Jessica Martinez - The Vow

“That would be the cook,” she says. “Amir.”

“Wow. Seven years, same beard. Go, Amir.”

She laughs, but it’s tight and nervous. There’s more. I’m torn between wanting to hear it and hoping she doesn’t tell me everything. “Have you started school yet?”

“It’s summer here too,” she says.

“Right.”

“I went to mosque the other day.”

“Yeah? How was that?” I ask. We only went to mosque in Louisville a few times. I guess people were nice enough, but I always felt like such a fake. We were too far away from everyone to be part of any sort of Muslim community. Nobody else there was the only Muslim in their school.

“It was nice,” she says. “Teta goes all the time, so I go with her. Mom and Dad not so much. And I’ve started wearing a hijab when I go out.”

I try picturing Sarina’s face framed by a head scarf or anything but her light-brown hair, and I’m lost. “Do you hate it?”

“No. Actually, I kind of like it.”

I’m not sure what to say. A few weeks ago I would’ve been disturbed, borderline pissed, but now, not really. She doesn’t sound particularly miserable. Except then I remember who I’m talking to. Sarina would sing on her way to the guillotine. “Is Mom wearing it too?”

“Yeah. Most of the women here do. It isn’t so weird when everyone is doing it. In fact, I stood out more those first few days before I started. So, how’s Duchess?”

“Duchess?” It takes me a moment to realize she’s talking about Satan’s Cat. “Still alive.”

“Tell me you’re being nice to her.”

“She’s getting free room and board at the illustrious Wisper Pines. That’s as much nice as I’ve got in me.”

“Seriously, just pet her every once in a while, okay?”

“That beast nearly clawed my eyes out last time I tried to touch her. Luckily for you, Annie seems to like her.”

“Good.”

She sounds relieved enough that I shelve the comment I was going to make about the rising black market rate of feral cat kidneys.

“So,” I say.

“So.”

But then there’s nothing to talk about. We’re not good at this—scheduled conversations, our noses too big, our words out of sync with our mouths. Even if we do this regularly, I have to assume the talking will just get harder and more unnatural as our worlds shift further and further apart. Until we don’t even know each other.

“So you’re coming over winter break?” she asks.

“Depends. Turns out I need special permission to leave and come back if I’m in the process of becoming a permanent resident.” Another of Sam’s bombshell revelations.

“Oh.”

“So Mom’s not there?” I ask even though Dad already told me.

“Nope.”

“Has she been a total basket case?”

“No. Yes. Both. Yo-yo. How’s Annie?”

“Fine.” I put my feet up on the coffee table, and Satan’s Cat hisses from her lookout. I flip her off.

“Are you giving me the finger? Was that Duchess?”

“No and yes.”

“Can I see her?”

“I couldn’t make that cat come to me if I was wearing a catnip suit.”

“Okay. Parting request, once she calms down, rub her belly for me.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then ask Annie to.”

I roll my eyes. “If I remember.”

She smiles. “Thanks.

“You’re welcome.”

We hang up, and I stare at the empty Skype window.

Living alone sucks.

I could email Bryce. Yeah, I’ll do that. I open up a new email, ready to tell him the truth—or the lie that Annie and I are in the process of making true—but I can’t. I stare at the white screen and blinking cursor instead. There isn’t a good place to start. And I can’t even concentrate on it because as worried as I am about Bryce’s reaction, it’s not what’s really gnawing at me.

I’m worried about Annie.

She was so stalwart yesterday, a rock, an Amazon warrior, but then she had to go all comatose on me in the car after—how am I supposed to process that? I thought we were in the clear, but the delayed zombie routine means we’re definitely not. Not until she’s actually told her parents. If she’s even going to tell her parents.

Satan’s Cat thumps her tail against the wall.

“Stop it.”

She glares, keeps doing it.

“Seriously. Cut it out.”

It’s hypnotic, the swirly eyes, the rhythmic thump . . . thump . . . thump.

“I swear, I’ll put you in the bathroom.”

She smiles at me. It doesn’t seem like she should be able to, like that’s even anatomically possible for a cat, but I swear, she smiles, and that smile says Go ahead. Try.

I sigh. We both know I can’t put her in the bathroom without sustaining significant lacerations to my face.

I close my laptop, email unsent. Next week Bryce’ll be home for five whole days before he’s off to Greece. I’ll tell him then.

“Happy now?” I growl.

No answer. Just thump . . . thump . . . thump.

* * *

I spend the rest of the afternoon making room for Annie: cramming all of my clothes into the bottom two drawers, pushing my hangers to the left side of the closet, transferring my toiletries into just one of the drawers in the bathroom, clearing my books and retainer case from the bedside table. I strip the sheets and put clean ones on for her.

I’m not sure when I forget how miserable talking to my family made me, but I do. Somewhere between stuffing pillows into fresh pillowcases and scrubbing the toilet, the anger is replaced by a wave of sheer relief. Because Annie’s coming. And when she’s around I’m not spiraling toward insanity or begging the cat to stop screwing with me or worrying about Sarina. I get to live with my best friend. It’ll be fun. We’ll stay up late watching South Park reruns, and she can set up her easel in the corner of the family room where my boxes and junk used to be, and maybe she’ll even make some half-decent food every once in a while. Not like I’m expecting her to, but it’d be nice. I could offer tutoring for food. Or even better, she could teach me how to make some half-decent food for myself. That would work too.

The relief doesn’t last long before guilt finds me, prickles my skin like the glare of that evil, evil cat. I am one selfish bastard. I’m sitting here thinking about how awesome this extended slumber party is going to be when Annie is at home packing up her life. Closing down. Logging out. Shutting off.

It’s not that I don’t feel bad, because I do. But I didn’t ask her to do it. She dreamed it up and chose it again and again and again, even after I tried to talk her out of it. So maybe it makes me a jerk, but for the first time since my family left, I’m happy. After a few days of loneliness, living with Annie sounds like heaven.

Annie

You look like hell,” Flora says.

“Thank you.”

She takes the cigarette out of her mouth and chucks it into the parking lot planter. It looks like it may have held a plant at one time, before being converted into a giant ashtray. “Hon, when’s the last time you ate?”

“I’m sick,” I say.

She takes lip gloss and a compact from her purse and starts reapplying. “Lovesick?”

“No. He’s not here, is he?”

“Believe it or not, he’s sick too. Y’all are either sharing germs or driving each other insane.”

“Neither. Not anymore.”

She sighs and slips the gloss back into her purse, her lips like shimmering worms. “Do I want to know what happened?”

I shake my head.

“You aren’t here to quit, are you?”

“Is Soup here?”

She rolls her eyes, then scratches the back of her head, and the entire hairsprayed mass of burgundy shifts back and forth. “Half of his staff is dying of broken teenage hearts and too sick to work. Of course he’s here.”

“I’m not quitting over a broken heart,” I lie.

“Just like how working here in the first place wasn’t about trying to become your sister?”

I’m too tired to argue, so I just scowl.

“What? If you aren’t going to be working here anymore, it seems like I should be able to say my piece. Your sister was a sweet girl. You’re a sweet girl.”

I stare at my car keys, run my thumb over the panic button. If I press it, she might be startled enough to let it go.

“Stop trying to fill her place in the universe. You’re going to be miserable if you’re always trying to be what other people need you to be.”

“Okay.” I take a step toward the door.

“I’m not done dispensing life tips.” She puts her hand over the knob. “Boys are breakable. Even the big, strong ones that act like nothing touches them, so be careful with them.”

Panic button. Panic button. Panic button. My thumb traces the indent, and I’m about to press it when she pulls the door open and holds it for me.

“Okay, now I’m done,” she says.

I walk through, still looking down so she won’t see the tears pooling in my eyes. Being lectured is so much better than being pitied.

Quitting is awkward, but Soup takes it well. He’s unreasonably kind actually, considering I’ve cheated on his brother-in-law and left him short-staffed with no notice. But maybe Reed hasn’t told him yet. Soup even gives me a hug and tells me to take care, which makes me feel worse about everything and almost unable do what I really came down here to do. After all, I could’ve quit over the phone.

I’ve never stolen anything before. It seems like everybody has a childhood shoplifting story to tell—Mo took Tic Tacs from a Kroger—but I never stole anything, or if I did, I don’t remember it. Maybe that’s why I’m sure someone’s watching me as I stuff the acrylic peach apron into my shoulder bag. Ruffles and ties and more ruffles, I cram them in with my heart thumping, even though I know Flora and Soup are back at the counter scooping custard.