“Well, congrats, man, but I’m not gonna logic with a guy who just got laid for the first time in half a year.”
“Hey, that’s the best kind of logic there is! I’m telling you, this is your chance to make a move.”
I tip onto my back on the couch and rub my temple with my free hand.
“I’m not going tomake a move, Nabil, for many reasons, including the fact that she’s severely injured. That’s like, unethical, for one thing.”
“I don’t mean a move likethat. I mean a move of the heart.”
I burst out laughing. “A move of the heart?”
“Yeah, you asshole! Tell her how you feel. Tell her that all your shit from high school is just part of the past and that you want a shot with her now.”
“It’s not that simple.”
There’s some rustling on his end, like he’s moving to a different room.
“And why’s that? Oh wait, are you gonna tell me itgot complicated?”
I can hear the air quotes in his voice. I consider bullshitting him or brushing the question aside, like I’ve done every time the matter of Paige has come up over the years. Even the times I’ve started drunkenly rambling about it to him—or anyone who will listen—I’ve kept the details vague. Vague details are easier to face, easier to forget and get over.
Or pretend you’ve gotten over.
There’s not much room left for pretending now, not when the facts start pressing in every time I look at Paige. I’ve been tempted to just let it all out to her at least a dozen times, all the questions and hurt that have kept me up at night even all these years later.
I don’t know where to begin, though. I don’t know if we should begin, or if she wants me to, or ifIeven want to. I don’t know what will happen if we do. I just know I have to let it out tosomeoneor I’ll start losing my self-control.
“Promise you won’t be an asshole about this.”
“Oh shit.” He whoops into the phone. “Am I finally getting the deets?”
“Don’t call them deets.”
“Les détails, Monsieur?”
“I’m really going to regret this, aren’t I?” I pause and take a breath. “Okay, so, she started grade nine when I was in grade eleven. Our lockers were pretty close together. That’s how we met.”
“Aww, cute.”
“Fuck off.”
“Sorry. Continue.”
I gather my thoughts for a few seconds, letting the sounds of the crowded hallways fill my head as I watch Paige tuck a piece of hair behind her ear for the first time.
“It was one of those things where you see someone, and you justhaveto know them. You just look at them and know you’d do anything to get close to them. At first it wasn’t even romantic, you know? I mean obviously she was gorgeous, but she was a freshman, and even then, she wasn’t exactly the most...welcoming person. I just wanted to know what made her like that, what she was hiding. She seemed so separate from high school sometimes, like she knew things it would take all the other kids years to figure out. She seemed like she was going somewhere.”
I couldn’t help wanting to go with her.
A moment of silence passes, and I startle a little when Sufjan jumps up on my stomach. He kneads my shirt for a moment before settling down. “Look, I don’t mean to talk your ear off. We don’t need to have a heart to heart. I just—”
“No! Keep going! I’m hooked, man. This is beautiful.”
“Asshole.”
“I mean it!” he protests. “You have to tell me the rest.”
Now that I’ve started, it’s hard to stop. I give in and keep going as I stroke Sufjan’s back.
