Page 73 of When Love Gives You Lemons
Well, someone had to bring up the elephant in the lemon groves.
I barter with myself about what to bring up. How much is too much? We have a lot to talk about, but it feels like we’ve finally started to reconnect, maybe even build something new, and I don’t want anything to rock the boat. It’s too delicate, so I say the most honest, true, and neutral statement possible: “I wouldn’t have gotten through it without him.”
Ricky’s jaw pulsates as he looks away, off into the mountains.
“What’s on your mind?” I ask, knowing the thoughtful look on his face, the one he has when he’s writing a new poem and trying to turn a phrase or planning the blueprints of a new woodworking project and working through the schematics.
He lets out a heavy sigh and sips the fiery limoncello like freaking apple juice. I never liked the stuff, so I’m pretending to savor mine. “Nothing.”
“Come on, I know you, Ric.”
“Do you?”
It’s a quick jab, but it hurts like a paper cut you don’t see coming.
“I did, once,” I say softly. “Until you left without saying goodbye. Then I wondered if I ever knew you.”
He takes a step back, the color draining from his face. He turns from me, but instead of walking away, he takes a beat, a breath, and then starts talking. “I regretted leaving the second I walked out the door. I thought I was doing us both a favor—it doesn’t matter now. But I-I regret it every day. When you didn’t take my call, I knew I’d fucked up, but I thought maybe we could . . . I don’t know. I’m not good at talking about all this stuff.” His voice is shaking.
“Doing us both a favor? Your call? I never got a call.”
He swiveled on his heels. “Yeah, I called you. Well, not you because you had me blocked. But Matty. Back in January.”
“Uh, nope. You didn’t. IthinkI would’ve remembered that. What happened? Piece it together because—”
Ricky grinds his teeth. “It was the anniversary of Nonno’s death. I ended up in the ER after I cut myself in the workshop, and I wanted to talk to you because my head wasn’t right. I didn’t have anybody to call. I didn’t wanna worry my parents or Sienna with something silly like stitches.” He holds up his thumb, which I take in my hand. I run my index finger across a small scar down his pad. “I still had Matty’s number, so I took a chance, and he was actually with you. At the mall. He said you were shooting content at some new vegan health bar place.”
I vaguely remember that day, and Matty never mentioned Ricky calling, but . . . “Holy balls. He was actingreallyweird after he got a call from his mom. I kept asking him about it, but he was giving me attitude, so I left him alone. I figured he was pissy because he gets moody for no reason sometimes, especially with Zia Rosa, but what the actual fuck? That was you on the phone?” My legs feel wobbly. Come to think of it, that morning I got an alert on my phone that it was his nonno’s death anniversary. I open my mouth to speak again, but nothing comes out.
“You really didn’t know?”
“If I had known, I would have talked to you, no question.” Anger builds in my chest, and I clench my fist. “I’m gonnakillMatty.”
“It’s not worth it.”
“Isn’t it?” Matty knew I spent every waking hour workingtoward a plan to win Ricky back. That could have been an opportunity to do exactly that.
“Is it?” he asks calmly. “What would it have changed?”
We both chew on that question because the potential answers are too vast for either of us. My mind spins,Avengers: Endgame–style with reverse timeline scenarios of what could have happened if my dumbass cousin had just given me the phone.
Infinite possibilities, sure. But the only one that matters is this one. The real one.
Our eyes meet, and a single tear falls from his.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“I hated you for that,” he says.
I hated him, too. For breaking my heart and doing so without warning. For leaving like a coward. For making me feel like I wasn’t good enough to keep. But I loved him at the same time. It’s funny, the fragile line between love and hate—it’s not really a line at all. Hate isn’t the absence of love, nor is it the opposite of love. Hate is love with nowhere to go.
Being with him these last few days has made me remember the real Ricky, the quiet, fun, beautiful boy I fell in love with, not the Ricky who broke my heart and whom I became desperate to prove myself to in the wake of heartbreak. I spent the last year so hell-bent on my revenge bod and becoming a self-reliant Fielder because at the end Ricky made me feel like I was lost, floundering, and in need of being taken care of by him.
But maybe it wasn’t that I needed to change myself so much as find myself. Maybe it was that Ricky just needed to be cared for, too.
“Can I have a . . . ?” he asks, holding his arms out.
I nod becauseof course! My body is screaming for his hugs.
