Again, but Better (17 page)

Babe and Sahra are last-minute packing when I emerge from the shower at 2:15 a.m. I venture to the kitchen for water.

I go home to my disappointed parents tomorrow. Disappointment that will have no doubt rippled through the entire family by now.

I manipulated my parents into paying for a study abroad trip completely irrelevant to my degree
.

Standing at the sink, I close
my eyes and heave a giant breath, pressing my palms up into my eyes. The door opens behind me. I turn to see Atticus. His happy-go-lucky expression drops.

“Jeez, Shane, are you okay?” He takes a seat at the table.

“I’m fine, just, um, sad that this is all over.”

He presses his lips together and nods. “Yeah, me too. I wish I went to school with you guys.” Atticus goes to a different university
that sent him to our program.

“Me too,” I agree. “But we’ll still keep in touch, right?”

“Yeah, of course!” he says adamantly. “Are you going to be okay? Do you want to talk about it?”

I smile at him gratefully. “I’m fine. I think I just need a second, you know?”

“Yeah, I do,” he agrees, understanding on his face. He gets up and fills himself a glass of water before heading toward the door.
“Good night, Shane.”

I slump down into a seat, resting my head and arms on the table. I’m going to miss Atticus. And Sahra and Babe. And Pilot.

There’s a giant pit in my stomach. The kind you get when you know you failed the test the teacher’s handing back, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

In the morning, we’re all up early cleaning out the kitchen. Everything needs to be thrown out
or wiped down. It’s our last flat activity. I don’t know what I was expecting, but this last group hang isn’t fun. Everyone’s on edge. We don’t make much eye contact, and we’re all quiet.

We clean for an hour before Atticus, Babe, Sahra, and I make our way up the stairs with our luggage. Pilot helps us. We roll up to the door with our bags. Pilot gives Atticus, Sahra, and Babe each a hug, and
then it’s my turn. It’s not the goodbye I’ve romanticized. It’s barely a goodbye at all. He avoids my eyes and leans in for the same generic hug he gave everyone else.

“Bye,” he says quietly with his arms around me.

“Bye,” I whisper under my breath. It’s quick. He turns his head, pulls away, and then he’s heading back down the stairs.

Babe walks off to catch the Tube to her new hotel (we’re
all kicked out of the Karlston today). Atticus, Sahra, and I share a cab to the airport. We’re all on different flights, so at Heathrow we part ways.

I wait in a long check-in line for Virgin Atlantic, and think about how I’ve let everyone down. Including myself. Wendy and Donna and Declan, and Mom and Dad.

I let all my writing goals go to shit, and I never confronted Pilot.

I’m going to be
waist-deep in premed work when I get home, which will leave little to no time for book drafting. And things with Pilot are really going to change when we get back to the US—I’m never going to be able to tell him how I feel. He’s going to go back to Amy, and it’ll be like nothing
ever happened. Maybe this wasn’t a big deal for him, but feeling like this was … is a big deal for me.

“Next in line!”

I roll up to check in with my two bags and heave my giant suitcase onto the scale.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, this is fifteen pounds overweight,” the woman says.

I blink at her and take it off. I pull on my carry-on.
I came here to do things. Not regret things.

“This one’s four pounds overweight.” She points to an area behind me. “You can go over there and try to rearrange things. There’s a max of
fifty pounds per bag.” I follow her gaze to where two other young girls have their bags wide open on the floor, repacking shit in the middle of the check-in area.

I came to take risks. I came to be outgoing. I don’t want it to end like this.

“What?” I hear the check-in lady ask.

Did I say that out loud?

I pivot and drag my bags away. I don’t stop near the repacking girls; I keep walking and
head outside again, gaining speed as a surge of adrenaline courses through me. I wait for another cab. I give the driver the address of the Karlston, and we plow back into London.

My heart beats outside my body, running in circles around the taxi. I’m doing it. I’m gonna do what I said I was going to do: I’m going to tell him. I’m at the end of the rom com, not the drama. It’s not going to end
with me getting on the plane.

I practice what I’m going to say:
Pies, I really, really like you. I don’t know how you feel, but I really, really like you and I had to tell you. I had to let you know.
Simple, straightforward, easy to remember. I can go off cuff from there.

I repeat it over and over in my brain the entire way.

When we pull up to the Karlston, I leap out onto the sidewalk.
Pies,
I really, really like you. I don’t know how you feel, but I really, really like you and I had to tell you. I had to let you know.

“I’ll be right back!” I tell the driver. “Can you please keep the meter running?”

I slam the door shut, beaming now as I hurtle up the steps.
I’m doing it!
I’ve committed, and god it feels great!

I have my ID out and ready to flash at security. I sprint past them
and down the stairs, holding onto the railing so I don’t trip and break my neck. I shuffle over to the kitchen and peek in through the windows to see if he’s in there.

It’s empty, so I run down the hall to his door, heave in a great breath, and knock.
Pies, I really, really like you. I don’t know how you feel, but I really, really like you and I had to tell you. I had to let you know.

“Pies?”

I laugh. I can’t believe I’m doing this.

“Pies?” I knock again. “Pies!” I yell louder now. No answer.

Maybe he’s listening to music. I put pressure on the doorknob and find that it’s unlocked. I push the door open. The room is empty save for the black comforters we were told to leave behind.

“No,” I breathe quietly. “No,” I say again, wandering into the room, looking for any remnant of Pilot
that might suggest he’s still here, just not
here
.

“No.” I run out into the hall.

“Pilot?” I call. I go into the kitchen to make sure he’s not hidden from view on the far end of the couch. I run down the hall to the other flat where his guy friends live. “Pies?”

No one’s here.

I can call him!
He’s still in London! I fumble for the phone in my cross-body for half a second before the idea crashes
down around me. I don’t have a phone. Dad broke my phone, and I never got a new one because I hardly used it anyway. I don’t know Pilot’s British number by heart. His US phone doesn’t work here. I never thought to ask where he was staying after this.

Maybe he’s on his computer wherever he is, and he can give me a location? I sprint back up to the taxi, dive into my book bag, and whip out Sawyer.
I run back in and down to the basement to connect to the Wi-Fi. I open Facebook chat.

Shane

Hey, Pies?

I wait thirty seconds.

Shane

Pies, you out there?

Thirty more seconds.

A minute. Three minutes. The messages remain unviewed.

My face crumples. I close my laptop because my meter’s running. My plane’s waiting. I drag myself back up the stairs and into the taxi. Ask the driver to go
back to the airport.

I miss my flight.

When I finally land back in the United States, Leo and Alfie are waiting for me at JFK. My expression falls as I step up to where they’re standing, fiddling on their smartphones. I was expecting Mom.

“What are you guys doing here? Where’s my mom?”

“Your parents sent us,” Alfie answers, still texting.

I look to Leo. “Why?” My voice cracks.

He shakes
his head like he’s at a loss. “You tell us.”

I start walking toward the baggage carousel, tears welling up in my eyes.

Leo trots after me. “Shane, come on. You never tell us anything anymore. You’ve never been in trouble your entire life. What the hell did you do to piss them off so much?” He steps in front of me, blocking my way.

I close my eyes and heave a breath. I’m so tired. “Leo—” I huff.

“Leo lost his baseball scholarship and dropped out of school,” Alfie snickers from out of view.

Leo winces. Whatever I was about to say dies on my tongue.

I glance at Alfie over Leo’s shoulder, but he’s back to texting on his phone. I study Leo’s eyes. They’re blank, guarded.

“What is he talking about?” I ask quietly. “What’s going on with you?”

“What did you
do
?” he asks again.

I slump forward
and step around him toward the carousel.

Pilot responds to my message the next day, asking what was up. I tell him I needed Babe’s British number because I accidentally packed one of her shirts.

“If you were a shape, what shape would you be?” The chair creaks as the man leans back and folds his hands over his knee.

If I were a shape?
If I were a shape.
A diamond? Would they want to hear diamond? Am I a diamond? I’m under enough pressure. What about parallelogram? I like how the word
parallelogram
rolls off the tongue.

What. Shape. Am I? What shape am I?

His fingers drum on the table. Shit.

“Uh, I would be a circle, or actually a sphere because I’m three-dimensional, you know, and, because I can always roll with the punches.”

He blinks. “Hmmm.”

I swallow.

“If you were a flower, what flower would you be?” he drawls.

Flowers? I don’t really know flowers. Rose because
Red
is my favorite Taylor Swift album? Sunflower because I’m upbeat? What
are those things at Christmas? Poinsettias! Also red. And poisonous. Is there something orange? Orange feels unique.

The fingers drum again.
Make a decision.

“Okay, I’d say, I’d be a rose—”

His eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. Okay,
rose is bad.

I choke. “I mean, no, that’s too romantic. I’d actually be a sunflower because
they’re really bright and positive, and well, tall … and I’m just,
like, average height. I retract that?”

He sighs loudly.

“I’m an orange tree!” I blurt. “I like to make … things that people can enjoy, and oranges are unique, but not too unique because … they’re universally good for your health.” I nod absently to myself.

“So, not a flower,” he states gravely.

My shoulders droop. How does any of this trace back to my medical experience?

His frown deepens.
“What was my last published work?”

His? Oh god, I found out I’d be interviewing with him half an hour ago. I’m bombing this. I can’t believe I’m bombing this. I did so much research on their program.

“I, I … I’m sorry, um … I don’t know.”

Silence stretches.

“Okay, thank you for coming in.” I’m dismissed.

“I, um … would you like to hear about any of my medical experience? I—”

“I’ve read about
it in your file, Ms. Primaveri.”

There’s a moment of uncomfortable gaping on my end.

“Um, uh, okay, well, I just want you to know, I’m graduating top of my med class, and I think the world of the university and I really appreciate, um, your consideration for the residency position here at NYU.”

He says nothing. I pick up my purse and stumble from the office.

Outside, students bustle around
me, entering and exiting the building. I drop down, taking a seat on the stone steps. Well, that went poorly.

I check my cell. Still no return call from Babe. I have a few hours before my other interview—
that one will be better
. Now I know to expect random, obscure personality questions.

My gaze drifts over to my left hand. I’m still having a hard time processing what happened yesterday. Straight
up out of the blue, Boyfriend asked me to marry him. The second the proposal left his mouth a different guy barged back into my thoughts. Both the proposal and the reemergence
of Other Guy have been very inconvenient surprises to deal with while doing last-minute residency interview prep.

I couldn’t sleep on the plane ride over because my brain was like: Um, you know what would be more fun than
sleeping? Staying up forever and rehashing every waking memory that Other Guy’s ever been a part of. Now I’m tangled up in a mile-long string of what-ifs.

It just so happens that Other Guy works here in the city at a company that makes golf equipment or something. I’ve seen the name of the place on Facebook. I’ve also looked up where it’s located on Google Maps because apparently I’m slowly making
the transition from Facebook stalker to actual real-life physical one.

I can’t go see him.

What I’m going to do now … is get some work done in a coffee shop for a few hours, and then head over to Columbia for my other interview, and then I’m going back to San Diego, and over to see Boyfriend. There will be no pit stops. I will not complete the transition.
Rage, rage against becoming the stalker!

I huff a breath, a wave of hair fluttering away from my face as I watch taxis weave through traffic.

It would be ridiculous.
We haven’t exchanged communication, other than a happy birthday on each other’s Facebook walls, in six years. If I’m being honest, he missed my birthday last year.

I check my phone again. Still nothing.
Call me back, Babe.

Stalker Shane thinks perhaps this inner turmoil
means she needs closure; then she can go back to her pre-boyfriend-proposing mindset. Everyone talks about closure on TV. Closure is magic. Closure is the knife that’ll sever the what-if strings and leave her free to dwell on other less irrelevant things. Like Boyfriend. And … marriage. Taxes. Gastroenterology. Important shit.

I speed-dial Babe one last time. It goes to voicemail again.

“Babe,
where are you? I think I’m about to do something stupid, and I need you to talk me out of it. Or maybe tell me it’s not stupid and I should go for it.” I hang up and make my way down to the sidewalk, mind racing.

I come to a standstill at the curb. I have a missed text from Melvin:
Counting the minutes till your return

I blink at it. I think he’s trying to be cute, but without emojis and punctuation,
there’s an underlying creepiness. I tap out of Messages and push away this new claustrophobic feeling that I now apparently associate with my boyfriend.

A yellow cab’s approaching.

Don’t do it.

I throw up my arm.

Full-blown stalker status, unlocked.

I can do this. I can talk to him again. I can say things. I’m a grown-up. I’m almost a doctor. This is casual. This is nothing.

When the taxi
comes to a stop, my stomach’s turning itself inside out, but I have a plan. It’s simple and classy. Simple and classy. It’s classy. And it’s simple. I’ll ask him to grab a cup of coffee. That’s a normal thing that people ask people when they want to catch up.

I step out of the car. My tight, blue business dress rode up and got all twisted in the cab. I hastily pull it down while I crane my neck
to get a better look at the generic, sleek silver building towering before me. A wide set of steps leads up to a row of glass doors.

I spend a good two minutes staring at the doors.
This is a terrible idea.

Then I steel myself.
Do it for the closure
.

My tiny neutral-colored heels clack up the stairs. I fumble a little as I take the last two steps at once, before striding into a large, high-ceilinged,
empty lobby. Gold elevators line the wall a little way in to the left, and a man with gray hair sits behind a desk to my right.

“Good morning!” I greet him.

“How can I help you?” he responds blandly.

I clear my throat. “I’m looking for Pilot Penn. I believe he works at FJ Golf. Could you tell me what floor I could find him on, please?”

“Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but it’s all right.
I’m a friend of his,” I lie. I mean, we’re kind of friends.

The security man stares at me for a second, contemplating whether or not I should be allowed up without an appointment. He seems to decide I’m not a threat to the building.

His face falls, and he mumbles, “You’re going to need a visitor’s badge. Name.”

“Shane Primaveri. P-R-I-M-A-V-E-R-I,” I respond automatically. He scribbles my name
on a small white sticker, slaps it on a badge that says
VISITOR
, and hands it over the counter.

“Put it on and head up to the sixteenth floor.”

I carefully clip it to my silver cross-body purse before ambling over to the elevators on the balls of my feet in attempt to be less conspicuous. Why is the urge to be stealth overwhelming? I don’t need to be stealth!
This isn’t weird
.
This is fine!

Inhale. Hold. Exhale. I punch the up button with my index finger.

The arrow over the elevator all the way to the left glows yellow. I nervously float up to the crack in the gold doors until I’m right up on them. There’s a muted ding as they slide out. There’s already a guy inside, holding a bunch of paper. When he looks up my eyelids snap back.

“Shit,” I breathe, stiffening as insecurities I
banished years ago materialize instantaneously.
It’s him.
I was counting on having a few more seconds to prepare and he’s just here.

He’s sporting khakis and a white button-up shirt today, carrying two big stacks of paper. He stares at me blankly for a half a second before actually registering that I’m me. I know when he does because his eyes widen like he’s seen a ghost, and the paper slips
from his hand. It flops to the floor of the elevator with a hard thud.

“SHANE?” he spurts.

I inhale sharply.
You are a grown lady who’s been successfully networking her ass off at medical conferences the last four years. You can and will confront Pilot Penn.

I take the step forward into the elevator. “Hey, Pies.”

The doors start to close. He gathers the paper off the floor before snapping
back to a normal, standing-with-two-packs-of-paper stance.

“What are you doing here?” His voice is still laced with shock, but he’s trying to regain his composure.

“I’m actually here to talk to you…”

His forehead crinkles up. “
To talk to me?
” He’s loud and confused again.

My instinct is to laugh, but his eyes catch mine and instinct drowns real fast in my ever-growing pool of anxiety.

I suck
up some air. “Yeah, I’m sorry to disturb you at work, but I kind of really needed to talk. To you … Can we go grab a coffee or something?” I resist the urge to fiddle with the zipper of my purse.

The doors slide open to reveal floor sixteen: a large, bright open room lined with windows and divided into gray cubicles. Pilot steps out, and I follow as he strides along the edge of the room.

“I
haven’t seen you in”—he pauses, turning to look at me—“six years?” He takes on a higher pitch with those last two words.

He rounds into one of the cubicles, drops the two packages of paper on his desk, and collapses into a desk chair. He closes his eyes and takes a breath before looking back up at me.

I hesitantly smile and wave. “Hi, cup of coffee?” I repeat.

He glances around and scratches
his neck. He looks almost the same—different haircut, maybe broader shoulders?

“Why are you here?” he repeats, calmer this time.

“I had an interview at NYU earlier, and I have one at Columbia later.” I pause. “I mean, that’s not why I’m here, here. I’m here, here because I need to talk to you and I’d like to get a cup of coffee,” I repeat, leaning a little against the thin gray divider entrance
to his cubicle.

“For?”

“Their internal medicine program,” I say. His eyebrows pull together. He looks down, propping his elbows up against his knees.

“So, you just randomly decided to come to the building where I work and ask me to go get a coffee?” He meets my eyes.

“I mean, kind of, yeah,” I say with a strained expression.

He tilts his head. “Who does that?” Amusement creeps into the question.

“Crazies,” I answer sardonically.

“I’m not really supposed to leave right now,” he says quietly.

“Oh, um.” I glance around uncomfortably.

Pilot stands. He swings his head around, taking stock of the room until he finds who he’s looking for: a heavyset man in his late thirties walking along the opposite wall.

He locks eyes with him. “Hey, Tom, I’m going to have to step out for an hour. Family
emergency.” I straighten abruptly and try to look solemn as Tom’s eyes dart from Pilot to me and back to Pilot again.

“Okay,” he responds slowly.

“Okay!” Pilot replies, hopping out of the cubicle. He puts a hand on my back and silently leads me from the room.

He drops it as we load back onto an elevator. We’re quiet until the doors slide closed.

“Okay, let’s do it. Coffee,” his says with small
smile, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He studies me for a moment. “It’s weird to see you.”

“Weird to see to you too.”

“Sorry about”—he shakes his head—“that minor freak-out; don’t know what happened there.” He leans against the wall of the elevator.

“I know. That’s out of character for you.” I cross one foot in front of the other and bobble slightly in my heels.

Pilot huffs a laugh and
purses his lips. We’re both quiet for a moment before he says, “So are you a doctor now?”

I nod. “Almost. Interviewing for residency programs, working toward becoming a gastroenterologist. What have you been up to? What do you do here?”

“Oh, you know, computer programming, writing code, solving IT issues, exciting stuff.” He crosses his arms, inspecting me like a riddle he’s trying to crack.
I turn away to glance at the doors.

That’s when I realize—we’re not moving. The buttons are on Pilot’s side. I grin and mirror him, leaning against the opposite wall.

“Hey, Pies.”

He tilts his head. “Yeah?”

“You never pressed any buttons, so we’re just chilling in a metal box.”

Surprise dawns on his face. He releases a quick laugh before jabbing the lobby button.

“You know, I usually travel
the building with an assistant. He does all the button pressing when I elevator,” he relays in a haughty voice.

A laugh busts out of me. The doors ding open, and we emerge into the lobby.

“You have a coffee place in mind?” he asks.

My heels clack onto the tile. “Um, I’m haven’t really—”

“You’re looking for a coffee place?” The guy at the front desk casually interrupts me. He grins at Pilot.

“Hey, Jack,” Pilot greets him. “You know a place?”

“Somebody dropped off flyers for some new place just ten minutes ago.” Lobby Jack waves us over and pulls a stack of lavender paper from behind the desk. “I was like: lady, this isn’t the grocery store, we don’t hand out flyers, but she left ’em anyway. After reading the thing, I mean, it actually sounds like a pretty cool coffee joint. Take
a look.” He pushes the stack toward us.