Page 16 of First-Time Caller
He knows about the radio interview.
“Mm-hmm.” He nods as realization slowly slinks its way across my brain. “Now you’re catching on.” He drops both of his palms on my shoulders, gently shaking me. “Why didn’t you tell me you’ve been having trouble with dating? Me”—he rocks me back and forth again—”the platonic love of your life.”
“Gray.”
“I’ve known you since you were three years old and stealing my Sesame Street figurines, and you’ve been telling melies.”
“I haven’t told you a single lie. I’m—”
He cuts me off with a swipe of his hand through the air. “I’ve been trying to talk about this with you for years, Lucie.Years.And you decide to tell a stranger on the phone that you’re looking for magic?” He blinks owlishly, looking for all the world like I told Aiden Valentine I wanted to meet a man under a bridge for something illicit. “Magic?You told me dating gives you indigestion.”
That is . . . partially true. But the rest of it—the real reason I don’t date, the anxiety that there might not be someone out there for me to fit into the life I’ve made for myself, that maybe I want too much, that I’m being too whimsical and naive, that it’s too late for me—I haven’t wanted to talk about that with anyone. Especially Grayson. My oldest friend. The father of my child. My coparent.The platonic love of my life.Grayson has never had any trouble being exactly who he is, and he didn’t have any trouble finding Mateo. I didn’t think he would understand and I didn’t want to give him a reason to worry.
So I tucked it all away in a neat little box and buried it until I couldn’t feel the sting of it anymore. Not until Aiden Valentine shoved a crowbar in there and wedged it right open.
I push Grayson’s hands off my shoulders with a scowl. My stomach is somewhere on the floor with the Frosted Flakes, my heart in my throat.
“You heard it?” I ask.
“I did.”
“How?”
“Well, Lucie, I’m not sure if you know this, but when you’re on the radio, people can listen to the things you say.”
I scowl at him. “Don’t talk to me like I’m stupid. I know how the radio works. But it’s been a week since the broadcast. How did you—whendid you hear it?”
He leans sideways in his seat and reaches in his back pocket, still frowning at me. He unlocks his phone with a flick of his paint-stained thumb, then scrolls. He scrolls and scrolls some more. Maya’s chair creaks under her and I resist the urge to hightail it up the stairs and bury myself beneath my comforter.
I thought we were in the clear. I thought we were moving on.
Finally, after the longest minute of my life, Grayson tilts his screen so I can see it.
“I think the entire Eastern Seaboard has heard it.” He flicks up with his thumb, and message after message with the sameHeartstringslogo appears. It’s the broadcast, I realize. Shared over and over and over again on some social media site. “You’ve gone viral.”
I drop my mug to the floor with athunk. It doesn’t crack, but it does tip over, turning the dried cereal on the floor into a soupy mess.
“Oh shit,” Maya and I say in unison.
I dart through the back door of the mechanic shop, my hood over my head and a scarf wrapped around the bottom half of my face. It’s excessive, but I need the comfort of multiple layers right now. I’m back to thinking everyone on the street is judging me, though it’s certainly more likely now than it was a week ago.
The interview went viral. A week later and the interview wentviral. How? Why? I wasn’t brave enough to read any of the commentary from Grayson’s phone before he snatched it back, tucking it in the pocket of his ratty jeans while I sat at the table in a stupor. He’d given me an ominousWe’ll talk about this lateras he ushered Maya out the door for school, and that was that.
Joke’s on him, though. We absolutely won’t be talking about this later. We won’t be discussing it ever again because I plan on packing all my belongings into the back of my tiny Subaru and driving off into the sunset. I’ll pick Maya up from school and we’ll drive to . . . San Jose. I’m sure there are plenty of cars to fix in San Jose.
“All right there?”
I smack my elbow on the edge of my tool cabinet as I fight with my puffy jacket. “Fine,” I mutter, not bothering to look over at Angelo, already at his station. I beat my coat into submission and toss it across my rolling chair. I need coffee and a mental reset. I need to go back in time and slap that phone out of my hand. I need the ground to swallow me whole.
I need to pretend like everything is fine.
“You sure?” He tosses a grease-stained towel over his shoulder and peers at me from over the top of his glasses. Angelo has somehow managed to not age at all for the past decade I’ve worked here, hovering somewhere around sixty-five. He says it’s the ouzo his brother ships him from Greece. I think it’s all the laughing he does at other people’s expense.
The lines by his eyes deepen. “You don’t usually look so”—he waves his hand, a quick flick of his wrist—”stressed before nine in the morning.”
I also don’t usually have my love life a topic of regional conversation, but I suppose we’re all trying new things today. I yank my coveralls off my hook with more force than necessary, tearing the tag before shoving my legs in. I loop the sleeves around my waist and tug them into a loose knot.
I need to start working so my mind can disappear. When my hands are busy, everything else seems more manageable. Fixable. My brain takes the back seat and I follow the steps to put everything in exactly the right place.
