to call him. She’s wrong, of course. Andrew isn’t perfect. He’s just perfect for me.
I’ve known it since eighth grade when Mr. Everson assigned us to be lab partners and we realized we were the only two people in class who used mechanical pencils.
“Because they’re always sharp and precise,” he said, to which I replied, “And no nasty pencil shavings.” It was pretty much love at first sight. Well, at least for one of us.
The hard part of being friends with a guy before they’re interested in girls is that by the time they see the light, you’ve already spent too much time in the Friend Zone to easily make the switch. Not even after your boobs come in.
I exhale slowly at the sight of him. God help me, Andrew’s grown up to be totally hot. Pretty much a walking Ralph Lauren commercial, except that he doesn’t actually play polo. After losing one child, Mr. and Mrs. Mason would never have let anyone swing a mallet by Andrew’s head.
Sometimes, I think, as parents go, Mr. and Mrs. Mason might be even more messed up than mine—just in a different way. While my parents are like plastic bags in the wind, Andrew’s are strung as tight as harp strings. I swear, if you plucked them on the shoulder they’d sound like Pachelbel’s Canon in D.
“Hi, Denise,” Andrew says familiarly, as much a part of my family as his own. He’s tall, and we’re definitely not, so he looks down at us. His thick, nearly black hair doesn’t fall in his eyes, though, because he spends a lot of time and product on it. “You look nice tonight.”
Mom rubs her string of faux pearls between her finger and thumb. “That’s awfully sweet of you.”
I clear my throat and check my watch. “You said you’d be here ten minutes ago.” I don’t realize how rude the words sound until they’re already out of my mouth. Mom clicks her tongue at me, and Andrew’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise, but then his eyes soften with sympathy. He knows it’s hard for me to spend time in this house since Dad left.
“I got here right behind you. But did you notice your back tire was flat?”
I glance past him to my rusted-out Corolla. It’s leaking oil on the driveway, but the tire looks fine.
“I changed it for you,” he says, and only then do I notice his fingers are black with grime. God, I love him.
“But it’s only the little emergency spare. You should take it in tomorrow and get a decent tire. Or maybe they can patch the old one. I don’t want you driving too long on anything dangerous.”
“Wow,” Mom says, giving me a pointed look. “Our hero.” Though I know she’s really calculating the cost of new tires in her head.
“No big deal,” Andrew says. I know he means it when it comes to making sure my car is safe to drive, but when it comes to the dirt on his hands, well, that’s another matter. He’s even more fastidious than I am, and probably desperate to get to a bar of soap.
I gesture toward the bathroom, and he looks at me thankfully. While he’s sudsing up, Mom asks, “So where are you two headed tonight?”
Bella Luna is our favorite Italian restaurant. Andrew and his parents are very cultured when it comes to food, so when we come here he always talks about the marinara being the “perfect balance” between the sweetness and acidity of the tomatoes.
I don’t have much to add. Frankly, I’m happy to get through dinner without slopping sauce down the front of my white dress. Talk about “balance.” Managing a fork, not to mention my half of the conversation, all while keeping my head from exploding over Mom’s confession, puts me on par with that guy who tightrope-walked across the Grand Canyon.
But maybe I’m not doing as good of a balancing act as I think, because when I glance up from my pasta, Andrew is looking at me with a worried expression.
“What?” I ask, wondering for a second if he can read my mind. The internship. How do I tell him I can’t do the internship?
He chuckles and swirls his wine. I respond by sucking an ice cube out of my water glass. No wine for me. It holds no allure after the last three years with my mother. They say addiction runs in families, and that’s not something I intend to test. I will not be her.