“I knew it,” she said. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me he was yourboyfriend, Auntie Sean!”
I almost tell her that I didn’t know he was my boyfriend myself until a few days ago, but Julian has already turned on his charm for her.
“You were fantastic up there,” he says. “Congratulations.”
Sophie’s expression flickers with knowing. It confirms what I’ve been asking myself: if she saw what happened between Julian and her father from the stage. It saddens me some when she doesn’t address it. It’s the surest sign that Winona’s baby girl is growing up: she has learned artifice.
When Sophie squeezes past us to greet her dad and stepmom at the end of the row, Julian pulls me into him.
“She’s a great kid,” he says softly, watching Sophie’s three parents put aside their personal enmities to celebrate their daughter. He sounds almost wistful, and I study his face in profile. Anxiety tickles my throat. I can never give him this, and he knows that.He has to know that.
“Is that what you want?” I say softly.
Julian turns to me. The amber auditorium lights shroud him in a halo. He swallows, and I follow the course of his Adam’s apple like a ball drop.
“I don’t think I’d make a very good parent. And that’s okay. Family doesn’t have to look one way,” he says. He tucks a loc behind my ear, and the tenderness of the motion assures me more than his words. “I might like something like what you have with Sophie. Being an impactful adult in a child’s life. It looks nice.”
“It is,” I confess. “Getting to watch her grow up, figure out her passions, form thoughts and ideas…it’s been rewarding.”
Julian nods, pensive. I’m about to ask him if he’s consideredmentoring youth alongside his entrepreneurs when he freezes, his fingers stilling on my face.
“What?” I ask, watching his brows furrow with concern.
“Your hair,” he whispers.
I squint up at him in confusion, but Leila’s voice cuts through the din before I can respond.
“Julian!” she says, waving. “We’re heading out!”
Julian twitches back to life.
“One moment,” he says to me. To Leila, in a voice like thunder, “Wait. We need to talk.”
My gaze swings reflexively to Brandon, whose attention has already locked on to Julian. Leila gives them both a beatific smile, then tells her husband, “Why don’t you wait right here, honey. Spend a little more time with Sophie.”
Brandon doesn’t look pleased with being grounded, but he steps aside and lets them go.
And then there were four.
When Winona, Sophie, and I hang out, it always feels natural. But after Brandon’s infidelity came to light, adding him into the mix has always made me feel like I’m imposing. I shuffle just slightly outside their circle as Sophie demands her parents’ opinion and tries to make a case for Applebee’s. When ten minutes pass and Leila and Julian are still nowhere to be found, the panic begins. It comes in a rush: sweat beading on my forehead, my stomach twisting into knots, the sort of nauseating anticipation triggered by receiving a phone call from an ex or walking onto a stage for a big presentation. I imagine Julian and Leila tangled together in bathroom stalls and darkened corridors, stealing away to sneak passionate kisses behind one of the theater’s heavy metal doors. The feeling doesn’t feel quite my own, and the images are improbable to the level of absurdity—Leila andJulian interact more like siblings than friends, with a mixture of affection and contempt—but they linger in a way I can’t shake.
I turn and catch Brandon’s eye, the anxiety breeding behind it. I suspect that he feels the same way, and that the only reason why he hasn’t already given chase is because his beloved told him to wait.
“I’m going to the bathroom,” I announce as Sophie changes her mind and suggests a trip to Steak ’n Shake instead.
When I break out into the hall, the crowds have already thinned. A movement catches the corner of my eye: two figures, one tall and broad, the other small and slight, turning into a dark alcove labeled “Exit.”
I know I shouldn’t follow them. Two close friends wanting to have their tiff in private isn’t anything out of the ordinary, and if I can’t trust Julian alone with Leila I shouldn’t be messing with him at all. But something in my body wants to come between them, and without thinking about it, I follow them.
The alcove leads to a stairwell, all concrete and rusting iron that looks nothing at all like the cheerily painted walls of the atrium. I slip inside.
I hear them before I see them, furious whispers echoing against the concrete walls. I can tell they are a floor or two below, out of sight but just barely. Quietly, I settle into a squat, straining to listen.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Julian?”
That is Leila’s voice, all right, but it sounds different—higher, harsher, and ringing with a level of fury I didn’t know she was capable of.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Julian says.