Then Everything Happens at Once, page 26
“I know it’s tough at your age,” Mrs. Morales says. “Believe me, I know. I had a boyfriend I was forbidden to see when I was fifteen. I snuck out to see him so often, my parents nearly threw me out of the house.”
“Then what happened?”
“I ended up marrying him.” She rolls her eyes. “Anyway. I know what this feels like, and I’m sorry you’re stuck going through it during a goddamn pandemic.”
“Do pandemics last long?”
She lets out a sigh. “That is a mystery to everyone. We don’t know. I heard something on the radio about how closing the country for six months to a year would likely make a big difference in controlling the spread, but it’s not realistic.”
Six months? Six months in my house without seeing anyone? Without doing anything?
Shaya runs out of toys, so she heads to the big basket of toys in the corner of the living room and comes back with a bag of building blocks.
“So let’s talk about what we can do that’s realistic. I’ve got a proposition for you,” Mrs. Morales says.
“A proposition?”
“This day care being closed and me working from home thing is not working. Freddie tries to help, but my son is not great with kids, and this little nugget is a handful.” She shifts her weight, pausing until I unzip the bag of blocks for Shaya. “So what do you say to being my nanny? You can look after her while I work, and in exchange, I’ll let you stay in the guest room.”
I’m speechless for a minute, considering the meaning of her proposition.
“Oh my god—thank you. But . . . I think my mom will change her mind,” I say. “She’ll probably just make me stay barricaded in my room for another couple weeks.”
“And if she does,” Mrs. Morales says. “You’re telling me you and Freddie will cool it for good?”
The version of me who glows pink around Freddie, who can’t think clearly and justifies taking off in the night to see him, she warns me to tell the truth. And the truth is that I know better, but I can’t promise I will do better. These are things that are only okay to admit in my head and in my journal.
But I have to be honest.
“You’d let me come into your house, in a pandemic?”
“We don’t have much of a choice, do we? Your mom’s got a lot on her plate,” Mrs. Morales says. “We’re all tired, and we’re doing the best we can in this mess. I prefer to be a little more realistic and find a solution that might actually work for everyone.”
“Is Freddie okay with this?”
“He’d be off the hook for Shaya, and you’d be around? I think my son will be thrilled,” she says. “I’m thinking of him, too, in all this. He’s had a rough year already with everything that happened with his dad. It would be nice to give him something to offset all the loss.”
I pick Shaya up, sitting her on my hip, and there’s a pang of sadness within when I think of my friend being hurt. Shaya’s fingers get tangled in my hair, and she goes for my hoop earrings.
“Now we do blocks,” she says. “Down.”
I let her wiggle away from me, and she hands me a rectangular red block.
“The rules here are not going to be much better than the ones you had at your house,” Mrs. Morales says. “Do you understand that? No going out. No seeing anyone outside this house. Homework gets done on time.”
I nod.
“You will clean up after yourself,” Mrs. Morales says. “And you will be responsible for all the shitty diapers between the hours of nine to five. And no funny-business stuff with Freddie.” As the awkwardness registers on my face, she rolls her eyes. “Just . . . don’t be obvious about it, and please be safe and responsible. Got it?”
I grin, glancing at Shaya. So many feelings swirl inside me. “Yes.”
Mrs. Morales stands, hands on her hips. “You can start tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
“Baylee,” Mrs. Morales says. “I made myself clear, right? You understand the extreme privilege you’ve just been granted?”
“Yes, I do.”
“You get in a fight with my son, you can’t just run on out of here and go home—you get that, right? I’m helping you guys out a little, but you both need to step up and show you can adapt. This is hard for everybody, but I want my family protected,” she says. “No one comes in and out of this house. We don’t even go out shopping. So you traveling back and forth between your house and mine puts us at risk, too, right?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.” She nods. “You can go.”
“Thank you,” I say. “I don’t even know what else I can say.”
She waves me off, headed for the kitchen. “Come, Boo. Let’s get something to eat.”
Shaya abandons her blocks and rushes after her mother. I head back out to the garage. Freddie puts his pen down and searches my face, waiting to be filled in.
“Your mother just basically took me on as a live-in nanny,” I say.
An eyebrow goes up. “Damn. I guess I should give the universe a bucket of gratitude for giving me one awesome parent, at least.”
“Next-level awesome.”
We fist-bump and settle on the couch. I check my phone for something from my mother, but there are no alerts.
“Are you okay with this?” I ask him.
“As long as you come sneak into my room at night, I’m very okay with it.”
I keep the things his mother said about him, about his dad and loss, to myself. This doesn’t even need to go in my journal.
“Can we go to your room right now?”
Freddie nods all exaggerated.
“Wait—no. This can’t be how I start my new job,” I say, sitting up. “I’d really like to bring my stuff up and take a shower.”
“I feel like I’m down with this plan. I need a shower, too.”
The way he looks at me, it makes me open my mouth in shock. “Oh my god, as if that would ever happen.”
“Not even if we keep the lights off?”
I tip my head to the side, like I’m considering it for a moment. “No. God, no.”
He fake-punches my upper arm. “You suck.”
We each grab one of the Ikea bags filled with my things, and we head inside.
The guest room is right next door to Freddie’s bedroom. I spend some time organizing my things in the corner of the room, placing my pillow and duvet on the double bed. There is a little secretary desk and a rickety chair I’d never actually sit on. The bed frame worries me with all the creaking, so I am ever so careful getting on it, as though trying not to wake up someone else who might be sleeping in it. I place my laptop on the desk and put my phone to charge.
[Baylee] I’m at Freddie’s.
[Mom] I know. You can thank Sheila for being understanding.
[Baylee] I did.
I take a shower, then throw on my robe and quickly rush back to the guest room. I let my hair air-dry, applying oil to the ends, and slip into fresh underthings. There are so many items I’m going to need, like my nail stuff, some books, more clothes.
[Baylee] Can I come get more of my things tomorrow?
[Mom] Tell me what you need and I’ll have it in the garage.
[Baylee] Are you mad at me forever?
[Mom] You broke my heart, Boss. I never thought I’d have to fight you this hard.
Her words make me feel wrong inside, ashamed. They have a way of making me feel so unsure about everything.
For an hour or so, I lie on this bed that isn’t mine, reading the news, and I cry, thinking about everything that’s happened. I’m at Freddie’s house, but now I almost wish I could go home. Except if I went home, I’d just be trying to figure out how to get back here.
This can’t be real life.
Through the wall, I hear Freddie talking to someone, and it sounds like Trey and Rav. I can’t make out the words, but Freddie’s low tones are like vibrations coming through the wall. It lulls me to something that’s close to sleep, but then there’s a soft knock on the wall.
I knock back.
Freddie comes to the door, opening it a crack and summoning me with a finger. The feeling of homesickness disappears.
Tonight, we’re in a bed, in a house. Freddie plays music, leaves only his bedside lamp on, and locks his door. I am drowsy and full of chills and goose bumps.
Freddie hums the slow-rock ballad. I turn my head to catch his gaze. “Freddie? Can you pick a good song next?”
He grabs a pillow and smooshes it against my head.
He turns out the lamp, plunging us into darkness. Not total darkness, because the window curtain is open. The glow from the streetlights penetrates the room, allowing us to see a little better. A little bit more. I am full of thrilling feelings and sensations as Freddie and I do things that only get better when you get to really know someone that way.
Forty-Seven
The next few days are odd. Trying to move around a house that isn’t mine, acclimating to a routine that I hadn’t planned for, all the while thinking of my own house, my room, having no idea when I’ll get to go back. The weirdest, most nerve-racking thing of all is the idea of having to use the bathroom for more than just a cute little tinkle while Freddie is right down the hall. I’ve had to save those moments for when I take a shower, praying my overpowering bodywash camouflages anything else that might be floating in the air. If he only knew I wasn’t just having some girly spa night in there. I would die.
[Rianne] Is it time yet? I NEED to hear about this new development.
[Baylee] I’m almost done work.
[Rianne] How do you have a new JOB in a pandemic?!
I am lying on the bed of the guest room, holding my phone up above my face. Rianne’s makeup-free face appears on my screen, and her hair is wet from a shower.
“Spill!” she says. “Wait—where are you? That’s not your room.”
“I know.”
“Where are you?”
“Freddie’s.”
Her mouth hangs. “Whoa. Wait, wait, wait—how?”
Suddenly, I picture myself telling her what’s going on, what truly led to this, and it just feels wrong. The avalanche of questions it would lead to. I can picture her asking me if I’m suddenly living with my boyfriend, and the energy it would take to explain that’s not what this is, that she’d be looking at this through the wrong lens—I just don’t have it in me. Even I wouldn’t understand what this was if I wasn’t living it.
I don’t want a boyfriend. I don’t want to owe people stories about a relationship or worry about carrying this thing out in public. I want it to be private, for it to include no one else but me and him.
“I am Shaya’s nanny now,” I say.
“Really? That’s pretty cool,” she says. “I kind of miss my job. Not my rude-ass supervisor, but just being able to go somewhere else. Thank god my grandpa’s here. It’s like he’s my only friend now. No offense.”
“I get it.”
“So you get to see Freddie,” she says. “You should not tell Lara that.”
“Why?”
“She’s now convinced he might’ve been the love of her life, and you wrecked it forever,” Rianne says. “I think Trey gave up on her for good, and now she’s just going a little crazy, home alone with her parents. Talking to Taylor way too much.”
“Don’t tell her I’m here.”
Rianne zips her lips.
The next evening, Freddie’s new daily chores begin. Since I am watching Shaya during the day, Freddie’s responsible for cooking dinners and doing laundry—not mine, of course. He makes spaghetti sauce from scratch, and it is amazing—second only to my mother’s sauce.
“You cook?” I ask as he and I clear off after dinner.
He shrugs. “I don’t enjoy it, but I’m okay at it.”
“I am like, next-level impressed. This was so good.” I would’ve eaten another bowl if I was at home.
“Wait until I make enchiladas,” he says. “They’re pretty amazing.”
“I literally can’t wait,” I say. “Can you make them tomorrow?”
“Possibly.”
Freddie loads the dishwasher while I wash the big pots. When we’re done, we head for the garage. I sit on the couch, scrolling through my phone, enjoying having nothing to do. The garage door is up, and Freddie stands near his car on the driveway, vaping.
[Mom] I get a thousand a year for psychotherapist services. If you’re still wondering about that.
[Baylee] Really? Thanks, Mom.
“Would you like to kill some time by reading my screenplay?”
“Finally. You’ve only asked me five times but never handed it over,” I say. He comes back to the couch with a stack of paper he riffles through before finally handing them to me. “Just out of curiosity. Am I doing this out of the goodness of my heart, or am I getting paid for this service?”
“I can definitely think of something to give you in return,” he says. “You can even cash in all the favors I owe you.”
He gets that look in his eye that I swear, I spend my whole day waiting for. My body erupts in goose bumps. He holds out a hand, and I put the pages down, taking his hand and pushing up to my feet. An observation I’ve made is that the moments before kissing are sometimes just as exciting as the actual kissing. I trace his jaw with my eyes. Then I focus on his mouth. My own mouth opens. My whole body opens when his face comes toward mine, anticipating that initial contact.
There’s something about this thing with Freddie. It’s hard to hold it up next to anything else because it can’t be compared, and it can’t be defined. But I know what the most important part about it is: It’s safe. There’s no pressure; that’s what I love most about it.
I just want to do what I can to preserve the privacy of it all.
“Oh my god. This is sick!”
That voice.
It’s Taylor, stopped on the sidewalk that cuts through Freddie’s driveway. She straddles the bike she was riding, holding her phone up at us.
Forty-Eight
Taylor is having some kind of revelation while I push Freddie away. This must be a thirty-minute bike ride from her house. I don’t know what’s happening, how she can even be here, intruding on my secret world. A world not compatible with the one we lived in before. She was supposed to have floated away with the rest of normal life. Or be on hold, at least.
“I was just coming here to drop the thing off for Freddie,” Taylor says to her phone. “I can’t believe this is what I walk in on! This is so good! Well, it’s bad. Sorry.”
She swipes and types on her phone.
“Don’t post that!” I say, trying to keep my voice down.
“I’m not posting it,” she says, looking at me like I’m crazy. “I’m sending it to Lara.”
I glance at Freddie, and he’s just shaking his head like he’s been confronted with the biggest chore of his life.
“I should probably put a trigger warning for the gross-out factor,” she says, making a show of tapping her phone like she’s just hit the send button.
“You’re gross, Taylor,” Freddie says. “You’re such a loser. Go home.”
Freddie moves to the side of the garage door, punching in the code.
“Wait!” Taylor calls. “I have a letter for you!”
“Choke on it,” Freddie says, and the door closes fully.
Freddie and I are side by side on the garage couch when the first alerts from Lara start arriving. Question marks flash across my screen. Once, twice, three times.
“Wow,” Freddie says while I put my phone on silent.
“What am I supposed to do?”
“I can tell you from experience, she won’t stop.”
[Lara] Do not ignore me.
[Lara] I saw the video.
“She was trying to have Taylor hand-deliver you a letter?” I say.
“That’s kind of sad,” he says.
“I bet Taylor talked her into doing that. That’s next-level desperate, even for Lara.”
I start pacing, more alerts coming through. Freddie’s attention is pulled to his own phone, and he swipes through it for a minute, looking thoughtful.
“Is it her?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Taylor is telling everyone.”
“How do you know?”
“Trey just sent me a text about it,” he says. “Matt, too.”
I cover my face with my hands, the sensation of doom settling over me. People know. Everyone will know.
“Baylee, why are you freaking out about this?” Freddie asks.
“I don’t want people to know!”
“Why?” he says.
“What if Taylor posted the video?”
“Again, so?”
I let my hands fall at my sides. “People will start thinking all kinds of things. I didn’t want that.”
“Here’s what you do,” Freddie says, holding his phone up at me. “You turn it off and look—none of it matters anymore.”
I turn my phone off and place it on the workbench. We seem to both be listening to the silence around us, then Freddie’s nodding with a grin. “See how easy that was?”
“Freddie,” I say. “People are still going to think things.”
“Who cares?”
“I do.”
“So what if they think you’re my girlfriend?”
“I’m not, though.”
He stares at me like he’s waiting for my reaction to decide where to go with his words. Seriousness is all he must see reflected. “You could be.”
“I don’t think I want to be anyone’s girlfriend,” I say, my words slow and cautious. “Especially not just because somehow everyone found out about . . . this.”
“So what is this, then? Friends with benefits?”
“Maybe?” I raise a shoulder. “I like having fun with you. Is that okay?”
He nods. “Is it okay that you’re the only one I want to have fun with, though?”
