11.
All the blood rushes to my head, and bile swiftly climbs my throat. The backs of my knees burn from the pain of the metal monkey bars I hang from, but I still dangle upside down for what feels like the tenth minute.
“I can’t do this anymore,” Valerie says beside me. She grips the bar with her hands and flips herself right side up. “I’m gonna be sick.”
I follow suit, flipping myself over. My feet lack sober strength and can’t absorb the impact of the jump—I hit the ground.
Valerie is not too sick to keep from pointing a finger my way and laughing as I groan, then laugh, then groan again. Wood shavings cling to my jeans and my back, and when Valerie reaches over to brush some off my skin, she falls on top of me.
Two drunk women fumbling around a playscape. Very mature. Very normal.
We giggle, trying to help each other up.
“I knew we should have stopped at six,” Valerie says. “Your tolerance is crazy.”
I shake my head—the world teeters—and I make a mental note to keep it as still as possible. “Your fault,” I say, leading us to a bench overlooking the rest of the playground. “You said you could handle more than I can— and I can’t stand losing. I lose a lot, but not for lack of trying.”
After Valerie declared she wanted to host the wedding at the art gallery and demanded no follow-up questions, she ordered us a flight of shots.
Somehow, it became a celebratory night, turned competition for who could take the most.
It didn’t help that Valerie slipped a fifty under one of the glasses—a reward for whoever finished the row. I currently have the bill stuffed into my bra.
The art gallery kindly asked us to celebrate elsewhere, as they had a private viewing arriving. Both of us being unable to drive, we wandered a mile up the road and decided the playground was the perfect place to sober up.
Valerie pinches my cheek. “You’re fun,” she says, almost accusatory.
“Thanks?”
“Anders isn’t some bore, but he’s not one to join a drunken excursion.
And he’s always been tight lipped about whoever he’s dating.”
I thought he’d only dated Anna?
Valerie snorts and shoves my face away. “Please,” she says. “You think he’s only been with Anna?” Oh. So I must’ve voiced my annoying thoughts out loud. A drunk habit I need to snuff out. “Sure, she’s the only girl he’s ever loved, but he’s been around. Trust me, I’m dating his college roommate. Anders has had many a fling.”
I actively work to keep my face neutral at the mention of Anders with “many” anything.
“That’s why I’m confused about you. I like you, but Anders mentioning you, then bringing you to meet us right after, when he doesn’t even give us the names of the people he’s seeing—what’s really up with you two?”
My nerves ratchet up. Is it really so out of character for Anders to bring along someone he’s dating? He seems to be the appropriate amount of private, not meticulously secretive, but not going out of his way to keep his love life entirely separate from his family.
But it’s not like I could possibly know him better than them.
“Nothing,” I say.
She narrows her eyes at my stomach. “You pregnant?”
“Hell no.” I cover my belly. “I’ve just been helping myself to a few extra servings this week.”
“Hired an Etsy witch and fed my brother a love potion?”
“Please listen to yourself and tell me if you sound sane.”
She barks out a laugh. “See? You’re funny? I never pictured Anders
with someone funny. Or cool.”
“What did you picture, then?”
“Not sure. Anna was reserved, really quiet unless you knew her. Not exactly someone you’d invite to an after-party, but she’d show up if you needed help setting up. Reliable. And boring.”
“And I give off loud? Drunk? Unreliable?”
“Unpredictable,” Valerie pitches in. “And my brother is anything but that. Not that I’m complaining. If you can help him have a little fun every now and then, that’d be nice.”
Of course, being referred to as someone fun, enough so that it can bring joy to another person, welcomes warmth into my chest. But as swiftly
as the warmth comes, guilt seeps into its place. Anders’s family has easily welcomed me into the fold, without much effort from my part. That easy kindheartedness in them is something I see when I’m with Anders.
Would it come so easily to them if they knew I came here under false pretenses?
“Valerie.” A male voice joins us. “This is absolutely not the corner store you said you’d be at.”
A lanky man with large, circular wire glasses approaches. A mess of curls frames his heart-shaped face, which is covered in so many freckles you only catch tiny peeks at his pale skin. If Anders hadn’t told me his age, I’d think he was twenty-one instead of thirty.
“John!” Valerie opens her arms wide, shoving me away in the process.
“This is exactly why I have you share your location,” John says with a sigh. He glances at me, and his smile widens. “You must be Lucy.”
I help Valerie up. “Nice to meet you,” I reply politely, but my brain snags on his words. Is he forcing Valerie to share her location so he can track her? That seems controlling. Maybe it’s not, but I find myself stuck on it.
With their age gap, someone—i.e., me—might find it suspicious. The typical story of an older man taking advantage of a younger woman, watching her every move, frowning upon drunken nights with friends,
attempting to keep her all to himself.
Does Anders know about this?
“Likewise,” he says, and I can’t tell if he’s stuffy or if his voice naturally has a nasally undertone. He holds out his hand, and I shake it.
Not too firm, a bit weak, and a teeny bit wet. My father always said you can tell a lot about someone by their handshake. I’m too drunk to figure John out, but I’m erring on the side of nervous.
We swap custody of Valerie, and she throws herself at him, mumbling something into his collared shirt. Whatever he mumbles back, he says it in an even quieter whisper, but his face pulls into a wrinkled frown.
He keeps both arms around her. “I wish we could talk properly, but I need to get this one home.”
“Come on,” Valerie shouts. “We’ll drop you off at Anders’s.”
“I’m okay,” I say. “It’s a beautiful night out.”
“It isn’t safe for a girl to be alone at night.” Valerie points to what I’m sure she thinks is me but is actually a set of swings.
“I know jujitsu,” I lie.
“I don’t know what that is,” Valerie says.
“Picture something incredibly badass and unbeatable.”
Her answer is a thumbs-down, so I add the lie, “Don’t worry, I texted Anders, he’s on the way.”
The thumbs-down becomes a thumbs-up, words already beyond her. I wave them off, then make myself comfortable on one of the swings. Each push and pull makes the evening air cooler as I gain momentum. The more I move, the better I feel—as if I’m following the tipsy world instead of waddling through it.
As the night continues, the air begins to bite, and I ease my swinging.
My eyes close, and for a moment, the world softens, and out of nowhere, my mom’s voice floats through my mind—singing her favorite lullaby. One she learned from her mother, and one she made Taina and me memorize as soon as we could form words.
It’s not often I remember specific moments like this. Maybe it’s the silence. I’ve never been good with it. For so long, keeping busy was my armor. Work, school, caretaking, endless motion—it kept the grief locked away when I lost my parents. I had to be strong. Had to take care of Taina.
No room for breaking down.
But now, with Taina grown and steady on her own, those quiet moments I once feared have more room to creep in. My life is still busy— new, but less frantic than when I was a young girl desperately trying to be an adult, less buzzing with constant motion. In these calmer spaces, the grief surfaces more often.
And, if I’m honest, the silence leaves too much room for self- reflection. A reminder of where I want to be and where I actually am. Still struggling, still single, still trying to find steady ground.
At least, filling these quiet moments with the soft echo of my mother’s lullaby feels better than letting my mind wander to all the things I haven’t fixed yet. At least here, wrapped in memory, the silence isn’t empty.
“Lucinda.” Anders’s voice cuts through the song. For a moment, it feels like a dream, so I smile when I meet his concerned gaze. Only when his hands grasp my face do I jolt to reality.
“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
“What are you doing here?”
His hand on me pulls me to a full stop, and the world shakes a bit like an aftershock. “Why are you here alone? It’s midnight. You should have called me if you felt uncomfortable riding with Valerie and John. By the way, Valerie says if you’re going to lie about asking me to get you, you could at least try to pretend to have been on the phone.”
More perceptive than I thought, the drunk nepo baby. “I wasn’t uncomfortable.”
He pauses, then cocks his head slightly. “Then why didn’t you come home?”
I’m going to need him to stay far away from referring to his place as my home. Trouble, this beautiful, unintentionally charming man is. Far too much of it. And I don’t have the emotional capacity for it when my life is such a mess I’m confusing basic human concern for romantic gestures.
“My God, I need to get laid.”
Anders blinks. Then blinks again. And again.
I shoot up, removing his hands from my face, nearly headbutting him.
I step away, but it’s not enough space. I move again, trying to widen the gap, but the slide behind me hits the backs of my knees and nearly tips me over.
He snakes his arms around me, tightening until our bodies press together like the pages of a book slammed shut. His hands take up so much space on my back, their warmth somehow seeping through the fabric and burning like hot coals.
To break the tension, I move my lips to thank him, but we’re so close together I fear any movement will lead to our mouths pressing. And though my body begs for the touch, the warmth, for Anders in this moment—I fear if I start kissing him, I won’t stop.
And those are too-real desires for a fake-dating situation.
With effort, I sneak my hands between us, pressing against his chest. A gentle push doesn’t budge him.
His eyes flick between mine and my lips, like he’s measuring the distance too.
I know I’m attractive—I’m not naive enough to think Anders doesn’t find me so. Still, there are millions of attractive people in the world, and normal people can appreciate seeing one and keep it moving, they don’t do anything about it.
But when I see Anders, my brain doesn’t move on to the next thought, it only burns with the feeling of finding him so sexy it feels like the world might end if I can’t have him inside me.
And it’s the first time I’ve felt it in such an all-consuming wave. The attraction runs deep—visceral, bone deep, and between my legs.
Just my luck it’s for the most unreadable, unattainable man I’ve ever met.
I push harder. It’s not enough to move him, but he blinks, then pulls back, righting me to stand, before stepping away. My knees buckle, and he swoops in again, wrapping an arm around me.
“How much did you drink?” he asks, mistaking my shaky legs for drunkenness rather than lust. He leads me to the bench, sits me down, and leans in, fingers massaging through my hair, pulling out tiny strands. After the second pass, I notice wood chips under his nails before he flicks them away.
I chew my lip, gaze down. Each time he leans in, his scent orbits me, and the warmth from my cheeks spreads and spreads.
“Do you feel okay?” he asks.
“Why are you here on your own?” he asks.
“Are you upset with me?” he asks.
His fingers pause their exploration. “Are you on a silent strike?”
“No,” I say. “I’m just trying not to embarrass myself.”
His hands slide to my cheeks, thumbs pressing into the high points.
“What are you talking about?”
“I know with how you met me, this silly little job, and my failure to actually do it right before—you may think I don’t have any pride. But there’s a sliver of it left. And there are only so many times I can be drunk in front of you before you start thinking I have a problem.”
His brows furrow. “Don’t speak for me,” he says. Firm, not argumentative, but close. “The only thing I have a problem with is you being out after midnight, drunk and alone, not answering your phone.
You’re not from around here, you don’t know anyone—you should’ve
called me.”
“You don’t have to worry about me.”
“I know that I don’t,” he says. “Is it a problem that I do?”
“I think we had this discussion when you took me out to dinner, and it feels like you’re disregarding that.”
“No. I believe I said, ‘I’ll keep that in mind.’ And I have. And I don’t think caring about your safety is as big a deal as you’re making it out to be.
You should expect basic human decency and concern from other people.”
Something tightens in my chest.
It’s not that I don’t deserve it, but that I’ve gotten used to not expecting it. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a real relationship, and the ones I was in before didn’t offer much care. There was a turning point for me, a pivotal moment in my life’s path of failed relationships and excessive self-deprecation, where I learned to view care from others as a luxury, not a bare-minimum act from another human being.
Right. Good. It’s not a big deal to him. Just human decency. Which means it shouldn’t be for me. Good. Great.
The warmth that enveloped me quickly cools off. Every time I think I’m getting mixed signals, Anders is quick to remind me that this is just how he is.
It’s me and my eager little heart and imaginative mind that muddle things.
“Okay, then.” I wave him off, removing his hands from my face. “I am drunk. I got drunk with your sister, and I think she really likes me.”
“Of course she does,” he says, settling beside me on the bench. “She cursed me out for leaving you out here on your own—despite me not
knowing you were here at all.”
I laugh. “Oh, she’s so far gone.”
“If”—he points a finger right at my nose—“you end up on some drunken excursion again, you call me. Okay?”
I press the tip of my finger to his. “Okay.”
He leans his head back and takes a deep breath. “It is a nice night.”
Nice enough that he pulls up the sleeves of his black top, and I know I should tear my gaze away a moment after I catch it snagging on the veins wrapped around his arms like knotted rope.
“She invited us on a double date,” I say, since business is the only reason I’m here. “It’s progress. And I think she likes me, but she’s a little bit suspicious of me too. She doesn’t know exactly why, but she knows I don’t
exactly fit with you.”
“Says who?” Anders frowns.
I decide, right now, that every time Anders gives me a round of butterflies, I have to deflect and move on quickly. He sends them fluttering
in the pit of my stomach too easily for me to maintain focus. Better to just breeze past every moment.
“We’re going to some billiards place tomorrow. I didn’t get much of a feel for John when he came to get Valerie—it was too quick—but I’d like to speak to him more when we meet.” I lean in. “Would you make your girlfriend share her location with you?”
“Is she going on a trip?”
“No, just in general. To keep an eye on her.”
“Well.” He scratches his neck. “I’m not sure. I wouldn’t think to ask for that unless I was worried she was going places she shouldn’t be. And if I didn’t trust her, I’d probably just want to separate before doing that.”
Humming, I turn from him and face the moonlight. “I get that.”
It takes a couple of extra seconds to pull up the sober parts of the day.
“Do you know Nick?”
His eyes widen a fraction before returning to normal. “She told you about him?”
“Not really, no,” I say, an idea playing in the back of my head—but I’m not able to pull it into a coherent thought yet. “She just brought him up, which I thought was a little strange, seeing as we were searching for her wedding venue.”
I refrain from mentioning that it was her and Nick’s first date or the initial moment she believed in the authenticity of love. I owe Anders a lot, but I also owe Valerie some respect—it’s girl code.
It doesn’t feel right sharing more intimate secrets she may want kept closer to her chest. I’m already planning to ruin her marriage; I don’t need things getting out that could maximize the hurt she’ll feel when it all falls through.
“This is what I meant,” he says softly. “Valerie is all over the place.
And wherever she decides to land—even if she knows it’ll hurt—she latches herself to it anyway. After Nick . . .” He cuts himself off, then restarts. “That was a dark time for her. Maybe the worst. I’ve never known anyone more careless with their own heart.”
“Do you think Valerie does love these men? John, and Nick, and anyone else? Or do you think she doesn’t understand it?”
He opens his mouth, then shuts it. “I’m not exactly sure.”
Then, after a few moments, he adds, “Did you love them? Your ex- husbands?”
I hold a hand to my chest like he landed a direct hit. “Thanks for the
reminder of my two failed marriages.”
“Sorry—”
“I’m kidding.” I nudge him. “And sometimes I think, of course not, and other times I think, I must have.” I shake my head. That doesn’t make any sense. “You know what I think?”
“What do you think, Lucinda?” he asks, and the way he says my name disregards any vow I just made to keep from longing over him.
I peel my gaze from him. “I think people make love out to be this scary and weighted word—and sure, it can be—but love comes in many forms. It can be this lighthearted feeling, this sense of true contentment, like sitting out and basking in the sun for hours and listening to the sky breathe.
It can be as small as the act of letting a bug out the slider door rather than killing it. It can be weighted and filled with baggage, but still feel warm— like loving people who hurt you as much as they make you laugh. And it can be this all-consuming desire to care for another person.”
“So.” I slap my hands on my knees. “Maybe Valerie does love John, and I loved my men, and love isn’t so hard to feel as people make it out to be. But some people don’t deserve that love, and sometimes it isn’t enough to keep two people together—when so many people get away with hurting others because they know that love can save them. How horrible is it to keep hurting someone and let love be your shield from accountability for it?”
When he doesn’t speak, the tips of my ears warm.
“I’m rambling now. Sorry. I don’t mean to project. I’m not making much sense.”
He reaches for my hand, bringing it over to hold it in his lap. “You make perfect sense.”
Anders keeps his hand wrapped around mine, his thumb tracing small, hot circles into my skin, until my initial nerves settle and my heartbeat slows.
My eyes flutter, and my head becomes too heavy for my neck, so it rests on Anders’s shoulder.
Neither of us complains, or moves, or speaks—as if any disruption to the peace will ruin this delicate, confusing comfort between us.
We stay like that for hours.
