Chapter Ten
Molly
2013
Molly fell for Jake quickly, easily. She’d known she loved him since that first night, though she waited two more dates to sleep with him—Nina said she absolutely could not do so sooner than the third date, not if she wanted their connection to become something real.
And the magic of it was, Molly felt sure Jake was falling for her, too. One February afternoon, over Presidents’ Day weekend, they were working in Jake’s apartment. Molly was editing a short story for her thesis, and Jake was writing a new song for the album. Snow fell heavily outside the windows, piling high on the sidewalks and emptying the streets. Sam and Hale were back in North Carolina for the long weekend, and the apartment was cozy and warm, filled with the sound of Pachelbel. Classical music helped Jake focus.
From the other end of the couch, Jake nudged his socked foot against Molly’s. She glanced up from her laptop. He smiled at her, his eyes gleaming blue, and she was filled with an almost unbearable blend of affection and awe. He was hers. How was it possible? She often thought of Jake’s ex, of the girl who’d tried and failed to make him stay. She couldn’t imagine the pain of loving someone like Jake and having him not love her back.
“You know what the song I’m writing is called?” he asked.
Molly shook her head, mirroring his smile.
“‘January Girl.’”
Molly said nothing, a clamp over her heart. She was tempted to make a joke—Who’s February Girl, then?—but she didn’t. The moment was real, and she didn’t want to trivialize it.
Her heart felt like a balloon, inflating inside her chest. It could’ve carried her to the sky. She’d never experienced this before—the feeling that her own exhilaration was safe. Molly was certain they loved each other—she knew musicians didn’t write songs about girls just because—even though it would’ve been crazy to say it after only six weeks.
Nina had always told Molly it would happen this way, that when she met the right person, it wouldn’t be complicated. She’d just know. And Molly did know. She knew Jake was the light that touched her darkest corners. She knew that because of him, her deepest dreams felt conquerable. She knew that his touch sent waves of electricity through her body, that being physically near him—even just in the same room—made her feel more alive than anything or anyone else ever had.
Walking home from a shift at Angelina’s a few weeks later, Molly realized that something big was finally happening to her in New York. It was Jake Danner.
The way he consumed her was like her senses had been woken up after a long hibernation. The intoxicating smell of his skin, raw cedar mixed with bar soap; his clear, unadorned voice; the protected, treasured way he made her feel. Images of him, conversations that replayed in her head, took up every square inch of Molly’s mind.
She wasn’t completely naive; she realized that what she felt stretched beyond healthy love. Some days, it felt closer to obsession, and this worried Molly. But Jake wasn’t a fantasy, she had to remind herself. He wasn’t some toxic, wishy-washy fuckboy, like she’d worried he might be in the beginning. He could have picked any girl out of any bar, but he had picked her. He adored her. He’d written a song about her.
“This is the honeymoon phase,” Liz explained over Chinese takeout with Nina and Ev. “Lots of sex, lots of long, lazy days inhaling each other’s scent. Just enjoy it, Moll. It ends eventually.”
“The honeymoon phase, she means,” Nina cut in, chewing a spring roll. “Not the relationship.”
Liz shrugged as if to say: Not necessarily. Molly flashed her a glare, she couldn’t help it. Lately, she had an odd feeling that Liz wasn’t entirely happy for her.
Everly scooped more fried rice onto her plate. “Moll, you’re just freaking out because you never had this with Kevin or Darby. And definitely not with that Cameron guy.”
Molly looked at her best friends. Sometimes she truly believed the three of them knew her better than she knew herself.
Thus far in her life, Molly had dated only a few men. In high school, there’d been a short-term boyfriend, Kevin, who’d lasted only half of her junior year. Molly hadn’t been a particularly great girlfriend to him—in retrospect, she knew she hadn’t felt enough of what you’re supposed to feel when you commit to someone. In college, there was her relationship with Darby, a tumultuous year and a half that began her freshman fall, his senior, and ended when he called to tell her he’d met someone else, the real estate broker who’d found his rent-controlled apartment on Beacon Hill.