Page 79 of The Statistically Unlikely Reunion

Khloe takes Vi’s hand. “We can go to my room.” She turns toward Lucas. “You coming?”

But Lucas Sebastian Murray chooses that moment to sit. He crosses broad forearms. “No.”

24

WE SAVE MONEY. WE ZOOM. WE COUNT THE DAYS

PAST

The days leading up to Yellowstone Club seem to crawl by.

We continue to practice as a team, twice a week.

In our group chat, we send stupid memes and agree it’s past time to share location with one another, especially since we’ll be traveling from different places. Lucas asks me for book recommendations, and Brody whines about my picks being too philosophical. Somehow, in the weeks leading up to Yellowstone Club, we turn into a little mini book club, debating everything from whether author intentionality matters to why the monk in A Psalm for the Wild-Built goes by they/them pronouns.

I add even more hours to my work schedule, doubling up on Pizza Palace and tutoring because one is more lucrative, the other stable and secure.

It helps that Lucas also works too many hours.

We’re exhausted together, even though we’re apart.

Because meaningful phone conversations remain tricky, he texts me each morning with pictures of the city. During his lunch break, he’ll share songs that made him think of me (Blake Shelton’s “Austin,” because apparently Lucas’s grandparents lived in Texas, a YouTube video of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” being sung via 331 movies).

Because he has more of a social life than I do—no siblings in Chicago to take care of, appearances to keep up if he wants that return offer—he often goes out with coworkers. He sends me pictures of a retro poster of someone talking about the necessity of caffeine (and a picture of the receipt because he cannot believe was forced to pay $8.50 for a vanilla latte so he could sit at the same table as his coworkers). Another day there’s a pretty contrail (cue debate about whether contrails can really be beautiful, which then devolves into a Plato vs. Aristotle sidebar about aesthetics in general).

Only once do I send a picture: Here’s a sweatshirt you left at my dorm, and because possession is nine-tenths of the law . . . I guess it’s my Pasadena City College sweatshirt now.

We save money. We Zoom. We count down the days.

Lucas and I land within half an hour of each other. He looks so nauseous I can’t help but laugh.

“That bad?”

He wraps his long arms around me. He’s filled out a little, eating the free breakfasts and lunches Eluva provides. He also looks more put together than usual. He had to get a real haircut (though he’d kept it long) because I forgot to trim it before he left. “Better than when we flew back from nationals.”

I laugh up at him as he smiles ruefully down at me. “Every single flight attendant and child left this plane with at least two origami creations. My fingers are numb.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to help distract you.”

“If I could have justified renting a car and driving here, I would have.” He kisses the top of my head. “But I didn’t want to miss a single minute with you.”

Because the words don’t come as easily to me, I squeeze his hand as I pull him toward the baggage claim. “No more calluses.”

“Will you think less of me if I admit I miss the outdoor stuff?”

“Are you… not enjoying the internship?”

Lucas looks around, as if worried that even here, hundreds of miles away, someone will hear him disparaging fintech. “It’s intellectually more interesting, but—” He shrugs. “Maybe because I’m just an intern, but all summer I’ve been given mini projects, micro tasks that slot into someone else’s big picture.” One corner of his mouth tilts up. “Can’t complain about the difference in pay, though.”

Brody’s waiting for us at the curb, leaning against what he tells us is the family’s Yellowstone Range Rover.

“Meaning it stays here, year-round?” Lucas doesn’t mean to sound judgmental, and luckily, Brody is hard to offend.

“We need a car when we’re here, guys.”

Brody’s other friends are out hiking when we arrive, meaning we get a private tour of the place. Like with everything in Brody’s life, townhouse is a misnomer: the Huntington-Branca vacation home is a four-bed, six-bath, 2,600-square-foot single-family residence that happens to share one small wall with its neighbor. It’s larger than Lucas’s and my family’s apartments . . . combined.

“I get the master because it’s my birthday week and I’m gonna have girls over. But . . .” He pauses, dramatically opening the door to a magnificent bedroom, with beautiful hardwood floors, lush Persian rugs, and a queen canopy bed.