Page 10

Chapter 9

Guy

I waited in the dark auditorium with Mikey, one of my best friends from the hockey team.

“So how do you know this chick?”

“We grew up together for a while. She goes here now. She’s really smart and funny,” I told him.

“Wait, is this the one who puked all over our place and Samantha had to change her clothes for her?”

I sighed. He was about to be a dick. “Yep. Same one.”

“Ugh. Why are we here?”

“Shut up. You puked in someone’s bed while you were hooking up with them,” I pointed out. Mikey was notorious for that one.

“Touché, mon frére.”

A Drake song kicked on and the improv group ran down the aisles of the auditorium to cheers from the crowd.

A busty blonde with a big dimple stepped forward, folding her hands behind her like she was an SNL guest host. “Welcome, welcome everyone to the Chainsaw Chatterbugs. To start our show, we just need a one-word suggestion from the audience.”

“Damn,” Mikey whispered, admiring the blonde.

Shouts came from the audience and she nodded. “I heard ‘pebble.’ Thank you, and enjoy the show.”

I didn’t tell Kitty that I’d be coming to her improv show. I’d seen a picture of her in the school paper that proved she was indeed part of this particular troupe. Pretty quickly, I recognized that they were doing long-form improv, something I was familiar with thanks to spending hours comedy nerding with Kitty and Frank. With three monologues and three sets of three scenes, they built a play from nothing. It was fascinating how quickly the actors molded to each other.

I hadn’t seen Kitty act since high school, and she’d really improved. Not that she was bad to begin with, but she was so fluid in both her words and her physical comedy. She wasn’t afraid to be raunchy, but she didn’t rely on basic humor either. She was balanced, giving and taking from her team members. Even when her teammates made really wild choices, she supported it.

I’d always thought she was beautiful, but seeing her talents on display was just plain hot. It felt like the epiphany I had in the storage room at the ice rink when I kissed her. I was still crazy about her, not as a friend. There’s nothing like seeing someone in their element, doing what they do best. I felt self-satisfied knowing I’d had the hottest girl on the stage in my bed, telling me she loved me. Begging me to make love to her. And God, I wanted to, but she was drunk and I didn’t want to screw up years of friendship with one night of bad decision making.

“Your girl the brunette?” Mikey whispered. I nodded, not wanting to take my eyes off the stage to explain that she’s not my girl. “Nice.”

After the show, Mikey and I waited as Kitty got off the stage.

“Guy-Guy! Thanks for coming!” Kitty said, surprised and reaching up for a hug. “How did you know I’d be here?”

I loved the feeling of her body under my hands, and how I could cross my arms behind her back to hold her extra tight. I gave her a little peck on the cheek.

“Lucky guess. Told you you wouldn’t be able to get rid of me,” I said with a wink. Mikey cleared his throat. “Oh, this is Mikey. Mikey, this is one of my oldest friends, Kitty. Mikey’s on the hockey team with me.”

“Pleasure,” Kitty said, her West Virginia accent peeking out.

“You were so, so good, Kitty,” I gushed. “I haven’t seen you act in so long. You’re amazing.”

“Yeah, you were funny as hell,” Mikey added.

Kitty’s cheeks pinked. “Aw, thanks, guys.” I wanted to kiss her hot cheeks.

“I think Mikey and I were going to stop by a little get-together if you want to come,” I offered.

“I actually have some math to do. It’s due in the morning and I waited till the last minute,” she said with a grimace. “Thought I’d get the core classes out of the way first so I can do all the fun writing stuff later.”

“I could help you,” I said.

“Bro!” Mikey objected, offended I was bailing on him.

Kitty smiled, good-natured. “It’s alright. I managed the last three years without you. Y’all go on.”

I fidgeted with my backward baseball cap. “Alright, well, since I came to your show, do you want tickets to our game Friday? It’s the home opener.”

Her eyes brightened. “Yeah, I’d love that.”

“Bring your friend,” Mikey said, gesturing to her blonde teammate.

Kitty laughed. “We’ll see. I don’t know that she’s the bloodsport type.”

“She could be,” Mikey said.

“Okay, we’re going,” I said, ushering Mikey away. “You were lovely, Birdy.”

We sat around at the main hockey house, drinking beers for a mid-week shoot-the-shit session. I’d had maybe two sips of beer when my phone buzzed.

KITTY BIRD

Help me solve an equation

Sure!

If Guy leaves the party at 10:04 p.m., and Kitty leaves

her dorm at 10:07, who will arrive first to that coffee and

waffle shop on Mass Ave?

Really? I can leave now

I don’t deserve you

See you soon

When I got to the decided-upon coffee shop, Kitty had changed into sweats with her hair up in one of her signature ponytails. She already had her book open and was chewing on the end of her pencil.

“Hey,” I greeted her, walking up to the booth.

“Hey,” she said, not really looking up. “When the server comes, get yourself whatever you want. I already gave her my card since they’re closing soon. I didn’t realize that.”

I got a hot herbal tea with a waffle when the server came over. Kitty was still in the zone. I grabbed her hand to get her attention.

“What do you want on top, ma puce ?”

Kitty seemed surprised to see the server, then forced a smile at me. “You pick. I trust you.”

I asked for strawberries and whipped cream. Strawberries made me think of her lip balm.

“Thanks,” she mumbled. Her eyes screwed up in a pained, frustrated expression.

“Math still gets you worked up, huh?” I said, moving to slide next to her in the booth.

“I can’t wait until I’m totally done with it,” she sighed. “Just this semester and next and then I’m free.”

“Good thing I’ll be here to help you both semesters,” I said, elbowing her side.

“Why don’t you just do it for me?” she whined.

“Because then you wouldn’t learn, Kitty Bird.”

“I don’t want to learn. I want to write comedy. This is a means to an end.”

“Alright, let’s break it down.”

We fell into our familiar rhythm of how we work together. Kitty was prone to skipping steps and jumping to the end, so I had to help her slow down. She berated me the whole time like she always has. In a cute, friendly way. It felt nice to have a moment of normalcy with her. The last time we spent extended time together, Maman was dying. And over the weekend she’d been . . . unwell. We couldn’t finish her homework before the waffle shop closed.

“Finish at my place? It’s on your way back,” I said. “Then I can walk you home.”

“I can probably finish on my own. It’s out of your way. I’ll be okay.”

I picked up her backpack for her. “It really wasn’t a question, Kitty. Let’s go finish at my house.”

“Fine.” She shoved the last piece of waffle in her mouth vengefully.

“I was saving that for you anyway,” I pointed out.

As we walked, she caught me up on some of the high school gossip from people I’d remember. It was so nice to hear her voice again and be close to her. I had forgotten how her eyes lit up when she told stories, or how she watched me when I talked. Being back with Kitty was comfortable in a way I hadn’t expected. Time had passed between us and there were things we didn’t know about each other, but it still felt easy. I was grateful for that kind of friendship.

When we got in, I was still somehow starving. Practice had been a tough one earlier that day, and I still didn’t feel caught up on calories. I dug through the pantry and fridge.

“Nothing looks good,” I complained as I munched on a cheese stick.

“Hang on. Move,” Kitty said, pushing me out of the way. She stacked ingredients on the counter. “Where’s your candy?”

“What candy?”

“You’re telling me you don’t have candy or chocolate stashed anywhere around here?”

Sheepishly, I pointed to a drawer. Kitty opened it and gasped.

“You hockey boys eat this much junk? I’m telling your coach!” She fished around in the drawer. “Aha!”

She unearthed a bag of M&Ms and started mixing things up, turning on the oven.

“What are you making?”

“You’ll see,” she said, turning on the oven. We chatted while she mixed up what appeared to be M&M cookies. Colton and Mikey dropped into the kitchen, back from the hockey house party.

“Smells good,” Mikey said. “What the fuck, are those my M&Ms?”

“I’ll get you new ones,” I said.

“And I’ll share the cookies,” Kitty crooned.

“I can’t believe you let the freshman eat my M&Ms,” Mikey grumbled.

“The freshman again, huh, Frenchie? I see our guest of honor is feeling better,” Colton said, looking amused. I glared at him.

Kitty took it in stride. “I guess we must have met the other night when I was under the weather,” she said gracefully. “I’m Kitty.”

“Oh, I know,” Colton said. “I’m wondering if you two have made love yet.”

Kitty looked at me, mortified. “You told him?”

“No, Birdy. You told anyone who would listen that I was the love of your life and we were going to make love,” I reminded her.

“Christ,” she muttered, rubbing her eyebrows. “Not my finest night. Will delicious cookies make you forget that?”

“Nope. We were going to eat the cookies anyway,” Mikey teased. “Hang on, let me put on some mood music.”

He pulled out his phone and played “I’ll Make Love To You” by Boyz II Men. Colton and Mikey started slow dancing. Kitty cackled, her face going red.

“Hey, Guy, if you don’t want to make love to her, I could step in,” Mikey said with a wink to Kitty.

“No. No. No one is making love to Kitty,” I said firmly, shielding her from their view. Kitty saw how uncomfortable I was and piled on.

“I don’t know. We could have fun, couldn’t we, Mikey?” she suggested, peering around me. I shut it right down.

“Take your cookies and get out. Kitty’s got homework to finish,” I said, shoving a laughing Colton and Mikey out of the kitchen.

“Night, Kitty,” Mikey sang with a flirty wave. I could have killed him.

Over cookies and milk, Kitty and I finished her last few math problems. Then we talked and did dishes. And couldn’t stop talking. And then it was 1 a.m.

“What time is your first class tomorrow?” I asked.

“Not until 10. What about you?”

“Same. And I don’t have practice until the afternoon. Wanna just stay over? I’m tired,” I offered with a yawn.

“No, I can walk home,” she said, packing up her backpack.

I put my hand on her backpack. “No, you can stay here. Spinninanight.” I said it with a little smirk. I knew she’d cave to that. That’s what she and Frank always called it in their West Virginia accents. It was years before I realized it was supposed to be “spending the night.”

“I don’t have a toothbrush or jammies,” she protested, cracking a little at my joke.

“Colton’s mom shops at Costco. We’ve got toothbrushes out our ears. And I’ll give you some sweats again. Come on. Slumber party. It’ll be fun.”

Kitty laughed. “Fine, but I want your rattiest t-shirt and grossest shorts. I like soft things.”

“Deal.”

Kitty dressed in my worn-out clothes and waiting for me in my bed did nothing for my “are we still just friends” question. I was playing with fire. Kitty probably didn’t remember, but the way she looked at me while we were together over the weekend was unmistakable. Something stirred deep inside me when she looked into my eyes and whispered, “You’re the love of my life. We’re meant to be together. Make love to me, Guy.”

It wasn’t like I wasn’t attracted to Kitty or hadn’t ever thought about what it would be like to fuck her. I totally had. For years. But even with our occasional kissing when we were in high school, it felt like we were in “just friends” territory in college. But I wasn’t sure I wanted it to stay that way.

It was confusing. We’d even said I love you in our hungover haze, but as friends. Right?

And there I was, crawling in bed with her again. I loved torturing myself.

I got in the bed, facing her like we did.

“Hey.”

“Hey. You still have chocolate breath,” she said, booping my nose.

“I brushed my teeth! You’re smelling your own chocolate breath,” I objected.

“I’m a good brusher. You’re a boy. You’re probably not as thorough,” she said, all smug.

“Yeah, okay,” I said, reaching out to tickle her. She squealed and slapped my hand, squirming away from me. I grabbed her by the waist and pulled her back closer. Her eyes searched mine as her smile softened. Fuck, I wanted to kiss her. My heart took off and my stomach fluttered. But I got too nervous. I started blabbing instead.

“Hey, you know those skeletons they found in Pompeii? The ones that were curled into each other?” I asked.

“You mean how we snuggle?” Kitty laughed.

“Yes, that’s what I always think of! We’re just like those skeletons tucked into each other,” I said, smiling at her.

“Wouldn’t be a bad way to go,” she said. “All at once. Just covered in ash. I mean, it was actually probably scary. I don’t know. I wasn’t there.”

“But with someone you love,” I added, folding our hands between us. “Wouldn’t be so bad at all.”

Kitty’s expression turned more serious, not meeting my eyes. I wondered if she was thinking about us being something more, fulfilling our promise to Maman and growing old together. I wanted to see if her lips were as soft as I remembered. But her eyes started to drift shut, so I reached over to my desk and turned off the light.

“Goodnight, my fellow skeleton,” I said, kissing her forehead.

“Goodnight, Guy-Guy.”

* * *

In the morning, Kitty was up before me. She was the unfortunate soul to go in the bathroom after Mikey, which was bad on a non-drinking day and heinous after a night of drinking. When I realized what was happening, I tried to stop her. It was too late. I ran into Mikey in the kitchen.

“So, your girl stayed over. You never do that,” Mikey said with a quirked eyebrow.

“She’s not my girl. Nothing happened.”

“She’s not your girl, but you went to her improv show, left a party to help her with her homework, and let her stay over.”

“It’s not like that. We’re old friends,” I said, but again not really sure if that’s what I wanted going forward. Mikey was right. I didn’t let girls stay over. I usually went to their place and left as soon as it was socially acceptable. I didn’t want anyone getting the wrong idea.

I wasn’t boyfriend material. I hit and quit. I made it well-known. I always treated my partners right and made sure they had a good time, but I’d be gone just as soon as it was decent to go.

Kitty, on the other hand, had stayed over twice in less than a week. And the thing was, I wanted her to stay over more. I liked having her around, having our old rhythm back. Everything was so easy with Kitty. She didn’t expect me to be a stud for her, nor did she treat my French-ness like a novelty or fetish. She knew the real me, and she loved me for it. She’d seen my lowest moments and loved me through them. I’d also had some of the hardest laughs in my life with her.

“Jesus Christ, Michael,” Kitty said when she came out of the bathroom, her shirt over her nose. “You might want to get that checked out.”

“My name’s not Michael. It’s Ben Miknevicius,” Mikey objected. “And my doctor says I’m in perfect health, thank you very much.”

“You hockey boys and your fucking nicknames,” she laughed, heading back to my bedroom.

I watched after her, struggling to wipe the smile from my face.