Chapter Fourteen

fourteen

Less than twenty-four hours into a fake relationship seems a little early to be falling into a routine, and yet Ellie and I have found ourselves out in the cold in front of her house again. Unlike this morning, we have neither sun or a car to keep us warm. We both wince against the wind, bargaining frostbite for privacy as I tug the door closed behind me.

“What do you want?” Ellie snaps. She’s already shivering a little.

“You’re pissed,” I say, “and we should talk about why you’re pissed.”

“I’m not pissed.” Her eyes roll a lap toward the sky, and I can barely hold in my laugh. We’ve both told a lot of lies today, but this has to be the least convincing among them. Not even Bo, who can’t seem to sniff out the right place to pee, would fall for that. The wind picks up, whipping Ellie’s blonde hair in front of her face and pasting a few strands onto her lips. She turns a cheek against it, then stares down at Bo, who is sniffing a trail along the bushes. “C’mon.” She jostles his leash. “Go potty.”

“Listen,” I start, staring at Bo despite talking to Ellie, “I’m sorry I had to leave during the thankful thing, but I was so freaked out—”

“Can we drop it? Please?”

I roll my lips over my teeth, burying my hands in my coat pockets. “I was just trying to apologize.”

“I just think it’s funny how you were so invested in our agreement when it was about you and your accounting grade,” Ellie says, decidedly not dropping it. “But the second I need you to support me on the grad school thing, you’ve got more important things to do.”

“I’m really sorry,” I say, putting my whole chest into each word. “If you hadn’t noticed, I was sort of going through a major transfer crisis.”

A tiny, unimpressed huff buzzes past her lips, but she won’t even look at me. Her eyes stay fixed on Bo. “So your problems pull rank and you don’t have to hold up your end of the bargain. Got it.”

“I was trying,” I say, then dial my voice back a few decibels. If her parents overhear this, it’ll be over for both of us. “I set up that whole grad school conversation, didn’t I?”

Ellie’s laugh is more of an indignant puff. “Yeah, and that’s about all you did. You just had to side with Mom on the whole cost of college thing, and then you completely jumped ship. I needed you.”

“I didn’t side with your mom. And I didn’t jump ship either . I stepped away to take a breather.”

“You stepped away to call Kat,” she corrects me. “I heard you.”

“No, Kat called me because she needed help with her own emergency.”

“And?” At long last, Ellie’s head snaps toward me, and I watch her jaw stiffen while her glossy blue eyes narrow an inch. “What was the emergency?”

“Family drama,” I grumble. Now that I have her direct eye contact, I no longer want it, so I slip into a staring contest with a stain on the hem of my coat. Coffee, probably. “She needed me.”

“So did I,” Ellie says. “Listen. I get that missing the transfer deadline is a huge blow. And I get that Kat is important, but you made a promise. We were supposed to help each other.”

“There’s nothing to help me with anymore,” I remind her. “I can’t transfer. My grade doesn’t matter.”

“It still matters, Murphy. You heard my mom. You can still transfer next fall.”

“Just in time for you to have already graduated and for Kat to have only a year left.”

Ellie resets with a deep inhale that rolls into a slow, measured sigh. “This isn’t about Kat. This is about me and you. Our lives, Murph. Right?”

“I guess.”

“And if you have to think about it from Kat’s point of view, I’m sure she wants to see you pass accounting, right? She knew how important it was for us to pull this off.”

I swallow hard, fighting back the truth. It’s gristly and thick, lodged in the back of my throat. “She, uh.” I swallow again. “She actually didn’t know I was here.”

When I finally drag my eyes off the ground, I’m greeted with a wide-eyed stare and a small exhale clouding the air around Ellie’s parted lips. “What?”

“I didn’t tell her I was coming here for Thanksgiving,” I say. “I mean, I told her just now on the phone, but before that, I just let her think I was staying home.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t want her thinking I was choosing you over her.”

Ellie scoffs through her nose. “You weren’t choosing me,” she says. “You were choosing you. Your grade and your future. Kat clearly has other priorities besides you, Murphy. Aren’t you allowed to have other priorities too?”

“It’s not like that,” I snap. “She’s my best friend. You wouldn’t get it.”

“Oh, because I’m a friendless moron, right?” The crack in Ellie’s voice is borderline pubescent. “I have friends, Murphy. Normal friends who don’t base all their decisions on one another.”

“Oh yeah, your normal friends,” I say. Bitterness inches into my tone with each passing word. “Are you referring to the friends who didn’t even show up to the bar last night? Or the friends who did, but didn’t remember your name or even notice when you were gone?”

“At least I have more than one,” she spits. “And don’t act like Kat is perfect either. We both know just how pissed you were that she screwed up your night by dragging Daniel along without telling you.”

“So she made one mistake,” I admit. “She was probably just nervous because—”

“Because she was choosing her boyfriend over you?” Ellie says. “And she knew it’d break your heart because you don’t get to be her favorite anymore? She’s clearly moving on from this freaky codependent thing you two have going, but you just won’t let it go.”

“We’re not codependent,” I correct her, “We’re close.”

“You skipped your family vacation for Kathryn . You want to go to U of I to be with Kathryn . When I need you to go to bat for me, you’re stepping out to take a phone call because you’re so in love with Kathryn .”

“Oh come on.” I fold my arms over my chest and wait for her to take it back. But she doesn’t. She doesn’t even blink, and I want no part of her staring contest. “Don’t act like you believe that shit just because your mom thought Kat and I were a thing.”

“I don’t know anymore!” Ellie throws up her hands, and Bo jolts at the tug of his leash, then follows at Ellie’s heels as she starts to pace. “Maybe Mom has a point. You’d do anything for Kat. And today, you had this miraculous, Hail Mary chance to save your grade by—God forbid—spending a single day with a girl you’re clearly into.” She halts, and I watch her shoulders pin up against her ears before releasing all at once. “You couldn’t even commit to a single day without putting Kat first. Which sucks, because I’m into you too.”

“You’re what?” My heart drops like an anchor, holding me in place against the wind while my neurons fire a singular message throughout my body: shut it down . My hands ball into fists, and my jaw winds tight, trying to lock up the pins and needles behind my nose before they can surface as a full-blown cry. “Make up your mind, Ellie. You spend all of last night flirting with me, then you want to be friends, then you call me your girlfriend to your mother , but you make sure I know it’s fake, then you kiss me, but refuse to talk about it…”

“Because I was confused!”

“Then imagine how I feel!” It’s my turn to pace. “You give me this whole speech about how you’re not looking for anything, how we can only be friends, and then what? Eight hours later, you’re into me? What am I supposed to think?”

“That I just got out of a relationship and I’m scared?” Ellie says, her voice growing scratchier and more raw with every word. “I like you, Murphy. I like us together.”

“You don’t know that,” I snap. “You’ve known me for, like, a day.”

“Whatever happened to ‘it doesn’t matter how long you know a person?’?” She hurls my own words back at me in a sickly sweet tone. “But you’re right. I don’t know you that well, which is why it’s not fair for me to make assumptions about you. Just because something didn’t work with Mary doesn’t mean it won’t work for you and me.”

I stop pacing and try to process. “What are you saying?”

Ellie takes a cautious step forward, and when she speaks, her voice is gentle and breathy. “I’m saying…why shouldn’t we try this?” She softens as she takes another step, then another until she’s close enough to hook one finger through my belt loop. My body responds, even if I’m not sure I want it to. “I know we’re still feeling things out, but while you’re in Geneva, Champaign isn’t that far from here. If we date through the spring and everything goes well, we can try long distance if I move to New York or…wherever I end up. And when you’re done with school, you could join me, you know. You said yourself you can do your business stuff remote.”

“I’m not actually doing that business stuff, you know that, right? That was part of your lie.”

“Our lie,” she corrects me, and it’s all I can do not to laugh.

“You don’t even realize what you’re doing, do you?”

Ellie blinks against the wind. “What do you mean?”

“Making yet another grand plan for you and me without even asking what I want.” Her face falls, but I keep going. “Did you ask me if I would want to do long distance? Or if I have any interest in living in New York? You don’t even know if I want to try a real date with you after this ridiculous day.”

The color slips from Ellie’s cheeks. “Do…do you not?”

“That’s not the point. Don’t you know what this is?” I don’t leave her room to answer. “You’re planning for you, not for us.”

Ellie flinches, then her lower lip stiffens. Her eyes look like she’s seen a ghost. “Don’t say that.”

“But it’s true. What you’re doing to me is exactly what Mary did to you.”

“Murphy.” Ellie says my name like it’s a full sentence, an entire thesis, the whole point and the proof in and of itself. She says it like she knows I want to hear her say it again and again, and I wish I could pretend it could be that simple. We could forget this whole fight and tumble into an enchanting spring and summer of Cubs games and Pride parades, just like we’ve talked about all afternoon. I could tell her what she wants to hear. It would be easier, but it wouldn’t be honest. What comes out instead is:

“I think I should go home.” I turn back toward the house. Through one sidelite, the blue light of the living room TV flashes onto Otto’s silhouette. Through the other, the warm glow in the kitchen backlights Kara and Carol, standing hip to hip over a sink full of dishes. At Ellie’s feet, Bo lets out a soft, pitiful whine.

“Murphy,” Ellie pleads. “Stay.”

“No,” I decide. “I gotta go.”

“What about my family? Are you at least gonna say goodbye?”

I shake my head. “Tell them I have a stomachache. Too much pie or something.”

“Don’t be like that.”

“Like what? I’m tired, El. I just want to go home.”

“I’m sorry, just…please.” She takes a step toward me, just barely placing her fingers on the tiny bit of exposed skin between my sleeve and the cuff of my glove. I steady my gaze on the front-door wreath, working overtime to keep my breath even. When I say nothing, Ellie gives in. “Fine,” she says. “But it’s cold. Let me drive you. Not as my girlfriend. Just as a friend.”

The earth tilts and spins around me, my throat feeling tighter and tighter by the second. I swallow, and everything balances a little, enough for me to shake my head and say, “I’m not sure that I’m either.”

The wind howls through the trees, and I wish it would take me with it so I didn’t have to see Ellie like this, with her eyes wide and sorry and her blue-tinged lips parted just an inch, just enough to be ready should she think of something to say that would change my mind. I tug the zipper of my coat up to my chin to block out the cold, but it’s too late. It’s inside now, freezing me in place for just a moment longer than I’d care to stay. “See you later, Ellie” is all I manage to say as I step into the cloudy, navy night. No moon, no stars poking through. Just me and the streetlights, which are slow to kick in. I switch on my phone flashlight to light the sidewalk in front of me and start the long trek home, wondering if the houses in this neighborhood have always been kind of small or if I’m just growing up.