On Rotation(41)

Ricky raised a questioning eyebrow at me, and I shook my head, helpless, as Michelle started doing lunges behind me.

“Well, I should let you guys go,” he said. Then, without preamble, he reached for me, loosely cupping my elbow. “We’re still on for tomorrow, right?”

My eyes darted down to his hand, then back to his eyes. It was an innocent touch, and feather-light, but it felt like he was breaking some unspoken rule. He’d been touching me a lot more lately: brushing his fingers past my back to squeeze behind me, nudging me to get my attention. Nothing I would’ve noticed coming from anyone else . . . but Ricky wasn’t anyone else, and so of course I did.

“Yeah,” I said. He smiled and, dropping his hand, took a swig of his coffee.

“Cool,” he said. “Then, well, I’m heading home. I’ll pick you up around two?”

“Sounds good,” I said, feeling Michelle’s eyes bore into the back of my head. She hardly waited for the doors to the L&D to shut behind me before rounding on me, jabbing me forcefully in the chest.

“What. The. Hell,” Michelle said. “I am so freaking appalled.” She pulled out her phone, typing a message to the group chat that made my pocket buzz a second later. “What do you mean, ‘he’s just like that’! With who?” Her expression grew grave, and she placed a hand firmly on my shoulder. “Angie, I can’t believe that I have to be the one to tell you this . . . but that man wants to screw you into the carpet.”

I winced against her crudeness, but Michelle didn’t spare me even a half second to recover before barreling over me some more.

“Where are you even going tomorrow?” she asked. “For your little not-date?”

I crossed my arms, preparing myself for an excessive Michelle response.

“King Spa,” I grumbled, as Michelle sputtered in disbelief. “What! I told him I was stressed out, and he thought it would be fun. I know I was supposed to go there with you first, but it’s been two and a half years since we moved to Chicago and we still haven’t managed, so—”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever, you have betrayed me, okay,” Michelle said, waving me off. “I don’t care about that. I want to know why you’re lying to yourself so thoroughly. Look!” She held up her screen, where I could see that Nia had responded: Yeah, Shae thinks it’s only a matter of time. “Even his best friend thinks he’s into you! So why don’t you?”

“Because!” I said. “I believed him when he said he wasn’t interested! And even if he was . . .”

Even if he was . . . I paused, simmering. It wouldn’t last. It was just as Michelle had said. Guys like Ricky didn’t stay single for long, and girls like me . . . Well, we were exciting in theory, interesting as a concept. Bright and shiny when we were new and our outspokenness was “refreshing” and our exoticness* exhilarating. Eventually, when reality settled in and they realized that, actually, they did want the kind of woman that society told them they should—thinner than me, paler than me, less educated and more in awe of them than I ever could be—they left. Just like Frederick had left and every man I’d dared to let into my heart before him. But those men hadn’t really been my friends, and Ricky was, so why change that? Why take something that felt good and right in its current form and try to morph it into something that could hurt?

I told Michelle as much. She listened, the furrow in her brow deepening with every word. Then she scowled.

“Why do you feel this way about yourself?” she snapped. “Like you’re not enough, or something?”

“I don’t think I’m not enough,” I said plainly. “I think I’m too much.” A door slammed shut in the distance, and I winced, wondering if our absence had been noted. “I . . . Never mind. We should get back to the workroom before Gwen realizes I’m gone.”

Michelle looked at me like I’d grown a second head.

“Um, no we shouldn’t, because what the hell, Angie,” she said. “You realize he can just like you, right? That it doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that?” When I didn’t say anything, she crossed her arms. “I wish you’d just told me that you weren’t interested in him or something. That would be way less depressing.”

Depressing or not, it was true, and I wasn’t about to apologize for my reality.

“It’s fine,” I muttered. Then I looked her in the eye. “I’m fine. Ricky and I are friends, and we are just going for a nice day at the spa together. Just like with the girls.”

“Fine,” Michelle said. “Just . . . if you do like him”—she held up a finger when I opened my mouth to protest—“I said if—then can you not do that thing you always do? Where you let yourself live in limbo to stop yourself from getting hurt? It’s different if you actually want to be his friend, but if you’re mucking around in no-man’s-land just because you think that it’s safer there, I’m going to be pissed. Because you’re too grown for that now, and I’m too busy to help you pick up the pieces when it inevitably doesn’t work out.”

I recoiled.

“What do you mean, what I always do—”

Before I could demand an explanation, Michelle marched ahead of me and into the workroom. Through the sliver of the open door, I could see Gwen waiting for me, clicking her pen menacingly. I groaned. It was going to be a long shift.