He has equally loving things to say about his niece, who just turned two.
“She’s the love of my life,” he tells me, pulling out a picture of a chubby-cheeked child with dark curls. “I mean, she’s way smarter than I am, but besides that we’re actually pretty similar. When I go visit my family, it’s usually just the two of us at the kids’ table, laughing at how silly peas are. Because they’re pretty silly, aren’t they?”
We talk about his list—about the things he always wanted to do when he became successful—and how most of them ended up being gifts for his family.
“My mom was a high school teacher,” he says. “We didn’t have the kind of money that other families had to go on trips and vacations. I wanted to take her everywhere that she dreamed of going.”
They’ve been to Bali, Paris, Argentina, and Kenya. Next on the list?
“She wants to eat her way through Italy,” he says. “I think we’re going to take the whole family for that one.”
All that in addition to the bookstore he bought for her and his sister.
“The Cozy.” He makes sure I write the website down. “They have everything. Books, crafts, everything. And if you aren’t sure what you want, write them an email—they’re great at recommendations.”
Chapter
6
“I used to have a good recipe for chai,” Gabe said as he rummaged through his kitchen. “But I keep misplacing it.”
“You have a recipe for chai?” I asked.
“From Preeti,” he said. “She used to bring it to work every morning and it always smelled so amazing. She gave me the recipe on our last day.”
He pulled his head out of the cabinet, revealing a box of pink tea bags in his hand.
“Is peach okay?”
I nodded, wondering who he had bought peach tea for.
“Why do you hate New York?” Gabe asked as we waited for the water to boil.
“I don’t hate New York,” I said, once I realized that he was recalling the part of the conversation we’d had at the restaurant where he had essentially handed me my ass for being presumptuous and unprofessional.
“I think you do,” he said.
He was spooning ground coffee into a pour over. Jeremy had been big on coffee—very particular about what he drank and how he made it. I’d admired the ritual of it all. I liked rituals.
“It’s just not for me,” I said. “Like coffee.”
Gabe nodded.
“It’s nice to visit,” I said, feeling like I had to explain myself. “And I liked going into the city to see shows when I was in college.”
“At Sarah Lawrence.”
“At Sarah Lawrence.”
“Not an all-girls school,” Gabe said, as if he wanted to prove that he’d done his research.
“Not an all-girls school,” I said. “Not since the fifties or sixties.”
“What kind of shows did you see?”
“Mostly musicals,” I said. “I like musicals.”
The kettle began to whistle. Gabe shut it off, but the kitchen wasn’t quiet. It took me a moment to realize that Gabe had started whistling. And that he was whistling a familiar tune.
“You know Into the Woods?” I asked.
“Maybe,” he said.
He had been humming “Last Midnight.”
“You liked the theatre,” Gabe said. “But nothing else.”
“No,” I said. “I liked the food. No one does bagels or pizza like New York. Their Chinese food is better too. I still can’t find a place here that does a decent scallion pancake.”
“And that’s it,” he said.
The smell of coffee filled the kitchen. It was a smell I loved—ironic because I didn’t like the taste of coffee at all. Jeremy had kept telling me that it was something you had to get used to, but I never had. I was content just to smell it whenever he made a cup.
It always smelled cozy to me—and it smelled that way now—Gabe and me standing in his kitchen together while his puppy stretched out on her belly, looking a bit like a surfboard, chin against the floor.
“I guess it feels like you have to choose,” I said. “Between New York and L.A. And I choose L.A.”
“You’re loyal to your hometown.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Especially because New Yorkers can be such jerks about L.A. They really think they have the cultural upper hand.”
“But they don’t have tacos,” he said.
“But they don’t have tacos,” I said.
Gabe poured some hot water into my cup and I watched as it bloomed a bright, vibrant pink. I dunked the tea bag a couple of unnecessary times and left it, the water going fully fuchsia.
“When does he move?” Gabe asked. “The Novelist?”
I shrugged as I took an exploratory sip of my tea. It was weird that Gabe had read my blog. That he knew about Jeremy. Knew that he was moving to New York.
“Probably soon,” I said.
I knew he thought he needed to ensconce himself in the literary scene in order to write the kind of book he wanted to write. The kind of book he had promised to his publisher.
“I think I’d pick L.A. too,” Gabe said. “How’s the tea?”
“Good,” I said.
“You really should try that chai recipe,” he said, before turning to search again.
“If you find it…” I said.
“I thought it was in here.” His voice was slightly muffled from inside the cabinet. “You’ll just have to give me your number so I can send it to you.”
“Ha,” I said, but when he turned around, hand outstretched, gesturing toward my bag, I realized he was serious.
“I’ll text it to you when I find it,” he said.
Wordlessly, I dug my phone out of my bag and handed it to him, extremely grateful I’d remembered to remove his photo from my lock screen.
He still raised his eyebrow at my ancient phone, but didn’t say anything, typing in his number. There was a buzz, and he pulled out his phone—the highest-end iPhone that money could buy—and saved my contact information.
When he handed back my sad little phone with its cracked screen, I saw that he’d put his number in as Gabe Parker (Team L.A.).
I smiled at that.
It was getting late. My tea was getting cold.
“I should probably go,” I said.
Gabe nodded.