But it was too late. He stood and crossed his arms. “You act different around your family. Especially her. And I don’t like it.”
What a dumb thing to say, I thought. If I acted differently, it was because I had to. Ben didn’t need me to clean his kitchen, for example, and Selena didn’t need me to referee her younger siblings’ fights . . . because I wasn’t related to them. “Everyone acts different around their family.” I glanced at the door, which was cracked open, praying that neither of my parents was nearby to hear him say this. “Let’s change the subject, please.”
“No, Laine. I’m not changing the subject. And no, not everyone. You.”
“How?” I challenged.
“You do whatever they want!” he said with exasperation.
“I do not,” I said, but my cheeks were flushing because I knew it was a lie. “And I don’t see how we can be friends if you don’t like who I am around my family.”
“Oh, come on, Laine. I didn’t say I don’t like you. I said I don’t like the way you act with them. Sally knows you’re a people pleaser, and she takes advantage of that. The question is, what the hell does she have against me?” He took a step back, almost like he’d been hit. “Unless this is about me being Black.”
“Are you serious?” I said. I wasn’t being rhetorical. Ben and I had been friends for fifteen years. When, during that entire time, had she ever treated him differently or less than? I couldn’t think of a single instance. And yet I immediately found myself rationalizing: She and Reggie were always friendly, and wasn’t that proof she wasn’t racist? She never unknowingly stuck her foot in her mouth the way I’d heard some of my other friends’ parents do. Heck, one of her closest friends, Mary, was Jamaican!
But every one of these defenses suggested that she needed defending.
“It’s all fun and games until it’s about your daughter dating,” he added, his voice barely audible.
“I cannot believe you’d say that about my mother,” I whisper-hissed.
“And I can’t believe she put me in the position to have to consider it.”
I stared at him, trying to square his accusation with the mother I knew and loved. What if he was right—then what? He knew I’d never go up to her and say, Hey, Mom, any chance you’re a racist and don’t realize it? And even if he was wrong, the idea was already in my head; how was I ever going to get it out?
I wasn’t.
“You know what? We’re done here.” I stood and started for the door.
“Oh, come on, Laine,” he said, his tone instantly more forgiving. “Forget I said that.”
I froze and stared at him. Forget? Who was he kidding? I would’ve given anything to hit a rewind button and go back to the minute before we kissed, but there was no undoing what had happened. My mother had been right: romance had ruined everything. “I’m never going to be able to erase that from my memory,” I said, reaching for the doorknob.
“Where are you even going? This is your house.”
“Away from you.” I flung the door open. “This,” I said, pointing between us, “was a mistake, and our conversation is proof.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “So you’d rather make your mom happy than yourself.”
I didn’t know why, but he wanted a fight. Well, too bad: I was not going to justify that with a response. “I’m leaving, Ben,” I said over my shoulder.
“If you go, I’m not coming after you,” he said.
I could barely bring myself to turn and look at him, because I somehow knew it would be the last time for a long time. And yet he’d crossed a line—a big one—in bringing my mom into this. If he really thought she was racist, why had he waited until just now to say that?
“And why would you even want to? You don’t like who I am when I’m around my mother, and, PS, you think she has a problem with the color of your skin. I hope to God that’s not true, but even if it is, she’s my mother, Ben. I can’t turn my back on her.” Tears stung my eyes as I shook my head. “So, yeah—I guess this is goodbye.”
That had been sixteen years ago, but the pain was still so fresh in my mind that it could’ve been yesterday. How could he possibly smile at me after that?
“Hello to you, too,” he said pleasantly.
“Um. Hi.” My tongue felt like sandpaper. “What are you doing in town?”
“Um.” He arched an eyebrow. “I live here?”
“You’re . . . staying with your dad again?”
“Long story, but no. I live at his place now.”
My pulse quickened. That was going to make things even more complicated.
He continued, “Dad’s over in Jersey, right down the street from Bobby. New York’s no country for old men,” he added with a twisted smile.
“Ugh, I’m sorry.” I sounded too familiar for someone who wasn’t anymore, and I quickly glanced away. Carroll Park was just across the street. Ben and I had once snuck a bottle of Reggie’s whiskey onto the play structure, where we’d had our very first drink. And how many games of hide-and-seek and tag had we played there with Bobby and our friend Selena? How many impassioned conversations had we had beneath those very trees, about life and our futures and the people we planned to be?
All that friendship wiped away with one terrible, unfixable argument.
But now Ben was leaning against the side of the bakery like nothing had happened. Then again, he’d always had a way about him that put other people at ease. Our fifth-grade teacher had spent almost an entire year calling him Bobby, and instead of correcting her, Ben just played along. Because that was the kind of guy he was . . . at least up until a point.
“Then you’re not in—” The word Australia was about to come shooting out of my mouth, revealing that I knew exactly where he’d been last. “California,” I supplied, since that’s where he’d been talking about heading before our argument.
“Not for five years now,” he said. “After Celeste and I split—uh, she was my wife—I had to get out of San Fran. Been all kinds of places since then, but guess I’m a New Yorker again. At least for the time being.”
For the time being? And what exactly had happened between him and Celeste? I had questions, lots of them. None of which I would be asking.
“Hey, how’s your mom? Guessing you’re in town to see her?” The way he said this made it sound like he knew my father had passed. “Hadley called me after your dad died,” he added.
Damn it—how was he still reading my mind after all these years? “She never told me that,” I said, making a mental note to have a word with my sister. “But why do you care how my mom’s doing?”
“Come on, Laine. Don’t be like that.”
“I’m not being like anything,” I said. “But I’m not going to pretend like you didn’t basically tell me you thought she was the worst, then acted like I’d dropped off the face of the earth.” I needed you, I added mentally. I needed you to meet my dog, and comfort me when my dad died, and to know what was going on with my life.
He frowned. “You’re the one who said goodbye, Laine.”
Oh no. I was not rehashing that. Especially not today, but not ever. “Let’s not go there and say we did.”
Now he was regarding me with amusement. “Some things never change, huh?”
I turned away briefly. Just like that kiss, this conversation was a mistake.
“And now look at us,” he continued. “A couple of almost-middle-aged people.”
“Fun,” I deadpanned.
He broke into a grin, and even though I hadn’t been trying to make him smile, I couldn’t help but crack a smile myself.
“Well, lucky I decided to go get a coffee at this exact moment. Otherwise I might not’ve run into you,” he said.
I hated that hearing him say he was happy to run into me filled me with a painful kind of joy. “You’d have seen me at some point, given that I’m staying three houses down,” I said.