Free The Bargaining by Carly Anne West Page B

miserable for us both. Or you can consider—just consider—the possibility that I wanted you here with me.”
    April walks away, leaving the air heavier than before. That quiet fills the room again, only this time not even the papers are chattering about how embarrassing that must have been. For her. For me.
    I take one last look at the green eyes in the wall, convinced they witnessed and judged that entire interaction. And even though I found this mural with its pastoral trails and earnest face with shocking red hair and whatever else the wallpaperhides, it feels strangely against me. Like it wasn’t ready to be found and hurled out of hiding into the wreckage of this room and my life.
    â€œSorry, kid,” I tell the wall. “Looks like we’re all in it together now.”
    As I leave the room, I hear the paper flutter in my wake.

6
----
    A PRIL AND I STARE INTO our respective coffees in Ripp’s Caffeinator. Her hand is frozen, pen limp in the crook of her fingers between scribbles and stops, never taking her eyes from the steaming mug in front of her. I assume she’s waiting for it to tell her what else to add to her list of renovation items to be purchased at Scoot’s General once they open.
    â€œDuct tape,” she says. “Everything can be fixed with duct tape.”
    I stare at my own latte, its foam pool undecorated, a departure from so many Seattle coffee houses. Not that I need a reminder that we’re in another world now that we’re in Point Finney.
    â€œAnd I need to ask if they know who can install a ­garbagedisposal,” she says. “Buyers might be charmed by the oven, but they won’t be charmed by having to scrape everything into the trash, especially if this becomes the bed-and-­breakfast I think it will. All those rooms on the top floor. It’s practically screaming to be a B and B. Except for the bathroom situation . . .”
    â€œMhmm.”
    â€œOh, that reminds me. Hand soap. I forgot to pack any.”
    I cover my eyes with my palm, which is warm from cupping my mug of coffee.
    â€œPenny.”
    I mentally replay the list of items she’s put forth, unable to fully block her out. Duct tape. Garbage disposal. Hand soap. Penny.
    â€œPenny?” she says.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œDo you have a headache?”
    I open my eyes. Jagged worry lines groove her forehead.
    â€œI’m fine.”
    She gives me a look that speaks an entire novella about all the ways I’m not fine, which makes it a little easier to dislike her. She has no place deciding that. Except I can’t help thinking about what she said last night, about how she’s the only one trying.
    About how she’s right.
    â€œI mean, yeah. Headache. I have one,” I say.
    She nods. “Tylenol. I’ll add that to the list. Oh, window cleaner,” she says. “I can’t tell if the windows are really that old, or if they’re just neglected. That whole house is neglected,” she tsks. I think of the awkward little handprint on the window upstairs.
    April’s purse chimes from beside her on the table, and she pulls her phone out, her face beaming in a way my mom’s never has.
    â€œYour dad says hi. He misses us.”
    I nod, unable to say the same. I try to remember the last time I missed him. I could describe every last detail of his appearance to anyone who asked. The way he smells like aftershave and spearmint, which should be gross but somehow just smells clean. The way he seems to growl instead of laugh, even when he knows something is really funny.
    But it’s been more years than I can count since I’ve felt the pull of him.
    I stop looking at April’s phone with all its ambiguity and pull my eyes back to the list in her hand. Ink on paper is so much easier to decipher.
    â€œAdd a new door bolt to the list,” I say, remembering the jimmied lock and the probable squatters.
    The caffeine begins to