Page 49 of The Getaway List
Jesse nods in agreement. “Yeah. I think it was just—I really, really liked you. More than I knew how to deal with or express at the time. So I just didn’t. And then one day after Christmas break someone called me your boyfriend in the hallway and I heard you say that we’d been broken up for weeks, and I just—guess I hadn’t really realized it was over, until then?”
My throat isn’t just tight with guilt then, but something else—a sudden surge of gratitude that we managed to stay friends through this. I don’t know if a lot of people would have, after such a mess.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I think I just took it all for granted. We were so close that I figured we’d always be around for each other no matter what we were, that I just sort of thought it didn’t matter if we weren’t ‘dating’ anymore. But clearly it did, and I’m a shit friend for not realizing that.”
Jesse shakes his head. “It’s not your fault,” he reiterates.
“Fuck that,” I say teasingly. “Let me have some blame, will you?”
His lips lift into a slight smile, but his eyes are staring through the grates of the fire escape and down the narrow street.
“Where is this coming from?” I ask. “I mean—the flowers were beautiful. The song—I don’t even know what to say. But I think it’s safe to say you don’t have those kinds of feelings for me anymore.”
Jesse sets his own mug down then, and goes quiet for long enough that we can hear the disjointed sounds of the city slowly, creakingly start to wake itself up. Sidewalk cellar doors opening and dogs barking and delivery trucks ambling down the street.
“I’m in love with Dai,” he says.
I bite down a smile but can’t stop it from reaching my eyes. When Jesse meets them he can’t help a shy smile of his own.
“I, for one, am absolutely shocked,” I deadpan.
“Shut up,” he mumbles. But then after a moment, he says, “The thing is—Dai is my best friend. And you were my best friend when we started going out. So it made it hard to wrap my head around it when it just—ended, I guess. Because we knew each other better than almost anyone, and it didn’t take anything for it to just be over.”
I want so badly to reach out and hug him right now. And maybe build a time machine and rattle both of our baby selves by their lanky little shoulders. But Jesse’s letting something out of his system right now, and it’s clear it needs to be all the way out before we can try for any of that.
“I’ve seen other people since you and I dated, but—none I was especially close to beforehand. So this is scary to me. I guess I’ve just been afraid. Trying again with someone I’m that close to, and having someone who knows me—really knows me—reject me if I muck it all up again, like I did with us.”
The worst part of this is the way Jesse can deflect almost anything he says with a joke, but can’t even try for one now. I don’t have to do that thing where I look past the joke to see what he really means. It’s all there, bare and raw on his face, cast in golden pinks from the early-morning sunlight.
I make myself think carefully before I speak, because I want the words to land.
“You didn’t muck anything up between us. We’re still here together, aren’t we? That’s all because of you. You helped inspire me to do this and I’m so fucking grateful for it every day.” I scoot my butt a little closer to him, lowering my voice. “And as for Dai—I don’t think you have to worry. It’s clear how much he likes you. Hell, Eddie stabbed his avatar like eighteen times because Dai couldn’t stop staring at you after you took your damn shirt off last night. And Dai always laughs way too hard even at your worst jokes.”
“Hey,” Jesse mock-protests.
I kick him lightly in the shin. “I’m only allowed to say that because we were the two biggest clowns at Falls Creek High. Anyway, the most important thing is—things are different now. You’re different now. I know you’ll be able to make Dai understand what this means to you. I mean, you just told me what he means to you, didn’t you? Tell him the same thing.”
Jesse purses his lips like he’s trying not to get overly emotional, but that’s too bad. We’re in for emotions now. So I add, “Don’t let fourteen-year-old Riley being a total dope get in the way of eighteen-year-old Jesse dating his extremely hot best friend.”
This seems to be the perfect compromise between keeping it light and letting Jesse feel the impact of it, because he lets out a wet, stuttering laugh, swiping his eyes with the heel of his hand.
“Yeah. Okay. You’re right.”
“Hell yeah, I am,” I say, holding up my coffee mug. “Now let’s cheers to you actually fessing up to Dai sometime in the immediate future, all right?”
Jesse holds his mug up, too, but hesitates.
“What if…” he starts.
I shake my head so abruptly that it stuns whatever Jesse was about to say right out of him. “Your worst-case scenario is a great scenario. You stay friends. Like you and me.” I point a finger at him. “The only actual worst-case scenario is you never telling him how you feel and having to live in the abyss of what if for as long as you’re alive.”
Jesse clinks his mug with mine, and as we each take a long swig of our coffee, I try not to let the irony leave a bitter taste knowing that I’m not planning to say a word to Tom about my own feelings.
My hypocrisy feels justified, though. Tom is leaving. A fact is a fact, no matter how badly I want to un-fact it. If I tell him how I feel now, I’m worried it’ll only come off as a ploy to make him stay. I could never do that to him. As upset as I am, it doesn’t change that for him, leaving New York is my version of staying here—a chance to start fresh, and on our own terms. I could never deny him the same happiness I’ve already found.
“All right. Thank you,” says Jesse sincerely. And then, with every bit as much sincerity: “Also, let’s go the fuck back to sleep.”
I shove the window to the apartment back open. “Count me in.”
