this together.

We can be together.

We can cut through all the bullshit, and what we’ll find underneath is love.

I know I should let go of all of these things—but you can’t let go of something that’s inside you. You’re not holding it like that.

You are not good enough, Mark.

You will never be good enough.

How could you ever expect him to see you that way?

He was using you, and now he’s done.

You were just a substitute until he found someone better.

And now he’s found someone better.

Ryan stands up. Goes to his bookcase. Straightens something on the shelf.

“I’m sorry for dragging you back here. And for thinking it was a good idea to invite you to Taylor’s party. I’m going to leave it up to you whether you want me to tell you about it or not. I’ll understand if you don’t want me to. I don’t have to talk about him at all to you. Whatever it takes for us to get through this.”

It would help if he were acting like more of an asshole. It would help if he would say the absolute wrong thing. That way I could storm out. It’s too hard to just leave.

But he has a party to get to, and I have nothing left to say out loud. So I stand up. I find my breath. I force myself to meet his eye.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I tell him. And then, because I know I will hate myself for it, I add, “Have a good night.”

“You too,” he replies.

We’re just so helpless.

I open the door. I decide not to look back.

“And, Mark?”

I look back.

“I would fight for you, too,” he says. “I hope you know that.”

I can’t. I just can’t.

I run away before I lose myself completely.

TUESDAY

12

Kate

I wake suddenly—warm summer light through my window—and check my phone.

Nothing.

Which is so strange, because Mark said he would text no matter what. Whether it was good news or bad news,
I love you
or
I love you not
.

So??
I write now, and then I carry the phone with me down the hall, set it on the edge of the sink. As I shower, I keep waiting for it to buzz. Maybe the water is too loud, or maybe, while I’m standing under it and thinking of kissing Violet, I am too swept up in the memory to listen closely. But when I draw the curtain and check again, he still hasn’t answered.

I worry while drying my hair. I worry while applying mascara. I worry as I raise the tube of lipstick to my lips, but then I rethink the lipstick altogether. Violet and I are going to see each other again tonight, and I don’t want to have to think about red smearing on my face or getting on her perfect mouth.

I don’t want to think about anything.

When she kisses me, I will lose myself in it.

I keep my phone on my lap as I drive to school, a rare violation of the no-phones-in-the-front-seat rule that my parents set for themselves and for me. The three of us are prone to distraction and lost causes when it comes to patience. It’s better not to tempt us. But the drive is textless, and as I park I decide that the night must have gone well for Mark.

Because if he is anything like Lehna or June or Uma, he wouldn’t necessarily text me if he was deliriously happy, but he would absolutely text me if he was crushed. He would send me
novels
via text. Multivolume collections of sad poetry. I would be up all night typing
Oh no!
and
So tragic!
and
Want me to come over?

The more I think about it I realize that not only did Mark’s night go well, it must have gone
really
well. Like, stayed-up-all-night-together well. Passionate,
how-could-I-not-have-realized-before
well. Maybe they forgot to set their alarms and Ryan’s parents discovered them this morning in a state of undressed togetherness and they are both being lectured to at this very moment. Or maybe that already happened late last night and now they are grounded and their phones have been confiscated, which explains why Mark hasn’t texted me.

On the way to my locker I take a detour through the C hall where Mark’s locker is, but there’s no sign of him. No sign of Ryan, either. I’m on my way to my hall when two junior girls stop me.

“We can’t wait for your show tonight,” one of them says.

“Yeah,” says the other. “I heard all your paintings already sold. That’s so impressive. Congratulations!”