Pokékumo

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'She used to pride herself on all the things she had in common with him, regard the similarities with affection. Night owls. Messy. Always late, always carrying a book.'    Careless about sunblock and addicted to every from of potatoes. Alive when we were on the water. Arms thrown wide, jackets rustling, eyes squinting into the sun.    'Now she worried thos similarities betrayed the terrible wrongness that lived in her. Maybe she, like her father, was incapable of the love she'd spent her life chasing.'    Or maybe that love simply didn't exist. 

Mom's first diagnosis taught me that love was an escape rope, but it was her second diagnosis that taught me love could be a life vest when you were drowning.  The more I worked on my love story, the less powerless I felt in the world. I may have had to ditch my plan to go to grad school and find a teaching job, but I could still help people. I could give them something good, something funny and hopeful.  It worked. For years, I had a purpose, something good to focus on. But when Dad died, suddenly writing – the one thing that had always put me at ease, a verb that felt more like a place only for me, the thing that had freed me from my darkest moments and brought hope into my chest in my heart's heaviest – had seemed impossible.  Until now. 

For him to leave us and for the ugly truth to walk into his funeral and tear all our pretty memories in half. She was in pain. I knew that.  But I was in pain too, so much of it that for once I couldn't laugh or dance any measure of it away. I couldn't even write myself a happy ending.  I didn't want to sit here in front of my laptop outside this house full of secrets and exorcise my father's memory from my heart. But apparently I'd found the one thing I could do. Because I'd already started typing.    'The first time she met the love of her father's life was at his funeral.' 

"So. We have a deal?" He held out his hand to me.  My mind spun in dizzying circles. It wasn't like I had any other ideas. Maybe a depressed writer could only make a depressing book. "Okay." I slid my hand into his, pretending not to feel the sparks leaping from his skin straigth into my veins.  "Just on more thing," he said soberly.  "What?"  "Promise not to fall in love with me."  "Oh my God!" I shoved his shoulder and slopped back into my seat, laughing. "Are you slightly misquoting A Walk to Remember at me?"  Gus cracked another smile. "Excellent movie," he said. "Sorry, film." 

"Okay. So what about this? We spend our weekdays writing, and leave the end of the week for education."  "Education," he repeated.  "On Fridays, I'll go with you to do whatever research you would usually do. Which would include . . ." I gestured for him to fill in the blank.  He smiled crookedly. It was extremely evil. "Oh, all sorts of riveting things," he supplied. "And then on Saturdays, we'll do whatever you usually do for research – hot-air balloon trips, sailing lessons, two-person motorcycle rides, candlelit restaurants with patio seating and bad cover bands, and all that shit." 

"But I'll make it a little easier on you. I'll throw in a rom-com crash course."  "Fine," Gus said. "Then I'll tak you through my research process. I'll help you lean into your latent nihilism, and you'll teach me how to sing like no one's listening, dance like no one's watching, and love like I've never been hurt before."  His faint grin was contagious, if overconfident.  "You really think you can do this?" I asked.  He lifted one shoulder. "You think you can?" 

"If you're not into the plan, just forget it."  But now I couldn't forget it. Now I needed to prove to Gus that what I did was harder than it looked, that I was just as capable as he was. Besides, having Augustus Everett promote a book of mine would have benefits I couldn't afford to pass up.  "I'm in," I said. 

"Okay," he said. "I have an idea."  "A seventh Pirates of the Caribbean movie?" I said. "It's so crazy it might work!"  "Actually," Gus said, "I thought we could make a deal."  "What sort of deal, Augustus?" (…)  "You try writing a bleak literary fiction, see if that's who you are now, if you're capable of being that person (…) and I'll write a Happily Ever After." (…)  "You're kidding."  "I'm not," he said. "You're not the only one who's been in a rut. I could use a break from what I'm doing–"  "Because writing a romance will be so easy it will essentially be a nap for you," I teased.  "And you can lean into your bleak new outlook and see how it fits. If this is the new January Andrews. And whoever sells their book first – with a pen name, if you prefer – wins." 

"I can write whatever I want," I said. "Though I can see how writing a Happily Ever After might be hard for someone whose happy endings usually happen during one-night stands."  Gus's eyes darkened, and his mouth hitched into an uneven smile. "Are you challenging me, Andrews?"  "I'm just saying," I parroted him, "it's not who you are." 

"Or ask me for free books."  "Oh, I don't need free books," I assured him.  "Really?" he teased. "You don't want to add a fifth level to your shrine?"  "You're not going to distract me," I said. "I'm not done with this conversation."  "Shit. I honestly didn't mean to offend you," he promised. "Again."  "You didn't offend me," I said uncertainly. Or maybe he had, but his apology had caught me off guard yet again. More so, I was baffled. "I just think you're being silly." 

"And secondly, are you honestly saying you don't believe in love?" (…)  Gus's brow furrowed, his dark eyes flashing from me to the road with that intent, absorbing look Shadi and I had spent so much time trying to put into words. "Sure, love happens," he said finally. "But it's better to be realistic so shit's not constantly blowing up in your face. And love is way more likely to blow up in your face than to bring eternal happiness. And if it doesn't hurt you, then you're the one hurting someone else.  "Entering a relationship is borderline sadomasochistic. Especially when you can get everything you would from a romantic relationship from a friendship, without destroying anyone's life when it inevitably ends." 

"It's the happy endings," Gus said suddenly as he pulled onto the main drag.  "What?" My stomach clenched. They all live happily ever after. Again.  Gus cleared his throat. "It's not that I don't take romance seriously as a genre. And I like reading about women. But I have a hard time with happy endings." His eyes cautiously flashed my way, then went back to the road.  "A hard time?" I repeated, as if that would make the words makes sens to me. "You have a hard time . . . reading happy endings?"  He rubbed at the curve of his bicep, an anxious tic I didn't remember. "I guess."  "Why?" I asked, more confused than offended now.  "Life is pretty much a series of good and bad moments right up until the moment you die," he said stiffly. "Which is arguably a bad one. Love doesn't change that. I have a hard time suspending my disbelief. Besides, can you think of a single real-life romance that actually ended like Bridget fucking Jones?" 

"You just revealed you know the title of my book. Who knows what other secrets are on the verge of spilling out of you?"  "How do you know I didn't just Google it?" I countered. "Maybe I'd never heard of it before."  "How do you know that your Googling me wouldn't be even more amusing to me?" Gus said.  "How do you know I wasn't Googling you out of suspicion you had a criminal background?"  Gus replied, "How do you know I won't keep answering your questions with other questions until we both die?"  "How do you know I'll care?"  Gus shook his head, smiling, and took another bite. "Wow, this is terrible."  "The donuts or this conversation?" I asked.  "This conversation, definitely. The donuts are good. I Googled you too, by the way."