She cocked an eyebrow, pleased. “Are you moaning over my cookies?”
“I’m definitely moaning over your cookies.”
She shimmied, and sighed dramatically. “If I had a dollar for every time a guy told me that.”
“You’d have one dollar and zero cents.”
She flipped me off, and I fell more for her. I couldn’t decide what I wanted more, her lips against mine, or her words. The idea of both entertained me more than I ever thought they could.
Words, go with words. “What’s your biggest dream?” I asked, tossing a few raspberries into my mouth, before throwing a few into hers.
“Biggest dream?”
“Yeah. What do you want to be or do in the future?”
She bit her bottom lip. “I want to play the piano and make people smile. Make people happy. I know it sounds little to a lot of people, like my mom. And I know it sounds like a stupid goal, but that’s what I want. I want my music to inspire people.”
“You can do it, Alyssa. You are already doing it.” I believed in her dream more than I could ever say. Whenever I heard her play the piano, it was as if all of the terrible parts of life kind of melted away. Her sounds made me find a few moments of peace.
“What about you?” she asked, placing a raspberry between my lips. I wasn’t really in a life situation where I’d ever been able to dream, but when I was with Alyssa, all of that seemed a little more possible.
“I want to be a chef. I want people to come in grumpy and leave happy because of what I put on their plate. I want people to feel good eating my food and forget all of the bullshit stuff going on in their real lives for a few minutes.”
“I love that. We should open a restaurant, toss a piano inside, and call it the AlyLo.”
“Or, LoAly,” I smirked.
“AlyLo sounds much, much better. Plus, it was my idea.”
“Well, let’s do it. Let’s open AlyLo and make amazing food and play amazing music, and live happily ever after.”
“The end?”
“The end.”
“Pinky?” she asked, extending her finger toward me. I wrapped my pinky with hers.
“Pinky.” Our hands kind of clasped together after that.
“What’s another dream of yours?” she asked.
I debated if I should tell her, because it seemed a little lame, but if there was anyone I trusted to not judge me, it was her. “I want to be a dad. I know that sounds stupid, but I really do. All my life I grew up with parents who didn’t know what it meant to love. But if I were a dad, I’d love them more than words could say. I’d show up to their baseball games, their dance recitals, and love them, regardless of if they wanted to be a lawyer or a garbage man. I’d be better than my parents.”
“I know you would, Lo. You would be a great dad.”
I don’t know why, but her saying that made my eyes tear up.
We stayed up there for a while, not speaking one word, but solely looking up.
It was still so peaceful up there. I couldn’t imagine anywhere else I’d rather be. We hadn’t stopped holding hands. Did she like holding my hand? Did her heart flip every few seconds? Was she kind of, sort of falling in love with me, too? I held her hand tighter. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to let go.
“What’s your biggest fear?” she softly spoke.
I pulled out my lighter and started flicking it on and off with my free hand. “Biggest fear? I don’t know. Something happening to the few people I care about. Kellan. You. My mom. What about you?”
“Losing my dad. I know it sounds stupid, but each day, when the doorbell rings, I wonder if it’s him. Each time my phone goes off, my heart stops, hoping he’s calling me. I know these past few months he’s been a bit MIA, but I know he’s coming back. He always does. But the idea of losing him forever kind of breaks my heart.”
We listened to each other’s darkness and we showed one another our light.
“Tell me a beautiful memory about your mom,” she said.
“Hmm…” I chewed on my bottom lip. “When I was seven, I walked to and from school each day. One day I came home and heard music blasting on the front porch of our old apartment building. Ma had a boom box playing oldies music—The Temptations, Journey, Michael Jackson, all of these classics. Ma said she got the CD from a neighbor, and it made her want to dance. So she had been dancing in the street, and she only moved to the sidewalk when a car came. She looked so beautiful that day, and made me dance with her all night until the moon was high. Kellan came over too. He rode his bike over because he’d had leftovers of his dinner that he’d bring for Ma and me. When he came all three of us danced.
“I mean, looking back on it, I’m sure she was on something back then, but I couldn’t tell. I just remember laughing and spinning and dancing free with her and Kellan. The sound of her laugh was my favorite part because it was so loud, and wild. That’s my favorite family memory. That’s the memory that I go back to whenever she seems so far gone.”