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“Oh. Sawyer, hi. What are you doing here?” Gram asks, her surprise at seeing Sawyer in her bedroom doorway evident. She leans in past him and catches me red-handed with her medication. She clears her throat and nods toward Sawyer and Nancy. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to speak with my granddaughter in private.”
Sawyer
The door does little to conceal their voices. I hear the muffled arguing while I pace in the hallway just outside. Nan gnaws at her cuticles. “This isn’t good,” she says.
“No. None of this is good.”
“I told Maggie, ‘You need to tell her.’ But she wouldn’t listen.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “They’re stubborn. Both of them.”
“And yet,” Nan says, smoothing her wrinkled hand over my arm. “I imagine the two of you had a nice evening together?”
“We had a great night. Not that it matters, because she’s made it abundantly clear that she’s not interested in anything long-term. Not with me. And like I said, stubborn.”
“Oh, Sweetheart. Maybe she’s right.”
I halt my pacing and stare at her. “Are you serious?”
Nan shrugs and nods. “The logical thing is to end it here, have a clean break. It was fun while it lasted, but who really wants to do the long-distance thing when they get back?”
The complete one-eighty sends me reeling. “Wasn’t your whole plan to help us meet and, I don’t know, fall in love eventually? Isn’t that why you tricked us into coming here?”
“That was the plan exactly.”
“So why are you giving up, too, Nan?”
“Sawyer. Your whole life, you’ve wanted things to be practical. Logical. And this thing with Gwendolyn definitely isn’t. Ending things now is logical. Letting this be some vacation fling is logical. What Maggie and I did, well, it was a wild idea. We shouldn’t have tried to meddle like that. It’s not your thing, Sawyer, and it’s not hers, either. But carrying on a long-distance relationship with someone you don’t truly care about—” I open my mouth to object, but Nan holds up a finger to stop me and continues on. “Carrying on a relationship just so you can say you didn’t have a fling is maybe the most illogical and impractical idea of all. Perhaps you should be content with the good times you had together and go back home tomorrow with some nice memories.”
I truly don’t know where all this is coming from. The words sting—an indictment on my character, a recipe for a boring and lonely future. Dating Chelsea was logical. And before her, being single was logical, too. I didn’t have the time to pour into a relationship, not with getting my very practical master’s degree, finding a practical job, setting up a practical future for myself.
It makes sense. My whole life, I’ve seen Mom and Nan—single women—making it work. Food on the table, bills paid on time, providing for me and each other. Practicality was the key to getting by. I think I was drawn to math because it was logical. The answer is always just a little bit of work away, and you can always check if you’re right or not. Unlike the more subjective arts, there’s no guessing, no interpretation needed. So I craved it. I wanted to have the right answers and build the stable life I’d known since I was a kid I was supposed to have one day.
And somehow, along the way, I didn’t see what was underneath the surface of the way Nan’s face would light up at a memory of Grandpa, or how she and Mom would laugh when telling stories about their family, or the pain in Nan’s eyes when she missed him most: when I was learning how to ride a bike, when she drank her morning coffee, when Mom learned how to change the oil in her car, or when I went to prom or graduated Salutatorian. There, underneath it all, was deep, unrelenting love. The joy and pain of feeling something so strong it breaks you in all the best and worst ways, over and over again, even long after the person is gone.
I know I haven’t known Gwen long, but that breaking feeling is happening already, and she’s only on the other side of the door. “I don’t want logic, Nan.” I sink back against the wall and slide to the floor, ready to wait it out for as long as it takes. “I want her.”
She looks down at me and smiles with a wink. “It’s about time you figured that out.”
It’s been an hour, and I can still hear their muffled arguments through the door. Nan went back to her room a while ago to rest her legs, leaving clear instructions that she is to be contacted as soon as the door opens to offer moral support, for whomever it’s needed.
Then things quiet, with hushed bursts that no longer sound angry. One voice grows louder and clearer, and I make it to my feet as the door opens in front of me. Maggie stands in the doorway, her face shrouded in so much sadness I want to hug her.
“Hi, Sawyer,” she says, emerging into the hallway and easing the door closed behind her.
“I feel awful, Maggie. I didn’t realize—”
She cuts me off. “No. I should have told her months ago. You couldn’t have known.” Then there’s pity in her eyes when she pats my hand and says, “I’m sorry, though. I think she just wants some time alone right now.”
“Yeah,” I sigh. It makes sense, but I don’t want to leave her alone after having the conversation I know she just had. “Nan is down in her room, if you don’t want some time alone.”
“And what about you?” Her eyes are red and watery, but her lips quirk up when I lower myself onto the floor again.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Gwendolyn
Everything hurts.
