He turned away from her room, unable to contemplate the emptiness a moment more. He walked toward his own room and stepped inside, feeling like a stranger in his own home. He’d left his room in good order, but he could see Mer had been there too. His sheets had been washed and his pillow plumped. The old carpet had been cleaned too. The ammo box he’d purchased a few years ago at an army surplus store remained on his dresser, but everything else was packed up. He walked to the ammo box and opened it. A few of his treasures remained inside. A valentine Mer made for him when he was nine years old, a dog-eared copy of Man’s Search for Meaning, a handful of pictures, and half of a geode from a rock mining expedition freshman year to Utah’s west desert. The geode didn’t look like much on the outside, but when he’d broken it in half, it was deep purple inside, and the coolest thing he’d ever seen. He’d had both halves once but had misplaced one somewhere.
The ammo box was the only thing Noah wanted from his room. Everything else was cleared out, as if Mer had known he would need a place to sleep, but had wanted to relieve him of everything else.
“What now?” Cora said, sitting on his bed. Noah sat down beside her, the geode clutched in his hand. The edges were jagged and bit into his palm.
What now indeed.
“I go to New Mexico for Tech School. I’m on emergency leave right now. Maybe I’ll be deployed. There’s talk. The rent is paid through the end of the month. I’ll stay here until after the funeral, and then I’ll go.” Carole Stokes had promised to handle the service itself, which was a relief to him. It would be a grave-side service—prayer, a few words, a song. He wondered if he could play the theme song to Night Court on his guitar. It was a little too funky. And it needed horns. He laughed at the ridiculous train of his thoughts, but the laugh broke on a choked sob, and he ran a hand over his face. He wasn’t going to cry again.
“There’s nothing holding me here anymore. I guess I can go wherever I want,” he whispered.
“You’ll always have me . . . and Sadie. We love you. My mom, Alma, and Abuela love you too. We’re your home. We’ll always be home, whenever you need us,” Cora said, and her voice was choked too. “Just . . . please . . . don’t leave and never come back. Please don’t do that.”
He didn’t know if he could promise to leave and never come back. At the moment, it was all he wanted to do. So he sat in silence for far too long, considering her request. When he finally spoke, he offered the only guarantee he could.
“I love your letters, Cora. Don’t stop writing, okay? If you write, I’ll always write back, and we’ll stay connected. I look forward to your letters. You . . . surprise me.”
“I do? Why?”
“You’re different in your letters.”
“Nah. I’m just me without restraints,” she replied.
“You without restraints. What does that mean?”
“Words are like souls. Soundless, even shapeless. But full of substance. You are getting all substance and none of the distraction in a letter.”
“See? That surprises me,” he murmured. Her letters had been like that. Insightful. Illuminating. Even intoxicating.
She smiled at him, and he noticed again how pretty she was.
“You’re lucky,” she said.
“I am?” he asked, his voice wry. “How do you figure?”
“When my dad died, I wanted to move. I didn’t want to stay in the apartment where he died. We left for a week, remember? The apartment was painted and recarpeted. Mom bought a new couch to make it feel like a different place. Dad’s wheelchair was taken away, and all his things were cleared out. But it was hard living there, seeing him, even though I knew he was gone. You won’t have to stay in this apartment, seeing your mother whenever you close your eyes. It will be good to leave it behind. I’ve never been able to leave my dad behind.”
“I’m sorry, Cora.” He’d never considered how hard it must have been for her to live where her father had died.
She sighed. “I’ve made this about me. I’m good at that. I’m sorry.” She reached up and touched his face.
“What I’m trying to say is, I’m glad you can leave this apartment behind. But don’t leave us behind. Okay? Don’t leave . . . me . . . behind.”
He stared at her too long, the deep red of her lips, the clear blue of her eyes. Cora was all contrast while Mer was a warm blend. Then Cora leaned forward and placed her mouth on his, and all comparisons slid away for another time.
He didn’t hear Mercedes slip quietly out of the apartment, as silently as she’d entered, leaving her two best friends sitting side by side on Noah’s bed, her chest aching, her eyes wide open, her path set.
* * *
Mercedes avoided Noah all week. She didn’t return his calls. Didn’t respond to his messages. Didn’t reach out at all. If he had done the same to her, she would have hunted him down and sliced off his fingers. She wouldn’t have let him get away with it, and she knew eventually he would come looking for her. But by then he would realize what she was trying to tell him, and she wouldn’t have to say the words.
She was ashamed of her cowardice. She cursed herself and called herself ugly names in both Spanish and English. But she didn’t know what to do. At times, she would find herself lost in daydreams of wedding bells and cohabitation, only to shudder and cross herself for thinking it could work. And if it couldn’t work, she wouldn’t risk it. She needed to find her way back to the way it was before, to the Mer that Noah loved but didn’t make love to, to the Mer that he needed, but didn’t need too much. She wanted to be the Mer that would grow old beside him, platonic and persistent, the kind of friend he never outgrew.
He caught her between appointments at lunchtime on Friday, walking up to the counter at Maven, terse and tight-lipped, his timing impeccable. Grim face notwithstanding, he looked good. His pale blue dress shirt was tucked into fitted grey slacks, and he’d rolled the sleeves to his elbows and pulled off his tie. The color lightened his blue-black eyes and contrasted with his dark hair. The counter separated them, but she could smell him, clean and warm, like pine cones and peppermints—and her thoughts tiptoed back to the way he kissed and the way he felt and the way he made her feel, even when she was afraid. Remorse for avoiding him grew in her chest and climbed in her throat.
“Hey,” she said weakly.
“Hey.” He didn’t smile, but he didn’t scold. Not yet.
“I have an appointment at one o’clock. I don’t have much time,” she said.
“I’m your appointment.”
Mercedes scowled down at the ledger, looking for his name.
“We can talk in the back, or we can talk with me in your chair, but we’re going to talk, Mer,” he murmured.
“Your name isn’t on the schedule,” she argued, still evading him.
“I was afraid if I used my name, I’d be pawned off to another stylist, and you wouldn’t be here.” She deserved that, but she shot him a glare anyway.
He regarded her patiently. “Are we going to do this here?”
“Let’s go in the back,” she relented, the knot factory in her stomach going into overdrive. She didn’t want to talk to him on the open floor with ten stylists and their clients pretending they weren’t listening in. He followed her at a comfortable distance, but she could feel his eyes on her back and his mouth in her memory, and she wondered if she could kiss him once more before she told him they should never kiss again.
But when they walked into the employee changing room, he didn’t crowd her or try to take her in his arms. He sat down on the long bench and met her gaze.
Mercedes didn’t sit. She was too unnerved. And disappointed.
“Do I need to find someone else to watch Gia on Mondays?” Noah asked. His voice was level and kind, and Mercedes imagined it was the voice he used with his patients, never getting ruffled, never losing his cool. She knew his patients yelled and screamed sometimes. She knew they cried, and she could picture Noah sitting with them, his face compassionate, his hands folded, looking at them the way he was looking at her.
“What? Why?” Mercedes said, remembering suddenly that he’d asked her a question.
“Because you’re obviously avoiding me. You won’t be able to continue to avoid me if you watch Gia on Mondays.”
“Are you threatening me?” she asked, desperate to turn the conversation away from her own crappy behavior.
“Mer.” He sighed. “Seriously?”
She began to pace. “Don’t you get it? This—right here—is the reason why s-sleeping together was a t-terrible idea. Now you want to replace me! It’s awkward, and you want a new babysitter. I knew this would happen. It’s the reason I fought you so hard.”
“You fought me so hard?” his voice rose mildly.
“Don’t use that tone with me, Noah Andelin. I see right through you. So calm and kind. Well, I’m not falling for it.”
“Falling for what, Mer?” No anger. No mockery.
“Falling for you!”
He stared up at her, eyes gentle, face calm. “It’s too late. Isn’t that what this is about? We’ve fallen for each other. And you don’t know if that’s what you want . . . if I’m what you want. And you don’t know how to tell me.”
Mercedes wanted him. She did. She wanted him so much. She folded her arms and unfolded them. She sat down and rose again, and he watched her, clearly waiting for her to confirm or counter his point. He sat with his legs slightly spread, elbows to knees, his chin resting on his clasped hands. Where did he find the confidence to just lay it all out there like that? Where did he find the courage?
“Remember when you had a few bad days? I came over and bossed you around. And you told me that . . . showering . . . was not what you needed?” Mercedes asked, grasping, trying to find the right thing to say to make him understand. The shower scene was a tricky one to navigate.
“Yes. And you informed me it was exactly what I needed. You were right.”
“I was wrong,” she argued.
“No, you weren’t. I stunk. I hadn’t showered or eaten in three days, and I was depressed. You were right.”
“I was wrong because I didn’t respect your boundaries,” she countered, wagging her finger at him even though she was criticizing herself.
“My boundaries?”
“Yes,” she said, firm.
“What boundaries? We’ve been best friends since we were eight years old. There are no boundaries. You just wanted what was best for me.”
“But that’s just it, Noah. Nobody gets to decide what’s best for you, but you,” Mercedes said, enunciating each word, loud and clear. “I decide what’s best for me, you decide what’s best for you, and if we don’t respect that, then we have no relationship at all.”