Something Like Normal(42)

We go inside and order ribs, greens, and macaroni and cheese off a menu board spelled out in mismatched letters.

“Do you want to sit in or out?” I ask.

“In,” Harper says as we sit down at a picnic table. “The air-conditioning feels good.”

She’s right, it is, but shit—I have to take off my sunglasses. Because it would be weird if I didn’t. And as soon as I do, she notices the black eye.

“What happened to your eye?”

“I got in a fight with Ryan.”

“Over Paige?”

“Why would you think that?”

She picks up a rib. “Because if you were going to get in a fight with your brother, chances are it would be over a family thing or Paige. I went with logic.”

“I, um—I kind of hooked up with her since I’ve been back.”

She puts down the rib and starts gathering all of her food onto the tray we brought from the counter. She does it really fast. Angry fast.

“Harper, I didn’t mean—”

“Don’t talk.” Her voice is low and controlled as she stands with the tray. Quiet, so she doesn’t draw attention. “Or I’ll dump my lunch on you and that would be a waste of good food. I’m going to the Jeep.”

I get up, but she cuts me with a look so sharp it drops me back down on the bench. My stomach growls again, reminding me I’m hungry, but to dig into my lunch would be a dick move. On top of all the others I’ve made since I’ve known her, I mean. From the window I can see her sitting in the passenger seat with the tray on her lap. She doesn’t look my direction at all. So I eat.

And try to think of a way to fix things. Again.

She’s still in the Jeep when I go outside, but the tray is gone, and she goes out of her way to not look at me. I check the computer-printed directions to the hotel and then start the engine.

“Why?” Harper says as I pull out into traffic. At first I think she’s asking me why I slept with Paige, but then she continues. “Why would you bring me all the way to St. Augustine and then tell me you hooked up with your ex-girlfriend?”

“If I told you at home, you wouldn’t come.”

“You’re a shithead, Travis,” she says. “And I’m stupid for thinking you could possibly feel the same way about me as I do about you.”

“I do.”

“No, you don’t. Because I would never do that to you.”

Just like that I’m leveled. Ripped open. She could have shot me and it would be less painful. I know. I’ve been shot. Only I lived.

“Harper, I’m sorry,” I say.

She doesn’t reply, but I guess I’m not really expecting an answer. I’ve done a lot of apologizing and can see how that might call my sincerity into question—and piss her off.

We reach downtown and it sucks she’s not speaking to me, because St. Augustine is cool. The buildings are old and historic, some dating back to the 1700s, and the Spanish moss dripping from the oak trees in the park make it feel like we’re somewhere other than Florida. I wonder if Harper likes it as much as I do, but I don’t ask. Instead I ask her if she wants me to drive her back to Fort Myers.

“And prove to my dad that you’re as big an idiot as you were in seventh grade?” She snorts. “I don’t think so. Let’s just go to the hotel. Then you can do your thing and I can do mine until the service.”

Shit.

“I don’t want—”

“It doesn’t matter what you want,” she says. “What I want right now is for you to leave me alone.”

“But—” I want to explain. Tell her that what happened with Paige didn’t mean anything.

“Just don’t,” she says. “Because if you try to tell me that it didn’t mean anything or it just happened or that we weren’t technically together when you hooked up with Paige, I will punch you in the face again.”

And that’s the thing. There isn’t any good reason why I slept with Paige. I didn’t do it to get revenge on Ryan or because I wanted her back. I just did it because I could. And there’s really no excuse for that.

We don’t talk again until we reach the hotel, which is probably the fanciest place I’ve ever seen. The lobby is filled with overstuffed leather chairs, Spanish tapestries, golden chandeliers, and a tiled fountain. I feel like a peasant in the palace as I approach the black-vested man behind the marble-topped reception desk. He lifts his eyebrows when I tell him I have a reservation—as if he can’t believe it either—and for a moment I’m annoyed.

“Name?” he asks.

“Stephenson.”

His fingers click on his computer keyboard. “Two rooms,” he reads off the screen. “One night.”

“I want to pay for my own room,” Harper says.

“Harper…” All the while I was in Afghanistan, my pay was direct deposited into my bank account. Since I’ve spent very little money over the past year, I can afford these rooms. They’re expensive. Too much for what amounts to a couple of well-decorated bedrooms, but I wanted to impress her. Now I just want to make it up to her. “I’ve got it.”

She doesn’t say anything, but she walks as far away from me as she can as the bellman carries our luggage to the fourth floor. It’s strange letting someone else carry my seabag. Also, my dusty bag looks so alien in a hotel that looks like a Spanish castle. We stop first at Harper’s room. Although she doesn’t say anything as she goes inside, she glances back at me before closing the door.