You are very still. Watching me. Waiting.
“I love you,” I whisper. “I love you so much, but—”
“But? It’s like that now?” you say. “I love you but? But what, Grace?”
I start crying. Big, messy tears and I don’t even know what they mean. Grief. I feel something like grief. Because I know what you expect now. I can’t go to New York, can I? Because if I do, then I don’t love you as much as you love me. Then we’re over.
After a minute you reach for me. “Hey. Baby, it’s okay. The band’s starting to get good gigs in LA,” you say as you wrap your arms around me. “If you get into a school there, I’ll transfer. I swear. We can get an apartment together. Can you imagine?”
I’m sobbing, my whole body shaking, and you just hold me, murmuring nonsense like I’m a spooked horse. I cling to you even though you’ve just stabbed me in the gut with a dirty knife, quick, out of nowhere. But then this still, small voice inside me starts to get louder. Louder. It’s shouting and I pull away from you, staggering back. Dust swirls in the headlights and clouds drift over the moon. Cars pass on the highway, oblivious to the drama on the side of the road. We could sell tickets.
I know I have to fight for this. It wouldn’t be my life if I didn’t have to go into battle for what I wanted. The universe doesn’t hook me up. It doesn’t give a damn about me. I’m lucky if it puts a sword in my hand before throwing me out into the shit.
“Gav.” I swallow, take a breath. “This is my dream. Like my whole life, I’ve wanted to live in New York and do theatre. It’s … it’s who I am. You know that.”
A lone car passes by us on the highway, its lights cutting through the darkness. I hear a snatch of music, loud rock with jagged edges.
“LA drama schools are just as good,” you say. “Plus there’s the whole film industry.” You take my hands and intertwine your fingers with mine. “I already talked to the band. They’re not willing to go to New York. LA’s a better scene for us, it’s cheaper, easier to get into the clubs … I tried. I swear I tried.”
“When were you going to tell me any of this?”
“I thought … I didn’t think you were still seriously planning on going to New York. I was waiting for you to change your mind. Or I thought, you know, maybe you wouldn’t get in.”
Was this a test? If it was, I failed it.
“You don’t think I’d get in? What, like I’m not smart enough—”
You’re not very deep.
“No! I just…” You sigh and pull off your fedora, run your fingers through your hair. “I mean, we’ve talked about living together.”
We went to Ikea once, for fun. We picked out all the furniture for our imaginary apartment and your bought me the ugliest stuffed heart with arms coming out the sides of it and a big grin on its face. You named it Fernando and when you came over that one time when no one was home, we had to hide the thing under the bed because it was weird having sex in front of it.
“I thought the apartment and all that was for after college. I mean, of course we’re going to live together someday.”
“Someday,” you say, your voice flat. “Five years from now? Really?”
“What if we did, like, a long-distance thing—”
You shake your head. “Those don’t last. Everyone I know at school who had a boyfriend or girlfriend at the beginning of the semester has already broken up with them, and we’ve barely finished midterms. You know what they say happens over Thanksgiving break? The ‘turkey drop’—when everyone in college dumps their boyfriend or girlfriend from home. We wouldn’t even make it to Christmas.”
“Yes we would. Those people aren’t us,” I say. “We’re soul mates. Nothing’s going to come between us.”
This is my dream. My future. My life. How can I just give that up?
“We’ll get there someday,” you say. “I promise. New York’s not going anywhere.”
My head is pounding and I pull off the stupid cat ears. I can’t believe I’ve been talking about the most important thing in my life looking like an ensemble member of Cats.
“We’re probably fighting over nothing. I might not even get in—”
“Don’t apply,” you say. “Please.”
I don’t say anything.
“Four years is a really long time, Grace. You won’t be at any of my shows. I won’t get to know your friends. I wouldn’t be able to come by and pick you up after rehearsal and go out for Denny’s. You’d be going to bars and clubs and I wouldn’t be there to dance with you, to buy you drinks and make sure you got home safely. Our lives would be totally separate. I mean, look how hard it is now, and we live five minutes from each other.”
I honestly had never thought about it that way and I realize you’re right. I don’t want to spend the next four years on the other side of the country. I want to be with you. I see it play out: the time difference making it impossible to call each other, you getting upset because there are pictures of me on social media with guys you don’t know. And then some cool, arty, hot girl who starts going to your shows finally gets your attention. You run into her at parties, maybe have a class together. Then one night, you drink a little too much and she’s right there and her lips look so soft.…
You rest your forehead against mine. “Choose us. You won’t regret it.”
“For where thou art, there is the world itself … And where thou art not, desolation,” I whisper.
The corner of your lip turns up. “Romeo and Juliet?”
“Henry IV.” Ironic, isn’t it, Gav, me quoting a star-crossed lover at the very moment we were doomed for good? I didn’t realize it then, of course. I just knew the moment was important. A game changer.
I hold the image of me riding the subway and traipsing through the Village close, then let it go. It wouldn’t matter if you weren’t there to share it with me. I’d be miserable, and so would you.
“I need a minute,” I say, and I walk over to a tree standing at the edge of the field you’re parked beside.
You’re supposed to sacrifice for the people you love. It’s what my mom did when Beth and I were little, pre-Giant, working three jobs to keep food in our bellies. It’s what Fantine did for Cosette in Les Mis. I dreamed a dream in times gone by, when hope was high and life worth living. I love you. And the fact of the matter is that you have to be with your band and your band doesn’t want to come to New York. That’s not your fault. It’s not like you’re asking me to move to Omaha. There’s tons of theatre in LA and maybe I can try my hand at film. Get an internship or something. It doesn’t have to be forever.
So why does it feel like I’m drowning?
“Okay,” I say when I walk back to you. “No New York.”
You kiss me, hard. “I love you so much.”
Something in me is dimming, something that I already know I can’t get back. But you’re worth it. You are. I will tell myself this for several more months. And when I realize you aren’t worth it, it’ll be too late.
“I love you, too.”
“Do you still want to go to the party?”
I shake my head. “No, you’re right. There’s not enough time.”