Phoebe Berman's Gonna Lose It(6)
But I was so flustered by his appearance that my opening line came out harsher than I intended it.
“Why are you listening to this?” I couldn’t imagine what a guy like him was doing blasting the Grease soundtrack.
He crossed his arms against his broad chest, frowning slightly. “It’s a great song.”
“It is a great song,” I agreed. “Sorry, but when I heard Olivia Newton-John coming from your room, this”—I made a sweeping gesture over his body—“wasn’t what I was expecting.”
He chuckled, and I exhaled. “I’m Jonathan,” he said, opening his door farther to reveal a mess of clothes and moving boxes.
“I’m Phoebe,” I introduced myself, finally. “I can help you get organized if you want. I’m really good at it.”
We got to know each other while I helped him unpack. I learned that Jonathan was from a small town in middle-of-nowhere West Virginia, which surprised me. I had never met anyone from there and wasn’t entirely convinced it was a real place until Jonathan assured me that it did definitely exist and there were actually people who lived there.
“It wasn’t a great place to grow up,” he explained. “There was nothing to do there. Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad if my parents were less strict, but they didn’t even let me watch TV. We didn’t even have one in the house. I was so bored.” He told me that when he was younger, the only time he ever got to watch anything was when he snuck over to his neighbor’s house before his parents got home from work. She was a few years older than him, and while she did have access to a television, all she ever wanted to watch was Grease. And so that was all Jonathan ever watched, too.
“And now here I am, majoring in film.”
“Wow,” I said. “But you’ve seen other movies by now, right?”
“Yes,” he said, laughing. “But I still love Grease the most.”
“I’m glad,” I told him. And I was glad. Thank god for Grease, because if I hadn’t heard it coming from Jonathan’s room that day, I probably would have looked down at my feet every time he passed me in the hallway.
* * *
—
Now, twelve years later, the soundtrack to our friendship is the same, only instead of having to lower the volume at ten p.m. in order to avoid noise complaints, we can play it as loud as we want in our own apartment.
I throw my arms around him the second he reaches the bottom of the stairs, knocking him slightly off-balance. He catches us both before we fall.
I step back, leaving less than a foot between us, and look him over. He’s wearing my favorite shirt of his, the green one that brings out the emerald flecks in his hazel eyes. It’s only been three days since I last saw him, but in that time, his stubble has grown out to the perfect length: a little longer than a five o’clock shadow, but not long enough to be considered a beard. I ball my hands into fists at my sides to stop from reaching up and brushing a loose strand of dark hair from his face. Sometimes the way he looks still manages to overwhelm me, like he just opened his dorm room door and I’m seeing him for the first time all over again.
Ironically, though, Jonathan’s looks quickly became one of the reasons I’ve always been so comfortable around him. I’ve never had to worry about something sexual or romantic happening between us because there’s no way someone who looks like that could be attracted to someone who looks like me. Not because I’m some sort of troll, but because I’m not in the same league as Jonathan.
Although I’m not sure anyone is.
He runs his fingers through his messy hair. “Are you gonna be ready to go soon?”
“Yes, give me a few minutes to freshen up,” I say while absentmindedly reaching for my own curls, smoothing down a halo of frizz. Luckily, trivia night at Jeffery’s doesn’t require too much primping.
I make my way up the stairs to my bedroom, subtly taking a deep breath in when I pass Jonathan. He’s been wearing the same cologne the entire time I’ve known him, and it always puts me at ease.
Two years ago, when Jonathan’s roommate moved out and he offered me his second bedroom, I jumped at the chance. I’ve always loved this place and its high ceilings and bright, natural light. Not to mention the bedrooms are huge; though I still haven’t quite gotten around to decorating mine the way I want to. My walls are far too bare and the stack of books piled on top of my dresser needs a permanent home. I’ve been daydreaming about getting myself a nice vintage bookshelf for my collection of romance novels, but the idea of investing in quality furniture in my twenties seems daunting, especially as someone who’s apartment hopped a bunch. It could be a perfect thirtieth birthday gift to myself. Something to actually look forward to about turning thirty.
I open my dresser drawers and stare at the neat stacks of shirts, currently organized by color.
I play around with alternative configurations in my brain.
Of course.
It would make infinitely more sense to organize them by how frequently I wear each one, rather than by color. Unable to stop myself, I start to shift the shirts around, arranging the ones I reach for least in the bottom drawers while keeping my favorites in the top ones.
“Pheebs!” Jonathan yells from the bottom of the steps. “I can hear you in the T-shirt drawers. Trivia starts soon!”