Chapter 18

It’s been a while since I last ate chicken and dumplings, but I’m pretty sure Suzie’s are the best in the world.

I’m sitting beside Levi under the stars in his backyard, laughing at the stories Augustin and Ivanka tell about the first time they met, how they fell in love. Levi laughs as well, and when his head moves his hair bounces with a life of its own. He’s relaxed, and I’m smitten. It’s no longer just a possibility; I’m well aware that I’m falling hard. I might try to pick myself back up, but let’s face it: I like it here. From this angle, I can see the stars and the sky spinning around me, and the universe doesn’t feel so large, and I think I might know myself in a bigger way.

But in the same way that everything feels good, it also hurts. My chest aches and my heart is a little too big, and when Levi puts his arm around my shoulders and leans in to ask how my food is, my throat strangles, and I don’t know how to speak.

(What are words, anyway?)

After barely getting myself together, two seconds too late, I smile up at him. (Oh, God, no, not the dazzling eyes. DON’T LOOK AT HIS EYES, BEE.) “It’s delicious.” I only just manage to not say something stupid. (Like, “You’re delicious.”) I fixate on Suzie so I don’t fall into the abyss. “Suzie, really, you’re amazing.”

Suzie winks at me. “I’m glad you could make it tonight,” she says.

“Me, too.”

Ivanka puts her hand over her fiancé’s, grinning. “Augustin has already asked four times to see the dress. I tell him ‘no’, but he does not listen!”

I laugh. “Come on, Augustin. Play fair.”

“I am too happy,” he protests. “Was she the most beautiful creature you ever saw?”

“Yes,” I say, although I’m lying, because Levi is the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen. “She’s an angel.” I take the last bite of chicken and set my spoon down. “When does your family get into town?”

“Friday morning, early,” Ivanka says. “I miss them very much.”

I smile sympathetically, trying to imagine moving so far away from my family. “I’m excited to meet them.”

“I’ve already told them about you, the girl Bonita who likes to be called Bee. They cannot wait to see you.”

I am so glad I don’t have food in my mouth right now—I would have choked. Suzie puts her head in her hands, as if sharing in my exasperation. And Levi…well, I’ve never seen him look so smug.

I realize, with my stomach clenching tight, that there are a lot of things I haven’t seen him do, a lot of things I don’t know about him—and I want to know them all.

“Thank you, Ivanka,” I say, giving Levi the Death Glare. “Your wedding will be a great success, thanks to everyone giving their time and energy. I’m so excited for you both.”

“Would you like to stay for dessert?” Suzie asks, staring to clear the plates.

“Thank you, but we should leave,” she says, and nods at Augustin. “I have to hide my dress from this one.”

We say our goodbyes at the front door. I’m watching them drive away, getting ready to grab my purse and leave, when Suzie drags me back into the house. “You, at least, must stay for dessert!” she tells me.

I smile and nod in assent. “Okay, if you insist.”

“I do,” she says with finality.

“As do I,” Levi adds from the kitchen. I find him standing at the sink, sleeves of his orange sweater rolled up to his elbows, scrubbing away at a plate. He grins at me over his shoulder. “Just so you know, your phone rang.”

I excuse myself to the front room and dig through my purse. Gretchen called twice in the last three minutes, probably because I texted her before dinner—with all the calm of a hysterical puppy—to tell her where I was going. And since I hear Levi and Suzie talking, their voices quiet, I click on Gretchen’s name and put the phone to my ear.

She answers in two seconds flat. “Bernice, you better have good news for me.”

“It’s just dinner with his mom and Ivanka and Augustin,” I whisper, trying not to sound exasperated. I suddenly feel exasperated. (I think this is what comes with wanting something you cannot have.)

“So what?!” she squeals. “Are you still there?”

“Bee?” Levi’s voice scares me. I jump, heart thudding, and face him. (His eyes are laughing at me.) “You okay?”

“It’s Gretchen,” I mouth.

“Let me talk to her,” he says, just as Gretchen screeches into my ear, “Is that him?! Let me talk to him!”

I laugh, overwhelmed, and hand him the phone. “The feeling is mutual.”

He puts the phone to his ear. “The famous Gretchen!” He smiles at me and continues, “It’s good to put a voice to the name. Now I just need a face.” He pulls the phone away and looks at the picture I have of Gretchen in the background. “Ah, got it,” he tells her. He’s silent for a few moments, his eyes still laughing. “We’re about to have dessert.” Another pause. “I heard you love Bon Iver,” he says finally, and laughs. (I just knew that was coming.) “Yeah, I’ve been trying to get her to love them, but she’s stubborn.”

I roll my eyes at him.

He smirks. (Dear Levi, could you please stop giving me heart palpitations? Sincerely, The Nameless Creature) “Yeah, she just did.”

I gape. “What are you talking about?”

“Gretchen predicted you’d roll your eyes.”

I shake my head. “This is hopeless.”

He’s back to Gretchen now, so I sit down on the couch and listen. “What has she told you about me? I assume since you know who I am that she’s talked about me,” he says, a bit quieter.

I sit up straight. Levi’s nodding his head into the phone, grinning, laughing at his own jokes, at hers.

I want to die.

“Oh, you know, that you’re best friends and all that. That she misses you every day. That you’re practically twins.” Levi pauses again, his face growing serious, eyes narrowing.

Without even a glance in my direction, he turns away from me.

“Hey!” I protest. He holds up one finger, so I sit back and watch him, all tall and lean and pretty as he rests against the door frame that leads to the kitchen. Eventually, after a few mumbled responses and nods, he turns back to me.

“Nice to finally talk to you, Gretchen,” he says, and hands the phone back to me.

Yep, I’m dead. “Gretchen, what on earth?” I meet Levi’s gaze, surprised to find him already looking at me. No, more than that: He’s studying me. Not smiling, but happy. Curious, but not invasive. His lips part like he’s contemplating saying something, but then he turns away from me.

My whole body is one giant, pounding heartbeat.

Gretchen’s laugh rings in my ear, but I can barely hear it over my rushing blood. She says, “It’s nothing, really. Just…talking.”

I want to strangle her. “As dead as Jay Gatsby, Gretchen,” I threaten.

“Your attempts to terrorize me are futile because you love me too much. Now, go. Be charming. And snatch him up, because if you don’t, I will. He likes Bon Iver. Also, I think you’re crap.”

And just like that…she hangs up.

Levi comes back into the room to find me staring at my phone, shocked. “Here, have some pie.”

I take the plate from him absently, but his laugh brings me back. “Sorry,” I say. “She drives me crazy, but I love her.”

He nods, as if completely understanding, and then motions toward the back door. We walk, past the patio table and onto the path that curves around the yard, coming to a little double-seated swing, between two looming rose bushes. I sit down, and he joins me, scooping a fork-full of pie into his mouth. “So. Gretchen. How’d you meet her?”

I shrug. “She lived here, for a long time. My parents knew her parents. And then her dad had to move for his business. It wasn’t until then that we realized we couldn’t live without each other. Like soulmates, but…not?”

Levi laughs. “I mean, I only just met her, but I’d say she’s a keeper.”

You’re a keeper. “What about you? Your friends?”

“I have a lot of good friends now, but…” He shrugs. “This might sound stupid, but it’s hard for me to make friends.”

I scrunch my nose up at him. “Lies.”

“I promise it’s not. I’m only just learning how. I didn’t do much friend-making in high school. Everyone around me was a little like my father: insincere, arrogant, self-centered. Maybe it was just the school I was at…I don’t know. But if there’s anyone I don’t want to be, any type of person I don’t want to hang out with, it’s my dad.” Levi studies me from the corner of his eye. “It’s not that he’s a terrible man. He’s not the monster under my bed; I’m not afraid of him. He just…he breaks hearts, you know? He broke my mom’s heart and said nothing, did nothing. He broke my heart and he didn’t even know.”

I breathe out heavily. “Where is he now?”

“Malibu, in a huge mansion, with however many girlfriends he wants. It’s like he turned fifteen and then never aged mentally.”

I fake-gag. “Do you see him often?”

“He comes to TCP events.” Levi sets his empty plate on the ground. “You should know something, Bee.”

I lean forward, hands on my knees, the empty pie plate in my lap. I’m stuffed and comfortable and the air is cool. I don’t want to move ever again.

Levi takes a deep breath in and says, “I didn’t found The Color Project, Bee.”

I turn in surprise. (Although it’s hard to look at him and I want to close my eyes or disappear or make him disappear. His hair is so touchable and his lips are pursed like they want to be kissed and they want to be kissed by me.) “You didn’t?”

“I mean, it’s mine now. But my father started it, years ago, before the divorce. It was under another name, Orville Center for the Needy. He totally sounds like an arrogant jackass, huh?”

I bite back a laugh. “Yeah, he kind of does.”

“When my dad told me about the divorce, he tried to bribe me into ‘being okay’ by offering me anything I wanted. I took my time…. I dunno, maybe I just wanted to mess with him. There wasn’t much I wanted, anyway. Especially not his typical rich divorce bribes—a shiny car, a yacht, a new gaming system. I wanted something that wouldn’t remind me of my dad and his money every time I looked at it. Something I could make my own.”

I stare at him, openly. (I’m too impressed to care.)

“I didn’t have a single idea what I wanted until the week before the divorce. My mom was on her last few days volunteering for the original charity, and I guess…I guess that made us realize we didn’t want him to ruin a good thing with his selfishness and greed. So I asked him for the charity, and he gave it to me. It’s under my mom’s name, but she put me in charge of basically everything. We did everything we could to keep the original sponsors and donators. My dad pays rent every month, but as soon as we’re independent, I’m moving to a bigger facility. Somewhere we can have our fundraisers and our interviews, if possible.”

I’m still gaping. I shut my mouth but continue to stare.

“I hope that doesn’t…I don’t know…make things weird,” he adds.

I laugh outright. “That doesn’t make anything weird. You turned down everything else in the world to run a charity. Do you know how much I respect you for that?” I’m mostly whispering now because I can’t believe I said the words out loud. (Is this that thing they call confidence?)

“You respect me?” He laughs. As if this was funny.

“Duh, of course I do. Who wouldn’t?”

“Um, my dad?”

“But we already established that he’s an arrogant jackass. Do I seem like an arrogant jackass to you?”

He chuckles. “No.”

“Then you have no choice but to believe me.”

“Fine.” His expression changes then, but I can’t quite pinpoint it. Then he says, “Can I tell you something?”

I nod.

“I feel like I’ve known you longer than most people in my life.”

“I know,” I whisper.

“It’s kind of weird.”

“And yet,” I say, looking at the stars above us, thankful that Levi is on this spinning planet with me, “it’s not weird at all.”

He sits back, the swing moving with him, and looks up with me. “The stars again.”

“Yeah. They’re always the first thing I think about when I go outside. Even in broad daylight.”

“Same here. After our conversation, I did a little bit of research. That one right there is Orion.” He points, tracing the constellation, and when I scoot in close to him, I can see it.

“Ah! With the line of three stars?”

“Yeah.”

“Any others?” I don’t want to move, with my shoulder pressed up against his chest and my elbow against his thigh and our faces angled just right so that they’re not touching (but they might as well be).

“Don’t remember them.” We laugh, and he drops his arm, and I regret not paying more attention in astronomy last semester. “One day, maybe, I’ll learn them well enough to teach you.”

I nod, not thinking about the stars anymore, and dare enough to lean my shoulder against his. I’ll be here, I think. I close my eyes and try not to dream about stealing kisses in a world made of flowers and stars.