Ahhh! It was neurotic Will. “Whatever do you mean?”
“I don’t understand you. There, I said it. How many times do I have to tell you? What do I have to do to prove to you that I’m not going anywhere? I’m leaving for a month; I’m coming back. I live with you, for God’s sake. You’re my best fucking friend, Mia. I wish it were more and I think you know that. You are the most guarded person I have ever met, yet everything you feel is right there on your face and you don’t even know it. Whatever you need me to be, I’ll be! Friends? Fine! Best friends? Great! I’ll do it, because I want you in my life more than anything I have ever wanted. So please stop with the don’t-forget-me shit!”
“Okay.” I meant to say it softly, but it came out as more of a whine.
He glanced over at me and his expression softened. “Okay? I’m sorry, baby, I just… I don’t want to leave, either, and I don’t want you to put up your defenses because you think I’m going to run off and forget about you.”
Will knew I had always been worried about the rock star life and all the faceless, foregone conclusions that would come into his life. He was reassuring me that I wasn’t that, no matter what label we gave to each other. Really, Will wasn’t the rock star, at least not the stereotypical image I’d had in my mind when I first met him. He was nothing like that. Sure, he could flirt with women, but he was never smarmy and he didn’t sleep around… per se. He liked people, he liked women, he was a lover, but he was honest with everyone he came in contact with and he was especially honest with himself; a quality I needed to work on.
I reached over and squeezed his hand; he pulled my hand to his mouth and kissed it, never taking his eyes off the road. He changed the CD, turning up Nina Simone’s “Sinnerman.” He accelerated and we flew toward Ann Arbor without another word. He bobbed his head and tapped his hand on the steering wheel to the fast, jazzy beat. The music set my mind into spiraling motion, thinking about what he had said. I never considered myself guarded, I thought of myself as strong, but I was wrong. Life had thrown me for a loop when my father died. I’d gone to New York thinking I would straighten things out with the café, then go to grad school, further my education, meet some strapping doctor or business man and let my life follow the square rules I set forth, but the moment I stepped onto that plane back in March, I’d started to feel a different pull. There was a magnetism I felt toward Will, the music, my new friends, the café, and the city itself. It felt right and it felt good. How could I have been so wrong about myself before? If I was guarded it was because I was realizing how little control I had over my feelings and it scared me.
When we got to my mother and stepdad’s in Ann Arbor, I gave Will a brief tour and introduced him to David, whom I called Dad. It was a Sunday and the Detroit Lions were playing, so my stepdad was wearing his normal NFL garb. Will struck up a conversation about the team and the two hit it off right away. I didn’t even know Will followed football, but there were so many things I didn’t give him credit for. He may not have been a sports fan, but Will read the newspaper every single day. He knew a little about everything and his own curiosity and desire to better himself and grow as a person had given him a far more valuable education than I had gotten from a fancy, Ivy League college. My mother and I caught up in the kitchen while we prepared dinner.
“Mom… I want you know that I don’t blame you for what happened between you and Pops. I’m getting things now… I guess I’m realizing we’re all just people… trying to figure it all out.”
She walked over and wrapped her arms around me. “Thank you for telling me that. You’ll figure it out, Mia; I think maybe you already have.” She glanced over at Will. Somehow letting my mom know how I felt gave me a sense of closure regarding my father.