Page 16 of Every Step She Takes
But unlike every other person I’ve impulsively fallen in love with since, I never felloutof love with Michelle. Our love simply shifted. We became best friends who stayed close, even as I flitted around the country, around the world. Michelle got into the University of Washington’s Forest Ecology program and settled in Seattle where she grew up. I took dozens of jobs at dozens of nonprofit organizations around the world and settled nowhere.
Eventually, I decided I liked the labellesbianafter all; Michelle met Kwame and realized she’s bisexual. And a year and a half ago, I came to Seattle for Michelle’s wedding, met Kwame’s cousin Ruth, and did the insta-love thing all over again.
Michelle has seen me at my absolute worst. She knows all my annoying habits, all my secret neuroses, all my childhood trauma, and no matter how many times I’ve tried to push her away, she never budges. She’s the only person I can be my trueself with, the only person who never leaves. Michelle is my platonic soulmate.
“You make me sound like some kind of slutty womanizer,” I complain now through bites of sausage roll.
“You’re not a womanizer,” she quickly corrects. “You’re a serial monogamist, and I think you should try being single for more than a day this time.”
I swallow. “For the sake of full transparency, I should probably tell you that there was, in fact, a woman on the airplane…”
“I fucking knew it.”
“It wasn’t my fault! She hadfreckles.”
Michelle sighs again, and this one carries a potent mixture of exhaustion, exasperation, and a hint of maternal disappointment.
“Don’t get your panties in a twist. I’m never going to see her again.”
“Worry about your own damn panties,” she snaps.
“I don’t want you to worry about me, M,” I tell her seriously. “Ruth dumped me, and I’m taking a trip to heal my broken heart. It’s not that complicated.”
“Ruth didn’t have the ability to break your heart,” she says, effortlessly cutting through my emotional smokescreen. “But yourdad…”
“I don’t give a shit about my dad,” I insist, “dead or not.”
Michelle’s tone abruptly shifts to cartoonish placating. “That was a nice, big fart, baby boy! Yes! Yes, it was! Get that gas out of your cute little belly!”
The tension of our conversation dissipates into wild laughter as Michelle continues to celebrate her baby’s flatulence.
Sometimes, I think Michelle puts me on the same level as her colicky, constipated newborn. And maybe that’s fair. She has a PhD and a postdoc position at UW. She’s doing critical research on forest resiliency and global climate change. She’s aworld-changing Aquarius, and I’m just an aimless Gemini who doesn’t know the cost of oat milk.
“I’m not Cedar,” I tell her when the laughter stops. “You don’t have to take care of me.”
“Of course I’m going to take care of you. That’s what friends do.” Michelle’s voice goes soft, but no part of her is babying me. “Just like how you’ve always taken care of me when I’ve needed it. Whether you want to deal with it or not, your girlfriend dumped you the same day your dad died and left you this massive, unexpected inheritance, and if you don’t deal with that grief, you’re going to—”
“How can I grieve someone who never accepted me?” The words stop Michelle’s tirade in its tracks. I wish my tone was flippant, but I’ve never been good at staying flippant with Michelle.
The memory roars in my ears, in my heart.
The first time I fell in love with a girl, I held nothing back. I was seventeen, and I believed Prithi wasthe one. We were roommates at our boarding school in Scotland and started dating in our final year before university. We even made plans to attend Oxford together. I was positively bursting with love, and I desperately wanted my father to know about it. I wanted to shout about my love for the whole damn world to hear.
So, the summer before Oxford, I decided to come out to my father.
I should have known better than to trust Valentim Costa with my real feelings.
“Grief isn’t logical,” Michelle finally says.
“Look, I’m going to miss my flight if I don’t—”
She sees through this lie and barrels on. “I know it’s tempting to distract yourself with something—orsomeone—new, but maybe you can spend some time alone with yourself on this trip…” Michelle tries in the soft voice she uses for Cedar. “Spend some timereflecting. You’re the most generous, mostloving person I know, but you tend to lose yourself in relationships.”
“No I don’t,” I argue. “When have I ever done that?”
“Well, when we were dating, you pretended to likeBattlestar Galactica…”
She’s got me there.
