“Totally.” Sadie gets up and goes over to her dresser. “What kind of top do you want?”
“Any kind would work.”
She takes out a yellow tank top. Then a yellow tee. Followed by another yellow tank top.
“Take your pick,” she says.
I smile at her three yellow tops.
“What?” she asks.
“Nothing.” I pick up the first tank top she pulled out. “Thanks. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem. You can borrow anything you want.”
Slippery slope alert. Sadie has nice clothes. Not as designer as Darcy’s. But they’re cute. How would Darcy describe Sadie’s style? Kind of girly boho with an urban edge. If I start borrowing Sadie’s clothes, I would not be able to stop. Except for this one yellow time.
I yawn. We got home late from Coffee Shop last night. I didn’t get to bed until after 1:30.
“I hear that,” Sadie comments on my yawn. “I’ve been dragging all day. But in a good way. I love our Coffee Shop girl time. All our girl time.”
“Me, too.” It’s amazing how close I feel to Sadie and Darcy. Sadie and I clicked right away over everything we have in common. Darcy and I got closer when I opened up to her. The friendships I had back home weren’t like this. I had a few close friends, but it felt more like we were going through the motions. None of them felt like a real best friend.
I never thought I could be this close to anyone I met so recently, but here we are. I didn’t expect to become so confident after seeing the way Sadie springs into action with her random acts of kindness. Now I’m also a person who takes action. I open deli doors for old ladies, run ahead on the sidewalk to pick something up that the person ahead of me dropped, throw a baby’s tattered pink bunny to her mother through subway doors as they are closing. You can change in astounding ways when you allow yourself to become the person you want to be.
D meets me outside the Chambers Street subway station for the flash mob. He’s all in red. Distressed red V-neck T-shirt, red jeans, and red Adidas high-tops.
“You look incredible,” I say.
He kisses me. “So do you,” he says. But I know I don’t. Sadie’s tank top and my shorts are way different shades of yellow. Neither of them fits right. My flip-flops are orange with yellow flowers. I didn’t have any strictly yellow shoes.
“Not really,” I mutter. “I had to borrow this shirt from Sadie. And I don’t have any yellow shoes.”
“We don’t have to wear matching shoes.”
“How do you know?”
“I watched videos of the other Mp3 Experiments. One of them had everyone dress in color blocks, but their shoes didn’t matter.”
“Oh.” I should have found that video. That was stupid.
“Should we head over?”
I nod, fumbling in my bag to see where my headphones are. I was rushing to leave so quickly I almost forgot them.
Tons of people are walking into the park. You can tell who the Improv Everywhere participants are by their colors. But usually the participants dress normally for flash mobs, making it impossible for observers to tell they’re part of a group until they all play red light, green light on the sidewalk or something.
It’s a little before seven. We look around at the other Improv players, commenting on the best outfits. A purple boy is wearing a purple tiara with huge purple feathers sprouting over his head. A red boy is wearing D’s same sneakers. One green girl even painted her face green.
This is one group of New Yorkers I immediately feel comfortable with. They’re not battling it out for five inches of lawn space at Bryant Park movie night or glaring at me at the Waverly Inn because I obviously don’t belong there. Clearly, I have found my people.
I check the time. “It’s seven-oh-three,” I tell D. We take our phones out, plug our headphones in, and go to the Mp3 file we’ve downloaded. At exactly 7:06, we all hit play.
There’s an “omnipotent narrator” named Steve. He will be giving us directions for the next forty-five minutes. The first thing Steve tells us to do is find people wearing our color. We have to divide up into our respective color blocks.
D makes a pouty face because we have to split up. I wave goodbye.
Yellows are hard to find. There aren’t too many oranges, either. Just as I thought, a lot of people are wearing blue. Blue is the easiest color to pull off. All you have to do is wear a blue shirt with jeans. I find two more yellows and the three of us stick together, wandering bananas looking for the rest of our bunch. We eventually form a small yellow pond adjacent to the big blue sea.
Steve instructs us to take out the plastic shopping bag we were supposed to bring. We all do the wave with the bags on cue, raising them high in the air. There are so many people here I can’t see beyond our group. I wanted to watch onlookers’ reactions. A large red lake is on the side. I try to find D, but it’s impossible. I wonder how many other reds are wearing red shoes. None of the yellows are wearing yellow shoes. I’m kicking myself for worrying over nothing.
Now we all take out our balloons. Steve tells us to blow them up and tie them. Then we keep our balloons in the air beach-ball style, tapping up any of them that come our way to keep them afloat. The colorful balloons bouncing above our blocks of color are making everyone smile.
The last thing we do is unplug our headphones and hold our devices over our heads. Ambient sounds chime through the air. We stand still like that for a few minutes, enjoying this moment of Zen on a sweet summer night.
“What did you think?” I ask D when I find him after.
“It was fun,” he says. But his face tells a different story. He almost looks irritated.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I just . . . thought there would be more to it.”
“But you saw videos from the other years. You knew what to expect.”
“No, it was cute. Did you have fun?”
“I loved it.” Tonight was a perfect example of why I was dying to live here. Why I can’t imagine living anywhere else. Why I feel like I’ve finally found my place to belong.
As we leave the park together, D reaches for my hand. I love walking around with him like this. I just wish we had the same level of enthusiasm when it comes to these kinds of activities. It took a while for D to start revealing his dorky side to me. He said he doesn’t show it to just anyone. But D doesn’t really seem that dorky to me. More like he knows a few dorky references. Anyway, dorky and weird are two different things. I don’t think D will be into doing more Improv Everywhere events the same way I will. I wish he were as excited for the next event as I am. I wish this were something we could share.
We cross the street. “Wasn’t that last part awesome?” I ask. “With the sounds?”
“What was that?”
“What do you mean?”
“What was it supposed to be?” D says. “What was the point?”
I can’t believe he doesn’t get it. “It was supposed to be awesome. It was awesome.”
“Hmm. Guess I missed something.”
Sometimes we truly connect. But other times he just doesn’t get me.
CHAPTER 10
SADIE
AUSTIN PRESSES ME BACK AGAINST the couch cushions. He watches me in the candlelight.
“You’re so beautiful,” he says.
He kisses me again, over and over until it feels like we are the only ones here. The only ones in the whole world.
Rosanna told me about Otheroom after D took her here. It’s a tiny bar with a tinier room in the back. Thursday is the most popular weeknight to go out, so I was stoked when Austin not only scored us space on the sectional sofa in the back room, but got us the corner spot. I’ve walked by this place on Perry Street a thousand times, but never thought about trying to get in. Kind of like when Darcy got us into that bar where Residue was playing. It just never occurred to me that I was finally old enough to try getting into bars I’ve walked by my whole life. Rosanna was right about it being
romantic in here. The dimly lit room flickers with shadows cast by the light of candles scattered everywhere. Since it’s so dark, you can make out all you want without people really noticing.
I want to stay here on this couch making out with Austin forever.
When Austin and I got back together, I told him I needed to take it slow. He reluctantly agreed to only seeing each other a few nights a week. I was trying to separate lust from love. But when we’re alone together, especially in a place like this, lust takes over. When he kisses me, I remember how right we are together, how we fit together like puzzle pieces.
Austin slides his hand up my thigh. Too high. I put my hand on his to stop him. Dark corners of romantic bars can apparently be dangerous.
I reach over to the side table for my cherry soda.
“Sorry,” Austin says. “You kind of drive me crazy.”
“Only kind of?”
“No.” Austin picks up his ginger beer and takes a sip. There’s something super sexy about being in a dark bar with a cute boy drinking from a cold bottle on a hot summer night.
“How’s it going at Trey’s?” I ask. It must be strange for Austin to be living with a high school friend after being married.
“He’s been great, but I really need to find a place.”
“Was anything good listed today?” Austin has been looking for an apartment every day. He gets listings from a few different sources and goes to open houses for the ones that look okay.
“Yeah, if I want two roommates in Queens. I cannot believe how outrageous rents are. I read that New York City is now officially unaffordable to renters making minimum wage. In all five boroughs.”
“So you might move back to New Jersey?”
“I don’t have much of a choice.” Austin traces his finger down my cheek. “Still think I can find that needle in a haystack?”
I remember our conversation over pie at Bubby’s when I asked Austin why he lives in New Jersey instead of New York. He complained about the astronomical rents. I said that he could find the exception to the rule, an affordable place in lower Manhattan, if he looked hard enough. Like finding a needle in a haystack.
“This is New York,” I say. “Anything is possible.”
“Even getting back to the way we were?” The hopeful longing in Austin’s eyes makes my heart flutter. I know, without a shred of doubt, that I will never stop loving this boy.
“I’m trying,” I say.
“I never expected to be in a situation like this.”
“Neither did I.”
“You have a lot going on.” Austin takes my hand, squeezes it. “I don’t want to add to your stress. I want to make you happy.”
“You do.”
“How’s it going with Marnix being home?”
Just thinking about how to answer that makes this tiny back room feel less intimate and more claustrophobic. My history with Marnix is complicated. Way more complicated than a sister should feel about her brother. I don’t want to talk about it, but I can talk about anything with Austin.
“I’m happy he’s okay,” I say. “And it’s not like I’m still living at home, so . . .”
“What if you were?”
I drink some more cherry soda, trying to figure out how much to reveal. Austin used to be the person I could tell anything to. He was the only person I ever told about my sister. I felt like I could trust him with anything, which wasn’t that long ago. He’s the same person I knew before . . . or thought I knew before. Isn’t he?
Austin waits patiently for my answer, open to whatever I want to share with him. This Stereophonics song “Rewind” comes on. I get caught up in his moody eyes, the flickering candlelight, and the nostalgic pull of the lyrics.
Don’t waste your time
You can’t make back
If you could rewind your time
Would you change your life?
Austin hasn’t known me that long, but in a way he knows me better than anyone.
“Marnix scared me,” I admit. “He would have these tantrums where he’d go ballistic. The smallest thing could set him off. One time when I was in tenth grade and he was a senior, he punched the wall next to my face so hard his fist went through the drywall. I ran to my room and blockaded the door. Marnix kept knocking on my door saying he was sorry. But I didn’t let him in. The whole time I was sitting on the floor next to my bed, crying.”
“That’s intense.”
I nod.
“Was that the only time he was violent?”
“There were a few other times he threw stuff. He smashed my mom’s favorite vase when she wouldn’t let him go to a party because he kept lying to her about doing his homework. But that’s the only time I remember him almost hurting me. The crazy thing is, he wasn’t even mad at me. He was yelling at my dad when he punched the wall. He didn’t even notice I was standing there.”
Austin rubs my arm to soothe me. It works. I feel better just having shared this with him. Everything will work out with Marnix. He is alive, which is the only thing that matters.
Flickering candlelight. Another song I love coming on. Austin’s lips on mine. Everything else slips into the background.
I have no idea what time it is when we leave. And I do not care. The thing I love most about this summer is how I am free from time. In high school I couldn’t just stay out all night doing whatever I wanted. I always had to race against the clock when I went out. Nights were never completely mine. Fun always had a predetermined expiration. No matter how much fun I was having, the deadline of my curfew was always there, bringing me down. My new freedom keeps astonishing me. I still can’t believe I can stay out as late as I want, go wherever I want, do whatever I want . . . that this is my life now. I don’t have to cram in epic experiences before the clock strikes nine. Those zings of panic I would get when I looked at the clock and saw I had ten minutes to make it home before my curfew have become a part of my history along with lockers and homeroom.
Time is now a key, not a lock. I am finally unlocking parts of living that were inaccessible before. Life can unfold around me the way it was meant to, naturally, without constraints. It’s like my life has finally gotten to the good part where I can actually live it. Where I can just . . . be.
“Do you want to help me look for an apartment?” Austin asks when we’re walking down Perry Street.
“Totally. But only if we can look for some here.”
“Where? In the West Village?”
“Yeah. This is the best neighborhood.”
“And the most expensive. You know I could never afford a place here.”
“What about the needle in a haystack?”
Austin picks me up and holds me tight against him, my face right in front of his.
“You make me believe in magic,” he says. “We’ll look at a few places here.”
“Really?”
“Really.” He kisses me as people swirl around us. I hear one girl say how cute we are. The hum of traffic blends into other urban white noise I’ve heard my whole life. A dog barks. Crickets chirp. Way in the distance, a siren blares.
Even with these city sounds surrounding us, the rest of the world disappears again.
CHAPTER 11
DARCY
“WOULD YOU LIKE WHIPPED CREAM with that?” I inquire of the grimy skater boy ordering an incongruous frothy mocha concoction.
“No doubt,” he confirms.
Ten years later when I’ve made his drink (extra time accrued for having to redo the whole operation when I add milk instead of heavy cream), I present it at the register, complete with chocolate drizzle over the whipped cream. He pays me. I’m about to count out his change when I see who is standing in line.
Logan.
Took him long enough. Not that I want to see him. But still.
Skater Boy is waiting for his change.
“Sorry.” I snap into action, taking care of him and the next two people in line. By the time it’s Logan’s turn, I still haven’t f
igured out what I’m going to say. Or do. Throwing another drink in his face is an option. Bonus: I can make the drink extra sticky.
“I found you,” Logan gloats. Like he hasn’t known where I work. Like he didn’t call me earlier today and find out I’m working a double.
“Here I am.”
A middle-aged lady is in line behind Logan. She’s tapping away on her phone. But her type-A vibe will probably only give me another minute to get rid of Logan before she gets impatient. “Working. Like I said.”
“Can you take a break?”
The manager is restocking bags of ground coffee on the shelf above the machines. He looks over at us. My face must be showing how much I don’t want to have this confrontation with Logan here because he says I can take my break early.
We go outside. We walk to Leroy Street and turn off busy Bleecker Street onto the empty block. A torrent of rage is swirling inside of me. I do not want to be near the place I work in case the torrent breaks out. Props for Sadie’s protest and all, but my love life cannot become a spectacle.
“So what’s the story?” Logan says, trying to keep up with me.
“With what?”
“You’ve been avoiding me.”
“Have I?”
“Darcy.” Logan stops walking. I stop with him. He hardly ever says my name. “What’s going on?”
There is no point in evading the inevitable anymore.
“I know,” I say.
“You know what?”
“Why you really came here.”
“You wouldn’t see me. I don’t want to disrupt your work or whatever, but—”
“No. Why you came to New York.”
“To get you back, babe.” Logan reaches out to touch my arm.
“Stop it!” I shake him off. “Stop lying to me! I know you were trying to scam me out of money to pay off your bookie. I know about the money you stole from my wallet. I know about the girl you’re seeing back home. I know everything.”
Logan gapes at me. I can tell he is wavering between further denying and admitting the truth.