Finding Mr. Brightside

45

ABRAM

IT’S THE WEEKEND after getting back from the beach, and Mom’s in the kitchen making breakfast when I walk in searching for a stamp. I find one in her secret candy drawer, slap it on, and slide the envelope toward the pancake griddle so she can see what I’m mailing today.

“Is this what I think it is?” Mom says, pointing the spatula at my college application. I nod, and she wraps her arms around me.

“Just finished filling it out downstairs,” I say proudly. “Accepted the te

“Whatever you want to do, Abram, as long as you go to school. And to class while you’re there, please—that would be a nice bonus.” She turns back to the pancakes and takes a deep breath. “Oh, thank God, I’m so relieved.”

“Wow, I must’ve really looked like I was going nowhere for a while,” I say.

“Noooo,” Mom says, reaching out and squeezing my hand. “Well, not since you met the beautiful closet organizer downstairs.”

I give her a sheepish grin. “How’d you know she was here already?”

“Moms always know, Abram,” she says with a smile. “Plus, she’s almost always here.”

I find Juliette eavesdropping at the top of the basement stairs.

“Did you hear the part about moms always knowing?” I ask.

“Yes.”

“What did you think?”

“I wanted to believe her,” she says.

“But?”

She shakes her head. “So I believed her.”

Juliette

ABRAM TAKES MY HAND and leads me toward the breakfasty smells escaping from the kitchen. I forgot to bring my appetite, remembered the tension in my neck. I’m leaving as soon as Abram’s mom says anything passive-aggressive about our trip to the beach. But I’ve eavesdropped on enough of her conversations with her son to know she won’t; that’s just me wanting to go already.

“Mom?” Abram says. Suzy removes several pancakes from the griddle in front of her and turns around. “This is Juliette.”

“Hi,” I say with a weird wave of my hand. Suzy Morgan attacks me, all right … with a vicious hug! Her body radiates warmth, like Abram’s, and I can smell the rosemary-mint conditioner she buys for him in her bouncy blond hair.

“Thank you for coming,” she says, sounding genuine. “Next time I promise not to burn the pancakes.”

“Oh, no, I’m sure they’re fine,” I say, looking over at them.

“They’re mildly burnt,” Abram says by the griddle, picking one up and taking a bite out of it. “Still taste good, though.”

“What can I get you to drink?” Suzy asks me. “We have orange juice, milk…”

What if I were the kind of Bob Evans farm girl who rubbed her tummy and said, Mmm, yes, can I have a big, tall glass of milk with a straw, please?

“Coffee?”

“Yes!” she exclaims. “We have that.” As if to prove this is a house of no beverage judgment, Abram reaches into the fridge and pops the tab on a can of Sunkist.

“It’s a little on the strong side,” Suzy apologizes, handing me a huge casino-branded mug with a red 7-shaped handle. Abram smiles to himself, well aware of my caffeine-glugging tolerance (one of my few high tolerances).

“I’ll just sip it,” I tell Suzy, because she hasn’t stopped caring yet. She smiles and buzzes back to the carafe to pour a cup for herself, too.

The three of us take our seats and start passing plates of food around, salt and pepper shakers, syrup, etc. Suzy’s phone blows up several times as her sister, Jane, tries to set her up on a date. Oh, Aunt Jane, whose life I now know better than my own, thanks to Facebook—e.g., her latest post wondering if her feet aching has more to do with the cold weather or her half-marathon training. Thirty-seven people Liked it, practically begging for the next installment, and I was one of them.

True to form, Aunt Jane won’t take no for an answer, so eventually Suzy stands up and puts the phone inside the Crock-Pot to slow-cook away any future distractions. I’ll have to borrow that recipe from her sometime.

“How do you feel about recently divorced veterinarians?” I ask Suzy when she sits back down. Feeling stupid, I reach under the table for the dog. She’s chewing the piece of bacon Abram just gave her. “There’s this doctor at the Humane Society, sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

Suzy leans forward and smiles. “What’s his name?”

I hold up my phone so she can see for herself.

“Now that’s an option,” Suzy says. Abram smiles at me as his mom continues to explore it. I mouth a Sorry, he mouths back a Thank you.

“I don’t think he has any kids,” I tell Suzy, thinking that’s a huge plus. She looks disappointed for a second, then goes back to staring.

“Okay, enough about my future boyfriend,” Suzy says, handing back my phone, “tell me more about the beach. Did you run into Terry and Linda, by any chance?”

Abram and I look at each other, then back at Suzy, who’s now looking away. “After I called and asked them to keep an eye on you,” she says to the refrigerator.

The three of us share a laugh, splitting it pretty much equally.

ABRAM

JULIETTE AND I put away the dishes while Mom directs Aunt Jane to the Humane Society website over the phone. From the sounds of their conversation, Aunt Jane seems to be approving (we can hear the approval from her end of the line).

“What if he’s a creeper?” Juliette whispers, handing me a bowl to place in the dishwasher.

“Then we’ll design an exit strategy for her.”

“I like where your head’s at,” she says, “but I’m not sure why you put that bowl there.”

“Sorry, baby.” I look up and grin, waiting for her brain to reject the “baby.” “Too soon?”

“Not at all … baby.” She can’t keep a straight face.

Is this a preview of us two years from now, coexisting in our first crappy on-campus apartment together? I’m thinking so. Ten dollars she won’t be scrunching her nose at my pet names by then, either. She’ll be like, “Hey, baby, will you stop putting the cookie sheet in the dishwasher when it doesn’t fit, please? Or maybe just stop making cookies altogether, babes, thanks?” And I’ll say, “I’ll take those requests into consideration, sugar cookie.” She’ll roll her eyes, and then sugar cookie will be her new nickname for a little while, until she goes back to being my baby again.

Juliette’s been trying to hand me a plate for a solid ten seconds now.

“My bad, baby.”

EPILOGUE

Juliette

THERE SHE IS, standing behind the counter like she’s been expecting me. Mindy hasn’t changed a bit since she last dispensed my pills, so that’s something to appreciate about her. I wore my hair down to surprise Abram today and nearly died from the psychological adjustment on the way over here.

“How are you, Mindy?” I say, sliding my new prescription across the countertop.

She smiles. “I’m well, Juliette. You’re looking ta

I’m loving Mindy these days.

I tell her I was at the beach last week, and she says her boyfriend’s parents have a place down that way, OMG, small world. Odd, I’ve never pictured a boyfriend figure living in Mindy’s townhouse—more like a sloppy girl roommate who rolls down the waistband of her baggy sweatpants while making Ramen in the kitchen, a scratched-up dining room table covered in student-loan invoices, and an overfed cat named Mr. Whiskers who’s wondering where it all went wrong. That’s my way of expressing that I’m happy Mindy has someone, too.

“Let me just see if we have this medication in stock.”

“I think you do,” I say. “That was me calling ahead two hours ago.”

Nervous laughter from both sides of the counter. It’s like some sort of customer-service barrier has been broken, her knowing I call every month, me finally acknowledging it. She comments that it’s a lower dosage than I’ve gotten in the past, and I tell her this will be my last bottle.