Page 59 of 32 Days in May

There will be a before and an after with no evidence left behind.

I spend the subway ride trying to leave something behind. If I tangle myself with him tight enough, when I pull away there’ll have to be a mark.

There’s a stillness about the empty car and a timelessness to the smell of grass on Marco’s collar, and I’m intoxicated by the way he hums and sighs when my lips trace the soft, smooth skin beneath his ear. It’s like I’ve never kissed anyone else before. I wouldn’t have been able to stop myself even if I wanted to.

Maybe it’s his breath, warm and ragged on my neck as he slides his hands down over the curve of my hips until he’s pressing into me, lifting my hips to meet his. Marco whispers in my ear that this is what he’s wanted all day. His voice vibrates through me, and I let go of the last shred of whatever has kept me imprisoned for months.

Friday, May 12

As promised, Marco wakes me up at 4 a.m. He rolls on top of me, covering my throat with kisses, even as I moan and whine in protest, muffled under his mouth on my chin and neck, his hair falling into my face. I can feel the weight and heat of his naked body through the thin sheet and only that stirs me.

“You know,” I begin, running my nails over and around his shoulders as he plants lazy kisses on the soft planes of my stomach. “Two weeks ago I didn’t even know who you were. Now you’re pressing your dong into my thigh to wake me up.”

“That’s love, baby,” he mumbles into my skin, and I try to ignore the ache in the center of my chest.

We cross the bridge into Evergreen and every part of me relaxes. This is home.

I quickly change and drop off my stuff before running down the steps. I actually can’t wait to get back to my place behind the till, the crisp, sappy smell of fresh-picked peppers and green beans and onions all around me. Soph left extra early to haggle for a better spot, away from the food trucks, and suddenly, this feels deeply exciting. I imagine our little stand accruing more customers.

Allie’s waiting for me on the last step of the porch with a thermos of fresh coffee. “I need to know everything. Everything.”

“We fucked,” I say, taking my thermos and pressing my lips to her cheek. “Gotta go.”

She gasps—a wild, uncharacteristically loud sound for such a country mouse. “Oh my God. You’re obsessed with him.”

I screw my mouth up into a grimace as I buckle my bike helmet under my chin. “I am. I’m so obsessed with him. It’s a real problem.”

“Wow.”

“An absolute pickle.”

Allie wraps her arms around herself, a barefoot bundle of hoodie and sweatpants in the morning breeze. “What if he’s your soulmate?” she shouts after me.

I laugh as I swing my leg over my bike. “That would suck, wouldn’t it?”

“You cannot leave me like this.” She’s hauling ass after me down the driveway as I’m pedaling away. “I need details, specifics, timelines! Give me content, Nadia!”

“I promise,” I call back, picking up speed. “You’ll get details, but if I’m late again Soph’s going to kill me and then you’ll never, ever know.”

I zoom down Neptune until it meets Brambleberry, then I make a left and pedal past The Billiards and the record shop and Cecily’s Hot Donuts and the bench where I lay down after my first night out with Marco. The sun is heavy and orange, dripping like honey down the vinyl-clad roofs. My phone is playing music from my bike basket, and I’m feeling sensations I haven’t felt in weeks. A tingling in my hands, in my wrists. A quickness in my pulse.

I want to write something. A script, a story. Something complete, more complete than scribbles on the notepad I keep next to my bed. I want to sit down and try to capture this feeling—this type of aliveness. It’s like I’ve glimpsed a butterfly resting on a purple dahlia, and I know I have to take a picture because this is rare. So rare that in twenty years it might no longer exist.

Happiness has that feeling for me now. A depleting resource.

I start to piece together some words—barely fragments. I like the butterfly metaphor. I’ll keep it. I’m not ready to start a big project, but a few lines about last night I could do, and that feels incredible. Maybe I could blow the dust off my laptop and even open a Word document.

I’m pulled away from my music and my thoughts when my phone starts buzzing in the basket of my bike.

I wouldn’t stop this song for anyone else.

“Hello,” I call out to Marco. “You’re on speaker.”

Marco chuckles, his voice deep and sleepy. The man laughs at everything I say. Preemptive joy. “Okay, I’ll keep it PG. Listen, I just got some really good news. Remember that work thing I said I didn’t want to jinx? Well, it’s happening—soon, too. This week, and I want you to come with me.”

“Come with you?” My pedal strokes grow languid. I thought he’d retired from acting, given up the whole shebang forever. “On location or something? Is this a movie?”

“No, it’s something totally different. You’ll just have to trust me. It’s in Rome.”