and whipped toppings the exact way that she had done. He also put a framed picture of her on the big table where all the pies were, so it seemed like she was gazing out over them, smiling at their familiar guests.
And just last year, we had all gone: my mother and my father, Elise and Charlie, and me. I hadn’t thought much about it. I hadn’t known it would be the last year, how much everything was about to change.
Tim rested his elbows on his knees. Even with his knees bent, his long legs stuck out far from the bench. A man walked by, and he pulled them in. “I was just asking,” he said. “I wanted to help you. You hate your job, right? I was trying to help.”
“I know,” I said.
He rolled his eyes. “Okay. That’s not completely true. I wanted you to move in. For me.”
“But you wanted to help me, too. I know you did.”
He gave me a long, appraising look. His gaze moved from one of my eyes to the other, and his mouth did something close to a smile. “I forget you’re younger.” He looked unhappy again. “It makes a difference, I guess.”
I nodded. Despite popular belief, it wasn’t always so great to be both young and in love. And yet, even at that moment, I had to sit on my hands to keep them from going to him. It felt like a physical pull.
We sat on the bench for a while, not speaking. Someone walked up and gave each of us a flyer for a garage sale.
He rubbed his eyes and looked up at me. “So what do you want, Veronica? You want to date around? You want to see other guys and then get back together? I’m not going to do that. I can tell you that right now.”
“No. That’s not what I want.”
“Then what? Do you know?” He pointed at himself. “Because I do.” The tops of his ears were pink, maybe from the cold, maybe not. He squinted up at the sky. “Eventually…I want what my parents have. That’s not a terrible thing. They’re pretty happy. Okay? I know you’re cynical right now. But sometimes it all works out. You would know that if you’d ever met them.”
This was probably true. Two stories about Tim’s parents stood out in my mind. The first was that before Tim’s eldest brother was born, his mother had been in a car accident that burned her left arm and some of her neck so badly that she was in the hospital for months, and Tim’s father had stayed with her every moment that he could, reading to her or just sitting there with her so she would know she wasn’t alone. The second story was that just last year, the two of them had been asked to leave a movie theater because they were laughing too much at a movie that wasn’t supposed to be funny.
“I wish I’d met them,” I said, only because it was true. He turned and looked at me, mad.
“Why?” he asked. “What’s the point? Just curiosity?”
I shook my head, as if that were a reasonable answer. He waited.
“I want…” I rubbed my eyes, trying to think. “I want to be with you, but…” But what? I didn’t have the word for it. It was the feeling of being in the semi, all those exits rolling by. “It would be so easy to move in with you. It’s what I want. But it might not be good for me.” Even as I said this, I heard how cold the words sounded, and I hoped he would hear in my voice that I didn’t mean them coldly at all. “I meant everything I said last night. It was just a dumb thing I did. I still want to be with you.” I reached across the bench and tugged on the sleeve of his sweater. I let my hand rest there on his sleeve, and he didn’t pull away for a while.
But eventually, he did. He was quiet as he packed his things back into his bag. When he finally started to speak, I thought I was going to get an answer one way or the other. But he only looked up at the blue sky and said that the weather was supposed to turn again and that it might snow. I closed my eyes.
“Look,” he said, standing up. “I don’t know what I think. I need some time.”