CHAPTER NINE
Nico
Once again, I feel like a complete asshole. I’m out on Valentine’s Day in New York City, and I completely forgot the most basic thing: reservations. Everywhere decent is filled up because, you know, it’s the busiest night of the year. And I’m stuck wandering around with Layla like a bum. She’s going to think I don’t give a shit about tonight. About her.
It’s not like I don’t know how to do this. I’m just a little rusty. It’s been a long time since my last girlfriend––three years, to be exact. And twenty-three-year-olds aren’t exactly known for being masters of romance. But still. I should have known better.
The hostess seats us at a small table in the window where we can people watch, mostly other couples out on similar kinds of dates. I offer to take Layla’s coat because I’m not a complete Neanderthal. But it turns out that was a mistake, because what I see just about knocks me the fuck out. Suddenly, I can’t quite breathe the right way. Between the skin-tight jeans she’s wearing and a shirt-thing that I’m really not sure how the fuck stays on, she looks like a package I want to unwrap. Like, right the fuck now.
“Damn,” I breathe, and she looks over her shoulder to find me practically drooling. Fuck me, her ass looks good in those pants.
When I realize she’s caught me staring, my mouth snaps shut, and I try to smile, although I have a feeling I look more like a serial killer. Layla sits down smugly. Yeah, she knew exactly what she was doing wearing that outfit.
Luckily, I didn’t mess around either. A leather jacket might not be the best choice when there’s a blizzard threatening outside, but the only stuff she’s seen me in are the baggy FedEx uniforms and the puffy coat I wear at the club. Between my job and the gym, I actually work out pretty hard most days, and I’m wearing a black t-shirt that shows it off. From the way Layla’s looking at me right now, the shirt is doing its job.
Unfortunately, she’s not the only one who notices. The hostess, a cute little thing with long brown hair, bats her eyelashes as she hands me a menu. She’s pretty, sure, and if Layla weren’t around, I might be a little interested. But it’s the same look I get all the time. They see the tattoos, they see the dark skin, and they see a bad boy and nothing else. Right now, I can’t see anything but the girl across the table, the girl who seems to see me. And I want this chick to stop flirting with me in front of my date.
“Should we get a bottle?” I ask Layla when the hostess asks for drink orders.
Her eyes bulge slightly as she nods. She’s only nineteen––I wonder if this is the first time anyone has ordered a bottle of wine at dinner who wasn’t her dad. Shit, I’m not sure I’ve ever ordered a bottle of wine at dinner.
“Um...that one,” I say, pointing to a random name on the list. I have no fuckin’ clue what I’m doing. Usually I drink PBR or whatever cheap beer is handy.
The hostess walks away with another wink my way, but I ignore her, especially since I see that Layla has noticed the flirting too and is not happy about it. Okay, time to distract. I’m not going to let this date be ruined in the first five minutes.
I tug off my beanie and set it on the table. When I look up, Layla is staring at me, mouth slightly open, as I push a hand through my short, curly hair. Really? All I had to do was take off my hat to get her to look at me that way?
I clear my throat.
“You clean up good, NYU,” I say, trying for some levity. “But I already knew that. A lot different than your usual look in the office.”
Immediately, she smiles. She does look different. With the gold chains and the tight clothes, she sort of looks like some of the girls from my neighborhood. I can’t decide if I like it or not.
“Oh. Yeah, thanks,” she says as she opens her menu.
I watch her for a second. She’s fidgeting, tapping a finger on the side of her menu, avoiding my gaze. Does she really not know the effect she has on me?
“Well, I think you’d look good in a paper bag,” I tell her, provoking another shy smile.
A silence falls, and we both become really interested in looking through our menus. Layla seems surprised when I order the steak. I want to ask her why, but I don’t want to hear her say what I’m pretty sure she was thinking: that she thought I was too poor to order the most expensive thing on the menu.
No. I’m not going there tonight. Not when I’ve been thinking about this date for the last two weeks and definitely not when she hasn’t said anything. I’m not going to let the chip on my shoulder fuck things up.
“I’ll have the side salad,” she says, handing her menu back to the waiter.
Now I’m the one who’s surprised. “You’re only going to eat a side salad?”
Layla just looks uncomfortable, but smiles at the waiter and nods. “I had a big lunch,” she says to me.
I don’t believe her. “Whatever you say, sweetie,” I say.
I have two sisters––I know how chicks are. Layla’s nineteen and obviously does something to keep her ass looking like that. Guaranteed she can put it down. Which means she’s not ordering for one of two reasons: she doesn’t want me to think she’s fat (yeah, not possible), or she can’t afford it.
It’s then I consider that maybe Layla isn’t exactly the same as the rich kids she goes to school with. Her jewelry and her nice clothes tell me she comes from something, but she’s also working twenty-five hours a week on top of going to school. It’s not full-time work like my sister, but she’s no slouch. Rich kids don’t have to work as receptionists.
I hope she’ll tell me what’s up, but she doesn’t say a word. Okay, then. Time to move on.
We continue sipping our wine way too quickly, making awkward conversation about the weather and the recent subway repairs on Forty-Ninth Street until our food arrives. It’s…weird. And really fuckin’ awkward.
I don’t get it. The energy I feel with this girl in every other place is like the way the air feels right before a thunderstorm. Sparks everywhere. All she has to do is smile, and I’m on fuckin’ fire. But now, on an actual date, sitting across from one another, we can’t get up a conversation any better than one I’d have with my Great Aunt Cecelia. And she speaks this really weird Creole dialect that I barely understand.
I watch as Layla drains her second glass of wine and reaches for the bottle, and it’s then I realize the problem. We’re both nervous.
~
Layla
To hell with playing nice, I decide just as our food arrives. Nico and I have been staring awkwardly at each other for the last fifteen minutes while we drank an entire bottle of wine. My lips are feeling loose. I have questions. He has stories. With a little liquid courage, I’m ready to dive in.
“So, Nico,” I say, spearing a piece of lettuce with my fork. “What’s with working at FedEx?”
He frowns at me mid-bite of his steak, then swallows heavily. “What do you mean?”
“Do you like it there? How long have you worked there? Is that all you want to do for a living?”
This strategy can go either way, I know. Some guys would take these kinds of questions to mean I think he’s a loser, like I’m giving him the third degree in order to make him feel like shit about himself, make him think he should change. More often than not, I’ve found those guys are just insecure in general. There’s a reason they always think they’re under attack.
I hope he’s not like that. I don’t want Nico to feel persecuted here, but our date so far has been about as exciting as dry toast. If this is how “nice” girls behave all the time—non-confrontational and demure—I can’t for the life of me understand how any of them ever have fun.
Nico peers at me with a raised eyebrow, as if he’s trying to figure out where I’m going with my questions, and then shrugs. “It’s not a dream job or anything, but it pays good. I’ve been there for almost seven years now.”
I almost choke on my lettuce. That would have made him, well, my age when he started working for them. I can’t imagine having the same job for that long. If I had to answer phones at Fox and Lager for seven years, I’d strangle myself. With the telephone cord.
But before I can respond, he continues.
“I was actually in school before then, but I had to drop out when my mom got hurt. I was the only one old enough to help out when she couldn’t work. My buddy got me the job at FedEx, and I’ve been there ever since.”
He takes another large bite of his steak, but keeps his intense black gaze trained squarely on me, watching my reaction carefully.
I swallow. “Your mom. Is she okay now?”
His expression softens, almost as if he’s relieved that I’m not trying to tear apart what he does. He nods.
“Yeah, she’s fine, but she can’t really work much anymore. Her back’s all messed up. The doctor says she has a couple of ruptured discs.”
“Jesus, that’s terrible.” I’m shooting for kind here, even though I’m wondering what kind of ruptured disc problem keeps you housebound for seven years. “She’s lucky she has you to help.”
“Well, it’s not just me anymore,” he says gruffly. “But when I started, my sisters were both in high school, and my brother was just a kid. We didn’t have health insurance, so when I was old enough to get a job with benefits, I was able to claim them as dependents and get everyone medical.”
I try to maintain a neutral expression and tone that echoes the one he’s kept firmly in place, but it’s hard. I can’t imagine having to support three younger siblings at my age. I also want to ask why his mother didn’t have health insurance, but something in his darkened expression tells me he doesn’t want to talk about this anymore.
“So what about now?” I ask. “Do you ever think of going back? To school, I mean?”
He considers the thought again, chewing carefully. “I’ve thought about it. But honestly, I actually want to be…well…it’s kind of dumb.”
I lean forward over my plate, curiosity getting the better of me. He is so much more interesting than the watery cucumbers in my garden salad. “What? What is it?”
He grins, and I almost knock over my wine.
“Well,” he says. “The engineering degree was really more because I thought it would be a good idea than something I was really interested in. But since I was a kid, I actually wanted to become a firefighter. Like, for the FDNY. Those guys are tough, and they live a kick-ass life. You get to be active, save people’s lives, and once you’re hired, you pretty much have a job for life unless you do something to really screw it up. And then, after 9/11...well, you were here. You know what happened.”
We both grow quiet at the mention of 9/11. I was only a freshman when it happened, had only been in the city for three weeks, and the memory of it was seared into my heart. Like most people who were actually in the city for it, neither of us elaborate. It was only a year and a half ago that the city shut down, filled with the ghostly debris of death and asbestos in the wake of one of the biggest tragedies in American history. Most of us still don’t have the words for it. I think the shock that everyone in the country felt was the only reason my dad didn’t yank me out of New York immediately.
Nico continues. “I just kept coming back to the firefighters. I always wanted to be one before, but those guys were really heroes. Some of them gave their lives to help the people who were trapped in those buildings. I just...I remember thinking after that, I want to do that. I want to be someone people think about as a hero.” He bites his lip and gives a sheepish grin. “I sound like a little kid, don’t I?”
“Not at all,” I say, completely charmed. “Why don’t you do it?” I take another bite of salad and wait pointedly for his answer.
“I’ve tried,” he confesses. “It’s not that easy. I applied twice to the FDNY and was turned down both times. Once because I wasn’t qualified, and the other because they were full up. I’m out of time. They don’t hire anyone over twenty-nine.”
“Aren’t you only twenty-six?” I ask.
He shrugs. “I’ll be twenty-seven in September. But first I have to get the invite to take the exam. Then I have to go through academy...if they even reopen their hiring to begin with. I’d be twenty-seven, almost twenty-eight by the time I could even start. Time’s pretty much up.”
Nico signals to the waiter for another bottle of wine, stopping any more questions I have. Well, I did sign up to drink, didn’t I?
“You know,” he says. “I’ve thought about becoming a cop, because I hear sometimes that can help you get into the academy, too, but I don’t know. I don’t really like cops.”
I snort. “Who does?”
He grins. “You get pulled over a lot, NYU?”
I say nothing, just purse my lips. He’s got me there. He’s nice enough, though, to let that line of conversation die.
“So, my turn for twenty questions. What’re you studying in college? What do you want to be when you grow up? Tell me all about Layla.”
Something about the way he rolls the syllables of my name over his tongue sends ripples all over my skin, the kind that make me want to throw myself across the table to see what else that tongue can do. I cringe a bit at the backhanded reference to my age, but maybe he’s just kidding. I hope.
“Well,” I say as I stab another piece of lettuce. “I’m kind of figuring that out. I’m supposed to go to law school.”
“Supposed to?”
I shrug. “It’s the only way I could convince my dad to let me come to NYU instead of staying home and going to UW.”
“So, what are you, pre-law?”
I shake my head. “NYU doesn’t have a pre-law program, so I can pretty much choose anything. I’m still figuring out my major.”
Nico cocks his head to the side. “Don’t you have to do that soon? Before your junior year or something like that?” When he catches my surprised look, one black brow arches. “Hey, I put in a couple of years. I remember a little bit about it.”
I finish chewing my lettuce and sigh. “It’s a sore subject.”
“Well, what classes have you enjoyed the most?”
“That’s the problem,” I say after a big gulp of wine. “I sort of like everything. I’m taking a literature class right now, and that’s great. Biology was fascinating. This religious studies seminar I took last semester blew my mind.” I look up. “Did you know that in one version of the Gospel, the direct translation of Christ’s death actually says he was hanged, not crucified?”
Nico blinks. “I did not know that.”
I shrug and go back to forking my limp lettuce. “Anyway. Yeah. I guess I’m having a hard time deciding exactly what I want to study. But I have to declare soon. This is my last semester of prerequisites. I have to start my major classes next year.”
Nico watches sympathetically. “I get it. It’s hard having that kind of decision forced on you, especially when there are so many amazing things in the world to see, and too much shit to figure out about yourself, right?”
I blink away the sudden tears that are welling up. Somehow, this conversation ended up touching on a bunch of nerves. I’ve known this guy for all of a couple of weeks. How does he know the questions that are brewing inside me––questions I haven’t even been able to put into words yet?
“Hey.”
Nico puts his fork down and reaches over to touch my hand. There it is again––that strange tingle that happens when we touch. I shiver, despite the fact that inside the restaurant, it’s actually pretty warm.
“Layla?”
I look up, blinking away the wet sheen clouding my vision. When it clears, I just see Nico. Instantly, I feel better.
“You’ll be all right,” he says as he squeezes my hand. “You’re smart, sweet, and you obviously did something right to end up where you are. You’ll figure it out in the end.”
The confident, kind look in his eyes just about breaks me. “Thanks,” I say as I take back my hand and swipe under my eyes before I actually do cry and trash my eye makeup. “Sorry. I didn’t mean for things to get so heavy.”
Nico takes another bite of steak and grins. “I’ll take heavy over bullshit any day of the week, baby. I like real.”
I finish my salad and set the plate aside, picking up my wine and taking a long drink to chase away the emotions clouding my head. Nico refills my glass with the last of the first bottle while the waiter opens our second. But what really surprises me is when he cuts off a portion of his steak and plops it on my plate along with a handful of fries.
“What’s this?” I ask.
He just shrugs adorably. “You need to eat, baby. Nobody can drink a bottle of wine on iceberg lettuce. So, your family’s from Brazil, right? You go there a lot?”
Still marveling at the way he just pivoted from the steak, I start to cut up my food. I can’t deny that I’m still starving. I’m also starting to feel the pleasant wooziness of alcohol rising in my head and dissipating the last of my nerves.
“Just a few times,” I say. “The last time was when I was in high school, for Carnaval.”
“Carnaval,” he repeats with a clipped “r”, the way Spanish speakers, not Brazilians, would say it. “That must have been crazy. I’m so fuckin’ jealous.”
I take another, smaller bite of my steak and nod. “Yeah, it’s pretty nuts.”
“Do you go to the parades, like in Rio?”
I shake my head. “No, those are mostly for tourists, although a lot of people watch them on TV. My dad’s family goes up to Salvador, in Bahia, where they rent a condo on the beach. The city has these giant trucks, they’re called trios electricos, and the samba bands play on top of them, blasting their music to the crowds. Everyone parties in the streets for six days straight. When you’re tired, you go sleep in the house; when you’re thirsty, you drink the cheap beer all the vendors have; when you’re hot, you go run in the ocean. It’s amazing.” I sigh. “I wish I was there now. It starts next week, you know.”
I sit back in my chair and smile, a little lost in the fond memories.
“Did you ever go to a soccer game?” Nico asks, interrupting me from my samba daydream. He’s just finished his steak and has assumed the same comfortable, slightly glazed-eye position that I’m in. Apparently, the wine has loosened up us both.
I smile. “Hell yeah, I did. Played too.” I take another bite, satisfied with the shocked look on Nico’s face.
He leans forward. “Seriously? You, playing? I thought chicks didn’t really get into sports there; at least, that’s what the Brazilians I’ve met say.”
I nod, swirling my wine glass meditatively. “It’s kind of true, actually. Most of the girls just go to the gym. But I played soccer through high school, and so I played on the beach with my cousins, too. It’s where I get all my moves.” I gyrate my neck a bit, demonstrating one of said moves, and earn a laugh in return. “You like soccer?”
Nico nods, eyes blazing. “A little, yeah. I play in the park sometimes too, but I suck. What position did you play?”
“Striker,” I say with a wink and a grin. “I know how to score.”
And that’s all it takes to jumpstart the connection I knew was there all along. We talk about everything and nothing, finishing the second bottle of wine and ordering a slice of mediocre chocolate cake to share just so we won’t have to leave. I tell him about the lonely house where I grew up, what my parents are like, and how my biggest dream right now is to stop living off my parents when I graduate. He tells me about how he likes to draw in his spare time, how he lives in Dominican City, sometimes with his sister and her kid when she’s on the outs with her boyfriend, and how his favorite sibling is his baby brother, Gabriel, who’s just a couple of years younger than me. He’s proud of Gabe, who is getting ready to go to school at CUNY next year. Nico has about half his tuition money saved so far.
The job at FedEx makes more and more sense. Nico carries the burdens of a lot of people on his big shoulders, burdens that require a full-time job that, after so many years, pays well and comes with excellent benefits.
“Gabe’s crazy smart. Just like you, baby,” he says. The second bottle of wine has also made him a lot more familiar, and I like it. “You’d like him.”
“You sound like you want to set me up with him,” I joke. “Maybe I’m out with the wrong brother.”
That earns me a dark glare almost immediately, and I start to giggle almost uncontrollably. Nico leans over the small table, now cleared of all dishes besides our wine glasses and the empty bottle. He covers my hand with his. I try to pull it back, playing the coquette, but he presses it tightly to the tablecloth.
“Oh, no,” he growls, causing my heart to skip a few beats. “You definitely got the right brother, NYU.”
I stop laughing, caught in the intensity of his gaze, now just a few inches from my own.
“Did I?” I ask.
He grunts and signals for the check. “I think,” he says as he drains the last of the wine in his glass, “that it’s time we get out of here. Don’t you?”
I couldn’t agree more.
~