Page 44 of The Goode Girls of Maple Lane
I spin within Everett’s embrace to face her. “About that. You guys made a bet?”
Regina shrugs. “Saw it coming a mile away. I have a sixth sense about these things.”
“She does,” Tegan says. “I never should’ve placed my money on Khalil.”
“What? No!” I sputter out a surprised laugh. “You thought... I mean... really?”
She tosses the towel over her shoulder and counts off on her fingers. “He’s smart, he’s nice, he cooks, and he’s built like an underwear model. If you’re into that kind of thing.”
I spin around to face Everett, who’s watching me with a distinct note of curiosity in his eyes. I could leave him hanging, but one of my favorite things about him is that he doesn’t play any games with me, so I see no reason to play games with him.
“I’m intothiskind of thing,” I say, and then I loop my arms around his neck and kiss him. I kiss him for trust. For care. For standing up for me. For letting me make my own decisions about my dog, social media, and money, even when hereallywants to intervene, and even when we both suspect his ideas are better than mine. For cooking vegetables instead of turkey. For opening his home to discarded plants and discarded people. For the first Thanksgiving I’ve wanted to remember. And for everything I’ll want to remember in days to come.
Chapter Seventeen
The first weekend in December, we set up a photoshoot at the studio that’s been the source of Everett’s secondhand plants. I give him and Regina free rein, not because I can’t make a video that mentions the shirts and directs people toward her website, but because this is a world they know better—pitching, packaging, and selling—and they run with it like the pros they are.
The TikTok they create of Aggie and me in matching shirts—playing ball, hugging, happy, and showing off her progress walking a few yards on her own—is carefully edited and synced to music. It tells a story about Aggie’s and my relationship. It starts and ends with an animated pink and maroon Goode Girls graphic Everett designs, riffing off Regina’s tee. Even the caption is snappier than what I post, tagged and keyworded to increase potential viewership. It’s not what I imagined for the account, and I’d never admit this to “no offense” Brandon, but I can see the appeal of a little polish. The video quickly garners hundreds of thousands of views and a load of shares and new followers, along with countless comments from people excited about the shirts, and about having a means of contributing to Aggie’s caretaking expenses.
It’s a positive start to the month, wrapping a few of the happiest weeks of my life, but I can’t float on new-friendship feels and falling-in-love endorphins forever, as becomes patently clear when Aggie’s meds require refilling and I can’t afford them. Regina’s shirts will bring in some income, but we won’t have solid sales numbers for a few weeks, and she has to cover her initial costs before there’s any profit to share. Thankfully, I’m able to double my cleaning hours for the month, clocking in Monday through Thursday from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Not so thankfully, this leaves me with very little time for studying, and when end-of-term exams kick in, for the first time since I started my biology degree as a freshman in college, I’m underprepared.
At the end of the term, on a gray Thursday, I get called in by not one but two of my professors, who are concerned about my drop in performance. I eked out a C on my immunology exam, and a C-minus on my pathology final, while still pulling off an A-minus in anatomy and physiology, so I won’t fail anything this term, but for a previously straight-A student, the dip is noticeable. And the grades hurt. I hate not doing well in my classes. It’s one of the only areas of my life in which I’ve never questioned my capabilities, and I’m mortified to have lost my professors’ esteem.
“It’s not just the exam,” Dr. Meacher, my immunology professor, says as I sit across from her in an office that smells like old leather and fresh lavender. A gentle snowfall is drifting down outside the window behind her, and it reminds me I need to get Aggie some traction booties. One more thing to add to the list. “You’ve been falling asleep in classes. Distracted. Disengaged.”
Dammit.I thought I’d hidden that better, strategically parked in the back rows.
“I’m working two jobs right now,” I tell her. “But hoping to cut back in January.”
She steeples her long, slender fingers and taps them against her lips. She’s my toughest teacher, very no-nonsense, and it’s not surprising that I’m falling short of her expectations.
Ihatethat I’m falling short of her expectations.
“You’re sure it’s just work?” she asks.
“Work, life, paying rent. My loans cover my tuition, but not my living expenses.”
She regards me with unblinking eyes that suggest a question without asking one. I don’t know what she wants me to say, other than something different from what I already told her.
Then she takes out her phone and opens TikTok.
“My teenage daughter showed me your account,” she says. “I respect the work you’re doing with the dog you adopted, but if you’re spending all your time on social media—”
“I’m not,” I interject, suddenly furious. She has a right to call me in about my grades. I appreciate that she cares enough about me to check in and not let me slide downhill any further, but seriously? She thinksthisis what’s exhausting me? Making and posting a few short videos about my dog? Not scrubbing congealed dispenser soap off restroom countertops late at night and convincing people with disposable incomes to buy grossly up-charged home furnishings all weekend so I can afford a shoebox apartment and a weekly allotment of generic cereal? Was grad schoolthatmuch cheaper when Dr. Meacher got her degree? Or rent? Or even cereal?
Although, admittedly, adopting Aggie has stretched me especially thin, making my dad’s most recent comment about making smart choices echo in my ears for the umpteenth time.
Yeah. Great. Noted.Though a choice doesn’t always have to feelsmartto feelright.
“Cameron,” Dr. Meacher says, and to her credit, she doesn’t say it in a patronizing way. “You’re such a smart girl. Hardworking. Good instincts. But this field is competitive, and you’ll need to bring your grades up next term if you expect to earn an internship or residency, both of which I think would be good for you, so you get more practical experience.”
“I know.” My lower lip starts to quiver but I bite it into submission as I repeat, “I know.”
She regards me again without speaking, maybe because she knows her next words might unleash tears, and she doesn’t strike me as someone who’d want to deal with that. I’ve always respected her cool, exacting demeanor. It’s given me hope about finding my own footing as a vet without being good with people. But today? I can’t help but wish she was a little bit warmer.
“I trust that you do know,” she says. “Take some time over the holiday break to consider your priorities. Let’s see if we can get you back on track in the new year.”
I nod and thank her and head out with a sincere but lacklusterhappyy holidays, walking straight into meeting number two, in which Dr. Stean, my pathology professor, exhibits greater compassion for everything I’m juggling and offers to give me a retest in January if I think I can do better then. I gratefully and eagerly accept the opportunity, even though it’ll mean studying my ass off over the holiday break, when I was hoping I’d have less to juggle, and not more.
