Page 89 of Drawn Together
When the time comes for our food to arrive, we go from ten conversations all at once to nothing—only the happy sounds of chewing and hums and yummy food noises.
“What are your plans for tomorrow?” Fletcher looks up from his pappardelle—he has pushed all his mushrooms over to my plate. “Tourist stuff or more local?”
I appreciate him trying to sign as much as he can—he doesn’t know the sign for plans, so he spells it out—it’s so cute, I’m starting to rethink if this crush is ever going to leave, or if it’s like a tattoo permanently etched in my chest.
“I kind of have a whole day planned out.” I turn to my sister and sign while I’m speaking. “Unless there’s anything extra tourist-y you want to do?”
I’m good with anything. She smiles and takes a colossal bite of her strip steak.
“Oh.” Lennon straightens. “You guys should try the row boats near Central Park; Stephan and I have done that a ton. But he’s horrible at it, so don’t let him be in charge. We could take you guys?”
I had plans for the day that consisted of shopping and coffee and books and more shopping, but Sloane's eyes are the size of saucers as she reads my translating sign, and I quickly scrap my original plans, deciding row boats are a fine idea.
When dinner is over and everyone is overstuffed, I walk out as the last of the group beside Fletcher.
I reach out a hand to grab his wrist, and he stops in his tracks.
“You learned sign.” My voice is coated in awe.
“I attempted to, yeah.” He rubs the back of his neck. “It’s harder than I thought. I assumed you kind of signed every word that you say, but then when I watched the videos, the teacher said there’s filler words, I guess? I’ll be honest, I still don’t understand all—”
“Fletcher.”
He turns to me, the shy smile back that I enjoy so much. “Flora.”
“I don’t think you realize how important this is to me.”
Fletcher shakes his head, the lights bouncing off his round glasses. “I don’t think you realize that me wanting to be able to communicate with your family is the bare minimum. I don’t know what you’re used to from everyone else, but start expecting more from me, okay?”
Twenty-six
Wordoftheday:Serendipity
Definition:finding something good without looking for it
Turns out, my perfect plans for Sloane's visit are just that: perfect.
I offered to sleep on the couch last night to give her my bed, but around one in the morning she slipped out of my room and fell right next to me. We cuddled up under hedgehog blankets, and I think my home sickness was cured overnight.
We wake while the sky is still a deep, drowsy indigo—Sloane’s always been an early riser, practically allergic to sleeping in. She flits around the apartment like a little bird, tugging on boots and yanking me out the door. We head straight to the coffee shop where Fletcher and I first met, where she orders a peppermint hot chocolate, and I get the butterscotch latte—which has become a crowd favorite between Lennon, Stephan, and I.
Warm paper cups in hand, we stroll through Park Slope. Sloane takes approximately ten thousand pictures of all thebrownstones on St. John’s, Lincoln, and Berkeley Place. Trees drop leaves in flurries of rust and ochre, and the sidewalks are blanketed in each crunch of our booted steps. The neighborhoods are full-out Halloween now—pumpkins stacked like sculptures, fake cobwebs shimmering with morning dew, and little ghosts swaying from iron fences.
Sloane happily pulls me in and out of little shops: a store called denim that only sells denim, an indie bookstore with used books and signed local author copies—I check to see if there are any of Cedric’s and though his stock is full, there are no bookplates or information on him from the booksellers—and a vintage clothing shop that has the funkiest hats and purses. We try them all on and she takes a million pictures of me in red heart sunglasses in point-five zoom lenses so my head looks shrunk.
We hop on a short bus ride to the entrance of Grand Army Plaza arch, just north of Prospect Park. We grab two hot dogs with mustard and find a bench nearby. We sit, eating slowly while watching Brooklyn move around us: joggers, strollers, couples holding hands with fingers laced. Cars honk and dogs bark at each other in passing, babies laughing and crying—the world around us a blur of color.
Sloane signs between bites. I love her coat.Should I become an Uber driver when I move here? Do you think we look like tourists? I feel like a local.Her hands flutter quickly—naturally—like tiny birds flying in the wind.
When we’re ready to keep moving, she goes back to the hot dog stand and grabs one more for each of us and a cinnamon pretzel for us to split. We take a quick walk down to Prospect Park—I easily could have taken her to the same reading spot that Fletcher takes me to, but something about that feels like betrayal, and we share a walk around the lake where she tells me more about this boy she’s been dating for the last month.
What about Fletcher? You aren’t together?
I divide our pretzel and hand her half, tucking mine under my arm so I can sign back to her.
He’s important to me.
She gives me a deadpan look, and I shrug.
