LOVE,
DAD
I had to laugh. My dad always wrote his letters to me mid-errand, or under some arbitrary time constraint, as if he couldn’t just stop writing partway through and return to it later, without my ever knowing he’d paused. It made his letters feel like dispatches, like he was away at sea, when really he was home in Durham with, as far as I knew, a working phone. But I didn’t mind. Letters felt old-fashioned and meaningful. Even the ones that were mostly about moths. They might not have been the most efficient way to communicate, but they did give me something to keep.
And then there was his super-casual suggestion of breakfast, as if we had seen each other more recently than a year and ten months ago (not that I was keeping track). My dad was terrified of flying, though in his words he just really, really hated it. I wondered if he was planning to drive all the way from North Carolina like last time, and if not, which friends were worth getting on an airplane for.
I sent him a text: Got your letter. Thanks for the $. Let me know when you have dates for your trip. Love you too.
* * *
—
I sat on my Triple Moon news for a few days, trying to decide how to deliver it. A text would be easier, for several reasons: one, I wouldn’t be face to face with Ruby, who seemed to get prettier and prettier every time I saw her, even though you’d think that sort of thing would have a ceiling; two, I could fine-tune my wording, thereby avoiding the possibility of sounding like an awkward freak; three, by texting her, I would set a precedent for texting as a thing we did, and maybe eventually we would text about something other than venues for her band.
But one day, at the end of Civil Liberties, just after Jamie had booked it out of the classroom, waving goodbye over her shoulder, I saw Ruby pause in the hallway to look at her phone, and I found myself walking—no, gliding—over to her, and saying her name.
She looked up, and smiled.
“Hey, Quinn,” she said.
“Hey, um,” I said. In my defense, I had not been prepared for her to greet me by name. On top of the smiling it was just too much.
“Hi…”
“Yeah, so, you know that coffee shop I told you about? I told the owners about you and they’d love to have you guys come do a show,” I said. “Or, multiple shows, I think.”
“Really?” She grabbed my arm. “That was so nice of you.”
Keep it together! I screamed in my head. Ignore the electricity coursing into your shoulders!
“Ah, well,” I said. “I’m glad they went for it.”
“Should I email…someone? Should I stop by to meet them?”
Until then, my plan, insofar as I had one, had been to simply send her Gaby’s calendar, and mediate from there until a date was set. But going there in person was a much better idea.
“Yeah, maybe you should meet them and, like, see the space,” I said. “If you want, I could go with you? Just, since I know them.”
“Oh! Sure,” said Ruby. “Yeah, that would be cool.”
It occurred to me then that this was a lot of attention being paid and a lot of effort being put into preserving a band whose music I did not, historically, enjoy. Not that Ruby knew that. But if my sudden enthusiasm felt like it should seem weird to Ruby, it didn’t seem like it actually did. Perhaps she was on the receiving end of this sort of eager desire to help and please all the time. Her life must be so fun.
“Maybe Saturday?” I suggested. “I have soccer tonight, so.”
“I thought you guys played in the winter.”
“We do,” I said, feeling strangely touched she knew. “This is my club team.”
“So you play all the time.”
“Kinda, yeah,” I said. It was true: between club soccer and school soccer, there was virtually no down season, except a week or two here and there for holidays. Soccer was the reason I couldn’t have a part-time job, which meant soccer was keeping me broke until it made me rich.
“Okay, well, let’s do Saturday, then,” said Ruby.
“What time?” I was trying not to sound desperate, but she wasn’t really giving me a lot to work with, detail-wise.
“…Three o’clock?” she guessed.
“Yeah, three works.”
“Well, I’ve gotta get to class.”
We smiled at each other, each of us (I assumed) surprised to have formed an actual plan with the other. “Well,” she went on, “I gotta go meet my ride.”
“I could give you a ride,” I said. For some reason.
Ruby seemed as surprised and confused as I was. But also—maybe—a little charmed.
“Thanks, but—”
“Yeah, that would be rude,” I interjected. She laughed.
“Exactly.”
“You don’t have a car?” I asked. Ruby’s family obviously had money, and in Southern California, no one who had any money didn’t have their own car. I was curious, but more saliently, I was stalling. I didn’t want her to walk away.
“I do, but,” started Ruby, sighing. “My parents have a lot of rules.”
“They’re still together?” I asked. She nodded, and I nodded. “Classic divorce trade-off.”
She laughed. Again my chest twinged with that long-lost crushy feeling. The warning bell rang, and Ruby smiled, and I smiled, and we took off running in opposite directions.
I spent all of soccer practice thinking about Ruby and most of it trying to talk to Ronni about her, running over to fill her in in thirty-second installments every time-out and every water break. After five or six of these she grew exasperated. “Oh my God,” she yelled. “Can this PLEASE wait until after?”
But it honestly didn’t feel like it could. For the first time in ages, I felt something other than heartbroken. When Jamie broke up with me I knew I’d never love anyone like I loved her. Maybe this was true. But other loves were still possible. Or at least other likes. Other girls existed. And that felt revelatory and huge and exciting. I was still very aware that the public record didn’t show much (any) evidence that Ruby had any romantic interest in girls. But the way she smiled at me made me think it was possible. How could I explain all that to Ronni?
Someone was yelling my name. I came out of it just in time to see the ball flying my way. I trapped it, pivoted my body toward the net, and kicked it, hard, just over Halle’s outstretched hands. The rest of my squad cheered. Ronni, even though she was on the other side, ran up and smacked my butt hard. “Lucky shot.”