On Rotation(63)

“Oh, okay,” he said. I watched him plug in his graphic tablet, spinning his pen between his fingers. Guilt sat heavy in my stomach.

“Is that okay?” I asked, suddenly nervous. Ricky’s gaze flickered up to mine.

“Of course,” he said, giving me a warm smile. He reached across the table and squeezed my hand. “I know you’re busy. It’s all good.”

Oh, Ricky. Ever understanding, endlessly considerate. Next time he asks, I thought, I’ll say yes.

“Well,” I said, “on the bright side, I stopped by Jewel and picked us some snacks for today. Grabbed a few of your favorites.”

Ricky leaned back in his chair.

“Yeah? What’d you get?”

“Goldfish,” I said, then added with a smirk, “the Annie’s kind. Got some pineapple in the fridge, too.”

“Ooh, big spender,” Ricky said. “You want to bring those out?”

“I got you,” I said. I threw open my cabinets, swearing quietly to myself when I found them bereft of goodies. “Oh shoot. I must have left a bag in the car. Hang on a second; I’ll go look.”

Ricky waved me along, not looking up from his work. I snatched my keys off the wall and dashed down the stairs, a small part of me hoping in vain that my small offering of goods could make up for my flightiness. Frederick’s parents lived just outside of Milwaukee, only a two-hour drive away, and not once during our six-month stint had he proposed we visit them. And yet here was Ricky, ready to merge our lives without even a week’s hesitation. But was that out of his regard for me? Or simply out of a habit of making a home with every woman he dated? He loves love, Shae had said, and Ricky had demonstrated that over and over again, in his effusive love for his family, in the fact that he’d left his grandparents’ home for his ex. I threw open my car door, relieved to find the abandoned bag nestled under my front seat. Tossing it over my shoulder, I journeyed back up my stairs, my pace slowed by the whirl of my thoughts. Maybe I should have said yes to the birthday party. Maybe meeting Ricky’s grandparents wasn’t as big of a deal as I was making it out to be; maybe, as he’d postulated, his grandmother and I would get on like a house on fire and all my hand-wringing would be for naught.

I sighed, pushing open my front door. Inside, I could hear the muffled sound of Ricky’s voice. He was on the phone, no longer sitting at the table but standing by it, looking out the window to our building’s courtyard below.

“I know it must feel like shit,” he was saying. His voice was gentle, like he was trying to lure in a skittish cat. “Okay, yeah, worse than shit. But you’re doing good. Just . . . try to power through.”

As I approached, the voice on the other end grew audible. It was a man’s voice, trembling with an infectious anxiety. The tension felt familiar, and I pondered why for several seconds until it clicked—it was the same panicked tone I heard from my patients right before they were wheeled into surgery; uncertainty, fear, and anticipation rolled into one. Ricky looked at me askance as I stepped closer, giving me a small, hapless shrug, and suddenly I knew exactly who was on the other end of the line.

“Get through this, and I can go with you to the clinic, yeah?” he said. “You just need to make it to the morning, and we can walk in together.”

In that moment, my small offerings felt insufficient. I placed the tote bag of snacks gingerly on the table and walked toward Ricky, watching him gnaw at his thumbnail as he listened to his father’s exhausted rambling. The blinds cut harsh shadows across his face, the orange glow of the setting sun turning his eyes almost amber. He spoke to his father tenderly, like one would to a frightened child, listening to him describe his withdrawal symptoms with unending patience, offering words of encouragement, assurances of his support, and . . . God, how could I not love a man who loved like this? With his whole heart, even when choosing love was hard? Even when the only thing he could reliably expect in return was disappointment?

I roped my arms around his waist from behind and rested my head against his back. His voice vibrated into my cheek, and I let myself be lulled by the sensation, by the whooshing of my pulse in my ears and the thrum of his heartbeat against the flat of my palm. He twined his fingers through mine as he talked, running his thumb back and forth across my knuckles, and I hummed, content, as my mind formed the words that I already knew to be true. Because Tabatha was right. This . . . thing I felt for Ricky wasn’t just infatuation; it was something deeper, more fundamental than that. It was love, or at least something like it, and I was tired of trying to fool myself into thinking it was anything less.

Eventually, Ricky hung up. He turned around in my arms slowly, a chagrined expression on his face, like talking his dad through his withdrawal was a source of embarrassment.

“Sorry about that,” Ricky said. Then, with a small smile: “I know it’s probably bullshit. But he might actually be trying, so . . .”

In response, I grabbed ahold of Ricky’s collar and pulled his face to mine. It was a decisive kiss, a declarative press of my lips against his, and I hoped he knew what was in it—an apology, acceptance, a promise to myself to finally see him as more than a liability. When we broke away, his eyes were full of questions.

Before he could ask a single one, I jumped in with one of my own.

“Tabs and I are meeting up on Sunday to go over my presentation,” I asked. “Do you want to come?”