“I suspect she’s very good at it.”
I picture A as Lindsay, or some other mean girl. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t have to meet her.” Because what would the point be? If A was like that, there’s no way we could ever be like this, the way we are now. This might be a cheap Chinese restaurant with grease stains on the menus and ceramic cats guarding the soy sauce on the tables, but it’s still an escape, it’s still exciting. We hold hands and look at each other and not much needs to be said. I have found someone who cares about me, and right now I can accept that.
“I’m sorry for calling you a jerk,” I say. “I just—this is hard enough as it is. And I was so sure I was right.”
“I was a jerk. I’m taking for granted how normal this all feels.”
“Justin sometimes does that. Pretends I didn’t tell him something I just told him. Or makes up this whole story, then laughs when I fall for it. I hate that.”
“I’m sorry—”
“No, it’s okay. I mean, it’s not like he was the first one. I guess there’s something about me that people love to fool. And I’d probably do it—fool people—if it ever occurred to me.”
I don’t want to sound like a complainer. I don’t want to sound like this weak girl who can’t take care of herself. But I also want him to know—I can’t stand people being mean. People playing games. I want to guard myself against it, but I make a shitty guard for my own heart. I would rather lose the game than play it. I would rather be hurt than be mean. Because I can live with myself if I’m hurt. I don’t think I could live with myself if I were mean.
I’m worried A is going to try to say something to make it all better. That he’s going to tell me it’s all in my mind. Or, even worse, like Justin, he’s going to tell me I have to learn how to take a joke. Like my lack of humor is the real offense.
But A’s not saying any of that. Instead, he’s emptying the chopstick holder.
“What are you doing?” I ask. The woman behind the cash register is giving us a strange look, and I don’t blame her.
A doesn’t answer. Instead, he works the chopsticks into the shape of a heart, covering the table. Then he takes all the Sweet’N Low packets from our table and two others in order to turn the heart a pale paper pink.
It’s too much. And it’s awesome at the same time.
When he’s done, he points proudly to the heart. He looks like a kindergartner who’s just finished a fort.
“This,” he says, “is only about one-ninety-millionth of how I feel about you.”
I laugh. I think he’s forgotten that his heart is full of Sweet’N Low.
“I’ll try not to take it personally,” I tell him.
He seems a little offended. “Take what personally? You should take it very personally.”
“The fact that you used artificial sweetener?”
Saccharine. Everything fake. But also real.
He takes a pink packet from the heart and throws it playfully at me.
“Not everything is a symbol!” he shouts.
I am not going to let myself sit undefended. I pull a chopstick from the heart and use it like a sword. He takes up my challenge, and raises another chopstick in the same way. He lunges. I parry. We are happy fools.
The waiter comes over with some plates. A turns his head and I pierce his chest.
“I die!” A calls out.
“Who has the moo shu chicken?” the waiter asks.
“That’s his,” I say. “And the answer is, yes, we’re always like this.”
After the waiter leaves, A asks me, “Is that true? Are we always like this?”
“Well, it’s a little too early for always,” I answer. Not to ruin the moment. Just to make sure we’re not carried away by it.
“But it’s a good sign,” he says.
“Always,” I tell him.
I forget about the rest of my life. I don’t even have to push it away—I’ve forgotten about it. It’s no longer there. There is only now, there is only me and A and everything that we’re sharing. It doesn’t feel like amnesia as much as it feels like a sudden absence of noise.
At the end of the meal, we get our fortunes. Mine says:
YOU HAVE A NICE SMILE.
“This isn’t a fortune,” I say, showing it to A.
“No. You will have a nice smile—that would be a fortune,” he tells me.
Exactly. A fortune has to tell you what’s going to happen, not what already is.
And, really, who doesn’t have a nice smile?
“I’m going to send it back,” I say.
A looks amused. “Do you often send back fortune cookies?”
“No. This is the first time. I mean, this is a Chinese restaurant—”
“Malpractice.”
“Exactly.”
I wave for the waiter, who comes immediately.
“My fortune isn’t really a fortune, it’s just a statement,” I tell him. “And it’s a pretty superficial statement at that.”
The waiter nods and returns with a handful of cookies, each individually wrapped.
“I only need one,” I tell him. More than one would be cheating. “Wait one second.”
I open a second cookie—and am relieved by what I find inside.
ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER.
“Well done, sir,” A says to the waiter once I show it to them both.
“Your turn,” I say. A carefully opens his cookie, and practically beams when he reads what the fortune says.
“What?” I ask.
He holds it out to me.
ADVENTURE IS AROUND THE CORNER.
I am not a superstitious person. But I’m excited to get to that corner. Wherever it may be.
I know we don’t have much time left. I know that A and I are only borrowing this time from someone else, not receiving it entirely for ourselves. But I want to borrow it for as long as I can. I want him to keep talking to me. I want to keep listening to him.
Back in the library, I ask him to tell me more books to read. Because I know the answer to this question will get me to know him even more.
He shows me the book he was reading before. It’s called Feed.
“It’s about the difference between technological connection and human connection. It’s about how we can have so much information that we forget who we are, or at least who we’re supposed to be.” He takes me farther down the shelves, to the very end of the YA section, and holds up The Book Thief. “Have you read this?” I shake my head, and he continues. “It’s a Holocaust novel, and it’s narrated by death itself. Death is separate from everything, but he can’t help feeling like he’s a part of it all. And when he starts seeing the story of this little girl with a very hard life, he can’t look away. He has to know what will happen.” He pulls me back to an earlier shelf. “And on a lighter note, there’s this book, Destroy All Cars. It’s about how caring about something deeply can also make you hate the world, because the world can be really, really disappointing. But don’t worry—it’s also funny, too. Because that’s how you get through all the disappointments, right? You have to find it all funny.”