Page 13 of Unreasonably Yours

Toni

I read Cillian's text for approximately the hundredth time in the last fifteen minutes.

Cillian

I know tomorrow is a Monday, but any chance you're free during the day?

When he said next week, I didn't think he meant Monday. An invite for Saturday or even Wednesday would have been enough time to come up with a solid excuse to let him down gently. Tell him I appreciated the gesture, but it was a bad idea. All of it.

But forty-eight hours after seeing him? The memory of his voice and his kiss and his...HIM-ness, still fresh?

Exasperated with the situation, myself, and the clothing pile on my bed that I'd been in a losing battle with for no less than eight days, I fling my phone away from me with a groan. Plopping on the edge of my mattress, I slide to the floor.

It's a short distance since my bed frame still sits unopened in the corner. My whole apartment looks like it belongs to a gay 20-year-old frat boy. Chaotic. Unkept. But hey, there's a pink couch.

My ass hits the floor and, of course, my phone chooses that moment to vibrate from somewhere within the mountain of clothes behind me.

“Excellent,” I say to no one.

I manage to excavate my phone before Belle's video call goes to voicemail.

“Video calls require at least an hour's warning,” I say, returning to my position on the floor.

She scoffs, leaning the phone on her counter as she pulls her long brown hair into a ponytail.

“I've seen you trash can punch drunk. Sunday goblin mode is nothing.” Her East Texas accent makes me oddly homesick for a place I hate, or maybe I just miss her.

She squints at the screen. “Girl, is that the same laundry?—”

“Please. I am suffering. Don't judge me.”

She laughs. “Ok. Ok. Honestly, my recycling pile isn't much better.”

Belle, at least, has a legitimate reason for being a mess. Watching your husband die over two years was a fucking horrible way to kick off your thirties. In comparison I have nothing to bitch about.

“So tell me what happened!” She insists.

“Nothing.” I groan. “Just Hurricane Toni bullshit.”

“Come on, I'm living vicariously through you here.”

She still spent most of her time on the ranch she'd shared with her late husband. Fifteen acres about an hour outside of Austin at the foot of the Hill Country, a place they'd planned on turning into a rehab center for horses and people alike.

Now, there were no horses or people—just Belle.

“You could come visit me.” I hate her being all alone out there .

“I will.” A screen door slams before the familiar chorus of summer cicadas hums in the background. “Now talk.”

I give her the details of what happened Friday. Being stood up, meeting Cillian's friends, the show... And of course, the wager he’d laid at my feet.

“He asked me where I was going next,” I say. Sighing, I trudge to the kitchen for iced coffee. “Which drove home that I don't have any idea. I'm thirty-three. I'm supposed to have an idea. Right? A plan? Something?”

Belle laughs sardonically. “If I've learned a damn thing these last few years, it’s that even if you do have a plan the universe is just as likely to set fire to it as not.” She pauses. “Honestly, if anything, maybe not having a plan is best. Less shit to bog you down when it fails.”

My heart aches for my friend. “If you feel bogged?—”

She makes a buzzer sound. “We aren't talking about me.”

“Fine.” I return to my nest on the couch. “So, yeah. That's where I'm at. Hot-nice-man is too hot and too nice. I'm?—”

“Also hot and nice.”

“The former, sometimes. The latter, debatable. Especially if I willingly bring all my bullshit to this hot-nice-man's nice life.”

“First off, 'hot-nice-man' cannot be his codename.”

“Got better ideas?” I ask.

“Hmm,” she strokes her chin. “Hung-and-handsome? Bearded-and-burly? All I've got is alliteration.” I laugh, nearly choking on my coffee. “Or we can just call him his actual name.”

“Ugh, and treat a man like a person? Fine.” I joke.

Belle shrugs. “I feel like Cillian has earned that, seeing as he's got you all stressed by following through with what he said he'd do.”

“I...” Damn her. “First off, I am not stressed. ”

“Says the woman who just claimed she was suffering. But continue.”

I sigh, flipping the camera to sweep it around the troll cave that is my apartment. “This is the physical manifestation of what is going on in my skull and in my life. No one wants to deal with that. Especially someone who has clearly already sorted their shit out.”

“You don't get to decide what he wants to deal with.”

“Isabelle,” I grumble. “You're supposed to tell me this is a bad idea.”

“It is.”

“Thank you.”

“A bad idea to say no to him,” she adds.

“I hate you.”

She grins. “No, you don't.”

I make an annoyed noise.

“Look, I'm not flying all the way to Boston just so you can blindly take me around. Let him try to sell you on the place if for no other reason than you can be a better tour guide for me.”

“So what you're saying is, this is all about you?”

“Obviously.” Silence hangs for a beat before we both laugh.

Another call notification pops up, this time from my sister-in-law, of all people. “Weird, Dianne is calling me.”

“Find out what she needs. Keep me posted on what happens with Cillian?” She asks.

“I will.”

I don't get a word out before one of my ten-year-old twin nephews' faces fill the screen. “Ant-Ant!” The nickname the boys had called me since they could talk brings a smile to my face, even if Parker's volume makes me worry for the phone's mic.

“Hey! What's up?” The video takes a Blair Witch-esque turn, all muffled sound and shaky camera work, for a solid minute. “Y'all still there?”

“Fine!” Parker says. “We can both be in it.” Parker and Asher, mirror images of my brother at their age, come into focus.

“Does your mom know you have her phone?” They exchange a conspiratorial look. “Thought so.”

“We can use it for important stuff, and this is important,” Asher reasons.

Parker nods in agreement.

I barely hold back a laugh. “Alright then. What important stuff do you need to talk to me about?”

What follows is an impassioned debate—one I take sole responsibility for—about who the best Star Trek captain is. Unsurprisingly, Asher, the more bookish of the boys, argues in favor of Picard while Parker is Team Kirk.

Once I knew I'd be moving to Somerville, I decided to save money and take up my brother's offer to stay with his family in New Orleans for a few months. To say the least, it had been an experience.

Not a bad one. I just didn't know how to do the whole family thing.

The last time I'd spent any significant time cohabitating with a blood relation, I’d been seventeen. While I wasn't nursing several bruised ribs and a fractured orbital bone this time, I felt just as shattered. Yet again, seeking some kind of shelter with the brother I hardly knew.

I hated it . . . for all of a week.

It was hard to be too miserable with two funny, sweet, loud swamp gremlins around. Sure, I'd seen them for holidays and a few long weekends here and there, but never enough time to really get to know them. But this time, I threw myself into full auntie mode, finding that I kind of loved it.

As an added bonus, hanging out with them made things a little less awkward between Ben and me. We still struggled, but it felt less like we were well-acquainted strangers and a little more like we were brother and sister.

“Ok,” I cut into their tirade. “You've both presented solid arguments. But you're wrong.”

“Which one of us?” Asher asks.

“Both of you.” They look flabbergasted. “You haven't even gotten to the best captain yet.”

“Boys, have you seen your mama's phone?” I hear Ben's deep drawl call out.

“Busted,” I taunt.

“Why're y'all botherin' your Ant-Ant?”

I laugh. “They're fine. We were just discussing who the superior Star Trek captain is.”

“You've ruined my children.” He takes the phone, my brother’s face replacing the boy's. There was little denying the resemblance between us. For better or worse, the Devereaux blood ran strong. “Say bye to Ant-Ant and go help your mama with dinner, please.”

“Bye Ant-Ant! Love you!”

“Love y'all, too!” I call back.

Ben waits until the thunder of their retreat fades before asking, “How are you?”

I shrug, a twinge of guilt at not checking in with him souring my stomach. “Not bad. Settling in.”

“Given any thought to where you're going next?”

Why was everybody obsessed with asking me this fucking question?

“I haven't even unpacked all my boxes, Ben.” Or practically any of them.

“No pressure. Just checkin'. Gotta know if I need to fly up in January.”

“Well, if I move elsewhere, a...friend might be helping with that. ”

His eyes narrow. “What kind of friend?”

“A friend-friend.”

“This friend wouldn't happen to be a guy?”

I sigh. “I'm just as likely to be shacking up with a woman if that's what you're getting at.”

“What? No!” A red blush rises on my brother's full cheeks. “I just...I worry, alright?”

“Well, you don't need to. I can handle myself.” Always had.

“Yeah. I know.”

“I gotta go,” I say.

“Right. Take care.” I love you had never really been our style.

“You, too.”

The silence feels heavy, but I resist the urge to put on a record to fill the void.

Why not just stay here? Why not at least try?

For most of my life, I'd had little bandwidth—or income—to do much more than follow the path of least resistance to my next zip code.

And each place always felt off, like wearing shoes that don't quite fit, but that your mom assures you you’ll grow into.

Except I never grew into any of them. Even so, I tried to make them fit—stuffed the toes with lovers and acquaintances and standing brunch dates, only to find my heels still bled from the blisters.

Maybe this could be different.

True, I hadn't picked Somerville off a list. An opportunity arose and I took it, but it wasn't the easiest choice I could have made. For once, I had the benefit of both time and resources, and I still chose this.

“Why not?” I say aloud.

I text Cillian back.

The joy of being self-employed is making my own schedule...for the most part. What've you got in mind?

Cillian

You'll see. Meet at the Davis Square station. 10:30?

I'll be there.