Here's to Us(What If It's Us #2)(76)

And then, just as I’m about to push through everyone to reach him, I see someone in a blue beanie sidle up to him, linking arms. It’s got to be Mikey.

I feel like I’ve lost my voice and lost control of my muscles. I want to sink down onto the curb and hide behind the parade.

I don’t even get how Mikey’s still in New York. Did he quit his job and just move here? Are they seriously not capable of living apart for one summer? I think back to that weird night at the open mic bar, trying to imagine how everything must have played out. Maybe Mikey just couldn’t bring himself to get back on that train. Maybe they spent the whole week having incredible sex. Maybe Mikey has been delivering personal encores of his karaoke performance every single night. That would definitely explain why Arthur hasn’t texted me all week. It sucks, because I really thought Arthur and I were getting closer. But I feel further away from him now than I ever have before, even when we lived almost a thousand miles apart.

He could have at least let me know he’d be at Pride.

Then again, I guess I could have reached out to him, too.

I don’t even know why I care. All I know is, this is why I’m so fucking ready to start over in Los Angeles. No more memories catching me by the throat every few blocks. No more turning corners and stumbling into exes with their new boyfriends who get the ultimate do-overs that I never did.





Chapter Thirty


Arthur

Tuesday, June 30




What sucks is that I really thought I was fine—or at least I was getting there. Sure, it stung when I couldn’t text Mikey about the Animal Crossing cosplayers at Pride, and I’m still checking in on Mario’s Instagram like it’s my full-time job, but at least my mouth was starting to remember the mechanics of smiling. There were even real stretches of time where I didn’t think about Ben or Mikey at all. I was just a guy in a Hamilton Pride shirt, walking with my best friends through the rainbow-spangled streets of Manhattan.

And then Ethan went home.

I really need to start learning the difference between fine and distracted.

Yeah. So, it turns out, the world doesn’t stop for heartbreak. I don’t get to skip work because I look like a sleep-deprived ghoul, or because I feel bad about Mikey, or because Ben doesn’t love me. I don’t get to unravel nine days before our first dress rehearsal.

Nine days—and just eight more days after that until we officially open. Shouldn’t I be at least a little bit excited about this? Here I am standing on a real New York stage, beneath a scaffolded ceiling and professional-grade lights. I’m not saying it’s Radio City Music Hall—it’s a black box, which is basically just a dark-painted cube, even at a top-tier place like the Shumaker. But the black box isn’t the problem. I’m the problem. Because my brain won’t shut up about the boy I’m not in love with.

Except when it remembers the one who’s not in love with me.

“I’m not buying it,” says Jacob. “Arthur—sorry—would you mind pushing the crib back a few feet? All I’m seeing is that creepy fake baby.”

I roll the crib upstage, almost to the backdrop. “Here?”

Jacob surveys the new configuration for a minute, before sighing and turning to Taj. “Should we bring in a real baby? We’re going to have to bring in a baby, aren’t we?”

“You mean the crying kind?” Taj asks.

Jacob pinches the bridge of his nose. “Maybe we age him up to three or four? I’ll play around with the script—”

“Totally. I totally hear you. But.” Taj’s voice is unnervingly calm. “I’m wondering if there’s a way we can avoid changing the entire script? Since we’re, uh, less than three weeks out from opening night?”

I shift my weight from one foot to the other, gaze drifting down the rows of empty chairs—right to left, like reading in Hebrew. Fifty seats arranged on platforms, ascending like stairs. But the front row is level with the floor and the stage, and that’s where Jacob and Taj are sitting.

“Yeah . . .” Jacob sighs. “Okay, why don’t we press pause for a second. We’ll circle back to this in fifteen.” He stands and stretches, tapping the screen of his phone. By the time I reach the front row of seats, he’s already halfway to the lobby.

“Yikes. Rough day for the GDB,” Taj says, peeling the lid off a soy yogurt container.

I grab a pack of cheese crackers from my messenger bag and plop down beside him. “He’s not actually going to age the baby up, right? Like, you’d have to rewrite the entire bedtime scene, plus anything in the park, and it’s just so—”

“Bananas,” Taj says. “It’s the whole banana grove. But he really hates those dolls.”

I turn back to the stage, currently set to resemble an apartment interior—living room, nursery, and kitchen. The design’s more suggestive than literal—it’s really just a few key pieces of furniture arranged in front of three canvas backdrops. Though when you see it with the lighting in place and the actors moving from room to room, it actually does feel like a home.

But even I have to admit: Jacob’s right about the goddamn baby. I guess it’s decently realistic for a prop doll, but you can’t pretend it’s not serving up some major corpse energy. Or lack of energy.