“Okay,” I say, and start assembling my team in my head. I think back to middle school, when we’d have to pick players for dodgeball in gym. David was always chosen last. I imagine him standing there, looking two feet above everyone else’s heads, his hands flapping at his sides—something he still does occasionally, though I’m not sure he realizes it—and I want to go back in time and hug him, whisper in his ear that he can come stand by me. Tell him if he gets tired of flapping, he can hold my hand instead.
“I very much hope you’ll consider including me,” my mom says in her quietest voice, and I realize this is the closest someone like my mother gets to begging. When I don’t immediately respond, she says, “At the very least, hashtag squad goals.”
I laugh. My mom loves to try to talk like a teenager. A few weeks ago, I overheard her on the phone complaining about how she was tired of adulting and the last time we watched a romantic comedy together, she wanted to ship all the secondary characters.
“Yeah, we can work on that,” I say, and realize just how much I’ve missed my mom recently. How I can’t make it through without her. That there will always be room in my tribe.
I unwind the soiled scarf from my neck. Hold it out for my mom to take. A bizarre, vomit-soaked, cashmere peace offering.
“Do you think this is dry-cleanable?” I ask.
—
Me: Hey. Just woke up. We can talk. I’m just crazy hungover, so can you give me a few hours?
David: You were drunk last night?
Me: Um, yeah.
David: Like drunk enough to be hungover?
Did David not notice me drinking? At one point I think Annie and I started swigging straight from the bottle. He was standing right next to me.
Me: Apparently.
David: So. Does that mean—
There’s a long pause, that terrible pulsating ellipsis, and I wonder what he’s doing. Is he writing? Thinking of what to say next? What does he have to report about the Accident Project? What was I thinking, getting him involved with that? It seems so pointless now. An act of desperation. Or self-sabotage. There’s no unwinding what happened. My father’s death isn’t some sort of logic problem. It’s a tragedy.
David: Does that mean you didn’t mean it? That you only kissed me because you were drunk?
Me: What? No. Yes. No.
David: Please explain.
Me: I mean, I wanted to kiss you and the drinking made me more comfortable.
David: You were uncomfortable kissing me?
Me: No! That’s not what I meant. I was…shy. Are you serious right now with these questions?
David: Of course. I’m always serious.
Me: It’s not a big deal.
David: What isn’t? The kiss? You being drunk? Or the Accident Project? You are opening new loops, and it’s confusing.
Me: I was talking about last night. LAST NIGHT was not a big deal.
David: It was a big deal for me.
Me: Oh. I didn’t mean. I just. Never mind. Let’s talk in person. Texting isn’t working.
David: What service provider do you have?
Me: Why?
David: If your texting plan isn’t working, could be your provider. I’ll look up on Yelp who has the best coverage in Mapleview.
Miney wants to help but I don’t let her. I need to figure out how to do this on my own; I’m ready. It’s the least I can do for Kit. I’m pretty sure after today she will no longer want to kiss me, much less sit at our lunch table. I hold out hope for the slim possibility that this will be received as good news, that I will be hailed as a conquering hero for uncovering the truth. That’s what she wanted, right? For me to figure this all out?
I can’t trust my instincts. Trusting my instincts gets me stuck in a locker with someone else’s shit in my hair.
I arrive at McCormick’s fifteen minutes early and snag the same booth we ate in last time. I order two milk shakes, one for me and one for Kit, while I wait. If there is a multiverse, somewhere else, not here, instead of sitting and waiting for the horrible moment when I will tell Kit that the accident did not happen in the way she thinks it did—that it’s all lies—we would be kissing. Yes, we would be kissing, maybe even on a bed.
And then she is here. Her face is free of makeup and she’s wearing her K-charm necklace and that big man shirt she’s taken to donning twice weekly, and this way, without any attempt to hide the blue circles under her eyes, she seems even more essentially herself.
I decide I like her even better with her natural face. The red mummy dress last night was a little intimidating. Now she just looks like a girl. My favorite girl, maybe. But still just a girl.
“Wow,” I say, the words escaping before I have a chance to think them through.
“What?” she asks, and sits down across from me and reaches for her milk shake. Takes a sip from the outside of the glass and ends up with a white line above her lip that she wipes away with a napkin.
“You. I like you even with a milk mustache.”
“Stop, you’re going to make me blush,” she says, and then, like magic, her brown cheeks get a pink glow. “Listen, your texts, I don’t know, freaked me out.”
“First, can I kiss you?” I ask, and she shrugs and I don’t know if that means yes or no. I decide to be brave and go for it. I switch to her side of the booth, and I put my hands on both sides of her face and I lean in slowly and touch my lips against hers. It’s different than last night. It’s soft and sweet—in both senses of the word—and too short, and when Kit pulls away she looks at me with wet eyes. She shakes her head.
“You’re the one who wanted to talk, remember?”
“Right,” I say. “Right. So the thing is…”
“What?” The way she’s sitting, it looks like Kit is bracing herself. Her hands are in front of her face, as if I’m going to sneak in an uppercut. Why would she think that? Or is she shielding herself from my lips? I have no read on the situation.
“I’ve done a lot of research, and I don’t think your dad was driving that car,” I say.
“What are you talking about?” Kit asks, and her voice is all growly and low.
“Well, I did the math and I studied the blood spatter and the photos and, well, everything, and given that his injuries were ultimately fatal, there’s no way he was driving that car. The newspaper never actually specified he was alone, and I’m pretty sure he was in the front passenger seat. So someone’s been lying to you and I’m sorry to be the one to tell you and please don’t hate me. All I wanted was to solve the equation for you.”
“Okay,” she says, but she doesn’t smile or say thank you or slap me, all of which seemed like equally reasonable possibilities when I played this out in my head.
“Maybe he was having an affair, like your mom, and his, um, mistress was driving and that’s why no one told you?” I ask.
“What? My dad was not having an affair.” Her voice goes even quieter. Almost a whisper. Like she is water evaporating.
“There could be lots of explanations. But the how—that’s what you wanted to know, right? The how of it? It isn’t what we thought. And I know you don’t like open loops just like me and this is one hell of an open loop,” I say. “I’m sorry.”
“Actually, it’s not an open loop.” Still quiet. Too quiet.