The Girl He Used to Know (Page 29)

“I want to stay together after we graduate,” Jonathan said afterward. “There are plenty of libraries in New York. We’ll both get jobs and we can go to grad school at night. We’ll probably have to live in a crappy apartment even smaller than this one, but someday I’ll make enough for us to live anywhere we want. Say you’ll come with me, Annika.”

I told him I loved him again, and then I told him I would.

27

Jonathan

CHICAGO

AUGUST 2001

Nate and his new girlfriend are waiting at the bar when Annika and I arrive at the restaurant. The woman is completely Nate’s type, or at least the type he’s been dating since the divorce: late twenties, club attire, pretty. I won’t know until we’re seated and having a conversation if she’s an improvement over the last one, who talked incessantly about the TV show Survivor and drank several frozen strawberry daiquiris that gave her “the most awful brain freeze.”

Nate and I shake hands. “This is Sherry,” he says.

“Jonathan,” I say. “Nice to meet you. This is Annika.”

Annika smiles, shakes hands, and maintains brief eye contact with both of them. She’s wearing a long, full skirt, which is in direct contrast to Sherry’s super short dress and skyscraper high heels, but Annika’s top clings slightly in all the right places, and I’ve been glancing appreciatively down its deep-vee neckline since I arrived at her apartment. Nate appraises her and shoots me a quick, approving look, which I ignore because we’re not twenty-two anymore. Also, he can’t read my mind, so he doesn’t know my thoughts about the cleavage.

Our table is ready and once we’re seated, I take a look at the drink menu. Nate asks Sherry what she’d like to drink and she says “Chardonnay” as if she’d had the kind of day only wine could fix.

“Would you like a glass of wine or would you prefer this?” I ask Annika, pointing to the one nonalcoholic option the restaurant offers, a mix of mango, cranberry, and orange juice with a splash of ginger ale.

“I’ll have the Chardonnay,” Annika says.

“Jonathan tells me you’re a librarian,” Nate says.

“Yes.”

Nate waits for Annika to provide details, but he’s greeted with silence. “Where?” he finally asks.

“The Harold Washington Library.”

“How long have you been there?”

“Six years, three months, and thirteen days. How long have you been at your job?”

Nate laughs. “I’m not sure I can answer that as thoroughly as you have. You’ve put me on the spot.”

Annika shoots me a quick look as she tries to decipher whether he’s kidding, so I smile at her. “Don’t listen to him. I bet he can tell you the exact date of his retirement, right down to the minute.”

“You got me,” Nate says.

“What do you do, Sherry?” I ask.

“I’m a scientist.”

Okay. Did not see that coming.

Nate doesn’t even bother to hide his smirk and was probably near bursting from holding that little detail inside. The daiquiri girl was between jobs and seemed vastly uninterested in remedying the situation anytime soon. Nate broke up with her a short time later.

The waitress brings our drinks and Annika takes a tentative sip of her wine. “Do you like it?” I ask her.

“It’s very good.” She puckers her lips a little, because it’s probably a bit drier than she expected.

“I need to use the restroom,” Sherry says. She looks at Annika. “Would you like to come with me?”

“No,” Annika says, grimacing and using the same tone you’d use to turn down an elective root canal.

Sherry looks at her in confusion. “No?”

Annika pauses. Removes the napkin from her lap and smiles. “Actually, yes. I should probably go now, too.”

I keep my expression blank, but inside I’m laughing. Annika’s honest response to what is essentially one of the most common female conventions is priceless, but she says it so sweetly—without a trace of sarcasm—that I may be the only one who realizes she didn’t arbitrarily change her mind. It just took her a few extra seconds to shuffle through her brain for the appropriate social response. No wonder she was so tired after I took her to my company dinner. It must be exhausting, and it makes me feel extra protective of her.

“Does she always say what she means?” Nate asks after they’ve left the table.

I take a sip of my drink. “Always. What you see is what you get with her. If Annika likes you, she’ll let you know.” I laugh. “And she’ll also let you know if she doesn’t.”

“No games, no bullshit. I bet it’s nice. And you were right. She’s beautiful.”

“On the inside, too.” Even with her bluntness, I can’t imagine Annika ever saying an unkind word about anyone. She’s been on the receiving end of too much bullying and abuse to ever make someone feel bad on purpose.

“So, I guess she did want to rekindle.”

“We both did.” I’ll never tell Nate or Annika how close I came to shutting the door on giving us a second chance. It doesn’t matter now.

Sherry and Annika come back from the bathroom. Sherry takes a big drink of her wine and Annika mimics her, choking slightly.

“This wine is amazing and just what I needed after the day I had,” Sherry says.

“Me too,” Annika says with a sigh.

“This is my favorite Chardonnay, but sometimes I prefer a nice crisp sauvignon blanc. Then there are those times when nothing but a giant glass of Cabernet will do,” Sherry says. “What about you? Do you have any favorites?”

“It really doesn’t matter to me. I drank wine coolers in college, but no one orders those anymore.”

I pause with my own drink halfway to my lips as I wait for Sherry’s response.

“Yes! Oh, that brings back memories. I loved the watermelon ones.”

“I liked cherry. They turned my lips red,” Annika says.

“But they’re so sweet. I could never drink one now.”

“Oh, me neither,” Annika says a beat or two later, shuddering like she can’t imagine such a thing.

She is so adorable right now. Also, I’m pretty sure she would drink a cherry wine cooler right this minute if I set one down in front of her.

She and Sherry finish their wine and when the waitress asks if they’d like another, they both say yes.

“So, you must like books if you work at a library,” Sherry says.

“I like books more than I like most people,” Annika says.

Nate and Sherry stifle a polite laugh, but there’s nothing patronizing about their reaction. It really is nice to be with a woman who genuinely owns her choices. There were times when Liz’s behavior was as chameleon in nature as Annika’s, but in my ex-wife’s case, it was less about fitting in and more about manipulating her business opponent. It’s not fair of me to excuse one while vilifying the other, but I do it anyway.

Our dinner proceeds uneventfully. When we’re done eating, no one takes the waitress up on her offer of dessert, so Nate orders a third round of drinks for the table instead. Annika isn’t even done with her second. Her cheeks are flushed and she’s leaning back in her chair instead of the usual stiff posture she displays in social situations. Nate, Sherry, and I probably have what could be described as a solid buzz, but Annika’s size and low tolerance for alcohol has put her much closer to the intoxicated end of the spectrum. It’s the most I’ve seen her drink, ever, and when she finishes off the second glass she looks warily at the third.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to drink that,” I say to Annika, pointing at her glass.

“I don’t.” The blunt way she says it reminds me that I shouldn’t automatically assume she needs me to come to her rescue.

She may not have wanted any more wine, but what she’s already consumed is still working its way through her bloodstream. I ask Sherry some questions about her work, and she mentions a grant she’s hoping to gain approval for. “But I’m having trouble convincing my boss.”

“Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn’t have the power to say yes,” Annika says. In theory, yes, but in this case I’m pretty sure Sherry’s boss has the power to say both.

“What’s that?” Sherry says. She sounds hesitant, as if she’s not sure where this is going.

“It’s a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt,” Annika says. “Are you familiar with them?”

“I know a few,” Sherry says.

“My best friend bought me a book of them. ‘Do one thing every day that scares you’ is what got me through my twenties. ‘Do what you feel in your heart to be right—for you’ll be criticized anyway.’”

She had been doing so well, and it might have gone unnoticed if she’d only shared one or two of the quotes. But once Annika gets started on a topic that interests her, it’s hard for her to stop. She shares quote after quote, her cheeks pink from the wine and her enthusiasm about the subject matter. Annika talks with her hands, and her movements are becoming more pronounced by the second. Sherry and Nate are every bit as polite as they have been throughout dinner, but then Annika stops talking abruptly and the color on her cheeks deepens from excited to self-conscious as she realizes she’s let down her guard and gone totally off script.