Page 36 of All Our Almosts

Andy

“I don’t know,” Andy says. “It doesn’t really sound like me.”

“Well edit it, Mr. Editor,” I quip, pushing the laptop back towards him. “Make it sound like you. But leave in the compliments, butter him up a little. Once he likes you he’ll be more receptive.”

“Are you saying I’m unlikable the way I am?” His tone is joking, but also maybe a little not.

“I love you just the way you are,” I insist, “but I also have the privilege of knowing the whole you and not just email you.”

“So email me is unlikeable?”

“You said it, not me.” I raise my hands in feigned surrender, keeping the mood light, and Andy’s expression turns devilish. He sees an opening—lunging forward to grab the spot on my ribs where he knows I’m most ticklish. I shriek and topple backwards, batting his hands away, but it’s hard when he’s bigger than me with crazy long arms and I’m already wheezing. He grabs my waist again, and I can’t help my peals of laughter as I flail on the rug. He’s absolutely ruthless, and it’s only by luck that I catch hold of his arm and pull him down too, compromising his offensive. He falls gracelessly, landing across my chest, arms and legs tangled in mine.

“Not another move, Walsh!” I gasp, trying to hold his arms against his sides. “Hands where I can see them.”

“Okay, okay,” he smiles. “Truce.”

He props himself up on his forearms, putting a bit of space between our chests. And only then do I process the position we’re in.

I’m on my back, hair splayed out, chest rising with each panted breath. Andy’s lying over me, and God he’s so close. He smells like clean laundry and something muskier, heavier. He smells like him and it’s comforting and masculine and as familiar as the look in his eyes. Only a few inches of air and a decade of boundaries separate our faces from each other; even less separates the rest of us. Our bodies line up in all the places that count, his gaze locked on mine, and my brain is short circuiting. Trapped under the weight of Andy’s body, convincing myself that maybe—just maybe—that look in his eyes means he’s started to feel some of the attraction I’ve always felt.

I’m frantically searching through reasons why it could be okay to stay like this. Explanations that sound like friendship. Excuses to press more of myself against more of him. But Andy beats me to it. His voice is a low scrape as he says, “You’re so—”

My phone buzzes on the rug next to me. I want to know the end of his sentence more than I want my next breath but I shouldn’t, so I reach for the phone. Mariane’s name is on the screen.

“Oh, I have to take this.” I still sound breathless, and that’s as embarrassing as anything. Andy pushes up to his knees to free me, and I press accept. “Hi, Mari. What’s up?”

I stand—too flustered to have this call with Andy watching me right now—and start walking towards my room. I mouth “sorry” back towards him, gesturing towards the phone, then close the bedroom door behind me.

“Darn it.” I trudge back into the living room a few minutes later in the midst of a completely new thought spiral. “Apparently there’s a typo on some of the signage we sent to the printers. I just had to call and ask them to halt the job, which they had already started, so we’re going to have a penalty fee.” I sit back down on the floor and immediately start angry-scrolling on my computer. “I knew we shouldn’t have let that intern proofread the signs. But he was so excited and I felt bad saying no. See, this is why people shouldn’t leave me to manage things. I’m too much of a pushover.”

“You’re a great manager,” Andy says automatically, but he has no idea.

“Objectively, no I’m not. I have messed up a lot on this project. This is just Example A. And it’s okay, right? Management is a growth area for me, and that’s alright. I just hate feeling so incompetent.”

“You are not incompetent. Look. I already got an email back from Hank.” He turns his computer screen so I can see. “I couldn’t have done that without you.”

I take a few seconds to skim the response he got before looking back up at him. “Yes, you could have.”

“No, I couldn’t have.”

And I love him for having faith in me, but clearly he doesn’t get it. I’m shaking my head as I say, “This whole experience has made me wonder if I’m crazy applying for a PhD. I just don’t know if I’m cut out for it. My professional strengths are things like that.” I gesture vaguely towards the email on Andy’s screen. “I’m good with vibes and vibes only. The second I have to do logistics I become a hot mess. And education research is like… all logistics. Maybe I’m not ready. Maybe I should just defer and try again next year. Then I can pick more schools in New England and I won’t have to go so far anyway. I probably should have thought of this a long time ago—”

“Sophie.” He cuts me off, taking hold of my upper arms. “You’re catastrophizing. Stop. Come here.” He stands and pulls me up with him, then leads me to the coat rack.

“Where are we going?”

“We’re going to have a snowball fight.”

I barked out a surprised laugh. “Why?”

“Because we need a break. Come on.”

“Rules?” I ask as we descend Andy’s front steps into nearly a foot of fresh, unshoveled snow.

“Hmm… First to three hits wins?” he suggests, looking up and down the quiet one-way street.

“Do we each get a home base?” My hand trails down the railing, already collecting the snow piled there.