Page 54 of Well, Actually
The world stops, capturing us in a Polaroid moment staring at each other. The image shifts, and it’s us from six years ago, faces young and cheeks aching with laughter. It morphsagain—smiles loose and eyes glassy as we celebrate a birthday over drinks. And again—noses burnt on the Fourth of July, ugly sweaters at Christmas, a kiss at New Year’s.
I see all of these precious snapshots of what could have been like I’m viewing a tenderly made scrapbook—the way our bodies curl toward each other, the easy intimacy, the sharp glint of playfulness in our eyes as we take for granted another giddy night at a cheap diner. The idea sears itself in my mind like a memory, blistering as I remind myself it’s not.
It hurts too much to linger in flighty fantasies, cutting my fingers on the edges of all of those fake photos and blank pages.
“No,” I say, shaking my head and pulling my hands away. Cooper’s face falls, and I keep going, slipping into my most flippant mask, creating the distance everyone is so comfortable holding with me. He doesn’t get to leave me and then come back and play a game of what-ifs over the tombstone of my hardened heart. “We’re way too different. For example, your love language is physical touch. My love language is mac ’n’ cheese. This would have never worked between us.”
“Eva,” he says on a breath that’s half laugh, half frustration. “Come on.”
“No,” I repeat, anger rising. “You come on. Where do you get off asking me a question like that? Be serious for a fucking second, I beg you.”
Cooper opens his mouth, but I cut him off. “I’m not some social experiment for you. You don’t get to fuck off just long enough for things to heal only to resurface and reminisce about the past, tearing the cut wide open again.”
This wasn’t part of it. This was never supposed to feel real or honest or important. This was never supposed to unravelme, chip away at all my armor until I’m standing bare-boned in front of him.
“Eva. I’m sorry. I—”
“I’m out of here.” With shaky hands, I dig through my wallet, throwing whatever cash is in there on the table before I bolt for the door. It takes me a good ten seconds of storming down the sidewalk to realize it’s raining. Of course it is.
I look around, trying to get my bearings through the sheets of rain falling in every direction. I’m not super familiar with Brighton Beach, and I pull out my phone, trying to find the closest subway stop so I can take what I can only imagine will be a super-convenient two-hour train ride back to Manhattan.
“What the hell are you doing?” Cooper calls over the heavy wind. I jump when I realize how close he is, my phone slipping out of my hands into a puddle.
“Oh, real nice,” I say, pushing my drenched hair out of my eyes and glaring at him. “Look what you did.”
“Don’t start,” he says through clenched teeth, making me want to dig in and really fucking start.
He bends down to grab my phone, but I shoulder him aside, getting it myself. I don’t need him playing hero. I randomly pick a direction and start marching, trying to get my screen to respond to me instead of the raindrops. I almost cry out in relief when I see the Q train is only three blocks away and I’m heading toward it.
“Where are you going?” Cooper says, chasing after me.
“I’m taking the train home,” I say, ignoring the rain in my eyes as I keep my chin lifted, pace fast. But Cooper’s faster. He grabs my arm, spinning me around.
“Don’t be ridiculous. That’ll take forever. I’ll drive you home.”
“I don’t want to go anywhere with you,” I say, ripping my arm from his grasp. I know I sound like a petulant child but I couldn’t care less.
His look is thunderous, and he rakes his hands through his wet hair. “Would you just stop it, you ridiculous woman? Why can’t you let me do anything for you?”
“Why didn’t you ever call me?” I yell. It shocks us both.
Cooper blinks, water sluicing down his cheeks, the lenses of his glasses collecting raindrops and making it hard for me to read his expression.
“Why?” I repeat in a whisper, voice cracking. Embarrassment swamps me, but I continue to stand there, waiting for an answer. It’s a pathetically old wound, but it’s only festered with time. Gouged deeper and deeper as I’ve watched more and more people step into their lives without me, leaving me behind like a used doll they’re tired of playing with.
“I already told you,” Cooper says, his voice so low it’s hard to hear over the rain. “I made a mistake. I regret it.”
“Butwhy?” I push, unable to leave well enough alone. “Why was that the choice you made? Why did you make me like you? Why did you chase me, if you knew how it would end?”
Why was I so easy to leave? What is it about me that’s so simple to forget?Recitals and parent-teacher conferences and important dates and milestones where I’m left alone on the curb with my heart in my hand desperately wishing someone thought I was important enough to remember.
Cooper lets out a rough noise, scrubbing his hands over hisface. “Because I was a mess, Eva,” he says, dropping his arms with a wet smacking sound against his jeans. “And I need you to listen to me when I say that because it’s the goddamn truth.” He stares at me, his expression harsh, jaw working. “I wasn’t coping with the loss of my sister. I was about to graduate college with no job lined up. I was secretly hooking up with a guy who I had feelings for but both of us had too much internalized shit to ever tell the truth and it screwed me up. I was at rock fucking bottom. Then I met you and I messed that up too. I really liked you, and it scared me because I was too much of a disaster to even look at myself in the mirror, let alone start something with this cool, funny woman with her life figured out and these amazing dreams I had no doubt she’d reach with the snap of her fingers. It’s pathetic but for a twenty-two-year-old idiot, that’s a pretty intimidating picture to try and squeeze yourself into.”
Cooper takes a step toward me, gripping my shoulders, forcing me to look at him.
“I can’t change the past,” he says, fingers tightening around me. “Do you have any idea, any fucking clue, how much I wish I could? How many nights the idea has kept me awake with frustration? I’d do it in a heartbeat. I’d go back in time and slap myself and tell that idiot version of me to get his shit together and not hurt the amazing girl who actually seems to care about his pathetic ass.”
A shiver runs through me, emotions knotted in my throat. I can’t tell if it’s the rain on my cheeks or if tears have started slipping out.
