Anything Less Than Everything (6 page)

S
orting through the last box took the
longest. Unlike the clothes that went immediately into the closet or the knick
knacks that mostly went into the trash, the papers and mementos of the final
box begged me to look at each piece. They were mostly school
things--certificates, “A” papers, college acceptance letters. But there were
other things, to: notes from friends that I never threw out, birthday cards.
And the list. I stared at it for a second then laughed when I realized what it
was. The list. I had not seen or thought about it in years. Five years,
actually.

"What's
so funny?" Jill asked. She was sitting in my bedroom, getting ready to go
out to dinner with me. Now that I wasn’t living in the same house as she, we
found that we actually enjoyed each other’s company, and in the two weeks since
I’d moved into my apartment dinners out had become part of our routine.

"Nothing,
just this old list I found."

"List of
what?"

"Um,
nothing important."

"Well,
it must be if you packed it up and moved it over. Lemme see." She grabbed
the paper away from me, unfolding it and smoothing the creases. She studied it
for a moment before asking, "Are these...?"

"Qualities
I wanted in a guy," I finished for her. "I made it out right before I
left for college. It's stupid," I said, trying to grab it back. She moved
it out of my reach.

"#7,"
she read, "can carry on an intelligent conversation." My face burned
with embarrassment.

"#12,
likes kids."

"Seriously,
Jill, it's dumb. Just give it back."

"#34,
gets my sense of humor. Brooke, there are fifty-six items on this list. No guy
I ever met even had fifty-six qualities in him, much less
these
fifty-six."

"I know;
I said it was stupid."

"It's
not stupid," she said, softening, "just unrealistic. I don't want you
to set yourself up for disappointment, that's all."

She handed
the list back to me and I folded it into its neat square, the creases finding
themselves automatically. I started to place it in the trash, but something
inside told me to save it. I tossed it back in the box instead.  

“Are you
ready to go?” I asked. “I have to work in the morning, so I don’t want to be
out all night.”

She rolled
her eyes. “I promise we’ll be home before nine o’clock, grandma.”

I threw a
pillow at her in reply. “Okay, okay!” she said, surrendering. “Let’s get out of
here before you ruin my hair. I can’t have Dave seeing me all messy.”

I froze.
“Dave’s coming with us?” It’s not that I really minded Dave--I actually liked
him much better than any other boyfriend of Jill’s--but with him there, I
became the fifth wheel. Or third. Whatever.

“Is that not
okay?” she asked, hurt stretching across her face. “He’s not playing ball
tonight because of the rain.” What was I supposed to say? We gathered our
things and headed in my car to our favorite place, Sam’s.

We got a
table and ordered drinks while we waited for Dave to show. A few minutes later
Jill started waving her hands, trying to get his attention. He wound his way
over to us, kissed Jill, but didn’t sit down. He looked out at something behind
me, and shifted his weight from one foot to another. Something was weird. I
turned around to see what was going on. Standing just over my shoulder was a
guy I’d never seen. He was just standing there, smiling at me. I looked over at
Jill.

“Oh, Brooke!”
The fake cheery voice. I hated that voice. “I forgot to tell you. This is
Dave’s friend, Carson. I invited him to join us!”

Forgot
nothing. I’d been set up. I shot daggers at Jill, but tried to give a polite,
if somewhat forced, smile to Carson. “Nice to meet you,” he said, pulling out
the chair next to me and sitting down. I could sense the nervousness in his
voice. The slight quaver, the forced conversation. I was going to kill Jill.

“So, Carson,”
Jill began. “Brooke just started a summer job at a home boutique, didn’t you,
Brooke?” I knew what she was doing, that she wanted me to answer the question,
then follow with one of my own, and pretty soon we’d all be involved in a
lively conversation. I was not biting.

“That’s
right,” I said, looking at her and not Carson.

Jill paused,
waited for me to continue. When she saw I wasn’t, she shot me a look, but
continued, undaunted. “She’s a teacher the rest of the year, right Brooke?”

“Right,” I
said. After a couple of more questions like this she gave up and moved on to
topics of conversation that actually interested her. Dave gave me a sympathetic
smile across the table. He was most likely an unwitting accomplice in Jill’s
little scheme.

We ordered,
and though my appetite had been ruined, I chose a steak, figuring that if I
could just keep chewing I could get away with not talking. It worked, for the
most part. Carson continued to try to drum up conversation; I continued to stifle
it as best I could, walking a fine line between not leading him on and being
rude. I was being a brat, and I knew it, but I hate having other people try to
map out my life for me. It wasn’t really Carson’s fault, and I’m sure he was a
nice guy, but I was going to be the one who decided whom and if I dated, not
Jill.

When there
was nothing left on my plate to keep me quiet, I snuck a peek at the clock on
my phone: 7:15. We’d been at the restaurant for nearly an hour. I needed only
to stick it out for a few more minutes before I could reasonably leave.

Our waitress
came by to ask about the check, and Dave, bless his heart, quickly told her
that he was taking care of it. By doing so he saved me the awkward situation of
Carson trying to pay for my meal, thus making it a date, and the scene I might
have created trying to not let him. I met his eyes across the table and smiled
to let him know I understood what he was doing. He winked in reply. His taste
in girlfriends might be a little suspect, but Dave really was a pretty good
guy.

Out in the
parking lot, Jill put out a last ditch effort to get me to fall in love with
Carson. “This was fun!” she exclaimed. Fun? This was torture for all involved.
I just smiled politely, my expression of the night. “We must do this again.
Soon.”

“I’d like
that,” Carson answered her while looking at me and smiling.
You have got to
be kidding me
, I thought. I could not have made it more obvious that I was
not interested.

Fortunately
Jill had ridden with me, so I was not dependent on her for a way home. She and
Dave left together, and I assume Carson went off on his own. I didn’t really
check.

Safe in my
car, I pounded out a text:
I am going to kill my sister.
Aaron’s reply
came just moments later:
Almost home. call you in 10.

My nightly
talks with Aaron were another habit I had formed in the past few weeks.
Fortunately, the potential consequences of this one were much less scary than
dinner with Jill. It started innocently enough. He called after arriving back
at school from camp, just as he promised he would. It was my first night in my
new place, and until I heard his voice, I was feeling pretty alone. He asked
about the apartment. I asked him about his flight. We talked for two hours.

And then he
called the next night. And the next. I think I might have called him after
that. The conversations were typically shorter than those first ones, but I
looked forward to them just the same.

Our schedules
often overlapped: he working at the golf course when I was off, or I going into
work at Dwell just before he left to work out with his teammates, but we often
sent text messages throughout the day, sharing random happenings and thoughts.
And if we hung up much before going to sleep, I would always get a message
later wishing me sweet dreams.

With each
question answered, each story told, I learned more about the guy who was
quickly becoming my best friend. And though we never used those words, I was
pretty sure he felt the same.

And so it did
not surprise me when he was so quick to reply to my distress message.

“Hey,” I
answered the phone.

“What’s going
on?” he asked, worry in his voice. “What’d she do?”

“She set me
up!” I blurted out.

“Set you up?”

“With a boy!”

“Wait a
second,” he said. “Start over.”

I took a deep
breath and then told him about the previous few hours, from ambush to
extraction. “I cannot believe her!” I finished. Aaron didn’t say anything.
“Well?” I finally asked.

“Well, what?”

“What am I
supposed to do about this?” He was being such a guy at the moment.

Aaron sighed.
“Do you want to go out with this guy?” It was a stupid question, and I didn’t
answer. “You’re glaring at me, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

Aaron laughed
softly, which only made me angrier. “I’m glad you find this so humorous,” I
said.

“I’ve never
seen...uh, heard you mad before,” he said. “It’s cute.”

“You’re
supposed to agree with me and validate my feelings towards my sister,” I said,
“not laugh at me.”

He cleared
his throat, and I imagined him straightening his face, wiping the smile off of
it. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But it
is
cute.”

“Aaron...”

“Okay, okay,”
he said. “You are absolutely right to be mad at your sister for putting you in
an uncomfortable position.”

“Thank you.”

He wasn’t
done, though. “But maybe her intentions were good. I mean, maybe she just wants
you to be happy again and thought you needed a little nudge.”

“I am happy.
And I don’t need a guy to make me so.” That wasn’t entirely true. Yes, I was in
a much better place than I was a few months, or even a few weeks before, but
much of that happiness was tied to Aaron. Work was great, my new apartment was
liberating, and I was going out with friends often, but what I looked forward
to and enjoyed more than any of it was talking to Aaron.

I thought
about what this conversation would look like if he was here, if we were talking
over pepperoni and mushroom instead of 500 miles of telephone wires. The smile
that danced in his eyes would make it impossible for me to stay aggravated with
him. He’d probably bump my leg with his knee, jerking me back to more important
things. That’s when I realized how much I missed Aaron.

“I know you
don’t,” he said. “All I’m saying is that maybe Jill meant well, even if she
went about it all wrong.”

“She wanted a
project. You remember Brad and Leighann, don’t you?” Jill loved throwing people
together. When the relationship succeeded, she gloated; when it failed, and it
almost always did, she denied any involvement. I had no interest in ending up
like the many others: messy breakups, drama. “But what really ticks me off,” I
continued, “is that she paid no attention to the quality of guy she was setting
me up with. Carson is so obviously completely wrong for me.”

“What was so
bad about him?” I had to give him credit: Aaron was a great listener. Every
other guy I’d ever known, preschool to present, was incapable of staying
focused on a girl talking for more than five minutes. Aaron paid attention to
everything I said like there’d be a quiz on it at the end of the conversation.

“Aaron, he
was awful. I mean, we obviously have nothing in common.”

“What? He
doesn’t share your love of football? Or maybe he likes to shower girls with
flowers?”

“Validating,
not laughing,” I said. I paused. “It was really more about his...never mind.”

“Tell me.”

“I can’t,” I
said. “No matter which words I use I’ll end up sounding stuck up and judgmental,
even though I don’t mean it that way.”

“You don’t
have to worry about that with me, Brooke. Tell me.”

I sighed,
knowing there was no way I was getting out of this. “Okay. We had very little
to talk about because he lacked the ability to carry on intelligent
conversation.” There. I’d said it, and he could judge me all he wanted.

“So he’s
dumb, as in stupid? Or just goofy?” Aaron’s voice was even, not accusing, but I
knew he probably thought I was crazy.

I sighed.
“It’s not like a guy has to be a rocket scientist, or even highly educated, to
be dateable, but if he’s not pretty intelligent, well...” I stopped again, not
sure how to go on. I knew what I meant, but how do you talk to a guy about
problems with guys?

“I get it,”
Aaron said. Some of my embarrassment eased. “So this guy was a blockhead.”

“Pretty much.
Do you know what he said? He asked me if I’d read ‘The Tell Tale Heart’ by
Edgar Allen Poe, except he said ‘The Tell Tale Breath by that Polk guy.’
Please. Like I wouldn’t have read that, and how does anyone not know who Poe
is...?” I trailed off again.

Once again,
Aaron jumped in. “You’re right. ‘The Tell Tale Heart’ is required reading for
pretty much every middle schooler.”