Poinsettia Lane

Chapter Fifteen

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THEY HAVEN’T YET discussed the date further, but Asim said he had an idea and asked her to trust him to get it set up for them. She’s only a little surprised by how easy it was to let go and trust him with it. Now that he knows about her anxiety, she doesn’t have anything else to hide. Everly feels seen, validated and understood after their conversation today. The emotional connection between them is almost tangible. Imagine that; Carrie is right again.

They’re little more than halfway done with the planting and it’s starting to come together. The plants she and Asim picked out work well together, and Everly is pleasantly surprised by the colorful picture it’s creating in her backyard. Asim left with Moose a few hours ago, and she’s since showered and changed. Standing in the living room with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the backyard, she continues to admire their work, and her thoughts soon turn to their date.

Now Everly has to wrap her head around the reality of going out on a date. She hasn’t dated in ages, and the idea of going out with someone, in public, is a little intimidating. If it was with anyone else, she knows she’d be freaking out right now. Everly can’t stop marveling at her responses to Asim though, and the way her mind has started to quiet and calm when they’re together. Anytime she’s accepted a date in the last few years, her nerves would take over and she’d debate various back-out strategies until the last second. She’s never really had a good experience with dating, truth be told—it’s been less than stellar since the beginning.

When Everly was 16, finally feeling as though she fits into her body and flooded with hormones, she had her first real kiss with her first ever love.

She didn’t even see it coming.

He kissed her with groping hands and too much tongue in his friend’s stale basement at the tail end of a party, and when she didn’t want to go further, he slid off the dingy couch in a cloud of dust motes and retreated to the bathroom. She spent the next few minutes trying to keep her eyes to herself as the few other couples were all messily making out and looking like they didn’t have plans to stop. She inspected the worn, white ceiling and counted the speckles on each tile, she looked at the diluted green and brown stripes of the unraveling rug under her feet, she traced her fingers along the cracks in the dull couch cushion, and she tried her best not to bounce her knee or otherwise give in to the nervous apprehension lining her gut.

When he finally returned to her, he held out his hand and pulled her up with a smile she couldn’t quite decipher. Relieved to have him back, Everly didn’t question it. He walked her to his car, opened her door for her, then drove her home. She didn’t entirely realize anything was off until he sat silently in the drivers seat in her driveway. He didn’t speak, didn’t get out, didn’t move a single muscle, both hands white knuckling the steering wheel. He didn’t even glance in her direction; instead, his eyes were hard and focused straight ahead through the windshield.

Heart in her throat and stomach full of lead, Everly murmured a soft “goodnight” as she opened the door and stepped out. She never heard from him again. He ignored her at school the next day, and every day after that. His friends snickered when she walked by. He had completely ghosted her, left the few messages she sent on read, and at times she almost wondered if she had made up the entire night in her head.

That was Everly’s first experience with heartbreak.

Since then, it’s been a string of short, disappointing relationships interspersed with long periods of being single. It got even worse after her parents died. The loneliness became so entrenched she didn’t know if she’d ever escape it. Spending time with Asim feels different, though.

Everly wonders if he could be the exception. Maybe this time, it will stick. She’s afraid to let herself hope, afraid to let herself truly feel, but the cracks in her armor are expanding and it’s only a matter of time before her walls come crumbling down.

~~~

As usual, she can’t stay away from Roasted for too long, and Everly’s back there again today. She inhales the cozy scent of fresh-brewed coffee and sun-warmed wood, trailing her fingers along the back of a worn leather couch as she meanders her way to her favorite seat in the back. There are a few other patrons inside, and although she tends to avoid interacting with others as much as possible, she’s feeling good today. Optimistic, even. She meets their smiles and her heart warms at their nods of greeting. Although she recognizes most, she doesn’t know their names, which she acknowledges is unusual in a town this size, and she vows to fix it at some point.

Eventually.

When she’s done fixing herself.

She’s been spending so much of her free time with Asim, it feels like she hasn’t seen Frankie in weeks. Realistically, it’s only been a few days, but that’s longer than they normally go without spending time together, and they’re both feeling it.

Frankie wraps her up in a bear hug the moment they see her, and Everly clings to the familiar comfort of her friend. They smell like the coffee shop, warm and homey with a hint of bitterness from the fresh beans they grind each day. Pulling back, Frankie eyes her up and down, then grins one of those big, mischievous grins.

“Spill it, girl.” Never one to dance around a topic, that’s for sure.

Everly is already smiling back, and Frankie’s eyes get bigger when they see the obvious joy on her face .

“Uh, yeah. I am here for whatever this is.” Frankie swirls their hand around in front of Everly’s face, demanding answers to all their unasked questions.

Everly relents, no longer wanting to keep her feelings a fragile secret, giving in to the excited happiness filling her voice as she tells them about her time with Asim. It must be infectious, because Frankie hasn’t stopped smiling either. Everly gushes about the kiss, of course, and all the little touches, and how desperate she feels for more. Somehow, things are moving too fast and too slow at the same time. Her feelings have skyrocketed, and she’s been avoiding fully acknowledging them. They’re quickly bubbling up to the surface though, and she knows it’s only a matter of time until she’s forced to face the full brunt of her emotions.

“I have to meet him, for real," Frankie says. “I’m your only friend—”

“Hey!” Everly interrupts, but Frankie keeps going, barreling right over her.

“—and anyone who makes you this freaking happy deserves some free coffee or a high five or something .” They almost sound exasperated, as though making Everly happy is difficult to achieve.

“What does being my only friend have anything to do with it?” Everly is trying not to pout, because while true, she doesn’t see how it’s relevant to the conversation. Her grumpy face is definitely about to make an appearance.

“Anyone who is important to you is important to me," Frankie says this like it should be obvious, with a silent duh at the end. “You’ve only got me in your corner right now, so it falls to me to vet and welcome anyone else who wants to join me over here on Team Everly.”

Everly’s eyes start to feel glassy and she blinks to clear them, pulling Frankie into a fierce hug again. What a rollercoaster of emotions she’s going through today. It almost feels safer to just stick to her realm of anxiety.

“You’re the best. I think you’ll like him, he’s so nice and chill and knowledgeable about everything. Plus, he has the cutest dog.”

Frankie perks up at that. “Dog? Do you have a picture?”

“No, I should though. His name is Moose and he’s this really sweet mutt, he looks like a black lab mix, and just such a lover. This one time, all I did was look at him and his tail started wagging. It was so cute, and he’s obsessed with Asim, not that I blame him. Oh my gosh, and the way Asim plays with him and talks to him…” Everly restrains herself from rambling about Asim again. “I do have to keep stopping myself from freaking out though whenever I think about how perfect he is.”

One minute she stresses because he seems too perfect, and the next she’s feeling overjoyed at how perfect he is. Her brain can’t decide which to land on, so for now it seems both are equally true.

Rolling their eyes, Frankie admonishes her. “You know that’s the anxiety talking. No one is perfect, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t good for you. I mean that’s why you’re going on a date, right? To get to know each other better. See if it’s a good fit.”

“I wonder what he has planned," she murmurs to herself, imagining all the possibilities.

Maybe he’ll take her to her favorite Vietnamese restaurant and they can share a plate of spring rolls while their knees touch under the table. Maybe a cute picnic along the river with the sun warming their faces, or a concert in the city. He’ll have put together the perfect playlist for the drive there and back. Maybe he’s planning a nighttime stroll under the stars, holding hands, kissing… She doesn’t realize she sighs breathily at that thought until Frankie’s cackle cracks through her musings and her eyes fly open.

“Oh my god.” Frankie has their head thrown back and even goes so far as to slap their hand on their knee. “You have it bad. Where did you just go in your head?! Because from your face and the noises you just made, it must have been fantastic.”

“I was thinking about what he might be planning," she says, and takes a sip of tea to help hide her face from her friend.

“With his dick?” Frankie asks.

Everly spews tea across the table, much to Frankie’s delight.

“No! Geez Frankie, I can’t believe you.” Everly snatches a napkin from the next table over to mop up the mess, patting off her mouth and lips as well as the tabletop. Thankfully it was a small sip, and she hasn’t gotten any on her dress. “You are the absolute worst sometimes, you know that?”

Her words and tone are grumbling, but she’s smiling anyways. They both know it’s not true.

Frankie grins. “You might not have been then, but I bet you are now.”

“I’m leaving.” Everly playfully wrinkles her nose at her friend and crumples the napkin in her fist as she scoots her chair back, wooden legs scraping across the floor. Before she can even stand though, Frankie stops her with a hand on her arm.

“Okay, drama queen. I’m done, I’m done.” They hold their hands up in surrender. “I’ll stop, for real. I’m truly happy for you Everly, you deserve someone who appreciates you.”

Everly leans back in her seat, tossing the napkin onto the table and accepting Frankie’s words at face value. They might tease her relentlessly at times, but they also respect her boundaries and Frankie is honest to a fault. They turn the conversation to Frankie’s business challenges, the ongoing drama with the grocery store guy, then to Everly’s latest therapy project, that of being true to herself. Everly shares how much easier it is to be herself around Asim compared to anyone else, apart from them of course. She mentions how she shared with both Ad and Asim that she sees a therapist and they responded surprisingly well, in their unique ways.

“Points for them both in my book," Frankie responds, and Everly’s heart swells.

“Oh! And Addison told me why she randomly came to the holiday party.”

“Yeah? What’d she say?”

“She said she had spent the last couple holidays with her ex, but then she cheated on Addison so they broke up and she didn’t want to spend the holidays there without her.”

Frankie perks up, leaning forward in their seat. “She’s queer?”

Everly shrugs. “We didn’t really get into specifics or labels or anything, but I guess so, yeah. ”

“Huh.” Frankie leans back again, eyes glimmering with… mischief? Interest?

Everly narrows her gaze at her friend. “What? What’s that look?”

“Nothing.” They attempt a casual shrug, but Everly isn’t fooled. “Just interesting is all.”

Everly won’t get anything else out of them if the stubborn set of Frankie’s jaw is anything to go by. She purses her lips and tucks her legs up under her on the padded cushion, returning to her own thoughts.

What would it be like to have more than one person in her corner, as Frankie phrased it? She sees the possibility of adding two more people, if things continue to go well with her sister and Asim. That would be more people truly caring about her than she’s had since her parents died, and she’s never really been herself on the outside, so that part of it would be entirely new. It almost feels like Carrie is sitting on her shoulder cheering her on, telling her to push herself and not give up.