Page 87 of Anywhere with You
“That must’ve made my betrayal feel even worse.”
I shook my head quickly, then nodded. “Well, yes.”
She sniffed a laugh, her eyes glistening.
“But it made my reaction worse, too. You came into the store that first day and changed absolutely everything. And I think I understand what you were looking for, when you came looking for me. It wasn’t about blaming me or trying to hurt me or even about getting answers. You came because you didn’t want to go through it all alone. You wanted to be with someone who would understand how much you were hurting, and you picked me.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t want you to be my therapist.”
“No,” I said, rolling my chair to the side of the desk so I could take her hand. “You wanted me to be your friend. And I’m so glad you did, Cara.”
“So am I,” she whispered.
Chapter Thirty-six
It would’ve been easy, at that point, to fade out of each other’s lives. We didn’t live or work in the same parts of town. We could move on, consider our trip a failed experiment, and pretend not to notice if we ended up in the same grocery store aisle one day.
But I hadn’t been lying to Cara. Everything else aside, her friendship meant a lot to me, and I intended to keep it.
So the next morning, I texted Cara to ask if she wanted to come see my new apartment on Sunday. She agreed, only if I would let her help by unpacking some boxes and listening to her sage advice on where to put everything.
“You can’t just throw things around willy-nilly and hope you end up creating a comfortable space,” she said the moment she arrived. “You have to plan.”
“What about nilly-willy? Is that an acceptable alternative?”
She picked up a pillow from the top of a stack of boxes and threw it at me.
Badger yipped in protest, then, duty done, rolled over at Cara’s feet in expectation of belly rubs. Cara acquiesced, adding in some baby talk, which made Badger’s ears perk up lightning fast.
“Have some dignity,” I told him. He lolled his tongue at me.
I had worried that it wouldn’t be the same with Cara and me, now that we were back in our regular lives. Maybe we had only liked the vacation versions of each other. Maybe it would turn out that we had nothing in common past a few days on the road and a couple of memorable nights together.
Or maybe not. Maybe all we needed was a little thought, a little effort, and a trip to a gourmet popcorn store.
I’d stocked my new pantry with fourteen kinds. Cara had gone wide-eyed when she found them, immediately insisting that we put some blue kernels in my new air popper.
Cara ate the first popped kernel, disappointingly white, not blue, and made a soft happy sound that was so familiar that it stopped me where I stood in my new kitchen. The last time I’d heard that sound, I’d been kissing her neck at the hot springs, my arms wrapped around her, pressing her against me, skin to skin.
“Water?” I offered with a croak.
Cara and I unloaded most of the kitchen and bathroom boxes. She organized dishes by frequency of use, so I no longer had to stand on tiptoe for coffee cups every morning. She found cabinet space for any appliance I didn’t use at least once a week, freeing up my counters. She alphabetized my medicine cabinet and threw out my expired cough syrup.
“You packed expired cough syrup,” she said, baffled.
“I kind of threw stuff into boxes without looking too closely.”
“Clearly.”
When she stopped, it was to shake her head at the ragged state of my towels. “We have to fix this immediately. Let’s go shopping.”
We went shopping. I followed her through the store, watching each expression on her face.
I’d been convinced that we could make this work. We’d apologized. We’d forgiven each other. I’d bought popcorn. We were friends again.
But seeing Cara rub her soft hands over the towels at the store was a challenge for which I was not prepared. I watched her hands caress the fabric, fingers pressing the slightest divot in the cloth. She slowly smoothed the surface with her palms.
She bit her lip thoughtfully, comparing textures.
