Here's to Us(What If It's Us #2)(93)

The do-over, to be precise.





Chapter Thirty-Eight


Arthur

Thursday, July 9




Pretty sure my phone’s just mocking me at this point. As if my gaping void of a text thread with Ben wasn’t enough, now there’s a fresh round of radio silence from Mikey. I wonder how many times you can swipe your lock screen before your thumb starts to blister.

I should go completely off the grid. I should move to a farmhouse in a postapocalyptic version of New Hampshire where almost everyone’s dead and there’s no cell service or electricity, because when it comes to the absence of text messages? Turns out, I’m a full fucking expert.

But it’s cool. I’ll just sit here rereading every line of this program like I’m Bubbe and her shul friends rolling in early from New Haven for a Sunday matinee. Because tonight has nothing to do with my phone, or boys, or the absence of boys. It’s about the fact that I’m here in the Shumaker Blackbox Theater, one row back from my favorite director. It’s about getting to see my new favorite play in its near-final form, and knowing I helped get it here.

Jacob murmurs something into his headset that makes the house lights flicker.

Then: a sweep of movement, the soft scoot of a chair. Ben sliding into the seat beside me with dumbfounding nonchalance, just before the house lights cut out.

I’m pretty sure my heart just leapt a full octave.

I squint into the darkness, my stomach in knots. Am I even awake? Is this actually happening? Ben shoots me a quick sideways smile, but it’s cool, because who even needs lungs? Why are we all so obsessed with breathing?

It’s completely surreal. The fact that he’s here. Does he know I would have been singing dayenu over a text message? A single GIF would have been enough.

How am I supposed to act normal when my heart’s pounding out eighth notes?

Time keeps tumbling forward—every time I blink, another scene goes by. Act One is apparently ten seconds long. Either someone’s messing with the universe’s speed-control dial, or my brain’s short-circuiting.



When the show ends, Emmett and Amelia plop down onto the stage like high school kids. I turn dazedly to Ben. “Did you like it?”

“For sure. It was great.” He nods quickly.

I glance back at the stage, where Jacob and Miles, the stage manager, have scooted in next to Emmett and Amelia. “They’re just giving the actors notes,” I explain. “Shouldn’t take too long, and then I can introduce you to Emmett.”



“I’m not here to see Emmett.” Ben’s voice is unexpectedly intense. “Is there—can we go somewhere? Just for a second?”

“Yeah. Yes. Definitely. Let me just—here, come with me.”

I lead him backstage, behind our black curtain backdrop and outside the back door. Be cool, okay, be cool be cool be cool be cool. But there’s no cool. No such thing. Not for me.

I think my brain’s tilting sideways. I feel like the sky before sunrise, the pause between two, one, and liftoff.

I look up at him. “Is this okay? Are you okay?”

“Yeah. I don’t know.” He lets out a slightly hysterical laugh.

“Ben, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t blame you at all. You know that, right? Not even close. You’re so—God, I can’t believe you came to the show. I’m so glad I get to be your friend. That’s not—”

“You really never stop talking, do you?” Ben says, smiling so affectionately, my breath hitches.

“Never.”

He laughs a little. “Okay, well, my turn. I’m just—I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Tuesday. Everything you said. Arthur, I had no idea. None.”

“I know. I shouldn’t have—”

“Nope.” Ben shakes his head fiercely. “Listen. As soon as you left, I went back to my room, and I’m sitting there, staring at those fucking boxes, thinking—oh my God, California. Like, it’s supposed to be this big reset button, right? I’m supposed to do my whole life over, twenty-five hundred miles from everything and everyone. Except you—Arthur, you’re like this stowaway in my head. I don’t know how to not bring you with me. Every time I think something weird, I’m like, Arthur would get this. Do you realize that every time, every single time anyone’s smiled at me for the past two years, I’ve compared it to your smile? For two years. As if anyone else could win that game.” He presses a hand to his forehead. “And the thing about being a writer is that it’s not only about telling stories to other people, right? It’s also about the stories I tell myself. Anything and everything I can say that’ll make me believe I’m happy. But I’m done rewriting how I feel because I’m scared of getting hurt again. All that’s going to do is break my heart later when I don’t get my perfect ending. And the perfect ending to my story is with you.”

“You’re—” I press my fist to my mouth. “I’m going to cry.”

“You’re already crying. Literally right now.” He lets out a choked laugh, grabbing my hands to pull me closer. Then he presses his lips to my forehead, leaving them there just long enough to turn me to liquid. “I love you. Te amo. I’m not moving. I ended things with Mario. Can I kiss you?” His eyes are wet. “Please?”