Swear on This Life by Renee Carlino
To Anthony, you’re always the just one person
1. He Found Me
In class we say That’s too on the nose when someone has written a story or a scene where exactly what you think should happen does happen. Or when the events are too perfect or precise. But in real life we have a hard time recognizing serendipitous moments because we’re not making the story up as we go along. It’s not a lie—it’s really happening to us, and we have no idea how it will end. Some of us will look back on our lives and recall events that were a bit too perfect, but until you know the whole story, it’s impossible to see the universe at work, or even admit that there is something bigger than us, making sure everything that should happen does happen. If you can surrender to the idea that there might be a plan, instead of reducing every magical moment to a coincidence, then love will find you. He found me.
“WOW, THE SEAGULLS are going crazy. I think there’s a tsunami headed this way,” I said, staring out the window of my second-story apartment as I watched the marine layer thicken over La Jolla Cove. The fog was moving fast toward my building as the storm clouds swirled in the distance.
Trevor laughed. “Such a San Diegan, overreacting to the weather.” He was sitting on the floor with his back against the overpriced leather couch that my aunts Cyndi and Sharon had bought for me when I first moved in.
“Do you think we need sandbags?”
“No, you’re being crazy,” he said.
“Crazy or cautious?”
“More like neurotic. It’s drizzling. California is still technically in a drought.”
I noticed that Trevor had put down the short story I had written so he could continue playing Angry Birds on his phone.
“Trevor . . .” I warned.
“Emiline . . .” he teased back without looking up.
I plopped onto his lap and threw my arms around his neck. “I really want you to read it.”
“I did. I read it fast.”
“What’s it about, then?”
“It’s about a girl who discovers an ancient formula for cold fusion.”
“So you got the gist. But did you actually like it?”
“Emi . . .” He paused. His eyes darted around the room. When he focused on me again, I saw pity in his face. “I liked it a lot,” he said.
“But . . . ?”
“I think you should write what you know. You’re a good writer, but this”—he held up the paper—“seems a little silly.”
“Silly? Why?” I could feel anger boiling over inside of me. Trevor was honest—it was one of the reasons I liked him—but sometimes he was blunt to the point of belittling.
“For one, it’s unrealistic.”
“It’s science fiction,” I shot back.
“It needs more character development.” He shrugged as if his statement were obvious.
“Trevor, please don’t start spewing that Writing 101 crap at me. I get enough of that in the program. I want to practice what I preach. I’m constantly telling the undergrads to forget the rules and write intuitively. Now I’m asking you for realistic feedback, from a reader’s point of view, not an instructor’s.”
“I’m trying to. I thought that’s what I was doing. You know how hard it is for me to critique your work. You can’t handle it. I didn’t connect with the characters, so I wasn’t interested in reading the rest of the story. So there. I’m just being honest.”
“There’s a nice way to be honest,” I muttered.
“I still finished the story, and now I’m trying to help you, but you’re not being receptive to it. Just tell me what you want me to say.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Are you serious right now?”
“Yes.” He got up abruptly and I toppled over onto the floor.
“You’re not a reader. I shouldn’t have asked you to read it. Are we actually fighting over this?”
“We’re always fighting over this,” he said. “And I resent you for saying that I’m not a reader, as if I’m some kind of illiterate Neanderthal.”
I had been dating Trevor since our senior year at Berkeley, so I knew exactly where this insecurity was coming from. Seven years—that’s a long time in anyone’s book. When we met, he was a superstar quarterback destined for the NFL, and I was a bookworm trying to be a wordsmith. He was Tom Brady handsome, and for so long I wondered why he was into me at all. Yet for some reason, in the beginning, it just felt right. We got along beautifully, and our relationship went on like a fairy tale—until he injured his throwing arm in the last game of the season. His professional football career was over before it even began.