Fullepub 
12
12
Another email from Julian landed in my inbox early the next day. He really did know how to ruin a morning.
Do you want to meet for dinner soon?
I rolled my eyes as I climbed out of bed. Why in the world did he think I would want to meet him for dinner? I didn’t feel like I’d left any room for interpretation in our interactions, but apparently he thought there was still hope. If I weren’t worried about the police calling my parents, I’d go ahead and get that restraining order.
Maddie and Nicole left after breakfast to go to Long Island to see Maddie’s grandparents, and I decided to wait to tell them about Julian’s new email. No use ruining Maddie’s day.
Edan was going to visit his friends today, which would leave me all alone in the biggest house I’d ever seen. Now that we were back in the States, it was more obvious than ever that I’d had no friends and no life before. Everyone else had people to catch up with, shared histories, and a life they could go back to, if they wanted.
All I had was the teams, but at least that was something. I took my laptop into the media room and opened an email from Noah, responding to my question about Grayson’s note regarding noncombat teams.
I didn’t find anything,Noah wrote. Worth exploring, though. You may want to talk to Laila. She mentioned something about that once. She might have some ideas.
I grabbed my phone and called Laila. She picked up right away.
“Hey, Clara.”
“Hey.”
“How’s New York?”
“It’s good. You should see Maddie’s house.”
She snorted. “I can imagine.”
“How’s Chicago?”
“Really good, actually. It’s nice to have a break.”
“Listen, I’ve been going through some of Grayson’s old notes about recruit dropouts, and he mentions noncombat teams at one point. Noah said you’d had ideas about that?”
“Not really ideas, but I did talk to Grayson about it once.”
“Yeah? What’d you say?”
“I asked him if he had plans to help in other ways—like with scrab destruction or homelessness caused by scrabs. He said he’d like to, but there was only so much he could do at once.”
“That’s true,” I murmured.
“Why?”
“I’m working on putting together new training and recruitment plans, and I just came across that note, and it made me wonder. Naomi said the same thing to me when she quit—her friends wanted to join, but they weren’t the fighting type.”
“You think there should be another option?”
“I don’t know. Grayson could have been right about focusing on one thing at a time. I just wonder if we could recruit more people if we had other options. Or maybe even bring back some of the ones who quit.”
“Maybe,” Laila said. “I’d be in favor of it. What we do is flashy and exciting, and people love it, but I feel like it could be even more important to address some of the shit that happens after the scrab leaves.”
“Yeah, I think so too. Let me know if you have any ideas, OK? I’m going to start looking into some of those organizations that do rebuilding after scrab attacks.”
“You got it.”
“Thanks. I’ll talk to you later.”
My email notification dinged as I hung up the phone, and I looked to see Julian’s name again.
I clicked on the email with a sigh.
“Oh my god,” I exclaimed, pushing my laptop onto the couch beside me.
“Are you OK?” a laughing voice asked. I looked up to see Edan standing at the door of the media room, an amused expression on his face. I muted the television.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just new emails from Julian.”
He walked into the room and sat down on the couch, sliding my laptop back to me. “What does he want now?”
“To have dinner. He said that I never would have come here unless I wanted to see him. To New York, I mean.”
“Sure. Logical. Everything you do is about him.”
“Apparently.” I sighed. “Are you on your way out?”
“No, we’re not meeting up until later. I was actually wondering if you wanted to come with me.”
Yes.I really did. I didn’t want to be here alone, like a friendless loser. And I always wanted to be wherever Edan was.
But I didn’t want a pity invite. I hated the idea that Edan felt sorry for me. I opened my mouth to decline the invitation.
“I’d really like to introduce you to my friends,” he said, almost shyly. “I’ve told them a lot about you.”
Heat bloomed across my cheeks. I didn’t know why it hadn’t occurred to me that he was asking because he actually wanted me to come. Because he wanted me to meet his friends.
“I would really like that,” I said.
“Great.” He smiled. “Meet downstairs at five.”
Edan and I took the subway into Queens. It was rush hour, and we didn’t talk much on the crowded trains. We had to squish together as people piled into the subway car, and I tried not to notice how close we were, but it was hard when I kept bumping against his chest. The girl next to me had circled her arm around her boyfriend’s waist and leaned into him, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how nice that looked. I turned to look at the guy muttering to himself near the door instead.
We didn’t talk as we walked out of the subway station and a few blocks to a red-brick apartment building. We climbed the stairs to the fourth floor, and a bearded man threw open the door with a grin.
“You crazy bastard,” he said, grabbing Edan and pulling him into a massive hug.
Edan laughed, returning the hug and then stepping away to gesture at me.
“This is Clara.”
He held his hand out to me. “Tucker.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” I said, shaking it. He looked older than us, maybe in his early twenties. And he had more tattoos—they covered every inch of his arms and part of his neck.
We stepped into the apartment, and three people rushed forward, nearly tackling Edan. There was another guy who looked a bit younger than Tucker, and two girls. They were all talking at once, telling him he was crazy, asking how long he was in New York. The pretty pale-skinned girl with long black hair moved in for a second hug, lingering for several seconds, and I knew immediately who this was—Andrea.
“Clara, this is Pedro and Kim and Andrea,” Edan said after Andrea released him.
“It’s so nice to meet you in person!” Kim exclaimed, throwing her arms around me.
“Oh,” I said, startled. “You too.”
“Sorry.” She laughed as she pulled away. “Between Edan’s Insta stories and Noah’s videos, I feel like I know you already.”
“Sit down,” Tucker said, gesturing to the living room. It was a tiny one-bedroom apartment, and the living room consisted of a worn gray couch and a wooden chair in the corner. Kim dragged a couple more chairs away from the round table off the kitchen.
Edan sat on the couch, and I lowered down next to him. Andrea’s eyes followed me, and I smiled at her.
She was Edan’s ex-girlfriend. He’d told me about her—they’d dated for about six months, and then were on and off again for another six months after that. He said that they were just friends now, but I knew that she was the girlfriend that he’d been most serious about. And the way Andrea looked at him made my stomach tighten. There was such open affection in her gaze.
Edan had so many experiences that I didn’t have. He’d lived away from home for three years. He’d had several different jobs. He had an ex-girlfriend. Girlfriends, actually. Plural. I’d kissed three guys in my entire life, and all of the relationships had been so short that they barely qualified as boyfriends.
“Clara, do you want something to drink?” Tucker asked. “We have beer, wine . . . Kim, we still have some vodka too, right?”
“No thank you,” I said. “I’m fine.” I’d still never tried alcohol, and I didn’t feel much desire to with Edan around. He never drank, and it was nice to have a friend who was sober when all our friends were getting tipsy.
“How long are you in town for?” Tucker asked, sitting down on the ground and resting his elbows on the coffee table. “It’s just the three of you here, right? You guys and Madison?”
“Yeah, the rest of our team is visiting their families,” Edan said. “I’m not sure how long we’re staying. Not permanently, but the plans are . . . in flux, for now.”
“Is this your first time in New York?” Pedro asked me. “Where are you from, again?”
“Dallas. Yeah, first time. I like it. It’s like London, without the scrabs.”
“I can’t believe you’ve been in London for six months,” Kim said, sitting down next to Tucker and looping an arm around his waist.
“I can,” Pedro said with a laugh. “Edan is the craziest bastard I ever met.”
Everyone laughed, and I cocked my head, confused by that description of Edan. He’d been a thief and a pickpocket while living here, but “craziest bastard I ever met,” was not the Edan I knew.
His eyes flicked to me and then quickly away, pink splotches appearing on his cheeks.
“Edan’s not crazy,” Andrea said. “He’s just fearless.”
“Fearless, crazy, same thing,” Pedro said with a wave of his hand.
Fearlesswas a more apt description of Edan. Or it had been, before. Not so much these days, and I wasn’t sure that was a bad thing.
“Do you think you’ll live here after all this is over?” Andrea asked me.
“Oh. Uh, I don’t know.”
“Isn’t it sort of already over?” Kim asked, her tone apologetic. “The teams?”
“We’re just regrouping,” Edan said.
“Regrouping?” Tucker repeated.
“Maddie just suspended the teams for a while,” I said. “The media is reporting that they’re dead, but she is definitely planning to keep them alive.”
“But you think you’ll come back to New York, when the time comes?” Andrea pressed. “You won’t want to go back to Dallas?”
“Oh god no,” I said, too quickly. Tucker laughed, and Edan brushed a hand across his lips, like he was trying not to smile.
They were all looking at me expectantly, and I realized they wanted more.
“I hadn’t really thought about where I’d go after,” I said. “But Maddie is a good friend of mine, and she lives here, and . . .” I trailed off, stealing a glance at Edan. It seemed weird to say I’d stay in New York because he was here too.
But I would. The thought of being in a separate city, miles or even an entire ocean between us, made my chest hurt.
“Is Maddie Madison St. John?” Kim asked with a laugh. “You call her Maddie?”
“Everyone calls her Maddie,” Edan said.
Kim rolled her eyes. “I seriously can’t believe you’re friends with the St. Johns. Are you staying at their place? Is it as ridiculous as it looks in the photos?”
“Hadn’t you been there before?” Tucker asked.
“Yeah, I went there with Grayson a few times,” Edan said. “It is absolutely as ridiculous as it looks in photos.”
“There’s an elevator,” I said. “And a pool.”
“Jesus.” Tucker bumped Edan’s knee. “I was going to ask if you needed a place to stay tonight, but clearly you’re fine.”
“I’m good. But thank you.” Edan smiled at him. “What have you guys been up to?”
Tucker told us about work—he was a tattoo artist. The artist who had done all of Edan’s tattoos, except the most recent one. He told us he’d moved studios, and business had really picked up.
Tucker moved forward to see Edan’s new tattoo, his eyes flicking to my wrist. “You have the same one.”
“We all do,” I said, turning my wrist over so he could see. “The team, I mean. All eight of us got this.”
“Your first?” Kim asked me. I wore long sleeves and jeans, so I wondered how she knew that. Apparently, I looked like the sort of person who didn’t have tattoos.
“Yes,” I said.
“Do you want more yet? It’s impossible to stop with just one.”
“I do, actually.” I glanced at the tree on Edan’s arm, and then at Tucker. “I love Edan’s tattoos. I will definitely come to see you when I decide on my next one.”
Tucker looked pleased by the compliment, and Edan smiled at me.
We stayed for a couple hours, sharing stories of scrab fighting in London, telling them about the team, and confirming that yes, Patrick really was that good-looking in person.
We took the trains back and walked side by side down the street toward Maddie’s house. It was colder in New York than it had been in London, but it was a nice night, the air crisp and still. We weren’t far from the house, but I wished we were. I would have liked to stay out all night with Edan.
I glanced over at him as we walked. He was looking up at the hazy black sky, and it took him a moment to notice my gaze.
“What?” he asked.
“Andrea seemed kind of worried about you. I saw her talking to you right before we left. And Tucker kept looking at you in this surprised way. Right? Or was I imagining it?”
“No, you’re right. I think I seem really different to them. Andrea wanted to know why I was so quiet.”
I guess the difference in Edan would seem jarring to them. For me, I’d watched it happen slowly, over the course of months. But when I thought back to the Edan I’d talked to on the bus during tryouts, I could see the difference. He was less quick with a snappy comeback these days, and perhaps a bit quieter, but I couldn’t really know about that one. My relationship with Edan had always been marked by quiet—in the closet hiding from scrabs, in the room MDG had locked us in, in the days after Grayson’s death, when we took long walks just to get out of the hotel room for a while, and barely spoke. Quiet used to be easy with Edan. It felt heavier these days.
“They were very nice,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “It felt a little weird, though. The three of them are some of my closest friends. I’ve known them for, like . . . three or four years? But it sort of felt like I had lived this whole other life that I couldn’t quite describe to them. Do you know what I mean?”
“Not really,” I said to the ground. “I don’t have anyone from before. The only person I ever try to explain things to is Laurence, and things have always been weird between us.”
“Did you tell him we’ll be in Dallas next month?”
“Not yet.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. It’s still a couple weeks away. And part of me thinks he isn’t going to want to hang out in person. We almost never did before.”
“I’m sure he’s going to want to, even if only for a few hours.”
“I guess.”
He was quiet for a moment. “I got the impression that you wanted him in your life?”
“I do! It’s just weird, you know?”
He tilted his head and said nothing, which I took to mean he didn’t know.
“Sorry,” I said. “I sound like an asshole, don’t I? You don’t even have any siblings, and Maddie just lost hers. I shouldn’t be complaining about this.”
“You weren’t complaining; I asked. But you can complain to me anytime, if you want. I don’t mind.”
He smiled at me, a shy smile that made me feel like I was melting into a giant puddle on the sidewalk. I quickly looked away before he noticed my reddening cheeks.
“I was just curious,” he continued. “I don’t want my mom in my life, and I wouldn’t like it if people pushed me to reconcile with her just because she’s family. It should be your choice. I’m not going to judge you if you decide not to call him when we go to Dallas, for the record.”
“Thank you,” I said. I hadn’t really thought about it as a choice. It just seemed too rude to be within a few miles of my brother and not call him.
Two women walked down the street toward us, and I moved a little closer to Edan, making room on the sidewalk for them to pass. Edan’s fingers brushed against mine, sending a jolt of electricity up my arm. My hand moved, almost on its own, until I felt his skin against mine again. I felt one of his fingers barely hook onto mine.
I quickly shoved both my hands in my pockets, my heart pounding. I didn’t know whether he’d just tried to hold my hand or if we were just so close it couldn’t be helped. I put a tiny bit of distance between us after the women walked past.
Edan’s phone dinged as we approached the house, and he pulled it out of his pocket and read the message with a smile. He stopped, typing out a reply.
“I’m going to go meet up with Hannah. She’s loaning me some books.” He slid his phone back into his pocket. “I shouldn’t be too long. Unless you want to come with?”
I couldn’t help but think that Hannah would have sent me the message too if she wanted me to come. She had my number, and she knew Edan and I were alone together at the house tonight.
And I couldn’t help but think that Edan didn’t really want me to come either. It wasn’t a real invitation, like the one he’d extended to come meet his friends. This was a polite invitation, because he felt like he had to.
“No, that’s OK,” I said, my voice too quiet. I cleared my throat. “I’m kind of tired, actually. I think I’ll just go in.”
“OK.”
He walked with me the short distance to the house, and then waited while I unlocked the door. I turned around and waved as I pushed the door open. He lifted his hand with a smile, and then turned to go.
I stepped inside, closed the door behind me, and leaned against it. I felt like crying, which was stupid, because this was the choice I’d made.
I’d thought it was a good choice. But tonight, it mostly just felt awful.
