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I took a sip, savored it, and stretched out my legs. “Hey, weren’t you hooking up with someone? What was her name?”
“Bega.”
“What happened with her?” I asked.
“Nothing. I bang her. Sometimes. In the office.”
“You’re hooking up with a coworker?”
“I’m hooking up with my boss.”
It took me a moment to realize that for him, this little slipup was a breath of fresh air, something wild that he could hold on to in the midst of a life that he had never wanted. That need to rebel somehow to feel he wasn’t getting lost in his responsibilities, his schedule, order.
“Is it worth it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sure.” I took a sip.
“I like her, but it’s complicated, she just lives to work. But what we have—that’s it. I have important things to worry about, I can’t risk all that. And I don’t know if I want to. We’re not like that, are we, Axel?”
“Like what?”
“Commitment. Getting tied down.”
“I don’t know.”
After thinking it over a lot, I had come to the conclusion that I didn’t know many things, especially about stuff that hadn’t happened yet. I had realized that because I’d spent so many years clinging to what I thought I knew, that I would become a painter or that nothing would ever happen to the people close to me, my family. I was wrong. So now I never assumed anything.
“I guess I don’t either,” he admitted.
“So the idea is Leah’s going to go to college, right?”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I’m talking about you. About what you’ll do then. About that responsibility that you have now but you won’t have forever. I know you’ve got the tuition and the apartment for her, but it’s not the same. You can take back part of your life. And if she starts painting again…”
“She won’t,” Oliver cut me off.
“If it does happen…” I went on, remembering the promise I made to Douglas one night lying on my porch, “I’ll help her figure out her path.”
Oliver finished his drink. “She’s not going to do it. Don’t you see that? She’s a different person.”
“But she is doing it,” I said softly, and for some reason, I felt weird sharing it, as if I were betraying her, her trust, our bond. But shit, he was her brother; he was worried.
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah. She’s not doing a lot. And no colors.”
Oliver sat there thinking. “Why didn’t she tell me?”
The question I didn’t want to hear. “Maybe you’re too close. Why are there are people who can open up and talk with a psychologist about things they can’t tell their own family? I guess sometimes being so close to someone makes things harder. And I think…I think she feels guilty with you, because of all the changes…”
He stared into his empty glass and ignored the loud music around us.
I felt an unknown pressure in my chest.
“I’ll do it, I promise.” I stood up. “Come on, let’s have some fun.”
