Page 31 of Drawn Together

“He had a clear diagnosis two weeks later.” He clicks his tongue, twists his mouth, and bites down on the corner of his bottom lip. Through it all, my grip stays tight. “He would’ve gone earlier had I not—”

“No.” My voice is strong, a strict contradiction to the tears forming in my eyes. “No, I will not allow that.”

“Flora, you can disagree, but it’s so glaringly true.”

“Stop, Fletcher,” I say, matching his tone. “I don’t care what you think about it, nothing in that horrible situation is your fault, and I refuse to sit here and let you toss the blame on my closest friend.”

“Every moment mattered, and he wasted time because of me. Because of my big mouth and the words that so easily slipped out.” When he looks back up to me, the pure devastation in his eyes makes me feel like I’ve been punched in the gut.

“I know now what words can do. My whole career I’ve used words so carelessly in everything I have written and put out for the world to read as their own interpretation.

But, I never realized just how powerful the tongue is until Ryan was gone.

How every letter and every word and every sentence is shaping up someone else's life.”

How…silly. How silly of me to think all this time that Fletcher was just quieter with others because he simply didn’t want to talk to them.

That he didn’t want to talk to me. I imagine Fletcher at night, pacing his living room, hair all astray as he pulls and stretches to find a solution that no one could have come up with.

To regret the words he put out in the world, and wishing he could shove them right back down. My stomach lurches.

“Fletcher,” I whisper. “You couldn’t have done anything.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. I won’t get to find out.” He looks out to the city skyline, wind whipping around us. “But, I know I will never say something I don’t mean again. I won’t ever slip out a word without knowing it’s exactly what I want to and should say.”

Moments pass like sand in an hourglass, each granule a different space of silence where we allow his promise to the world to linger in the distance. I don’t have the capacity to push comfort. For someone who has all the words, I fall surprisingly silent.

“That’s an awfully pathetic career if it comes down to the fate of a baked good.”

“Hm?” Fletcher squints back at me, the devastation in his eyes long gone, just scars left behind in those dark honey pupils.

“That’s what you said when we first met. I told you that everything in my job was relying on that muffin and you said—”

“Oh.” His brows furrow. “I’m sorry about that, by the way. It was a rough morning, and that muffin was the only reason I came there, and I really just said that without thinking much—”

“That’s my point, Fletcher. I’ve always thought that you just blurt out everything you’re thinking.

I always liked that you had that tenacity, but now that I think about it, you don’t do that with everyone.

You take such long pauses between answering your friends.

Stephan asked you if you liked his curry the other day, and you thought about it for so long before you answered that I wondered if you even heard him.

Maybe you do overthink every word with everyone else, but you’ve never done that with me. ”

Fletcher’s mouth falls open, then shuts abruptly. His jaw shifts. Fingers curl tighter. Shoulders slump more.

“I…didn’t realize I was doing that.”

I squeeze his fingers again. “You don’t have to overthink every word with me, okay? If you pick one person that gets to have you unfiltered, then let it be me.”

He doesn’t look my way when he nods. “Okay.”

Fletcher Harding apparently also likes to make you cry on first dates. Or maybe, that’s just me that gets that treatment as well. It turns out that he sets unreal expectations on first dates, too.

Once the water taxi has done a full loop, we are back by the Brooklyn Bridge where Fletcher takes us in a mostly silent uber—save the German Christian metal core that our driver has blasting full volume—to…

wherever this is. I thought after our last conversation that maybe Fletcher just felt uncomfortable putting so much out there with me; I thought maybe he needed space.

So, when he let go of my hand to pick up his phone, I didn’t say a word.

I let him go about whatever he was doing through the ride here, and when we slipped out of the Uber and I asked if everything was okay, he said, and I quote, ‘never better.’

Which, judging by our recent talk, I took that as the highest of decrees.

And now, I believe it. Because here we stand in front of a stone building covered in different variations of chrysanthemums and dahlias with a massive green and white striped awning leading out to the water, the city across the river.

The golden string lights’ reflections bounce around the water as boats pass by at their leisure.

It is—and I say this within the deepest pits of my easily pleased heart—the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

“What—”

“I had to do it last minute. I wasn’t exactly planning on it, but you mentioned the water felt like home, and I thought maybe you’d like this.

I had to get a table toward the corner, and I know we ate already, but they have really good desserts and a huge drink menu.

You can try anything you want. I thought you might—”

“Incredible,” I whisper out in the cool October evening air.

When I turn back, Fletcher is beaming. Any previous sign of fret and worry has slipped away, and I’m left with this raw version of the man I tried so hard to rid my mind of.

Turns out the ‘last minute corner table’ has a better view than I could have ever imagined.

Candles flicker on crisp white tablecloths, casting soft shadows on polished silverware, and tall, crystal glasses.

A piano plays somewhere near the bar. Through the wide, arching windows, the East River behind us shines in inky blues and silvers.

It holds the reflection of the Brooklyn Bridge above us, strung with lights like a pretty new necklace.

“I am so underdressed for this.” I tug on my sweater when I recognize everyone else taking in this view is either in full business suits or dresses that cost more than my rent.

“If it makes you feel better, that lady is wearing oversized pants and a vest with a rose in the pocket. If anything, she should feel weird.”

“She works here Fletcher.”

“I stand by the statement.”

I smile. “This has been the oddest turn of events I have ever experienced.”

“Odd good or…?”

“Odd very good. Seriously, I know you weren’t really wanting to do all of this, and you showed up in your funeral suit, and I just am so gratefu—”

“I did want to do this. Let that not go unsaid. I really wanted to do this.”

“You did?”

“You’re my best friend, Flora. Of course I wanted to.”

It’s a double-edged sword, that sentence.

On one hand, I am so horribly embarrassed that while I’ve been over here daydreaming about kissing him and holding his hand and dancing in the moonlight by the water, he’s been thinking what a great friend I am.

On the other hand, I’m his best friend. And what a privilege it is to be called Fletcher Harding’s anything.

Best friend. What an unworthy title for a woman who has no clue who she even is, for someone who had to research what her favorite color was before a date. For someone who’s loud and too much and always over the top and—

“What’s that?”

“Hm?”

“That look right there.” He points his chocolate covered fork at me with a frown. “I don’t like that one.”

“I didn’t think I was making a face.”

“Did I say something?” His brows drop. “I wasn’t trying to upset you.”

“No, you didn’t say anything.”

He didn’t. He didn’t say anything wrong—he never has.

Even his sly little romance comments were the most genuine parts of Fletcher.

He said he didn’t get them, not that he didn’t respect them.

In the same way he said I was his best friend, not ‘you are never going to be more than my best friend.’ So, why do I feel like I’m choking back tears, then?

It has nothing to do with Fletcher and everything to do with me.

It has to do with Austin’s words in my head of ‘too much’ and ‘over the top’ and ‘extremely enthusiastic,’ on top of learning tonight that I might be exactly all three of those things. That I have physical proof right here that maybe I can get someone in my life, but can I keep them there?

The short answer is no.

And I think I can grow to accept that one day. I can accept it with just about anyone but Fletcher. I’ve had a handsome, kind, big-hearted man tell me I was his best friend before and lost him in the same way you lose your favorite hoodie.

One day it’s your everything, the one thing that brings you the most comfort in the world, and the next, it’s tossed in a hamper and lost for years. Maybe a distant thought here and there when you’re cold, but ultimately never thought of again.

“What’s wrong?” Fletcher whispers low, just above the steady piano behind us.

“I’m the old hoodie,” I sob.

“Hey, hey, hey.” Fletcher furrows his brows and tucks his hand under my chair, pulling it to his side so our legs are pushed together. “Look, if this is about the bartender…that guy is a jerk, alright? It’s a good thing in the long run; you don’t want to go out with someone like that.”

I nod and try so hard to reign in the tears pooling over. Boy, how many times am I going to cry tonight?

“I just don’t get it. What did I do wrong?”

Fletcher's sympathy is so palpable it drives straight into my chest and pushes out the tears even more. “What’s the last thing you two spoke about?”

I open my phone and slide up on the conversation that felt like it was going so well in the moment but, looking back I probably should have known better.

“Here.” I slide the device across the table. “You can read it.”