Page 14 of Square Waves (Big Fan #2)

XIII

I’m grabbing my stuff to go home that evening when Willa comes bursting into the front room, fist-pumping. “Cassidy!” she shouts. “Cass! It’s official! Richard Kerrigan just placed an order! And it’s huge!”

“Oh my god!!! Congratulations!”

She sweeps me up in a hug, and we bounce across the room. I can almost feel the tension draining out of her body.

“C’mon,” she says. “We’re getting out of here. Bryce is putting together a picnic. We’re going to meet at Indian Rock to celebrate.”

“Damn, that’s a throwback.” In high school, Willa’s parents lived a few blocks away from Indian Rock Park, and we spent a lot of time there: sitting in the grass, watching cute older guys learning basic climbing skills on the boulders, and furtively smoking cheap, shitty weed.

“I want to watch the sunset.”

“You certainly deserve it.” Leon. He’s holding a jean jacket over his forearm, and his messenger bag is slung across his chest, highlighting the lean muscle there. Of course he’s coming with us. And... I guess I might want him to.

Ever since he helped me with the lock after Willa’s birthday party, something has been shifting between us.

It’s more subtle than seismic, but still, I can feel it: the ground slowly rearranging itself under my feet.

Now my chest feels too light, like I’ve sucked in helium and accidentally turned into a balloon.

The three of us pile into my car and head into the hills. I haven’t been to this neighborhood since I’ve been home, and every turn through the winding residential streets is a memory. In fact, this is the first place I drove myself after I got my license: straight to Willa’s to pick her up.

In the past, when I imagined being back in Berkeley, I thought this kind of nostalgia would be suffocating. But weirdly, it’s kind of comforting. It makes time feel expansive, wide open, and layered, instead of narrowly focused on the present and the immediate future.

Despite the summer-evening crowd at the park, we manage to set up where we have a view of the water, San Francisco and the Bay Bridge bright in front of us.

Bryce shows up a few minutes later with a spread from the Cheese Board.

We pour wine into paper cups, a little secretively, and I really do feel like a teenager again.

Except that this time, Leon is on our blanket instead of sitting with some other group, his back to me in a way that couldn’t have been—but always felt—deliberate.

“To Willa”—Leon raises his cup—“who’s about to be an even bigger success. And who actually deserves it.”

“To Willa!” Bryce and I echo. She blushes but doesn’t object.

Bryce and Leon have apparently become just as good of friends as Willa and Leon have; they immediately start chattering about a sculpture show that Bryce read about. I lean against Willa’s shoulder. “This is only the start for you,” I say.

“Yeah.” She doesn’t sound half as excited as she did back at the store.

“‘Yeah’ what?”

“It just... doesn’t feel like I thought it would.”

“The opening will help, I bet. I mean, this is a truly crazy time to be trying to feel anything. You’re too in it. Working too much.”

She nods. “Sure. But it’s also—”

Bryce leans over to interrupt. “Leon and I are gonna go climb for a minute,” he says. “Want to join us?”

Willa and I shake our heads simultaneously. You can’t grow up in the East Bay without doing at least a little climbing, but neither of us has ever taken to it.

The boys head off. I turn back to Willa. “But also what?”

“Oh, it’s nothing.”

“Doubtful.”

Willa closes her eyes. “I’m just. So. Tired.

And everyone keeps congratulating me and telling me how amazing this is.

And it is! But it’s also scary and overwhelming.

” She smears a palm across her face. “Everyone expects me to be excited and happy, and right now I just... can’t.

I’m sorry if that sounds ungrateful. But it’s the truth. ”

I nudge her shoulder with my chin. “It doesn’t sound ungrateful. It sounds honest.”

Willa opens her eyes. She smiles at me. “It’s really good to spend real time with you, Cassidy.

” Then she rearranges herself, recrossing her long legs, and I can tell she’s not done.

“As long as I’m being honest, I have to tell you, at some point last year, I started wondering if we were really friends anymore. ”

My heart sinks, and my jaw clenches. But her read—it’s not wrong. What does it mean to be friends with someone who you never actually see, whose voice you rarely make the effort to hear?

“I mean, I will always love you, obviously. But our relationship had been mostly sporadic text messages for so long that I was starting to feel like maybe you were just going to fade away from me.”

She holds my gaze. A signal that she knows this conversation is hard, but we’re going to have it anyway.

“And then you said you were coming home... during the busiest three weeks of my life. I was like, okay, maybe it’s a sign to let this go.

But when you volunteered to help—when you showed up every day and busted your ass for me—it reminded me of why I love you.

And why I wanted your friendship then, and why I want it now.

So. Thank you for being this kind of friend to me again. ”

I press a hand to my heart; Willa does the same. “It’s been different than I imagined, being back here,” I admit. “Better. Like... a lot better.”

Willa and I grin stupidly at each other for a minute.

Then she takes another sip of wine. “You go back to DC right after the opening?”

“A week from tomorrow.”

“You must be looking forward to being there again.”

“Yeah,” I say automatically. And I do miss certain things.

My apartment, with all of my books and clothes, and my shower with the good water pressure.

Walking through the park on my way home from work—it’s crazy, but part of me misses the wet, dense heat of DC in late summer.

The way it makes me feel every inch of my body.

But I’m also realizing how rarely I see any of my friends there. I’ve done more socializing on this trip than in the last six months at home. In an effort to preserve energy, I had just kind of... closed in on myself. And it feels good to be opening up again.

I’m distracted from my thoughts by a shout: Leon, yelping with glee as he makes the leap from one boulder to another. His shirt rides up as he finds his footing. I realize I’m holding my breath.

Willa is giving me a look that I can feel . “You guys really are getting along lately,” she says with studied nonchalance. “You and Leon.”

“I’m as surprised as anyone, but. Yeah.”

Her tone softens slightly. “It’s nice.”

“I’m sorry it took so long.”

Willa laughs at that. “Listen, babe, me too. But also, I guess I kind of always thought—you know. You guys hated each other, but you were also clearly obsessed with each other.”

Something happens on my face, and I try to hide it, but I’m not fast enough.

“Hah!” Willa cries.

“ Hah what?”

“Please. You’re blushing!”

Her accusation only makes it worse. I can feel how hot my cheeks are. “I’m not.”

“Cassidy Weaver. Are you really going to keep lying to me about this? How many times do I have to say ‘since we’re being honest’ or whatever until you spill?”

I really thought I was doing a good job keeping my feelings to myself. I bury my face in my hands. My heart zings in my chest. “Okay, listen. We ran into each other the night I got here.”

“I knew it! I knew something was going on. Did you make out? What happened?”

“We slept together.” My words come out muffled by my palms.

“ Cassidy !!!” Willa is being way too loud. I emerge from my cocoon of shame to clap a hand over her mouth. She gives me big, sad eyes, so I remove it... slowly. She has the grace to look around guiltily before continuing in a quieter voice, “Was it good?”

“Unfortunately... it was so good.”

Talking about it conjures that night in vivid, aching detail.

Leon pressing me up against the wall outside of the bar, kissing me, lighting my bones on fire.

His fingers moving inside of me, how he coaxed me to the brink of an orgasm once and then again.

How satisfied I felt when he was fucking me, like I was finally exactly where I needed to be.

“And then? Have you done it since? Is that why you’re suddenly—”

I shake my head rapidly. “No, no, no, no.I mean, it was supposed to be a one-night stand, and then...”

“Guess I really screwed that up for you. God, no wonder it’s been so weird in there. Sometimes I thought about plugging you two into the electrical sockets. The tension could power a small city , Cass.”

“I was trying so hard not to make it weird!”

“Well, you failed.” Willa reaches over for the bottle and pours each of us another drink.

She’s been sitting cross-legged; now she pulls her knees into her chest. It’s a habit I recognize from high school, and there’s a pang of familiarity in my chest. “Now you really, really have to be honest. You’re totally in love with him, aren’t you. ”

“Oh my god, no!”

Willa looks skeptical, but I shake my head defiantly. I’m not in love with Leon Park. But... as we warm up to each other, it’s gotten harder and harder to remember why we shouldn’t sleep together again. And again.

And again.

“Well, listen. Obviously I don’t know anything about anything. But as you know, I’ve always liked Leon. And he hasn’t said anything. But I think he likes you.”

I roll my eyes.

Willa gives me a look, like, You are not playing it as cool as you think .

I look over at the boulders. Leon is standing on top of one, reaching his arms up to the sky. His body is like a knife: sharp, useful. He stretches one leg out toward another rock, testing the distance. Seeing if he can make the leap.

The last time I chose someone romantically, I got it so utterly, catastrophically wrong.

I know it’s stupid that I’m struggling to open up even to Willa, but this is territory—emotional and conversational—I’ve worked hard to avoid.

I blink hard. I put the disaster zone of my love life out of my mind and conjure all my self-possession.

“Well. I think I might like him a little bit too.”

Willa rolls her eyes. “Cassidy,” she says, “I have been waiting to hear you admit that for fucking years .”