This Girl: A Novel

thinking what I’m thinking. That this is more than likely Julia’s last time to carve pumpkins. Lake brings her hand to her eyes and it looks like she’s trying to stop a tear from falling. I quickly turn to Julia to remove any focus from Lake.
    “What’s your suck?” I ask.
    Julia continues to watch Lake when she responds. “My suck is the same as my sweet,” Julia says quietly. “We’re still carving pumpkins.”
    I’m beginning to understand that “carving pumpkins” has taken on a whole new meaning. Lake immediately stands up and grabs empty plates off the bar, completely ignoring her mother’s gaze.
    “My suck is that it’s my night to do dishes,” Lake says. She walks to the sink and turns on the water. Kel and Caulder begin discussing Halloween costumes again, so Julia and I help throw out a few ideas.
    No one ever asks Lake what her sweet is.

15.
    the honeymoon
    “I DID HAVE a sweet that night,” she says. “Remember the conversation we had when we took the trash out? When you told me about the first time you saw me?”
    I nod.
    “That was my sweet. Having that moment with you. All the little moments I got with you were always my sweets.” She kisses me on the forehead.
    “That was my sweet, too,” I say. “That and the intense stare you gave me while we were playing suck and sweet.”
    She laughs. “If you only knew what I was thinking.”
    I cock my eyebrow at her. “Naughty thoughts?”
    “As soon as you said ‘My sweet is right now,’ ” I wanted to jump across the bar and ravish you,” she says.
    I laugh. I never would have thought we were both thinking the exact same thing. “I wonder what your mom would have done if we had both attacked each other, right there on the bar.”
    “She would have kicked your ass,” she says. She rolls onto her side and faces the other direction. “Spoon me,” she says. I scoot closer to her and slide my arm underneath her head, wrapping my other arm tightly around her. She yawns a deep yawn into her pillow. “Tell me about The Lake. I want to know why you wrote it.”
    I kiss her hair and rest my head on her pillow. “I wrote it the next night. After we had basagna with your mom,” I say. “When we all sat around the table that night and discussed how things with the boys were going to be handled during her treatments, I realized that you had done it. You were doing exactly what I wished my parents had done before they died. You were taking responsibility. You were preparing for the inevitable. You were facing death head-on, and you were doing it without fear.” I put my leg over her legs and tuck her in closer to me. “Every time I was around you, you inspired me to write. And I didn’t want to write about anything but you.”
    She tilts her head back toward me. “That was on the list,” she says.
    “Your mom’s list?”
    “Yeah. ‘Does he inspire you?’ is one of the questions.”
    “Do I inspire you?”
    “Every single day,” she whispers.
    I kiss her forehead. “Well, like I said, you inspired me, too. I knew I already loved you long before then, but that night at dinner something just clicked inside me. It’s like every time we were together, all was right with the world. I had assumed, just like your mom did, that staying apart would help you focus on her, but we were both wrong. I knew that the only way either of us could have been truly happy is if we were together. I wanted you to wait for me. I wanted you to wait for me so bad, but I didn’t know how to tell you without crossing some sort of boundary.
    “The next night at the slam when I saw you walk in, I couldn’t stop myself from performing that piece so you would hear it. I knew it was wrong, but I wanted you to know how much I thought about you. How much I really did love you.”
    She rolls over and scowls at me. “What do you mean when you saw me walk in? You said you didn’t know I was there until you saw me leaving.”
    I shrug. “I lied.”

the lake
    AS SOON AS I step up to the microphone, I see her. She walks through the doors and heads straight for a booth, never once looking up at the stage. My heart rate speeds up and beads of sweat form on my forehead, so I wipe them away with the palm of my hand. I’m not sure if it’s from the heat of the spotlight or the onslaught of nerves that have just overcome me seeing her walk through the door. I can’t perform this poem now. Not with her here. Why is she here? She said she wasn’t coming