The Girl He Used to Know(43)

“I’ve never worn lipstick before.”

“I’ve never worn it either.” I must have looked confused, because he laughed. “It was a joke, Annika.”

“Oh!”

“Sit up here,” he said, patting the counter. After hoisting myself onto it, Jonathan stood between my legs. “I bet it’s just like a coloring book.”

Using the pointed side, Jonathan traced my lip line with the precision of a surgeon. Then he used short strokes to fill my lips in completely. I closed them, enjoying the subtle popping sound when I opened them wide again. “Check it out,” he said.

I looked over my shoulder, staring in amazement at the girl in the mirror. “Wow,” I said. The bright color heightened my features and made me curious about whether a little mascara would balance the effect and improve it even more. Janice was going to be thrilled when I asked her.

I turned back around and Jonathan took my chin in his hands, moving my face to the right and then slowly to the left, studying my mouth. “I like it.” He looked into my eyes when he said it, and just when it would have been impossible for me to hold his gaze for one more minute, he closed them and pressed his forehead to mine. Maybe other people felt what I was feeling at that moment when they looked deeply into each other’s eyes, but when Jonathan and I were joined in a way I could handle, I knew what it felt like to be deeply connected to someone.

Years later, in therapy, when Tina helped me understand that he’d done it on purpose, the sadness I’d felt at losing him had been profound. At that moment, I missed him more than I’d ever missed anything, and the possibility of seeing him again someday seemed highly unlikely. But that day in his bathroom, at his mother’s house in Waukegan, I knew that Janice had been right when she said I was falling in love with Jonathan, even if I couldn’t completely identify it yet myself.

“I will never let anyone hurt you the way those girls did,” he said.

“Okay,” I said, because I didn’t doubt for one minute that he spoke the truth.

Then Jonathan kissed that lipstick right off me.



* * *



Jonathan wanted to leave by four o’clock so we could get checked into the hotel and meet the rest of the team for a pep talk in Eric’s room.

“Mom, why is your car in the driveway instead of the garage? It’s freezing out, and it’s supposed to snow tonight. Give me your keys, and I’ll move it for you.”

“I seem to have misplaced them.”

“Well, just give me the spare key.”

“That was the spare set. I lost the first set a month ago. I thought they would have turned up by now.”

“When did you last have them?”

“I went to the store yesterday, and when I came home, I thought I put them in that little ceramic bowl on the counter. The one my sister brought back from Paris.”

Jonathan went into the kitchen, and when he returned, he was holding a set of keys. “You did, Mom. They were in the bowl.”

She laughed and shook her head. “Oh, good lord. I think the holidays have done me in this year. Thank you, honey.” She kissed Jonathan on the cheek and took the keys from his hand. “I’m putting these back in the bowl right now. Still can’t find the other ones,” she said on her way out of the room.

Jonathan’s mother stood in the driveway and waved as we backed out. I waved back enthusiastically.

“That was odd,” Jonathan said. “My mom never loses anything.”

“I lose everything,” I said. “Maybe that’s why I like your mom so much.”

He took his eyes off the road for a second and smiled at me. “You like her?”

“Yeah. She was really nice to me.”

“She told me she liked you, too. She called you Katherine again, but what the hell. She likes you.”

I laughed, too. “Yeah.” She likes me.





23


Annika


THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN

1991



The Palmer House Hotel was the venue for the Pan-Am Championship. My mother had insisted on paying for our four-night stay, since Jonathan had been doing all the driving, and she’d given me her credit card and cautioned me not to lose it. I’d told my family about Jonathan’s dad dying and his part-time job and how he was putting himself through school. Will had said that he was probably strapped for cash, which made me feel even worse about the money he’d spent on the perfume. I had some money saved up and decided I would take Jonathan out for a nice dinner to repay him for the Christmas gift. My mom thought that was a great idea. Jonathan didn’t like the idea of me paying, but when he protested I said “I insist!” with the same tone my mother had used with me.

We deposited our luggage in our room and took the elevator two floors down to meet with the rest of the team in Eric’s room. Tournament participants had filled the hotel to capacity, and as we walked down the hall, students milled in and out of the rooms carrying ice buckets, six-packs of pop, and pizza boxes stacked five high. “One Night in Bangkok” from the Chess cast album blared from a boom box in an open doorway. When we arrived in Eric’s room, the rest of the team was lounging on the beds drinking cans of Coke.

“Hey, Jonathan. Annika,” Eric said. “Ready for tomorrow?”