Chapter 2
To: Michelle Amato
From: Fabian Charles
Subject: Marketing campaign inquiry
Ms. Amato,
I’m contacting you in regard to the Victory Fitness campaign you spearheaded with Rosen and Anders a few years ago. My name is Fabian Charles, and I am writing on behalf of myself and Gabriel Aguilar in our capacity as co-owners of Agility Gym in Los Angeles to see if you are available to consult on the campaign for our upcoming expansion to New York City. I’m attaching a document with further information. Please contact me at your earliest convenience.
Fabian Charles
Co-owner of Agility Gym, Los Angeles
he/him/his
To: Michelle Amato
From: Gabriel Aguilar
Subject: Fwd: Marketing campaign inquiry
Hi Mich. It’s Gabe.
It’s been a long time.
I didn’t know Fabian had reached out to you, and we’ll understand if you pass on this.
I’ve missed you.
—G
Gabriel Aguilar
Co-owner of Agility Gym, Los Angeles
Pronouns: he/him
Michelle Amato struggled for breath as she reread the emails that had landed in her inbox only moments before.
No. No no no no. How could he do this? Crash into her life again like the goddamn Kool-Aid Man, like he hadn’t completely wrecked her when he’d left? Fuck him.
And with this? With a job offer? The motherfucker wanted to hire her?
“Everything okay?” Ava asked from over by the stove.
Michelle glanced up from the phone and tried to control her facial expression. She was babysitting her sister Monica’s three children for the day, and her cousin Ava Rodriguez had come over to help. It was summer break, so Ava, a middle school teacher, was off, and Michelle, as a freelancer, made her own schedule. Ava was cooking a big pot of arroz con gandules for lunch, and Michelle was supposed to be slicing plantains to be made into tostones.
Thank god Ava was there, because after these emails, Michelle needed a minute alone. The kids—eleven-year-old Phoebe, nine-year-old Danica, and six-year-old Henry—were busy in the living room with screens of various sizes, but they’d each been in and out of the kitchen three times in the last hour.
“Work email,” Michelle said, holding up the phone. Technically, that wasn’t a lie. “I’ll be right back.”
Michelle opened the basement door and jogged down the steps, intending to sit at the desk her father had put down there. They were in her parents’ house in the Bronx, the house Michelle had grown up in. Mom and Dad were currently in Florida at their beach house, and Michelle was staying here while her one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan underwent a bathroom renovation.
If she’d been thinking clearly, the basement was the last place she would have gone to process an email from Gabe, of all people. She stopped short halfway to the desk, glancing down at the carpet under her chancletas.
Back to the scene of the crime, she thought. Or at least, the moment when everything had changed between them.
It had been a hot summer day, barely a week after high school graduation, and this basement had been Michelle’s bedroom then. Gabe had come over to smoke up while her parents were at work. They’d huddled together in the backyard, just on the other side of the sliding glass doors, and gotten super fucking high. Afterward, they’d retreated inside to watch some nineties action movie on TV, giggling and making the kind of commentary only very high teenagers do. Michelle had been sprawled out on the floor right here, propped up by colorful throw pillows, and Gabe had been sitting on the edge of her bed.
She still didn’t know what had possessed her to ask the question. Maybe something on the TV had sparked the memory. Or maybe it had been on her mind ever since Lizzie DeStefano, Ava’s school friend, had put it there a few days earlier. Either way, Michelle had been feeling giddy, from marijuana and the prospect of the whole summer stretched out before them, when she’d turned to Gabe . . .
And asked if he had a big dick.
It made her cringe with embarrassment to think about it now. What a totally inappropriate thing to ask one’s best friend! But at the time, she’d felt like a little flirting between friends was okay, especially friends whose eyes sometimes lingered on each other’s body longer than they should. It didn’t have to mean anything, right?
Hey Gabe, I got a question for ya.
Yeah?
You got a big dick?
Do I—what?
Lizzie DeStefano, Ava’s friend from St. Catherine’s, said she thinks you’ve got a big dick.
I barely know Lizzie!
Well, do you?
. . . Do I what?
Do you have a big dick?
Gabe had evaded the question, but Michelle hadn’t missed the way his gaze had been glued to her boobs. He’d been so adorable, and playful banter was part of their dynamic, so she—and this was totally on her—had gone and sat next to him on the bed . . .
And asked if he was hard.
You do, don’t you? Oh my god. Are you hard right now?
Looking back, Michelle wanted to shake herself. At the time, she’d thought she was being so edgy and cool. Talking about penises, without a care in the world! Like a real grown-up! But before she could laugh it off or apologize, Gabe had answered her in a voice gone low and deep.
Yeah.
Yeah, he was hard. For her? The thought had given her a thrill.
Michelle could never remember who moved first, but in the next second, they were kissing, and it was the most amazing and stunning thing she’d ever experienced. She’d kissed a couple of other boys before, but this was Gabe—her Gabe—and his mouth was like heaven. Soft lips and frantic kisses that tasted like the wintermint gum they always chewed post-joint.
As Gabe’s hands roamed her body, Michelle had straddled his lap and reached into his sweatpants to find out firsthand just how hard he was.
And it turned out Lizzie DeStefano was right. He was big.
From there they’d been caught in a cyclone of teenage lust. Michelle’s shirt and bra were lost to the whirlwind, and then Gabe’s mouth was on her, driving her wild with need. And just as she’d started to rearrange everything in her mind—like moving Gabe from the category of best friend to potential first lover—she’d spotted the piece of paper sticking out of his sweatpants pocket.
Michelle often wondered what would’ve happened if she hadn’t seen the paper at that exact moment. If she’d been too far gone to be curious, or if she just hadn’t noticed it. Would they have had sex?
Would he have stayed?
She’d never know. Because she had found the paper then, and it had been a one-way plane ticket to Los Angeles for the following week.
All the excitement at discovering this new aspect to their relationship had drained away as the truth he’d come over to tell her spilled out. Gabe wasn’t staying in New York for college, as she’d thought. Instead, he’d gotten a scholarship to UCLA, and he was leaving soon.
To make matters worse, he’d lied to her about it. For months. He’d told her he was going to Hunter College in Manhattan. That he would be here, right next door, when she drove down from SUNY Binghamton on holidays and the occasional weekend.
They were supposed to spend the whole summer together. They’d had plans, damn it.
Anger had won out over tears. Michelle said some things she wasn’t proud of.