His shoulders rise, pressing into his neck. He is still so angular, so long.
“Hey. So,” I repeat.
“Thanks for inviting me today.” He gives me this smile that I don’t know I can describe. It’s the smile that says, I know we’ve known each other forever, but it still means the world to me that you included me here. How he does that with a simple curve of his lips and some eye contact, I’ll never know.
“Well,” I tell him, “you should probably know that I hosted this entire thing so that I could invite you to meet my friends.” Only when I say it out loud do I realize it’s true. This is what Elliot does to me: he pulls honesty from those scrambled parts of my brain.
His eyes narrow, irises blooming as his pupils become pinpoints in the dim light beneath the clouds. “Is that true?”
“Why did you pull me back?” I ask him instead. I don’t even know what I want him to say here. How will I feel if he says that he’s come to his senses and realizes that I’m right, that we can only be friends? A treasonous part of me hopes I don’t find out.
“I wanted to ask you something.”
My chest is a jungle; my heart is the drum. Am I thrilled or terrified?
“Just wondering when we could get together next,” he says.
“Oh.” I blink over his shoulder to the towering eucalyptus trees swaying in the darkening sky. “I think I have some time off around Thanksgiving.”
He nods, and my heart droops a little. Why did I say that? Thanksgiving feels really far away.
Clearing his throat, he says, “Andreas is getting married in December—”
“December?” It seems an odd month for a wedding. Also, much farther away than Thanksgiving, if that’s when he’s thinking we’ll hang out next.
“New Year’s Eve, actually,” he clarifies, “and I was wondering if you wanted to come with me.”
New Year’s.
New Year’s.
He’s really asking me that.
And from the look in his eyes, I know that he’s aware of the weight of that date.
But instead of addressing that beast, I ask, “You don’t want to hang out until December?”
I watch the thrill of this pass through his hazel eyes. “Of course I do.” He laughs. “I’m free pretty much anytime you want to hang out. But since it’s a holiday I wanted to ask ahead of time if you’d come.”
“I can’t come as your date.”
Elliot shakes his head. “I’m not asking you on a date, Macy, while your fiancé and future stepdaughter are climbing into the car right there.”
“So, just . . .” I flail, searching for words, “to come with you?”
“Yeah,” he says, “to come with me. To Healdsburg.” Then he adds, “For the weekend.”
His shoulders drop back down as if it’s so simple.
Come along.
We’ll carpool.
It’ll be fun.
But the words settle between us, and I hear them in a different tone the longer I fail to reply.
Come away with me for the weekend.
Forty-eight hours with Elliot.
What will things be like between us in two and a half months, when they’re already so muddled now?
I blink over his shoulder to where Sean is buckling Phoebe into the Prius.
“Everyone would love to see you, and I’m the best man so it’d be nice to have a friend there with me,” he says, struggling to pull the conversation back from the brink of death. “Mom and Dad asked about you . . . they’re going insane knowing we’re back in touch.”
“I need to ask Sean what the plans are,” I say lamely. “He might have some art showing or event already in the books.”
Elliot nods. “Of course.”
“Can I let you know?”
“Of course,” he says with a small smile, a rumble of thunder bringing his attention to the sky. When he looks back down at me, I feel about as stable as the billowing rain clouds overhead. For a brief moment I imagine hugging him. I would wrap my arms around his neck and press my face there, breathing him in. He would bend closer, letting out that tiny little grunt of relief he always made. I want it so intensely it makes my mouth water, and I have to force myself to take a step back.
“I better . . .” I say, motioning over my shoulder.
“I know,” he says, watching me, expression tight.
Another rip of thunder.
“Have a good night, Elliot.”
And I finally turn to go.
then
saturday, july 9
twelve years ago
We were lying on the flat roof over his garage, basking in the sun. It was