“If I don’t get in, you have to go anyway.”
“I might not get in either!”
“If you do.”
“If I do, I have to go. You know that. That was why we were doing this together.”
She’s quiet.
“But I might not,” I say, because at the moment it’s a less heartbreaking scenario than the one where I do but Quinn doesn’t even try, and next year she’s—what? Just some girl I remember? I don’t want to have to just remember anyone.
“And, like, I’ll still apply regular decision then,” I say. “Then it still depends where else we get in. Oberlin isn’t, like, my dream school. I don’t have a dream school. I want to be somewhere cool and liberal artsy and hopefully where my girlfriend is, too.”
Quinn makes a scoffy noise.
“Why are you being like this?” I cozy up behind her and wrap my arms around her shoulders. My bare toes are cold against the backs of her still laced-up boots. “Please talk to me.”
“I’m talking! I just think I could end up getting in nowhere, and going to PCC next year, and that’s fine, but I don’t want your future screwed up when you have more choices. I worked out this whole plan where getting into a computer science program at a liberal arts school is my best chance, but there’s no guarantee, K. We haven’t been together that long, and you shouldn’t rearrange your whole life for me.”
I feel that I’m about to cry and try to distract myself by looking at the soft blonde hair at the nape of Quinn’s neck.
“You’re quiet back there,” she says, and her voice sounds soft again, the voice that I know is just for me, for moments like this when we’re lying in her bed. “I’m just nervous.”
“Well, duh, me too.” I bury my face against her shoulder and hope she can’t tell I am crying, just a little. “I don’t feel like I’m rearranging my life.”
My life got completely rearranged the day Mom died. Trying to be at the same school as Quinn next year doesn’t feel anything like that at all. And I’d say it, but it’s so freaking depressing. I don’t want to be the crying grief girl, when I can be the girl snuggled up against my girlfriend and her soft hair and the back of her neck with all my tears hidden.
“I feel like I screwed this whole afternoon up,” Quinn says. “I just wanted help with my homework and to have sex with you. Which would have been a much better use of our time.”
I reach into her pocket to take out her phone and check the clock. “I definitely don’t have to be home for a while longer.”
“Oh thank god.”
Diane is waiting in the lobby of Firefly when the three of us walk in. I don’t know what I expected her to look like—I just hoped that it would be nothing like Mom. And she doesn’t. Mom was fair and blonde, and even though she was a tough businesswoman, she had this sort of carefree quality about her. Diane has dark curly hair, dark brown skin, and a perfectly put-together outfit of expensive-looking jeans, gray boots, and a cashmere sweater layered over a soft-looking T-shirt. It’s good Dad asked me about the shirt for his first date with her, because Diane’s style is perfect. The restaurant is dim and sophisticated, and so I assume she chose this as our meeting spot.
“This is Kat, and this is Luke,” Dad says to her, even though it’s probably not necessary. I pull on my monogram necklace as Diane shakes Luke’s hand and try to look friendly when it’s my turn.
“I’ve heard so much about you both,” she says. Her voice is warm and husky, like a lady who’d be on NPR.
“I’m not that exciting,” Luke says with a smile. “Kat, on the other hand . . .”
“Oh my god, I’m super boring, too,” I say. “Trust me.”
Dad sighs loudly. “Don’t be weird, guys.”
For some reason that breaks the tension and we all laugh. Diane’s laugh is warm like her voice, and I already don’t hate her. Already I hope she thinks my outfit is cute and that my hair is well-styled. Her curls seem in much better control than mine.
“Luke, Charlie tells me you’re a freshman at Purdue,” Diane says once we’re seated and looking at menus.
“Yeah, I’m in the engineering program,” Luke says. “My plan is to specialize in civil engineering, get into urban planning.”
“Luke is, like, a genius,” I say.
“You do OK,” Dad says with a grin, and I feel it, how proud he is of us. I don’t totally understand how that works, being a parent. Luke got into a great college and has these big and real goals to make cities better. I’m still not sure what my future’s going to look like. Is there much to be proud of me for—yet, anyway?
“Your dad says you applied early decision for Oberlin?” Diane asks, and I nod, while a lump tightens in my throat. I’m not sure that I want it as much without Quinn, and I don’t know that I like feeling that way. But is it wrong to feel that Quinn’s so right? It’s not like I was making college plans with Matty. I don’t fall the same way for everyone.
“I did,” I say. “I haven’t heard back yet. It’s OK if I don’t get in. I can go somewhere else.”
“What do you want to study?” she asks, and she looks so eager for my response that I feel even worse that I don’t really have one.
“I’m still figuring that out,” I say. “I just want to be somewhere where I can learn a lot and be surrounded by interesting people.”
“That’s more than enough right now,” she says. I’m sure she’s trying her best to seem nice to us in front of Dad, or maybe she’s just flat-out being nice to us. So she might not mean it. She might have had her plans all lined up at seventeen. But I am so glad to hear it anyway.
“Diane’s a social worker,” Dad tells us, and I like that. It sounds like an important job, that she has to be responsible and look out for people. I sneak a look at her and see the way she’s looking at Dad, and then it’s sort of too much for me, even though I wish it wasn’t. I want to feel the way Luke looks, calm and accepting and mature. Instead I sneak a look at my watch and count my heartbeats.
Luckily a waiter pops up at our table to get our drink order, so there are a few moments I don’t have to think too hard about what to say next. Diane orders a beer, just like Dad, and suddenly I can’t remember what Mom’s drink was, if Mom even had a drink.
It’s not Dad going out with Diane that’s erasing Mom, I realize. It’s time and distance and death.
Luke elbows me. I try to evaluate what my expression is because apparently it’s not the best right now. My heart could choke me, I think, and then I wonder if that’s literally possible. For now, I can still breathe, so I focus on that.
“You OK?” he asks, but quietly, and I nod.
It’s just a dinner, I realize, even if it’s also a big scary deal. I eat pasta and make conversation, and before I know it, we’re saying good night to Diane and getting into Dad’s car. We all survived.
“Diane’s cool,” Luke says, almost like an afterthought. He’s so chill it just rolls off his tongue.