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“You okay?” Tommy sidled up next to me as we waited to board the bus that would take us back to the hotel. He must have noticed the emotions warring with each other on my face. I was glad he interrupted the mental argument happening within me or I was sure I would have jumped off the deep end.
“Yeah. Of course.” It was like my brain went into autopilot and decided to give Tommy my normal response. I watched as Tommy looked at me like he knew better than to believe me.
“Got something on your mind?” he asked as he gestured for me to board the bus first.
“Yeah.” I sighed as I claimed one of the seats. Tommy slipped down next to me. Jamil gave the two of us a wink as he walked by. If I hadn’t felt weighed down by thoughts of Luke, I would have played along with him. Instead, I let him pass the two of us without a second thought.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Maybe. I think I want a distraction first.” I knew in my heart that my mind needed to take a step away from the struggle happening within me to find any clarity or answers.
“Well, it seems you’ve come to the right place.” Tommy gave me a sly smile. “I’ve got just the thing.”
When we arrived back at the hotel, Tommy told me to meet him down in the lobby in fifteen minutes. It gave him enough time for a quick shower and for me to freshen up. Every time I walked out into the lobby to see Tommy waiting for me, it was like I was living some dream that shouldn’t belong to me. He turned when he heard me coming, a smile lighting up his face when he saw me. I would never get over that smile. It lit up my insides and filled the parts of me with enough joy that wherever Tommy had planned on taking me felt bearable.
“Are you hungry?” When I was close enough, he offered me his elbow. My hand found its favorite place in the crook of it as the two of us walked toward the front doors.
“Always.”
“Pizza okay?” The glint in Tommy’s eye told me he knew what my answer was going to be. “I thought we could enter the great Chicago versus New York pizza debate.”
“Chicago will win,” I told him as we exited into the lively city streets on a mission to find the best New York City pizza. The energy was buzzing among the people out walking around. The air was warmer for the people in the city, and it was like everyone had emerged from hibernation on that very night. It was exactly what I needed to let the voices inside my head die down for a minute.
Tommy and I took turns pointing out different storefronts that looked interesting and guessing how much certain apartments were as we passed them. It was like the two of us had started to carve routines out with each other. When we crossed the street, Tommy always walked on the side of the road that the car was most likely to be coming from if someone were to miss seeing us in the crosswalk. I was physically incapable of walking in a straight line, and whenever I started to drift into Tommy, his arm would snake around my waist to pull me the rest of the way into his side. This easy give and take that we developed felt like the start of a song that I knew would become my favorite on the album.
“What about that one?” Tommy pointed toward a pizzeria with a line coming out the door. It was moving quickly and the place was clearly loved by many. I flashed him a quick smile before I looked both ways and dashed across the street. A holler sounded behind me, which I was sure had come from Tommy as I left him in the dust.
“Nobody said anything about racing!” he called after me as he bounded across the street.
“I like to live by the motto of never letting them know what you’re going to do next.” I shrugged before I took Tommy’s arm again.
“Well, in that case, I feel like I should follow suit. After you, my lady.” Tommy opened the door to the pizzeria, bowing as if I really were royalty. I laughed as I skipped through the door to the counter.
We ordered our pizza and took it outside to sit on the curb and people-watch everyone that was walking the streets of New York City. The pizza was completely different from Chicago style. The pie we got was thinner and was the perfect kind to fold over on itself. I grabbed my slice, folded it in half, and brought it up to my mouth to take a bite when I saw Tommy shaking his head at me, just like the first time he saw me do it.
“What?”
“It’s sacrilegious to eat pizza like that,” he told me as he took a bite of his own slice.
“Don’t knock it until you try it.”
We continued to pick through our pizza as taxis flew past us and people hurried by to an unknown destination. I knew what was on the other end of the silence that was sitting between us. Tommy waited until I had finished my first slice before he finally voiced the question I knew he was waiting to ask.
“So you want to tell me what was on your mind back at the field?”
I let out a sigh as I realized I couldn’t keep these feelings to myself any longer. It wasn’t fair to Tommy. I had already opened up to him and started to build that trust between us. If I denied him the opportunity to help me through this moment now, it would only crack the foundation we were building.
“Luke grew up here. Staten Island, to be exact.” Tommy wiped his fingers off on a napkin as he gave me his full attention. “I’m not sure why, but the fact that I’m so close to his parents and his childhood home have been weighing heavily on my mind this visit to New York City.”
Tommy stayed quiet for a minute, thinking deeply on what I had told him. After a moment, he turned to look at me with one of the most serious looks I had ever seen on his face. “You should go visit them.”
“What?”
“You should go visit them.” The way he said it was like it was final. The decision had been made and there was no way around it. My eyes danced around his face, trying to figure out if he was being serious about this.
“I don’t know if I should.”
“I think that . . .” Tommy spoke softly; his words felt carefully crafted as he delivered them. It warmed my heart that he was trying his best to be thoughtful. “In order to move on from this chapter of your life or get any closure, you need to visit them.”
