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I lift my eyebrows, curiosity piqued.
“I’ve never been to Europe. You’ve never been to Europe. What if we did the whole broke college student backpacking thing this summer, as a way to cap off our freshman year? One of my friends went with her boyfriend and said it completely changed her. You can geek out about all the languages, and I can pretend to be annoyed with you when you order for us in flawless French but secretly I’ll find it extremely hot.”
A grin spreads across my face. I can picture it: sipping espresso in Italian cafés, exploring ancient castle ruins. Rowan there with me.
Unfortunately, I can also picture the enormous price tag.
“I love it,” I say, even as that worry twists my stomach.
“Yeah?” Now she’s grinning too, perched on the edge of the bench, one leg bouncing up and down excitedly. Her joy is infectious, and for a moment I think I’d say yes to anything if it meant getting to see her this way. “Because I know it’s still not going to be cheap. We could take a flight with a hundred layovers and stay in hostels, of course. And it wouldn’t be until summer, so that gives us enough time to save up.”
“I think we can do it. I still have most of the Howl money, and—we can budget.” If there ever was a perfect use for the Howl prize, this is it. I’d never have won without her.
All of high school, my life was full of no. If this is something Rowan wants for us—and the more I think about it, the more I want it, too—then I’ll do everything I can to make it happen.
“I’ll only eat croissants in Paris, if I really have to.”
“And only chocolate in Belgium.” I drop a hand to her knee, clutching it. “Or—oh! We could go to Basel, Switzerland. It’s right near Switzerland’s borders with France and Germany, and Switzerland has four national languages, which is really quite fascinating, and—” I pause. “I feel like I’ve never said Switzerland as many times as I just did.”
“One, I love that you just know that off the top of your head. And two: that sounds amazing.”
I’ve never given much thought to travel. It’s always seemed as though I had too many other priorities to allow any space for wanderlust. But God, it’s there, that desire to see the world. There’s no way I could have studied those languages, often in my spare time, without it sitting beneath the surface.
The fact that she’s looking ahead like this, making this plan for us… My heart is suddenly too big for my chest.
“And just so you know,” she says, “you’ll never be a small fish to me.”
“Is that innuendo?”
She just gives an innocent shrug as I pull her toward me for another kiss.
This girl. She could take the gloomiest day and paint it brightest gold.
Eventually we make our way back downtown. Earlier this morning, I managed to grab rush tickets for a new musical adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, and when the lights dim and the curtain goes up, her hand in mine in a back row of the theater, I’m full of nothing but calm. We’re sliding back into what we had before summer ended, the two of us fitting together the way we always have.
Only this time we have two new cities to learn. Apart, and then together.
And perhaps, this summer, so many more.
7
ROWAN
IT’S ALMOST ELEVEN o’clock when we get back to Neil’s dorm room, after we’ve gone full AP Lit, analyzing the musical and all the ways it compared to the play.
“I’m sad I don’t get to meet your roommate,” I say as Neil shuts the door behind us and flicks on the lights. Skyler went home for the weekend, he informed me when I arrived earlier. “Although if it means we have the room to ourselves, maybe I’m not sad at all.”
Five years ago, I was in New York with my parents for a book tour, but the reality of being here with Neil is almost too good. He navigated the streets with a tentative confidence, as though wanting to prove that he knew where he was going as he squinted down at Google Maps. It was adorable, the fact that he wanted to impress me. There was some envy, too—because I’m jealous of this entire city, these skyscrapers and streets and subway cars that get to wake up with him every day.
Part of me was worried he’d judge the note from Professor Everett, an imperfect record to begin my college career. We always kept pace with each other so evenly, but he’s no longer my competition. I shouldn’t be shocked by the feedback, given how I stared at that blank document until my retinas burned, finally dragging out sentence after agonizing sentence. She’d said no more than a thousand words. Mine was barely three hundred.
At first I wasn’t sure why I brought it with me, but as he read it, I realized it was because I needed someone to process it with. Someone who understands me, who knows how out of character this kind of feedback is. And how much it might sting.
The joy on his face as he read my writing and then Professor Everett’s note was so far from disappointment that I wasn’t sure why I second-guessed it. He didn’t tell me I was overreacting, or that I’d do better next time, or that her note wasn’t really that bad. He knew exactly why it upset me so much.
Even better: the joy on his face when I mentioned Europe. Something we can look forward to later, when all of this feels too difficult.
Right now, though—right now he is all mine.
