Page 20 of Anywhere with You

“I can’t believe that was only an hour,” I said as we hurried to the car.

“Didn’t you say something about time portals to that guy in Roswell?” Cara asked.

“Uh, time dilation? Wouldn’t make a difference unless that elevator was very, very fast.”

We were skipping continental breakfast in favor of drive-through breakfast burritos. We debated our coffee situation while waiting in line.

“The coffee might be good here,” Cara said with considerable doubt.

“It’s possible that there’s a real coffee shop somewhere ahead.”

“A real coffee shop. With no line.”

“Right,” I agreed. “Because it’s a weekday.”

“It’s worth the risk.”

It wasn’t worth the risk.

Four hours later, we stopped at a convenience store for very large cups of drip coffee and bottled iced coffee for the cooler, just in case the drip was undrinkable, which it absolutely was.

Another hour down the road and happily caffeinated, Cara turned down Billie Eilish and shifted sideways in the passenger seat to face me.

“So, were you a practicing accountant before you opened Strings & Things?”

“For a while,” I said, mentally apologizing to Billie Eilish for the interruption. “Then I taught guitar lessons. Then I did both.”

“And then Bridget was promoted.”

“Yes. Then Bridget was a VP, and all the money I’d been saving to open the shop felt like pennies. She was always…Keep in mind that she is still the most despicable person alive.”

“How could I forget?” Cara asked, but she was smiling slightly.

“Just such an easy person to hate with all your soul. But she was always more concerned about people than money. I will give her that.”

Cara nodded. “I believe that. Lorenzo told me that she used to buy snacks and shampoo and stuff for kids in her dorm that didn’t have much extra money.”

“Right. She grew up solidly middle class, but you’d never know it.

Did you know she paid for my guitar tattoo?

I’d been wanting it for years, and we couldn’t really afford it.

But she used her first Christmas bonus to do that for me, even after I told her that we should save it.

Or spend it on something she wanted. So, yeah.

It wasn’t a big surprise when she told me that we had the money for the storefront, and that we should just do it.

Just rent the place, start fixing it up, filling it up with merchandise.

I thought she was joking at first. I thought we were years out from being able to do that.

But we started spending all our free time getting our business proposal ready, planning our inventory, fighting over the name. ”

“Let me guess,” Cara said. “Strings & Things wasn’t your choice.”

I glanced over. Cara had her bottled caramel coffee in her hands, rotating it slowly. I wondered if she missed her fancy cups and porcelain sugar bowl and creamer pitcher. The coffee she’d poured for me at her house was far better than this.

“No,” I said. “I wanted a shop name that was…”

“Cooler?”

“I guess,” I said. “Though some people have asked if we named it after the TV show Stranger Things .”

“That makes it slightly cooler?”

“Slightly. Bridget said that the names I picked were off-putting, that they would attract one kind of buyer, and that we needed more than that to stay afloat.”

“And did you? Stay afloat?”

“Nope,” I said. “I had to quit my accounting job as soon as we opened. We wouldn’t have survived if Bridget had wanted to do the same. She paid for everything. The house, the bills, the groceries. The store breaks even if I don’t take a paycheck.”

“Oh, Honey. I had no idea.”

I shrugged, twirling my purple hair around my fingers with one hand on the wheel. “We have enough money. We… had . I’m too scared to think about what’s going to happen when all this is official. To the shop, I mean. And to Florence and Doug.”

I didn’t remind her that I meant it literally, that I hadn’t had the guts to open the envelope, as though I could just keep delaying my failure, the end of my dream.

I don’t know when Cara started recording me, but when she showed me later, I agreed to let her post it. I wasn’t above a pity sale or two.

Florence and Doug would be okay. I’d make sure of it. I’d tell them to start looking for new jobs the minute I got home. They deserved to have time to find something they wanted, and if the store held on for a few more months, then I’d take what time I had.

I’d have to start working on my résumé, too, I realized.

It was long out of date. Maybe I wouldn’t have to go back to accounting right away.

Maybe I could find a job at stupid Guitar Center.

Maybe I’d go back to school and…do what?

It wasn’t as though I wanted a career change.

I was doing what I wanted to do. I just wasn’t succeeding.

Cara was still talking, and I answered her absently. I’d done such a good job of setting aside my worries and enjoying this trip. I had a talent for denial. But at some point, I was going to have to form a real plan.

Eventually, Cara gave up on trying to get my attention, and we listened to my playlist, interrupted now and then by Sir David Attenborough telling us to “ keep right. ”