On Rotation(20)

“You mean you could have tried,” Markus accused. “I don’t live here! You think I can just roll up anywhere in Nashville and order red velvet French toast?”

“It’s Tennessee, Markus,” Michelle deadpanned. “They’ll probably deep-fry your red velvet if you ask.”

“First of all, leave Tennessee alone—” Markus started, just as the waiter sidled up to our table.

We ordered, giving Diamond the last pick so she could have more time to deliberate. Ricky barely glanced at the menu before making his decision, like, despite his protests, a true Yolk regular. Once the orders had been placed, the coffee poured, and the menus cleared, we settled back into casual conversation. I chatted Nia and Michelle up about an article I’d read online, only occasionally tuning in to the conversation happening on the other side of the table. Seeing Ricky here, among my closest friends, felt surreal. I felt like I was reliving our afternoon in the garden, but instead of feeling the heat of the sun on my face I felt the gust of an overzealous AC, and instead of feeling impossibly close to him I felt like there was an uncrossable chasm between us. Even their discussion, which was currently about a prank Diamond and her roommate had played on Ricky and his in college, sounded like it was echoing through a distant valley. Two people, sitting at the same table, with mountains dividing us.

My phone buzzed.

Hey. It was from Ricky.

My eyes flickered over to him. Ricky looked like he had before, listening intently to something Markus was saying. I flipped my phone back over with a thud.

“What’s up?” Nia asked, looking from my phone to me in alarm.

“CNN News alert,” I said. “Some guy in Florida wrestling a gator.”

“Fucking Floridians,” Nia said.

Michelle turned on her phone.

“Wait, I didn’t get that alert—”

“Sorry, did I say CNN? I meant Vox,” I amended. My phone buzzed again. I ignored it.

“Another alert?” Nia asked with a knowing smirk.

I silenced my phone. This time I felt Ricky look at me, and I leered back out of the corner of my eye, channeling as much contempt into the look as I could garner. He turned back to Markus, a hint of discomfort on his face, and offered up a punny joke that they all laughed at.

The food arrived, and we set upon it like rabid wolves. I’d never seen anyone stuff an entire half slice of French toast into their mouth, but Markus somehow managed. Michelle and I divided our dishes in half and doled them out to each other with the automaticity of an old married couple. My phone stayed flipped, facedown and deceptively quiet, on the table. I was glad that at the very least Ricky didn’t try to talk to me. There seemed to be an unspoken line between conversations at our table, one that was reinforced by the way Nia had turned her body away from them. That was probably why I missed the fact that the other side was now focused on me.

“Angie. Angie!” Markus said.

My chunk of omelet fell off my fork halfway to my mouth.

“Whoa, sorry, yeah?” I said, ears hot because of course Ricky had seen that bit of inelegance.

“You do your pediatrics rotation at Rogers Children’s, right?”

I blinked. I didn’t know that Markus knew that Rogers Children’s existed.

“Yeah,” I said.

“I knew it!” Markus said, puffing out his chest. He jostled Diamond next to him, who rolled her eyes. “See, baby, I do listen!” Then he leaned forward, his whole body alight with the excitement of a child with a dirty secret. “Ricky volunteers at Rogers! He does Child Life stuff there. Small world, right?”

For the first time during this meal, I let myself look at Ricky with more than a passing glance. We met eyes instantly. I knew all about the tragedy of his mother’s passing; how had he failed to mention that he volunteered at the children’s hospital affiliated with my school?

“Yeah,” I said. Neither of us looked away. “Crazy.”

If Markus was disappointed that I hadn’t been more excited about his discovery, he hid it well, and he didn’t try to force interaction between us again. I appreciated that about Markus. He always knew when to drop what needed dropping, and when to pry. And he knew how to lighten a heavy mood with a stupid story—this time about the time he’d caught pneumonia as a kid and Child Life had tried to send him a guy in a Barney suit to cheer him up.

“I was sick as a dog, but I knew a demon when I saw one,” he said. “Kicked Barney right in his dino-balls, hard as I could. He went down like a felled tree, just tipped right over. My momma was mortified but she couldn’t stop laughing for long enough to help him up. Barney was over there rolling on the floor, in excruciating pain, because I played soccer and I knew how to punt—”

We laughed. At some point, our waiter put down our bill. We ignored it and Nia talked about the time in college Markus had sleepily kicked her in the crotch and we laughed some more until said waiter sidled up to our table ten minutes later to ask if there was anything else we needed, and after that we took the hint and left.

“I’m tired,” I announced. I wasn’t. I yawned anyway to add credence to my claim.

“Me too!” Markus said. “What do you think is wrong with me, doc? WebMD says I got the ’itis.”*

“WebMD is a better doctor than me right now,” I confessed. “Let’s go home, Nia?”