Page 47 of Vera Stein Is Fine
The mug he set down in front of me had a spaceship shooting around it and in bold letters it readCrawford Basin Astronomy Camp. I topped the coffee off with creamer, his brow rising as I continued to pour. It was infinitely unfair how much he could communicate with just a single eyebrow.
Holding the cup up to my lips, I couldn’t resist a smile. “So what was the inciting incident? With med school.”
“The inciting incident? Is my life some kind of script treatment in need of workshopping?” He smirked before dropping his chin to his chest. “Someone I loved very much got sick. The medical community cares verydeeply about lifesaving efforts. That’s where the money is. But death? We’re not very good about helping people die. We’re all so scared of the end, but it’s the one thing we can’t prevent. Only delay. And only for so long.”
I blinked, not realizing that my eyes were welling with tears. “I’m sorry,” I said. “That was just... My mom was dying for a very long time before she finally went.”
He nodded, running a hand up the back of his neck. “So you’re part of the Dead Moms Club too? I’m so sorry, Vera.”
“It’s okay,” I told him. “But your mom... Is that— Was she—”
He nodded. “Parkinson’s. What about your mom?”
“Colon cancer.”
“That’s a fucking miserable way to watch someone die.”
It was. It really fucking was. Amid all the condolences and encouragements, this exact moment was the first time someone had acknowledged the pain of watching her deteriorate. Mom endured the truest misery, of course, but watching it unfold had turned into an immovable part of me. Not only her death, but the process of watching it happen was a canon event in the story of my life.
“Parkinson’s couldn’t have been easy,” I said.
“It made me furious. It made me want to punch walls.” His eyes, green with a lighter ring around the pupil, shifted down to where Marlon was curled up like a croissant at our feet. “Sometimes I did.”
“I liked your mom,” I said. His parents were big donors, so it wasn’t unusual to see them on campus. We’d met only two or three times, but she actually made eye contact with me. And she remembered my name and my major and one time during parents’ weekend at Sigma Chi, she said I had a contagious laugh.
“She liked you too,” he said.
“You’re just saying that to be nice.”
“You should know by now that I don’t say anything just to be nice.”
My stomach clenched. It was true.
“I didn’t have a lot of friends growing up,” he went on. “I mean, I was always surrounded with people. Like my Sigma Chi brothers or the lacrosse team in high school, but she liked knowing that I hung out withBrody. And you. Plus I told her about the time you got drunk and called me an entitled sycophant. She was an English major. She liked big words.”
I laughed. “Sycophantmaybe wasn’t the right word.”
“Butentitledwas,” he said quietly.
I swallowed, running my tongue over my bottom lip. “Maybe. But you obviously had things going on. Like with your dad. He sounded like a ray of fucking sunshine.” I’d only heard about Eli’s dad from Brody, but from what I knew, he was the kind of man whose approval and affection was a moving target, which was what I’d always thought of Eli, to be honest.
“I told her,” he said, his chin in his hand. “About our short-lived marriage.”
“Oh my god.” I wanted to melt into my coffee cup and then be poured down the drain. “She must have been horrified.”
He shook his head. “It surprised her. I don’t do that to people often and she liked surprises.” He went silent for a moment, and then looked back to me all serious and earnest. “For the record, surprises are awful.”
“Well, you’ve been surprising me since I showed up here,” I admitted.
He leaned back, with his arms folded and his feet crossed at the ankles. My fingers itched to run through the hair on his bare chest. “Nah. I haven’t changed, really. I think I was always there deep down.”
I gave him a pointed look.
He bit back a smile and shook his head. “Okay, maybe I have changed a little. But not too much.”
“Well, considering you could barely stand to have me in your room back in college, and now you’ve asked me to live with you, I’d say you’ve changed quite a bit.”
His forehead creased with concern. “Is that what you thought?”
