CHAPTER 8
LIYAH is drunk. Not four-drinks-over-four-hours buzzed the way she usually is at Survival Club meetings, but properly drunk. Which explains why she cannot, for the life of her, stop stealing glances at Daniel’s chest. His eyes are on Siobhan now, laughing at something she says, so Liyah’s gaze slides over. The top two buttons of his shirt are undone, and any time Daniel leans back or turns to the side, the fabric falls open a bit. His skin is lightly flushed and a mole on the left side of his sternum is playing an exceedingly frustrating game of peek-a-boo. This is his fault, really, for deciding that his button-down needed to show off his chest instead of just the standard forearm display.
She is definitely drunk, because during this particular glance, she fails to pull her eyes away fast enough and Daniel catches her staring.
He smirks, bringing his hand up to rub his chin. The ring on his pinky glints in the low light. “Avid interest in my shirt choice, Liyah?”
“I’m just wondering where you find these. Is there a boutique somewhere in Wicker Park that specializes in casual button-downs with headache-inducing prints?” This one is covered in watercolored oranges. It’s not bad, especially since it matches the orange and green accents on his sneakers, but some have been truly awful. Last week he wore something that could have been scraped off a bus seat from the eighties.
“Oh, you’re looking for a wardrobe makeover.” His eyes run up and down her slowly. She knows he’s doing this to emphasize his point, but goose bumps erupt across her skin. “I can see why. I don’t know anywhere that’s open this late, though, so you’ll have to hold your excitement in until tomorrow.”
“I’ll take your fashion advice over my dead body,” Liyah fires back.
“I’ll make sure to bring a good outfit selection to your shiva house.”
“House Rule number four!” Siobhan and Jordan say in unison, not for the first time.
Liyah looks at Daniel expectantly. As per their tacit agreement, it’s his turn to explain. He takes a sip of his drink and says, “It’s what you call the home of the mourning family for the week after the funeral.”
“Shiva means seven, for seven days,” Liyah adds.
Jordan shakes his head in response. “Y’all are fucking dark.”
“I don’t know, I think it was a good one,” Siobhan says, much to Liyah’s chagrin. As it happens, her displeasure seems to be synonymous with Daniel’s delight.
Liyah takes a drink from her glass, some surprise cocktail that Alex insisted they all try. It’s ginger-heavy and probably sugary enough to give her a headache tomorrow, if the tequila shots haven’t already ensured one. She decides to change the subject. “Daniel just wants to avoid giving away his trade secrets.”
Siobhan claps her hands together. “Right, back to Emailing Like a Man 101. Don’t you try to get out of your Survival Club duties—we had to explain why you need a bed frame when you’re flush and over twenty-two last week.”
“Thanks for that, by the way,” Jordan says. “You set me back a couple hundred bucks.”
“Well, I already had a bed frame,” Daniel interjects.
“Good for you, man. Nobody ever complained before.”
Liyah laughs. “Maybe not to your face.” She makes a get on with it gesture. “The email workshop. I would like it on record that I’m listening out of curiosity, not because I believe I should change my behavior. Not a big fan of leaning in.”
A chorus of groans greets her. “Okay, Liyah,” Jordan says. “You got an example? Hand it over.”
Siobhan scrolls around her in-box before passing her phone off to Jordan. He and Daniel huddle around the screen with concerned expressions on their faces.
“Okay, first of all, you need fewer exclamation points.” Daniel backtracks when he sees Siobhan’s frown. “Sorry, it’s not terrible. It’s just that every other sentence is kind of a lot.”
“See,” Liyah says. “I told you a good rule of thumb is three to five.” Jordan laughs, and now it’s Liyah’s turn to frown.
“No, try one. Max.”
DANIEL IS THANKFUL for the collective decision to forgo their usual few rounds in favor of several. He’s spent the entire week dreading the upcoming holidays. Sure, it’ll be nice to see Kayla and his mother for Rosh Hashanah. It’ll also be nice to see the food, as Kayla sweetens her challah to ring in the new year with chocolate chips instead of the traditional raisins. But he can’t help but feel like the table will be painfully empty with only the three of them. And since he doesn’t plan to make the two-hour drive out to Madison next Wednesday for Yom Kippur, he’s going to be totally alone for services. He’s heard grief gets harder around Christmastime, and he supposes that this is the Jewish equivalent.
The quantity of alcohol Daniel’s consumed has prevented him from thinking about it, or at least helped him let the thoughts pass by instead of dwelling. He’s struggled the whole week trying to work around the knot in his chest, but it appears that the knot is no match for bourbon. The only downside of his drunkenness is that he’s even more aware than usual of his attraction to Liyah. Her lips are painted a very distracting color of red, and he’s only managing to look at her eyes half the time she talks. Thank God Alex got her off her usual old-fashioned; Daniel wouldn’t survive watching her tie a cherry stem right now.
Liyah kicks him under the table. “Pay attention, dummy,” she stage-whispers.
“I was!” He was not.
“Oh yeah? What’s Jordan talking about?”
He ventures a guess. “Love?”
Liyah scans his face as if trying to determine if it was a lucky guess. Daniel blinks. Eventually, she huffs and turns her focus to the rest of the group. Daniel does the same.
“Wait, so you’re saying you had your first kiss and then lost your virginity in the same night?” Siobhan’s eyes are wide, aghast. Daniel hasn’t heard this particular Jordan story before, and it piques his interest.
Jordan wears a cheeky smile, the type that makes Daniel appreciate the extent of his friend’s charm. “It was a passionate moment.”
“No. You can’t leave it at that. Go on,” Liyah demands.
“I may have implied that I was more experienced than I was. But what was I gone do? She was popular.”
“You weren’t?” Siobhan seems truly astonished by this. She tries to cover it quickly, but Daniel knows a woman enamored with Jordan when he sees one. His eyes flick to Liyah. If she knows, she doesn’t let on.
Jordan smirks. “I did okay. But she was dating-the-starting-point-guard-type popular. He cheated with most of the cheerleading team, and I offered my shoulder to cry on.”
Daniel smiles. Typical. “While spitting as big a game as you could, I’m guessing.”
“You know how I do. She never found out I was a virgin, and we dated for a whole year.”
“Very J. Cole of you.” Liyah lifts her glass. “I’m impressed.” Jordan clinks his cup against hers and knocks his drink all the way back.
“Okay, now that I’ve told my embarrassing story”—Liyah and Siobhan exchange a look at Jordan’s effort to play off his brag—“someone else has to tell theirs.”
“First time for sex or a kiss?” Daniel asks, half joking.
Jordan takes the question on its face. “Either. Both if you want.”
“Okay, I’ll go first. Then we’ll go around the table,” Siobhan says.
Daniel’s eyes slide to Liyah, waiting for her to protest. She knows full well that they’ll tell the same story. But she nods her agreement, never meeting his gaze, wearing that same alcohol-brightened smile, like she truly couldn’t care less. Daniel mimics her nod, dazed.
“Alright, I was in sixth class,” Siobhan says.
“I hope this is the kiss story,” Liyah says.
“It is! It was the bloke who grew up next to me. We went cycling around the neighborhood together, and then I told him I liked him. He full-on snogged me. It was kind of gross. Tongues are weird if you think too hard about them, right?” Everyone nods.
When she doesn’t continue, Jordan asks, “And the other story?”
“Eh, less interesting. Took someone home from a pub on my eighteenth birthday. The utterly horrible beginning and end of my one-night-stand career.”
Liyah furrows her brow. “Wait, so you’ve only had sex with three people?” Siobhan turns an impressively deep shade of red. “Oh God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to … fuck.” Liyah reaches for her cocktail as if looking for a way to busy herself, but the glass is empty.
“It’s okay, I know it’s not that many.”
Liyah shakes her head. “No, no! I sometimes forget that me and Neen both have kinda high body counts. I’m a dumbass. You’re normal. I mean, any number is normal. Because there’s no right way to … Daniel, can you go before I bury myself deeper in this hole?”
“Um, first kiss … I was thirteen? I think.” Daniel gulps, trying his best at an easy tone. It’s one thing for Liyah to agree to do this, but another to push him to share. He looks down at his drink, at the print of a 1920s mobster, at the mercury glass mirror—really, anywhere but Liyah—feeling like his every movement might give him away. “It was at Jewish sleepaway camp. We snuck out of our cabins and made out on the archery field.”
“Arrows are very romantic,” Jordan says.
“It was the middle of the night, so Cupid didn’t make an appearance. I’m sorry to disappoint.”
“Daniel and I went to the same camp,” Liyah says.
“Wait, what?” Siobhan says. “You guys were childhood friends?”
Liyah fiddles with her straw, waving Siobhan off. “That’s beside the point. They would leave seventeen-to-nineteen-year-old counselors in charge of thirteen-year-olds and it was practically the Wild West.” Daniel looks at her, directly now, his heart in his throat. Her lips curve into a smug smile. “I didn’t have to sneak out, though. She slept in the bunk above me. They really forget about gay people when they make gendered cabins.”
His stomach drops. I wasn’t her first kiss?
“I’m stuck on the fact that you lot knew each other and said nothing,” Siobhan says, looking at Liyah. “I was under the impression that your issue with him began and ended with the marketing project you didn’t want to do.” Liyah wilts slightly under her gaze.
“Well, I hadn’t seen her in fourteen years,” Daniel tries.
“And we weren’t, like, close friends,” Liyah adds, her words spreading like venom through his veins.
“Is that where you lost your virginity, too?” Jordan asks.
“No, not everybody’s a speed demon like you, sir,” Liyah shoots back. Jordan smirks. “Stop smirking, Jordan.”
“Can’t, my face is just like that. So, what’s the story?”
Liyah makes a face as though the drink she’s sipping is long expired. “Hard pass.”
Jordan doesn’t seem to take the hint because he’s about to press on. Daniel stops him before he can start. “Mine’s a good story. It was my senior year of high school, and my parents were gone for the weekend, so I invited my girlfriend over. To set the scene: candles, lava lamp, the works.”
Siobhan snorts. “Lava lamp?”
“I said the works. And then, my sister walked in. She didn’t even knock, just pulled the door right open. Apparently, she didn’t know that my parents were out of town and when the house seemed empty, she thought we’d all been murdered. She went back downstairs and got in her car and drove back to her dorm without saying a single thing to me.”
Jordan laughs and Siobhan gasps at the punch line, but Liyah just looks relieved. He doesn’t realize just how relieved until half an hour later when they’re waiting on the L platform.
“Thanks for doing that. Telling your embarrassing story,” she says, staring intently at her shoes.
“Who said I was embarrassed? It might be one of my proudest moments; I still managed to get us both to the finish line after Kayla interrupted.” It was so embarrassing that he couldn’t look Kayla in the eyes for almost a month afterward, but he wants to give Liyah an out.
She doesn’t take it. Instead, she looks straight up at him, holding his gaze for a long moment. “Thank you.”
Daniel swallows. “You’re welcome.” The train comes, and they board in comfortable silence. He feels impossibly tired now, and he leans his head on the probably filthy pole that he and Liyah hold on to. His hand grips the bar just above hers, so they’re millimeters from touching. In his drunken, sleepy state, he’s tempted to close the gap.
“I’m drunker than I’ve been in a while,” she says.
“Me too. You know,” Daniel starts, looking down at the fluorescent lights dancing in her irises. “That summer, you told me that I was your first kiss.”
Liyah grins. “No, I didn’t.”
He shakes his head, and his hand slips lower, the underside of his pinky pressing along the line of her thumb. “You did. I remember asking you.”
She rakes her teeth over her bottom lip slowly, and when she’s done, her smile spreads even wider. “You asked me if I’d ever kissed a boy before, and I said no. Which was the truth.”
Daniel squeezes his eyes shut, pressing his free hand to his forehead. “Oh, God.”
Liyah pulls his hand away, her laughter ricocheting in the sparsely populated car. “Weird Q,” she says, then pauses, as if making sure that Daniel realizes she’s making fun of his text message that one time. “What are you doing for Yom Kippur?”
He shrugs. “Going to services and trying not to think about how hungry I am, I guess.”
“Want to go with me?”
“Really?”
She stumbles into him as the train lurches to a halt at the Chicago Avenue stop. He’s surprised at how easily his hand finds her lower back to steady her, even more surprised at how she seems to melt into his touch. Must be the liquor. The train starts again, and he pulls away.
“Yes, really. I don’t know any practicing Jews my age here, on account of the whole thrice a year thing. And…” She trails off.
“You get stared at when you walk into a mostly white synagogue?”
She grins. “Might as well really give them something to look at.”
He matches her smile. “Might as well.”
Before they part ways at Division, Daniel tries to convince Liyah to let him walk her home. She insists she’s fine and makes a big show of lifting her leg so he can see that the heels of her shoes are thick and stable. He begs her to stop, given that she’s wearing a skirt, which results in an “I’ve got spandex shorts under this, you prude” and Daniel feeling like his entire body is blushing. Eventually, she agrees to text him when she gets to her apartment. It may only be because the doors are about to close, but it appeases Daniel all the same. The message comes as he’s walking down from the platform at Damen.
Liyah
Home safe, worrywart.
Daniel
glad to hear it. not a worrywart
Liyah
Sure, and I’m not grouchy!
Daniel
she admits it!
Liyah
Which means, in turn, that you admit it.
Daniel
touché.
He smiles to himself the entire walk home, humming one of the jazz tunes the band had played earlier in the night. As soon as he’s locked the apartment door behind him, he scoops Sweet Potato into his arms. She purrs loudly, and he wonders if she knows that he’s intoxicated and that’s why she gets so cuddly. Maybe it’s that he’s a little extra affectionate and she is meeting him where he is. Either way, he’s always happy to come home to her after a night out.
The next morning, he wakes up with Sweet Potato sitting on his chest, his head pounding. He must have forgotten that hangovers exist last night; there’s no other explanation for voluntarily doing this to himself. And now, despite his brief respite, he still has the next two weeks to face. His phone lights up with a notification:
Liyah
Please add “No more than one round of tequila shots” as number 7 on the list of rules. Or at least make whoever suggests them buy the Tylenol.
SSC #6 MEETING NOTES
Secretary: Siobhan
• Work projects
• Siobhan wants to know if anybody actually reads newsletters
• Mostly no, but the examples she’s given are quite eye-catching
• Daniel would like to know what everyone’s favorite thing about the CTA is
• Jordan says nothing
• Siobhan says that the L is mostly aboveground— unpopular opinion but she loves how the tracks look weaving through the city
• Liyah says the places it takes her
• Liyah and Jordan would not like to talk about their work, thank you very much
• Liyah would like to specify in all caps: “I ALREADY HAVE TO WORK WITH DANIEL. I WOULD LIKE NOT TO THEN HAVE TO TALK ABOUT SAID WORK WITH DANIEL ON FRIDAY EVENINGS WITH DANIEL”
• Dating
• Liyah is still adamant that romantic love is not real, or is “back on her bullshit,” in Jordan’s words
• Siobhan and Jordan say this makes her a right grouch
• Daniel is more agnostic, but leans toward its existence
• Liyah says this is because Daniel’s agnostic about everything, and if he were capable of making up his mind, he’d see the light
• Jordan says that it’s more darkness than light
• Liyah insists that we move on
• Daniel’s sister made delicious challah
• “Siobhan, you don’t need to take notes on that”
• Liyah asks that he have Kayla email her the recipe
• See, taking notes was quite helpful
• Yom Kippur is next week and Liyah is already grouchy about fasting
• Daniel says it’s not that bad
• Liyah requests that Siobhan stops writing that she is grouchy
• Seriously, she is not that grouchy
• “Please stop”
• No rule additions this week