The Futures(97)

I knew what was on that camera that Jasmine had found. I kept the unopened envelope of pictures on the desk in Abby’s room. Over the following few days, it gradually disappeared underneath an accumulation of receipts and spare change. I didn’t forget about it. I would open it eventually. But I wanted to take my time.

Sara Yamashita was waiting for me in a booth at the back when I walked into Balthazar at 12:30 on Wednesday. She stood up and kissed me on the cheek, smelling like mint and cigarettes. It had taken her a moment to place my name when I’d called, the Sunday before. A pause, then recognition. “Julia! Of course. Adam’s friend. I always wondered what happened to you.”

The room was buzzing, the mirrored walls reflecting a sea of attractive faces. “Have you been here before?” she asked, stirring a packet of sugar into her iced tea. “I’m getting the cheeseburger. You can’t go wrong with that.”

“I’ll do the same,” I said, closing my menu.

“So you went back to Boston? What happened?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Well,” she said, spreading her arms. “That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”

I had never really told anyone the full truth. Adam knew, and Evan knew. Abby, my parents, other friends—they knew about the breakup, but they didn’t know what had triggered it. No one searched for a precise, time-stamped reason amid the rubble. But Sara was different. She knew about me and Adam. I wouldn’t be able to leave him out of the story. It was why I forced myself to stick to the plan, even when gripped with nausea on the walk to lunch. If I didn’t take this chance, I wasn’t sure I ever would.

“Was it something to do with Adam?” Sara asked. “You’re not still seeing him, are you?”

“Yes. And no. We’re not still seeing each other. Adam is part of the reason I left last year.” I took a deep breath and told her the whole story. My relationship with Evan. The things that started going wrong. Adam’s reappearance in my life at exactly the right time. Everything Evan confided in me and the way I’d repeated it. And then, eventually, the implosion. By then our food had arrived. Sara listened attentively, nodding and asking a question every now and then. She didn’t dispense excessive sympathy or judgment or outrage. She just listened until I was finished.

“Wow,” she said. “Holy shit. You must be hungry after that.”

I nodded and picked up my burger. I was hungry. Starving, actually.

“You seem like you’re doing okay, though. All things considered.”

“I am. I think so, at least.”

“God. I wish I could say I was surprised.”

“You’re not? Has he—”

“Has he done stuff like this before? Yes. Unfortunately.”

I swallowed a bite of my burger. “To you?”

“Maybe never as bad as this. But he’s just shady, you know? We were dating freshman year, and I applied to an internship in the city for the summer. I asked him to read my cover letter—you know, proofread it, edit it. He took a long time to give it back to me. Like, a week, two weeks. He kept saying he was busy, but he’d get to it. When I finally gave up and went ahead and applied, I found that they’d already filled the position. Another Yale student.”

“Adam?”

“He was like, why are you pissed? He acted like I was totally nuts. Then he broke up with me two days later. But you know what? This shit’s going to catch up with him eventually. I’ve seen him around a few times since the Spire story. He’s insufferable. But he knows this was a fluke. His editors are already asking for more. They want their genius reporter boy to keep working his source. Which is you, I guess.”

I pictured Adam squirming in his editor’s office. Sara smiled.

“Yeah,” she said. “Exactly. I’m sure he’s spinning the bullshit for them as fast as he can.” She dragged a french fry through a hill of ketchup. “But you came back, huh? Do you know what you want to do?”

“I’m not sure,” I said. This stretch, as nice as it was, wasn’t going to last forever. Within the hour, most people in this restaurant would push back from their tables and return to their offices, where they’d continue carrying out whatever slight rearrangement of the world their jobs demanded of them. But they were doing it. They were in it. They had found a way to fit themselves into the flow of time. I poked at the remains of my burger. “I’m still figuring it out,” I said. “I’m staying at a friend’s place for a while. I guess I’ll start applying to jobs soon.”

Sara cleared her throat. “Can I give you some advice?”

“Of course.”

“I’m an only child. I never had an older brother or sister or anything like that. You’re the oldest?” I nodded. “Right, so you can understand. I always wished someone had warned me about what it was like after college. How weird things are. And I had it really easy. My parents are connected. I got a job right after I graduated. I had nothing to complain about. But I still felt like shit. No one told me how hard it was going to be. It sounds like you went through this last year, too. You can relate.”

She leaned back, letting the waiter clear our plates. “Dessert? Coffee?” he asked, glancing toward Sara. “Two coffees?” she said. Then she continued.