I nod, curious about where she’s headed.
Willow sets the JanSport backpack at her sneakers and then unzips a pocket. Retrieving a phone, she clicks into the camera app. “So you know Maggie?”
“Your friend from Maine.” Her only friend. Before I came along.
“Every day she asks me about Lo and Lily, sometimes even Connor and Rose, and Ryke and Daisy…and I can’t answer her questions. She hasn’t been answering my texts in two days, which isn’t like her, and she unfollowed me on Twitter.”
“Damn.” I rest my elbow on the control panel.
“I know, it’s bad.”
I frown. “All because you wouldn’t talk about your cousin and his friends?”
Willow flips the cellphone in her hand. “I used to tell Maggie everything. She has a right to be mad and upset that I’m…I’m shutting her out. I’d be sad too, and I want to share my life in Philly with her. I just can’t share that side.”
It clicks. “You want to share me?”
Willow pales again. “Not like share you, share you—”
I hold out my hand to stop her eyes from widening. “I know what you meant.” I see how hard this is for her to ask. We may spend a lot of time in each other’s company, but she still has no idea how I’ll react to new situations or where our friendship boundaries lie.
New friendships come with a shit ton of untested waters, and half the fun is testing them—but then there’s the risk of drowning the friendship altogether.
With a deep breath, Willow asks, “Can I take a selfie with you?”
I think I’ll always remember this moment.
We haven’t really taken each other’s picture. Not even during Halloween. Not alone or together. I’m not opposed to photos either. People tag me in pictures on Facebook and Instagram all the time. Most of them are of me at parties with friends.
My father scolded me about a few that “future employers” would deem disrespectful and irresponsible. Underage drinking in one picture, and about six or seven show me giving rude gestures to the camera.
Without hesitation, I hold out my hand for her phone. “I have longer arms for a selfie.”
She wavers. “So that’s a…yes?” Seeing that it is—even before I answer—she hands me the phone.
“Yeah.” I tweak the lighting settings, and then I raise the camera towards us. She stands on her tiptoes to be closer to me, the Streets of Rage machine a backdrop.
I dip my head towards hers, my hair brushing my eyelashes. We’re not touching, but the not touching thing almost builds more tension.
A good kind.
Willow smiles that awkward smile, more horizontal like a line than upturned like a U. She looks happy, and I look like the delinquent everyone believes I am.
I snap several photos and then return the phone. “What are you telling her?”
Willow texts Maggie quickly. “This is my friend Garrison. We’re playing Streets of Rage. Wish you were here! Visit when you can. You think that’s enough?”
“Maybe add emojis. Hearts, sparkles, pizza.”
Willow has this look like she wants to say something, but she’s mulling over her words. Thinking about them. And then finally, she says, “You know, um, if we ever fight, now I know what emojis will bring you back.” Avoiding my reaction, she slips the cellphone into her backpack.
“If we ever fought, it’d be my fault, and I’d be the one to send you pizza emojis and penguins, some turtles.” She’s smiling. “Maybe a raccoon.”
“There’s a raccoon emoji?” She braves a glance at me.
I have no idea. “I’ll make one.” I reach into my pocket for change, but Willow is already pulling out a Ziploc baggie filled with a ton of quarters.
“No,” I instantly decline. “I’m paying.” It’s a date. I haven’t announced this or anything, but in my mind, it’s sort of a date. Kind of.
It could be.
Willow hesitates but then opens the baggie. “You can’t pay.”
I shift my weight and comb back the long pieces of my dark hair. “Why not?” She doesn’t want this to be a date, you idiot.
“It’s your birthday.” She pops two quarters into the coin slots, one for player 1 and one for player 2.
I was the one who sent the Twitter message: Blaze, want to kick some ass today? Galactica Arcadia, noon-ish.
Willow replied: sure, Axel.
Now we face the game with the characters Blaze and Axel, prepared to wipe crime off a city street using crowbars and broken bottles.
I never meant this arcade outing to be a “birthday thing” but my date of birth is posted on all of my social medias. So she knows.
“Hey,” I say before we start playing, “do you want to hang out after this? Nothing birthday-related. I just figured we could do that Supernatural marathon tonight, if you want to.” I keep postponing on her, and she’s too nice to bug me about it.
“Yeah,” she says instantly. “Yeah, of course. Still at your house?”