However, on one of her excursions into the Coleman’s kitchen, she realized that she had absolutely no idea where Candace kept the Cool Whip that Brennan said he needed to enjoy his pumpkin pie. She was just about to return to the dining room when she slammed into the one person she’d been avoiding all night.
Thank you, Universe. You really like to give me everything I don’t need, don’t you?
“Oh, sorry,” he murmured, and she felt set on edge. When was he going to stop apologizing? Or was sorry the only word he knew how to say to her?
“I know,” she snapped, stepping back and glancing up at him.
He didn’t look any different than the last time she’d seen him in Rome: his hair was slightly longer, his eyes were a little bloodshot, his skin was a little lighter. Other than that, he looked the same.
She looked down, cheeks burning. She’d been staring for too long.
“Do you know where the, uh, Cool Whip is?” she asked, backing further and further away, tail between legs, hit and run.
“Oh yeah, that’s . . . I’m pretty sure Mom keeps it in the freezer,” he sighed, brushing past her, the shoulder of his dress shirt swiping her bare shoulder.
Goosebumps rose. She flinched again.
She followed him to the freezer, which he opened and stood in the way, the frozen air rolling out in visible clouds. He ducked down, searching the jam-packed freezer for the Cool Whip, coming up empty-handed. He shrugged and shut it.
“Uh, yeah. I don’t know,” he sighed, reaching for the next door over. “Fridge?”
“I checked there,” she said wearily, trying to make it sound like he was inconveniencing her. In a way, he was.
He glanced over his shoulder at her, and she hated how her stomach dropped. She was sick of this. Sick of it all. The pretending like nothing was wrong and the passive aggression. Where did it leave them? What would happen in the future if they couldn’t even be friends?
He opened the fridge nonetheless, scavenging around past the billion gallons of milk and cans of Coke and Red Bull and the plastic box of grapes, hot sauce, leftover pizza slices, a block of cheese stuffed into a giant Ziplock bag—
“Here we are,” he said as he lifted out a blue tub of Cool Whip. Good for him.
He turned and handed the Cool Whip to her, catching her eye only once. And maybe that was enough for him.
“Kennidee, what?” he demanded as she took the Cool Whip.
She cringed again and set the tub on the counter behind her. Crossed her arms across her chest because she knew what was coming was going to hurt right there.
She looked at him, and then she couldn’t. She couldn’t do it. Because with the way he looked at her, she saw everything—everything—she had blocked out for the past almost five years. The vulnerable him when he slept on the floor in her apartment, wrapped up in thick blankets with her body pressed to his, the angry him when someone told him he was wrong, the sensitive him when somebody he loved was hurting, even the embarrassed him when he was asked to play a song he didn’t know if he was ready to share or not yet. That boy had the same nose, same ears, same eyes and face as this man standing in front of her in the kitchen of his childhood home. That boy, though he had written a record that a few people up in the music industry liked, sold a few million copies of his words, feelings and experiences, was the same one as the one who had serenaded a fifteen-year-old girl on some beach down on the west coast with nothing but a guitar and his raw, sixteen-year-old voice.
Nothing had changed.
And so why were things different?
“I’ve missed you,” she sighed, and there—she had said it.
He looked surprised, like for some reason, that was the last thing he’d imagined her saying after all that time. Well, heck. What did he expect? Did he want her to drop to her knees and plea forgiveness, clasping her hands together and shaking her fists, Forgive me Ryland, for I know not what I’ve done?
“You have?” His voice sounded hoarse as he reached into his leather jacket, fumbling for something in there.
She glanced from his eyes to his jacket to the ground. She gripped the counter with one of her hands. “Well, yeah. I haven’t seen you since Kendon’s wedding. And you kind of just . . . left.” She looked up.
And paused.
Taken aback, because the Ryland she knew didn’t smoke. But this one had an unlit cigarette between his lips and the lighter in his hand was poised a few inches away. He stared at her like he’d been caught stealing cookies or something innocent like that. The longer she stared, the more uncomfortable he seemed to get until he finally just put the lighter away and pushed the cigarette back into his leather jacket.
Then it was his turn to cross his arms. Not in defense or protection, just because she’d somehow offended him by reminding him about his sudden disappearance and, it seemed, his bad habits.
“Things were complicated,” he finally sighed.
She hummed in response and eyed him carefully. He dropped his gaze before she could read his emotions, which was something she had never been able to do, anyway.
“That’s what people say when they don’t want to explain,” she murmured.
His eyes flashed up at her and he made a face like he was trying to smile, but it hurt too bad.
“I’ve never had to explain,” he confessed, hanging his head. “I just always sort of assumed that you . . . knew.”
She shrugged and brought her arms back around to close her body off. “I think I did. Once upon a time.”
He bit his lip and looked up at her through his long, most likely dirty hair, and it occurred to her that he was holding something back. Not feelings or words or anything like that. But tears. Sobs, maybe. Because she’d caught the way his bottom lip had trembled before he’d bit it to keep it steady.
He inhaled sharply and looked down again, gulping. “So what happened?”
Her gaze dropped from his sunken head to his brown Oxfords to the sleeve rolled up to his elbow, to the tattoo that was just below that.
She’d seen that before. The lyrics of that one song his mother used to sing to him. The lyrics of that one song he’d once sung to her. It was kind of ironic.
Because he’d reached for the stars with that band of his, but had he remembered who he was? Had he stayed true to himself?
She thought of the cigarette and part of her reluctantly doubted it.
But then she looked at his other arm. And she paused, taken aback and choking on her words. Because on his arm was an anchor. An anchor.
It was suddenly extremely difficult to breathe.
“Uh—” She blinked and tried again. “Um . . . I think we just . . . I don’t know. Grew up?”
He caught her gaze and held it, asking her What’s going on? with his eyes. And truthfully, she didn’t know how to answer that.
“This hurts, Ry,” she whispered.
His eyebrows pulled together like he hadn’t heard her right. Or at all.
“You know,” she sighed, gesturing to the wide space between them. “This. This is hard. How are we supposed to— We can’t even—”
She stopped herself short, exhausted from trying to piece it together and make things right. Then again, it was almost midnight in New York, and that was the time her body was still on.
She raised a hand to her head, which suddenly ached and spun. She closed her eyes, praying to open them and find herself back in New York, maybe in Brooke’s apartment, where her best friend and Channing would just be, be there, happy and in love, and—
But that was wrong. Because Channing was gone now. And another girl had gotten her heart broken. For what? Nothing good. She’d gotten nothing good out of Channing leaving. And Kennidee had certainly gotten nothing but bad out of Ryland leaving.
She tried to look at Ryland again, but tears were starting to prick at the back of her eyes, and if she looked, she knew she wouldn’t be able to handle it. And so she didn’t. Instead, she stayed quiet long enough for him to grab the Cool Whip and leave.
She didn’t look up until all she could see was his back, walking away again, just like it had before. But before, he had walked away somewhat strong, with a kind of spring in his step, which had seemed odd at the time, and now, he walked away with a limp, a slight stagger that hurt just to look at.
And just like that, it was clear. He wasn’t okay. His relationship with Aubri wasn’t everything he’d always dreamed of that she couldn’t give. His job as a famous musician wasn’t everything to him. He had fights with his bandmates and didn’t always enjoy spending every waking moment of every single day with the three of them.
But he fought to make it look like that.
He fought to make it look like he was intact, even though he wasn’t.
Because that was what people did.
They fought.
- The Kids Are Alright, Chapter 31: Rush
