The Art of Losing(75)

Raf nodded with a solemn, single tilt of his head. “Okay,” he said.

I walked back to the house in a daze and proceeded to pace its silent rooms restlessly. Floyd followed me for a while, from kitchen to basement to bedroom, before he grew tired and curled up at the bottom of the stairs. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I wanted to fix things, to do something, but I didn’t know what or how.

I wished Audrey were home. Mom and Dad were early-to-bed types, but I could always count on Audrey to be awake late into the night if I was ever bored or couldn’t sleep. Now, almost two months into her hospital stay, it still felt weird not to hear the low murmur of the TV show or movie she was watching or the creak of the floorboards beneath her feet while she roamed the house at night. Without thinking, I picked up the phone and called her.

She answered right away, sounding wide awake. “Hello?”

“Hey, Audy,” I said. “How are you?”

“Pretty good, considering,” she said. “You?”

I sighed into the phone so she could hear it.

“That bad?” she said. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m a mess,” I confessed. And I told her about Raf’s relapse and going to the meeting with him. What I had learned, and realized, about what a relationship with him could be like.

“Wow,” she murmured.

“This is why I don’t take chances. I just know disappointment will follow.”

She scoffed dismissively. “That’s a ridiculous philosophy.”

“I know that,” I said. “But it was working for me.”

“Really?” she asked. She knew the answer as well as I did.

“I don’t want to get hurt again,” I confessed.

“Of course you don’t.”

“Fine, but what do I do? I mean, you watch all those movies about love and finding The One, and now I’ve watched them, too, and . . . I just don’t get it. It all just seems so hard. There’s always so much heartbreak that goes into finding the happy ending.”

She laughed softly. “Maybe it’s na?ve,” she said, “but I just feel like it has to be worth the pain or there wouldn’t be so many movies made about love, you know?”

“But when do you know it’s worth taking that risk?”

“I wish that I knew,” Audrey said, sounding wise beyond her years. “But I think there are too many people in this world for it to be impossible to find someone you want to be with for the rest of your life. I mean, people are friends for years, right? Some people are friends their whole lives. And that’s not an obligation. There’s no marriage certificate or ceremony.”

I thought of Neema and wondered if she and Audrey really could remain friends. I’d hate to see their friendship end when it clearly meant so much to them both.

And I thought of Cassidy, who I loved like a sister, who I probably wouldn’t be friends with if we had met later in our lives, but who I would do anything for.

Audrey kept talking, amazingly at length and with very little slurring. “I also think it’s better to have loved and lost, you know? I just think everyone should get to experience that happiness, even if there’s a chance it might lead to heartbreak.” She was silent for a second, but when I didn’t answer, she went on. “Do you want to be with Raf badly enough to take the chance that it might not end well? That you might go through what you’ve been through with Mike all over again?”

I was quiet. It was the same question that Cassidy had asked, but now it held much more weight.

“You still there?” she whispered.

“I’m here,” I answered. “I’m just wondering how you ever got so much smarter than me.”

“Ha! I’ve always been smarter than you. You just refused to see it.”

“Maybe,” I said, allowing her to get away with it.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Audrey said.

“I know. Because I don’t think I can. And not because I don’t love Raf, I do. It’s because I don’t think I’d let myself get treated the way Mike treated me again. If Raf wants to keep drinking, then I’m out. And it’ll hurt, but not like it would if I kept letting him break my heart over and over again the way Mike did.”

This time it was Audrey’s turn to be quiet.

“I love you,” she said finally.

“I love you, too,” I answered, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Come home soon, okay?”

“I’m working on it.”

We said good night and hung up. But I wasn’t ready for bed yet. I dug around under my bed until I found a half-empty notebook and turned to a blank page. But this time I wasn’t writing angry poetry to submit to the literary magazine. It was a script for a comic. I illustrated it crudely with the worst stick-figure drawings in history, but I hoped it would make Raf laugh, at least.

I wrote a note and clipped it to the front page of the “comic.” It read:



Dear Raf,

I don’t remember the first time I saw you. It felt like you had always been there, at my side. I would have followed you anywhere as long as my hand was in yours.

You were my first friend. My first kiss. My first broken heart.

You are my first love. I just didn’t know what love was when I was three.