You First: A Joe Goldberg Prequel (You, #0)(104)

That’s the upside of a simultaneously arrogant and insecure prick. That gym rat ice-hearted circus freak of a man would never tell a cop or a mother or a bored girl at a bar what I, the young, roid-free bookselling intellect, did to the big, bad globe-trotting dick.



You have to be very careful about who you lock up in a cage. I chose well.





36


But then we hit traffic on the bridge and the high fades as the truth surges like fucking cab fare. I wish the cabbie would shut up about his medallion and his wife. I’m not safe. And neither are you. You called me, sure, but it’s not that simple. You only called me when you couldn’t have him, and here I am, going to see you as if I don’t know that. I know what I am, what I have.

I have stage IV cancer of the heart.

We make it into the city and I look out the window at all the pretty girls, girls who might be less deceitful than you. But they don’t interest me. I can’t see myself hand in hand with them. I love you. Can’t stop, won’t stop. Same way I was with that book, the one you coauthored in real time on Instant Fucking Messenger, and that’s another thing I forgot to be mad about.

You told me you couldn’t do that anymore. You just preferred to do that with him.

Am I Carrie with the whip? Am I a masochist or something?

Possibly, because here I am now, jumping out of a taxi and hugging you in your bad blue cape (the first red flag). You smell like you, and my whole body tingles. It’s like I never read that awful fucking AOL IM book and love is crazy.

Stage IV cancer is crazy. A beast without boundaries that doesn’t quit.

You request the table, the one from Serendipity, and we are in luck. It’s available.

We climb the stairs in the wake of a hostess who thinks we are adorable young romantics, and you raise your eyebrows at me and the cancer spreads like wildflowers. I want you no matter what and I am Angus with his little crystals of meth and crack. This is all I ever wanted. It’s the opposite of a fear of intimacy. You’re safe with me, and Dick can fuck off. You’re not a monkey and you’re not a hamster. You’re a woman. You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t want to cut him off. It’s okay, Vail. You made it to Serendipity. And because you are safe, I can breathe. Relax. Dick won’t escape. He only pushes himself when someone’s around to see it. At heart, he’s a lazy fucker. He’s sure as hell not busting those cuffs while we eat our frozen hot chocolate and even if he does manage to get free…Who cares?!

I am the man, the motherfucking gunslinger.

I have Dick’s phone in one pocket and I have my phone in the other and I have you in my crosshairs. You really don’t know what I did for you today, and it’s pretty fucking cute, the way you are still going on about your stupid freezer, my poor battered hands. Oh, Vail, if you ever knew about the other fucking freezer…

You raise your spoon, so I raise mine. “To the man who did the undoable…” I tied up Dick so he can’t fuck with you. “To the man who brought my freezer back to life.”

We click our spoons, and I can’t stop loving you. I don’t want to stop. Not here, not like this. Same way I didn’t stop loving you when I saw the yellow hat. Or the night you left me alone with Angus. Everything between us was fine then, it’s fine now. Better, even. Which is impressive, when you think about what I’ve been through today…the IMs, the betrayal, the rewrite of our Missed Fucking Connection.

Yes, I ought to have my head examined, but there is no fucking point. Love is a disease. A cancer.

The waitress delivers our bowl of frozen hot chocolate, and you clap and shine and, God, there is a world in you. A disposable camera in your pocket because we just have to remember every second of this. I smile for the cardboard plastic camera and I should’ve stopped loving you in the bathroom at Passerby. So rare to see one in the States. But I didn’t stop loving you then, and it is real to me now. One True Thing by Anna Fucking Quindlen.

I will never stop loving you, Vail. Ever.

“I’m sorry,” you say. “But I’m like…This is good. I say we make it our thing. We go to every place from every rom-com.”

We’re on fire, back-and-forthing about New York City movies. I tell you that Taxi Driver is a rom-com just to fuck with you, and you say in that case, so is American Fucking Psycho. I ask if you read the book, and you flick a lovin’ spoonful at me. Adorable. Creamy and wet. You.

“So,” you say. “How is it going with Jeremy?”

I sip my water. Think, Joe, think. You used me to get to Dick. I built Jeremy from scratch to get to you. Your cancer is a thing we can beat, this thing you have for Dick. And I think my buddy Jeremy can help us out.

“Ugh,” I say. “The poor guy…I dunno.”

“Well, did you tell him what I told you about Sarah?”

“Yeah, but, Vail…it goes a little deeper than that.”

“How do you mean?”

Gently, Joseph. “It’s kind of a long story.”

“My favorite kind, honestly. Lately I think I do prefer TV over movies because TV just goes on and on, you know?”

One day, you will become a reader, but that day is not this day. “Okay. A few weeks ago, Sarah’s boss threw a binder at her head. She had to get stitches.”

“Jesus Christ.”