Come As You Are

No more ice. My heart is open.

It’s telling me to take a chance with him.

I can’t let the heart fool me though.

Life isn’t a fairy tale. The modern-day maiden must be practical above all. I might want to toss responsibility into the breeze like dandelions, then skip and tra-la-la my way home with him, but I have bills.

And, more importantly, bills have me.

But if I keep looking at his handsome face, his square jaw, his gorgeous green eyes, I’ll buckle.

I tear my gaze away from his magnetic eyes, and something catches my attention on a nearby park bench—the plaque on the top slat of wood, shining as if it has been polished today.

I point to it. “What’s that?”

We walk closer and we read it together out loud, our voices forming melody and harmony. “Tony, win, lose, or break even, you always have me. Love, Karen.”

I look at Flynn. We both shrug then smile.

“One more adventure?” I offer, a note of hope in my voice. “We need to know what that means.”

“Clearly.”

We whip out our phones in unison, and we google like it’s a race.

“It’s an inscription,” he says excitedly.

“A wife surprised her husband,” I say, the words piling up in a rush.

“For his sixty-fifth birthday,” he adds.

And we laugh as we each read the details from an article on the many benches in this park. We learn Tony was a retired investment banker. When he came home from work, his wife, Karen, used to ask him if he won, lost, or broke even.

We spend the next hour or two on a treasure hunt around Central Park, searching for more of the four thousand inscribed benches, reading quirky details of the memories and loves and lives carved into plaques in this park, each inscription costing about ten thousand dollars.

“We rarely notice them. We sit on these benches and we read, drink coffee, make phone calls, or maybe we just text or tweet,” I say.

“Maybe we feed the pigeons. Or wait to meet a friend and meanwhile, we’re surrounded by memories of other people and things that were important to them.”

I spot another one with a fantastic inscription and tug his sleeve, pulling him closer to read. “We would make the same mistake all over again! Vic and Nancy Schiller. Still best friends.”

He finds the info. “When they told her they were getting married, her mother said it would be a mistake,” he says, smiling.

“Guess they had the last laugh. Still together and happy. Okay, this is seriously the coolest thing I’ve ever discovered in New York City.”

“I think so too.” He sets his hand on my arm, running his fingers down my bare skin. “I want to keep discovering them. I want to go all over the park and find the best ones. I want to do that with you.”

My heart soars, terrifying me with how much longing is in it, so much I feel like I’m going to burst, to drown in it.

I meet his gaze.

The look in his eyes is different than I’ve seen before. It’s vulnerable and hopeful and perhaps the slightest bit nervous.

23

Flynn

In front of the Schillers’ bench, I have to float the next question. Despite the risks, despite my own fears, now is the time to ask.

I didn’t plan to ask her here. But here is the right place.

“Sabrina,” I say, my voice gravelly with nerves, “what happens when the story is done?”

The nerves aren’t from how I feel for her. They come from whether she’ll allow an us to happen. Whether she’s willing to take a chance. That’s the great unknown. That’s the uncontrollable factor.

“What do you mean?”

I reach for her hand, sliding my fingers through hers. “Do you think there’s any way we could do this?”

“Do what?” Her voice is barely a breath on the air. “I need you to spell it out.”

I love that she wants utter clarity. It’s so her. “Be together. You and me.” I point from her to me and back. “Have a real go of it.”

“Be together,” she repeats, as if she’s making sense of what I’m saying.

I loop my fingers tighter through hers. “I’ve had a great time with you over these two weeks, and I want to see where we can go. The article is almost done, so does that mean we can have a new beginning?”

She sighs, a melancholy sound. I want to hit the rewind button, go back in time ten seconds, and turn that sigh into one of contentment.

“Flynn,” she says, and my name sounds like an apology. Tension flares through me, and I wonder how I’ve read this wrong. How I’ve completely misunderstood yesterday’s kiss and everything else. “You know I wish it was different. You have to know that, right?”

There’s heartache in her voice.

“Yeah, I know that,” I say heavily.

Her fingers slide tighter through mine, and her touch has become an epilogue, the last reminder that we were always pretend. We were each better off not knowing who the other was, when we slipped on our masks and made believe we could be people we weren’t.

“I want that more than anything. But this is a big chance for me at Up Next. If I can impress Mr. Galloway with this piece, there could be a whole new beat writing deep features on companies—including yours. And you know it’s not only my career,” she adds, her voice a bare plea. “I have to support Kevin. I want to support Kevin. He’s my brother, but he also doesn’t have anyone else who can look out for him the way I do.”

“I understand.” And I do. I understand deeply he’s the world to her, and that’s how it should be. She has to put him first.

She has to put herself second.

That means we won’t turn into anything more. We’ll keep fading into less.

If I believed in fate, I’d say it was meant to be this way.

But I believe in math and on the surface, we don’t add up.

We’re an inequality.

One has more than the other. One needs more than the other. One can’t give what the other must have.

But what if I could balance the equation? A surge of energy shoots through me. I’ve built companies my whole adult life. I create jobs. I can make one for her. I can solve this math problem. “Wait. What if I gave you a job?”

She furrows her brow. “What? Why on earth would you give me a job?”

Be her cushion. “Maybe we can come up with something.”

“I don’t even understand what that would be.”

I hunt for an idea. Anything at all. “Writing a newsletter or marketing copy or something.”

She shoots me a look—one that says she can’t believe I offered that. One that says she’s slightly offended. “You can’t solve this for me by coming up with a job you don’t have and don’t need,” she sputters, flapping her hands.

“What if we needed that?” I posit.

She narrows her eyes. “But you don’t. You don’t really need to hire me. Also, that’s not the kind of job I want or am good at.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you,” I say, rubbing a hand over the back of my neck, frustrated as hell to be back to an equation with no answer. “That was kind of ridiculous and insulting.”

“It’s fine,” she says softly. “I know where you’re coming from. I just want you to understand. I’m not a marketing writer. Or a newsletter writer. I’m a reporter.”