“I can’t let you buy that,” said a low, husky voice. It was a voice I could recognize anywhere.
My heart raced as I turned to find Garrett smirking at me, swinging a brown bag full of whatever he had just purchased next door at Trader Joe’s Wine Shop. My eyes widened upon his outfit. He looked like he was moonlighting as another man. Instead of his rock and roll vibe, he was giving “Very Fuckable Brooks Brothers”—a crisp white collared shirt tucked into belted dark blue khakis. I glanced down at the shopping basket in his other hand, seeing lean chicken breasts, spinach, bananas, and protein powder. I surmised that the guy I knew very little about was a nine-to-fiver, and likely the proud owner of zero body fat.
I cradled my chocolate beer lovingly to my chest, letting my eyes dare to graze his.
“Weird beer has gotten me through some rough times,” I said.
“But who’s there to hold you after a chocolate beer hangover?”
Was he slyly asking if I had boyfriend, or was he trying to tell me what I already knew: there was a price to pay for consuming sweet alcoholic beverages.
“Oh, so you’re saying that your”—I squinted down at the pinot noir in his brown bag—“twenty-seven-dollar-wine hangover is better than my hangover?”
He opened his mouth with a comeback, but then he quickly pursed his lips together.
“Come on, don’t be shy. Let’s hear it,” I said as I crossed my arms.
A devilish grin hit his lips. “Nothing about me is shy.”
That smile—coupled with the warmth of his Adonis body inches from mine—made me consider taking off my flannel and laying my body on top of the frozen treat aisle. I watched his chest rise and fall, and each inhale played a game of tug-of-war with the buttons, which I wished would pop and give me the view of a lifetime.
“I caught myself about to use the word ‘congener’ in a sentence and decided I had too much life left to live before I turned into my father, so I kept my mouth shut,” he said, twisting a shiny silver watch on his wrist.
I clocked that he grew up rich, and he was trying to keep his upbringing from showing. But no matter how hard we try, our childhoods, one way or another, find a way to scratch the surface.
We floated to the neighboring aisle, and I grinned as he grabbed a box of the Smashing S’mores.
“What?” he asked, studying my wide eyes.
“I’m relieved that your body knows the taste of chocolate.”
“Oh!”
All at once, his face lit up. He pointed to the ceiling as if God had suddenly decided to bless us all in this TJ’s…with Fall Out Boy. “Sugar, We’re Goin Down” blasted from the speakers, and Garrett’s broad shoulders moved with the beat of the drums as he spun on his wingtip shoes, his body dancing backward toward the nuts section, his fingers playing the correct guitar chords, a killer smile fixed on me.
“Oh, so you’re one of those…” I mused.
“I’m not one of any, Maggie May.”
I went to open my mouth, but he stopped me. “Don’t you dare say it.”
“Say what? That you’re emo?”
“I told you not to say it.”
“I would never, because clearly you’re pop punk.”
He stopped dancing for a quick moment, as if I’d warmed his entire universe. He smiled big. “You see right through me.”
And somehow, in the absolute best way possible, I did. He put his large, calloused fingers over a bottle of olive oil, using it as a microphone.
“But you’re just a line in a song,” he belted, with vocals so rich and loud that every human in the packed aisle darted eyes at him. I watched as the pointed glares softened into adoration the moment strangers saw his gorgeous face.
He smiled and kept dancing, confidence bleeding through his skin. I had never cared for this song before. And now, I was doomed to go home, stare at the ceiling fan, and listen to it on repeat. Fall Out Boy lyrics would flutter inside my heart until I died, probably.
He continued shimmying toward the vegetable section. Garrett already had spinach in his basket, and it occurred to me it was possible he was re-shopping just to spend more time with me. Or maybe he just couldn’t not dance to Fall Out Boy. Either way, I had only come here for a frozen burrito, and I was absolutely window-shopping just to keep him in my orbit.
Garrett stopped and stared at me as if he was trying to unwrap my skull and see what was inside. I felt my cheeks grow hot, until he finally spoke. “Indie folk, indie pop,” he declared.
I took a proud curtsey.
“That’s me. Lover of the Who Hurt You? genre of music.”
“Who hurt you first?”
I didn’t even have to consider the answer.
“Tracy Chapman.”
He put his hand on his chest and closed his eyes, stumbling backward, implying that Tracy Chapman did things to his heart.
All I could do was nod as a memory snapped against my heart like a rubber band. I was suddenly nine years old, sitting cross-legged on a shag carpet, a silly grin across my face, wide eyes looking up at my dad as he danced away from his record player. He pulled the coffee table to the corner of the room, shimmied down to me in his dingy Queens apartment, tugged me up from the floor, and twirled me in his arms.
“Break it down for me,” I yelled over “Fast Car.”
My dad never blindly loved a song. He knew the entire backstory to all his favorites. It was habit—he was a music theory professor. He taught me to appreciate intention behind the lyrics, and he shaped my brain to fall in love with words before melody.
“Mags, this song is about a woman who drops out of school because her dad’s an alcoholic, her life gets worse from there, and eventually the hope she placed in her lover’s arms turns to rust,” he yelled back to me. As a kid, I loved that my dad treated me like I was smart enough to understand concepts that I was not yet smart enough to understand.
The memory of my dad bubbled inside me until my chin quivered, and I came back down to earth—begging my stupid lack of a poker face to hide the fact that I was one move away from weeping openly in the vegetable aisle of a Trader Joe’s in front of a man I wanted to see naked.
I glanced away so he couldn’t see my eyes glassing over, and we approached the checkout line, now just a few people deep. Garrett tilted his blue eyes at me, tall frame looming over my warring expression. Instead of asking what was wrong, he fucking smiled—a goddamn Cheshire cat smile. Was he aware he could heal people with a grin? Because the pang of grief melted away as I lost myself in his sparkling whites.
He pointed to his chest, announcing, “Blink-182.”
I exhaled a laugh. “Blink-182 hurt you first? Yikes. You’re officially no longer allowed to make fun of my chocolate beer.”
“Excuse me? ‘Dammit’ is a national treasure.”
“You cried to ‘I guess this is growing up’？”
“I don’t cry. The song just…spoke to my soul.”
He didn’t cry, but he had a music-nerd heart. Was he repressed, or did he have emotional restraint? Because I had a music-nerd heart, and I cried all the time. I was once reduced to the fetal position over a holiday minivan commercial. I could always find something that would bring me to my knees. And here he was, announcing “I don’t cry” as if it were a shrug.