Park Helena comes in behind us. We both bow deeply. “It’s so good to see you girls,” she says to us, eyes crinkling in a warm smile.
“You too.” I realize I mean it. It’s good to be back. Following June’s advice, I’m smiling compulsorily, trying not to internalize anything, and it’s working. It’s like an instant lobotomy.
“Especially you, Jayne.” Helena squeezes my elbow. “You should come home more often. Your mother’s been relentless all week. She raided my freezer for my homemade dumplings, radish kimchi from Oh Theresa. She’s been bending our ears and showing off for days how both of her girls are coming in from New York. She’s so proud of you two. It’s just a shame she never gets to see you.”
“I’m here all the time,” interjects June.
Helena laughs. “And we’re all so lucky for it. You always did take such good care of your little sister.” She pats June on the shoulder. “How’s work? Your parents couldn’t be prouder.”
“It’s fantastic,” says June. “Challenging yet rewarding. A wonderful growth opportunity.”
They talk about her son at Wharton, about all his scholarships. My eyes glaze.
“You girls should eat,” says Helena, before crossing the room to talk to the priest, who’s seated at a long card table with the rest of the men.
“I think if Mom ever said she was proud to my face my head would explode,” I tell June while we watch a flock of women descend on the priest to offer food. “Like, there would be blood pouring out of my ear and shards of skull and hair everywhere.”
June rolls her eyes. “It’s Mom. What do you expect?”
I look over at Mom again, heaping piles of food onto her plate. Suddenly, I can’t bear to see her.
“I’m not hungry,” I whisper before turning on my heel and walking back into the evening air.
The pea gravel that lines the parking lot crunches under my borrowed heels.
I watch a junky white hatchback pull up to the gas station across the street, taillights glowing red. Two girls hop out, wearing short skirts and tights and oversize, candy-colored hoodies. They both have scrunchies in their hair. I used to fantasize every Saturday about how my friends would come get me at church. Central to this fantasy was that it would be in front of everyone and that all the church kids would see how cool I actually was. How totally I didn’t need them. How they’d been wrong to ignore me and leave me out of their games.
I sit on an aluminum bench and pull out the cigarettes. It’s dark, but the seat’s warm from the sun earlier in the day. The smoke feels heavy in my lungs. The sprinklers have been turned on for the football field behind the school, the mist forming an arc where the lights hit.
I listen to Patrick’s voicemail.
He’s at work. Having lunch. He describes a chicken katsu sandwich in glorious, mundane detail. They cut the crusts off, which is a nice touch. He’s wondering what I’m doing, where exactly I’m standing. He asks if I’ve been to the restaurant. Whether or not June’s with me. If everything’s okay and says that he’d neglected to ask if I was going home for any particular reason. He says he’s thinking about me and that he’s still sorry that he had to cancel dinner. He asks if I’ve had barbecue. How the air smells.
I see the appeal of voicemails for the first time in my life.
There’s a prickly sensation inside my body when I think about him. It’s the nettlesome conflict between the him I know and the other him he becomes when I’m away. He’s flattened on Instagram. Bloodless and scarily intimidating for it, a stranger.
Patrick feels like my only tie to New York, and right now my link to him feels tenuous and imagined.
I recall him carefully pulling the hair out of my mouth. His steady, dark eyes. The rise of his shoulders above me. Warm and breathtakingly present. It’s my favorite moment of the ones I’ve experienced so far. The sweetness of it startles me no matter how many times I play the tape in my head.
I stub the cigarette out on the bottom of my shoe. My heart hammers as I dial his number.
He picks up on the third ring.
“Hey,” I say into the dark.
“Whoa, hi.”
“I’m at church.”
“How is it?”
“So unchanged that it’s distressing.”
He laughs. “I was convinced for a second that you were pocket dialing me.”
“Yeah, phone calls aren’t really my scene. This whole real-time communication business.”
I hear him chuckling down the line. It tugs at my chest.
“This is my first time back since I moved.”
“How’s it feel?”
“It’s a lot,” I tell him. “I have this paranoia that New York won’t let me in after this. That it’s like Shangri-La or El Dorado or some other magical place that will punish me for leaving.”
“Like all the hard work you’ve put in will get washed away?”
“Yeah.” I smile into the phone. “Like the score card goes back to zero.”
“I get that,” he says.
“But you have a real life in New York. It’s your home.”
“Yours, too,” he reminds me.
The two girls in the gas station across the street return to their car. They look tiny and insect-like climbing back into it. The green-hoodied girl pulls her friend out of shotgun by her backpack. She stumbles, and they laugh their heads off.
It seems strange to me that I’ve been their age.
“What are you doing this weekend?”
“Working. And then I have some people in town.” He sighs. “When are you back?” he asks.
“Tomorrow.”
“Thank God.”
“Seriously.”
He laughs. “Can y’all drive around and do something fun tonight?” I warm at him y’all’ing for my benefit. “Free tea refills, remember? Brisket?”
“True.”
“Plus, Texas gives great sky.”
I look up. It’s still there. All oceanic and silencing.
“You’ll see New York again. I promise.”
“I know.”
“Besides,” he says. “You still have our sweats.”
I grin helplessly.
We say good night, and I relight my cigarette and take a drag. I send Patrick the picture of the church. He likes it immediately.
“Seriously?” June sits heavily beside me. “I literally have cancer,” she says, gesturing at the smoke.
I take a long pull. It tastes gross, but I don’t want to put it out for her benefit. I make a big show of exhaling the smoke away from her.
I feel her cold fingertips on the back of my hand. She takes the cigarette from me and, shockingly, takes a drag.
“What the fuck?”
“Glarg,” she says exhaling, and then spits at her feet. “Disgusting.” Still, she hangs on to it and inhales again.
I take it from her and toss it.
I want to talk about Patrick but know better. I don’t feel like hating her for telling me what I already know. That he’s too good for me.
I wonder how much of the phone call she heard.
“When’s the last time you were here?” Her breath smells faintly of garlic.