Page 52

Jude

Jude had never seen so much food in her life, let alone in her apartment.

Earlier that day, she’d gone back to The Next Chapter to clean out all her remaining stuff, so the bookstore crew was throwing her an official goodbye party. They’d decided to make it West Village–themed, so they’d gone out and collected as many neighborhood delicacies as they could possibly find.

Jude stood up and took one of her mom’s records out of the crate by the wall.

She almost never played the Beatles records.

It usually hurt too much. But today, she picked up Sgt.

Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and dropped the needle in a bit so “With a Little Help from My Friends” started to play.

She switched off the playlist and Rhys stood up, taking Jude’s hands and twirling her around the room.

As the song faded into “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” they swayed together, arms around each other.

“I love you,” Rhys said, and Jude turned their sway into a squeeze.

“I love you too, buddy,” she said. “Always.”

“Hey, what’s this?” L.J. called as they came back from the bathroom.

Jude picked up her slice of pizza. “What’s what?”

“This big wrapped package.”

“Oh, that.” Jude tried to sound casual. “Um, Kat gave it to me.”

“ What? ” Rhys shoved her in the side. “Kat came over? When?”

“Like two weeks ago?”

“And you didn’t tell us?” Talia shrieked.

Jude shook her head. It had hurt too much to think about, let alone talk about.

“ Dude. ” L.J. shook their head at her and collapsed into an armchair. Rhys went over and sat on the ground in front of them. He casually leaned back against L.J.’s knees, and Jude saw L.J. try and fail to suppress a smile.

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“What did she want?”

Jude put down her pizza and slowly wiped her hands. “She wanted to get back together.”

“After admitting that she lied to you about your entire relationship?” Rhys sounded outraged.

“Yeah,” Jude said. “She apologized for everything.”

“What did she say?” L.J. asked, leaning forward.

Talia patted the couch next to her. “Don’t leave out a single detail.”

Resignedly, Jude took her seat. Then she told them everything.

How Kat had taken responsibility for her actions without providing excuses.

How she’d insisted that the feelings between them were real so sincerely that Jude couldn’t help believing her.

How she’d told Jude that she should have fought for her.

As she spoke, she found herself swallowing down tears.

Jude looked around the circle. Her friends all had rapt, dreamy expressions on their faces. “And then she said she was in love with me,” Jude added.

“Wow,” L.J. whispered, then immediately blushed as if they hadn’t meant to say it out loud.

“That’s…a very good apology,” Talia said, delicately.

“Extremely romantic,” Rhys added.

“Like something out of an Eileen Styles book,” Talia chimedin.

“I know,” Jude said, burying her face in her hands. “But she lied to me for so long. How can I trust her after that? I can’t, right?”

There was a very long pause, long enough for Jude to look up and catch her friends glancing around the circle at one another.

“Right,” L.J. said doubtfully.

“Absolutely. We support you in all of your decisions?” Rhys said. It sounded like a question.

Talia sighed dramatically. Jude ignored her.

“Wait, so, what’s the present?” L.J. asked.

Jude shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“You haven’t opened it ?” Talia looked scandalized.

“What if it’s a giant ‘welcome home’ sign because she bought you an apartment?” L.J. said.

“Or a collage of all things French because she got you plane tickets to Paris and wants to meet you on top of the Eiffel Tower?” said Talia.

“I highly doubt both of those things,” Jude said, but her words were drowned out by Talia chanting “Op-en it! Op-en it!” and the others joining in.

“I regret ever becoming friends with any of you!” Jude shouted over them. When she stood up and headed toward the gift, they all burst into cheers.

Lifting the large, flat rectangular package, Jude found it was heavier than she expected, and couldn’t help thinking of Kat struggling up four flights of stairs to bring it to her. She carried it into the living room and set it down on the floor.

Jude swallowed. She still wasn’t sure she wanted to open it.

She didn’t need any more reasons to miss Kat.

But Talia looked ready to rip the package open herself if she didn’t, so Jude reluctantly let her fingers find the piece of tape at the back and start to tear it open.

Her heart was in her throat, even though she kept reminding herself that it didn’t matter what was inside, because she’d already made her decision. Finally, the paper fell to the ground.

It was a painting of her apartment. Her and her mom’s apartment.

Captured during the afternoon, when sunlight streamed through the windows, alternating golden and green as it filtered through the long leaves of the potted plants, illuminating the worn couch and the framed Beatles posters and the crates of records.

It had clearly been painted off a recent photograph (Jude could see the water stain on one wall that had appeared over the most recent winter), but it looked so bright and cozy that it made Jude feel like her mom could at any moment throw open the door and stroll through the frame.

The colors were soft, realistic but gentle, with a swirling style of paint that looked very familiar.

“Is that—” Rhys started to say.

“It is, ” Talia shrieked. “Look at the signature! Fatima Halabi. No way. ”

Jude reached out and touched the painting, trying to convince herself it was real. Had Kat really done this for her?

“There’s a note.” L.J. picked up a white card that had fallen out of the paper and handed it up to Jude.

It was thick cardstock, with a plain border around the edge. In Kat’s scratchy handwriting, it said:

We carry the people and places that we love with us, even when we have to leave them behind. No matter what, I’ll carry you with me. For the rest of my life.

Jude held the card out to Talia, registering with vague surprise that her hand was shaking. Slowly, her friends passed the card around the circle. When they had all read it, they stared at her in silence, their faces solemn.

“Kat’s right,” Jude said sadly. “At least I’ll be able to carry the memory of her, of us, around with me, for the rest of my—”

“Oh my God,” L.J. interrupted. “Jude, you dumbass!”

“Excuse me?” Jude said.

“Kat came to your apartment and begged for you back. She got you a present that shows she knows you perfectly. Not to mention, we all saw the way she looked at you at the fake bar night. And you’re just going to walk away ?

Do you know what I would do to have the person I like do something like this for me?

” They glanced at Rhys. “For once in your life, stop thinking and just go for it, man.”

“They’re right,” Talia said. “This is literally the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard of, and if you don’t try to win her back with some enormous gesture, I will disown you as a friend.”

Jude shook her head, overwhelmed. “But she lied to me. How can I trust her?”

“People make mistakes,” Rhys said. “In fact, didn’t you make a mistake with someone recently? And that person forgave you, didn’t they?”

He raised his eyebrows, and Jude flushed. L.J. and Talia peered between them curiously.

“I guess,” Jude said. “But if it doesn’t work out…I don’t know if I can handle getting hurt again.”

Rhys put his hand on her shoulder. “We don’t get to choose whether we get hurt or not, bud. We only get to choose who hurts us.”

Jude scrubbed her face with her hands, trying to think. Trying to make a quick mental pro/con list, trying to weigh the risks and benefits, trying to—

She cut herself off.

Forget the pro/con list, she told herself. What do you want?

She looked up at Rhys, L.J., and Talia. They were her family. They were her home. And they would have her back if she got hurt again.

“You’re fucking right,” she said. “I want her back.”

They cheered and surged forward, collapsing in a giant group hug.

“Call her!” Rhys yelled, his voice muffled in L.J.’s hair. “Call her right now!”

“No, no!” Talia swatted his arm. “She can’t just call. This painting is an incredible gesture. Jude needs to do something big back.”

“But what?” Rhys said, and they all lapsed into silence, thinking.

“I’m going to check her Instagram,” Talia said.

“I’m googling ‘big romantic gestures,’?” L.J. said. They pulled out their phone and frowned at it. “Is she going to be in an airport anytime soon? Do you know of any cheaply priced string quartets?”

“Oh my God!” Talia shouted. “Wait, wait, wait. Look at this.”

She shoved her phone in Jude’s face, but her hand was moving too much for Jude to read it. “She’s making a new movie, and there’s a press conference coming up.”

“Really? What movie?”

“Something called Rom-Con. ”

Jude felt a burst of pride. Kat had taken the role in the movie she loved, even though it wasn’t attached to a big studio. She really was making a change.

“When is it?” Jude said.

“Um.” Talia peered at her phone. “In fifteen minutes.”

Jude swore. “Where?”

“The Luxembourg Hotel. On Sixty-third and Park,” Talia read off her phone.

“Shit!” Jude said. “That’s more than sixty blocks from here and on the East Side. We’ll never make it in time.”

“Car!” L.J. shouted. “I have my car! So I could pick up the food!”

They looked around at one another. Then they all hustled for the door and down the stairs to L.J.’s beat-up old teal sedan.

“Are you sure taking the subway wouldn’t be faster?” Jude asked as L.J. navigated them through the narrow streets to Sixth Avenue.

“Erm.” L.J. swerved to go around a double-parked Amazon truck and narrowly avoided hitting someone on an e-bike. “No.”