Page 42 of More With You

“I’ll be waiting,” I promise.

He kisses my hand and keeps hold of it as he gets out of the car, only letting go when the distance makes it impossible to hang on. I’m hoping it’s not a metaphor for what’s to come.

I watch him walk up to the gates and type in an entry code. The gate buzzes and off he goes, glancing back every now and again to lift his hand in an apologetic wave. I fix a smile to my lips and wave back, refusing to let him see how heavy I feel inside. He’s a father first. It’s comforting, in a way, to see how serious he is about his daughter.

But staring up at the gates, now closed to me, I can’t help but feel like Levi might be right: there’s no place for me here. I don’t even know the code.

BEN

Give me paint and make it red. The deepest, angriest scarlet, to streak my rage across the canvas. I’ve curated a life of peace and contentment, painted in the colors that bring the most joy—sea-greens like the ocean on an August afternoon, warm oranges that mimic sunset, cheerful yellows that sway upon sunflower heads, bright bursts of Valentine pink for Summer, and intense violet for Grace. I don’t ask for much, but I do ask that my parents refrain from interfering or taking liberties with my daughter.

What if something had happened on the flight? What if it had gone down over the Atlantic somewhere? What if they’d had to make an emergency landing? Sure, everyone wants a private jet until they’ve gone through insane turbulence in one and realized that it’s the flimsiest tube of metal you can think of, with a couple of wings stuck on.

I don’t lose my temper often, but I saw red tonight. I still see it, though Grace is safe in my arms, sleeping peacefully. I envy children that. They don’t worry over mundane things when they go to bed. Their minds are filled to the brim with imagination and inspiration and wonder, and they dream such dreams that a hardened adult mind wouldn’t know how to conjure. They don’t fret about the insults their parents are going to throw at the woman they’re falling in love with. They don’t get cold sweats over seeing a loved one in secret pain; they don’t even know the pain is there.

I know Summer is upset. She thought we had longer. I thought we had longer. But looking down at Grace, snuggled into me, I’m still hoping that the woman and the girl who both have my heart will adore each other. I saw a glimpse of that possibility in the car, when Summer said, “Poor kid. She must be spent.” Then again, that’s Summer. She thinks of other people. She’s been doing it all of her life, and now she’s going to go to bed, worrying about me, without me.

I could strangle my parents. What the hell did they think they were doing? The look on their faces when I walked in said it all. They’d been caught red-handed. So much red in my thoughts today.

“Darling, what are you doing here so late?” my mom squeaked, knowing she was in deep shit. She always goes ghost white when she’s wedged herself into a corner.

My father, on the other hand, is the kind of man who wouldn’t apologize, even if his car tires were still crushing a bicyclist. “We can talk about this in the morning. Your room is still made up. We’re tired.”

Of course, I insisted we were going to talk about it then and there.

“You don’t take my daughter out of one country and bring her into another without telling me!” I said something like that. “What were you hoping to achieve, huh? You know the ringtone changes when you’re in a different country, right, or did that slip your mind? Jesus Christ, this is pretty much kidnapping!”

My dad snorted. “Don’t be dramatic, Benjamin. Go to bed, and we’ll discuss this tomorrow.”

“Before or after your flight to Washington?” I shot back. The audacity of him, trying to weasel out before he had to face responsibility.

My mom broke down in tears, playing her usual cards. “It couldn’t be helped, darling. There wasn’t time to tell you. One moment, we’re on the beach in Naples, and the next, your father is telling us we have to get to the airport. It all happened so quickly.”

“Don’t give me that. It takes a minute to call me. You just didn’t want me to know you were back, so I wouldn’t take Grace to my place for the rest of the week.” I tell them I’m going to see my daughter, and I’ve been here ever since. I want to be the first thing she sees when she wakes up.

God, I’ve missed her.

And while I’m here, watching the sun come up, I’m thinking about Summer. I texted to let her know I wouldn’t be coming over, and I hate my parents for making me do that. I could take Grace right now, and go over there, but I don’t want her to wake up in a house she doesn’t know. Rock and a hard place, right?

Still, the thought of Summer will always make me endure. I’ll see her today. I made that promise and I’m going to keep it. I’m not going to keep running off, cutting dates short. That’s not how I want us to start, not when the fires are only just lit. They could snuff out at the slightest breeze of disappointment or abandonment.

I’ll make it up to you, Summer. Just wait for me a little while longer. I’m sorry to ask, but… it’s all I ask. Don’t run away. Please.

15

SUMMER

I stir to unbreathable heat cloying in my throat like molasses, my skin swampy with sweat that’s had nowhere to go as I’ve tossed and turned in my lonely sleep. Lethargy adds about forty pounds to each eyelid, while my body feels as though it has been baking in a steam room for at least a week, sapping all the vitality out of my pores.

“Ben?” I murmur, struggling to pull aside the veil of my foggy mind.

My hand fumbles across the other side of the bed, but it’s empty. Of course, it’s empty. Ben didn’t come here last night, after I dropped him off. At least, I don’t think he did, though I doubt I would’ve heard him knocking. The minute I got back to the cottage, I took a shower to wash away the unpleasantness of seeing Levi again, threw on PJs and clambered into bed. After that… nothing but comatose.

What happened? I physically force my eyelids open, rubbing some life back into them. Even so, my eyeballs are gritty with dehydration and my mouth is parched.

I glare up at the AC, listening for the familiar drone of cool air circulating through the ancient, boxy chunk of equipment. There’s only silence.

“You’ve got to be shitting me.” I kick back the covers, wondering if a firm smack with a wrench might spark it back into life. Vasily, my landlord, swore on his hundred acres in Wyoming that the AC would outlive all of us. I vaguely remember him telling me what to do if it glitched, but I can’t remember in my zombie-like state.

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