The Wild One (10 page)

The waiter refuses to be charmed by Joe's banter and mooches off miserably. I am completely enchanted by it. I just have no idea what to say in response.

We lapse into silence.

Suddenly I feel very sober. Wow, this
is
a date. I broke up with Ethan last night and I'm already on a date!

Shit. I don't think I'm ready to eat in front of this guy.

“What's Angie's boyfriend like?” asks Joe.

“Sam? He's lovely.” Joe's face falls. “Sorry! Um, I'm sure she'd be into you if it wasn't for him.”

Joe shrugs. “Shit happens.”

Never mind. This isn't a date. He likes Angie. Or would like her, if she was available. Which means he doesn't like me, not like that, anyway.

Well, at least that makes it easy.

“Story of my life,” continues Joe. “I'm never in the right place at the right time.”

“Neither am I,” I say. “In fact, everything I've done with my so-called adult life is wrong. I'm twenty-one. And I've made so many mistakes already.”

“I don't call them mistakes,” says Joe. “I call them life experiences.”

“Like what?” I can't stop myself from asking. “What experiences?”

“Falling in love with someone who didn't love me back.”

Joe says it so easily, like it's not embarrassing. I guess that's confidence.

“Um, I've done that too,” I say.

“Not a life experience to repeat, right?” Joe grins as our milk shakes arrive.

“I worked in a job I hated because my dad thought it was the right choice for me,” I say. “That was not a life experience to repeat either.”

“What did you want to do instead?”

“I don't know,” I say. “I guess I would like to do something with books. But that just sounds kind of stupid.”

“It doesn't sound stupid to me.
Someone
has to work with books. Otherwise they wouldn't exist.”

“Did you go to college?” I ask, to take the subject off me again.

“I did indeed. Then, when I graduated, Ireland was a fucking disaster area … So I started working in bars to fund my traveling and ended up here.”

“What did you study?”

“Engineering. But I don't want to be an engineer.”

“Me too!” I clear my throat. “I mean, I wasn't an engineer, but I studied early childhood. But I don't want to be a preschool teacher.”

“Sucks to be us.”

“Yep,” I say, then, trying to cheer him up, add, “At least you love bartending.”

“Love bartending? No. I love that bar. There's a difference. That's why I've been trying to turn it into a music venue.” Joe rubs his temples. “Probably sounds stupid, but I want to manage bands. When I hear a great band playing, my skin tingles, my heart starts beating really fast, and I think … I think … well, I don't know. Maybe everyone who loves music feels that way.” He trails off uncertainly. “And everyone loved Spector, right?”

“Yes! It was amazing!”

“They have so much potential. They should be writing their own stuff, figuring out what they want to say, and I can help them do that … I mean, I think I can, you know, as their manager.” Joe suddenly seems strangely vulnerable. I want to hug him. “Madeleine is the real deal.”

“I totally agree,” I say. “Do bands often employ managers?”

“Only the successful ones.” Joe grins, as though I made a joke.

I feel embarrassed suddenly. I wasn't making a joke, I just didn't know that bands needed managers.

There is so much I don't know about how everything in the real world works. All I know is what my dad and Julia and teachers have told me, what they think I should know. And they don't know
everything.
I mean, they're not stupid, obviously. They're really smart. But the world is just too big and messy and complicated for
anyone
to know
everything
about it.

How can I ever know what I want to do with my life if I don't even know what jobs exist? How will I find my way?

“Fuck! I can't believe Gary is really going to close the bar.” Joe presses his forehead to the Formica counter. I make a face. The counter isn't exactly sparkling with cleanness. “He won't change his mind. The earnings are shite.”

“What if you impressed him with how successful it is over the next few months?” I ask. “Like, if you can turn around the financials, I mean, um, the finances, numbers, you know what I mean, then he'll have to reconsider, right?”

Joe grins. “What do you think I've been trying to do? I've worked my ass off on that cocktail list.”

“Oh.”

Then silence falls again as our food arrives, so we can get to the more important business of eating. At first I feel nervous about eating in front of him, but after a minute of taking tiny unsatisfying nibbles while Joe takes great big chomps, I relax. And then I realize how hungry I am.

“God, I love American food.” Joe sighs happily.

“You love this?” I say, gesturing to the flaccid French toast and wilting fries.

“Yes. Love it.” Joe takes a sip of milk shake. “Ahhh … black-and-white milk shake! Where have you been all my life?” He sounds so passionately grateful that I start laughing again.

When we're done—throwing my is-it-or-isn't-it-a-date? quandary a curveball—Joe won't let me pay. “I'm your boss. It's my job,” he says, waving off my money.

“No,” I protest.

“Too late.” He places cash on the counter and takes me by the arm. “C'mon. I'll walk you home.”

“You don't have to,” I say.

“I'm your boss,” he says again. “Safety first.”

It's definitely, absolutely
not
a date. That's the clear message. He prefers Angie to me. He's my boss. And it's not a date.

We walk for a while. The summer air is soft and warm on my skin. I glance up at Joe, at his scruffy stubble and wild-man hair. He's so easy to be around. Maybe we'll be friends.

My first ever real male friend. Apart from Vic, of course.

“So, where do you live?”

“Carroll Gardens. Union Street,” I say.

“You live in
brownstone
Brooklyn?” says Joe in mock admiration. “Jesus, do you realize how much better that makes you than the rest of us?”

I laugh. I've laughed so much tonight, I feel slightly euphoric. “My sister and I inherited the house. Rookhaven. We could never afford it otherwise. And it's kind of run-down, but we love it. It feels like home.”

“That's how I feel about my apartment … Oh, wait. No, no, I do not feel that way about my apartment at all. It is a piece of shit. I think that the Craigslist ad for it actually read ‘piece of shit.'”

I crack up again.

“The way you laugh reminds me of a movie star, you know, like from the '30s or '40s or something,” says Joe suddenly. “I just can't think which one. One of those platinum-blond bombshells.

“Really!?” My delight manages to beat down whatever self-consciousness was edging its way in. “I love old movies.”

“So does my mom. She makes me watch them with her whenever I'm home.”

“Your father won't watch them with her?”

“My father is dead,” Joe says.

For a long moment, I can't think of how to respond. His father died?

“When?”

“When I was ten.”

We're on a quiet patch of the street now, and Joe's face is almost entirely in shadow, his voice low and expressionless. Suddenly he seems older, more serious. More tired.

“How did he die?”

“Car accident.”

“I…” I pause. “My … my mother died.”

“When?”

“When I was nine.” The word gets stuck in my throat, like always. “Cancer.”

I can't remember the last time I said this out loud to anyone. Most of the people I talk to already know about my mom. And with new people, I avoid conversations about mothers so I don't have to mention it. Ethan never even thought to ask, never cared.

As Joe and I turn the corner to Union Street, I feel all the space between us disappear.

So what if he's a player? And he's Irish and older than me and way hotter and cooler and funnier than I could ever be? I understand who he is, how he feels, what he thinks about in his darkest moments. I know, because he's just like me. I totally get him.

The thing about grief is you never really let go of it, you never forget it exists. You just get better at pretending everything is okay. You get better at structuring your life so there's a dozen different layers of protection that prevent anything bad from touching you again. I've always hid behind my dad, my sister, my books, my baking.

Everything around me holds me together. Because by myself I would fall apart.

And yet … I don't have any of those things right now, and I'm still together. I'm not falling apart.

I wonder why.

The Brooklyn night around us is so silent, all I can hear is the soft strain of music from one of the brownstones across the street, and suddenly I realize we're home. We're outside Rookhaven.

I stop walking.

I have an insane, almost unstoppable urge to give Joe a hug. Almost. But I can't. It would be too awkward. Joe is about a foot taller than me so it would be like hugging a tree. And we only just met, and he's my boss (which he insists on reminding me of every chance he gets). And he's like this big, messy, overgrown wild man, he doesn't exactly seem like the touchy-feely type. And he may not want a hug. Unwanted hugs are the worst. And, and, and I just … I can't. I'm too scared.

So I drop my gaze, turn, and start walking up our stoop.

But just as I reach the second step, Joe grabs me by the hand, pulls me sharply around to face him, and wraps his arms around me, tight.

A hug. A real hug. The kind of hug you just
sink
into.

Joe is so much larger than me that his arms totally encircle me. I barely reach his chest. I'm trapped, held tight, unable to move away, my body pressed tightly against his. I can feel the heat of his body and my heart beating so hard and so loud that he must be able to feel it too.

“Oh, Coco…” murmurs Joe. His voice is low and intense, all traces of that showy jovial charm gone.

This is so surreal. Joe, my hot, smart-ass Irish charmer of a boss, a guy I met
yesterday,
for Pete's sake, is standing on my front stoop,
holding
me.

I can hear the rhythm of his breath, feel the warmth of his body through his shirt. I can smell the soapy cleanness of his clothes and the tiniest hint of something else. Aftershave? Shampoo?

I can't remember ever feeling this close to anyone before.

Then Joe pulls away slightly and looks down, staring into my eyes, his face so serious, more serious than I could ever have imagined him looking at me.

I gulp.

He's going to kiss me.

After what feels like an agonizing wait—seconds have never felt so long—Joe's head moves an inch closer, then another inch, and another. He stops, just a breath away, before our lips finally touch.

Pia once told me that kissing a guy is like kissing every other guy, except when it's really good, and then it's like you forget what it was ever like to
not
kiss him. I totally agree: this is a whole new kind of kissing. It's like I always imagined it should be but wasn't, the kind of kissing that makes all your senses tingle, that makes you simultaneously burn and shiver all over.

Eventually we break apart.

“Jesus, that was unexpected.” Joe runs his fingers through his hair, slightly flustered.

“I've never kissed someone who knew how to kiss before,” I say honestly.

Joe laughs, then pulls me in closer, wrapping his arms around me again.

“Do you want—” My voice is so quiet I can hardly hear it, and I can't quite believe I'm about to say it, but I can't stop myself. “Do you want to come upstairs?”

“Yes.”

 

CHAPTER
11

Naturally, the girls bust me pretty much immediately the next morning.

I tiptoe into the kitchen, feeling light-headed from the sudden influx of sunshine through the kitchen windows.

I need water. And I need it bad.

Sex is exhausting, am I right?

I expected the kitchen to be empty, but instead I find Angie and Madeleine padding around happily in bare feet, fixing breakfast. Angie is having toast and eggs; Madeleine is making some kind of gross-looking shake with almond milk and chia seeds and spinach.

When I walk in, they both look up. Angie does an overly dramatic comic double-take.

“You had
da sex
last night!” shouts Angie.

“I did … not?” I'm the worst liar. I start giggling helplessly.

“You did,” says Madeleine. “Your hair's a mess, you've got stubble rash. And you look happy.”

“Okay,” I admit, slightly embarrassed. I wasn't used to being on this end of the conversation. “I had the sex.”

“
Da
sex,” Angie corrects me.

“Da sex.”

The girls scream with delight. “Details. Everything.”

“Um, well, you know, Joe and I started drinking at the bar, and, um…” I raise my eyebrows innocently. “I guess it just happened?”

“Nice work,” says Angie. “Sam is, obviously, my favorite flavor. But Joe has something.”

“Yeah, he has something,” agrees Madeleine. “The kind of guy who walks into a room and people notice him.”

“He has that
thing,
” says Angie. “That spark. Confidence without arrogance.”

“He's confident because he probably sleeps with hundreds of women,” I say. “I'm just another notch on his bedpost.”

Angie shrugs. “All I meant was that he has charisma.”