Page 14 of Made for You
She squeezes my arm. “He likes you. Don’t worry.”
Then Matt is talking, and Josh is taking his place by a table with seventeen roses laid out—Camila is already holding hers, straight as a sword between her breasts—and I panic.
“Wait,” I cry out. “Can I say something? Please?”
Before anyone tries to stop me, including my own nerves, I pick my way down to the front.
“I’m so sorry to interrupt the ceremony,” I say, clasping my hands at my sternum, “but, Josh, if I don’t speak up, I know I’ll regret this for the rest of my life.”
Matt seems primed to interrupt, but Josh gestures him down.
I launch in. “You and I didn’t get a chance to talk tonight, and I’m terrified I’m about to get eliminated. I felt the deepest connection with you I’ve ever felt with anyone. And I completely regret not coming to find you. I mean—I tried—but I kept not wanting to interrupt, because I could see how deeply you were connecting with the other girls. It seemed heartless to interfere, so...” Tears crowd my eyes. “But that means I missed my chance. I guess I have a lot to learn about going after what I want.” I suck in a shaky breath as a teardrop breaks loose and trickles down. “It’s a mistake I won’t make again, if you give me the chance.”
Josh nods, serious. “Thank you for saying that, Julia.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, and return to my spot among the girls. I can feel their animosity prickle in the air around me, but I don’t care.
Josh clears his throat. “I know this is unusual, but, Julia—I actually really appreciate you stepping forward. You’re right, I was thinking of sending you home, because you didn’t come find me, so I thought maybe you weren’t interested. But this has changed everything.” His eyes are on me and me alone. The feeling is intoxicating. Heavenly. Everything. “I admire boldness in a woman, which you’ve shown me tonight. But I also admire kindness. And all the women you didn’t interrupt? You showed them kindness.” A smile breaks over his face. “Don’t change, okay? Keep being kind.” He extends the flower, a red heart stretching forward on its green stem. “Julia, would you accept this rose?”
I put both hands over my mouth and gasp. It’s not fake at all; it’s the truest expression of the intense emotion crashing through me, washing away everything else. I barely register the fact that I’m walking forward. All I register is Josh, the man I’m walking toward.
His presence fills me. Awakens me. All I want is him.
“Of course,” I whisper.
I accept my first rose and take my place by Camila, on the side where the chosen girls stand.
The ceremony continues. Emma gets the next rose.
“She’s a smart bitch,” Camila whispers, and even though she’s looking straight at Emma, I know she means me.
But I don’t care. I’m the one on cloud nine now, floating in the certainty that Josh and I are meant to be.
And tonight, that feeling is enough.
NOW
Eden slouches in not ten minutes later and dumps her canvas backpack on the kitchen counter. It’s covered with pins—rainbows, arrows, Bot Rights, the Coexist logo. Like Bob’s yard used to look, but the opposite. She’s in Converse sneakers, black overalls, and an oversize blue cardigan.
“Where’s the cutie?” she says in a gravelly voice, always surprising coming from someone so petite.
“Napping,” I say. “She just went down.”
Eden is a gem of nurturing packed into the body of an emo gamer girl. She lives two lots up the road. She’s twenty-six and moved in with her aunt and uncle after some kind of career disaster on the West Coast that she doesn’t talk about. Now she babysits and smokes weed in the woods behind our house. I have the feeling she doesn’t get on too well with the aunt and uncle, who I’ve only laid eyes on twice—after Thanksgiving when an inflatable Santa went up in their front yard, and in January when it came down.
“There’s leftover lentils in the fridge for you,” I say, “and pureed sweet potato for Annaleigh. Oh! And the container of ground meat isn’t for the baby—it’s Captain’s.”
“Got it,” says Eden.
As if alerted by his name, Captain barks. Where is he?
“Hey!” I call out. I’ve trained him not to bark inside. I find him in the living room, pawing and sniffing the area rug. He barks again and looks at me, then straightens, body rigid, ears cocked forward, looking down.
“What is it? You find a spider?”
I kneel to investigate. Nothing obvious. I run my hand over the worn fibers, then stand, frowning at the rug. A brown low-pile shag that I really should replace. At some point.
“Go to your place,” I command. Captain barks once in protest, dancing his front paws over the rug, scratching. “Stop that!” What has gotten into him? “Place!”