The moment Emma came into view, my entire world slipped into slow motion. My brain took a screenshot. I felt the moment freeze and save.
She was beautiful.
I’d seen pictures, we’d video called, but it didn’t even begin to make me ready for this.
Long brown hair, a white top, leggings. She was smiling at me, this easy, comfortable smile, and the closer she got, the more paralyzed I felt. I couldn’t even will my legs to walk to meet her. I wasn’t standing by my car, waiting for my date. I was in the middle of a road, watching the headlights of a Mack truck coming right at me.
I liked to consider myself a pretty level, confident, easygoing person. I didn’t get flustered or anxious about dates. But everything I knew about myself prior to the moment I laid eyes on her was no longer true.
I was a nervous wreck. Instantly.
She closed the distance between us. “Hey.”
“Hey,” I said a little breathlessly, hoping that I didn’t actually sound breathless.
Then I was just staring. Wide-eyed and mute, like a human Justin wax figurine.
She didn’t seem to notice. She came in for a hug. The hug we’d agreed upon in the survey. But I was not prepared.
She wrapped her arms around me, and I processed her in split seconds. Shorter than me. Soft. Warm. Her hair smelled like flowers. This is what she feels like. This is her…
“You smell good,” she said, breaking away.
“Thanks. You too,” I managed.
“God, I’m so frazzled,” she said. “You should have seen us trying to dock the boat.”
My mouth was dry. “What happened?” I asked.
“We almost beached it. It was like a comedy skit.”
Her phone rang. “Oh, hold on. I have to leave my ringer on in case Maddy gets in trouble trying to get back.” She looked at it. “It’s her.” She swiped and put the phone to her ear. “Maddy? Are you okay?” She listened for a second and then glanced at me. “Okay.” Then she hung up. She nodded over her shoulder. “Can we go down there really quick?”
“Sure.”
She turned and started back the way she came. We made our way around the side of the enormous house until we had a view of the lake.
There was a short brown-haired woman in a pontoon just offshore. She raised binoculars to watch us.
“Is that her?” I asked.
“Yeah, that’s her,” she said, looking amused. “She must have found those in the boat. Go!” She made a shooing motion with her hands. “Call me when you’re docked!”
She turned back to me shaking her head. “I think she wanted to see you.”
I gave Maddy a wave over Emma’s shoulder and the woman’s smile vanished. Then she dragged a finger across her neck in the universal sign for I’ll kill you.
I blinked.
Emma saw my face and turned back around to see what I was looking at, and Maddy beamed and waved enthusiastically at her best friend.
Okay…
Emma came back to me with a smile. “So. Ready to go?” “Uh, sure?”
We walked to the car and I jogged ahead of her and opened her door. After she got in I went around the back to the driver’s side, too self- conscious to walk in front of her.
“I like your car,” she said when I got in. “I can’t believe you let Alex drive it.”
I let out a laugh that was probably too loud and turned on the engine.
She peered down at my drink holder. “You went to Starbucks.”
“Oh, yeah. I got us drinks. Here.” I picked up her salted caramel cold foam to hand it to her—and dropped it. It kerplunked in her lap and she caught it before it tipped sideways. The lid stayed on, but a little coffee splashed up out of the sipping hole onto her white shirt.
“Shit!” I breathed, looking around frantically for napkins. “Shit shit shit shit shit.”
“It’s okay, I’m fine,” she said, brushing the droplets off with her fingers.
Not a single napkin in the whole car. Nothing. I went to open the glove box and look in there and my hand grazed her knee. She jerked it out of the way.
Literally everything I’d done in the last sixteen hours since the minute I realized she was here was in preparation for this date. I’d made the questionnaire, typed up the invite, made plans and phone calls. I’d even cleaned my apartment—not that I thought she was coming back to my apartment. But on the off chance she wanted to see the billboard up close or meet Brad or something, I wanted it spotless. And now I wondered why I even bothered since none of the other stuff even mattered if I was just gonna come off as a fucking weirdo because I was so flustered.
I wanted to say, “I’m sorry, I’m so nervous.” But then I didn’t want her to know I was nervous. I wanted her to think I was calm and collected like I usually was on dates. But this date wasn’t like my usual dates, and not for the reason it should have been. The fact that this wasn’t really real, we were just trying some stupid experiment for the fun of it, should have made this less stressful. It wasn’t like I had to actually impress her. We were collaborators, she didn’t have to like me or even be attracted to me. But now I suddenly really wanted her to like me and be attracted to me, and even after all the things I did to make today special, I worried it wasn’t enough to compensate for me.
I rummaged through my glove box and cursed under my breath when I didn’t find anything.
“Justin, it’s okay,” she said, laughing a little. “I have wipes in my purse.”
Then I realized she’d moved her legs not because I’d accidentally touched her knee, but because she was getting her purse off the floor. She pulled out a baby wipe and started to blot the little stain. “See? Almost
gone.” She finished and balled the wipe up and put it back into her bag. Then she picked up her drink. “Thanks for the coffee.” She took a sip. “I can’t believe you remembered. I can never remember anybody’s drink. I was a waitress once—I was so bad at it.”
I felt the corner of my lip twitch up, despite myself. I cleared my throat. “Let me text her and tell her we’re on our way,” I said, pulling out my phone.
“Her? Who?” she asked.
“My friend Jane. Benny’s girlfriend.” I hit send and put on my seat belt. “So what’s this activity?” she asked.
“Can’t tell you. Top secret. So,” I said, changing the subject, “has Maddy ever killed anyone?”
She pretended to think about it. “Nobody I can prove.” I laughed nervously as I pulled away from the curb.
I felt like I was buffering with her sitting next to me. Like all I could do was loop around and around over the fact that she was here. I was physically willing myself to act normal. Be cool, Justin. Be. COOL. She’s just a regular person.
I glanced at her. She was definitely not just a regular person.
Thankfully she was not a nervous mess and she carried the conversation the next few minutes. Emma acting so comfortable and normal made me think she didn’t notice that I wasn’t comfortable and normal, and this helped me get ahold of myself. By the time we got to Benny and Jane’s, we’d fallen into the easy back-and-forth that we had on the phone, thank God, and I was mostly recovered.
We got out of the car, and Jane opened the front door before we knocked.
Jane beamed. “Hi, so nice to meet you!” She shook Emma’s hand. “Nice to meet you too,” Emma said.
“Benny still at work?” I asked.
Jane put out a bottom lip. “Yeah, he thought he might be able to get away for lunch but he can’t. Sorry.”
I hadn’t really cared too much that Benny might not be here today. He wasn’t the point of this visit. But all that had changed in the last ten minutes. Now I wanted my friends to meet her so I had someone to talk to
about her.
Jane led us through their living room and down a hall and stopped by a closed door. “Everything’s ready. You guys can go in when you want.”
“And what’s everything?” Emma asked, looking at me.
“I think I’m going to save it until you see it.” I put up a hand. “Now remember, no matter what’s behind that door, don’t fall in love with me. That’s not what we’re doing here.”
Emma laughed, and I felt relieved that I’d regained enough composure to be funny.
I leaned over and opened the door and she gasped. “Kittens?” She beamed.
“Yup.”
The five six-week-old kittens Jane was fostering came mewing up to us, tails in the air. We shuffled in and I shut the door behind us before any escaped.
Emma scooped one up. “Oh, Justin, look! It’s so cute!”
I grinned. “Do you want to sit? They climb all over you if you do. That’s why I said to wear pants.”
Emma set her purse down and sat cross-legged next to it, and I took a seat opposite her. The kittens began to scale us immediately. One clawed up Emma’s back and popped out over her shoulder under her hair while two more played in her lap.
Her whole face lit up.
I was glad we did this first. She was so busy looking at the kittens, it gave me the chance to look at her without her noticing I was staring—and I was staring. Tiny freckles on her cheeks. Bronze woven into her hair. Her hazel eyes were a kaleidoscope of green with flecks of gold. They were different in person.
Everything was different in person.
I think if I’d known she was coming, if she’d told me her plans to switch Hawaii out for Minnesota, none of this would feel so unbelievable. But then something told me this would feel unbelievable no matter what.
“Did her cat have babies?” she asked.
“No. She fosters for Bitty Kitty Brigade. I’ve done it a few times too. I like cats. We had one when we were in college, Cooter. Benny took him when he moved out a few years ago. He’s probably here somewhere.”
She talked to a kitten but was speaking to me. “We’re only twenty minutes in and this is already the best date I’ve ever been on. I don’t know how you’re going to top this, Justin.”
“I’ve got a lot of ideas.”
She glanced at me. “Oh yeah? Am I getting your top four?”
“You’re only giving me four dates?” I asked. “You’re here for six weeks.
We could have more.”
“I don’t want to take advantage.” “Please. Take advantage.” Please.
She gave me a wry smile that I hoped was flirting.
“Seriously,” I said. “I’d like to see you more than that. To show you Minnesota,” I added quickly, worrying I sounded too eager.
“Well, you did talk up a good game about this place. It would be a shame if I didn’t have a guide to show me the highlights.”
“Agree. One hundred percent. I consider it my duty, it’s purely obligatory, I won’t enjoy it at all.”
She laughed.
“So where are we going for lunch?” she asked, snuggling her baby. “A breakfast place actually. Unless you prefer pizza.”
“I love breakfast food,” she said.
“It is far superior to any other kind,” I agreed. “I do like pizza though,” she said.
“Do you eat the crust?” I asked, petting a passing kitten. “I love the crust on pizza,” she said.
“I hate the crust.”
“Maddy hates the crust too and I get to eat hers,” she said. “It’s part of why we’re so compatible.”
“Brad likes them too. He eats all my crusts. You know, I bet if they did a study about relationships, romantic and platonic, the ones where two people have alternating crust preferences are the ones that work the best.”
“Imagine putting that on a dating app,” she said.
I made my voice serious. “Must be willing to eat my discarded pizza crusts, no weirdos.”
She burst into laughter. The relief I felt that this seemed to be going well was insurmountable.
“What food don’t you like?” I asked, still smiling.
“Carrots. You?”
“Pappardelle,” I said. “Can’t stand it.” “That thin, flat pasta?”
“Yeah. It feels like you’re eating a tongue,” I said, getting my arm tackled by an orange tabby. “Okay, all right, that’s enough, Murder Mittens.” I pulled the cat off me one claw at a time and Emma beamed at me.
Her phone rang and she picked it up and looked at it. “Oh, hold on, it’s Maddy. Hello?” She listened for a moment. Then she sucked air through her teeth. “That’s what the bumpers are for. Well I’m glad you made it, I was worried. Okay. Okay. I will. Bye.” She hung up.
“She docked it okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, she rammed it kind of hard, but she says the boat is fine.”
“You two are going to be professionals by the time this summer is over.” “I hope so. It’s been a little stressful.” She picked up Murder Mittens. “I don’t think I really thought this island thing through. It sounded like a good idea at the time but it’s kind of inconvenient. Anyway, it’s only for six
weeks and Maddy likes the cottage, so…” “Where’d you and Maddy meet?” I asked.
She rubbed noses with the kitten. “She’s my foster sister. Her moms took me in when I was fourteen. They were amazing. Put me through nursing school and everything.”
“They adopted you?” I asked. She shook her head. “No.”
“Why not? Actually, you know what, no. You don’t have to answer that.
That’s personal.”
“I don’t mind. I didn’t want to be adopted,” she said. “I wanted my mom to be able to come back for me if she wanted to.”
“Annnnd… did she?”
She paused for a moment. “No. She did not.”
Another kitten crept toward me on its belly. I wiggled my fingers and it pounced on my hand and I picked it up and cradled it while it bit my knuckle.
She tilted her head. “That is adorable. I need to get a picture,” she said, grabbing her phone.
“Hey, you should find me on Instagram,” I said after she took the shot.
“Um…” she said as she set her phone down. “I have a little confession to make. I’ve already seen your Instagram.”
“You have?”
“Yeah. Maddy found you.” “When?”
“About four minutes into our first Reddit DMs?”
“Okay…” I chuckled. “Well, follow me then so I can follow you back.” “All right. Also, Maddy found you on LinkedIn too,” she said. “And
your dad’s obituary. I’m sorry.”
I paused. “I can’t tell if I should feel violated.”
“She just wanted to make sure you weren’t creepy.” “Did it help you decide to talk to me?”
“It did, actually.”
“Then I’m glad she did it.”
She smiled. Murder Mittens draped over her arm, languidly. “God, cats are just liquid, aren’t they? I always wanted a cat but we moved too much.”
“Moved for work?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes we couldn’t pay the rent or she was tired of the city we were in. My mom wasn’t really good at sitting still,” she said.
“So why the foster care? Do you mind me asking?”
She shook her head. “No. She’d leave me. It was neglect.”
She said this matter-of-factly, like it didn’t bother her and she was talking about someone else.
Then she laughed a little. “One time when I was eight, my mom left for the weekend, but she didn’t come back. She’d left me twenty dollars, and there was some food in the pantry. But a week went by. Then another week. Then three and the food ran out. When she did this in the winter or the fall, I’d eat at school. I’d always save some of my lunch and take it home so I had something to eat on the weekend, but this time it was the summer. The neighbor had this garden in her yard and I was so hungry that I couldn’t sleep and I went over there in the middle of the night and I dug up her carrots. All of them. I took them home and I ate them for days. I turned orange.” She laughed. “The beta-carotene gave me carotenemia. I thought I was dying. I went to the neighbors and they called 911. That’s how I ended up in foster care the first time. That’s also why I hate carrots.”
I just stared at her. “Where was she?” I asked.
She shrugged, petting the kitten. “I don’t know. She’d gotten a job as a flight attendant, and I’d spent lots of nights alone. But this time she just didn’t come home. I think something happened. Not really sure what. The hospital. Jail.”
“Jail??”
“I think she struggles with some mental health issues sometimes. It gets her in trouble. Anyway, she’d forgotten to pay the phone bill so the phone got shut off a few days after she left and I think she didn’t know how to get in touch with me without telling someone she’d left me alone. She was always really afraid I’d get taken from her.”
“You should have been taken from her,” I said, incredulous.
“She was a single mom, Justin, doing the best she could. She couldn’t afford overnight daycare and I was really independent. Honestly, it was fine 99 percent of the time.”
I shook my head. “Emma… That’s fucked up.”
“I genuinely don’t believe she meant to hurt me. She was doing what she had to do. It was what it was. I’m fine. I turned out okay. I’m happy and I have a good life.”
I blinked at her. “I don’t know how you could forgive someone like that.”
She shrugged again and looked up at me. “Why not forgive? In a world where you can choose anger or empathy, always choose empathy, Justin. I don’t know what it was like to be her. A single mom at eighteen, no money, no family. She struggled. She still struggles. But she loves me and I never doubted that for a second no matter what she did.”
She went back to playing with the kitten in her arms and I just sat there studying her.
Always choose empathy…
I wish I could do that. I wish I could go on with my life and not hold a grudge against Mom. But I couldn’t forgive her. At least not right now.
After an hour with the kittens, we wrapped things up to eat.
I’d wanted to bring her somewhere special, so I carefully selected where to go. It had to be somewhere uniquely Minnesota, the food had to be amazing, and it had to be memorable. I picked a small family-run place called Hot Plate. When she walked in and smiled around the little cafe, I knew I’d chosen correctly.
The walls were covered in hundreds of completed paint by numbers. Figurines sat on every surface, and eclectic lamps and chandeliers hung over the booths, and there was a whole shelf of games to play at your table while you ate.
“Wow,” she said, looking around. I was rewarded with a grin.
There was a fifteen-minute wait, so we stood outside talking. I was more than happy to draw the date out, it was already going way too fast. I was taking her to Minnehaha Falls after we ate, but I wanted to ask her if she’d like to check out the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden or go get ice cream after that, just to make it last, but she said she started work tomorrow and she needed to get back. I was hoping the table would take longer than they said, to give us more time, but after ten minutes they called my name. I was holding the door open for her when she put a hand on my arm.
“Let’s just hang here for a bit,” she said.
I looked at her confused. “Why, what’s up?”
She was peering past me at a middle-aged woman sitting on a Toilet King bus bench across the street, rummaging through a purse on her lap.
I looked back and forth between them. “What’s wrong?”
She didn’t answer me. She studied the lady for another moment, then crossed the street. I let go of the door and followed her.
Emma sat on the bench next to the woman. “Hi.”
The woman looked at Emma and then back inside her purse. “Do you know what time the bus comes?” Emma asked her. The woman didn’t answer.
“I’m going to see my mom,” Emma said. “Who are you going to see?”
“Samantha,” the lady said, not looking up. “I’m waiting for my Uber.
We’re going to Santa Monica.” “Oh. What time’s your flight?”
The woman stayed busy digging in her purse. “No flight, it’s a half-an- hour drive.”
Emma made split-second eye contact with me.
“So it looks like the Uber app is down,” Emma said. “I talked to Samantha, and she told me to take you to get some coffee in the restaurant over there until she can pick you up. Are you ready?”
The woman’s eyes moved back and forth over the mouth of her open Coach bag. Emma took her gently by the elbow. “I’m Emma. What’s your
name?”
The woman looked up at her. “Lisa.”
“Nice to meet you,” Emma said, helping her to her feet. “Can I see your phone for a second? Unlock it for me? I want to see if Samantha is almost here.” When Lisa gave it over, Emma slipped it into my hand. “Justin, can you make a call for me?” she whispered. “Let Samantha know Lisa is having coffee with us?”
I found Samantha in her contacts and called.
Ten minutes later a tearful twentysomething woman ran through the restaurant to our booth to get her mother. Emma had sat with Lisa the whole time talking about an imaginary day at the beach she was going to have in a city two thousand miles from here.
“How did you know?” I asked, once we were alone again. The woman seemed perfectly normal to me. At first glance anyway.
“Her shirt was buttoned wrong,” she said. “I used to work in memory care. She seemed off. Disoriented.”
“Was it dementia? She seems too young.”
“Dementia can happen young. Could be early-onset Alzheimer’s, head injury. Could be a lot of things.”
The waitress stopped by and filled our coffee cups. Emma grabbed some sugar packets, tore them, and spilled them into her mug.
“Why didn’t you tell her the truth? That we’re not in California,” I asked.
“It’s too confusing. The truth scares them. Sometimes the best way to show love or be kind to someone is to meet them where they are.”
“Literally? Or figuratively?”
She paused with the spoon in her hand. “Both.”
I watched her while she stirred her coffee. I liked that she helped. I liked that she noticed she had to.
We ordered our food, then we went to go check out the games. “What about chess?” I asked.
“I like chess,” she said, looking the game shelf up and down. “You don’t want to do one that’s more fun though? Uno or something?”
I arched an eyebrow. “You think we’re ready for Uno? That game has torn entire families apart.”
She laughed. “Okay. Chess then.”
We brought it back to the table and set it up. I knew ten minutes in that this wasn’t going to go well for me. I was good at chess, but she was better. A lot better.
“So, why travel nursing?” I asked, watching her take my rook.
“The money is nice,” she said. “We want to see the US. We take an international trip once a year too.”
“So you fly a lot,” I said, studying the board. “I do.”
“Do you clap when the airplane lands?” I asked. “Absolutely not.”
“Do you run on the fasty-fast moving sidewalks at the airport?” I slid my bishop over.
“I walk fast on the fasty-fast moving sidewalks. Do you run on the fasty- fast sidewalks?”
“No. Why? Did someone say something?”
She laughed with a hand on her queen. “I bet you’re that guy that stands in the walking lane and I have to clear my throat really loudly to get you to move.”
I made eye contact with her. “Do I strike you as the kind of man to obliviously impede the flow of traffic? I am a very considerate person,” I said. “I will have you know that I do not monopolize the armrests and I help little old ladies get their bags down from the overhead.”
Her expression was an amused one. “Wow. And I suppose next you’re going to tell me that you wash your dishes before there’s mold on them?” She knocked out my knight.
“Of course I wash them,” I said.
“And when’s the last time you washed your pillowcase?” “Wait… you have pillowcases??”
“And there it is.”
I was chuckling over the board game and she was smiling. Big time. “What kind of men are you going out with?” I asked, managing to get
one of her pawns. “I take pride in my apartment.” “I could see that about you.”
“Why? Because you’ve cyberstalked me and you’ve already seen all the pictures of it?” I grinned at her.
She moved her queen. “I didn’t see everything online. There is stuff I
don’t know about you.”
“Like?” I moved my queen.
She raised her eyes to me. “Like what happened to your dad.” I went quiet for a beat.
“A drunk driver hit him on his way to work,” I said. Her eyes went soft. “I’m sorry…”
I kept my gaze fixed on the game. “I never get used to explaining it— which I have to do every time I start dating somebody new. So it’ll be great once we break this curse,” I said, laughing a little.
“I get that. I don’t really like explaining my mom to people either.” “Yeah. I understand.”
We studied the board quietly.
“You know what I think about sometimes?” she said, raising her eyes to mine.
“What?”
“You know how when something bad happens to someone you love, and you wish you could take it from them instead?”
“Yeah.”
“What if the universe listened? What if you or your mom or the kids were supposed to die in a car crash and your dad said ‘Take me instead’— and the universe did. And nobody remembers the way it was supposed to be because that’s the deal. You never get to know that he’s a hero. The fates are reversed and the tribute takes the thing he asked for to save someone he loves. If you think of it that way, instead of being sad that he’s gone, be happy that he got what he wanted. And that somebody loved you enough to take your place.”
I nodded slowly. “That is actually oddly comforting.”
Her eyes focused on the board. “I’ve had a lot of bad things happen to me, Justin. I think sometimes the key to happiness is framing those things in a different way.”
“It would mean magic exists,” I said.
“It might. Isn’t that why we’re here?” Her lips quirked up. “Checkmate.” She knocked my piece over.
I stared at my fallen king. “I’m already out?” She shrugged playfully.
I sat back. “You are really good at chess.”
“Are you surprised?” she asked. “I’m not actually.”
“One of my foster homes had a chessboard and a broken TV.” “So I got hustled,” I deadpanned.
“Am I the asshole?” She batted her eyes at me. “No. It was a privilege to see you work.”
She laughed and I folded the board in half just in time for our food.
After breakfast we went to the falls. An hour later I drove her home. I didn’t want to drop her off. It didn’t feel like we’d gotten enough time, but to be fair the whole day wouldn’t have been enough time.
When we got to the mansion, I walked her to the dock, where Maddy was waiting in the pontoon.
Emma and I stopped on the lawn just short of the beach. “So you work the rest of the week?” I asked.
“Yeah. I work the next four days straight. Orientation tomorrow, then right into it the day after.”
“So I won’t be able to see you at all? Can I have lunch with you maybe?”
“I never know when I’m getting my lunches. But that’s sweet that you want to.” She smiled up at me. “It was a very nice date. Can I make a request for the next one though?”
“Of course.”
“Can I meet your dog?” I smiled. “Absolutely.”
She reached up and gave me a hug. When she broke away, she paused for a moment like maybe I’d kiss her. I was supposed to kiss her, but it didn’t feel right just yet, especially with Maddy standing there watching. But when Emma’s eyes flickered to my lips for a split second, I started to consider it anyway. Then she glanced over my shoulder and sucked in a breath. I turned to see what she was looking at.
A yacht was pulling up to a slip in the dock, a woman waving from the bow.
“Oh my God…” Emma whispered.
“What?” I asked, looking back and forth. “Who is that?” A long, disbelieving pause. “That’s my mom.”
