“But it doesn’t have to be like that. It’s not an either/or thing. I’m not ranking the people in my life. It’s not like Quinn is first and you’re second.”
“Well, it feels that way.” I clenched my fists. “I mean, we’ve stopped hanging out as much. We stopped writing our songs. Everything changed once you started dating Quinn, so I don’t get how you can just sit here and pretend like it didn’t.”
“Fine!” Harlow shouted, and it took me by surprise. I drew my knees to my chest. “You’re right. Maybe things have changed. But I’m not going to apologize for that, Tal. It’s called growing up. It can’t just be me and you forever and ever. That’s not healthy.”
I swallowed. The tears I was fighting back had left a briny taste in my throat. “It was enough for me,” I repeated quietly. “And I miss it.”
“Yeah,” Harlow said. She gave me a pitying look that somehow felt even worse than her yell.
“But it wasn’t enough for me. And it shouldn’t be enough for you. You need to learn how to let other people in. It’d be good for you, Tal.” She reached out for my hand. “I really do think this whole Julian thing is going to be good for you in that respect.”
There was a knock on the half-opened door to the guest room.
“Yeah?” I called out.
Julian poked his head through the doorway. “Sorry to interrupt, but we’ve got to leave now if we’re going to make it in time for Harlow to catch her bus.” He looked from me to Harlow and then back again. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, hugging my knees even harder. “Everything is really effing great.”
VI.
After Harlow left, I felt more alone than ever. Julian was confused about why I didn’t want to ride along with them to the bus station, but he finally let it go. The sympathetic glances they both gave me as they left were the absolute worst.
There’s nothing more humiliating than feeling sorry for yourself while watching other people feel sorry for you too. So of course I spent most of the time while Julian drove Harlow to the bus station moping around upstairs, feeling sorry for myself. I was going to stay up in the guest room the whole time, until Debra called up to me, asking me to come join her in the kitchen.
Once I went downstairs, I saw the kitchen was a blur of pots and pans. The whole room was filled with a delicious scent—a mix of fresh bread and spices and fried grease. Debra’s hands were coated with flour and her cheeks were smudged with some kind of sauce. She reminded me of Harlow for a moment and a sadness welled in my chest. I tried to push it aside.
“There you are,” she said, grinning at me. She walked over to the stove to check on one of the pots. “Looking good, looking good,” she mumbled to herself, and then turned back from the pot to me. “And how are you doing?”
I contemplated deflecting. I knew a standard “fine” would probably get me out of any uncomfortable talk. But I felt too worn down to bother with a lie. I took a seat on one of the kitchen stools, my feet dangling above the floor. “I’m not sure.”
Debra breathed audibly and then whistled to herself. “I hear you, sweetheart. That’s why I’m cooking. Whenever things feel overwhelming, I cook.” She pulled out a cutting board and started chopping up tomatoes. “What about you?”
“Hm?”
She looked over at me, her face glowing with genuine curiosity. “What do you do when you get overwhelmed?”
I thought about it for a moment. “I play the piano. Or I sit in my room and listen to music.”
She smiled a little but didn’t say anything. I knew what she was thinking, though. Julian’s daughter.
“This must be strange for you,” she said. She sprinkled herbs over the fresh tomatoes.
I nodded.
“It’s strange for us, too.” And then she quickly said, “Not in a bad way, of course.”
“I get it,” I said in a way that I hoped let her know that I wasn’t offended.
“You know,” she said, walking back over to the stove to check on a boiling pot, “you’re so much like your daddy when he was younger; he reacted the same way as you when he was overwhelmed. He’d always retreat up to his room to play the guitar after a big fight with his daddy. He’d have the volume turned up so loud it would shake the whole house.”
“They fought a lot?”
Something crossed over her face. Her lips pulled into a straight line. “I’m sure he told you about all that.”
“A little,” I admitted.
She opened the oven door and peeked inside. “Sometimes I think the problem between the two of them was that they loved each other too much. Same with him and your momma.”
I swallowed. The mention of my mother unsettled me slightly. “What do you mean?”
“Julian, he’s like his daddy. He feels things strongly. And sometimes that scares him. I think it makes him lash out because he’s afraid of how much he’s feeling. He gets distant and moody, just like his old man.” She swung a pot holder over her shoulder. “But maybe I’m just another old woman making excuses for my boy and my darling husband. But it’s what I like to think, so I do.” She smiled with her eyes. “That’s the best thing about life. You can think what you want to.”
“But Julian told me that Tom and him fought a lot because they had different ideas of what Julian’s life should be like. Was it the same with my mom? Did she want Julian to be someone other than he was?” Julian hadn’t given me the sense that Mom didn’t want him to pursue music. If anything, he’d given me the opposite impression.
Debra exhaled. She wiped her hands on her apron. “I can’t really speak for your momma. But concerning Tom, I’m not sure he wanted Julian to be someone different than who he was.” She paused and drew her eyebrows together. “Or maybe he did. I think the problem is that sometimes when we love someone, we see a certain version of them. And we get attached to that version. Convince ourselves that that’s the only version, the true version. So for Tom, Julian was his baseball-card-and-toy-train-loving little woodworking assistant. His mini-me.” She laughed at the memory and then her face went serious. “It was difficult for him to accept Julian the aimless and sometimes moody musician. But I believe strongly that we all have multiple versions of ourselves. And the true test of love is learning to accept all of those versions, even when it’s messy. Actually, especially when it’s messy.”