More Than Words(23)

But they hadn’t been. After Nina and Tim had gotten together in January, she’d had a series of long talks with Leslie about it.

“Are you sure this isn’t because your dad is sick again?” Leslie had asked. “I mean, I guess it’s fine if it is, as long as that’s not all that it’s about.”

Nina had thought about it. Some of it had to be, of course. All decisions were affected by the time in which they were made. Nothing existed in a vacuum. But it was more than that. She’d never wanted to risk their friendship before, but with her dad’s diagnosis, it felt like . . . like time was running out. For everyone. And maybe the risk would be worth it.



* * *



? ? ?

“I think we were afraid,” Nina said to Tim, holding a dirty dish in her hand. “If we tried to date and it didn’t work, it would change us.”

“Well, it turned out there was nothing to be afraid of,” Tim said. “And now we can make it official. You and me forever.”

Nina worked hard to control her face, to smile, to nod, though inside she felt panicked. He was right. She loved being with him, spending time with him. She always had. He’d been the person she counted on ever since she was a kid.

Tim looked at her, his head cocked sideways. “You want a big wedding, don’t you,” he said. “The dress, the ballroom, the dancing—the publicity for the hotels. Me too—we should make a big splash with our wedding like your parents did. But we can do that after. Do something small now, for your dad. And do something bigger later, for everyone else.”

He made so much sense. He always made so much sense. And though her brain agreed with him completely, her heart—her uncontrollable heart—didn’t feel the same way. She heard Leslie in her mind; she knew what her friend would say.

“That makes sense,” Nina told Tim. “But do we want to get married because it makes sense?”

Now Tim’s face was starting to pale. “Do you not want to marry me?” he asked.

“No!” Nina said, putting down the dish and taking his hand. “I just . . . I guess I was hoping for a proposal that was more about us than about my dad.”

“Of course it’s about us,” Tim said, kissing Nina on the top of her head. “I thought that was a given.”

Nina wrapped her arms around Tim and heard his heart beat. Say yes, it was saying, over and over. Say yes, say yes, say yes. She was about to, but he spoke before she did.

“I think I bungled this,” Tim said. “Let’s forget we had this conversation, and I’m going to get the ring from your dad, and then I’ll propose for real. A night out, the tasting menu at Per Se, a speech about how much you mean to me, a diamond hidden in your dessert. Okay?”

Nina laughed and nodded. “Okay,” she said.

Tim smiled. He looked so relieved that Nina rose up on her tiptoes to kiss him.





23



Tim and Nina had made plans with his friends from work that night, but Nina felt too drained to put up a good front.

“Would it be okay with you if I skipped?” she asked Tim. “I just . . . I can’t.”

He squeezed her shoulder. “Do you want me to skip, too?” he asked, concern on his face.

She shook her head. “No, it’s fine. You go. Have my share of fun, too.”

Tim laughed. “Are you sure?” he asked. “I can stay with you.”

“It’s okay,” she told him. “I don’t want you to miss out because of me.”

Tim looked at her for a moment, as if he were trying to make sure she was telling him the truth. He must’ve decided she was, because he said, “All right. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

And then he kissed her and headed downtown.

The ride home to Tribeca seemed like too much for Nina, so she decided to sleep on Central Park West that night.

She straightened up the kitchen and then took out her phone to call Leslie, to try to make sense of the on-hold marriage proposal. But then she put her phone down. She didn’t know what she would say. Didn’t know her own feelings enough to explain them to anyone else. She contemplated calling Pris to make plans to go out later this week and celebrate Rafael’s win, but she didn’t do that either. Instead she sat on the couch with Carlos. She wanted to escape her own life a little, so she picked up her dad’s copy of the New Yorker and was flipping through it while Carlos read something on a Kindle. After losing her place in an article for the third time, Nina put the magazine down and asked him if he wanted a drink.

Carlos asked for a beer, and she poured herself another glass of scotch. Not the Macallan, though. She felt like she’d need to ask her dad’s permission for that. And then she realized, like a punch to the gut, that once he was gone, whatever was left in the bottle would be hers. She wouldn’t have to ask anyone’s permission to drink it. She closed her eyes for a moment. Paper clips. Staples. Floor tiles.

When she opened her eyes, Carlos was looking at her.

“You’re in the middle of it now,” he said, putting his beer down on the table. “I know it doesn’t seem like your life will ever be okay again, but it will. I promise.”

Nina swirled the scotch in her glass and watched the little cyclone she created rage and then dissipate. Were the answers there? In the shimmering amber?