Chapter Twenty-One

· Twenty-One ·

Juliet

I’m back in the tub again the next morning, soaking in piping-hot water, willing away the ache in my joints as steam curls from the tub into the morning light. I haven’t heard from Will yet what the plan is for tonight, but whatever it is, I’d like not to feel like a corpse for it.

I’ve eaten breakfast and popped my hefty naproxen sodium. Now I just wait to see if it’ll help. Waiting to figure out if my body’s going to feel better. Waiting to hear from Will. Waiting to figure out how the hell I’m going to keep my body in check this weekend, when just the thought of him makes me ache right between my thighs. I’m too impatient a person to handle it—I’m not built for this much delayed gratification!

Like a divine universal blessing, my phone starts to buzz. As long as it’s not a telemarketer, or that weird guy who keeps trying to order a pastrami sandwich when I’ve told him a dozen times he has the wrong number, I’ll pick up. I need something to distract me from all this waiting around.

I dab my hand on the towel resting on the tub’s edge.

My phone buzzes again. And again. And again. Too fast to be a phone call.

A text message thread to get sucked into! Even better.

Hands dry, I pick up my phone from its perch on the closed toilet lid and lean my elbows on the tub’s edge. The friend group chat is blowing up.

Sula: We’ve got a babysitter I don’t have that kind of dough, between the limited income I’m earning from my freelance work, paying for insurance from the marketplace, and how expensive rent is for this apartment, now that I’m the only one living in it, but I’d fork over a hefty sum—to be able to see his face and read between the lines of his silence.

Did I offend him, when I mentioned not raising suspicion with the group? I know he’s said he doesn’t want to hide, but we’ve also agreed our practice plan is our private business.

Before the silence can stretch on any longer and send me into a panic, I ask him, “So what are our plans that start at five tonight?”

“It’s a surprise,” Will says.

Relief whooshes through me that he sounds fine, just like he did before.

“Can I guess?”

“You miss the part when I said it was a surprise?”

I smile, feeling playful. “Hmm. We’re going to…the museum.”

“Not doing this.”

“Bowling?” I try.

“Oh, come on.”

“What’s wrong with bowling? I love bowling!”

“Me, too,” he says. “You’re just way off the mark.”

I frown in thought. “We’re…going back to the conservatory. Since you’re bummed that we had to skip the carnivorous plant room last time because it was closed.”

“Eh, you’ve seen one Venus flytrap, you’ve seen them all.”

A laugh jumps out of me. “Jamie nearly got attacked by one, the first time he and Bea went together.”

“Really?”

“Well, it depends on who tells you the story. According to Jamie, it just grazed his shoulder; he’s very stoic about it. But how Bea tells it, you’d think he nearly lost an arm.”

Will’s deep laugh rumbles across the line.

I smile, shifting in the water. “You’re really not going to tell me our plans?”

“I will, if you want,” he says. “If it would stress you out not to know. I don’t really like surprises myself, but I’ve heard that a surprise, done well at least, can be…you know…romantic. And that’s what I’m making sure you get. Romance.”

My heart spins so fast, I feel dizzy.

Practice romance , that sensible voice reminds me. It’s all practice, Juliet.

Fine. It’s just practice. But it’s still giving me butterflies. And I intend to let them soar.

Smiling into the phone, I tell him, “Then surprise me.”

“You got it,” he says.

“When should I be ready?”

“Hmm, let’s say four thirty? That work?”

I pull my phone away long enough to read the time and kick my legs miserably. Seven hours of waiting! I’ve got to find something to do with myself today, or I’m gonna lose it.

“Four thirty,” I tell him. “I’ll be ready.”

“Excellent. And Juliet?”

“Yes, Will?”

“Wear something fancy, all right?”

Something fancy? Those butterflies whip round and round in my stomach. I bite my lip against a smile. “Okay.”

The call ends. I sit there for a moment with an alarmingly goofy grin, the phone glued to my ear before I set it on the toilet seat’s lid and plunge myself down into the water.