Totally and Completely Fine(75)

“Okay,” she’d said.

They were chocolate chip oatmeal.

No raisins because Ben was right. Raisins didn’t belong in cookies.

“They’re good,” Chani had said.

“Thanks,” I’d said.

We sat there, with our tea and cookies, and I realized it was the first time Chani and I had been alone, just the two of us.

“How was the rest of the trip?” I asked. It seemed like a safe enough topic.

Unless Lena had broken something in the Met or burned down a tree in Central Park. I braced myself.

“It was good,” Chani said, one hand resting on top of the other. “Nice.” Her cheeks were a bit pink.

“The show was good?”

“It was.”

“How does Gabe know the director again?”

“He did the choreography for the first Bond movie,” Chani said.

“Ah.”

“We had drinks with him afterward.”

“That sounds nice,” I said.

“I mean, Gabe had water,” she said. “He’s been really careful about his sobriety.”

“I’m glad,” I said.

“Being here has been good for him,” Chani said. “Being around family.”

“How is it for you? I know we’re a lot.”

Chani gave her cup a wry smile. “It’s taking some adjustments. Awkward family dynamics I’m used to,” she said. “I’m less accustomed to being the only Jew in a fifty-mile radius. Gabe does his best to help me feel at home, but his Yiddish is atrocious.”

We shared a smile.

I understood what it was like to feel out of place. What it felt like when you were outgrowing the world you’d always known.

Cooper had never felt so small before.

“We’re glad you’re here,” I said.

“Thank you.”

There was a long silence. My tea was too hot to drink, so I just blew on it continuously to give myself something to do.

I imagined Spencer here right now. He would have been asking a billion questions about the article Chani had written: What happened that weekend? Did she actually sneak out of Gabe’s house before he woke up? Had she really never seen a Bond movie before?

Was it true that Gabe had said that I was his best friend?

We’d teased him about that for months, but I was pretty sure that Spencer had been slightly hurt by that.

“It’s better press,” I’d kept telling him. “Makes him sound all sweet and down-to-earth.”

Guys could be so sensitive sometimes.

Chani tucked her hair behind her ears. She had a ring on her left ring finger. It looked like a lizard or a dragon or something. I was pretty sure she hadn’t been wearing it before New York.

Gabe, you sneaky bastard, I thought. Did you propose?

I was happy for him. For them.

But sad too.

Lonely.

I shook those feelings away.

Now wasn’t the time to be thinking about myself.

“For the record?” I tilted my head toward Chani. “Spencer was always convinced that there had been something between you and Gabe. He would have been so smug when you showed up.”

That made her laugh.

“We weren’t very subtle,” she said.

“No,” I said. “Not at all.”

She shook her head with an embarrassed smile.

One that faded as the voices from upstairs amplified.

Or rather, one voice.

“You could have died!” Lena screamed, and the frayed pain in her voice made me want to storm into her bedroom and sweep her up in my arms.

But I didn’t, because I knew this was something she had to say to Gabe and something he had to hear.

Chani and I exchanged a look, but neither of us moved. We both sipped our tea instead.

We’d all been so careful with him about his addiction—first while he was in the midst of it, afraid we’d just make it worse, and then afterward, when we were worried we’d push him back into it.

No one had spoken to him the way that Lena was speaking to him now, and even though a part of me wanted to protect my little brother from what was already a devastating attack from someone who he loved deeply and someone he had hurt equally deeply, it wasn’t my place.

“I needed you and you weren’t there.” Lena’s voice was all cracking and lilting and horrible and beautiful. “You cared more about a stupid fucking drink than you did about me.”

We were going to have to have a conversation about her language. It was not what I wanted to hear from her, but it was also the kind of language she needed to use in this moment. That she deserved to use.

Teddy—who was lying under the counter—let out a long, drawn-out groan.

“I know, buddy,” Chani said, reaching down to pet her. “We’ll go soon.”

“They might be up there a while,” I said to Chani. “Maybe it would be good to get Teddy home.”

“Are you sure?”

“It also might be good for Gabe and me to talk after…” I searched for the right words. “After he’s been reduced to a pile of ash.”

Chani managed a laugh. “She’s a good kid.”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s what I keep telling myself.”